Official rules for newbies thread
i'm reminded of when i started mapping for quake. (who's most popular editor was WorldCraft (Hammers Grandfather)) and there were like no tutorials. and the word "Wiki" hadn't even been coined yet. you learned by getting in there and fucking around till either A) the bitch worked, or B) you got tired and started something new.. most people hit (B) and thus weren't cut out for mapping.
my favorite is the:
"I have this problem" 5 minutes later someone posts the solution or helpful information, then then instantly the orriginal poster hits back with "Oh i already figured it out"
in my opinion if a problem is so easy to solve that you figured it out in the 5 minutes it took for someone to post. then it wasn't a problem in the first place. don't be afraid to get in there and fuck around with hammer. its the only way to learn your own style.
Personally I fucking hate how easy-to-use the Source SDK has become. You are right, back in Quake/Quake 2/Half-Life 1 days you had to setup all of the settings in WorldCraft yourself. It was like an IQ Test before you were even allowed to map and it kept a lot of the people who probably went on to create surf maps out.
But I digress.
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i hear ya... go drink some white wine it will help you relax.
msleeper, if you dont like this idea, then go ahead and lock the thread, thats fine with me. I just hate seeing people make the same mistakes I did and am still doing.
I was thinking more along the lines of what megadude suggested, portal specific stuff.
also, I was thinking it could be more along the lines of not necessarily the mechanics of it, but how you should make your map. here would be an example:
1. "a turret(s) placed in your map does not qualify as a puzzle. do something different with it, probably involving portals, dont just place one and say it is a puzzle."
or another:
2. "tell a story with your props. don't just place random bts props here and there, tell a story. what happened here? was there someone living in this bts area? etc.."
I can tell you probably dont like the idea. I agree with you, about stuff like lighting is a must is a little dumb to write down. thats way too simple. we can make the list more advanced.
I think the problem is that some people are coming into hammer thinking "oh cool, level editor", like you would see in a console game. I wish they would call it something else because I consider it "almost programming with pre-set tools without having to write code." if you want to work with hammer, you have to be dedicated and spend a LOT of time on it.
I really need to start doing #2...
The kind of person who would do this is the kind of person who doesn't read the stickies and therefore wouldn't be able to heed your warning.
@rpd: Oh snap! "Msleeper: Professional Classhole"
lol wtf did i say? *looks around confused* its 4am
The white wine thing.
Some Official Rules For Newbies (that i thought of while at work today)
1) Map be fun
2) Map not be surf map
3) Map have info_playerstart
4) Map have walls, ceiling, and floor