Hello SEN... It's been years since i've done any sort of Map making, was just looking to do one final project before GalaxyEdit comes out in the SC2 Beta. With that in mind, I figured i'd need to grab the tools I used to use, back in the day. Of course it's not that easy. Back when I did any mapping, SCMDraft was pre-beta and the only kind of text-based trigger editor was a DOS Application by SWW (I think...). Anyway, just wondering what you guys used in modern times so I could pick it up one last time.


I used to be KiLLeR(U) in case anyone is wondering, . And of course, I ran [T]wisted.

scmdraft 2.
It supports text triggers with its own language, too (best to write them with notepad++ & macros for conditions, actions and the trigger layout).

Some people use macro triggers, too. But I never spend my time for learning makro triggers (instead I write my own small programs that write the triggers I want).

SCMDraft 2 is the best editor we have now. You can find the newest copy in the sticky. Starforge has its abilities to input any data, but that's for the most part useless. Starforge ultimate has reached a plateau and hasn't really been updated in a while. Staredit mods (like xtra/fartyedit) can be useful, since they're pretty stable and can save/load triggers.

Other tools include uberation and tinymap for compression, EUDTrig for an easy way to convert EUD triggers, and trigger duplicator (both text and non-text versions).

All of these can also be found in the DLDB.

Tools I would get:
SCM Draft 2: The best editor currently, and probably forever, if SC2 comes out when they plan it, SCM Draft has the best terraining work, including copy/paste, it allows you to choose between text and classic trigedit, now has the sprite functionality of StarForge and can basically do everything any other editor can do and more.

Notepad++ and either MacroTriggers or ProTRG: Both are basically compilers for triggers, MacroTriggers is it's own language with documentation, ProTRG is built on Python. MacroTriggers is cleaner looking, but isn't supported any more and lacks a few useful features, and ProTRG is definitely the best choice for anything complex. Basically, these allow you to easily duplicate triggers using arrays and variables and loops and make your mapping experience less of a brute-forcing experience, and more of a problem solving intensive job. Notepad++ is the text editor through which both of them are made to run, and the compiled triggers are put into SCM Draft's text trigger format.

TinyMap2: For compression when you're finished, by far the best compressor, and just as an unintentional side-effect, it also happens to stop basically all unprotectors out right now. If it glitches on your map, switch back to TinyMap.

DatEdit: A modding program that comes in handy as a reference sheet for SC unit's properties, things like weapons range, vision range, attack speed, and other useful information can be obtained from it.

PColor: Only truly useful if you're going for some of the funky player colors, lets you preview what certain player colors look like so you can easily pick one.

Falkoner's Terrain Compilation: If you're going to do any major terraining, having a huge selection of blends to pick from is very useful, this compilation I made a while back has maps for every tileset that show different terrain blends, for easy copy/pasting into a map.

MapExp: A useful online program hosted by Farty that will generate a minimap preview of your map and give detailed information(change print settings to Print(some) labels) regarding your maps stats, an offline alternative that's slightly more buggy would be MapStats.

W-Mode: A useful hack that doesn't affect SC's innards at all, so it's undetectable my Blizzard, but it places SC in a window, allowing for easy access to testing without having to wait for SC to load while you maximize and minimize it.

Dexpot: A 3D desktop manager, allows you to have several workspaces open at a time, to avoid cluttered workspaces, extremely handy when editing as you typically have 4-5 programs open at a time.

Evernote: An extremely useful note-taking program, useful for putting down ideas and organizing your map's information, and makes it easy to later release it to the public.

Oblivion and a Location Hack: I can't post the links to Oblivion, because it's a hack, but Oblivion allows you to see other player's resource, and reveal the entire map(map hack), which is very useful when testing, and the Location Hack lets you see unit attack ranges in-game and the outline of locations, both are very useful, and if you need them, PM me and I'll send you links.

I know it seems like a lot, but these are all the tools I use when map editing, and it's taken a long time to work up to this point, but it makes mapping so much easier. Enjoy

Post has been edited 2 time(s), last time on Mar 2 2010, 4:29 am by Falkoner.

Or, even better, if it glitches let me know so I can attempt to fix it.

Thanks rockz... And thanks a ton, Falkoner, that was extremely helpful. That should be put in a sticky, imo. It'd be ridiculously helpful to anyone in the Map Tools forum. Nice terrain work, btw, ;P.

So anyway, what is sounds like is SCMDraft is our one-stop spot of all Map making? Aside form the extra's, like protecting & compressing maps, of course. I was looking at MT last night, I use NetBeans, any idea if there';s a way to run it in the NetBeans IDE?

@Farty: of course, of course. I like your PColor program, btw, that's a pretty neat tool. That was actually the first tool I saw when I started lurking again not too long ago, .

Post has been edited 1 time(s), last time on Feb 28 2010, 9:23 pm by Sixen.

Done.