Half time of my first map making was solving problems (50-75% of whole development time), in other words if i knew all below i would avoid 50% of errors
And so, i decided to write a category based quick solution/aid as a support to allready existing tutorials. I made this for myself first but then i thinked, that it would be great to gather all kinds of this quick solutions
Something simillar to Map Crashing topic but focusing on the map development. I will be filling this as time goes, if you have anything to add, feel free to write it down together with which section it belongs to and i will write it in, same goes with better solutions then allready written
. .Terrain- Try to make terrain as smooth as possible, it will help you later when
placing undergrowth/overgrowth. If terrain is not smooth enough then larger undergrowth might end up having it parts flying in the air (becouse undergrowth is flat!).
- If you have placed undergrowth allready, and you raise or lower terrain, the undergrowth close might move!
Effects-
Dont turn "SaveInSeperateFile" on, it will just make things complicated by spreading an created effect into many small files (unless you know what you doing ofc).
- When you make your own effects you have to use ini.con to call on them,
Engine doesint read unpacked FH2 zip files. Exemple of my ini.con
rem -----------------------------------------------------------------------------
renderer.globalStaticMeshLodDistanceScale 1
renderer.globalBundleMeshLodDistanceScale 1
renderer.globalSkinnedMeshLodDistanceScale 1
rem Effects
run effects\xxx.con
run effects\xxx.tweakI suppose samething can be done to custom vechicles etc... This "effect" folder that is called is located in my map directory.
- Becouse of amount of variables you have to set for effects best is to edit allready existing.
Objects- To place
Invisible walls while seeing them, you can turn on Soldier Mesh.
-
Camera mode "Soldier" seemly use diffrent height then ingame first person view. Thats why if you are making a very exact shooting spots, make sure to make them a little little higher (10-20cm up around), to make sure it will serve the intended porpose ingame.
- Personally, i like to scroll through (well, its my first map, but thats how i will do in future aswell) whole object resources and place out them all out in some free spot. Later, when i am assambling one part of the map, i just go over there and look, easy to see which objects fits best when all are out there at same time.
- To
easly copy an object hold down "Ctrl" and Move the object using (Not the middle) either X,Y or Z.
- Structure of effects goes like this: Bundle-->EffectBundle-->Effects(ParticleSystem, or whatever).
Skinning- There is a very usefull program called "BF2 mesh view", it is a must have for anyone who want to edit textures! Just search it on google, very easy to find :]
Custom kit tutorial Version 0.5
1. Copy one of existing kits, try to keep yourself to the kind of kit you want, like if you want to make custom engineer kit, then take existing engineer kit as base for your new kit. Becouse, the kit includes links to helmet & belt model and model when kit is on the ground. Acually, even names when you choose spawn in game, like "Engineer", "SMG" or "Assault".
2. Make your own folder inside your level's folder named "kits" (or whatever you like), put the copied kits inside there and rename it to whatever you feel suits it, but you must remember it as you will use that name in point "4".
3. Go into your custom kit's con file, and replace, however, read the whole point 3 before you begin:
ObjectTemplate.create Kit pu_B38_p08 <--- Name of your kit, you will use it later on, change it to what suits you.
ObjectTemplate.addTemplate Beretta38 <--- This line means that this kit will have one Beretta38.
ObjectTemplate.addTemplate P08 <--- It will also have a P08 pistol.
Before you edit those, goto "fh2\objects\weapons\handheld" look up the weapon you want to have for your kit, and open its tweak file (For exemple, Beretta38\Beretta38.tweak). You can use search function to find following line "ObjectTemplate.itemIndex". For Beretta38 it looks like this:
ObjectTemplate.itemIndex 3 <-- This number stands for which slot uses the weapon, in players weapon inventory.
Now, if you have two weapons in a kit with same number, there will be a crash! So, check every weapon's itemIndex before you include it in your kit.
4. Go into your maps Init.con file, at the end you enter the kit file's names that you want the game to load. Here is how the Init.con file looks for my warsaw map (if you still got that map you can look more closer by opening it yourself), to note, the following lines are placed at the very end of the init.con file:
rem KitSelectionPOL <-- This is just for my own info
run Kits\PU\pu_B38_p08.con <-- Here is the path to the kit file, your might be diffrent
run Kits\PU\pu_K98_Colt.con
run Kits\PU\pu_MP40_Colt.con
5. In the Init.Con file, you also have the starting kit settings somewhere in the middle of the file, it looks like this:
gameLogic.setKit 1 0 "GW_SMGAssault2_U" "gw_heer_maschinenpistole"
gameLogic.setKit 2 0 "pu_B38_p08" "pu_powstaniec"
"GW_SMGAssault2_U" and "pu_B38_p08", are the kits (look below for more info).
"gw_heer_maschinenpistole" and "pu_powstaniec" are the soldiers (soldier model and skin)
Remember that "pu_B38_p08" name comes from inside your kit file. If you open your kit's con file, you will see somewhere at top of the file the following:
ObjectTemplate.create Kit pu_B38_p08 <-- Yupp, here it is! =)
6. Make back up of your edited Init.con! =)
Note: This is only for kits that you choose before you spawn, not the ones placed around the map.I hope i didint miss anything, if i did just drop a note =)
