Hi, folks. I'm totally new here but I'm already asking for help. I want to make a unit, with a similar effect to the engineer in Command and Conquer, in the way that if it enters an enemy building, it changes that building's owner to yourself. Assuming I can make a new unit (which I can't yet since I'm super new) what would I need to do to create this effect? Basically, if you right-click the unit on an enemy building, when the unit arrives at the buliding, it "captures" it at the building is now yours. Even a poke in the right direction would be greatly appreciated.
First load up the editor and create a map, when your creating it click 'Modify' beside the dependancies dropdown box, then click 'Add Standard...' then check the 'Liberty (Campaign)' item. This will give you access to everything used in the single player campain. If you have already started making your map go to 'File->Dependencies...' and do the same thing.
Now to copy an existing unit to do your magic on.
Your looking at a few different things to do this, all of em are in the 'data' section of the editor (The blue icon that looks like a marine from the belt up w/ a gun)
In 'data' there is a drop down box labled 'Data Type' this tells you what your looking at, set it to 'Units'
Navigate through these folders, Campaign->Terran->Hero now right click on Rory Swann and go 'Duplicate Unit...' (Blizzard seems to love using elipses in their forms o_0)
By going duplicate rather than copy you have the option of copying things related to the unit... the only one we want is the 'actor' called 'Dutch' This will give you your unit Rory-Swann Copy(the copy of all the stats and controls for a real ingame unit) and an actor called 'Dutch (Unnamed) Copy' (the thing that has has an ingame model, can be clicked (if its type unit actor, alias _Selectable, and its unit has the right flags) and moves around/animates when the game tells it to).
None of those little details matter at your level of mapping, but it will all make senes if you stick with the sorded world of galaxy for long enough!
OK, so now you have a unit (that looks like a tough engineer with a mechanical claw for an arm) The problem is he attacks stuff, hes a hero (nasty hero icon on the bottom right of your screen) and he can place turrets.
First we change his name, Select the unit 'Rory Swann Copy' and go control+enter. You will see 'Name:' set this to Engineer (its what you see ingame), 'ID:' This is what the editor (and occasionaly YOU, see when your playing with your map files... dont worry to much about this at this level of mapping, just go 'Surggest'... an ID cant have spaces or insane characters... Now go OK and you have renamed him
Next we change the units properties, to do this you want your UI looking like mine, so you can follow my instructions... so click the brown buttons at the top of the screen, you want 'View Raw Data' The far left at the VERY top to NOT be pressed (this makes the editor show the real (complicated) values that you dont need to wory about yet..., the other 5 brown buttons to the right of the brown 'View Raw Data' should be pressed in while you work with me, many of em you wont want pressed in while you are learning but you will need for this guide.
Now if you have your unit 'Engineer' selected I want you to scroll down to the field 'Unit - Flags' and deselect the 'hero' flag (This gives him hero properties). Now scroll up to 'Editor - Editor Categories' and set 'Object Type:' from 'Hero' to 'Unit'. This will move where you see the unit in the editor from where heros are kept to where normal units are.
Next we remove his attack, go to 'Combat - Weapons +' and delete both 'Swann - Concussive Grenade' (his ranged) and 'Swann - Fist' (his melee) attacks.
*Spoiler*
If you think back to the campain, on the level in which you get to use swan you cant loose your heros... they just kinda chillax on no HP untill they respawn.
*Spoiler Ends*
You DONT want this, so go to 'Behavior - Behaviors +' and remove (Valerian02a - Hero Death Prevention)...
Next remove his nasty little turret 'Flaiming Betty', To do this, go 'Ability - Abilitys +' and delete 'Swann - Place Turret' (this removes the ability from him), Now go to 'Ability - Command Card +' and remove 'Place Flaming Betty (Dutch)' (this removes the icon for the ability).
Next comes his abbilitys... we need to remove that turret he has 'Flaiming Betty' , we also need to give him the weapon that will steal enemy buildings < 25% hp, kill 25% hp off enemy buildings > 25% hp, fully heal ally buildings < 100% hp, do nothing to ally buildings = 100% hp... For this we need a few new 'Data Source:' tabs, so far we have worked in 'Units', now we move to 'Weapons' (Alternaty we could make an ability to do this, but I think you want it strapped to his attack command like in red alert)
Ok, so your in Weapons, time to create a snazy Engineering Weapon for your unit... right click and go 'Add Weapon...' Set 'Name:' to Engineer, 'ID:' to 'Suggest' button, 'Weapon Type:' to 'Generic', 'Race:' to Terran and hit 'OK'
Ok, now time set an icon for your weapon, Go to the field 'UI - Icon' and navigate to 'Assets/Textures/btn-techupgrade-terran-automatedselfrepair.dds' You don't have to pick this icon, if you want a different one look around the rest of the btn- textures, they are the ones designed for these kinds of icons.
Set the 'UI - Tooltip' field to something appropriate for what the engineer does. The next step is to link this weapon to its effect (the thing that does the work) which we haven't made yet. To make it, you have to change from the 'Data Type' you are in (Weapons) to the 'Data Type' (Effects).
Have to leave for work, ill finsh the rest of this off for you sometime tonight. The long and short of it is that you need to create 4 effects, one for each of the three cases of building ownership/damage that you want to deal with. And one that links to the weapon, checks which case it is, and then tells the effect for that to activate.
Then you simply link the unit to the weapon, the weapon to the selecter effect, and make a few more minor tweeks to the unit and your done.
Unfortunately, my recommendation would be to become more experienced before you start messing with things as complicated as this. In reality it isn't that complex of an idea, but it will use either some complex data features, or triggers.
If you didn't already know, I figured I might as well explain the different sections of the editor.
The first important part is data, which is what the Umbra was talking about. Think of data, on an incredibly basic level, as setting the defaults of how the game works. And then triggers, which are the second main part of the editor, are what can react to events and change things. So for example, lets say that you wanted to create 15 zealots at a point, and then have them attack another point. You would do this through triggers. However, if you wanted to lets say, alter the attack speed of a zealot, you would do this with the data editor.
Keep in mind that if you are extremely new, and don't understand anything yet, that you should most likely get a feel for the editor, try and understand what you can, and then go look for every single tutorial that you can find. I would recommend starting with OneTwosc's Basic Tower Defense Tutorial on youtube.
In fact, I will post a link to it below. This is literally where I learned literally how to do almost all of the basics. This tutorial shows you everything, it could be the most beautifully written tutorial I have seen. It covers everything you need to know as a beginner. Then, when you understand the concepts listed in this video, I would recommend watching the advanced TD tutorial, and then his other ones as well. Good Luck! (Note that it does not matter whether you want to make a tower defense game or not, this will teach you EVERYTHING that you need to know in a fun way!)
TacoManStan has pointed you to the holy grail for noobs! OneTwo has created the best set of video tutorials I've found on the net for learning how to use the editor. I recommend just trolling the crap out of his channel!
You need to make it that your engineer cannot attack buildings with it's damaging weapon by altering the weapon filters to exclude structures. For the capture building you want a second weapon that has the flag set to cannot innitiate attack and the filters set so that it can only target structures. You then want to give that weapon a set effect. In the set effect you want to give it two effects, the first is an apply behavior effect which will apply your conversion buff and the second will be a damage effect with the kill flag active that targets the caster so that you cannot reuse your engineer after conversion (hope this is what you want). In the applied buff you will find the Behavior - Player - Value field, this changes the what player the unit with this buff belongs to. You also may want to make the buff hidden using the flags field of the buff.
Thanks so much for all your help. I didn't expect such in-depth instructions. Thank you so much for taking the time to help a complete stranger. Unfortunately, I don't have time to start learning all these things right now (hence the extremely late reply) but once I do, You can bet I'll let you know how I got on.
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Hi, folks. I'm totally new here but I'm already asking for help. I want to make a unit, with a similar effect to the engineer in Command and Conquer, in the way that if it enters an enemy building, it changes that building's owner to yourself. Assuming I can make a new unit (which I can't yet since I'm super new) what would I need to do to create this effect? Basically, if you right-click the unit on an enemy building, when the unit arrives at the buliding, it "captures" it at the building is now yours. Even a poke in the right direction would be greatly appreciated.
@MoonAndStars: Go
First load up the editor and create a map, when your creating it click 'Modify' beside the dependancies dropdown box, then click 'Add Standard...' then check the 'Liberty (Campaign)' item. This will give you access to everything used in the single player campain. If you have already started making your map go to 'File->Dependencies...' and do the same thing.
Now to copy an existing unit to do your magic on.
Your looking at a few different things to do this, all of em are in the 'data' section of the editor (The blue icon that looks like a marine from the belt up w/ a gun)
In 'data' there is a drop down box labled 'Data Type' this tells you what your looking at, set it to 'Units'
Navigate through these folders, Campaign->Terran->Hero now right click on Rory Swann and go 'Duplicate Unit...' (Blizzard seems to love using elipses in their forms o_0)
By going duplicate rather than copy you have the option of copying things related to the unit... the only one we want is the 'actor' called 'Dutch' This will give you your unit Rory-Swann Copy(the copy of all the stats and controls for a real ingame unit) and an actor called 'Dutch (Unnamed) Copy' (the thing that has has an ingame model, can be clicked (if its type unit actor, alias _Selectable, and its unit has the right flags) and moves around/animates when the game tells it to).
None of those little details matter at your level of mapping, but it will all make senes if you stick with the sorded world of galaxy for long enough!
OK, so now you have a unit (that looks like a tough engineer with a mechanical claw for an arm) The problem is he attacks stuff, hes a hero (nasty hero icon on the bottom right of your screen) and he can place turrets.
First we change his name, Select the unit 'Rory Swann Copy' and go control+enter. You will see 'Name:' set this to Engineer (its what you see ingame), 'ID:' This is what the editor (and occasionaly YOU, see when your playing with your map files... dont worry to much about this at this level of mapping, just go 'Surggest'... an ID cant have spaces or insane characters... Now go OK and you have renamed him
Next we change the units properties, to do this you want your UI looking like mine, so you can follow my instructions... so click the brown buttons at the top of the screen, you want 'View Raw Data' The far left at the VERY top to NOT be pressed (this makes the editor show the real (complicated) values that you dont need to wory about yet..., the other 5 brown buttons to the right of the brown 'View Raw Data' should be pressed in while you work with me, many of em you wont want pressed in while you are learning but you will need for this guide.
Now if you have your unit 'Engineer' selected I want you to scroll down to the field 'Unit - Flags' and deselect the 'hero' flag (This gives him hero properties). Now scroll up to 'Editor - Editor Categories' and set 'Object Type:' from 'Hero' to 'Unit'. This will move where you see the unit in the editor from where heros are kept to where normal units are.
Next we remove his attack, go to 'Combat - Weapons +' and delete both 'Swann - Concussive Grenade' (his ranged) and 'Swann - Fist' (his melee) attacks.
*Spoiler*
If you think back to the campain, on the level in which you get to use swan you cant loose your heros... they just kinda chillax on no HP untill they respawn.
*Spoiler Ends*
You DONT want this, so go to 'Behavior - Behaviors +' and remove (Valerian02a - Hero Death Prevention)...
Next remove his nasty little turret 'Flaiming Betty', To do this, go 'Ability - Abilitys +' and delete 'Swann - Place Turret' (this removes the ability from him), Now go to 'Ability - Command Card +' and remove 'Place Flaming Betty (Dutch)' (this removes the icon for the ability).
Next comes his abbilitys... we need to remove that turret he has 'Flaiming Betty' , we also need to give him the weapon that will steal enemy buildings < 25% hp, kill 25% hp off enemy buildings > 25% hp, fully heal ally buildings < 100% hp, do nothing to ally buildings = 100% hp... For this we need a few new 'Data Source:' tabs, so far we have worked in 'Units', now we move to 'Weapons' (Alternaty we could make an ability to do this, but I think you want it strapped to his attack command like in red alert)
Ok, so your in Weapons, time to create a snazy Engineering Weapon for your unit... right click and go 'Add Weapon...' Set 'Name:' to Engineer, 'ID:' to 'Suggest' button, 'Weapon Type:' to 'Generic', 'Race:' to Terran and hit 'OK'
Ok, now time set an icon for your weapon, Go to the field 'UI - Icon' and navigate to 'Assets/Textures/btn-techupgrade-terran-automatedselfrepair.dds' You don't have to pick this icon, if you want a different one look around the rest of the btn- textures, they are the ones designed for these kinds of icons.
Set the 'UI - Tooltip' field to something appropriate for what the engineer does. The next step is to link this weapon to its effect (the thing that does the work) which we haven't made yet. To make it, you have to change from the 'Data Type' you are in (Weapons) to the 'Data Type' (Effects).
Have to leave for work, ill finsh the rest of this off for you sometime tonight. The long and short of it is that you need to create 4 effects, one for each of the three cases of building ownership/damage that you want to deal with. And one that links to the weapon, checks which case it is, and then tells the effect for that to activate.
Then you simply link the unit to the weapon, the weapon to the selecter effect, and make a few more minor tweeks to the unit and your done.
Let me know how your going up to this point
Unfortunately, my recommendation would be to become more experienced before you start messing with things as complicated as this. In reality it isn't that complex of an idea, but it will use either some complex data features, or triggers.
If you didn't already know, I figured I might as well explain the different sections of the editor.
The first important part is data, which is what the Umbra was talking about. Think of data, on an incredibly basic level, as setting the defaults of how the game works. And then triggers, which are the second main part of the editor, are what can react to events and change things. So for example, lets say that you wanted to create 15 zealots at a point, and then have them attack another point. You would do this through triggers. However, if you wanted to lets say, alter the attack speed of a zealot, you would do this with the data editor.
Keep in mind that if you are extremely new, and don't understand anything yet, that you should most likely get a feel for the editor, try and understand what you can, and then go look for every single tutorial that you can find. I would recommend starting with OneTwosc's Basic Tower Defense Tutorial on youtube.
In fact, I will post a link to it below. This is literally where I learned literally how to do almost all of the basics. This tutorial shows you everything, it could be the most beautifully written tutorial I have seen. It covers everything you need to know as a beginner. Then, when you understand the concepts listed in this video, I would recommend watching the advanced TD tutorial, and then his other ones as well. Good Luck! (Note that it does not matter whether you want to make a tower defense game or not, this will teach you EVERYTHING that you need to know in a fun way!)
Great to be back and part of the community again!
@MoonAndStars: Go
TacoManStan has pointed you to the holy grail for noobs! OneTwo has created the best set of video tutorials I've found on the net for learning how to use the editor. I recommend just trolling the crap out of his channel!
You need to make it that your engineer cannot attack buildings with it's damaging weapon by altering the weapon filters to exclude structures. For the capture building you want a second weapon that has the flag set to cannot innitiate attack and the filters set so that it can only target structures. You then want to give that weapon a set effect. In the set effect you want to give it two effects, the first is an apply behavior effect which will apply your conversion buff and the second will be a damage effect with the kill flag active that targets the caster so that you cannot reuse your engineer after conversion (hope this is what you want). In the applied buff you will find the Behavior - Player - Value field, this changes the what player the unit with this buff belongs to. You also may want to make the buff hidden using the flags field of the buff.
Contribute to the wiki (Wiki button at top of page) Considered easy altering of the unit textures?
https://www.sc2mapster.com/forums/resources/tutorials/179654-data-actor-events-message-texture-select-by-id
https://media.forgecdn.net/attachments/187/40/Screenshot2011-04-17_09_16_21.jpg
Thanks so much for all your help. I didn't expect such in-depth instructions. Thank you so much for taking the time to help a complete stranger. Unfortunately, I don't have time to start learning all these things right now (hence the extremely late reply) but once I do, You can bet I'll let you know how I got on.