Start point for mission editing: where to ?

[galevsky 11]

Hi all,

sorry for the noob question, but I am new to Arma title and have no background in mission editing.

Could you please suggest good tuto/wiki where to read the right process to create scripted missions ? With many explanations ?

Thanks a lot and keep going to that great Alpha work !

galevsky

[Tajin 348]

This is the primary source of information:

http://community.bistudio.com/wiki/Main_Page

For everything else, try google. :rolleyes:

[Porky243 1]

Hello there,

Mission Editing has two basics. Working with the Editor - and Scripting.

To get a good point on how the editor itself works, i'd suggest watching some vids about it on youtube. There are many good tutorial videos on youtube on how to use the different tools in the editor, like placing units, groups and triggers or using the link tool aswell as using "modules". Just keep looking for Arma 3 Editor tutorial - you can watch arma 1 or 2 editor tutorials aswell since the editor is pretty much the same.

Units placed in the editor have a socalled init line wich can run code on mission start, like for example put a rifleman on the map and write "removeallweapons this" (without the quotes) into his initline, he will then spawn without any weapon.

To get a look at all those commands you can use just take a look at the BisWiki https://community.bistudio.com/wiki/Category:Scripting_Commands_Arma_3

Scripting is basically an advanced version of the init line.

A script in arma is just a textfile saved in .sqf format that has all the code lines in it that you can put into an initline aswell. The advantage is that you can run a script at any time like if you put a trigger on the map that detects a player you can put a script execution command on the "on activation" line, so the game will run the script in the background as soon as a player enters the trigger zone.

If you would for example create an empty textfile, write "removeallweapons player" and save it as for example test.sqf you have already wrote a script. you just need to call it from the game then. There are some ways to do it, one of them is the trigger I mentioned above. just write _nul = [] execVM "test.sqf" into the trigger on activation field and it will run the script as soon as the player enters the zone.

I need to mention that when you first save a mission in the editor it is stored under /mydocuments/arma 3 alpha/ other profiles / missions. in the file named after your mission there will be a mission.sqm wich is basically a script that tells the game about everything you placed on the map, where it belongs and what conditions and stuff you assigned to it. So every script you want to use for a mission must be stored in that missionfile right next to the mission.sqm in order for the game to find it.

For a single command, a script won't be needed. But when you want to do a lot of stuff on a single action, like armageddon as soon as your buddy draws his gun, a script is quite handy.

Edit just told me I forgot a good point on scripting:

Another advantage of scripting are loops and stuff, you could for example tell the script to wait until your player dies and then prompt a message on screen saying "bad luck" or whatever you want.

Advanced scripting uses a lot of different loops and checks, so like example Check if a group is alive, if anyone dies tell all the other members about one's death, if all are dead, create a new group.

So I for example am hanging around my first "little more complex, atleast for me" script that enables you to call a heli transportation by throwing a smoke grenade. Doesn't sound too awesome, but took about half a day for me to get behind the mechanics and understand every line I wrote :)

hope this helps for now, I can tell you more if you want, and I bet some old coding gods among this forum are likely to help you aswell :)

Edited April 3, 2013 by Porky243

[ARMAidiot 1]

I've made a bunch of tutorials for people with zero knowledge in the ARMA 3 Editor. It covers the very basics from placing a unit to simple mission building without going too deep into detail : )

[Slammin 10]

I've made a bunch of tutorials for people with zero knowledge in the ARMA 3 Editor. It covers the very basics from placing a unit to simple mission building without going too deep into detail : )

ARMAidiot on YouTube

ARMAidiot! As a first class rookie I find your channel very very valuable! I refer all friends interested in learning mission making to it. Keep up the great work! :)

@ galevsky : Besides ARMAidiot's channel you'll find useful information on mission editing also at :

Jester814's forumthread : http://forums.bistudio.com/showthread.php?148594-ArmA-3-Editor-Tutorials-Building-Simple-Missions

Swissmavericks channel :

Goodluck and have fun!

[marker 1]

A must for everyone to read!

Still very relevant today..

Mr Murry's Guide

http://www.armaholic.com/page.php?id=4847

http://forums.bistudio.com/showthread.php?67426-ArmA-Editing-Guide-English-Version

[Phantom Six 25]

I've been trying to work on a tutorial of my own with a template for a nice little standard, its still WIP until I can finish it up.

http://phantommissionsite.weebly.com/tutorials.html you don't have to follow exactly what it says, but I'm trying to make this newbie friendly as much as possible.

Here is another good tutorial http://forums.bistudio.com/showthread.php?148594-ArmA-3-Editor-Tutorials-Building-Simple-Missions

[ARMAidiot 1]

ARMAidiot! As a first class rookie I find your channel very very valuable! I refer all friends interested in learning mission making to it. Keep up the great work! :)

(...great tutorials...)

Thank you so much. The first messages I got were... lets say pretty "unpleasant" but everybody who subscribed/liked or posted keeped me going. Thanks to people like you I've still fun doing this : )

A must for everyone to read!

Still very relevant today..

Mr Murry's Guide

http://www.armaholic.com/page.php?id=4847

http://forums.bistudio.com/showthread.php?67426-ArmA-Editing-Guide-English-Version

While this is a must-read (!), I have to say that most of the scripting stuff is outdated, because it mostly deals with sqs instead of sqf.

The best tutorials on sqf-scripting I've read were:

Basic SQF-Scripting guide version 3.2 by Taurus

Basics of SQF by Cheetah

galevsky, the best I can suggest you is to get used to the "non-scripting" and then slowly transist (right word?) to sqf-scripting.

[Porky243 1]

While this is a must-read (!), I have to say that most of the scripting stuff is outdated, because it mostly deals with sqs instead of sqf.

The best tutorials on sqf-scripting I've read were:

Basic SQF-Scripting guide version 3.2 by Taurus

Basics of SQF by Cheetah

galevsky, the best I can suggest you is to get used to the "non-scripting" and then slowly transist (right word?) to sqf-scripting.

Oh guys really thank you! I really forgot to mention Mr Murrays holy bible when posting, but I must admit that those didn't help me a lot when it comes to figure out how a total different script works. But I think thats just the same with any script :) I just downloaded the tutorials you mentioned ARMAidiot (isn't this name somehow ironic?) and will look through them later on, I'd bet they will help me a lot aswell :)

And of course I will try a little sneak peek on your youtube channel sometime tomorrow :)

The more tutorials on sqf scripting I read, the better I will understand those few things I can't get into my head right now.

Cheers!

[Slammin 10]

Thank you so much. The first messages I got were... lets say pretty "unpleasant" but everybody who subscribed/liked or posted keeped me going.

Everyone helping this community, be it rookies or veterans, deserve a lot of credit! Since early February I peaked around the corner when friends introduced me to Wasteland and Arma 2. Impressed I am, so I did not hesitate obtaining Arma 3 Alpha right away. After two months visiting literally tens of Arma-related websites, browsing through hundreds of forumthreads and subscribing to over a dozen Arma tutorial Youtube-channels I am still strugling with simple and complex scripts. The information (over)load about Arma 2 and 3 missions is daunting! But at the same time fantastic and it shows possibilities are almost limitless!

Judging by the fact you already posted over 60 tutorials related to mission making, scripts for Arma 3 with a straight no-bs userfriendly explanation what pieces of code gets the job done, significes how much effort and time you invest in helping the community (ranging from beginners to old-school pro's) to get a better understanding of scripting logic. So much appreciation for your works from the mission makers, our admins and playerbase so far Armaidiot! And that goes for everyone contributing here and beyond.

I've been trying to work on a tutorial of my own with a template for a nice little standard, its still WIP until I can finish it up.

http://phantommissionsite.weebly.com/tutorials.html you don't have to follow exactly what it says, but I'm trying to make this newbie friendly as much as possible.

I came across your posts and website in the (awesome) FHQ TaskTracker already, bookmarked your site and put the excellent tutorial on briefing in description.ext (http://phantommissionsite.weebly.com/briefingsqf.html) in effect Phantom! Very helpful so mucho gracias! And I am looking forward to future tutorials.

[galevsky 11]

Thanks to all of you for these relevant info.