| THE BATTLEZONE MAP EDITOR |
| DISCLAIMER: The contents of this page are covered in more detail in mapeditor.doc which is a Word 97 document in your Battlezone\Edit folder. Not to worry if you don't use Microsoft Word 97 though, because the file can be opened in trusty old Word Pad too. Mapeditor.doc has a syntax error in the DOS command in item 2! The line maketrn /c multdm07 /w=2560 /h=2560 is WRONG! Ignore that part of the file. The CORRECT syntax is maketrn multdm07 /c /w=2560 /h=2560. THIS PART OF THE TUTORIAL IS TO PREPARE YOU AS TO WHAT YOU WILL SEE WHAN YOU FINALLY GET STARTED, AND A FEW TIPS THROWN IN FOR GOOD MEASURE. ANY QUESTIONS NOT COVERED HERE I CAN PROBABLY ANSWER IF YOU EMAIL ME: ~YG~ Killer ][nstinct |
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| ENTERING THE BATTLEZONE MAP EDITOR |
| When you first start Map Editor, you might think you are in a game, because you will be in a Grizzly Tank, you can fly around and fire the weapons, but you are all alone! Don't bother flying around too much because there isn't much to see... YET. |
| EDITING THE OBJECTS IN MY MAP |
| The first thing you will want to play with is the object, or "Builder's Menus". To access these menus, type Ctrl+A. (This means *hold* the Ctrl key down and press A.) While in Ctrl+A mode, all action ceases around you, like time standing still. For fun, hit 5 then 7 to see a Soviet Czar Tank appear in front of you. All objects placed on your map will be facing *away from you*. Now type Ctrl+A again and wa-lah! time begins to flow again. The tank will become aware of you and attack. While he is firing at you, (and he can KILL you -- DO NOT allow that to happen!) type Ctrl+A again to see his cannonballs freeze in mid-air. Pretty cool, but uh-oh! how do you get rid of him now? There are two auxilliary views to edit objects: Shift+F10 and Shift+F9. Both auxilliary views are only accessed from Ctrl+A mode. Shift+F10 will put you in that familiar "Satellite View". Put your mouse over the tank so you get the familiar red line, hold the left mouse button down and hit the Delete key on your keyboard. Shift+F1 will get you back to "in-the-tank" view. Shift+F9 will put you in Advanced Edit mode (as I call it). We'll play with this more later, but for now, type 1 then 4 to click on the Czar (holding the left mouse button down as before) and hit Delete to erase him. Again Shift+F1 will get you back to "in-the-tank" view. Many objects are on these nine menus, and the menus can be customized too! (See the Tips Section for more.) |
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| EDITING THE COLORS ON THE GROUND |
| In Editor terminology, the different colors on the ground that look like sand, snow, solid rock, moon-dust, etc. are called "textures". To edit textures instead of objects, you type in Ctrl+E. In this mode we get a toolbar instead of a menu system. The tools on the toolbar manipulate individual "tiles" which are set in a grid pattern on the map. To learn the tool functions, match the numbers in the picture below to these descriptions of the toolbar buttons. 1. Eyedropper: Copies texture (to editor clipboard) for Paintbrush use. 2. Rotates a tile 90 degrees per click. Right-click rotates in reverse direction. 3. Flips a tile top-to-bottom. I don't use this much, I rotate twice. 4. Flips a tile side-for-side. Again, I rotate the tile twice. 5. Paintbrush: paints copied tile the Eyedropper copied. Can be dragged around. NOTE: Holding Ctrl while Paintbrush clicking often blends two textures with a cap or diagonal. 6. Zoom? Never tried it, keyboard + and - zoom in and out. (See note1!) 7. Solids: Toggles between all solid textures (different colors) available. 8. Caps: Toggles between all Caps available. Caps blend straight edges of two textures. 9. Diagonals: Toggles between all diagonals, which blend inside corner borders of two textures . 10. Variant: Toggles between available solids and similar variant. Usually means same as solid but with a smudge in the middle or some such similar thing. NOTE 1: I always switch to view before zooming in or out with + and - or my machine crashes the Editor with the dreaded Unhandled Exception Error. |
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| EDITING THE LANDSCAPE ON MY MAP |
| In the Battlezone Editor, we can manipulate the landscape to a great degree by editing the wireframe. The wireframe is a series of lines, many crossing at right angles, and also diagonally one direction. Each intersection can me elevated, and as you do so, the lines stretch. Imagine if you will a blanket on the living room floor, with a child hiding under it. As the child moves around, the "landscape" of the blanket is changed. If the child stands up, a great mountain peak is made. When the child lays down again, all we have are low hills. So it is with our wireframe. As such, we cannot generate tunnels, because we aren't allowed to run a sword thru our blanket to pierce it. We cannot generate overhanging cliffs, because even if the child bends over, the blanket still drapes straight down. Such are the small limitations of our wireframe editor. Even so, we can generate awesome mountains, valleys, low hills, individual rocks half-buried in the ground, or narrow isthmuses connecting both sides of a freighteningly steep gorge. The only other limit is the mapmaker's imagination. To access the wireframe editor, we enter texture edit mode with Ctrl+E first, then toggle to wireframe edit mode using the W key. The Tab key changes the color of the wireframe. As in texture edit mode, we have a toolbar, but a few more buttons on this one. Again, a number key to the buttons: 1. Copies a specific elevation of a wireframe grid intersection (to Editor clipboard). 2. Zoom? Again, I use keyboard + and -, ALWAYS in wireframe mode (see NOTE1!) 3. Plateau Raising/Lowering Brush: makes a hill with a flat top. 4. Hillmaking Raising/Lowering Brush: makes a hill with a rounded top. 5. Leveler: Auto-raise/lower to specific elevation copied by eyedropper. 6. Hillmaker: works with #'s 9, 10, and 11 to make predictable hills one click at a time. 7. Vertex Raising/Lowering Tool: Manipulates only one wireframe intersection. 8. Ramp Tool: NEVER WORKED, NEVER WILL! (unless U are a #1 programmer?) 9. Brush Width Adjuster: controls width of RED area (see picture below again). 10. Brush Depth Adjuster: controls depth (front-to-back) of RED area. 11. Height Adjuster: works with #6 to make exact height hills (set low value at first). 12. Bell Adjustment: broad hills or skinny ones? 13. Increment Amount: How fast the tools raise/lower the wireframe. 14. Smoother Tool: evens out bumpy or spiky areas. |
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| EDITING THE WEAPONS AND POWERUPS THAT POP UP |
| Mapeditor.doc has a chapter (10) which lists items that will respawn. The truth is that the list is incomplete. The following is a quote from "BioHazard", an experienced BZ mapmaker, who introduced me into map-making with his mapeditorfixed.doc "Anything can be made to be respawning…. Even vehicles, wasps, comets, daywreckers! Vehicles will respawn without pilots, like the Golem in Stomp. But, if you place a respawning pilot ontop of a respawning vehicle, when they both appear, the pilot will drop into the tank and fight with it (got around that problem pretty easy). Any kills done by a respawing weapon (wasps, for example) will be given to the host, if it’s a multiplayer map." Items you want to respawn can be timed between respawinings. For example, I like to make my repair and ammo powerups respawn every thirty seconds, but for powerful weapons such as rave guns, I make it respawn every five minutes or more. Click here to see a copyable list of object codes that can be used to make respawning items appear. In the picture below, you see my tank (the green square) next to the cursor, which is clicked on a repair powerup. Note the box in the lower left corner which says aprepa_30_1, which states this is a repair powerup (aprepa code). Also it tells us it respawns every 30 seconds, and is the first one I placed on my map (_30_1) "Crater Zone" which is available at the YGC Maproom. |
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