The Worm

I'm back! To cut a short story long... 5. What do you feel is the ave. age of the current modders? Beats me. I'm 42. I started at Igor when the Game came out. 6. How does the amount of time you spend modding compare to the amount of time you game? I spent almost all my aming time modding and testing. Sad to say, modding ruined the SP game for me. I used to play thinking like a soldier: tactics, flanking, ambushes etc. but now I can't help but thnk in terms of scripting, triggers, responses, path points etc. and the enemy becomes so predictable. The Map is a paper-thin construct with textures, Map Rooms and transistion points. 7. If you were to start over learning to mod (without previous experience) - How would you approach it and what mistakes would you avoid. One big mistake was spending months trying to learn Igor by trial and error without refering to the old RS hands who "hit the ground running" and could have helped me greatly. But at that time, I didn't know such a modding community even existed. However, with Map making, I think I had the right approach and I would do it the same all over again. I used to teach High School kids, so I designed a formal lesson plan for myself. I gathered every Dev documentation, tutorial and interesting forum post and bound them together into my own "textbook" of GR Map modding. I raided the local library for 3DS Max books. Then I went to work. I actually had a checklist of Map items to practice on and check off one by one. I made dozens of Maps. Some maps had nothing but rocks and boulders of all kinds (geosphere, extruded splines, etc). Some maps had nothing but trees and grass. Another had lots of doors everywhere. One map had a ridiculously large number of portals. Another was full of rivers and waterfalls. Another Map had a dozen twisting rooms to try out & practice the Lighting Tool. I spent a lot of time on lighting. A very important step was becoming a member of the GR.Net forums and becoming a regular contributor. I think this approach worked well. My very first public release Map mod of any game won a GR.Net Award (with Mission by Jay316)

The first shooter I bought was SOF for $5. I played half the first level, got stuck, and assumed that was the end of the game and there was nothing else. That's how much of a N00b I was with regards to your tech/programing question. I didn't know there was such a thing as modding until after I got GR in 2000. I finished the SP Campaign and still didn't know about modding. The game was on a CD, and CD data cannot be changed, right? I did not check with the online community because I didn't know there was such a thing as a online forum for games. I didn't know there was such a thing as an online forum for anything. I discovered IGOR by accident and after spending several sessions tinkering at random, I opened up the Caves mission. More days tinkering I found I could add tanks and many enemy to the Caves mission. Of course they either slaughtered each other or wandered off somewhere because I wasn't aware of scripting issues. It was all trial and error. I learned Igor by trial and error and studying the stock missions. With no guidance or tutorials, it took a looooong time. But I got quite good at it. Finally it dawned on me that these new mission files are actually on my HD, and playing your own missions was like throwing yourself a surprise birthday party and expect to be surprised. therefore there must be some online geek squad e-mailing Missions to each other... Which led me to this site... It was through this forum (and the "other one") that I finaly took off. The guidance and help of the Community was invaluable. I tried Weapons and didn't enjoy that. I only made an 105mm calibre artillery piece as a side-arm (it went KA-BOOM & fired stock tank shells) and a Stargate staff weapon that shot a laser beam projectile. I tried Skinning and stuck my face on Scott Ibrahim but didn't like it. I tried Characters and even exported a few chickens but it was too much precision modelling for my meager skills I made a Map which was a flat brick rectangle to stand on. I later added a crate and it exported nicely. I added a few dozen crates and I had a map to play on! I was hooked. A Character or a Gun was modded until you finish, but a Map... it's never finished, you can add and add stuff as you like. Also, a weapon or skin mod is a faithful reproduction of a real item, but a Map is limited tou your imagination. (to be contd.... got to go home from work)

A scenecenter is a small cube about 0.1M across. Make one and place it at the dead-centre of the map-to-be in MAX i.e. at x=0, y=0 and z=0. Name it "scenecenter' (without quotes). And you're done. The documentation says you can make it of any size and place it anywhere, but if you do it exactly as above, you'll save yourself problems later. You can later place the Command Map "Offset" co-ordinates at (-200,-200) and the map zero-point will centre itself in the middle of the Command Map.

A Map is fixed. You cannot move anything. But you canmake a new map and place the cars and trees anywhere. The trucks and tanks etc on a Mission-Map can be moved using IGOR.

Uhhh... what do you mean? You cannot "modifier" a Map. You must make a Map from scratch using 3D Studio Max version 5 or v4 or v3 only. Then you can make mountains and the earth and create internal rooms.

One way to get around this permissions problem is to make 100% all-new models yourself.... start a new Mod project. But I'm not sure if the 3 people on the planet still playing GR are Stargate fans...

Let's see now... x02 nos. ring washers : $998,798 x01 nos. split washer : $293,451 Total : $1,292,249 Woo-hoo I'm rich ! All I need now is an envelope and some postage stamps. Don't think it's possible? Check it out HERE.

One of the files you need to install is called Ikesurfaces.TXT. Did you set the path to this file (Mike Tutorial Part 1)? Go to Map Editor. Press the General Tab. Press the Options button Then in the pop-up window, you'll find the "Sound file" path, "Debris file" path etc. Set the "Surfaces" tab to where you put the Ikesurfaces.TXT file. Hit OK. Should work now. If not, restart Max Oh BTW the Ikesurfaces.TXT is not in the MapEditorLists folder (in the Max4x_Levelexporter.zip) but the RSBEditor.ZIP.

I just read that some high school kid was arrested by the cops for making a Map Mod of his high-school. Sheesh *slaps forehead* what is the world coming to?! Link01 Link02

Have you tired using a scrolling texture instead? Don't know if the textures will scroll in a skybox... If it does, there's no reason a skybox must be a box. You can make a low poly half-sphere with a single texture, and have the texture scroll slowly.

Well, the unique name must really be unique for all windows, so u get 1_<n><glass>window01... to 1_<n><glass>window05 for example. Then there's the model name. In the Map Editor > General tab > LOD1 Model Name, put a unique name. If you have 5 identical windows all facing the same direction, they can have the same model name, but in your case, give each one a unique name. it might work.

Me, Myself and I (40)

You said it. The more I play the demo Coop mission,the more stuff I discover. I can steal RPGs from dead tangoes and load them up into my Humvee LOL. Run out of fuel? No Prob, plenty of gas stations around haha

Ya Stuff like this you can query in the Mission modding section. Map Modding is the making on the ground you walk on. To answer your Q, go to the GhostRecon folder and use IGOR mission editor. Just click on a NPC or OpFor Actor and change his kit from the menu on the Actor's properties.

You keep looking up at the sky like that, the vultures will have YOU for lunch But seriously, I took a photo of some vulture and made a dynamic map object built into the Map. If there are any birdwatchers out there you can take a pair of binos and tell me what's the species, because I can't remember myself