[Guide]Making StarCraft Maps

Grobyc

Canada18410 Posts

June 14 2009 10:08 GMT

Introduction:

This guide is going to show you how to make basic StarCraft maps, for both Melee and UMS purposes. This will not show you how to make crazy bounds, elaborate defense maps, RPGs, etc exactly, but will however, get you a start on it if you want to pursue it. The main focus on the UMS section is for creating simple maps like ones with observer modes, ones for practicing tricks you might want to practice and stuff like that.

Tools:

Depending on how "hardcore" you want to get into this, you will need additional programs. For creating very basic maps that you knew were easy to create but you were just to lazy to do it, you can make those with the original StarEdit that comes with StarCraft. If you want to make funky terrain, add cool colours, and stuff like that you will most likely need this very important map editor for StarCraft:

SCMDraft 2.0(beta)

In short, SCMDraft is way better than StarEdit for a number of reasons:
1. With SCMDraft, you can place misplaced and stacked units and buildings.
2. With SCMDraft, you can place units from all 3 races for any player, rather than just units from one race.
3. With SCMDraft, the terrain editor is far better and has simply lets you do a lot more.
4. With SCMDraft, the trigger editor has more capabilities.
5. With SCMDraft, the upgrade and tech options have more capabilities.
6. With SCMDraft, you can copy/cut/paste units, buildings, and terrain.
7. With SCMDraft, you can customize a grid for the map.
8. Much more, those were just some I thought of off the top of my head!

Basics of a map:

Simply put, all a map needs to have for you to be able to play on it is 2 start locations. To begin, go to File > New, and select the settings of the map you would like to make. Stay to the standard scenario sizes for now. Here you select the type of the map you want(I.E. Jungle terrain, Space, etc) and what you want the default terrain on the map to be. Since most maps have far more land than water, don't start with an all water map first! For the default triggers, you should just start with none because quite rarely you will need the default melee triggers. On melee maps players already start with 50 minerals so no triggers are needed. If you plan on making your map an observer map you can start with those default triggers instead.

Now that you have your map open, to place start locations in SCMDraft there should be a tall white box on the left once you open it with categories such as Terrain, Locations, Units, Sprites, and Doodads. Go to Units > Neutral > Start location and select star location. Currently, the map defaults unit placement to be owned by player 1, which is fine for now; we can always change it later(at the top of the editor). Place a start location for player 1, and one for player 2 then save the map. To play the map it needs to be in your StarCraft directory under maps so I recommend just saving it there. If you open up StarCraft and play the map in melee when you start you will have a CC/Nex/Hatch and 4 workers wherever you put a start location. If you start it in UMS you shouldn't be able to start since you don't have an opponent yet(all players in the editors default as a human player). If this isn't the case for you then you have already messed up somewhere.

Note: You cannot save a map you are editing/working on or open a map if it is open in BW(with SCMDraft anyway).

Making a physical layout:

Still using SCMDraft, we want to be able to make cool maps we can play on, instead of maps that are just plain dirt fields with no minerals! Open up the Terrain category on the left now and select a type of terrain. The default terrain placer creates terrain in isometrical squares. This is what you will most likely be making your map with. Feel free to play around with the terrain placer for a bit. Add some water somewhere, some high ground, etc to add some style to your map!~ Soon enough you will wonder "how do I make ramps and bridges?" To answer that you do this. At the top go to Windows > Doodad Pallete. This should open a small window with a black square and another drop down box. Click on the drop down box and go to Cliff(assuming you're making a jungle map. If you chose other scenarios the options might vary to "Cliffside" or something.). Here you should be able to scroll through a bunch of doodads to select and place on the map. At the bottom is the choice for ramps. It only allows you to place downward ramps because ramps that go upwards to the low ground have to be made through customized terrain(which I will get to later). If you scroll down more in the drop down box there are options for bridges(for most maps) and simple additions to the map to just make it look better. There are some exceptions to placing doodads: it has to be on a certain type of terrain, in a certain position, and sometimes it can't be close to certain things, etc. If you go to place it and the squares you want to put it on are red then you can't put it there. This is usually because it's too close to a different type of terrain that doesn't go well with it, or you have misplaced it on an area that you can place it normally. You can actually force doodads if they don't want to get placed there by going to Options(at the top) > Doodads > Allow illegal placement.

At this point, you should be able to re-create simple versions of almost any melee map(of course it would take a while). If you simply wanted to make a random melee map to play on you are just about good to go!

Note: You can undo and redo almost anything while changing terrain, so if you mess up don't worry!(alt+Z/Y)

Adding units to the map(including resources!):

Adding regular units to a map in hopes of making a UMS map is done in the same fashion as adding start locations. Open the Units subcategory on the left and you have 4 sections you will be using. Don't bother with undefined, it's almost never used. This part is simple. If you want player 1 to have an army of Dragoons and Zealots against player 2's army of Siege Tanks and Vultures, you simply open up the Protoss subcategory, go into Ground units, select the unit you want to place, then click wherever you want to put it on the map!

Make sure you are placing the units for the correct player using the drop down box near the top. Now that you have created an army for both player 1 and player 2, let's add some effects. Select the Protoss army(or any other unit(s)) and right click on one of the units you selected. In this window you can change the possessor of that unit/building, tick off boxes to make them burrow, invincible, cloaked, etc, and you can change their health, shields, and mana here. Since Protoss is as easy as 1a2a3a let's make it even more true and make them invincible!(if you want. I'm merely explaining an example). When adding units and buildings you can go to Options(at the top) > Grid and make the grid bigger or smaller, change the colour, etc. You can make units and buildings snap to the grid, or place them freely. Experiment with these for a bit if you want to get a feel of what you can do.

Adding resources is the same as adding any other unit except for 1 thing: The resources MUST be owned by player 12! Player 12 is the neutral player(a blue colour in melee maps in the game.) Player 12 has to own any critters, sprites, or minerals you want to appear in a melee map! Several people make the mistake of not doing this and spending hours upon hours trying to find out why the minerals didn't appear when they started the game. Resources are under neutral in the Units category. If you right click on resources(or Refinerys, etc) after, you can edit how much they have in them.

So now you can make your map and you can add units, resources, and buildings and to it. If you plan on making this map for melee purposes you are almost done.

Editing aspects of your map:

In this section you will be able to add a map description, choose default upgrades and unit stats, choose how many teams are in your map, and more! At the top go to Scenario > Map description. In this window you can edit your maps title, description, and even the colours of the players on the map!(every wondered how some maps have colours like black, green, and tan?) In this window you can also change the tileset of your map but when you do that the physical layout gets completely fucked for the most part. Your once been water terrain turns into ugly shaped ice and crap if you change the tileset. I don't recommend doing this, but if you do want to just save as and you won't lose anything. You can also change the default race of the players here, or leave it as user select so they can choose themselves in the game lobby. Instead of exiting here and going Options > Forces, you can simply change the tab. In the forces section you choose what players are on what team, whether they are allied or not, whether they change vision or not, whether their start locations are randomized and what the name of that team is in the game lobby. For a standard observer map, there are 2 teams: The "Players" and the "Observers". If that is what you are going for then you can rename the teams and any teams without players in them won't show up in the game lobby.

Now switch tabs over to the Units section. Here there are categories for the races and their buildings and units. You can search through here and change the stats of different units and buildings. This part is quite self-explanatory. If you are making a UMS map this is where you would change the damage, health, shield, etc, and if you are making your map a melee map none of these effects will have any effect on the game. These only apply to UMS maps. In the next tab over, Upgrades, everything is basically the same. Here you can change how long it takes for an upgrade to finish, how much it costs, what the default level is, etc. Once again, this only applies to UMS maps. In the Tech Settings tab to the right of that, it is the same as well. You can edit the cost of spells, upgrade speed, etc. String Editor and Wave Editor are rarely used here, so don't worry about them. Another hand feature under Options is adding and removing map revealers for some or all players if you are planning on making certain type of map where everyone sees the whole map and you don't want to place them individually. FYI, map revealers do exactly what it sounds like they would do. In a UMS game, if a player has a map revealer in a certain spot he can see whatever is there permanently(not cloaked/burrowed units though).

Note: In the drop down box for changing layers of your map(I.E. Unit layer, terrain layer near the top) there is a copy/cut/paste/brush section. With this you can simple select whatever units or terrain you want to copy then just use Ctrl + C and Ctrl + V to copy paste it somewhere else.

Extra - If you want to create upwards ramps to high ground and straight cut terrain:

For creating straight cut terrain, when you have the terrain placer ready, click the drop down box "Isometrical" at the top(not the very very top). Scroll down to rectangular and then continue placing terrain like you were before. Now you are placing terrain 1 square at a time. This isn't used for melee maps obviously(except like FPM) but it can really help with certain things in a UMS map.

[Difficult]For creating upwards ramps to low ground, you click the same drop down box but this time go to Tileset indexed. The reason why these upward ramps look somewhat jagged sometimes is because to make them you have to take little pieces of doodads and isometrical terrain to make a customized one manually. Yes this is time consuming, yes it is hard to make these ramps look professional, so I wouldn't bother with it too much. You are better off copy pasting those ramps from other maps and putting them in yours that way.

If your map was a melee map, this is as far as you need to go! You can save your map and play it!

Making Triggers for a UMS map:

Note: Make sure you saved your map periodically! Especially since this is a beta there are sometimes random crashes and errors.

Probably one of the most confusing parts of making maps but once you get used to it you have almost no problems at all. Melee maps do not use triggers(not even one that gives players 50 minerals at the beginning of each game. That is an auto-trigger for all maps played in melee mode.). Triggers are simply what makes maps happen. It does things in the map that you don't see(well some you do). You need triggers to do things like allowing the observer team to see the players in an obs map, displaying stuff to players in the map(ex. "KeSPA Python 1.3" or some shit that appears when you play an obs game on an iccup map), creating/removing stuff, and tonnes more. To start, go to Triggers > Classic Map Triggers at the top of SCMDraft. There is an option to go Triggers > Trigger Editor, but that is a text based trigger editor and is a lot more complicated to use. We will learn to used the Classic Map Trigger editor in this guide.

You can either delete the triggers that are there by default(if you didn't change it to no triggers when making the map) or you can just leave them there for example. Since I don't know exactly what type of map each of you will be making I can't give you a step-by-step process. Instead I will simply tell you how triggers work.

Triggers are made up of 3 things: Players, Conditions, and Actions.

Players: Players are who you want to triggers to happen for. If you go to "New" in this trigger window it will ask you to check off the players you want it to happen for.

Conditions: Conditions are are must be met in order for the trigger to fire or 'work'.

Actions: Actions are what happens as a result of the triggers being met.

Locations:

Some triggers need something called a location to work. With a trigger that starts each player in a map off with 50 minerals, we don't need to specify a location where it happens since it doesn't actually affect anything on the map. You do, however, need locations if you are referring to a certain spot of the map in your trigger.

So under what circumstances are we going to want this trigger to happen? Click on the drop down box and take a look at the options for conditions. Most of them are pretty straight forward.

List of conditions and how they work:

Note: A lot of these are self-explanatory, but some aren't so I'm just going over all of them just incase.

Note 2: When it says 'Current Player' that refers to all the players/forces/players in that force that you specified in the Players section of the new trigger.

Accumulate - This condition is true when the player/force you choose has a specified number of minerals and/or gas. This is semi-commonly used.

Always - This condition is basically an auto-activate. If the only condition you have for your trigger is this then the trigger will fire immediately when the game starts. This works the same as Elapsed scenario basically if you plan on putting the time as '0'. This is commonly used.

Bring - This condition is quite possibly the most used conditions. when the specified player/team brings the specified unit/building to the specified location, this condition will be true. This is used when you want a unit to spawn if a player sends a certain unit to a certain location(Ex. bringing a civ to buy a unit in a defense map).

Command - This condition is true when the specified play/force commands(a.k.a owns) the specified number of a specified unit/building. This is semi-commonly used.

Command the least - This isn't a very common condition but it is true when the current player(the player for which you marked the check box for the trigger) commands the least number of a specified unit/building. If, for example, you wanted the player who owns the least amount of Zerglings to have a Zergling spawn for them, you would use this as a condition.

Command the least at - This is basically the same as the previous condition. With this one, however you choose the location where the current player commands the least number of the specified unit/building. This condition is uncommonly used.

Command the most - The same as Command the least but this is true when the current player commands the most of the specified unit/building. Using the same example, if you wanted a Zergling to be removed from the player with the most Zerglings you would use this condition. This condition is uncommonly used.

Command the most at - The same relation between Command the least and Command the least at. This condition is uncommonly used.

Countdown timer - A countdown timer has to have been set for this condition to be true in the first place. When the timer(at the top middle of the screen in a game) is at the specified number in the game this condition will be true. This condition is uncommonly used.

Deaths - This condition is true when the specified player has suffered the specified number of deaths of the specified unit/building. If you wanted something to display across a players screen when has has lost 10 Zerglings you would use this condition. The condition is uncommonly used.

Elapsed time - This condition is true when the game is a specified number of seconds in. If you wanted something to display across a players screen saying "You are now 1 minute into the game," you would use this condition. This condition is commonly used.

Highest score - This condition is true when the current player has the highest score of whatever score type you specify. The score types are really strange so I don't know the exact meaning of all of them. This condition is rarely used, and if it is, kills is usually used as a score type.

Kill - This is a very commonly used condition. It is true when the specified player kills the specified number of a specified unit/building. This condition is used to make money or civilians(etc) spawn for players in a UMS game when they kill a certain number of something. This is used multiple times in defenses especially because of this.

Least Kills - This condition is true when the current player has the least kills of the specified unit/building. This is rarely used.

Least Resources - This condition is true when the current player has the least amount of minerals and/or gas. This is rarely used.

Lowest Score - This is the opposite of highest score. If the current player has the lowest score of the type you specified then this condition will be true.

Most Kills - This condition will be true when the current player has the most kills of the specified unit. You would use this condition for a trigger that displays text to a player saying "You have the most kills!" This is uncommonly used.

Most Resources - This condition will be true when the current player has the most minerals and/or gas between the players. If you wanted to issue a handicap to the player with the highest economy you might use this. It is rarely used.

Never - Wtf? Seriously, even I don't know what this condition means. You cannot use it to stop the following actions from happening; I've tried it. Because of this, I'm assuming this condition is never used.

+ Show Spoiler +

Pun intended.

Opponents - I've only used this a couple times because it is also rarely used. When the specified player/force has the specified number of opponents remaining in the game this condition will be true. I can't really think of any examples off the top of my head.

Score - When the specified players type of score is at the specified number this condition will be true. If you wanted the game to end when a player reaches a kill score of 10 units you would use this. This is commonly used.

Switch - This is somewhat of a tricky condition. Think of switches as light switches if you are having problems. There is an off(cleared) and an on(set). If you wanted something to display for a player like "The room is now illuminated!" when the switch is on you would use this. If you wanted to display "The room is dark!" when the switch is off you would also use this. Switches are set to off and on in the actions list, and are set as cleared(off) by default at the beginning of the game. This is pretty commonly used if a person knows how to use it properly.

Click New to start making a new trigger if you haven't already.

Let's say we wanted to make the default trigger where players start out with 50 minerals at the start of the game. This will be affecting only the players on the "Players" force/team since they are the ones playing. Because of this, we will check off them for who the trigger happens to. You can select some conditions and see how they work after you click Next. Since we want the players to start out with 50 minerals immediately, we will set our condition as Elapsed time. We would have our condition set as "Elapsed scenario time is _____ duration game seconds." with the blank as 0 so it happens immediately. Now onto actions, press Next.
+ Show Spoiler [Alternate answer] +

You can also use Always instead of Elapsed time, but Elapsed time is what the default trigger uses.

Here we actually make something happen with the trigger. Now that we know who this trigger happens for, and what makes it happen, we need to pick what happens as a result. What we want to do is make the players mineral count 50.

List of Actions and how they work:

Center View - This action makes the current players screen center on the specified location. This is very handy for introducing parts of your map if you have some sort of introduction, rather than pinging it on the map. This is semi-commonly used.

Comment - This doesn't affect the trigger whatsoever. Comment is only used to name your triggers basically, for organizing and taking up less room. I recommend doing this if you have many triggers in your map. This is very very useful.

Create Unit - This action creates the specified number of a specified unit/building for a specified player at a specified location. This is used all the time is many different types of maps. Learn to use this action well.

Create Unit with properties - This is the same as the previous one but with this you can edit properties for that unit to make them burrowed, invincible, start with a set amount of life/shield, etc. Because of that, this is also very commonly used.

Defeat - You lose, bitch. This ends the game for the current player. This is used pretty often.

Display Text Message - This displays text on the current players screen(only his! if you start asking about it other players will think you are crazy!). You can add colour to the text as well. This is commonly used.

Draw - This ends the game in a draw for all players. This is pretty uncommon to use.

Give Units to Player - This action is very useful. It gives control of a specified unit/building from one specified player to another specified player at a specified location. This is very common, I recommend getting to know this action.

Kill Unit - This kills all of the specified unit/building for a specified player. Pretty simple. This is commonly used.

Kill Unit at Location - This is the same as the previous action but instead of killing all of that unit/building, you can choose how much to kill and at what location. This is just the same option with more capabilities. This is commonly used.

Leaderboard - There are so many variations of Leaderboard it's not worth it to describe each and every one. The Leaderboard is the score of the specified score type in the top left corner with little coloured squares representing that player. This is most notably seen in Golems and Mass Attack games to keep score of kills. There are other scores you can display(I.E resource, unit count, etc) and they can be pretty helpful in a map, depending on what type of map it is. This is an uncommon action altogether though.

Minimap Ping - This creates a simple in-game ping on the current players minimap at the specified location. Simple enough. This is an uncommon action to use; center view is used more.

Modify Unit Energy - It's exactly what the name suggests. This action modifies the mana/energy of a specified number of a specified unit at a specified location. This is commonly used.

Modify Unit Hanger Count - There are only 2 uses for this action: Adding scarabs to Reavers and Interceptors to Carriers. This action adds a specified number of hanger count to a specified number of units at a specified location for a specified player. This is rarely used. It is usually only used in Reaver micro maps to give Reavers infinite scarabs.

Modify Unit Hit Points - This action is basically the same as Modify Unit Energy except it modifies that units health. This is a commonly used action.

Modify Unit Resource Amount - I've never actually seen this action until recently but it modifies the amount of resource for minerals or gas for a specified number of resource things owned by a specified player(either player 12 for geysers and mineral fields, or a target player who owns a Refinery/etc.) at a specified location. This is rarely used.

Modify Unit Shield Hit Points - This action is basically the same as Modify Unit Energy and Modify Unit Hit Points but it regards a Protoss's shield. It is uncommonly - commonly used.

Move Location - This is somewhat of a tricky action, but useful nonetheless. This action makes a specified location replace itself on a specified unit owned by a specified player within another specified location. Tricky yes, but very useful if you understand it. This action is often put on Preserve Trigger to make the location hover above a unit in games like bounds. If certain enemy units come within reach of the location hovering around that specified unit they die. This is a commonly used action.

Move Unit(also known as 'Teleport' in some editors) - This action moves a specified amount of a specified unit owned by a specified player at a specified location to a different specified location. Somewhat confusing, but that's the best way to describe it. This action simply moves or teleports units(buildings work too) and is very useful and very commonly used.

Mute Unit Speech - This action simply mutes the StarCraft in-game sounds for the current player so they can only only hears sounds emitted by the triggers and map. This is rarely used. I've only seen this used for UMS maps that are "movies."

Order - This action issues a command for all specified units owned by a specified player at a specified location to either attack, move, or patrol to a different specified location. This is used commonly, especially in micro maps to create somewhat of an AI.

Pause Game - This pauses the game for all players in it. This is rarely used.

Pause Timer - This pauses the timer at the top middle section of the screen in a game if there is a timer. This is rarely used.

Play WAV - This plays a WAV file imported into the map for the current player. This is rarely used. I haven't found out how to import WAVs into a map in SCMDraft but you can do it with other editors more easily.

Preserve Trigger - This is an amazing action. This action loops the whole trigger endlessly until the conditions are no longer met. If you wanted a message to display to you saying "Spend more money!" repeatedly you would use Preserve Trigger as an action so that it loops until you no longer have an excess of money(this amount would be specified under conditions). This is a very very common trigger.

Remove Unit - This action removes all of a specified unit/building for a specified player. This is quite simple. This action is commonly used.

Remove Unit at Location - This action is the same as the previous one but you must specify the amount of units/buildings to remove and the location as well. This is even more commonly used.

Run AI Script - This is the essence of making computers do stuff in a UMS map. If you give a computer probes and a nexus by minerals he will not mine them unless order to do so with an AI script. There are loads of different scripts ranging from forcing a player to share vision with the current player to making units run around mindlessly. Check them out yourself. This is a commonly used trigger.

Run AI Script at Location - This is same as the regular Run AI Script but there are now more options as you have a specified location to choose from. These range from loading marines into bunkers to making computers only sit in their base and mine minerals in the peace and quiet. This is a commonly used trigger.

Set Alliance Status - Here is where you force players to ally, to unally and to share allied victory. A specified player is set as what you choose for the current player. This is commonly used.

Set Counterdown Timer - This is what you use to create a timer at the top of the screen. You either set to, subtract, or add a specified amount of seconds to the timer. This is uncommonly used.

Set Deaths - This action allows you to control time and space!~ No... Not really... =/ ... This lets you modify the number of deaths for a specified player and his specified unit. This is uncommonly used.

Set Doodad state - This is the action that makes bunkers "disabled" in some bunker defense. This action was originally designed to disable and enable doors(created under doodad layer) to open. This can be handy, but it rarely used.

Set Invincibility - This action lets you enable or disable invincibility for specified units/buildings owned by a specified player at a specified location. This is uncommon to use since you can enable invincibility for things on the map before a game even starts but is handy nonetheless.

Set Mission Objectives - This edits the mission objectives that you can view any time after going into the menu. This is rarely used.

Set Next Scenario - This action is used at the end of a campaign map to load the following map in sequence. You will never experience this on b.net. This is almost never used.

Set Resources - This action sets/modifies the resources for a specified player to a specified amount of minerals and/or gas. This is extremely useful, especially in defense maps and maps where you earn minerals to upgrade through kills and such. This is a very common action.

Set Score - This action sets/modifies the score of a specified type for a specified player to a specified amount. This is most commonly used as a kill for money trigger, setting the kills back to zero and rewarding a player with a mineral/gas every time their score goes up. This is a common action.

Set Switch - This action either sets or clears the status of a switch(explained early under conditions). This is a very common action.

Talking Portrait - This changes the portrait of the character under your menu button in a game. This is almost useless and is never used.

Transmission - This is a combination of multiple actions put together. You can play WAVs, set the talking portrait, display texts, and pause the game(in a way) all at the same time. This is basically only used for campaign missions.

Unmute Unit Speech - This simply unmutes the StarCraft in-game sounds if they were muted before. This is a rarely used action.

Unpause The Game - This simply unpauses the game if it was paused before. This is rarely used.

Unpause Timer - This simply unpauses the game timer if you paused it before. This is rarely used.

Victory - This ends the current players game in victory. Hurrah! This is pretty common for games you can actually win.

Wait - This simply pauses for a specified amount of time before following up with the next action listed. This is very common, especially for waiting a certain amount of time before displaying a new text message for players on the screen.

To do this, click New and in the drop down box scroll down to SET RESOURCES. The description/details of this action should be "Modify resources for ______: ___ ____ ______."

+ Show Spoiler [If you can't guess what it is...] +

Modify resources for (either 'Current player', since this will happen to all the players, or Force 1/Players/whatever you set the team name as): (either Set to, or add, because they start out with 0, both have the same effect) (50) (minerals)

If you want to play around with the actions and figure them out a little go for it.

Then click OK and then Finish to complete the trigger.

Example 2:

That trigger works easily since it doesn't take place in any specific spot on the map. We don't need any locations. Let's say we wanted a marine to spawn in the bottom right corner repeatedly for player 2 when player 1 brings an overlord to the top left corner. Here we have to exit out of the trigger window(it saves them automatically, don't worry) and change the layer of from map from Terrain/Units/Copy-cut-paste/whatever you have it on before to Locations. In the locations window you simply make a box of an area to make a location there. You can edit the type of location(to make it only apply to air units if you wanted to) and the name if you double click it. So now lets make 2 locations: One for the top left corner and one for the bottom right. Name the one in the top left to "Ovie" and name the one in the bottom right to "Rine."

Now open up the trigger editor again and go to New. This is what the trigger would look like.

Players:
+ Show Spoiler +

The player for the trigger can actually have a wide range of options to use that all have the same ending affect. We could use either player 1 or 2. We will use 2 here.

Players: "Player 2".

Conditions:
+ Show Spoiler +

"Player 1" brings (either exactly 1, at least 1, etc, like I said there can be many options) "Zerg Overlord" to location "Ovie"

Actions:
+ Show Spoiler +

- Create "1" "Terran Marine" at location "Rine" for "(Current player or Player two)."
- Preserve trigger

^ Preserve trigger makes this trigger keep looping until the conditions are no longer met.

Note: You can edit any part of a trigger after you make it. You can also copy them too, don't make extra work for yourself!

Some common triggers:
+ Show Spoiler [Observer Vision for Players] +

Players(check):
Observers(a.k.a Force 2 by default)

Conditions:
Elapsed time is at least 0 seconds.

Actions:
Run AI Script TURN ON SHARED VISION FOR PLAYER 1
Run AI Script TURN ON SHARED VISION FOR PLAYER 2
Preserve Trigger

*^Assuming it's a 2 player 6 observer slot map*

+ Show Spoiler [Sunken Defense, kills for money] +

Players(check):
Sunken Defenders

Condition:
Current player kills at least 10 men.

Action:
Set resource for current player add 1 mineral
Display for current player: 10 Kills = 1 mineral

^ I will be adding more to the list later!

Check out my micro maps here for references on some triggers. I did not protect my maps(a.k.a lock them from being edited).

There's a lot more you can do with these editors too! I have only scratched the surface! If you enjoy doing this there's even more cool stuff you can do ;D

If you have any problems with maps or triggers I will try my best to help you out if you post here. Thanks for reading!

Grobyc

Canada18410 Posts

June 14 2009 10:08 GMT

FAQS:

How do you create stacked buildings?
This is done in SCMDraft. You must go to Options > Units > Allow stack. When you place buildings there is no sound that tells you when one placed so if you are aiming to place exactly 10, select them and right click after to see how many you have. Remember, if you want these to appear in a melee map they must be sprites, and not units!

You go Sprites > Units Sprites to let players see and attack them(which you would want in this case). You go Sprites > Units if you want players to be able to see them but not touch or click on them.

Remember, the sprites must be owned by Player 12 as well!

When I play my melee map my resources aren't appearing, why?
You probably forgot to set the owner of the resources as player 12 if you used SCMDraft to place them. If you use StarEdit or X-tra Editor it automatically places them and you shouldn't be having any problems.

I've made a UMS map but when I play it StarCraft crashes when I do some things, why?
This is particularly true when it comes to glitches with larva. I have had this happen to me a number of things and quite often there were different reasons why. Try the following:
- Sometimes the map editor hates it when you set the unit/building build time to 0. When you try to build that unit the game crashes. To fix this just go back to the editor and set it as 1 instead.
- Delete all stuff in your map to see whether it keeps happening or not. After you delete stuff save it as a different filename of course so you don't lose all your work. Trying deleting units on the map, removing weird terrain, deleting triggers, and resetting upgrade/tech values. Do each of these one at a time so that you can start to narrow it down.

*If anyone gets this kind of problem and ends up with another solution feel free to post it here and I'll included it.*

More to come

seRapH

United States9706 Posts

June 14 2009 14:56 GMT

could you tell me how to make those stacked temples in medusa?
the only thing scmdraft will let me stack are sprites...

dhe95

United States1213 Posts

June 14 2009 16:26 GMT

On June 14 2009 23:56 majesty.k)seRapH wrote:
could you tell me how to make those stacked temples in medusa?
the only thing scmdraft will let me stack are sprites...

Options -> Units -> Allow stack

Chef

10810 Posts

June 14 2009 17:01 GMT

I think you needed to choose one specific aspect of map making and then go into detail with it... This is all over the place and pretty basic to be honest :X

Grobyc

Canada18410 Posts

June 14 2009 17:14 GMT

On June 15 2009 02:01 Chef wrote:
I think you needed to choose one specific aspect of map making and then go into detail with it... This is all over the place and pretty basic to be honest :X

Hmm you have a point. Since Nightmarjoo put most of his emphasis on his guide on making Melee maps, I think I'll add a larger section for UMS maps and triggers later today.

On June 15 2009 01:26 dhe95 wrote:

Show nested quote +

Options -> Units -> Allow stack

Yes this is correct. Also make sure player 12 owns the sprites or they won't appear on the map.

konadora

Singapore66063 Posts

June 14 2009 17:24 GMT

The triggers are really a bitch to explain, I took almost a month to understand all the triggers, and an additional month for the third-party editors' triggers.

aznmathfreak

United States148 Posts

June 14 2009 17:31 GMT

Awesome, I've been looking for a guide for ums map making. This Beta key contest is producing a treasure cove of gems.

konadora

Singapore66063 Posts

June 14 2009 17:49 GMT

On June 14 2009 19:08 Grobyc wrote:
FAQS:

How do you create stacked buildings?
This is done in SCMDraft. You must go to Options > Units > Allow stack. When you place buildings there is no sound that tells you when one placed so if you are aiming to place exactly 10, select them and right click after to see how many you have. Remember, if you want these to appear in a melee map they must be sprites(more info on that in Nightmarjoo's guide), and not units!

Shouldn't they be unit sprites and not just sprites?

Grobyc

Canada18410 Posts

June 14 2009 17:55 GMT

#10

On June 15 2009 02:49 konadora wrote:

Show nested quote +

Shouldn't they be unit sprites and not just sprites?

Ahh yes I should have been more specific.
You go Sprites > Units Sprites to let players see and attack them(which you would want in this case). You go Sprites > Units if you want players to be able to see them but not touch or click on them. I'll edit that, thanks.

FaTe)SoL

Canada110 Posts

June 14 2009 18:14 GMT

#11

SCMDraft is, in all aspects, better than xtra editor. If you don't like the text based trigger editing, don't use trigedit. The "Classic" editor function of SCMDraft works like the original so there's no need to switch over to xtra.

Draft > xtra

Also, there's another third party editor called "Starforge" available, although I wouldn't recommend it to those just starting out at map making. It's pretty glitchy and the text based triggering is hard to get a grip on.

Grobyc

Canada18410 Posts

June 15 2009 04:21 GMT

#12

Ahh you're correct. I didn't even notice SCMDraft had a Classic trigger editor! Thanks FaTe, I'm going to re-arrange the OP.

Grobyc

Canada18410 Posts

June 15 2009 07:09 GMT

#13

Massive BUMP

The guide is now 6,347 words long and has had a much bigger section regarding triggers and UMS maps added.

StarN

United States2587 Posts

June 15 2009 13:51 GMT

#14

Great guide! I'm going to start pumping out some UMS maps now ;p

foeffa

Belgium2115 Posts

June 15 2009 23:06 GMT

#15

Sick guide! Props.

thezanursic

5478 Posts

September 08 2012 18:07 GMT

#16

I'm going to ask a question here because I don't want to create a new thread just for my question.

Why didn't we see 192x192 melee maps in Pro matches in Korea?

I mean is there a limitation where you can only make maps 192x192 if they are UMS?

There is literally no melee map beyond the bounds of 128x128.

Birdie

New Zealand4438 Posts

September 08 2012 19:57 GMT

#17

You can make 192x192 and up to 256x256 melee maps; the reason would probably be because 192x192 is too big for a 1v1.

Nightmarjoo

United States3359 Posts

September 08 2012 20:06 GMT

#18

It hurts the resolution on the minimap.

thezanursic

5478 Posts

September 08 2012 20:15 GMT

#19

On September 09 2012 04:57 Birdie wrote:
You can make 192x192 and up to 256x256 melee maps; the reason would probably be because 192x192 is too big for a 1v1.

Okay, but you can't honestly tell me 128x128 is as optimal as it can be, maybe 150x150 would work better or something like that.

Nightmarjoo

United States3359 Posts

September 08 2012 20:20 GMT

#20

The largest value has to be 64, 96, 128, 192, 256, 512, or game will crash. You could do 192x150 for example, but not 150x150. There are 128x112 pro maps for example.

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