Custom Scenario Editor Tutorial

(EDIT: updated screenshot (again))

I'm just going to throw together something very basic and let other people clarify anything that's confusing (I'm horrible at explaining things).

Go to Multiplayer (battle island), click Create Casual Game, then click the Custom button under the list of boards:



From the top:

• New: clears the fields
• Load... : load a scenario (.scn) file from your harddrive
• Save As... : saves this scenario (.scn) to your harddrive, I recommend always doing this before starting any game
  
• Name: text shown above victory stars
• Board: filename of board (.brd) being used
• Create: opens the board editor; this exits the scenario editor and YOU WILL LOSE ANY UNSAVED CHANGES
• Import... : load a board (.brd) file from your harddrive
• Export... : saves the current board (.brd) to your harddrive, generally only needed if you're messing with someone else's scenario
• Audio: presumably sets the music and ambient sounds (I keep those muted)
• Time: time limit per player (as in MP)
  
• Is AI: whether the side is controlled by player or AI; the box for "You" is disabled
• MP Party: if you want to use your current MP party; this disables the group fields for this player
• VP Target: number of stars needed to win; should probably leave as "Automatic" unless you're using victory squares
  
• Group #: size and type of each monster group; the dropdown list uses the names found in the logs, which may be different than what the player sees
• Tags: optional tags, discussed in a later post
• Invite Player (optional): select a name here to send an invite to that player when you click Create Game
  
• Ranked/Non-Ranked/Custom: the first two are for starting a game using a pre-made MP board, because this uses the same interface as Create Casual Game
• Cancel: return to MP lobby; discarding any unsaved changes
• Help: opens this webpage in another browser tab, which does nothing but link to here
  
• Create Game: starts the game you created; if Opponent isn't AI, your game will show up in the Casual Games section waiting for someone to join (unless you already picked someone from Invite Player)

It's too late for me to tackle the board editor, so here are two videos:
Lance:


Farbs:

 

Maybe if this gets fleshed out it could be Stickyed?

 

(continuing the tutorial...)

One thing you need to remember: the Scenario Editor and the Board Editor do not talk to each other. So if you download someone else's scenario from this thread and want to modify the board, here's what you need to do:

1. Open the scenario editor (Create Custom Game)
2. Load... the scenario file
3. Export... the board file
4. Open the board editor (Create)
5. Open the board file
6. Make your changes
7. Save the modified board
8. Close the board editor
9. Open the scenario editor (Create Custom Game)
10. Load... the scenario file
11. Import... the modified board file
12. Save As... the modified scenario file
13. Create Game to test

 

I have things I need to say about monsters, but nothing else for the scenario editor. Should I post the board editor tutorial here or a separate thread?

(It may be delayed a couple days while I try to beat Temple of Terror before they take away my fireballs.)

 

Before I talk about monsters, I need to decide on terms to use when talking about their names:

1. monster group name used by logs and scenario editor (unique)
2. monster group name displayed by their hand (not unique, may or may not resemble #1)
3. monster group name shown when hovering over figure (usually singular version of #2)
4. name of specific minion (not random and not always unique)

Any suggestions?

 

No, I'm going to talk about all the names, I just want to know what I should call the different names. For example, these are my first ideas:

1. key name
2. group name
3. description
4. minion name

 

So, monsters...

You can't edit monsters, since this would cause all sorts of problems (ie things that look like trogs but act like monkeys). You can't even view monster details in the scenario editor; all you can do is specify how many of each type. The small box is the quantity (treated as 1 if left blank), the larger box is the Group Name, which is what shows up in the logs.

I've attached the scenario I made to examine monster stats and decks (eventually this info should show up in the wiki). It has 6 large spawn points for group 1 and 1 large for group 2 to show how minions and non-minions behave (minions and traits are interesting). All the monsters are controlled by you (Gary doesn't have any spawn points) so you have all the time you need to experiment, draw the whole deck (group 1 has 6 members to speed this up), or whatever you want. I also put in a variety of terrains to examine how they affect movement and aoe coverage.

Remember, the scenario editor doesn't talk to the board editor, so the game engine has to figure out what to do if the numbers don't match. If there are more spawn points than monsters, it will place the monsters on random spawn points (most official maps have 4 or 5 "any group" spawns to randomize your party's placement). If the monsters outnumber the spawns, then it will fill all the spawns and discard the rest of the monsters. Note that whether or not a monster is a minion is determined by the size of the group in the scenario editor, not the number of spawns. Also, small monsters assigned to large spawn points will be placed on the bottom tile of the spawn. And don't worry, the game won't crash if it tries to draw more cards than are in the deck.

So what exactly makes up a monster?

1. Group Name: unique, used by the scenario editor and logs
2. Display Name: not unique, shown to player (by their hand)
3. Description: displayed when you hover over a figure, usually includes the race and sometimes also class, often matches #1 and/or #2
4. Minion Names: names of specific minions; each group has a list of these (though not always enough)
5. His/Her Flag: not fully implemented yet (and may be part of #4)
6. Health: max health
7. Size: size of the figure's base
8. Figure: groups with similar names often just have different figures
9. Draws: how many cards are drawn per living group member, groups with singular names will have a higher value than plural versions
10. Points: how many stars you get for killing one
11. Default Move
12. Deck: not unique; if you see multiple group names for a boss, he probably has different decks on different maps

 

Is it possible to download existing maps to test alterations?

 

The devs haven't released the files for the official maps, but you can play with anything posted to forums. And it wouldn't surprise me to see players create copies of official maps and pass them around (especially treasure hunts).

 

Board Editor

To open the board editor click "Create" in the scenario editor (you will lose any unsaved changes to your scenario) or type "boardeditor" at the F1 prompt. The first thing you'll notice is how long it takes to load (lots of graphics have to be downloaded from the servers).

Note: clicking the left mouse button usually draws whatever tile/doodad/terrain you have selected, so you have to crtl-click to drag the table. (And you'll spend a lot of time erasing things when you forget.)



(I'm using a tiny window to keep the screenshots small. This is the top corner of my board.)

You always have three menus visible. Starting from bottom and moving counterclockwise:

File

1. New: discard current board
2. Open: load board file (.brd)
3. Save: save current board
4. Close: discard changes and return to Multiplayer lobby (not the scenario editor)

Layers
Board details are saved in 7 layers, drawn from the bottom up. This menu has check boxes to select which ones are visible while you're editing (when playing a board, only the bottom four are visible) and buttons to select which layer you want to edit.

Edit
Menu for selected layer, described below.

Table Layer
Chose the table style: wooden or MP.

Lower Doodads Layer
Graphics you put around the edges of the board to give it thickness. Two styles to choose from, I'm using the cork one here because everyone else uses the silver. Usually one of the last things you add to the board.


(left corner of board)

1. Place Doodad: opens the palette window so you can select the doodad you want to add
2. Flip (x)/ Flip (y): flip the image horizontally/vertically
3. Move Doodads: allows you to drag a doodad somewhere else
4. Delete Doodads
5. [] Snap to grid: auto-align the image with the tiles, a really good idea on this layer
6. [] Place multiple: also very useful here
7. [] Show markers: I have no idea what this does

Tile Layer
This is where you usually start drawing your board. This is base of your map: floors, walls, water; most other stuff will be added as decals.


(bottom corner of board)

1. Tile Palette: select a tile from a variety of palettes. Each tile has a default terrain, but you can override that in the terrain layer.
2. Flip (x) / Flip (y): flip the tile's image horizontally/vertically
3. Clear Brush: stop drawing with the current tile
4. [] Show Bounds: draws a blue rectangle around all the tiles you've added; useful for making sure you didn't accidentally draw some off screen

Decal Doodads Layer
This is where you mark Difficult and Victory terrain, add non-wall Blocked terrain (like pillars and bushes), and generally make the board look pretty. Also where you add all the junk sitting on the table. Decals can be piled on top of each other.


(bottom corner of board)

1. Place Doodad: select a decal from a variety of palettes
2. Flip (x) / Flip (y): flip image horizontally/vertically
3. Move Doodads
4. Delete Doodads
5. [] Snap to grid: auto-align with tiles
6. [] Place multiple
7. [] Show markers: I have no idea what this does here

Terrain Layer
This views the terrain type of each tile and lets you override the tile's default. You have to set Difficult and Victory terrain here. Yellow, red, and blue Victory highlights can be found in the Treasure decal palette.


(top corner of board)

1. Type: Blocked (black), Difficult (dark green), Open (light green), Victory (yellow), VictoryP0 (red), VictoryP1 (dark blue), Impassable (light blue)
2. Display Opacity: set how opaque this layer is viewing other layers

Spawn Layer
Set spawn points for both players.


(top corner of board)

1. Player: None (delete spawn), Player 0 (red, you), Player 1 (blue, opponent)
2. Facing: West is shown
3. Group: "..." is "any group", often used for player's party; other numbers match group numbers in scenario editor; group 3 and 2 are shown
4. Size: for small and large figures; assigning a small figure to a large spawn will place it on the bottom tile

Upper Doodads Layer
Set where the dead chars go. If you don't set any, they just fly off the table.


(left corner of board)

1. Place Doodad: select which dead char marker to place; I'm not sure what the numbers mean
2. Flip (x) / Flip (y): not sure, maybe changes the facing of the dead char?
3. Move Doodads
4. Delete Doodads
5. [] Snap to grid
6. [] Place multiple
7. [] Show markers: you usually have to uncheck this then re-check it to see these markers, which is probably a bug

Then go back to the scenario editor to test:

 

The best tip I can give, save your work. My chrome just crashed while I was making my contest entry and I lost all my work (and my motivation).

 

I have a question, maybe a noob one, but i cant seem to put my mp party to respawn correctly, only one of the 3 chars respawn. can someone guide me to fix this so all 3 members respawn?

 

Thanks mate, i figure it out, i was uploading the old scn file and thats why the spawns keep getting wrong

 

Hey Kalin, great tutorial.
I have something that is either a question or a request: I have several ideas for Mauve Manticore, but most of them require a third player... a computer
opponent that will attack player 1 (human) and player 2 (computer) indiscriminately. Is this possible at the moment? If this is possible, it could open up a whole new realm of game scenarios, not just for MM but for single player too.
Also, is there some way to have a random party/group member spawn each game (in the same location) to mix things up a bit? I mean without just having a spawn point somewhere else for them.