[PRIOR] First video tutorial:

[PRIOR] Second video tutorial:

[NOW] New video tutorial:

Now get crackin' on those bases. Enjoy!

The main level terrain is built in 3DS Max and exported to a file with the extension "w3d." This terrain file typically includes all the ground, cliffs, caves, and a few other things (including proxies).

Here are images of what is exported as the main terrain on Seamist, first shown without proxies, and then with. You can see we use them a lot!

Once the file is built and exported, we use a program called Mammoth to make a preset that references this level terrain w3d file and places an instance of that giant map terrain piece on the level, so it starts as the main ground upon which everything else is built. After this point, we add everything else to the level that we want on it, which would include separate terrain pieces or tiles and various controllers that make everything work. 

Below is an example of some waypaths in front of a war factory that were added in Mammoth (and the little blue building icon near the top right was also placed in Mammoth). The building, lights, spawners, and orange construction zone were all "proxied in" as part of the terrain file, so we wouldn't need to add them manually to each level. How cumbersome that would be!

In very old versions of APB, the main terrain file also included the actual buildings and trees, and some props would be placed using LevelEdit (the older program which Mammoth has now replaced). This led to problems and confusion in several ways.

1. If actual buildings and trees are in the main terrain file, problems occur when those buildings and trees need to be edited or updated for any reason (the edit would need to be made, and then propagated manually to all of the buildings and trees in question on all of the maps that use them).
2. In addition to this, if these are "baked terrain" as I'll call it, then there are also way fewer options regarding said objects.
3. If objects such as trees, barrels, and rocks are placed on the ground in Mammoth, anything that's edited or placed on the terrain in 3ds max later on doesn't account for things that had been placed in Mammoth prior, so an interface disconnect takes place because those two very-related things would need to be edited across two different programs. For example if you place trees in mammoth, and edit the ground later in Max, then there are floating trees, sunken trees, or the trees could be merged with other objects that were placed there in Max. It would be an easy set of mistakes to make, and would simply be a frustrating way of doing it.
4. LevelEdit/Mammoth simply isn't a very good program at the moment for placing and rotating objects, and painting objects isn't an option. It's a process that 3DS Max's UI handles much better.

Inside the spoiler below is one example of painting tree presets (aka proxies) in 3DS Max. Nifty!

As a result of the issues listed above, we use something called proxies. Proxies, at their core, are references to Mammoth presets that are placed on terrain. If I place a proxy on a map, it's just an object (no mesh or polygons) that tells the game to place this Mammoth preset at this location, and rotate/scale it in such a way. Currently we proxy our buildings, infantry spawns, purchase terminal pokes, trees, and anything else that we want to operate as references rather than "baked terrain" or placed manually using Mammoth. Again, with proxies/references we have a lot more options, it's a huge time saver, lends to consistency, and it gives us the freedom to edit that preset once, having it propagated automatically to all the places where the proxies have been placed.

In Max, a proxy can look like a box, a triangle, a teapot, or literally anything you want it to be. In APB, we try our best to mimic the object that the proxy is referencing, while still making it obvious that the object is a proxy. It can be tempting to try to edit bits of the proxy object, thinking that it will edit the object's look ingame, but I want to make it clear that editing the proxy object won't do anything to affect the object's look ingame. All the game cares about is the location/rotation of the proxy object, not what it looks like. The preset will take care of what it looks like.

Because all these giant blue teapots are named appropriately as the Soviet base buildings on Seamist that they are meant to represent, exporting this would yield a map that looks correct, with Soviet base buildings and not teapots.

In APB's released SDK, you may find a file called that we named the "Proxy Masters" file. This contains a large set of proxies that we place around maps, and we use this file regularly to import those objects when designing levels, so we can easily place buildings, trees, and props. Here is what the file looks like at a glance.

Currently some of the buildings have two copies because the extra copy is the tunnel version of the building.

If you have ever used one of the w3d importers, you may find that it automatically turns all proxies into little yellow boxes, or some other form of Max primitive. This is consistent with the idea that the proxy objects/meshes don't matter, but the pivot point. However, it's best to try to represent the object that the proxy is referencing, so when it's placed on a level, it's easy to see at a glance what the object is and how much space it takes. For buildings, this is crucial if you need to cut holes in the ground around them.
What is the best way to create a proxy object?It may be best to have a source file for the preset that you'd like to proxy, but if you don't, it is easy enough to use the w3d importer (and the w3d importer also guarantees that the origin/pivot is in the right spot from the get-go). Whichever way you do this, open up the file in Max.

Today I'll make a proxy object out of this Refinery roof door.

Your object is likely to have multiple meshes. Decide which meshes you want to be a part of your proxy object. You won't want to use bones, bounding boxes, or other things that don't show ingame. Select these multiple meshes that you've decided will be part of the proxy object.

For me in this case, that would be sov-door and sov-glass.

Use Ctrl + V to copy and paste (use copy, not instance) the meshes you want to be in your proxy object, then use "collapse" in utilities to merge the copied pieces all to one object.

Now remove or hide the original meshes so only your new collapsed object is showing. Name this new object with the preset name that mammoth uses, and then put ~ as the suffix. E.g. if the preset in Mammoth is named t_pine, then the proxy object should be named t_pine~. Any characters after the ~ won't factor in to the preset's name, but will work to export multiple copies or instances or the proxies. If you had a pine tree preset in mammoth named f_pine, the placed proxies could be named f_pine~00, f_pine~01, etc. Or if you wanted to make the pine trees different scales, you would put a $ at the start, e.g. $f_pine~00.

Unlink the object if it is parented to anything.

Only if the object is animated: remove any animations that might be tied to the object. First make sure your animation slider is at frame 0, then drag a box over all keyframes and press delete key to remove them.

Remove all materials from the object. With it selected, press the buttons in the image below.

Reset xform, and right click on the object -> convert to editable poly.

The pivot now needs to be at location 0 0 0 on XYZ (a.k.a. the origin or middle of the grid). We can see below that it's not already at the origin, so we'll need to move it there.

Uncheck pivot only so you go back to normal editing mode.

Assign any object color and layer for organizational purposes.

Typically we try to choose colors that make the most sense, e.g. blue for Allies, red for Soviets, green for trees, etc.
Note * 2, I realize I used the Soviet doors to make the Allied proxy, but the fun part is that it doesn't matter!

Oftentimes we'll also assign a special layer for our proxies. Buildings are on the buildings layer, Trees are on a Foliage layer, and props that are proxies we typically just put in the Props or Proxies layer. However you want to do it that best suits your workflow, is how you should do it.

You can remove all collision settings, but make sure export transform (bone) and geometry are both checked.

Now with this door, I can place it exactly where in the building I want that door to be!

Left: Door proxy placed in 3DS Max, Right: How it appears ingame.

What is the best way to place proxies on my level terrain?

There are different kinds of proxies to place on levels. Let's start with base buildings. Open the proxy masters file. Assume we're placing an Allied Barracks. Select the barracks, then open the object list with H and select everything underneath it in the hierarchy that you would like to copy over to your level. 

Hit select, then File -> Save As -> Save Selected. I typically just save Untitled to desktop.

Now open your level file in Max, go to File -> Import -> Merge (I set this as a shortcut key Shift + M since I use it so often).

Select the Untitled file from the Desktop, then select all objects and hit OK. The Barracks will appear.

If you did nothing else at this point and exported your map, you would have a Barracks there, but do note you wouldn't be able to travel between the floors because no hole was cut in the ground. This placement method can be done with any of the buildings, trees, or other proxies that you wish to use from the proxy masters file.

BONUS ROUNDI know this isn't about proxies, but so that we put a nice pretty bow on things, let's cut a hole in the ground for the Barracks.

If your terrain isn't already editable poly, convert it to that.

Now press 4 or click on the little polygon icon to activate polygon editing mode.

Select the polygons that fill the Barracks area and press Del to delete them.

Now, get out of polygon mode (press 4 again) and attach the temp ground (which notably isn't a proxy) to your ground plane.

Now, go to Vertex mode (press 1) and start welding/collapsing these separate pieces together for each vertex. I set up a keyboard shortcut to help do this quickly. Customize -> Customize UI -> Collapse (Poly) set to button of your choice.

Once it's welded all the way around you should have your hole cut for your proxied Barracks, and the basement should be accessible.

That's about it for now, folks!

Notes:
- The game doesn't care about what your proxy mesh is, it only cares about the pivot and its location and rotation (and sometimes scale).
- For objects to export from Max, there is a character limit of 15 characters, which means you want relatively short preset names if you want to proxy those presets. 10 characters would be a safe upper limit for preset names, so the limit would account for a $ prefix, the ~ suffix, and would support hundreds of that proxy object.
- Proxies only work if you place them in terrain objects, not if you place them on hierarchical tiles or other simple objects/vehicles that you make.
- APB's buildings are proxied terrain objects which proxy yet more objects. This means proxying can be nested as long as all the proxy objects exist in terrain presets.

SDK Download Link

3DS Max 2017 Export Plugin

SDK Download Link

3DS Max 2017 Export Plugin

First read and follow Laubi's original tutorial on "Harvester AI Pathfinding" (W3Dhub link).  This tutorial has been around for a very long time.

The attached "harvtest_paths.zip" file contains three example .mix maps for you to try out, each one is mentioned in the appropriate sections below.  To play these you need to:

1. Extract the .mix files to your Renegade/Data/ folder (typically C:\Westwood\Renegade\Data\)
2. Start Renegade
3. Choose "Host a LAN game"
4. Change the settings to be:
   1. Max players = 1
   2. Dedicated = no
   3. Map rotation = any one of these three maps

Between the buildings on the map is a flying harvester that you can enter.  Flying above the map makes it easier to see what is going on.

You should be running an up-to-date copy of TT/scripts and the latest version of Leveledit (not the version shipped by Westwood, see the TiberianTechnologies website).  It contains several fixes that may affect how well you can follow the techniques in this tutorial.

Introduction

We're on an island floating far above a lava ocean.  On one side of the island are the Nod & GDI bases, on the other far end is the tiberium field:

In between the two bases is a maze with many possible routes for the harvesters to take

First: setup your map as normal (and as per Laubi's tutorial), but don't create any waypaths for the harvesters just yet.  Make sure to place the "Human" pathfind generator and generate pathfinding sectors for your map.

In LevelEdit you can show the generated sectors using the menu item Pathfinding->Display Sectors:

Note the greeny-blue boxes that appear.  Each one is a 'zone' that objects can travel within, and each connects to the sectors that touch it.  Objects in the game work out how to get from point A to point B by following a chain of these sectors.

You do not actually need to create waypaths for your harvesters

Despite all of the traditional advice: harvesters do NOT need waypaths.  They can find their way to the fields and back all on their own using the pathfinding sectors.  The only waypaths you need on your whole map are the short ones exiting your Weapons Factory and Airstrip, so that vehicles drive out a little after being created.

By default harvesters always start in this 'self-navigating' mode once they leave the WF/Air.  They only start using waypaths when they "accidentally" encounter one whilst driving (and several other conditions are met, described later in this tut).

If you don't believe me: try it.  According to JonWil there is no special code (in Vanilla Renegade harvesters) for handling waypaths. My understanding is that they incidentally can use waypaths because the W3D engine's normal innate pathfinding code (used by all AI) handles using waypaths.

On the example map for this tutorial: harvesters are picking a non-optimal route when left to work things out on their own:

Try the map C&C_Harvpath_nopaths.mix to see this yourself.

How do harvesters "enter" a waypath?

(1) When a harvester is created: it uses the pathfinding sectors to find its own route to the tiberium field (or other destination) and starts on this route.

(2) Every time the harvester enters a new sector it checks to see if there are any waypaths that start in this sector.

A harvester will only follow one of these detected waypaths if multiples conditions are met:

1. The path is of type 'innate'
2. The end of the path is closer to the harvester's target than where the harvester currently is.
3. (Possibly some distance or number-of sector metrics, unknown)

Once the harv starts following a waypath it will not leave it until the path ends.

How do I design my waypaths?

First find the path your harvesters take on their own.  Play your map in-game to find out.

Next create a path that starts from one of the sectors your harvester crosses.  End this path near (or closer to) the tib field:

Try the map C&C_Harvpath_Pathed.mix to see this working.  Both harvs end up getting caught by the one path in this example (but you generally want to add separate paths for each), and the path is not perfect so they start grinding against the walls.

You can use any type of waypath provided in LE, they're all the same:

I actually use the 'flying vehicle only waypath' just to make people feel unsettled.

The only requirements are that you change the waypath settings to enable 'Innate Pathfind' after you create it.  You get to this dialog by double-clicking a node on the waypath (not the line part of the path):

Two-way is an option that is legitimately accepted by the game and useful to consider.  The Human/Ground/Air fields appear to do nothing at all, you can even un-tick them and your harv will still follow the path.

You do NOT need to re-calculate pathfinding after making or changing any waypoints.  Waypoints are a separate part of the system that are handled during map export (to .MIX).  This feature may be buggy in older versions of LevelEdit.

Here's an example of a waypath that will NOT work.  Note that the path now starts in the doorway of the maze, rather than in the sector outside of it.  The harvesters never cross the pathfinding sectors in this doorway, so they never 'see' the path:

They may however 'see' this path on the way back from the tiberium field, assuming the path has been marked as Two Way.

Harvesters will use your path as long as (1) you start the path in a sector the harvesters already drive over, and (2) end the path closer to the goal than it starts.  This means that you can give them really stupid long routes and they will still follow them, such as this:

Try the map C&C_Harvpath_Stupid.mix to see this yourself.  Note that one of the harvesters takes a 'shortcut', I am uncertain of the exact logic behind this, but I believe it notices the nearby waypath nodes when it crosses sectors whilst leaving the Weapons Factory.

If we were to end the path at a position further from the tib field than where we started then the path will NOT be accepted/chosen by the harvesters:

(They could potentially choose this path on their way back, however, as its end may be nearer their "goal" (eg the GDI refinery) than their current position).

Conclusions

Confusions, comments or problems?  Ask below or on the main W3Dhub forums.

Areas that are still not understood:

• Whether or not this 'innate pathfinding' is exactly the same for all AI in the game, or slightly different for harvesters.
• What metric is used to make choices on route.  Eg minimising distance travelled OR number of sectors travelled through?
• How harvesters start waypaths at points other than their ends (ie take shortcuts)

harvpath_tests.zip

Skill level: 1

An Introduction to Renegade Mapping Foreword

This tutorial is designed to give you a brief insight into creating maps for renegade.It only covers the very basics needed to get started.

Getting Started

To get started with renegade mapping you will need to download and install Gmax and Renegade Tools. It is important to install Gmax before Renegade Tools, or you will not be able to export from w3d files from Gmax.

Download Gmax from here.

Download Renegade Tools 2 from here.

Now all you need to do is install gmax followed by Rengade Tools 2 and your all set.

Creating your terrain

The first thing to do when created your own map is make the terrain (land) for your map. This is done with RenX (the renegade addon installed to gmax). Locate RenX on your start menu and open it.

On the right hand side of the RenX program there are several buttons under Object Types. Click Plane (A Plane is a flat square when created).

In the Top view area click and drag to create the Plane. Your will see what you are creating in the other view windows from different angles.

You should now have a simple, flat area of land to work on.

Editing your terrain

Now that you have created your land you might want to move it around, make hills etc. To do this make sure your land is selected, right click on it and go to Convert To -> Editable Mesh.

The window on the right of RenX will now have changed. Click the + button next to Editable Mesh and select Vertex. Blue dots will appear on your land.

By moving these blue dots you change the shape of the land. First select the Select and Move tool at the top of the screen.

Click on one and drag it around to move it. To move it up and down, click the arrow with the Z label and the move it.

To switch back from up and down movement locate the part of the menu bar shown below and select the XY option. NOTE: if it shows YZ or ZX then click and hold until a small menu appears and choose XY there.

Play around with this method of shaping the terrain for a while, the best way to learn is by doing.

Preparing to Export your terrain

Once you are happy with your land you need to prepare it for use in Renegade. Click on the hammer tool on the right and select W3D Tools.

Scroll down until you come to Collision Options. Make sure you have your land selected and tick Physical, Projectile and Camera Options. This means you dont fall through your terrain, bullets cant pass through it and the camera does not go under it.

Before exporting you must create your Mod Folder. Open the Renegade Editor program from the start menu. It will show a window titled Choose Mod Package. Click New... and type in Test Level and click OK. Select your newly created package and click OK. When the program finishes loading minimise it.

Exporting from RenX

You now need to export your terrain the the W3D format recognised by renegade. Go to File -> Export. You must set it to save as type : w3d and enter the name terrain. Save it in C:\Program Files\RenegadePublicTools\LevelEdit\Test Level, assuming you installed to the default location.

You will be shown an options window. Select Renegade Terrain mode and click OK. It will export, and you can close RenX (save the terrain first if you wish to come back to it later to edit).

Adding level objects

Now your terrain is created all that remains is to add it to the renegade editor program and add spawn locations.

On the right window of Level Editor click the + next to terrain. Keeping the terrain folder selected click Temp at the bottom of the screen (there is a reason for not using Add, but that is not relevant here).

In the new window enter the name terrain. Click the settings tab and click the folder icon next to the text field for m_ModelName. Select your terrain.w3d file. Click OK and the terrain is now available for use in Level Editor.

Select your new terrain preset and click Make (next to Temp). Your terrain will now appear in the main window.

Now all you need to do is add spawners and export. In the presets window go to Object -> Spanwer -> Startup Spawners. Select the GDI Spawner and click Make. It will appear on your terrain. Select it and move it to one side to make room for the Nod Spawner.

Exporting your level

Once you have made the 2 spawners you are ready to export your level.

Firstly you must save the level. Go to File -> Save and enter the name testmap.

Once saved go to File -> Export Mod Package. Navigate to your Renegade Data folder (if it is not already shown), enter the name testmap and click save.

Your map will be saved as a pkg file. This is a mod package, not suitable for use on servers, but for this test it is easier to leave it in this format.

Open renegade, click LAN, host a new game (1 player) and select the mod package testmap which you have just created. Start the game and run around in your new level.

Notes

This tutorial is very basic, and only intended to help you get started mapping. The best way to learn mapping is to keep trying new things to see what they do.

Skill level: 4

Welcome to the second chapter of the tutorials that will show you how to add and configure more sophisticated bots to your maps.

In this lesson, we will activate the player-logic AI system and tell bots how to attack in groups. If you are a mapper, you will be able to fully setup your map to support bots.
 

This tutorial assumes you know the basic concepts about the advanced bots. If you haven't seen the corresponding tutorial yet, it is strongly recommended you check it out. You can find it here.

1. Adjust unit presets

Let's set up the presets for the bots so they fit the requirements.

Whether you are a mapper or a game core builder, you will have to edit them differently.

A) If you are just creating a map:

• You will have to work with the existing presets. If any of their settings do not meet the requirements or your needs, you will need to clone the original preset into a new Temp preset, edit that and use it for the bot system. Note that if you Temp a preset, it will cost 0 credits for the bots and require no production buildings or tech level, unless it is placed on a Temp purchase list, overriding the regular one.
• If a preset is already configured properly, you can just use it.

B) If you are building a game core:

• Since you are building the core preset list, you can outright forget Temp presets or having duplicate presets just for bot usage. You can use the same presets for bots that players purchase and use.
• Make sure all presets you wish bots to use are configured to fit their battle role.

Now for the requirements.

Select a soldier preset that you want the bots to be able to play as.

• Look at the attached scripts on the Scripts tab. Make sure there is NO MS_AI_Behaviour script present. If this is OK, rejoice! Bots can use this preset, you don't need to touch it. Otherwise, make these changes.
• Attach a MS_AI_Preferences script and adjust the parameters so the unit prioritizes and shoots the right targets.
  Note: You can skip attaching this script, the bot then will automatically attach it ingame at runtime with the default parameters.

Do this for every preset that you want bots to use.

If for whatever reason you want a bot to use a different weapon with a unit than the one players have, use the MS_AI_Replace_Weapon script. Attach it multiple times, if more weapons need replacing. Although if you are working with Temp presets already, you can just change the weapon on the Settings tab. Otherwise, using the same presets for bots and players is recommended for better maintainability.

The MS_AI_Preferences script almost has the same parameters as MS_AI_Behaviour, but it has no ObjectiveType. Therefore this script solves 2 things:
1. There is no need for duplicate presets, one for players and one for bots, since the preferences script does not activate the AI on the unit on startup. A controller script will.
2. Every preset can become offensive or defensive, so you dont have to create one preset for an offensive variant, and one for a defensive one.

Great, you have the bot presets ready!

2. Create bot purchase lists

In this system, the bots go into battle after choosing a unit they want to use, just like players. They take a look at a collection of presets, which we are going to define now. Thanks to this, we can block bots from buying certain units on specific maps, or only allow a few for special gameplay. All up to our imagination.

Note: skip this step if you want to let bots use ALL of the presets that players can buy, including resource collector vehicles, support units, etc.
Warning: at least the existence/creation of an Engineering Infantry purchase list is recommended! Otherwise, you will see bots try to repair buildings with damaging weapons. Alternatively, you can set the engi list parameter to "AUTOENGINEER" to let the game automatically find all the presets that can heal buildings already existing on the map.
If you have also skipped adjusting the MS_AI_Preferences scripts on all the units, the bots will definitely be using some units the wrong way (harvesters will think they can shoot, deployable units will try to fire a weapon that only works in deployed mode, etc).

We have to define 4 different purchase lists for the bots per team:

• Offensive Infantry (place characters on this)
• Defensive Infantry (place characters on this)
• Engineering Infantry (place technicians, engineers, any repairing characters on this)
• Vehicles (place vehicles on this)

Scroll down to twiddlers.

These twiddlers might already exist and be usable, in which case you don't need to create new ones (check the available twiddlers, all lists for both teams must be present). If they already exist, and your map does not require to change the available bot units, skip this step.

First, let's create the Offensive Infantry twiddler for Allies. Select Twiddler and hit Temp or Add (as described at "Adjust bot presets").
Name it (e.g. BotInfantryAllied), then switch to the Settings tab.

Click Pick Presets. (edit list)
Select Object->Soldier in the Preset Type dropdown.
Now you need to add presets to this twiddler list. To add a preset, double click it in the Preset Pool. It should then appear in the Selected Preset(s) list.
You can remove the preset by double clicking it in the Selected Preset(s) list.
Add all the Allied/GDI infantry presets that you want bots to use. Remember: they all should have the MS_AI_Preferences script on them (you should have set these up in the previous step)!
Click OK then OK again to finish editing the Twiddler.

Create an offensive infantry twiddler for the other team as well (Soviets/Nod).
If you want the defensive infantry to choose from a different list, create lists for them too (otherwise they can just use the offensive list).
Also create a vehicle twiddler for both teams.
Lastly, create an engineering infantry twiddler for both teams (place soldier presets on this, ones that have weapons to repair buildings, don't put anything else on this list - in APB, these twiddlers contain only 2 presets, the Technician and the Engineer).

Note: bots spawn as the same preset players do (e.g. Rifle Soldiers). You don't need to add these startup units to the twiddlers!
You can add a preset multiple times to a twiddler. The more times a preset is on the list, the higher the chance the bot will use it (if it has enough credits for that preset).

If a barracks or war factory is destroyed, the presets now unavailable to players will also become unavailable to the bots automatically. These lists are merely for fine-controlling what bots are allowed to use, and you, the mapper can decide that.

Right, you are done with the lists!

3. Setup bot player controllers

You could now ask: "How will the bots appear on the map?" It's time to make that happen.

In the previous tutorial, we have placed our soldiers and vehicles (or their spawners) manually. This time we will make use of the same spawn positions where players start, so we don't have to define separate positions for the bots.

In this tutorial, all the bots will have a controller. This is a script that every bot will have a unique copy of, belonging only to them. It will keep track of available credits, help decide what is buyable and ultimately control the spawning and vehicle purchasing procedures.

The controller script for every bot is MS_AI_Player_Controller. We are not going to configure or create them manually, because that will be the job of a global bot controller script. But for the sake of tutorial completeness, and because they actually work individually too, you can read here what it can do:

To create the bot controllers and with it, spawn the bots, we will use the MS_AI_Player_Count_Controller script.
This script will create/delete the individual bot controllers, driven by MS_AI_Player_Controller.

First, create an invincible, editor-only preset. To do that, Temp the Object->Simple preset, set its model to o_davesarrow.w3d, make it have Blamo skin/shield on the Settings tab, and tick IsEditorObject.

Now go to the Scripts tab and attach the MS_AI_Player_Count_Controller script.
Set the Count parameter to 12, so you will have 6 bots per team ingame (feel free to change the count, this is just an example).
Set the next 8 parameters (4 lists for both teams) to the purchase twiddler preset names that were set up in the previous step.
(Leaving any list param as the default USEPLAYERPURCHASELISTS will make bots use all units from the purchase lists. Recommendation: set the Engineering ones at least or set them to AUTOENGINEER to make the game find infantry that can repair buildings automatically.)
Leave the last 2 parameters as default (USEPLAYERSPAWNERS), so the bots will start at the player spawn positions.
Alternatively, they can start at any object preset if you prefer them not to share spawning positions with players. In such case, set this param to the name of that object and make sure there is at least as many of these across your map as many bots should be able to play.

Note that the bots are aware of buildings being attacked and will switch to defensive/repair duties automatically.
Bots will be removed/added one by one as players join/leave the game, so the total sum of players ingame (Count) will be the number of human players and bot players added together. So if the Count parameter is set to 12, and there are 6 players ingame, then 6 bots will be spawned. If all those players leave, 6 new bots will appear one by one.

Finish editing your controller preset (OK) and place it somewhere/anywhere (Make).
Save and export your map. You should notice that bots will join the game and start buying available units.

Good job, you've got your bots setup to spawn, then buy infantry and vehicles!

4. Organize group attacks

Right now your bots act individually and never cooperate with eachother in a group rush, which are normally more effective. Teamwork is often needed for victory in team-based games such as APB and TSR to name a few.

So now let's teach bots how to do group attacks.

We will have to define gathering positions for both teams. Bots will "register" themselves for a group rush. At the gathering points, they will wait for eachother to catch up (some units are slower than others, some are faster than the average), before running to the next gathering point and then the next. After reaching the last point, they will all be "released" to do their primary objective. If many bots went together, this can be a massive attack on the enemy base with many infantry/vehicles. This rarely happens with individual attacks, so this is our goal with the group attack.

First let's create an invincible editor-only preset to be the "host" of the script we'll be using. Get the settings up like you did for the player count controller script, but without attaching that script.
Now, pick a position around the Allied/GDI base and place (Make) the preset there. Unlike before, we will attach the script on the placed objects this time. So double click the object you just placed, and attach MS_AI_Rally_Point on the Scripts tab.

Parameters:

• Team: 1 (Allied/GDI gathering point)
• NodeGroup: 0 (this is a gathering point/node in the attack route of index 0, there can be multiple attack routes in both teams, indexing is 0,1,2, etc.)
• NodeNum: 0 (this is a 0 indexed node in this attack route = the first gathering position, order indexing is 0,1,2, etc.)

If we stopped here, bots would gather at this position and then run to their primary objective (if the objectives are setup right, this should be the enemy base) without waiting for eachother. So if the objective is far away and the bots have different speed, this could make the group rush uneffective.

Now create another Rally Point the same way as before for Allies, somewhere inbetween the Allied and Soviet bases. So place another instance of your editor only preset, and attach MS_AI_Rally_Point, but this time, set NodeNum to 1 (bots will first run to Node 0, then to Node 1 and so on).
Place the last Rally Point next to the Soviet base, outside of the range of any existing defenses (otherwise they will get damaged while waiting). Set NodeNum to 2 to finish creating this attack route (the highest NodeNum is always the last position in a given attack route).

Now create 3 Rally Points for the Soviet/Nod bots as well. Do the same steps as before, but set Team to 0.

You can create more than 1 attack route for both teams so bots can use more of your map. For a second route, just create Rally Points and set the NodeGroup parameter of all belonging points to 1. If you define yet another attack route, set the NodeGroup to 2, and so on. Bots will randomly choose one attack route and carry on following your defined positions.

You also have the ability to randomize the gathering positions a bit. Let's say you have a NodeGroup 0 but want the first gathering position to be randomly chosen from 2 different positions. To do that, just place an object with NodeGroup 0 and NodeNum 0 twice, and move them to different positions. Bots will choose one of them randomly, and then move on to NodeNum 1 (for which you can also define multiple locations).

As for how the bots decide which one of them will join the group attack and when:
- There is only 1 grouprush per team at a time. 
- The first rush registration starts at mapstart and a new one starts when the current group reached the last Rally Point or if they all died while trying to get there.
- Once half of the bots on a team have registered for the rush (also a maximum limit of 8 bots), the registration closes and the bots will begin running towards the Rally Points.
- While the registration is open, all offensive bots will join it after spawning immediately.

Congratulations, you are done!

5. Optional: Bot names

You have probably noticed that all the bots have a nickname tag: "Bot". If you want them to have individual names, this is the section you are looking for.

Create a new text file, and name it bot_names.cfg.
Copy this into it:

[BotNames]

BotName0=[Bot]Benny

BotName1=[Bot]John

So far you have 2 special bot names set up (feel free to change those 2 names). Using the "BotNameX=Name" syntax (where X is an index number), you can set as many as you wish, but make sure the indexing starts with 0.

The AI Player Count Controller script will hand these names to the spawned bots randomly, but each name will only be given to just one bot at a time.
If there are more bots ingame than names, the rest of them will get the default "Bot" name.

You are done with everything now, please go and enjoy the bot battles you've just added to your map =)

Q & A

• My bots are acting weird when seeing enemies/getting within attack range. Why?
  • Make sure the primary weapon's Range it is using is always higher than the Max_Attack_Range script parameter.
     
• Bots refuse to attack my base defense/building. What did I do wrong?
  • If it's a Simple/Vehicle object:
    - Either attach the MS_AI_Building script to it, or
    - Create a file called bot_config.cfg. and put this into it:

    ; List simple objects, base defenses, etc. here that need bot repairs but you cannot attach the bot building
    ; script to them for some reason (e.g. old games, no level sources) or you are lazy to do it in LE/Mammoth
    ; Replace the names with your preset names that should be attacked/repaired by bots, you can have more.
    [BotTargets]
    Target0=my_base_defense
    Target1=my_random_building
    
    ; Uncomment the settings below if you wish the game to create w3d models at the objective/target locations.
    ; This way you can check if something is wrong.
    ; Replace the entries in TargetModel/DebugObjectiveModel with model names that exist in your game.
    [Debug]
    ;EnableBuildingTargetsDisplay=true
    ;BuildingTargetModel=v_spotlight
    ;BuildingDebugObjectiveModel=o_davesarrow

     

• Bots have super good accuracy, they are too hard to fight against. Is there a way to nerf them?
  • Increase the WeaponError value on the Settings tab of the preset. This will only affect bots, not players.

Skill level: 3

Welcome to the first chapter of the tutorials that will show you how to add and configure more sophisticated bots to your maps.

In this lesson, we will place a few very simple bots and give them objectives to do. They won't shoot regular base buildings or do anything too interesting for now.
Optionally, you can also learn how to fine tune objectives and bot behaviour.
 

- Wait, what are bots?!

Bots are computer controlled objects (characters, vehicles) that do a task given to them. They don't need an actual human player to control how they behave. The most typical bots in a lot of W3D games are the mobile resource collector vehicles (Ore Truck, Tiberium Harvester) and the static base defenses (turrets, pillboxes, obelisks, sam sites).

1. Setup bot presets

Start the Level Editor if you haven't already and open your project.
Make sure you have generated pathfinding!

In the preset tree, go to Objects -> Soldier, and click on a soldier preset you would like to appear on your map as a bot.
Then, click Temp.
(Note: if you are making a .mix map for a game, always use Temp to add new presets. If you are editing a game core so the presets are available on every map in the game, use Add! In case you are creating a standalone .pkg map, you can use both.)

Give this new preset a name (for example MyAwesomeBot).

We will use a script to apply the AI. Switch to the Scripts tab.
Add the script MS_AI_Behaviour to the list and hit OK. Don't modify the parameters for now.

Click OK again to finish your new bot preset.

Create another temp preset by doing the same steps again, but this time, pick a soldier preset from the other team, so they can fight eachother.
If you want to go a little further, pick 1-1 vehicle preset as well for both teams and do the same steps to have a few bot vehicle presets set up.

Now that you have the presets ready, let's place them. Click on each preset and hit Make. You can move them around after placing to change their position. I recommend you place the bots into their own bases, but at least keep the two teams away from eachother if there are no bases on your map.


If you want the bots to respawn after dying, you'll need to create spawners. Please read the spawner tutorial here.
(You will need to place new spawners and delete the placed presets, since the spawners will create them dynamically.)

You're done setting up and placing your bots!
 

2. Add AI Objectives

Without objectives, bots will just wander around the position where they started and shoot enemies they see. You will want to give them objectives to run to and find, positions to defend, buildings or vehicles to attack. This is done by creating AI Objectives.

Alright, you have your bots sitting in their bases. If you export and play your map now, the bots will shoot enemies that get close to them, but they will not do anything specific otherwise. To change this, we will tell them to run into the enemy base!

First, let's create an objective for Team 1. For this tutorial, this is going to be the Allied team, while Team 0 is the Soviets.
On the preset list, scroll down to Simple and Temp it.
Give it a name, e.g. MarkerObjectiveAllied.
On the Physics Model tab, pick a w3d model's ModelName, e.g. o_davesarrow.w3d.

Go to the Settings tab, make sure IsEditorObject is ticked, so this model can only be seen in LevelEdit. 
Also make sure the object cannot die, set the Skin and Shield Type to Blamo (if there is no Blamo, pick one that is invulnerable to attacks).

Switch to the Scripts tab and attach the script dp88_AI_Objective. This is the marker that tells bots "Come closer, your objective is here!"
The preset we are creating is the "host" of the objective script, we will place it somewhere on the level so bots know where the objective is. Note that this is not the target that they will shoot, just a go-to location. This particular objective will be permanent and will not change position during the game.

Now, set up the parameters like so:

• Team: 1 (= Allies/GDI)
• Type: 1 (= Offensive)
• Range: 15
• Priority_Soldier/Light_Vehicle/Heavy_Vehicle/Aircraft: 1 (set all of them to 1)

Place this marker in the Soviet/Nod base somewhere on open ground (not inside a building). Now the Allied bots will know where the Soviet base is, and they will keep running here.

What about the Soviets, you might ask? Well, let's not let them down, and add an objective for them too.
Do the same steps you did for the Allied objective, but this time, make sure the Team parameter is 0 and that you place the object in the Allied base.

Good job! If you go ingame now, the bots will run to eachother's base and shoot enemy characters and vehicles.

3. Optional: Dynamic AI Objectives, Priorities

Static objectives, the ones we placed is one thing, but let's see what else we can do here.

In LevelEdit, place any vehicle object or vehicle spawner on your map, so that you can drive the vehicle ingame.
Now, double click to edit the vehicle object that you placed in the scene, or edit its preset in the preset tree (only if it's a Temp preset!).
Add the dp88_AI_Objective script for Team 1 on the Scripts tab with the same parameters as before, but change the Priority_Soldier parameter to 100.
Head ingame and test your map, play as Soviets (team 0). Enter the vehicle you edited and drive around ingame, somewhere away from your base. You will notice that the Allied soldier bots will run after your vehicle and find you no matter where you are (as long as you are within the pathfind grid).

Now you know how to tell bots to find a moving object. This can be very useful if you know what you want to do in your map/game. 
If there are multiple objectives for the same team on a map, the bots will consider 2 things:

• What's the priority of the objective? If two objectives are roughly the same distance away, the higher priority one will be picked.
• How far is it from their current location? If two objectives have the same priority, the one that's closer will be picked.

After analyzing, each bot will choose the optimal objective. For example, they will most likely pick an objective 10 meters away with priority 1 instead of another one 100 meters away with priority 2.

If the priority calculation for a particular objective ends up being negative (e.g. priority too low or distance too high), it will be treated as a 0.0001 priority objective (so it's positive). Keep this in mind when setting priorities for multiple objectives, as they can end up being the same value.

Note: after a bot chooses an objective, it will not change it, not even if a higher priority one appears. It will keep its chosen objective as long as the script-wielding object is alive or until dp88_AI_Objective is removed from it by other scripts.

4. Optional: Bot Targeting Priorities

Remember in the first steps, when we attached the script MS_AI_Behaviour but did not touch the parameters? Let's look at them now.

The priority system was created by @danpaul88, and lets you tell your bots what to shoot, how to shoot them, and in case of multiple targets, which one to shoot at first. MS_AI_Behaviour implements this system.

Quote

The AI uses a priority based system to 'intelligently' pick targets based upon a range of criteria such as the type of target, how far away it is, if it's already taken damage and how valuable it is. All of these criteria can be fine tuned in the script parameters to give you a high degree of control over which of several targets an AI will choose to shoot at.

The full description of the parameter list is here:

• Priority_Infantry: Base targetting priority for infantry targets, or 0 to ignore infantry
• Weapon_Infantry: Weapon to use against infantry targets: 1 for primary fire, 2 for secondary fire
• Splash_Infantry: Determines if we should try to damage infantry with splash instead of hitting them directly. This is useful for slow / inaccurate weapons which do splash damage: 1 to enable, 0 to disable
• Priority_Light_Vehicle: Base targetting priority for light vehicle targets, or 0 to ignore light vehicles
• Weapon_Light_Vehicle: Weapon to use against light vehicle targets: 1 for primary fire, 2 for secondary fire
• Priority_Heavy_Vehicle: Base targetting priority for heavy vehicle targets, or 0 to ignore heavy vehicles
• Weapon_Heavy_Vehicle: Weapon to use against heavy vehicle targets: 1 for primary fire, 2 for secondary fire
• Priority_VTOL: Base targetting priority for flying targets, or 0 to ignore flying targets
• Weapon_VTOL: Weapon to use against flying targets: 1 for primary fire, 2 for secondary fire
• Priority_Building: Base targetting priority for building targets, or 0 to ignore building targets
• Weapon_Building: Weapon to use against building targets: 1 for primary fire, 2 for secondary fire
• Max_Attack_Range: Maximum distance at which the unit can engage enemies when using primary fire
• Min_Attack_Range: Minimum distance at which the unit can engage enemies when using primary fire
• Preferred_Attack_Range: Preferred minimal distance, the unit will try to move within this range when using primary fire
• Max_Attack_Range_Secondary: Maximum distance at which the unit can engage enemies when using secondary fire
• Min_Attack_Range_Secondary: Minimum distance at which the unit can engage enemies when using secondary fire
• Preferred_Attack_Range_Secondary: Preferred minimal distance, the unit will try to move within this range when using secondary fire
• Modifier_Distance: Priority modification to apply based on distance to target. Higher values will favour targets which are closer to the unit, good for less accurate weapons and slow vehicles
• Modifier_Target_Damage: Priority modification to apply based on damage a target has already sustained. Higher values will favour targets which have already been damaged in combat, picking them off first
• Modifier_Target_Value: Priority modification to apply based on the value of the target. Higher values will favour targets with a higher purchase cost, good for hard hitting weapons
• DebugDeprecated: No longer in use
• Detects_Stealth: Determine whether this unit can detect stealthed enemies or not: 1 to enable, 0 to disable
• ObjectiveType: What type of objectives this unit will run for, valid values are 1 (Offensive), 2 (Defensive) or 3 (Engineering).

All non-flying vehicles are treated as light vehicle unless they have one of the marker scripts on them: 

1. dp88_AI_Marker_HeavyVehicle - Bots will use the Heavy_Vehicle preferences against them
2. dp88_AI_Marker_Building - Bots will use the Building preferences against them
3. dp88_AI_Marker_Repairable - All bots except Engineering bot types will ignore them

It is important to know that NEGATIVE PRIORITY is usable for any target type. The more negative a type priority is, the more chance the bot will pick that as the target. When this happens, the bot will still shoot these targets, but they will keep running towards their objective and will not chase them.
Here's an example: Object A: priority = 1 and Object B: priority = -2 ---> object B will be shot and the bot will move towards its main objective. 
If a target type should not be targeted at all, then you should use 0 as the priority value.

For practice, try configuring rifle soldiers so that they will prefer shooting soldiers even when vehicles are within their sight range.
Make tanks shoot other vehicles first and not chase soldiers (negative priority). Make them ignore aircraft.
Last, come up with something that makes sense for a unit. E.g. anti-tank infantry, anti-aircraft vehicles, etc. Play with the priority parameters until you are happy with your bot behaviours.

Please keep in mind that Objective Priorities and Target Priorities are completely separate things, even though both are affected by the Modifier_Distance parameter. Objective Priorities are for telling bots where to run when there are no targets around to chase, while Target Priorities are frequent calculations of enemies that the bot currently sees, and decides which ones to shoot/chase.

That's it for the first lesson, now you should have a basic knowledge of how the new bot system works.

Skill level: 1

This tutorial will show you how to add an mp3 format music to your level.

1. Add the music to the preset tree

If you wish to use a music that is already on the preset tree, skip this step.

Grab your mp3 music file and copy it into the LE folder of the level you want to add it to.

Now start the Editor and browse the preset tree down to Sound. Click that and hit Temp.

Name your sound preset to whatever you like and then switch to the Settings tab.

Now browse your sound file from your project's folder.

Make sure that

• Max-Vol and Drop-off Radius are really high values, and Max-Vol is always smaller than Drop-off
• Is 3D Sound is ticked OFF
• The m_LoopCount is 0 so that it will repeat
• m_Type is Music

Click OK and the music should appear on your preset tree.

2. Place the music on the level

Click the music preset you wish to use (e.g. the one you just created) and hit Make to place it anywhere.

(If you've set the Max-Vol and Drop-off Radious values on the preset high enough you can place them almost anywhere and everyone will still hear it. If those values are low, the music won't be heard from a longer distance away from the position you placed it.)

Yes it's that easy to place the music, that was all.

3. Finish

Export your map as mix/mod package and play it ingame. You should hear the music.

Q & A

Q: Why do I have to do all this, when Edit -> Background Settings has a Music tab where I can simply add one?

A: That only works on single player maps and/or if you are the server/host. Other players in multiplayer will not hear the music if you set it up like that.

Q: Help! My music is not repeating!

A: Try importing your music into Audacity (free sound editor software) and reexport the music as mp3 from that. If it still doesn't work, change Options to export it at 128 kbps, that should work for sure.

Skill level: 2

RenX Stage

OK This tutorial goes through how to make the realistic water from the link below, translucent. So I'm guessing you've already set up the water plane with the tutorial below *Hint*

Realistic water tutorial

OK so select the plane you want translucent. Hit 'M' to bring up the material editor. Firstly in the properties tab, make sure you have ticked static sorting and set it to 1 (should do this by default) Otherwise the water will seem to flicker at different angles. Also set the material type as "Water Permeable", so projectiles go through it. There should be two passes from where you set up the realistic water from the tutorial linked above.

Click on 'Pass 1', then 'Shader' and change blend mode to 'Alpha Blend'. Leave everything else.

Click on the little TV screen. Scroll down to find 'Vertex Colours'. Check this. Click on 'Shaded', This will mean in the next step when you colour the vertices they will change colour in renX. (just helps to see)

Change to edit vertices so the little blue cubes appear. Select the cubes in the areas you want translucent (or select all if you want it all translucent)

Scroll down to 'Surface Properties'. Click on colour and change the colour to Grey (halfway) This will make the water translucent but will still keep the water effects (i.e. not make it completely translucent)

Click on the hammer to see the W3D settings. Open up W3d export settings and click 'vAlpha' so that the game renders the alpha blend (and so makes it translucent) If its the sea your doing, click 'vehicle' so boats and subs can use it. Also click 'projectile' so projectiles leave splashes, but make sure the water is set to 'water permeable', otherwise boats can't hit subs.

Notes

When making a level in renX, anything that is made translucent like in this tutorial must be saved on its own as a different file, and deleted out of the original file.

I.e.

'MyMap' would contain all the terrain etc, but the water deleted.

'MyMapWater' Would only contain the water from 'MyMap', no terrain.

LE Stage

Now when you go into LE and 'make' the ground and water separately, both can be toggled hidden within LE. When you are ready to compute vertex solve, click the instances tab and deselect 'MyMapWater'. This will 'hide' the water in the level in LE. Now compute vertex solve while the water is hidden. Once the lighting is done, check 'MyMapWater' again to show the water. Save. Export to mix.

If you do compute vertex solve with water on your map in LE, it will turn white.

Many thanks to Raapnaap - For basically showing me how to do this, so he deserves most credit. I just wrote it up and took pics to help other people.

r34ch

Skill level: 2

This tutorial will show you how to create a custom shaped script zone because inside LevelEdit you can only create box shaped ones.

In Reborn, this technique is used to define underwater zones and areas where Sub-APCs and Devils Tongue vehicles can not dig/surface.

1. Create the zone model

Launch GMax-RenX or 3ds Max.

Create a model that will be the shape of your script zone. It must be a convex shape. The faces can look inwards or outwards it does not matter. Here's mine:

Tick Physical at Collision Options (Utilities tab -> W3D Tools).

If your custom shaped zone is map specific, you must position it perfectly in 3d space to where it should be on your map. For example, I made an underwater zone and positioned it at the lake:

Now export this single zone model (hide/delete everything else in the scene) as W3D format, Terrain type.

2. Add the zone in LevelEdit

In LE, browse down to Object -> Script Zone, and Temp that or any other zone you prefer to copy initial settings from.

Name it then switch to the Settings tab.

Browse your script zone's model at ModelName and point it to the zone w3d file you just exported:

The rest of the settings is up to you, along with the scripts tab if you wish to add extra script effects. Note that if CheckStarsOnly is enabled, the zone will only affect players and not bots. Up to you to tick it or not.

Hit OK to finish creating/modding the script zone.

3. Placing the script zone

Place the script zone by clicking Make.

Set its position to the origin of the map by double clicking on the zone, going to the Position tab and changing the x, y, and z positions to 0. Then click OK.

You don't need to change its rotation or size, the shape that appears when you hit Make will be replaced by the custom shape you created earlier.

Have fun with your new custom shaped zone  

Note: from engine version 5.0 onwards, custom shaped script zones can be moved away from the origin (0,0,0) world location. This means they can be proxied by buildings and are not restricted to be exported individually on every map when buildings want to use them.

Skill level: 3

This tutorial will guide you through the generic steps to make a typical C&C mode map with buildings work.

It does not cover how to model a map in GMax-RenX/3ds Max but does give an insight into Heightfield as an alternate way to shape a map.

Placing your buildings

To get buildings on your map you first need to position them in GMax-RenX or 3ds Max.

For that you need to download the buildings.

Renegade Buildings

Reborn Buildings BROKEN LINK

Merge them onto your map (File -> Merge, select the buildings, add to scene).

It should look something like this:

Now position them where you wish and modify your terrain around them to match their exterior's shapes (almost all of the building interiors have their own floor so make sure you have no terrain under them!)

Note: if you wish to make your terrain in LevelEdit's Heightfield, you only need to position your buildings and not create any terrain here.

Then Export the file, just like this:

Save your File: (in your mod Directory IE C:\Program Files\RenegadePublicTools\LevelEdit\Tutorial_work).

Make sure it is .W3D filetype.

Click Renegade Terrain and hit OK

Adding your buildings in LevelEdit

Start Level Edit, and click on the Preset "Terrain" and hit Temp. On the popup window's General tab, name your new preset (e.g. myterrain, mybuildings, etc).

On the Settings tab, click the directory icon next to m_ModelName and select the W3D file you just exported.

Leave m_LightFilename empty and hit OK.

Select your new preset and hit Make

Optional: Add a Heightfield map

If you did NOT export a map along with the buildings, you have to create a heightfield level.

Otherwise, skip this part.

Switch to the Heightfield tab and click Create New:

Set your dimensions (or keep them as default) and hit OK.

Click Material Settings

Select a tga format texture file from your mods's Level Edit folder and make the settings similar to this then hit OK:

Now your new heightfield terrain should appear under your buildings like so:

Optional: Working with Heightfield

If you haven't created a Heightfield for your level (because you created your map in GMax-RenX/3ds Max), skip this part.

Creating hills

NOTE: save before making height fields, you can't undo them. Save often, because if a mountain goes into a building, you'll never get it level again.

Pick a spot, anywhere you want a hill:

Make sure your setting are like this (Heightfield tab):

Click this button to affect the Heightfield:

Now click and hold your mouse to create cliffs/mounds. Right-click to decrease the height.

Adding extra textures

Use this same technique to add other textures to maps (switch Brush Type to Texture Paint).

Make sure you use an empty material box for each texture.

Tiberium Field

Just add this texture, set it to tiberium field (it will damage people walking into it)

Making the buildings functional

Every building needs its own, unique building controller to function properly.

(Building controllers are under the Preset tab -> Buildings in different "folders", usually named bld_name or mp_name. Click on the appropriate one and hit Make to place it. These are not visible ingame, only in the editor.)

This example will show how to set up the buildings in Renegade but most of them work the same way in other games too.

Advanced Guard Tower

Put the building controller on top like this:

The Advanced Guard Tower controller is under generic buildings, make sure you use the one called "mp_GDI_Advanced_Guard_Tower" on it.

Barracks

Power Plant

Refinery

Refineries are setup different. Placing the controller alone is not enough. Select the controller and hit CTRL+P to add and position the Car Marker:

Weapons Factory

The GDI Weapons Factory has a door that blocks you from placing the Car Marker inside.

To move that out of the way, click Edit -> Terrain Selectable (must be ticked)

Click on the Weapons Factory door and then Unlock it:

Hold CTRL + SHIFT and the up arrow to make it move up, just hold shift and the up arrow to make it go up slower.

Select the WarFactory controller, Hit CTRL + P again to make the Car Creator, and place it in the middle of the war factory, make sure its centered on all side so its in the middle.

Now make a Vehicle Construction Zone:

This makes it so people will die, if they are in this zone while a Vehicle is created (but the vehicle needs it too to drive out from the bay on its own so don't skip placing it!).

Strech it out by clicking on the black box in the corner (Shift-drag to stretch it upwards).

Put the door back (hit Enter while it's selected to lock it again), and also make the terrain un-selectable, by unchecking it under Edit.

Create Waypoints

They are under waypaths, and use the Vehicle Only Waypath,

Hit make and draw three points, hit esc to stop drawing them.

make three paths just like this:

then slide the three nodes a little more under the door, make it close to the car maker.

Double click one of the nodes, NOT the whole strand, just one node, and select these options.

Obelisk

Place the controller to the very top tip of the Obelisk and then double click it. On the Position tab, make the Z coordinate 41 meters smaller so it will appear UNDER the building.

Airstrip

Make the airstrip look like this, use the same technique as on the gdi side.

Make sure the car maker is facing the way the arrow is.

Also make the top 3 nodes closer to the carmaker than shown in my pic.

Tiberium fields

Now you need to place Tiberium Zones:

Make one for GDI, and one for Nod.

A tiberium field should be equal distance from each base, or make each base have its own.

Make a waypoint from one of the paths coming out of the Weapons Factory and Airstrip. Make the waypath go to the tiberium field. (its only one way, you dont have to draw it there and back, only there).

Also give this waypath the same settings as before, by double clicking one of the nodes.

Now make a waypath from the Tiberium Refinery to the field. Again, only one way, you dont have to draw it back. And also give this path the same settings as before.

Spawners and PTs

TS: Reborn has the PTs and Spawners placed already from the imported w3d building files. So if you are making a Reborn map, you can skip this step.

Go into a building, and find a pt. you have to do this for every Pt and Every Spawner, if you are setting up a Renegade map.

Find the PT object on the preset list and hit Make:

Position it over the PT model:

Now place some Spawners to where the players will start (next to PTs):

Position and rotate them so they face the PT object. This will make players face the PT immediately after they spawn.

Now redo this step for every single PT in the level

Generate Pathfind for AI Harvesters

If you don't already have one, place a Human Pathfind Generator somewhere (preferably close to Refinery, you can also place one at both refineries)

Now click Pathfinding -> Generate Sectors.

This can take a long time depending on the map size, sit back or take a break until it finishes.

Thats it, export your map and have fun!

Skill level: 6

This tutorial shows you how to add VIS to your map (objects that the players can't see from certain angles will not be rendered for them, increasing the Frames Per Second for the players).

Content:

1.1 Introduction

1.2 Getting Started

2.1 Getting the VIS sectors done

2.2 Important VIS sector notesTHE PLAYER in THIRD PERSON

2.3 Important VIS sector notesTHE PLAYER in a VEHICLE

2.4 VIS Sectors on a map with FLYING UNITS ENABLED

2.5 My personal VIS set up recommendations/known VIS issues

3.1 Getting VIS set up in the Commando Level Editor

3.2 Detailed Manual VIS point placement

3.3 VIS troubleshooting

3.4 Retouching VIS after the fact

4.1 Additional hints and tips

5.1 Credits

1.1 Introduction

So youre creating a map and you want your map to be played by as many people as possible? Whats the best way to do this? Make sure that the map gives the best performance as possible! Whats one way to do this? Get VIS set up on your map!

VIS is short for VISibility, as far as I know. Its Renegades way of speeding up performance on their huge single player levels and on their online multiplayer maps. By way of invisible meshes called VIS sectors located all over the map, each sector has its own data on what can and cannot be seen from that particular pointso for example, if youre inside the Hand of Nod your computer wont waste time rendering the inside of the GDI Barracks (with proper VIS data), or the barracks period if you cant even see it. The end result saves your video card and CPU from processing useless data and can leave it to focus on whats importantwhats right around you.

Now, setting up VIS properly can be time consuming, and most smaller maps should do fine without it, says Greg Hjelstrom, lead programmer for Renegade. On bigger, higher poly maps, though, VIS is a mustand if there are parts of your map where the FPS drops dramatically, youll want to seriously consider setting up VIS for your map. Besides, all of WWs maps have a VIS system in place!

1.2 Getting started

I assume youve downloaded the Renegade Public Tools. Navigate to your Program Files > Renegade Public Tools > HowTo > Multiplayer Maps > mp_hourglass folder. Open the mp_hourglass.gmax scene in RenX. Hit the Select by Name button and select everything in this diagram. Hide them after theyre selected. Everything thats left is the VIS group. Ungroup it.

Here are the VIS sectors for the map Hourglass. Notice the important characteristics that these VIS sectors share:

• Most every POLYGON on the map has been cloned into separate individual VIS sectors. A VIS sector is basically a hidden mesh with the VIS option checked in the W3D options. See diagram.
• Each VIS sector is hidden.
• Each VIS sector is located a meter or two below the actual terrain.
• The VIS sectors are located in every place the player, whether on foot or in a vehicle, can move (actually, every place where the players CAMERA can movemore on this later).
• The VIS sectors are not one huge mesh.

2.1 Getting the VIS sectors done

This is probably the most tedious part of the processif you do it right. I personally recommend getting your VIS sectors done before you texture your terrain, as hundreds of tiny meshes with a material texture assigned to them take longer to load than hundreds of tiny meshes with NO textured assigned to them.

The lazy way to do it would be to clone your terrain ground and Explode it. Select your terrain, clone it, select all of the faces of your mesh by hitting the ELEMENT selection button, click your terrain, scroll down to the Explode box in the Editable Mesh tab, set the number by the button to 0.0, and hit explode. Pick a name for your exploded meshes, and hit OK. See Diagram.

Now, I no longer recommend this method because (1) you can end up with thousands of VIS sectorsmeaning thousands of unnecessary VIS sample points, and (2) WW doesnt do this. The Explode function separates a mesh, when set to 0, into individual triangle FACES, which are not only awkward VIS sectors, but unnecessary.

Detaching your VIS sectors manually may take a lot more time, but it could save your VIS system from crumbling entirely when you try to Auto-Generate the VIS for your entire map (i.e., LevelEdit crashing when trying to Build the VIS sample points). If you notice on the Hourglass gmax scene, youll notice that WW did not explode their VIS sectorsthey selected a polygon or two, hit the DETACH button, and gave it a name. You could end up with hundreds of sectors, but not thousands upon thousands compared with using the explode method.

Give your VIS sectors a unique name followed by a number, so when it comes time to Select them all you can easily assign the VIS sector W3d propertiesHIDE and VIS. Group all of your VIS Sectors, and lower them all by two meters along the Z-axis.

2.2 Important VIS sector notes - THE PLAYER in THIRD PERSON

Its not where the player currently is thats important in the VIS culling systemits where the CAMERA is located. See diagram. When the Player is in first person mode, the camera is located exactly where the player is standing. When the Player is in third person or inside a Vehicle, that is no longer the case.

By looking at the crude diagram Ive supplied, consider this: the camera is always BEHIND the player depending on the direction the player is looking and the camera swings around the player as the player moves the mouse. This may be obvious, but you may not have consciously realized this.

Also consider these situations:

First diagram: the player has backed up against a wall that has the PHYSICAL and CAMERA w3d characteristics checked. The players camera cannot move beyond the wall, so when the player is perfectly against the wall the player is also smashed against the camera so the players view is probably obstructed by the players character model. The VIS sector in green, in this case, is fine. This case also applies if the wall slants at an ACUTE angle against the ground.

Second diagram: the player has backed against a wall that has the Physical and Camera w3d characteristics checked. The wall slants backwards against the ground at a degree greater than 90 degrees (pretend its a mountain or something). The VIS sector ends at the base of the wall, but since the wall slants backwards so that the players camera can move beyond the VIS sector, the VIS sector MUST be extended PAST the wall. As you can see by the Red camera circle in the diagram, the players camera has moved out of the VIS sector. Whenever the players camera stumbles outside of any VIS sector, nothing could happenor everything could turn invisible for the player (a VIS glitch).

Third diagram: the player has backed against an INVISIBLE barrier that blocks the player from falling off the cliff, but the invisible barrier does (and should not) have the CAMERA w3d property selected. The players camera has moved past the invisible barrier and the cliff itself! However, because the VIS sectors extend past the cliff, the player should experience no VIS glitches when this situation is encountered in game.

Now, in the gmax scene, we can put these situations to the test. Study this diagram. Get the picture now?

2.3 Important VIS sector notesTHE PLAYER inside a VEHICLE

Fire up Level Edit, load the map UNDER, and click the SHOW VIS SECTORS button. See diagram. Enter walkthrough mode, change the camera to third person, and escape walkthrough mode. Click the Camera menu, and click on GDI_Mammoth_Tank. Enter the walkthrough mode againsee something different? This is how you can walk around the map in your own virtual mammoth tank, minus the model and the speed.

When you make your VIS sectors, you must not only consider the FIRST and THIRD person camerasyou must also consider the VEHICLE cameras.

If you remember from the crude Camera diagram, the vehicle camera travels around a much larger radius than the Third Person camera. Walk around the map Under with the mammoth tank Camera. You may also want to consider using the camera Nod_Apache if you have flying units on the map. It swings on the widest radius possible--so it is even larger than GDI_Mammoth camera. Youll notice the green highlighted VIS Sectors as you walk around. If you ever have a landmark ramp like on under, youll have to make sure your VIS sectors extend beyond the physical ramp beyond a much larger area, but ONLY if a vehicle can get up there. Youll probably only have to test using the Mammoth Tank camera, because I believe that is the camera that circles the largest radiusso if you have the Mammoth tank camera covered, you have the rest of the vehicles covered. (The Nod_Mobile_artillery camera appears to be larger, but it seems pretty obsolete since if you look up the Havoc model gets in your waythis was patched with the flying path.) Youll want to consider making sure the player cant get too close to the edge, or rely on the player not getting so close to the edge that they fall off!

2.4 VIS Sectors on a map with FLYING UNITS ENABLED

When you have flying units enabled, you must have additional layers of VIS sectors in addition to the VIS sectors you have on the ground. Each VIS layer should be separated 10 meters on the Z axis. See diagram. Hopefully you wont have this many VIS layers, but you should get the idea. You should continue to have VIS layers until you hit the flight roof.

The 10 meters number is directly dependant on the VIS Sample height that you can increase/decrease in Level Edit. 10 meters is the default, but increasing this number, while it can cut down on VIS layers, it will vastly increase the auto-generate VIS processing time. I recommend leaving the VIS sample height at the default. More on this later.

Consider what WW did apparently on C&C_City_Flying. It was mostly likely because the team was short on time, but WW basically added square VIS sectors 30x30 each all over the map, even in areas where there were already VIS sectors. Since WW seems to have gotten this to work, perhaps you can too. According to the diagram, there are four layers of VIS sectors, each layer covering the entire map. The first layer seems to have been made from scratch, and each additional layer was cloned from the first.

This could get complicated, but Ill leave it up to you to get things doneI dont have anymore specific advice on making VIS sectors for flying maps.

2.5 My personal VIS set up recommendations/known VIS issues

The GDI/Nod Power plants need to have additional VIS set up on themthe default VIS sectors arefaulty. Even if you arent going to include flying units on your map, locate the FLYING_BUILDINGS_SETUP.gmax available on the WW FTP and merge the GDI and Nod Power plants onto your own map. They include the necessary VIS that youll need if you do not have terrain under your buildings (you have holes cut out of your terrain to specially fit each building, like WW does).

I recommend adding VIS sectors outside of the windows of the Hand of Nod. They are common places for VIS glitches. See diagram, except do this for all the windows.

3.1 Getting VIS set up in the Commando Level Editor

So youve finally gotten your VIS sectors done in gmaxnow youre ready for the work in Level Edit!

Make sure youve generated your Pathfind sectors and whatnot, so the Human Pathfind Generator is already on the map. See diagram.

First, go to the VIS menu and DISCARD VIS DATA.

Next, go to the Edit Menu and REPARTITION THE CULLING SYSTEMS.

Third, go back to the VIS menu and BUILD THE DYNAMIC CULLING SYSTEM. This step will take a little while.

Fourth, go take a nap or something while this is chugging away. Go to the VIS menu, and hit Auto Generate VIS. In the dialog that pops up, set the Granularity to 5 (my personal recommendation). I recommend 5 because this could save you a vast amount of time while checking for VIS glitches

Fifth, walk around the map, look for VIS glitches, and take MANUAL VIS point samples.

3.2 Detailed Manual VIS Point placement

The auto-generate VIS function is not going to be perfectyoull have to walk around the map and check for VIS glitches. Over my experience here are common places where VIS glitches occur:

• The doorways at every building
• The Hand of Nod interior looking out through the windows
• The GDI Advanced Guard tower just as you enter through the doorway
• Tunnel entrances
• The roofs and ramps of the buildings on Flying maps

When you find a VIS glitch, hit CTRL + ~ to take a manual VIS point sample. The invisible object that should be visible should become visible. See diagram.

Here is before; notice the obvious VIS glitch?

After hitting CTRL + ~, pay attention to the status window at the bottomhere is the after result:

I think you should get the idea now. Run around the map, around the areas I suggested, and check for VIS glitches.

3.3 VIS troubleshooting

Q: Im trying to fix this VIS glitch, but I keep getting a BACKFACE LEAK OVERFLOW ERROR!

This means there is a BACKFACE at that particular point. Backfaces prevent the VIS sampling system from generating a VIS sample, because the VIS system thinks the player is in an invalid location (i.e., under a mountain) and wont generate a sample. See diagram.

To show backfaces, hit the SHOW backface button. Everything that appears in BRIGHT GREEN is a backface. According to Greg Hjelstrom, the VIS system needs there for not to be any backfaces, or a very tiny amount, because this saves the VIS system from performing needless processing.

To fix the backface problem, go to the VIS menu and hit VIEW VIS window. Try the manual VIS point sample againthis is when something should appear in the VIS window. Move the mouse around the window until you see BACKFACE! Go to the instances tab and locate the particular mesh that has the backface exposed. Clear the checkmark by it and try to do the VIS sample again. This should fix the VIS glitch.

However, if this method cannot solve the VIS glitch, or if hiding that mesh with the backface makes something turn invisible that you dont want to turn invisible, you will have to go back to gmax and fix the problem manuallythis means youll have to start the VIS process in Level Edit ALL OVER AGAIN, so as you work, use the Toggle backfaces button often and be mindful of backfaces on the battlefield!

Q: I keep getting a Vis Sample Rejected - No Vis Sector or Vis Sector ID not assigned! error!

If the VIS glitch is severe, you will have to go back to gmax and add a new VIS sector to that location. You will have to start the VIS process in Level edit all over again. Study section 2 again, as this is probably most likely the culprit behind your VIS glitch problem.

3.4 Retouching VIS after the fact

After exporting your map, and after youve closed Level Edit, should you find more VIS glitches in game, reopen your map in Level Edit and fix the VIS glitch. Before you save your level again, make sure you go to the EDIT menu and REPARTITION the CULLING systemsthis is very important, if you dont do this, the VIS data could be COUNTER-PRODUCTIVE and actually SLOW down the players FPS. Do this every time before you export your level again, and your arduous VIS work will pay off.

4.1 Additional hints and tips

Use the wireframe mode as you move around, then hit F9 and toggle it back and forth before adding a VIS sample. You can totally customize the way VIS samples are taken this way, by making sure that only a needed sample is taken that doesn`t show more polygons than are actually visible to the player. Use wireframe because it can tell you when something is disappearing and lets you see how the VIS is working in the specific level. You can see things way off in the distance just become totally obscured by the VIS engine as you run around, and you can see the interiors of the bases start coming into view as you move towards each base.

Use the other camera views, like varying tank views, so you can fix issues the same way with vehicles, too.

Other points about hills. Say you`ve got a lot of hilly terrain on your map. It`s my theory that the VIS auto-generate sample seems to be based on the first person camera.

If you open up Hourglass I think you`ll notice all of the manual VIS points high in the air over the hill. If you switch to the first, or even third, person camera while on the hill, you`ll notice you won`t see a lot from the hill. But change to a vehicle camera you`ll see a lot more--but apparently the auto-generate VIS sample doesn`t consider the vehicle cameras. It appears that VIS glitches are common with a land form like the hill on Hourglass, or even on a smaller scale, if you have a sharp, sudden rise in elevation several meshes over the hill might be accidentally turned invisible by the VIS sample.

So, if you`ve got a lot of hilly terrain, like Hourglass, on a smaller scale, be sure to walk around with the vehicle camera and check for VIS glitches.

If you move your view below the map, and "unhide" all the VIS layers, it seems to go MUCH faster with high settings on the granularity and flight ceiling.

5.1 Credits

Written by YSLMuffins

Additional notes by Dante and Aircraftkiller

HTML Formatting by General Havoc

Skill level: 2

This tutorial shows an alternate approach of shaping up the basics of a map in GMax-RenX/3ds Max.

Make Terrain Without Modeling It!

Bored of Making Maps/Terrain? Well Now With my Tutorial I Have Made It Sooo Much Easier, And It Dont Take An Expert To Do.

This Tutorial Will Learn You How To Make Easy Terrain Just By Using Your Favourite Paint Package, PSP/Photoshop/Paint Or Whatever.

Right Reset RenX/Gmax By File>Reset

Right, Now Create a `Quad Patch` Object (In Standard Primitives Dropdown Box)

For Example Create One 200X200 And Units With 10 Segs In Both The Length And Width. See Below:

Now Its Time To Create The Terrain.

Ok, Now Open Your Favorite Paint Program And Make A New Image It Doesn`t Need To Be Hi-Res For This I Used 200X200.

Make Sure The Background Colour Is Black And Then Choose Your Brush Tool And Change Its Properties To The Lowest/Hardness And Opacity.

Make The Brush Whatever Size You Want And Now Just Scribble Or Make A Really Detailed Picture, Up To You.

This Is What I Made:

Make Sure That You Save The File As A .BMP

Now Under Modifiers Go Down To Parametric Deformers And Then Choose "Displace"

Set strength to 100 and click the bitmap box (it should say none) now select the BMP file that you just saved

Finished:

And That`s It! Remember This is a beginners tutorial, keep practicing and mess around with the settings and maybe u could make some excellent map, without actually modeling it....anyway ..that`s it .

moonsense715:

Obviously, it's a very rough shape that you get. Try smoothing it out or relaxing the outstanding vertexes to make the "cliffs" look less extreme and you might have a good map start that you can continue working on after converting it to Editable Mesh/Poly.

Skill level: 2

This tutorial shows you how to add extremely basic bots to your map.

1. Open leveledit to your desired map.

2. goto (on your presets tab) Objects ~ Spawners ~ Object Spawners, Temp the "Object Spawners"

3. Name the new Temp, whatever you want to call your bot ~ then hit ok. Now goto Soldier ~ Soldier_Presets ~

and select any of the players to use as a bot. Temp the soldier, and name it whatever you want your bot to be.

4. Now you must make the bot angry, so under your "Temped" soldiers "Settings tab" Click this setting:

Hit OK

5. Go back to: Objects ~ Spawners ~ Object Spawners, Select your temp you made ealier,

Under the "Settings" tab, select your soldier as its preset.

6. Place the Object Spawner on a map, and your done.

7. Extras: To make a random spawner (to randomly, spawn different player types) temp different soldier types like before, and make a new Spawner for them, but as its preset, add all of the soldier types you made.

Written by Oblivion165

Skill level: 2

This tutorial guides you how to place AI Harvesters and help them find their way from the Refinery to the Tiberium/Resource field when there is no Vehicle Production Facility present on the map that creates them.

1. Create the Harvester:

There are two ways:

I. If you only want to have a harvester that don`t come back if it is destroyed, just browse in the Presets to Objects -> Vehicles -> (Nod or GDI = xxx) -> xxx_Harvester - CnC_xxx_Harvester

II. The second way is using a spawner, that means if the harvester gets destroyed, a new one will spawn. Goto Object -> Spawner

If you making a map you must click to Temp, if you use this in a Mod use Add.

Enter a name e.g. Nod_Harv_Spawn. Then go to the "Settings" tab and click "Pick Presets". Then select Vehicle -> xxx Vehicles -> xxx_Harvester -> CnC_xxx_Harvester. Double click the preset so that it appears in the left list. Press Ok. (two times, your now back at Commando Editor Screen)

2. Place the Harvester and setting up the envoirment:

Select the Harvester on the preset list, click at Make, and move the Harvester somewhere in the Tiberium field. Also place a Tiberium field zone and waypath from the refinery to the Tiberium, with the two way, Ground vehicles and inniate pathfind options enabled.

Now write down the following ID`s (doubleclick on the object)

• Tiberium refinery Controller
• WaypathID (not the ID from a waypoint! The wapath ID is needed!)
• Tiberium field

3. Setting up the harvester script:

Double click an the Harvester and add the PDS_Test_Harvester script and fill in the following parameters:

• TiberiumID = ID of Tiberiumfielde
• DriveToID = ID of the waypath
• EntranceID = ID of the Tiberiumrefinery Controller
• DockID = ID of the Tiberiumrefinery Controller

4. Finish your work:

Save your level. Also place a human pathfind generator on your map and then generate the pathfinding, then save again, and enjoy your work.

Skill level: 2

This tutorial guides you how to let the AI Harvesters find their way from the Refinery/War Factory to the Tiberium/Resource field.

X. If you are making a map for Renegade:

Check in Gmax/RenX, that the airstrip building model sticks a little bit into the ground:

1. Export your Level and open it in Level Editor.

2. All waypathes you create for harvester must have the following settings checked:

3. Set three Waypathes for vehicle factories (for the nod airstrip, the vehicle must point to the direction of the arrow on the strip):

(If you don't have the building controller or car marker placed yet, you can find the controller under Buildings > Airstrip / WarFactory. Place the controller and press CTRL + P to create and place the carmarker.)

4. Then one waypath must go to the tiberiumfield (no difference between GDI and Nod):

5. Now you must make a waypath from the refinery to the tiberiumfield:

6. You must set a pathfindgenerator at your map (named "Human"):

7. Now save your Level as it's time for generating pathfinding sectors.

This next step can take some hours, depending on the size of your map and the speed of your PC. You should also check, that there is enough free disk space for the Windows swapfile, because this process sometimes need 500MB swapfile, depends on the size of your RAM.

Goto Pathfinding > Generate Sectors. The the pathfinding generating will start. When the status changes from Floodfilling World to Compressing Sectors it may seem that your PC hang up! Don`t restart, just wait some minutes and the progress will continue.

When the progress is done save your level and try it out ingame.

Skill level: 1

Getting Started

This tutorial will guide you through making a working teleport on a map. After you have completed this tutorial you should have enough information to add a teleport zone to any map. I will guide you through each step of making a teleport zone. You may wish to skip some steps if you know what your doing. The teleport works using a custom script written by Dante that needs to be setup correctly for it to work.

1) Setting Up The Map

Before we can begin to implement the teleport script we need to set up some objects to teleport to, these will be used in the script but not necessarily be seen in the game. First thing is to load up your terrain into the Level Editor.

After you have loaded up your terrain into Level Edit we can start to add the objects required for the script to work. The fist thing you will probably want to do is add an object to indicate where the teleport zone is. You can either use a preset (e.g. a pedestal) or make your own model in gmax and import it into Level Edit or you can just leave it and use a feature of the map to indicate where the zone is (e.g. a doorway into something). This object has no function, it`s just to tell the player where the teleport is because the script zones are invisible in the game. Add your object to the map.

The next step is to add a script zone that will indicate to the script the zone that any object goes within will be teleported. You will find the script zone under Object > Script Zone > Script_Zone_All. Make this object so it appears on the map, move the zone so that it covers the area you wish the object to be teleported in. You can size the zone using the back dots in the corners, holding shift will allow you to drag the zone upwards. it doesn`t have to completely cover the object or area, an it doesn`t need to be as tall as the object your teleporting. The next step is to set the destination for where you want to teleport to. This is the point where you choose what method to use. Dante`s teleport script has two parameters, only one of them should be used. The one tells the script to teleport the object to an XYZ location and the other one tells it to teleport the object to another object (using the objects ID). Each method is as effective as each other.

This is the first method, this uses XYZ coordinates to teleport an object. The object that enters the script zone we made will be teleported to specific coordinates we pick. if your teleporting infantry you can use any object to get the coordinates, but if you want to be accurate then it`s best to use a model from the presets such as a spawner found under Object > Spawner > Startup Spawners > Renegade Spawner. Place the spawner somewhere on your map and it`s best to make sure its aligned with the ground when you move it (Ctrl + D) then after you have it in the correct place where you want your teleported object to go to double click the spawner on the map. A box will appear, click the position tab and note down the X, Y and Z coordinates for later use. After you have got the coordinates, delete the object.

This is the second method, this uses an object`s ID to teleport an object. The object that enters the script zone we made will be teleported to this object that we add to the map. This allows use to see where we are teleporting to on the map but is no different in game to the first method. You may find that the different methods are useful for something. Place an object on the map, Daves arrows are probably the best thing to use as they don`t show up in game. There found under Object > Simple > Daves Arrows. Place the arrow on the map where you want to teleport to, make sure there is enough room for the object spawned to fit, you may have to adjust the object`s position later if you find that your being teleported into the ground. Once the object is placed double click the object and then note down the objects ID found in the box. Do not delete the object after you have it`s ID number.

2) Setting Up The Script

The last stages are to setup the actual script so that it is linked to everything we have made so far. go back to the script zone we made earlier and double click it. Then got to the scripts tab and click "add" this will bring up a box similar to the one in the picture below. from the "type" list you should see a list of different scripts, if you don`t see them then you have not installed the scripts into your mod folder correctly, follow the process at the start and check to see if you did everything correctly. From the list of scripts scroll down until you find "TDA_Teleport_Zone" select that then you should see the same as below.

You should see a section with the title "parameters", this is where you select the parameter according to how you set up the map. You must only use one of the parameters of the script or it may have undesired effects in the game. Select the "Location" parameter if you are using the XYZ to teleport to and the "Object_ID" parameter if your using another object to teleport to.

If your using the "location" parameter fill in the X, Y and Z coordinates you noted down earlier in the three boxes on the window. After that click "ok" then it`s finished.

If your using the "Object_ID" parameter then you have to fill in the object ID that you noted down earlier in this box. Remember you only use one parameter.

3) Testing

Congratulations, you have successfully added a teleport to your map. You can now save it and test it in renegade. You may need to adjust it if it is not working as it should. Follow each step carefully again if you think you may have messed something up. Good Luck!

4) Credits

This tutorial was written by General Havoc (Robert Hunt)

I`d like to thank Dante for getting this script working and originally writing the script and may others. Also John Wilson for working on the scripts.dll.

Also many thanks to the many people who help on the Westwood Mod Forums.

Finally of course Westwood Studios for the excellent series of C&C Games.

Let Westwood Live on!

Skill level: 1

Getting Started

This tutorial will guide you through making a working stealth generator zone on a map. After you have completed this tutorial you should have enough information to add a stealth generator zone to any map. I will guide you through each step of making a stealth generator zone. You may wish to skip some steps if you know what your doing. The stealth generator zone works using a custom script written by Dante that needs to be setup correctly for it to work.

1) Scripts

Here is some information about the scripts that are used in this tutorial:

TDA_Stealth_Generator_Zone - This script is attached to a scriptzone and defines the area where an object will be turned stealth. This zone will turn infantry and vehicles stealth whilst they are in the zone. The objects uncloak as soon as they exit the zone. There is a side effect to using this script, when the object exits the zone they will have inherited a stealth effect, similar to that of an uncloaked stealth tank or blackhand.

TDA_Stealth_Generator - This is the script that powers the stealth generator zone and is attached to another object. The script is normally attached to an invisible static object and then linked to the zone using the zones ID. This script can be attached to other things to give the desired effect. If it`s attached to a vehicle, then when the vehicle is destroyed the zone will no longer make objects stealth. When added to a building controller then when the building gets destroyed the zone gets disabled thus not making objects in the zone stealth anymore.

2) Setting Up The Map

Before we add the script to the map you will need to load up your terrain into Level Edit and check that your map is set up correctly and will work in the game. We will be adding the parts for the TDA_Stealth_Generator_Zone script to start with.

After you have loaded up your terrain into Level Edit we can start to add some of the required objects. The fist thing you will probably want to do is add an object to indicate where the stealth zone is. You will probably want to do this in the stages of your map making so that people know it will be a stealth zone. I have used walls to show where it is going to be on my test map. This is to tell the player where the stealth zone is because the script zones are invisible in the game.

The next step is to add a script zone that will indicate to the script the zone that any object goes within will be turned stealth for the amount of time it remains in the zone. You will find the script zone under Object > Script Zone > Script_Zone_All. Make this object so it appears on the map, move the zone so that it covers the area you wish the object to be turned stealth in. You can size the zone using the back dots in the corners, holding shift will allow you to drag the zone upwards. !t doesn`t have to completely cover the object or area, an it doesn`t need to be as tall as the object your turning stealth, just as long as the object can come into contact with the area.

The next step is to add the parts for the TDA_Stealth_Generator script. This script is like a "controller" for the zone. You will need to add an object for this controller to be attached to. See the information about the scripts at the top of the page for more information. If you want the zone to be always active and cannot be destroyed then use the arrow as I have above. If you want to make the zone so it can be disabled then you`ll have to use a building controller or a vehicle depending on what you want to use to disable it.

3) Setting Up The Scripts

The last stages are to setup the actual script so that it is linked to everything we have made so far. Go back to the script zone we made earlier and double click it. Then got to the scripts tab and click "add" this will bring up a box similar to the one in the picture below. from the "type" list you should see a list of different scripts, if you don`t see them then you have not installed the scripts into your mod folder correctly, follow the process at the start and check to see if you did everything correctly. From the list of scripts scroll down until you find "TDA_Stealth_Generator_Zone" select that then you should see the same as below.

You should see a section with the title "parameters", this is where you select the parameters. As you can see this script only requires one parameter, which is "Player_Type". The "player type" parameter tells the script which team it should activate the stealth for when an object belonging to the specified team enters the zone. 0 is "GDI", 1 is "Nod" and 2 is "Unteamed" or "GDI & Nod". Enter the number in the box according on how you want the zone to work. Click okay and return to the main level. Next double click on the controller, this should be an arrow, a vehicle, or a building controller. It can also be other objects, you`ll understand once you have used it. Go to the scripts tab and "add" script as we did before to bring up the box below. From the list of scripts scroll down until you find "TDA_Stealth_Generator" select that then you should see the same as below.

You should see a section with the title "parameters", this is where you select the parameters. As you can see this script only requires one parameter also, which is "Zone_ID". The "Zone_ID" parameter tells the script where the zone to generate the stealth is. This requires you to get the ID form the scriptzone we created earlier, do this by double clicking the object, it should come up with a screen and there should be a box named "ID" with a six digit number in. Type this number into the value box for the parameter. Click okay then your script is set up.

4) Testing

Congratulations, you have successfully added a stealth generator zone to your map. You can now save it and test it in renegade. You may need to adjust it if it is not working as it should. Follow each step carefully again if you think you may have messed something up. Good Luck!

5) Credits

This tutorial was written by General Havoc (Robert Hunt)

I`d like to thank Dante for getting this script working and originally writing the script and may others. Also John Wilson for working on the scripts.dll.

Also many thanks to the many people who help on the Westwood Mod Forums.

Finally of course Westwood Studios for the excellent series of C&C Games.

Let Westwood Live on!

Skill level: 1

Getting Started

This tutorial will guide you through making powerup spawners and adding spawn points to spawners so they can spawn at multiple places across the map as Westwood ones do. After you have read this tutorial you should be able to add spawners and spawn points on your own maps.

1) Setting Up The Spawners

First thing is to load up your terrain into the Level Editor. After you have loaded it up you need to browse to Objects > Spawner on the preset tree. Next click "add temp" which should bring up a screen like below.

Fill in the "Name" box with a name for your spawner then click the "Settings" tab, which should bring up something similar to below.

You will see a lot of settings now, you can leave them as they are or change them. The main things you would want to change are the "SpawnDelay" which is the length of time in between spawns and the "SpawnDelayVariation" which is the added variation that is added to the time. For example if the "SpawnDelay" was set to 10 seconds and the "SpawnDelayVariation" was set to 15 seconds then the maximum time between spawns is 25 and the minimum is 10. It is selected randomly each spawn unless the value of "SpawnDelayVariation" is 0. After you have played around with the settings click the "Pick Presets..." button. It should bring up a window like below.

This window is where you pick what the spawn actually spawns. You can see I have already added a few weapons, you can find them in the panel on the right side under PowerUp > Soldier Powerups > Weapon Powerups add as many as you wish, to add an item, double click it on the right panel, to remove an item, double click it on the left panel. It is a good idea to add many different weapons as when you add spawn points later you may want variation as these don`t act like individual spawners. The more times the same item appears in the list on the left, the more chance it has of spawning. After you have finished click on "ok" then "ok" again on the settings window. You should be returned to the map view with your new temp preset in the preset list.

Click on your newly made spawner and click the "make" button to make it on your map. To align it to the ground, press "Ctrl + D" and then drag it around to get it into position on the terrain. You can see my spawner that i have just made on the map below.

After your happy with it`s position press "Ctrl + P" to add a new spawn point. It should be linked by a pink line. Drag this copy around until your happy with it`s position. Repeat this process until you have as many as you want. Here is my may below. Don`t worry about the weapon that you see when placing them as it is just a random one selected from the list you made, in game it will be randomly selected.

The thing you just did was add a "point" which is a place for the spawner you made to spawn at. It will behave like the Westwood spawners in game meaning that only one weapon will spawn at one of those points at any one time. This is a good way of reducing the amount of spawners on a map and prevent players camping the spawner for a specific weapon as the weapons that spawn change and also the places.

2) Testing

Congratulations, you have managed to make a new spawner and spawn points. You can test this in game and see how it works. If it doesn`t work as you expected then read the tutorial again and check you did everything correctly.

3) Hints & Tips

Here are some hints and tips that may help you when making the spawners and spawn points:

• Don`t add too many spawn points especially in harder to reach areas as there could be an object spawned at that location for a long time if no one can reach it easily. This will prevent any more objects spawning at other points until the one was collected.
• Play around with the spawn times to find out what works best. A lower time may be more appropriate.
• Spawners and spawn points don`t just spawn weapons, you can spawn many more things including vehicles, bots and crates, experiment with different things.
• Remember to add multiple objects to spawners if you want to have the spawner spawning different objects.

This tutorial was written by General Havoc (Robert Hunt)

Thank Westwood Studios for the excellent series of C&C Games.

Let Westwood Live on!

Skill level: 2

Download the Models here

Creating terrain seems like a cumbersome job is you envision aligning planes and boxes only to yield flat ground and blocky mountains, but if you know how to use Max properly, it can be done neatly and in a relatively short amount of time. Note however that this only covers the basics of creating the terrain meshes, nothing advanced. When you create a C&C mode map, you`ll need to align the buildings with the terrain. I also am assuming you know how to navigate gMax, and how to do apply basic textures. Texturing tutorials are aplenty.

Start off by creating a plane. Convert it to an editable mesh (right click) and drag the edge vertices around using soft selection (found by expanding its tab under Editable Mesh. Round it out a bit to form the base ground. Select the outer edges of the mesh.

Scroll down to Extrude on the sidebar and set the value to 0.00000001 or similar to keep the extrusion from going anywhere. Hit the Extrude button, and drag the edges vertically. Hit it again, and repeat.

Note: a much faster and better method for extruding is to move your mouse above the Z arrow, hold shift and drag that Z arrow/axis upwards.

Use the scale tool to make the edges curve outward (mouse over the Z arrow/axis when scaling outward). Do this one or two more times until the edges cannot be seen from the ground below (by the players).

If you don`t have one already, create an opening by deleting some polygons (select them and hit delete on your keyboard.) Drag a few of the vertices to make an outer angle. Now select the edges on the opening and extrude some more to create an exit to the area.

Now create a larger plane, which you will make into the main area of the map. Attach the meshes together using editable mesh.

Shape the new plane into more terrain using soft selection on the edge vertices and extruding some more.

Now it`s time to connect the two objects together with polygons. Select vertices that are relatively close to each other and in the Weld box, set the value next to Selected to however many meters from each other you estimate the vertices are distant. Hit the "Selected" button, and they should weld. If you get an error, increase the value.

Hit the Face branch on the Editable Mesh tree and hit the Create button. Build face by clicking on three vertices consecutively in Counter-Clockwise order. Hitting them clockwise will build a backface.

Build more faces to completely connect the objects.

If you switch your view to smooth + highlights, you`ll notices that your level will be very faceted and blocky looking. Remedy this by selecting all the faces and scrolling down to the Auto Smooth button. Set the value to 180 and click it.

I have changed my terrain's color to look more like a desert. This is not the texture though and is merely for my myself during the modeling process.

Now, use soft selection to drag vertices smoothly on your mountains and ground to give the terrain a more realistic shape.

When you move a vertex with soft selection on, gmax/max will automatically also move the surrounding vertexes by a certain amount toward the same direction. The amount is merely indicated by colors on every vertex and can be controlled by Falloff, Pinch and Bubble.

Aircraftkiller taught me an easy technique for creating ridges. Select a few of your ground polygons and extrude them up a couple times scaling them down a bit each time to give the ridge a tapered look.

Now, select all the polygons that make up the ridge and find the Tessellate button. Leave it as Edge and 25, and just hit the button. It will smooth out the ridge with more polygons. Again, you need to run the Auto Smooth on your terrain.

Now it`s time to divide up your meshes. Select the mountain polygons. I selected mine by going to the front view and selecting the higher polygons. Clean up by holding down the Ctrl key on your keyboard and selecting/deselecting polygons my clicking on them. Hit the detach button on the sidebar, name it, and hit OK.

If you want to make a tiberium field, select a few polygons, Tessellate them with a value of 0 this time. Move the vertices around to give the tiberium a boarder, which will be the blending area. Detach it as you did the mountains.

Now, set up your materials with 2-passes. Pass one should be the texture you want blended onto the main texture. Don`t hit display on the texture until you have both passes set-up, or RenX will crash. Pass 2 will be the main texture. Set its Ambient and Diffuse settings to white, and its blend mode to Alpha Blend.

Apply the materials and texture accordingly. You`ll want to have display set up on the second pass to all your materials. I have 3 materials: Cliffs, Sand, and Tiberium. The Cliffs and Tiberium you`ll want to have a sand texture on their first pass, so that you can blend them seamlessly into the ground. For pass 1 on sand, I have an alternate sand texture. I`ll use blending to eliminate the monotony of a single ground texture. Now, go to the display tab on the sidebar. Select all the objects and put a check by Vertex Colors.

Select the vertices that you want the blended texture to appear on, and change their colors to black using editable mesh. First make sure to have all the verts bordering the ground black, then you can select random verts to prevent a tiled look.

When you`re done playing with vertex colors, select all the objects and mark your collision options. Check the Valpha box under the W3D export options to tell the W3D engine to blend the meshes.

Export to W3D, and take a look at it in W3D Viewer. If you have meshes that didn`t blend, make sure you have it`s blending mode set to alpha blend, and VAlpha is marked. If no errors exist, then you should have some nice looking terrain!

Skill level: 1

Proxies are probably my favorite thing in renegade. They make things a whole lot more stream-line and if you do your business right, you can make your maps load everything you need!

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1. First off open your terrain, or make some.

2. Make a 1x1x1 Box somewhere on the terrain.

3. Make your box into a point at the X axis. Seen below

Now name it "GDI Spawner~00" ~01 ~02 and so on for more than 1 spawner

(The X axis is generally the "Front" Direction of many westwood models, including the player models)

4. Export as renegade terrain. PROXIES TO MY KNOWLEDGE ONLY WORK IF YOU EXPORT AS RENEGADE TERRAIN.

Now make your terrain in LevelEdit and a GDI Spawner will be where you placed the proxie in Gmax!

5. Now make sure your spawner isnt touching anything like you normally would. As you can see his foot is in the sand.

A Great Mapping Technique

This is a really good idea to do when making maps. First go through the building controllers and make temps with shorter names.

(Alot of them are longer than 16 characters long, Renx wont export it correctly)

Go back to your terrain and do like you did with the spawner

Now your building controllers will load with the map!!! You wont have to touch a thing!

This works with just about everything, you can load tiberium fields, gun spawns, trees, PCT Zones, Bots, all sorts of things.

Now when you have all your temps made, make a copy of the Temps in your mod folder, so when you start a new map, paste them in and its all ready to go.

Skill level: 1

First step, Id like to give big thanks for Bumpaneer on allowing me to write this tutorial on realistic water making for Renegade. Well, lets get started.

1. Load your Ren-X and make a plane 10x10 or bigger. Remember this is only to get you started, once you learn this tutorial, you will be able to make the water any size you wish.

2. Press the M key on your keyboard, which should open the Renegade Material Editor.

3. Click on the blue box icon (Make New Renegade Material) to avoid conflicts between a material already used in other object. Then, change the Pass Count to 2 and select the Surface Type (Naturally Water) as show in the picture below:

4. Usually, when you start by the Pass 1 tab, Ren-X crashes, so lets move on to Pass 2 tab, then we come back to set up the #1.

Click on Vertex Material tab on Pass 2. Make sure Ambient, Diffuse, Specular and Emissive colors are black. Under the "Stage 0 Mapping" (bottom Left of screen). Select the drop down box to the right of Type and select "BumpEnv". And fill the box Args below with:

BumpScale=0.2

BumpRotation=0.3

VPerSec=-0.01

And dont forget to change the Stage 1 Mapping Type to Environment (Basically to make it reflective) as shown in the picture below:

5. Now lets move to the Shader tab (Still inside Pass 2 Tab). Select the Blend Mode to Add. On the Advanced (Still on Shader Tab, but on bottom), select the Pri Gradient as Bump-Environment and the Detail Color as Add. Watch picture below:

6. Now lets move to the Textures tab to set up the textures and the details of the water and its movement.

7. Check the Stage 0 Texture and click on the None button to select the proper texture. Use the texture called bump_water.tga here.

8. Now check the Stage 1 Texture (Detail Texture) and click again on None button and select the texture named water_reflect.tga

On next page you are going to see how your Textures tab should be after setting up all these changes.

9. Once you are done with setting up Vertex Material, Shader and Texture tabs on Pass 2, click on the button shown on the picture (Assign Material to Selection) to apply the changes to rhe object.

10. Now lets move back to Pass 1. On Vertex Material Tab, change the Stage 0 Mapping Type to Linear Offset and add VPerSec=-0.01 to the Args box, as shown in the picture on next page.

Important Note: The Ambient, Diffuse, Specular and Emissive are already set up properly, you dont need to change them.

11. There is nothing to change or set up on Shader Tab, so lets move directly to the Textures Tab on Pass 1.

12. Check the Stage 0 Texturing and select the remaining texture included in the pack:

water_texture.tga Once you select the texture, check the Display button and then, to finish, click once again on Assign Material to Selection button, wich will

Finished Product:

Tutorial Written by André. Realistic Water technique developed and improved by Bumpaneer and StoneRook.

If you wish to know how to make more realistic effects for Renegade, start using WDump provided with the Renegade Mod Tools, there you can view all W3Ds Textures settings, making you be able to duplicate any effect Westwood added to their maps with textures.

== Enjoy Your New Realistic Water ==

Skill level: 2

Part 1

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6h7UdzG44W0

Part 2

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MrcYBavZzVA

Skill level: 2

Part 1-6

Skill level: 2

Part 1

Part 2