Problem:
When running Stoke or Krakatoa in 3ds Max 2018 Product Update 3, some objects will not draw their points in the viewports (e.g. PRT Volume, PRT Source, Stoke Field Loader, Stoke Field Magma etc.).
Cause:
Most Stoke and Krakatoa objects now use a custom viewport shader for much faster Nitrous point display. A change to the drawing code in 3ds Max 2018 PU3 seems to affect the point drawing of such objects if the Cull Backfaces display option is checked.
3ds Max has an option under Customize>Preferences>Viewports to force Backface Culling on object creation which is unchecked by default. If checked, any newly created object will have the Cull Backfaces option checked, and if it is set to draw points, it will fail to do so in 3ds Max 2018.3.
Workaround:
Make sure the Stoke and Krakatoa objects suffering from this problem are set to not cull backfaces.
Planned Solution:
We plan to update the custom shader to account for Backface Culling.
Know Exceptions:
The Stoke Particle Simulator still uses the legacy point drawing code and is not affected by this issue.
The issue does not appear in 3ds Max versions prior to Product Update 3.