There's obviously parts of making a map that are a bit more fun than others. What parts do you find the most boring, tedious, ect.
For me, it's creating upgrades in the data editor. It's just a very repetitive process, especially if you have a lot of units or have to rebalance things/add a new upgrade.
I'd say either dialogs or cutscenes for the same reason as SuperEvil, you have to keep reloading the map and fine-tuning over and over
Yeah, the little changes like positioning dialog are just horrible, I wish there was a way to view it in real time instead of having to constantly reload.
I really like the process of creating dialog for the most part though.
Data entry. And I do not mean the data editing. In general, I've abstracted things so the only major work is literally typing stuff into User Types, which amounts to plugging data in, nothing more.
As for those who find Dialogs tedious: Yes they are, and you should learn UI XML, you can live experiment with that.
Oh yea, sc2 editor would benefit from some "drag that damage effect from the list and drop in the selected launch effect's impact field" kind of mechanics. Instead of manually selecting it from the list inside that field.
I would suggets most to skip to xml view on data editing. Upgrades become painless. Requirement nodes and conversations totally need the visual editor tho.
For me, even ddespite what i said, the data editor still grinds my gears, because loading all items and shit take forever for my cpu.
I would suggets most to skip to xml view on data editing. Upgrades become painless. Requirement nodes and conversations totally need the visual editor tho.
For me, even ddespite what i said, the data editor still grinds my gears, because loading all items and shit take forever for my cpu.
I'm gonna have to try this, because for me, upgrades, and the variable setting of them, and manually typing out tooltips for thousands of them. I really don't mind the trial and error of dialogs and actors, but I am not incredibly specific with those things, so once I got it looking decent, I pat myself on the back and move on.
tooltips might not be as trivial. for those i would suggest saving your map as sc2components, and then on the unpacked folders look for the enus.sc2data and search for objecstrings.txt and gamestrings.txt and edit tootltips via ntoepad
I'm not the biggest fan of anything to do with the data window. I'm hating it less and less as I learn it more and more, but anytime you're attempting something for the first time in the data window, it's like looking at pages of Greek and being told to translate it into Latin. The most annoying thing, though, would have to be fine tuning anything that you have to load the map to check. Five minutes of loading up the map to test a 10(whatever the dialog distance measurement is) change that the player might only see for 5 seconds for the entire map.
And if you have things that require finely tuned timing, it requires multiple tests just to make sure that things are consistent.
I would suggets most to skip to xml view on data editing. Upgrades become painless. Requirement nodes and conversations totally need the visual editor tho.
For me, even ddespite what i said, the data editor still grinds my gears, because loading all items and shit take forever for my cpu.
Yeah, good idea, I should have switched to xml for upgrades sooner, don't like using it for most things in the data editor though. It did save me about an hour or so here thankfully.
save the maps as sc2components, edit msot things save for terraining and cinematicsw using just the text files, and then load up your maps using command line parameters. if on win7, you can get the parameters by using the task manager on a simple test run through the editor. there are paramaters that let you load a mod saved anywhere on your harddrive, which can be used alongside a sandbox type of map for super easy data, galaxy script and xml ui testing.
My vote goes to actors too. It's embarrassing how much extra work they require compared to wc3, while providing little real advantage. Sure, there's a lot of cool stuff you can do with actors. It isn't worth the added complexity or development time in my opinion, though.
Runner up prize goes to weapons, which I think have no real purpose. Weapon attributes could've happily just been made part of the units tab, since some weapon effects are inherent to unit animations anyway (like backswing and damage point), and I can't think of a single reason why weapons have their own tab.
My vote goes to actors too. It's embarrassing how much extra work they require compared to wc3, while providing little real advantage. Sure, there's a lot of cool stuff you can do with actors. It isn't worth the added complexity or development time in my opinion, though.
Runner up prize goes to weapons, which I think have no real purpose. Weapon attributes could've happily just been made part of the units tab, since some weapon effects are inherent to unit animations anyway (like backswing and damage point), and I can't think of a single reason why weapons have their own tab.
cant agree here, i would even want more tabs. give use "unit filter" tabs blizzard!! setting up the same unit filter for weapons, abilities, search effects is shit. and changing them afterwards is even more.
trigger dialogs and UI are the most time consuming things you can do. change offset, test document, see where it is, change again, see where it is now, etc (f12 + ctrl + alt is not really a help or very handy to use).
once again tabs, i wished they had sorted the actors into different tabs (best example are site ops, why are they not in there own tab). actors take like forever to load.
but really most tedious are levelable abilties. you have to duplicate a whole bunch of effects just to change some damage value, register those at actors, set it up for every damn level. if they just had introduced "unit upgrades", just like upgrades but for units, that would have been waaaaaaay easier.
My vote goes to actors too. It's embarrassing how much extra work they require compared to wc3, while providing little real advantage. Sure, there's a lot of cool stuff you can do with actors. It isn't worth the added complexity or development time in my opinion, though.
I've also found actors to be the most trying of my patience. The big problem is the way the events field works. There is no way to copy and past events from one actor to another and there are so many events clogging up most actors that it usually takes some time to find one if you are trying to remove from already existing events. Also, there is no intuitive way to tell when you need a "term" or whatever they call it. That being said, actors are absolutely necessary and should not be rolled up into the units tab. There just needs to be a tip when duplicating units that tells you that you need to also duplicate the units actor for it to behave correctly.
I can also understand how UI and dialogs are considered time consuming though recently I started defining lots of constants and local variables in creating my dialogs and it makes it way less painful to deal with them.
Honestly stuff is usually time consuming because of odd choices made in the way certain fields work. Like leveled abilities often requiring different sets of effects and behaviors just because effects don't have a per level field for damage and damage bonuses. It's funny because I'm pretty sure all abilities in warcraft 3 were already set up be able to do that. Also, why can't we set up attack and armor upgrades more efficiently. you need like 3 entries per unit. need to set the attack increase itself, the level of the upgrade shown, and the icon. That is for each individual unit. Then the view for it so bad and crowded it's pretty difficult to catch that you accidentally forgot something.
So yeah, actors, leveled abilities, and attack/armor upgrades.
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Actors and UI, both take forever to get perfect, some of the repetitive data abilities get annoying but I have a way to mass create stuff for levels and what not.
There is no way to copy and past events from one actor to another and there are so many events clogging up most actors that it usually takes some time to find one if you are trying to remove from already existing events.
I haaate this. Especially on the mac version of the editor because it doesn't show the values for some things, so I have to completely guess what things like tint color are.
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There's obviously parts of making a map that are a bit more fun than others. What parts do you find the most boring, tedious, ect.
For me, it's creating upgrades in the data editor. It's just a very repetitive process, especially if you have a lot of units or have to rebalance things/add a new upgrade.
Actors hands down because those are the eye candy so making them perfect is plain tedious and repetitive.
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
@zrankzappa: Go
I'd say either dialogs or cutscenes for the same reason as SuperEvil, you have to keep reloading the map and fine-tuning over and over
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UI never inspired me.
Yeah, the little changes like positioning dialog are just horrible, I wish there was a way to view it in real time instead of having to constantly reload.
I really like the process of creating dialog for the most part though.
Data entry. And I do not mean the data editing. In general, I've abstracted things so the only major work is literally typing stuff into User Types, which amounts to plugging data in, nothing more.
As for those who find Dialogs tedious: Yes they are, and you should learn UI XML, you can live experiment with that.
@ArcaneDurandel: Go
Oh yea, sc2 editor would benefit from some "drag that damage effect from the list and drop in the selected launch effect's impact field" kind of mechanics. Instead of manually selecting it from the list inside that field.
I would suggets most to skip to xml view on data editing. Upgrades become painless. Requirement nodes and conversations totally need the visual editor tho.
For me, even ddespite what i said, the data editor still grinds my gears, because loading all items and shit take forever for my cpu.
Go play Antioch Chronicles Remastered!
Also, coming soon, Antioch Episode 3: Thoughts in Chaos!
Dont like mapster's ugly white? Try Mapster's Classic Skin!
I'm gonna have to try this, because for me, upgrades, and the variable setting of them, and manually typing out tooltips for thousands of them. I really don't mind the trial and error of dialogs and actors, but I am not incredibly specific with those things, so once I got it looking decent, I pat myself on the back and move on.
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tooltips might not be as trivial. for those i would suggest saving your map as sc2components, and then on the unpacked folders look for the enus.sc2data and search for objecstrings.txt and gamestrings.txt and edit tootltips via ntoepad
Go play Antioch Chronicles Remastered!
Also, coming soon, Antioch Episode 3: Thoughts in Chaos!
Dont like mapster's ugly white? Try Mapster's Classic Skin!
I'm not the biggest fan of anything to do with the data window. I'm hating it less and less as I learn it more and more, but anytime you're attempting something for the first time in the data window, it's like looking at pages of Greek and being told to translate it into Latin. The most annoying thing, though, would have to be fine tuning anything that you have to load the map to check. Five minutes of loading up the map to test a 10(whatever the dialog distance measurement is) change that the player might only see for 5 seconds for the entire map.
And if you have things that require finely tuned timing, it requires multiple tests just to make sure that things are consistent.
lol
Yeah, good idea, I should have switched to xml for upgrades sooner, don't like using it for most things in the data editor though. It did save me about an hour or so here thankfully.
btw, there are ways to skip the editor.
save the maps as sc2components, edit msot things save for terraining and cinematicsw using just the text files, and then load up your maps using command line parameters. if on win7, you can get the parameters by using the task manager on a simple test run through the editor. there are paramaters that let you load a mod saved anywhere on your harddrive, which can be used alongside a sandbox type of map for super easy data, galaxy script and xml ui testing.
Go play Antioch Chronicles Remastered!
Also, coming soon, Antioch Episode 3: Thoughts in Chaos!
Dont like mapster's ugly white? Try Mapster's Classic Skin!
My vote goes to actors too. It's embarrassing how much extra work they require compared to wc3, while providing little real advantage. Sure, there's a lot of cool stuff you can do with actors. It isn't worth the added complexity or development time in my opinion, though.
Runner up prize goes to weapons, which I think have no real purpose. Weapon attributes could've happily just been made part of the units tab, since some weapon effects are inherent to unit animations anyway (like backswing and damage point), and I can't think of a single reason why weapons have their own tab.
cant agree here, i would even want more tabs. give use "unit filter" tabs blizzard!! setting up the same unit filter for weapons, abilities, search effects is shit. and changing them afterwards is even more.
trigger dialogs and UI are the most time consuming things you can do. change offset, test document, see where it is, change again, see where it is now, etc (f12 + ctrl + alt is not really a help or very handy to use).
once again tabs, i wished they had sorted the actors into different tabs (best example are site ops, why are they not in there own tab). actors take like forever to load.
but really most tedious are levelable abilties. you have to duplicate a whole bunch of effects just to change some damage value, register those at actors, set it up for every damn level. if they just had introduced "unit upgrades", just like upgrades but for units, that would have been waaaaaaay easier.
ctrl alt f12 is not the best but it has helped me figure out positioning and size when needed.
Go play Antioch Chronicles Remastered!
Also, coming soon, Antioch Episode 3: Thoughts in Chaos!
Dont like mapster's ugly white? Try Mapster's Classic Skin!
Actors, UI and cutscenes.
http://www.youtube.com/user/RussianMapster
I've also found actors to be the most trying of my patience. The big problem is the way the events field works. There is no way to copy and past events from one actor to another and there are so many events clogging up most actors that it usually takes some time to find one if you are trying to remove from already existing events. Also, there is no intuitive way to tell when you need a "term" or whatever they call it. That being said, actors are absolutely necessary and should not be rolled up into the units tab. There just needs to be a tip when duplicating units that tells you that you need to also duplicate the units actor for it to behave correctly.
I can also understand how UI and dialogs are considered time consuming though recently I started defining lots of constants and local variables in creating my dialogs and it makes it way less painful to deal with them.
Honestly stuff is usually time consuming because of odd choices made in the way certain fields work. Like leveled abilities often requiring different sets of effects and behaviors just because effects don't have a per level field for damage and damage bonuses. It's funny because I'm pretty sure all abilities in warcraft 3 were already set up be able to do that. Also, why can't we set up attack and armor upgrades more efficiently. you need like 3 entries per unit. need to set the attack increase itself, the level of the upgrade shown, and the icon. That is for each individual unit. Then the view for it so bad and crowded it's pretty difficult to catch that you accidentally forgot something.
So yeah, actors, leveled abilities, and attack/armor upgrades.
Actors and UI, both take forever to get perfect, some of the repetitive data abilities get annoying but I have a way to mass create stuff for levels and what not.
Still alive and kicking, just busy.
My guide to the trigger editor (still a work in progress)
I haaate this. Especially on the mac version of the editor because it doesn't show the values for some things, so I have to completely guess what things like tint color are.