This is going to let you know how to create your first Warfare map for Unreal tournament 3. All of this assuming you already have at least a really basic knowledge of UT3ED such as the Interface, how to make terrains and ETC.
Select "New level", and chose additive. There's no way you're going to like this with subtractive. Trust me.
And save your level, don't forget the "WAR-" prefix in front of your level so when you play test the game knows this is a warfare level.
Actors needed
So you have your flat terrain set yet? Doesn't matter if you have one or not, you can always use a flat BSP floor for now. All the actors we are going to need such as the "Power Nodes", "Power cores", "Vehicles", "Health/Armor/Weapon pickups" are all under the Navigation tab in your Actor Classes tab, that is located in your "generic browser".
Objectives & Setup
For starters, we will place our first PowerCores in the level
As you know it, a warfare match is won by destroying the enemy's core, we could go with only that, but a good warfare level has at least some nodes going on around. You could make a level that only use two cores and a un-linked powernode with a good backup vehicles such as the "Tank/DarkWalker/Cicada" for optional additional firepower, but we will link the node to both cores at this time to see how it works.
Go find the PowerNode actor, which is just under the Powercore actor in the "Actor Clases" tab.
Place it in the middle, or wherever else between the two cores.
Now we have the very besic objectives placed, what if we wanted a "ORB base", which is also known as "Onslaught Flag Base"
I'll take the moment to let you know that, like the previous engine for UT2004 level design, the "WARFARE Player Starts" and "Vehicles" will auto-link with the nearest "PowerCore/Node". Same goes with the ORB base. Place it in your level and it should auto-link.
If you'd be testing your level right about now, you'll see the ORB base spawning a ORB, that you can grab and move around. But why the cores are not showing up? That's because we haven't set up any Link to our Cores via other objectives. And that's what we're going to do now. In View - > World Properties
Do as in the picture above, from there, it will bring all the options that you see on the picture. You initially don't have them
DO NOT, I REPEAT, DO NOT CLICK ON "Clear all Text". It may "Screw up" your world info actor and you may get some serious issues.
From there you have all the properties such as the music you can link there, your minimap, playercounts. And what we're looking for now, is the "UTOnslaughtMapInfo" label. click on that.
From there it's a node to Node game. It shouldn't be hard at all to set up manually, all you have to do is remember which nodes you connected together and you can always jump in your level to see if the links are correct on your minimap. Select the Node/Core you want to add in the Node-to-Node and press the green arrow. Then press the plus to add another link. And so on until you finished.
Standalone PowerNodes and starting Nodes
Standalone nodes are the nodes that doesn't link to others. Like if you want a optional node holding a Goliath or Cicadia that could be a good use. And the Starting Nodes are the nodes you pre-start on without having to build them at the start of the match. Just like in Torlan. Assing a Node by clicking on it, then press the green arrow.
Map preview & Minimap
If you have saved your package the same name as your map, you will get a package build inside your level, from there, if you want to set up your custom minimap image it's the time to. Once you've cooked your level, there should be a generated INI file, open it, and look at the following line:
<Images:WAR-MapName.FileName>
After "Image:", Yourpackage name, then the texture name after the dot.
AND REMEMBER TO CREATE A MATERIAL WITH YOUR TEXTURE TO APPLY IT IN THE WORLD SO THE EDITOR KEEP THE FILE.
That is for the screenshot. For the Minimap, It's the same as the INI file, exept there's no INI file. You'll need to go in the World Properties to set it from there. Take a look at a retail Warfare level to see how they did.
Why is the PowerCore explosion not showing up when the core is destroyed?
That is because the core doesn't have the emitters built-in. Level designers used emitter effects that are triggered when the core is destroyed, via Kismet. To make them work, here's how you do it. Open one of the Warfare levels from the "Private/maps" folder. Very important, because the ones from the simple map folder gives you save errors when copying their stuff. I got it working with WAR-Sinkhole for example.
Once in it, go to one of the core, you will notice that there are 2 emitters on each legs, and 2 in the middle. Select all of them, then select the core, copy, open your level, paste, save. Yes, you can copy both cores if you don't want to open the maps like 4 times. The thing is, we could copy everything in one shot including the Kismet nodes, but it isn't possible to copy things from your level and Kismet at the same time.
The parts to copy in kismet are the following:
These nodes are supposed to be like this in every Warfare level. Copy them both. And paste them in your level.
Everything should work from there. One more thing, I won't be covering this part, but there are camera linked to the matinee event. Matinee are what that controls cinematics. If you want to learn how it works, I recomend you take a look at 3Dbuzz's tuts. If you have UT3 Collection Edition it comes with it, otherwise here's a link.
Conclusion
That's pretty much everything for now. You may then add vehicles near the nodes. Inside UTVehicleFactory. Then for the final gameplay touch, add a couple of path nodes so the bots play in your level, Health pads and ETC. It's a must. It really doesn't take much time and it's really worth it for the people who are going to download your level.
There's sooo much more that you can accomplish for Warfare, things like the Core surge countdown as seen in WAR-PowerSurge, the cool Cicada floor doors in the middle of WAR-Dusk, Countdown respawning Vehicle(s) like the Leviathan in WAR-Serenity, all of this using Kismets. The tutorial you just read is the very basic idea. Tough, you're probably set for making a level that isn't necessarily going to be basic.
Note to the amateur
The example level you saw is hell of a really silly level just to give you the idea on how the basics of warfare works. with that said, in any cases... PLEASE DO NOT RELEASE THAT KIND OF LAYOUT ONLINE. Make cliff elevations, push your imagination, waterfalls, trees, bases, rocks, whatever - Just no flat terrain with 2 powercores next/far to each other. Thank you.
Hope to see some decent warfare levels released soon.