Editing tips

There's a new feature up on the editing page showing quick editing tips- if you have any, please post them here or use this form. Thanks :smile:

can't see them :S where abouts on the page are they?

[edit] slaps myself, found it!

Would you consider this a tip:? To ensure that you don't wonk up the 3d veiw in Worldcraft, make sure you minimize the program when you will be away for awhile and your screen saver will come on.

Press Ctrl+A to reset the 4 views in Hammer back to their default equal sizes.

If you want to concentrate on a single view press Shift+Z to focus the entire workspace on one view.

Is there a full list we can view so none are repeated or do you authenticate them first?

Press Ctrl+E in Hammer to focus all 3 grid views on the selected object. (very important)

Save often (Ctrl+S) and keep backup RMF's; Hammer can become unstable time to time and crashes once in a while, sometimes even erasing maps!

In Vertex Manipulation mode, select a yellow midpoint and use Ctrl+F to create a new vertice. Alternatively, you can also select two midpoints and use Ctrl+F to split a face.

EDIT: Might be handy to have a little link next to the box to display a list of all the random tips, in case people want to browse through all of them.

A short list of tips I would have found greatly useful in one concentrated list:

"Shift + Drag" brush cloning: unimaginable productivity gain.

"Ctrl + M" with a brush selected allows you to move, scale, or rotate brushes with exact numerical values

"Alt + E" with a set of vertecies selected allows vertex scaling

The entity "compass" is oriented to the XY view

Texture property cloning: select a face with the texture application tool (Crl +A), and right click on another face to copy the texture and all it's properties (except alignment e.g. "too world" or "too face")

Select a brush or a group of brushes and use [Ctrl]+L or [Ctrl]+I to flip it horizontally or vertically. Very useful when you want to create symmetric copies of objects.

Don't go into aligator farms.

Thanks all :smile: There's a link above the box now that lets you view them all.

Never rotate a solid manually; the vertexes will all be skew whiff. Instead, use the rotation tool, (Control+M) and you can rotate in which ever plain necessary.<?xml:namespace prefix = o ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" /><o:p></o:p>

read the manual.

it has some cool tips like;

<H1>Hotkey Reference</H1>
Tools

• <LI class=mvd-P>
  Shift+S - Pointer Tool
  
  <LI class=mvd-P>Shift+G - Magnify Tool
  
  <LI class=mvd-P>Shift+C - Camera Tool
  
  <LI class=mvd-P>Shift+E - Entity Tool
  
  <LI class=mvd-P>Shift+B - Block Tool
  
  <LI class=mvd-P>Shift+A - Texture App Tool
  
  <LI class=mvd-P>Shift+T - Apply Current Texture
  
  <LI class=mvd-P>Shift+D - Decal Tool
  
  <LI class=mvd-P>Shift+X - Clipping Tool
  
  <LI class=mvd-P>Shift+V - Vertex Manipulation Tool
  
  <LI class=mvd-P>Shift+P - Path Tool
  
  </LI>

Clipboard/Selection

• <LI class=mvd-P>
  Ctrl+C - copy objects to clipboard (also ctrl+insert)
  
  <LI class=mvd-P>Ctrl+V - paste objects from clipboard (also shift+insert)
  
  <LI class=mvd-P>Ctrl+X - cut objects to clipboard (also shift+del)
  
  <LI class=mvd-P>Ctrl+E - center on selection (vertex/object) in all views
  
  <LI class=mvd-P>Shift+Q - clear selections
  
  <LI class=mvd-P>PgUp - previous selection in "hit" list
  
  <LI class=mvd-P>PgDn - next selection in "hit" list
  
  </LI>

Grid

• <LI class=mvd-P>
  [ - grid lower
  
  <LI class=mvd-P>] - grid higher
  
  <LI class=mvd-P>Shift+R - toggle grid on/off
  
  <LI class=mvd-P>Shift+W - toggle snap to grid
  
  <LI class=mvd-P>p - (with mouse cursor in 3D view) toggle 3D grid on and off
  
  </LI>

Grouping

• <LI class=mvd-P>
  Ctrl+G - group objects
  
  <LI class=mvd-P>Ctrl+U - ungroup objects
  
  </LI>

Carving/Hollowing

• <LI class=mvd-P>
  Ctrl+Shift+C - carve
  
  <LI class=mvd-P>Ctrl+H - hollow
  
  </LI>

Creating Objects

• <LI class=mvd-P>
  Enter - create object drawn with block/entity tool
  
  <LI class=mvd-P>Alt+Shift+C - insert original prefab
  
  <LI class=mvd-P>Ctrl+R - create prefab with selected objects
  
  <LI class=mvd-P>Ctrl+T - create entity with selected objects; to add objects to an existing entity, select it and the objects and hit Ctrl+T (you will be prompted)
  
  </LI>

Other Object Operations

• <LI class=mvd-P>
  Ctrl+B - snap selected objects to grid (based on bounding box)
  
  <LI class=mvd-P>Alt+Enter - selected object's properties
  
  </LI>

File Stuff

• <LI class=mvd-P>
  Ctrl+N - new file
  
  <LI class=mvd-P>Ctrl+O - open file
  
  <LI class=mvd-P>Ctrl+S - save file
  
  </LI>

Undo/Redo

• <LI class=mvd-P>
  Ctrl+Z - undo
  
  <LI class=mvd-P>Ctrl+Y - redo
  
  </LI>

2D Views

• <LI class=mvd-P>
  Ctrl+I - flip vertical
  
  <LI class=mvd-P>Ctrl+L - flip horizontal
  
  <LI class=mvd-P>Tab - switch view types (top/side/front)
  
  <LI class=mvd-P>+/- - zoom in/out (hold Ctrl to synchronize all 2D views)
  
  <LI class=mvd-P>1 to 9 - preset zoom levels
  
  <LI class=mvd-P>Space - hold space and left mouse button to drag view
  
  <LI class=mvd-P>Alt - disable snap to grid while dragging with the mouse
  
  </LI>

3D View

• <LI class=mvd-P>
  Space - While holding the spacebar:
  
  <UL>
  <LI class=mvd-P>
  holding the left mouse button allows you to rotate your angle of view in any direction, while the viewing point remains stationary.
  
  <LI class=mvd-P>holding the right mouse button will allow you to move left, right, up, and down while keeping the viewing angle constant.
  
  </LI>

<LI class=mvd-P>
Space+Shift - While holding the spacebar and Shift:

• <LI class=mvd-P>
  the left mouse button acts the same as above.
  
  <LI class=mvd-P>the right mouse button allows you to move forward and backward, as well as from side to side.
  
  </LI>

<LI class=mvd-P>
z - Pressing the (lowercase) z puts the editor 3D view into its new "noclip" mode (this mode can be disabled in the 3D options dialog)

• <LI class=mvd-P>
  the mouse acts like +mlook is on (moving it around will change the player's direction of focus).
  
  <LI class=mvd-P>W - forward
  
  <LI class=mvd-P>S - backward
  
  <LI class=mvd-P>A - strafe left
  
  <LI class=mvd-P>D - strafe right
  
  </LI>

<LI class=mvd-P>
Shift+Right-mouse-click - will select an entire brush and bring up the 3D View context menu, as above.

<LI class=mvd-P>p - (with mouse cursor in 3D view) toggle 3D grid on and off

<LI class=mvd-P>o - (with mouse cursor in 3D view) display frames per second and yaw/pitch of camera.

</LI></UL>
Morph Tool

• <LI class=mvd-P>
  Ctrl+F - split faces (vertex manipulation) - must have two edges or vertices selected
  
  <LI class=mvd-P>Alt+E - vertex scaling
  
  </LI>

Selection Tool

• <LI class=mvd-P>
  Ctrl - hold Ctrl and click to select multiple objects
  
  <LI class=mvd-P>Shift - hold Shift when rotating to constrain rotation to 15 degrees; hold Shift when moving an object to create a copy (clone) of that object
  
  <LI class=mvd-P>(drag) - hold left mouse button and drag to select with a box; press Enter to select objects hitting the box, or press Shift+Enter to select objects only entirely within the box.
  
  </LI>

Camera Tool

• <LI class=mvd-P>
  Shift - create a new camera by holding Shift and dragging with the left mouse button.
  
  <LI class=mvd-P>PgUp - cycle to the previous camera position
  
  <LI class=mvd-P>PgDn - cycle to the next camera position
  
  <LI class=mvd-P>Delete - delete the current camera position
  
  </LI>

Clipper Tool

• <LI class=mvd-P>
  Enter - perform clip
  
  <LI class=mvd-P>Ctrl - hold Ctrl and drag with the left mouse button to move both handles of the clipper
  
  <LI class=mvd-P>Shift - hold Shift and drag with the left mouse button to create a new clip plane without performing the previous clip.
  
  <LI class=mvd-P>o - (with mouse cursor in 2D view) toggle clip sizes on and off
  
  </LI>

Miscellaneous

• <LI class=mvd-P>
  Alt+B - export again
  
  <LI class=mvd-P>Ctrl+A - auto-size 4 views to center
  
  <LI class=mvd-P>Shift - (while in Texture Application mode) select entire object
  
  <LI class=mvd-P>Shift+L - texture lock
  
  <LI class=mvd-P>Shift+Z - maximize/restore view
  
  <LI class=mvd-P>Ctrl+M - transform dialog
  
  <LI class=mvd-P>Alt+P - check map for errors
  
  <LI class=mvd-P>F9 - run map
  
  <LI class=mvd-P>Escape - abort current tool/mouse operation (drag/drop)</LI>

[edit] the quick tip is......

fishy said:
read the manual.

[/edit]

Fishy, that isn't very "quick". It's more like a week-long omnibus.

matt said:
Never rotate a solid manually; the vertexes will all be skew whiff. Instead, use the rotation tool, (Control+M) and you can rotate in which ever plain necessary.<?xml:namespace prefix = o ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" /><o:p></o:p>

Actually, I find it a little better to skew the object in the direction you want. Vertexes usually come out ok.

• Check the "default to 15 degree rotations" option from Tools > Options > 2d Views options, now you have a snap on your rotations, to turn this off, just hold down Shift and rotate.

• Compile and play test your maps often, the more time you spend on an area the more it will show in the end.

• Sometimes, spending an extra day aligning a texture or tweaking multi_manager timers can make or brake your map.

(hopefully i haven't repeated any of the posts )

fishy said:
[edit] the quick tip is......

fishy said:
read the manual.

[/edit]

the best advice i can think of, and the one most likely to be overlooked.. :sad:

• Sometimes, spending an extra day aligning a texture or tweaking multi_manager timers can make or brake your map.

If it takes you day to align a texture then maybe you should consider drooling as a hobby. :smile:

Alien_Sniper said:

• Sometimes, spending an extra day aligning a texture or tweaking multi_manager timers can make or brake your map.

If it takes you day to align a texture then maybe you should consider drooling as a hobby. :smile:

if it takes a day, someone waited way to long :sad:

Some of those manual entries don't look right...as in they're for the older versions...

Orpheus said:

Alien_Sniper said:

• Sometimes, spending an extra day aligning a texture or tweaking multi_manager timers can make or brake your map.

If it takes you day to align a texture then maybe you should consider drooling as a hobby. :smile:

if it takes a day, someone waited way to long :sad:

LOL @ tripple quote :eek:

I ment spending a day working on the entire map or maps

not one entity... that's strange, even for me :smile:

and

*CLIP that nasty architecture that blocks movement!