Yer Mom

This is a good tutorial, but it's a bit vague on things that are really important. I'm going to rewrite things as I go, but I won't post them untill certain areas are completely finished. I'm almost done with the ready room, just some touchups and some figure outs to go.

Hmmm....

In smart edit, there's only key and value. Key should be set to team, and value should be set to 1 or 2, respectfully.

I'm ahead of myself.

-Mom

__________________
Yer Mom /O>

To all but me is the look given but never received. My heart sinks faster and faster every time I look into them, yet I do not understand their controling power on my soul. - W11114m W45h1n670n

blu.knight

ok then yarmo

Yer Mom

Hammer can be downloaded here:
http://collective.valve-erc.com/index.php?go=hammer
It's a 2.04 MB download.

Beginning tutorial

First of all, you need to configure everything. This is explained perfectly by Browny Master here:
http://www.iam-clan.com/index.php?na...ewtopic&t=9162

He goes on to say that it is a good idea to plan out your map before you start. I reccomend this if you are going completely into the map head first, but if you're just trying to figure things out, then save this till later.

Now, I went on to make my ready room. With Hammer open click File>New. You should see 4 boxes.. 3 of them are graph-paper-like labeled top, side, and front. These are your building blocks. As far as I can understand (which means I'm not sure yet) every square is the size of a vent opening, if completely filled. (You'll need to be zoomed in to about 0.40 to see the exact squares I am refering to.) On each box (top, side, front), each square has a corresponding square in another box, showing you exact dimensions. (For each square in the front box, you have a square in the side and top boxes.) To get a complete understanding of sizing and everything: Zoom in till you can see each square easily. There will be blue lines in each box (front, side, top) that represents the middle lines of the "world". With the object tool (the gray box on the right) make a 4 tile square covering the intersection where the lines cross each other. Once you have positioned the square room you're placing, right click on it and select Create Object. (The above intersection represents the middle of the "world".) (For clarification, box represents front, side, and top angles you see in front of you. When I refer to tile, I'm refering to single squares inside of each box.) Once the object is created, you'll need to resize it to be an actual square. In the other 2 graph-like boxes, you'll notice now that you have a resize ability. Work from the Top box and resize the square you've made to make a complete square. (Note: The square does NOT need to be directly across the blue-line intersection in each box. In fact, you could put it anywhere on the graph, I just chose this intersection as a starting point because it's easier to reference.) Once your object is a complete square, right click on it and select Hollow. I normally use a wall width of 2, but you can leave it at whatever you want because this is your ready room. Certain walls can be shot through, if they're thin enough, in other games. I'm not entirely sure that you can shoot through walls in NS.

Now let's talk about the box I'm leaving out. The camera box will be your eyes inside of the world. In the toolbar on the top, select View>3d Textured Polygons. This will show you exact textures of your room in the camera box. Select the red camera on the right toolbar and left-click on the middle of the square room in any of the graph-like boxes. This should place a light-blue dot in the middle of the square you've created. That dot indicates where your camera is located in the world. In the camera box, left-click and hold it down. If you move your mouse left and right/up and down, you'll notice that it's almost like you're inside of the game itself. While holding the left-click you can press W A S D (as if moving inside the game) to move around. Look straight up and press W to move directionally up... etc. Once you have hollowed out your square, you can move your camera inside of it. You should see 4 walls around you that're textured pretty ugly. We will cover texturing now.

With the pointer tool selected (right tool bar, red cursor button), you can select the entire room itself from the camera or the graph-like boxes. Once the entire room is selected, you can texture the entire thing by changing the Current Texture drop down menu on the right. To select individual walls, and apply textures, select the square on the right tool bar that has colors on it (red roof, blue and green walls). [Note: When you select something it will turn red in the camera box.] Once you select the texture tool, it will pop up a window labeled Face Properties. From that window there are two ways to select a texture: The drop down menu labeled Current Texture will give you a thumbnail image of every texture in your texture vault. The second way is to click the Browse button below the Current Texture drop down menu. (I reccomend using the Browse button to select a texture, because the textures are much larger in the Browse menu, and you can filter certain textures such as floors and walls.) In the camera box you can select each wall, floor, ceiling and object individually. Click on one of the walls in the camera box and click Browse in your Face Properties window. In the filter line type in wall and wait a second. It will change the textures you see to all the ones with the word wall in their name. I reccomend using a regular looking wall that doesn't have Alien Splooge all over it. (Walls with the alien stuff on them tend to look crappy if overlapped in a small room). Double click a texture such as domewall_2, and hit the apply button in your Face Properties window. Did the texture of the wall change? It should have.

Now, let's resize this room to make a ready room. Click the texture box to close the Face Properties window (or click the X on the window), and select the red-pointer tool rather than the camera. The easiest way to select an object is to click it in the Camera Box, if it is visable. Click your room. In the Front Box, drag one of the left or right white boxes over about 3-4 tiles, widening your room. In the Top Box, drag one of the left or right white boxes over about 3 tiles. (I'm noticing that I'm starting to refer to tiles as squares. If this causes confusion, this should clarify). Your room should be rather large now. Select your camera and move into the room and look around. You should be getting a feel for how large each tile is now. Now we're going to create a platform inside of your room. Select the gray-square (Object Tool) tool, and drag a new object in the Top Box to fit an area that takes up about 1/2 of your room. Right-click, create object. You'll need to find the object in the Camera box and resize it so that it fits to the floor and covers about 1/2 of the room. It should look like a raised floor inside of a room. From the front view, you should see a tile high rectangle at floor level of room that extends about half way across the entire room. From the top, you should see a white wall representing your entire room, and a red box inside of the white walls that extends from one wall to the X in the middle of the room square. From the side view you should see a red rectangle that extends all the way across your white-walled room. The camera box should show you a room with a platform laying across the floor at one end of the room.

The next part is important information. Using the [ ] keys you can change the Grid size of your squares. This can become VERY confusing. When you first start building your room, all the way thru the platform we just placed, the bottom right hand corner of your window should say Snap:On Grid: 64.

Using the [ key you're going to change that grid to a 32, rather than a 64. Just press it once, it should change to 32. Now, create another object in the front box that consumes ONE tile directly beside your platform. It should show you the platform, and another square right beside it that is half of the height of the platform. In the top box, strech the object you just made to fit to each of the white walls on the left and the right. The camera should show you a platform with what looks like a step that connects to the front of the platform, and is half the heighth of the platform from the floor.

The 64 grid allows for platforms like this to be made, and the 32 grid allows for steps to be made. Later, creating objects will require more grid alteration. (If you need to be absolutely precise with sizing, you can Map>Snap to Grid (turn it off) and you can resize inch by inch. (I reccomend trying to stay on Grid if you're making rooms).

The next step is to add entities to your ready room so that players who start the map appear in the ready room, and can choose a team. I haven't gotten this far due to a lack of information covering the entities but I will play with Hammer later and figure it out. This should get you started in creating rooms and objects, though.

I realize this is extremely confusing, and haven't read over it myself. I wrote this over the course of an hour and a half as I played with Hammer. I remember all of this and more from mapping with Vulcan for CSS, but it will take me time to figure more out. Please re-read anything that seems confusing, and play with Hammer as you read. You will eventually figure it out, confusing or not.

-Mom

__________________
Yer Mom /O>

To all but me is the look given but never received. My heart sinks faster and faster every time I look into them, yet I do not understand their controling power on my soul. - W11114m W45h1n670n

Yer Mom

Entities and Etc

I have made a few screen shots to show you exactly what your room should look like, or close.

http://prophotohost.com/uploads/76ecd338f1.bmp

http://prophotohost.com/uploads/b12de6e367.bmp

That should be what your ready room looks like. Notice the platform, the ramp to it, etc.

You can continue with objects and stuff. Play around with objects and see what you can get done.

Entities are kind've easy, but kind've hard.

Click the entity tool. You should see a black horn with a + sign on it. Click anywhere inside of the room you've made. It should make a green crosshair appear inside of the room on the grid box. (Click anywhere inside the room on the grid box, not the camera box). Right click on the middle of the green crosshair and select Create Object. Once that object is made, it's invisable inside the game. It's a live object in Hammer, but in the game it only serves as a command issued to the engine.

http://prophotohost.com/uploads/f4890f8974.bmp

Select the object it just created. Go to Edit>Properties or hit Alt+Enter.

http://prophotohost.com/uploads/dffafea892.bmp

Make sure that SmartEdit is clicked on.

http://prophotohost.com/uploads/cea79f8feb.bmp

For each entity you create (One entity for every team), you'll need to assign a function to it through Edit>Properties. In this case we want it to send people that walk in to it to a team. So, click the drop down menu tagged Class and select info_team_start and then select team from the Attributes section, then click the drop down menu and select team one or team two, respectively. Then just close the window and the settings take effect.

Actually, I just hit a stopping point. BrownyMaster's tutorial calls for info_join_team and (like stated above) I thought it was calling for info_team_ start. I can't seem to find an info_join_team entity, so I'm going to have to figure that out before I go any further.

Either way, the above entity explination works, minus the info_team_start working as a join team function. The info_team_start is where the players go when they join a team. That comes way later... I'm still on the ready room, but marine start will be my next task.

As far as other people making rooms goes, if you all are following me in this, I need rooms. The design for the map supports somewhere around 9 rooms, so I'm looking for atleast 2 soon, if people are making rooms.

I'm looking for rooms that have changing elevations, atm. I want a LOT of catwalks, as my map is going to be designed like a factory. Think FACTORY when you're making rooms. Steam, pipes, catwalks, etc.

I'm designing a cafeteria myself, but if anyone wants to contribute later on, I'd love the help.

The main design goes:

room ---------------- room ------------------------- room
| | |
| | |
| | |
| | |
| (this whole section room
room will be the |
| cafeteria with |
| catwalks, etc) |
| | |
| | |
| | |
room --- hall ------------ room ---- hall --------- room

(That sucks hard. My map didn't work, but you get the gist of the building width and etc.)

You get the general design. I want the map to be two stories. The second story of the map is going to be a series of catwalks and pipes, while the first story is going to be laid out like the above. The cafeteria is going to be an enormously wide open room, serving as the map's double (maybe even triple).

Each room will have a connecting vent system. The northern most middle room will probably be the marine start, located on the first floor of the building. The hives will be located on second floor height in the bottom three rooms. Don't worry, it won't be a straight hallway between each hive, and there will be rooms moving into the cafeteria area. The whole area between the hallways won't be the cafeteria, but it will still take up a massive amount of the above map.

-Mom

__________________
Yer Mom /O>

To all but me is the look given but never received. My heart sinks faster and faster every time I look into them, yet I do not understand their controling power on my soul. - W11114m W45h1n670n

Kerostasis

Thats what
Is for.

__________________

Yer Mom

Ohhh!! Lol... thanks.

I'm gonna start working on the map again. I think what I'll do is just leave all the entities out and work in the rooms till I get the most of them built.

-Mom

__________________
Yer Mom /O>

To all but me is the look given but never received. My heart sinks faster and faster every time I look into them, yet I do not understand their controling power on my soul. - W11114m W45h1n670n

blu.knight

Jesus mom, don't you know how to make jpg files? .bmp?!


and by the way, two story maps don't really work in NS because the commander can only drop buildings on one floor.

Yer Mom

I'm aware of that, blu. The second floor isn't going to be a second floor as much as it is a second object inside of the first. It won't actually be ON TOP OF the first floor, but it will be elavated inside of the room.

Yeah, I use .bmp cuz I was doing them as I went, not compiling several and then pasting them. I was only posting them so you could see exactly what I was talking about because using text to explain all of this is confusing.

I'm having a problem. When I run the map, the debug mode just halts and won't continue for some reason.

-Mom

__________________
Yer Mom /O>

To all but me is the look given but never received. My heart sinks faster and faster every time I look into them, yet I do not understand their controling power on my soul. - W11114m W45h1n670n

Yer Mom

I'm going to stop building this tutorial, unless requested by you guys, and provide you all with this.

http://www.unknownworlds.com/portfol...info_join_team

I should've probably went to unknownworlds before I went anywhere else to find tutorials, but I was ignorant and didn't do it that way.

I just ran across that tutorial, and it pretty much covers the entire process.

-Mom

__________________
Yer Mom /O>

To all but me is the look given but never received. My heart sinks faster and faster every time I look into them, yet I do not understand their controling power on my soul. - W11114m W45h1n670n

Yer Mom

I'm not designing the map to be rooms above other rooms, but catwalks above the floor level acting as a second level.

I've read over the tutorial I posted, and it seems that if you are going to make a room for me with catwalks they need to be along the walls, unless there is a hive along one specific wall. This way comm's can see the floor level, and the catwalks can still be accessible.

-Mom

__________________
Yer Mom /O>

To all but me is the look given but never received. My heart sinks faster and faster every time I look into them, yet I do not understand their controling power on my soul. - W11114m W45h1n670n

xtcmen

I don't know much about map making, but I can help balance rooms and such. If you need me to help playtest and give advice then let me know. I'm also pretty good and finding any exploits and stuff.

Yer Mom

Works for me, X. I don't mind doing the whole map myself, but I'm having trouble understanding how the NS mappers made the walls and rooms look the way they do, but I'll figure it out.

If anyone is working on a room or a hive or anything, keep me informed.

-Mom

__________________
Yer Mom /O>

To all but me is the look given but never received. My heart sinks faster and faster every time I look into them, yet I do not understand their controling power on my soul. - W11114m W45h1n670n

Darkilla

I'm going to grab hammer tonight, and screw around, learning what I can.
I've always wanted to get into map making, mainly because I've had some WONDERFUL idea's for how some of hte rooms shoudl work in ns...

** I think we need a new place to start storing this map making idea's... new forum if possilbe **

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Ambriento for comm! Vote today!

Irish Pirate

One of my favorite things with map making is setting up complicated entities for player interaction.

If I make a map by myself it will probably use MS as a hive location (hopefully I can get something going to keep aliens from starting at that hive). Include a large power generator room for activation/deactivation to change things around the map, many weldables and probably some breakables meant for aliens (bite the power cables sort of thing).

If for some reason nothing can be done to stop aliens from starting in the MS hive do you think people would mind just restarting 1 out of 3 games?

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CryForMe

unfortunately i see one problem with your map design: in order for aliens to be able to put up all 3 hives, marines either HAVE to relocate, or aliens have to destroy MS, which means they already won.

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Never underestimate the power of human stupidity. - Lazarus Long