After talking to LordHavoc, I got some ideas to optimize my map Capturecity:

• hint brush blocks around the cars, which cost quite some polys:
  
• hint planes instead of letting blocksize subdivide the map in z direction; puts the planes at more useful places and uses less of them to speed up compiling:
  
• hint "pyramids" above buildings, to cull some stuff one can't see from below:
  

With this, I got +50% fps improvements on average. I'll soon release a complete compile. I also deleted one car that was not supposed to be there (it was stuck in a building's side). Technically this would make the map incompatible, but as I never fell on that car, I suppose I can remove it.

UPDATE: it is DONE!

http://hector.rbi.informatik.uni-frankfurt.de/nex/maps/inofficial/capturecity-v2.pk3

Optimization pk3 (only use if you ALSO have capture-v1.pk3 in your data directory, if not, move it from dlcache there): http://mensa.ath.cx/~polzer/nexmaps/capturecity-v1opt.pk3

Oh, and here some benchmark results on my PC at low settings:

Just running around (listen server, sv_cullentities_trace off):
before optimization: 2481 frames 17.6240802 seconds 140.7733042 fps, one-second min/avg/max: 28 143 215
after optimization: 2481 frames 12.4994202 seconds 198.4892073 fps, one-second min/avg/max: 99 201 285
increase: worst-case 253%, average 41%

Actual CTF game (7 players, sv_cullentities_trace off):
before optimization: 17867 frames 180.3721430 seconds 99.0563160 fps, one-second min/avg/max: 27 99 352
after optimization: 17867 frames 122.9129002 seconds 145.3630983 fps, one-second min/avg/max: 64 145 314
increase: worst-case 137%, average 47%

Actual CTF game (14 players, sv_cullentities_trace on):
before optimization: 19947 frames 138.9409909 seconds 143.5645440 fps, one-second min/avg/max: 56 144 262
after optimization: 19947 frames 119.9480920 seconds 166.2969345 fps, one-second min/avg/max: 59 167 340
increase: worst-case 5%, average 16%
(note that sv_cullentities_trace basically improves performance by only sending these players and items to the client which it actually can see, so the effect from my optimizations is much lower; however, servers should not have that enabled by default because 1. it causes players and items to suddenly appear when you are lagged, 2. it also hides players who are behind grates (like on toxic), 3. it is quite CPU intensive on the server on a small list of some "extreme" maps - OTOH it breaks any sort of wallhack so when an admin suspects a cheater, he should temporarily enable it)

Now all I need is a larger match with sv_cullentities_trace off.

That's a quite big improvement. I vote for name change. Like _v2 or something.

yeah new version = new name

nice. the other maps should be optimized too.

psychiccyberfreak wrote:nice. the other maps should be optimized too.

Most of the other maps are much smaller and not that open, so this kind of optimization would have little effect on them.

psychiccyberfreak wrote:nice. the other maps should be optimized too.

The other maps I made don't have such performance issues... well, maybe eggandbacon has performance issues because you can always see every player and shot, but optimizations won't fix this

I could however look at the problems on facing worlds nex one time.

ONly on your own responsibility... I don't take any responsibilities from damaging yourself when you see the map file in an editor

well, mabie slimepit can use alot of hinting too.

divVerent wrote:well, maybe eggandbacon has performance issues because you can always see every player and shot, but optimizations won't fix this

Actually, this map has no performance issue - more than eight players on it are just a spammy mess and the map was not designed for that. However, players seem to like that...

that looks damn good but i can play it what have i do with the file

What, the pk3? Save that into your data directory.

Actually, you don't NEED to install it - the RBI CTF server uses the new version. Whenever you play capturecity on RBI CTF, you'll automatically download this optimized version.

Yeah this new version really runs very fine.. should help to get people to like it more