I'd use the 3D clip tool and the vertex tool for this. It really does require some practice to create this kind of architecture in 3D, but it works. One thing that is really different from Radiant et. al. is that in TB, you have to move the camera around a lot.

Maybe necros and others can shed some light... in the long run, I hope someone will get around to making a bunch of tutorials for TB. 

As in snap to a fixed orthogonal axis and have a non-perspective view.

;P 

Not sure if this was reported, but the editor crashes if you snap vertices and then try to move them around. 

Hit 'C' to activate the clipping tool, you can then place up to three point to define the clipping plane.

V activate vertex manipulation, although it can cause microleaks if used as structural stuff and you don't use the snap to vertices action.

Use Tab to lock movement to X or Y axis, and hold Alt to switch to vertical Z axis movement.

With those you can easily make complex geometry fairly quickly.

Trenchbroom allows for much more freeform brushwork.

Which is where the grid mindset becomes hard to shake off. I've been using the editor for months now and still find myself constrained by the habit of thinking in front/sides/top grid terms.

It is worth unlearning that :) 

Could you create an issue on github? Please also add steps to reproduce. Thanks. 

Done. It looks like this doesn't always happen, though. I've given more information about that in the issue entry. 

Good and quick replies, thank you all. It was more a question in general. I'm having some difficulties finding the right words in English. Clipping and free form brush work is one thing, controlling the coordinates is another.

I made this in Radiant:

http://imgur.com/60ZuxN2

I was only able to do this by using some math in determining the grid coordinates to make all the curves out of brushes. That's something, as far as I'm aware, that I cannot do in Trenchbroom. I hope this makes sense.

Anyway, I can always build those parts in Radiant and convert to them Quake and import it in Trenchbroom. 

Maybe this will help then:

http://www.quaketerminus.com/hosted/happymaps/curv_tut.htm 

It looks like you're already basing your stuff off it. 

would it be helpful if you could place a grid plane to help you find the proper coordinates? Is the problem that you can only see the grid where it is already projected onto brushes? 

entirely in TB and I managed to get a lot of curve action going on. You can still apply a 2d grid mindset to working 3d.

You can make any of those shapes shown there in TB quite easily, you can just point the cam directly at it and use brush clipping with the grid enabled to get the same results.

The only thing I wasn't able to figure out was making curved pipes, I'm sure it can be done but I couldn't manage to figure it out. Someone should just make a bunch of prefab shapes to be honest. 

You mean a curved pipe like that? http://imgur.com/AQ7eRxa

I did this in TrenchBroom with the help of the grid. Granted, it's not the most curvy thing ever, but it gets the job done. :p 

... originally I was going to have my deck map have pipes leading into the different slime pits. but I scrapped the idea after several failed attempts at getting the pipe-work done (though there are some quite primitive pipes in the map in the final release). 

The CZG tutorial depends on being able to scale brushes as a whole rather than adjust faces alone.

I've got a map full of right angled pipes, should probably figure out a decent curved pipe construction method.

I'm guessing you used rotation, clip and snap vertices skacky? 

Yup. I didn't use the snap vertices command since it's glitchy for me, but I did use vertex editing. 

Thanks for the link Ijed. Different math, but the same system.

I've been a dumbass since I didn't realise a couple of things in Trenchbroom. But I do now. Tada!

http://imgur.com/jMleUOh

So this will be my editor of choice for Quake. Can't wait to start making maps.

Btw, I do miss a brush merge option but I see it's already on the list. 

everyone has said it better than me already. :)
I will say that it is a little bit awkward doing some brush operations without a 2d grid.

placement within the map coordinate is difficult to gauge, for example. i often put down point entities at the +- 4096 mark so I can keep track of where I am.

I have yet to start a map from scratch in TB, but i suspect the lack of a easily visible global coordinate system would be annoying. 

Personally I open my map with worldcraft to see if it's near the boundaries or not. It's also useful to see if I've made some bad manipulations. Now that I think about it, an error report window would be handy. 

error reporting is definitely planned. i think i'd just like some extra visualization stuff like being able to see '0 0 0' as well as the boundaries (or even arbitrary boundaries to help me keep a sense of place relative to the map origin). 

Necros said what I didn't manage to phrase correctly. I take it this would be helpfull then:

quote
would it be helpful if you could place a grid plane to help you find the proper coordinates? Is the problem that you can only see the grid where it is already projected onto brushes?
quote 

had a grid plane that ran through its 3d view that also showed you the edge boundaries. Maybe a toggle version of this would suffice? 

 

I think this would come under a general 'helper objects' thing. Maybe including other stuff as well, like a tape measure. 

That's on my todo list along with a placeable grid. 

I sometimes find myself applying different textures in order to measure things.