TriDiWorx

Hey, Yeah. It is a fair point. Thant every alternative program can go drastically up also. But how can you make your decisions on "it might go up to 4500". You can try to consider things that you cannot predict, but you still will have to make a decision based on information available right now. And right now it is what it is. What I wrote IS based on seeing the rest of the world. Everything is already going up in prices and will continue to go up. I think this is well known already. Another thing is of course different use cases and different needs of the user. I am a user who needs to consider "is my time worth spending on Chief or Revit" for example. The reason I use Chief is actually, because I do not like Revit. And Chief is cheaper. But the fact is that a lot more users in my country and vicinity use Autodesk products. Which means collaboration is much easier if I used Revit. If I some day need new workers or go myself to work for that matter, it would be much more beneficial for me to master Revit not Chief (I am a solo practitioner for now). No one probably even knows about Chief where I live and work. Chief is worth for me for a lower price. But for so much higher price I would need to at least see/hear that Chief will be making software better starting from more important things. Latest updates weren't so good in my opinion. And would be nice to hear what are the plans for the future of SSA prices and will there be at some point migrating everyone from SSA to new subscription. Some clear information about that. Maybe some roadmap or at least a well thought out statement. And yeah I think that Chief right now is worth more than current SSA price if the model would change to subscription and you do not have initial higher payment. I just don't think it is 2k yet, but that's not my decision to make. Revit is a superior tool to learn and work on. Even if one does not like it. At least from my point of view. It of course does not apply to everyone and depends on a use case. Some might think Revit is not good for designing houses. This is wrong. Revit just has a very, very steep learning curve. A lot steeper than Chief. It will take years to get good with it and even longer to master. Once you get to a point you be able to do much more with it. Again I am not praising Revit nor saying Chief is bad. Just considering programs I know, that in one use case are alternatives to each other. Comparing price, what you get for a price today or in years and the state of development. There is no need to debate on this because this was just my thought process about this price increase and this is probably not the topic for this debate. I do not expect everyone to think the same. Just wanted to clarify that I was not whining about anything just was giving my user opinion on what is happening and is affecting my livelihood/career by a lot. I do not expect anyone to care, but I do think there are more people who can relate. I will be thinking about switching software, because Chiefs benefits for me might not outweigh benefits from other programs at new prices. At least considering information that is available today. I do hope that Chief issues more clearer statement about this SSA continuation and what the pricing for SSA might be in the coming years. Also would be nice to hear what this additional revenue will mean for the development and what are the plans going forward. And I do hope they do it soon and within this year. As the statement they issued so far is vague as hell. This is a huge change and affects users lives. If someone already took my money under first conditions and now wants to get a lot more money from me under different conditions I expect to get a good explanation so I can make an informed decision about it. And for a side note. The e-mail said that if SSA expires you will not be able to renew SSA anymore. And in this thread they saying that you will be able to renew. What is that? Please give us a clear, well thought statement with all the needed information.

I will add a couple of more of my thoughts. I do understand that software development is not easy, cheap or fast. Everyone needs to be paid for their efforts. More money should mean better development. Subscription model gives that to a company and it is a stable income. But you do have to give to users something for that devotion. Especially to old users who bought Chief under different conditions and now are forced to think about trusting you or just bite the bullet and go start learning some other software. For me the decision is not clear yet. I have not seen any good updates, my experience with tech support was so and so and now this huge change in conditions and pricing model. And I cannot believe that this continuation of cheaper SSA for old users will last very long. I have used full Revit and Revit LT for a bit. I have seen how insanely powerful full Revit is and how much better collaboration with it is. Also Autodesk has whole huge ecosystem built and you get some of that functionality with subscription. For example a LOT better 3D model sharing than Chief has...A LOT better. There is huge amount of free Revit resources for family objects, tutorials, guides, forums, cheap or free online courses. Chief has community forum which is great, but Revit has still a lot more going for it. Considering that Revit is one of those alternatives for Chief and is priced at 2.7k then I cannot see the reasoning behind asking 2k a year for Chief. At least not right now. If I would be a new user and looking for a program I would never choose Chief at this price. I might not be the best judge on software business, but I just don't see this change getting more users or more revenue. Mostly I kind of see this as strongarming older users to keep up their SSA all the time, even if there is not much benefit from it every year for them. The only three reasons I picked Chief 2 years back was cheaper price, easier to learn, ownership and SSA model. Don't get me wrong Chief is quite a nice software with heavy emphasis on interior design. I do not hate it at current price point. It is a good software. But it is not good at 2k comparing with alternatives. As I have used only Revit then it is the only thing I have to compare with and Chief does not come even close to it. You really do have to give something in return for that money and out of the blue pricing model change. It makes me think about two options. Trust Chief and stick with it or just start learning something new. I will definitely start playing around with Revit and Revit LT trials to see if I should go back. Quite disappointing decision form Chief.

At the current state of Premiere this yearly price is not worth it. At this price new users are probably much better off with Revit or ArchiCAD. The only reason I went with Chief is because it feeled simpler to learn and cheaper. Now it is almost not the case. The benefits of industry leading software outweigh 700 extra bucks. The problem is not only in the price, but we have to consider the time it takes to learn software and get good with it and future prospects. So at similar price point I feel other software future prospects are better for new users. I have been with Chief about 2 years. And in this time used x12, x13 and x14 (trial, rent, buy). I don't remember any actually worth while updates in this time. This is the reason I decided to stop paying for SSA until Chief starts to fix, add and update functionality that is so much needed in this kind of software. Until now the version updates were rather small and for me personally almost useless. But the model where you own the version you have and have the option to upgrade if some good update came was worth for me not going for Revit or ArchiCAD etc. This tactic seems strongarming everyone to pay SSA or risk with the need to opt for 2k a year in the future if the need arises. I wonder if more revenue will be used to actually get better development. And I am quite sure that this SSA system will be changed in the future and older users will be strongarmed again to actually go to a subscription based model. Hopefully by then the software will have something more to offer for that price than it does right now. Now I am left with options either buy SSA again and never stop paying, use x14 and hope that it is enough (which probably at some point is not) or look to other similarly priced software and waist another year just to get comfortable with new program. I would understand raising prices for SSA and licence. Doing some better quality updates and maybe at some point when Chief can actually compete with other software go for more price increases. But this and right now I do not like at all.

Ok. Thanks. This seems what I need. I have not played with mansards in CA yet. And definitely not with this kind of roof cut-out.

Hello, How would one go about doing this part on the picture? Can I make a cut out from the roof plane and show a wall with siding in it? I do not have a plan yet started for this project, but I need to recreate this house in Chief and make drawings. Started thinking about it and cannot imagine how to show this wall through a roof plane. It is not exactly a dormer. The two most vertical sides of the roof are also at a small degree. One side of the house is like on the picture and on the other side there are windows inside the metal sheeted roof without this wooden siding cut out. Any tools that can make this or suggestions? Is it easily doable in a model or it is faster to just draw this wall part with windows in 2D? I don't actually need the whole model just 2D drawings.

I am actually inclined to use your suggestion as I do not need to do framing here. I have been using 3D solids to cover up messes all along. Chief Premier kind of has a lot of tools that seem pretty and convenient on videos, but in reality, in a lot of situations I cannot get them to work as I need or there are not enough options to customize properly. 3D solid tool seems to be one of the most useful tools. You can model things with it and to cover up things that Chief messes up or are too time consuming to fix in a model.

Thanks, for the replies. I hoped that Chief is able to do these with dedicated roof tools. But I will try your suggestions then. I am in Estonia. We use only metric units here and all construction stuff is mostly in mm. I mean drawings, models and documentation is in mm, but of course in reality you don't build so precisely that it is on point with the exact dimension. Even factory-made building parts or materials have its own tolerances. But yeah, the consensus here is that drawings and dimensions are mostly in mm.

Hello, I attached a picture that explains what it has to look like and a plan file that I started. Can anyone help me get the result as it is on the picture. How do you create an open roof over a deck like this? I tried using invisible walls and building roof automatically. And then tried to draw manual roof. I cannot get these two roofs to connect properly. Especially at eaves. It just creates a broken mess. Beams and columns and materials are not a problem. I just need to make a similarly shaped roof to work with. PLAN.plan

Hi, Sharing a link to onedrive with a plan: https://projektmaja-my.sharepoint.com/:u:/g/personal/info_projektmaja_ee/EaMGxsM5oTVCrG5hN4SbCacBcHx7hUVKT2MbPdM24X5waw?e=E3z9wF This colliding soffit is still visible just a bit behind quoins that I started to add. Would be good to know why this is happening so I can fix if I have similar situation next time. If I pull roof plane a bit away from stucco, then it does not link with the wall.

Hey, Thanks. The roof plane is actually right beside the outside of the stucco. The only thing that seems to help is if I make a 20 mm gap between stucco and closest roof plane line. If I move it closer than 20 mm, then soffit for some reason becomes linked automatically with the wall and rams into it.

Hi, Can anyone tell from the picture what might be happening here? Why soffit wants to ram into my wall? Cannot edit this line. These weird collisions between roofs, walls, railings, room dividers and attic walls are sometimes such a headache to understand what Chief is trying to do and how to fix it. I am running premier x14 latest update.

Oops. It really does. I had just deck layers turned off. I thought I had them on in my template and did not check. Then the only thing that does not work for me this way are 3D solid objects. I mostly do not use deck tools so overlooked this. It shows up for me too. Just needed to turn on layers. Thanks!

Thank you. It is actually a good idea. If I get the time I might save some objects to library myself. I don't really like Chiefs decking and railing tools anyway. They just break stuff or are not flexible enough. This time it was an easy deck so I chose built in tools for speed. And on that note stair tools could be also a bit less forceful. Sometimes I need to make a stair that is not "best fit" or most comfortable build/angle. I do all low decks that are on the ground with 3D solid (when I don't need framing details). Just place a chunk on the ground. Shape it how I need and apply deck texture on it. Not amazing, but is easy, fast and does not collide with anything.

The sentence you quoted is about balcony not stairs. Stairs are mostly not an issue. If I do auto stairwell or manual open below room then it shows properly on all needed floor plans. When I have this balcony like on the picture. If I do floor plans then on first floor I need to show posts and main beams, on second floor I show an actual balcony/deck and on foundation plan I show foundation columns. Same structure just different level. Different elements of structure need to be shown on different levels. But Chief only shows those things on a single story where it was placed. And yes I know about reference display and CAD drawing. Basically this is what I was doing all along. It is just not very good. It would be much better if Chief would be able to cut through those objects in a plan view on a specific height and show it on all levels. Floor plan is after all a horizontal section of a building. Another example is when I do a chimney with 3D solid. It goes through all levels to the roof. But I see it only on the level I placed it. Would be great if I changed the location of chimney it could change on all levels. If I redraw chimney on other levels with CAD lines then I have to remember to move CAD lines also. So it is half way like drafting in AutoCAD for example. And by levels and stories I mean "floors/floor plans". But thank you for the info. I guess I will just be using CAD drawing and reference display as I was doing.

Thank you. This works. Was doing all sort of other things to stairs, but apparently not that.