Halo 3 Trilogy

This article concerns Halo 3’s Forge map editor. For full reviews of Halo 3 itself, check out our Halo 3 campaign review and Halo 3 multiplayer review.

If you’re a Halo fan, by this point you have surely heard at least something about Forge, the map-tweaking utility Bungie is including out of the box with Halo 3. At first glance, it seems like a very limited tool. You cannot edit any fundamental map geometry, you can only place or remove various accoutrements such as weapons and vehicles, crates and other ornamentation, spawn points and objectives, and so on.

Don’t trust that first glance, however–it only scratches the surface of what is truly available when you start to delve deep into Forge. Though, for obvious reasons, Bungie has chosen to limit the scope of your individual additions to the supplied standard maps, the combined effects of these additions in creative ways can produce maps and games that play radically differently than anything offered officially.

How, you ask? Read on.

Hammer and Anvil

At the most basic level, Forge allows you to open up a standard Halo 3 map and add elements from a variety of categories–weapons, decorative elements, vehicles, new pickups such as the bubble shield and energy drain as seen in the multiplayer beta, gravity lifts, one- or two-way teleporters, spawn points, and so on. Essentially, these are all the things that can change on a given map depending on the gametype and other settings, but in Halo 3 you have fine control over all of them yourself.

Items can be rotated and stacked, and large simple objects like crates make for great building blocks. Many players will surely start off with simple tweaks like filling a map with rocket lauchers and grenades for a chaotic game, removing all excess weapons and ammo for a more conservative game, blocking doorways with large objects to alter the flow of a map, and so on.

By combining elements, such as placing a crate directly above a grav lift, you can create new unusual objects. A row of such combinations might create a floating, undulating “bridge” that could be used to get from one high perch to another. Taking that idea even further, one starts to imagine more ambitious ideals like a complex obstacle course such as one might see in a 3D platformer, with checkpoints placed at key areas along the set route.

Scrimping and Saving

To ensure that Forge-created levels never run into memory or performance issues, you are given a total budget which you use to spend on the elements you place–each element is assigned a dollar value, and also has a total overall hard limit per map.

For example, simple crates might cost only $2 each with a map limit of eight, while large Wraith tanks might cost $40 a pop with a map limit of two. Certain maps simply do not allow certain vehicles, for size reasons–smaller maps might disallow tanks entirely.

Overall budgets are in the range of hundreds of dollars, and you can always get extra cash by deleting extraneous decorative elements already placed on the map by default, so it does seem like there is a great deal of room for creativity before you start exhausting the practical limits.

Swiss Army Knife
One particularly clever placeable object is known simply as the custom powerup. On its own, the custom powerup is nothing but a blank slate. Its properties are actually determined in the custom gametype settings, which allows you to tie the same map to different gametypes while retaining different custom powerups for each depending on the needs of the gametype.

The remarkable and enticing thing about the custom powerup is that it really is what its name implies. The number and scope of simultaneous attributes that the pickup can assign to the player who acquires it–you can decide how long these attributes last, from 3-90 seconds–is absolutely staggering.

There’s a lot to cover with this baby, so let’s just get going. For one thing, you can modify the shield and health settings–how much damage resistance it provides, what shield multiplier it gives, if it removes the shield, if it raises or lowers shield recharge rate and by how much, if the player’s shield recharges when the player causes damage, if the player is headshot immune.

Similarly, it can affect weapon stats–modifying damage caused from 0%-300% or even to insta-kill status, if grenades regenerate or ammo is infinite, if weapon pickup is disabled.

The powerup can raise or lower movement speed, adjust the pull of gravity to be greater or less, forbid or allow vehicle usage in different ways, modify the player sensor’s range and ability to detect friends and foes, and even modify the player’s physical appearance to be a different color, apply different levels of cloaking, or apply different types of waypoints to the player.

Batter Up
The obvious use of the custom powerup is of course as a coveted stat boost item, or even as a crippling curse cleverly placed in a highly-trafficked corridor to spice up a game of deathmatch. Of course, it can be used in much more unorthodox ways.

One custom user-made gametype mentioned by Bungie’s Frank O’Connor, involves playing baseball with rockets (the balls) and gravity hammers (the bats) as well as checkpoints for bases; a special “batter” powerup might boost run speed and shields to give the player more of a fighting chance to make it around the bases alive.

Keep it Simple, Stupid
You don’t need fancy stuff like the custom powerup to make some interesting custom games. Just with the gametype editor, you could easily devise any number of skill-pushing Slayer variants. For example, points might only be awarded for headshots, allowing you and your gaming group to hone your killer instincts before sticking it to the online matchmade players.

You might also work on your efficiency by detracting a point for every death, meaning the winner of the match will be the player with the highest spread between kills and deaths–sure, that statistic is tracked in regular games, but why not use it as a victory condition? The enormous amount of control over how points are awarded and in what quantity open up the doors to a wealth of simple but useful quick hacks.

So how can you take it further? Read on to find out.

It’s in the Game
Where Forge really shines is when it is used in tandem with the extensive gametype customization options available in Halo 3. Multiplayer fans of Halo and Halo 2 (as well as Bungie’s past games for those whose gaming memories extend further back than the current millenium) know that the studio has always prided itself on offering a variety of multiplayer gametypes and options. Halo 3 represents the most dramatic implementation of that philosophy yet.

You can change an enormous number of properties regarding the world, such as its gravity and spawn settings; players, such as the properties described in the custom powerup section above; win conditions and how points are awarded; and a huge number of gametype-specific options. Listing all of the submenus upon submenus would simply require too much space for this article, but suffice to say there is no shortage of choice.

In addition to standby gametypes such as Slayer, King of the Hill, Capture the Flag, Oddball, Assault, Territories, Juggernaut, and VIP, Bungie has listened to its community and added Infection–commonly known in Halo 2 friend circles as “Zombie,” the unofficial gametype that converts “human” players to “zombie” players when killed by a zombie, until the last human is killed.

Each of these gametypes has a whole ream of options that can be tweaked, and if the type has geographical objectives, they can be adjusted and placed on any map through Forge. Capture zones can be placed and sized for Territories, hill zones can be placed in King of the Hill, go-to points can be placed in VIP games, and so on.

It Wasn’t in the Game (But Now it Is)

By combining Forge and the gametype editor, you can craft new types of games unlike anything offered in the default lineup. One player came up with a mode that, in some ways, shares more in common with land-and-air games like Battlefield than with the Halo series.

In this mode, customized in Forge for a large outdoor map, each team has a randomly-assigned VIP player and an indestructible flying vehicle with room for two passengers. The two VIPs, who cannot pilot the vehicles themselves, must reach airborne checkpoints before the other team does, chaufferred by another teammate. Meanwhile, other teammates on the ground attempt to disrupt their enemies’ checkpoint-grabbing progress by sniping the VIPs out of their passenger seats and protect their own VIPs by assaulting enemy ground troops.

With the baseball mode as an example, one could also imagine recreations of other sports, based on modes such as Oddball or VIP. By modifying maps and gametype objectives in Forge, the already-powerful gametype editor becomes all that more formidable.

Jump In

An impressive technical aspect of Forge is that other players can play around in your map as you edit it in real time, via Xbox Live; you can choose to let them join in the editing or remain as regular players. Creating very unusual and complex gametypes tends to require a lot of iteration, as developers and modders know, so having a group with whom you can jump in and out of games and serve as a live body of testers is invaluable for balance purposes.

Show the World

Of course you can share your creations with your friends through custom games, but Bungie wants to encourage polish and creativity by highlighting the best user-made content for the Halo community at large. You can recommend any content, whether it was made by you or others, to your friends, and Bungie will also be monitoring the content with the best user reaction and most recommendations, as well as content highlighted on community sites online, for its own “Bungie Recommends” website feature.

“Bungie Recommends” will showcase the best of user-generated Halo 3 content on a regular basis, and it will be part of what Bungie describes as its most extensive and ambitious game-to-website integration yet. The company has yet to fully unveil what all that entails (although we’re promised the big reveal is coming soon), but in addition to the already-known screenshot and video sharing features it will also allow you to “tag” featured content you’d like to download. Impressively, that content will then download automatically to your Xbox 360.

Here for the Long Haul

Just as Halo 2 provided the crucial showcase Xbox Live needed, with its elegant lobby system and website integration, so does Bungie plan for Halo 3 to demonsrate how Xbox Live can be taken to the next level with Xbox 360. The franchise is already known for its online multiplayer longevity, but with Forge and a formidable gametype editor, not to mention promised downloadable content, Halo 3 will clearly have enough on the multiplayer side to stay fresh for the rest of this generation if not beyond.

Source

Halo3Trio.com

Halo 3 How-to: Advanced Forge Editing

The following document is the work of Tyson Green, Bungie’s Multiplayer Lead on Halo 3.
Read Part 1 “Basics” here.
Read Part 2 “Object Editing” here.
To return to Halo 3 How-to Click Here

Special Objects

At some point, players stop making piles of fusion coils, and get serious about setting up their maps. It is usually around this time that they realize that you can’t turn Guardian into an awesome CTF map just by changing where the weapons spawn.
Fortunately, more control is provided. A multiplayer map in Halo 3 is configured almost entirely using objects, and the overwhelming majority of these objects are editable in the Forge.

Goal Objects

Gametypes, like Oddball or CTF, have a couple of special objects which only show up in those gametypes. These are things like flag spawns, or hill markers. These are called Goal objects.

When you load a map in the Forge, Goal objects do not show up immediately. You may have noticed that the object creation palette for Goals is empty at first. This is because, by default, the Forge only shows objects which show up in ALL gametypes.

To show objects specific to a particular gametype, you can switch Forge over to that gametype. To do this:
-    Switch into Editor Mode.
-    Press Start to bring up the Forge menu.
-    Choose “Change Game Type”, and select the gametype you wish to edit.

The round will end, and when the next round starts, objects specific to the gametype you selected will be present on the map, and in the Goal object palette.

Halo 3 needs certain objects to be on each map in order to function properly. If you accidentally delete such an object, and forget to replace it, it will be automatically restored when you save the map. So relax, you won’t break your map if you do something wrong, but you might see a goal object return after you thought you had deleted it.

Common Goal Object Properties

Goal objects have two common properties that are usually not found in normal objects, like weapons or vehicles. As with normal object properties, you edit these by placing your crosshair on the goal object, and pressing X.
-    Team: This is the team which owns this goal object. This is critical for some gametypes, like CTF, where you need to place a flag stand for each team.
-    Shape, Radius, Top, Bottom, et cetera: Some goal objects have an area, like a hill in King of the Hill. These properties control the shape and size of this area.
-    Spawn Order: This property is used to control the order in which certain goals are used. For example, in VIP Escort, the goal point with the lowest Spawn Order value is the first destination, followed by the point with the next lowest value, and so on.
Assault
Assault has two types of special goal objects:
-    Bomb Spawn Points, which are where a team’s bomb will spawn. Each team must have at least one. Also, one must be placed for the Neutral team, for Neutral Bomb Assault variants.
-    Bomb Plant Points, which are the points a team must defend from enemy bombers. Each team must have at least one. You can place more than one per team too, making their job more difficult as they will have more points to defend.
CTF
Capture the Flag has two special types of goal objects, similar to Assault:
-    Flag Spawn Points, which are where a team’s flag will spawn, which they must defend. Each team must have at least one.
-    Flag Return Points, which are the points a team must return the flag to after they have stolen it from an enemy team. Each team must have at least one.
Juggernaut
Juggernaut only has one special goal object:
-    Go To Points, which are points that a VIP must reach to score points in some VIP game variants. There must be at least one of these on the map. The Spawn Order property determines the order in which these points will be used, from lowest to highest.
King of the Hill
King of the Hill has only one special goal object:
-    Hill Marker, which is the center of a hill, and around which is the boundary of the hill. There must be at least one of these on the map. The Shape and size properties define the boundary of the hill, and the Spawn Order property is used to determine the order in which the hills move (when the game variant is set to Sequential movement.)
Oddball
Oddball has only one special goal object:
-    Ball Spawn Point, which is where the Oddball will spawn. There must be at least one of these on the map.
Territories
Territories has only one special goal object:
-    Territory Marker, which is the center of a territory, and around which is the boundary of the territory. There must be at least one of these on the map. The Shape and size properties define the boundary of the territory. The Spawn Order is used to determine the numbering of territories, with the lowest one being labeled “Territory 1”, and so on.
Note that you can place more than 8 territory markers on a map, but only 8 will be used at a time. The extras are there in case you want to set a map up with different symmetric and asymmetric layouts (for example, like Valhalla.)
VIP
Like Juggernaut, VIP only has one special goal object:
-    Go To Points, which are points that a Juggernaut must reach to score points in some Juggernaut game variants. There must be at least one of these on the map. The Spawn Order property determines the order in which these points will be used, from lowest to highest.

Spawn Points

When you load the Forge, you may notice glowing blue disks littered around the map, objects you don’t see when playing a Custom Game.

These are Spawn Points, and are the spots where players spawn.

Spawn Points of all stripes are found in the Spawners palette, and can be placed free of charge. Just mind your Inventory.

Respawn Points

By far the most common type of spawn point is a humble Respawn Point. These are the blue disks you see littered about.

The disk has an obvious forward facing, and when a player spawns, he will be facing in this direction. It is considered good form to not point a player at a wall when he spawns.

When Halo 3 needs to spawn a player, it takes into account a lot of invisible things, and chooses one of these points. You want to have a lot of these points. If you don’t, then there are limited choices for respawning, and you could end up spawning on top of a live grenade, or in the path of an onrushing Warthog.

Finally, respawn points have a Team property, which defaults to Neutral. You can restrict respawn points to a specific team by changing this, but you Should Not Do this—there is a Better Way, and that’s with Respawn Zones. More about those later.

Initial Spawn Points

Initial Spawn Points are special. They are game specific (like Goal objects), so you need to switch to the desired gametype to edit them. They appear similar to respawn points, but they have bright blue plasma rings above them. You’ll know it when you see it.
What makes them special is that they can only be used on the first spawn in a round. On top of that, a player is guaranteed to spawn there, unless it is blocked (for example, by another player.)

Like respawn points, initial spawn points have a Team property. Unlike respawn points, you should always set this to the appropriate team.

When Bungie’s designers set up a map, we place one initial spawn point per team, and place several ordinary respawn points nearby. That way, when a round starts, one player from each team starts off at these points. And then, because of the way Halo 3 prefers to spawn players near their teammates, the rest of their team automatically prefers to spawn at the nearby respawn points.

Respawn Zones

When Halo 3 tries to spawn (or respawn) a player, it takes a lot of things into account, like where teammates or enemies are standing, if there are dangerous things nearby, and so on. We call these influences.

When it is done doing so, it then chooses a respawn point for the player, based on these influences. There’s a little tiny bit of randomness, but that only really comes into play when all points are otherwise equal.

Now, when Halo 3 does this, it looks at ALL respawn points on the map. But in setting up your map, maybe you don’t want Attackers spawning in the Defender’s base. Or you want one team to only spawn on one side of the map. To do that, you want to restrict the search to only certain respawn points. And to do that, you use Respawn Zones.

Normal Respawn Zones

A Respawn Zone is an object which belongs to a team, and defines an area. All respawn points inside that area are strongly preferred when Halo 3 needs to spawn a member of that team. Very, extremely strongly preferred, so much so that a player will virtually never spawn outside of his team’s respawn zone (unless there is literally no choice.)

Respawn zones are gametype specific objects, like goal objects, so you need to switch to the desired gametype to edit them. They look similar to King of the Hill markers, a small object stuck into the ground, with a blue plasma field which defines their boundary.

These zones have a Team property, which controls which team uses this respawn zone. You should always set this to the appropriate team.

When Bungie’s designers set up a map, we often place a single large respawn zone for each team, making sure that it encloses many respawn points. Note that a respawn zone never prohibits an enemy player from spawning inside of it—they only affect the team they belong to. But if that enemy player has his own respawn zone on the other side of the map, you can be sure he won’t spawn in yours.
Make absolutely sure your respawn zone covers at least a couple of respawn points! If you don’t, respawning will be very predictable and unsafe. And if your respawn zones contain no respawn points at all, then they will have no effect whatsoever.
Respawn Zones are powerful tools. Use them wisely.

CTF Respawn Zones

Capture the Flag has two special types of respawn zone, in addition to the normal one.
-    Respawn, Flag Home: This is a respawn zone which is only active when your team’s flag is safely on its stand. As soon as an enemy player grabs your flag, even if he’s killed a second later, this respawn zone shuts off until the flag is reset.
-    Respawn, Flag Away: This is the opposite, a respawn zone which is only active when your team’s flag is not on its stand.
When Bungie’s designers set up a map, we might prefer to have a team spawn near their flag when it is at home, but spawn somewhere else if the flag is stolen, so that the thieves don’t have defenders respawning all around them. Last Resort is a good example of this.
Territories Respawn Zones
Territories is a special case worth noting. The territories themselves have a built in respawn zone which belongs to the team that currently controls the territory. It is invisible, and about 10 meters in radius.
So if there are respawn points nearby, you can in fact spawn at a territory you control, even if your team’s respawn zone is on the other side of the map.

Teleporters

Teleporters are great. You can use them to bypass walls, cover great distances quickly, and teleport your friends into the minefield on Sandtrap.
Teleporters are objects, and can be found in the object creation palette. There are three types of teleporter objects:
-    Sender Node: This is the entry point to a teleportation link. You can only enter via this point, never return.
-    Receiver Node: This is the exit point to a teleportation link. You can only exit via this point, never enter.
-    Two-Way Node: This node can function both as a sender and as a receiver.
Each type of node has a clear forward facing. The facing is ignored for sender nodes, but used to determine the facing of the player when he arrives at a receiver node. It is considered poor form to point your receivers at walls.
When you first place a teleporter node, you may notice that it is dark and lifeless. That is because there is no other node for it to link up to. For a node to activate, there must be a valid sender and receiver (either of which could be a two-way node.) Once you place the missing node, they will automatically link up and flare to life.
If you want to have more than one separate teleporter link on your map, you will want them to be on different channels. Channel is a property of teleporter objects, and you can change it by placing your crosshair on the teleporter object, and pressing X. Teleporter nodes on different channels don’t link up, and in this way you can keep your links separate.
You might be wondering what happens when there’s more than one valid receiver on the same channel. Simple: your destination will be randomly selected from the valid locations, and your evil twin will appear at the other one.
Oh, wait, we cut the evil twin thing. Something about the goatee shader. Never mind.

Halo 3 How-to: Forge Object Editing

Posted by lukems at 9/18/2007 12:40 PM PDT

The following document is the work of Tyson Green, Bungie’s Multiplayer Lead on Halo 3. Enjoy part 2 of the Forge Trilogy. For Part 1, “Forge Basics” click here.
To return to Halo 3 How-to click here

Advanced Forgery

On the surface, the Forge is pretty straight forward. Create fusion coil, hurl at friend, repeat ad infinitum. However, there are some other things that you may choose to make yourself aware of if you wish to master your tools.

Inventory and Budget

The number of objects you can place in the Forge is ultimately limited by two things: Inventory, which is the number of a specific object that you can place, and Budget, which is an overall total that keeps things in check.

There’s actually a third limit that kicks in when you’ve got a whole heck of a lot of objects on the map, but really, you need to be looking for trouble to bump into that one. The Forge will just squawk at you and give you a polite error message if you try to go above it. Don’t bother, it’s not that spectacular.

Inventory

Inventory is tracked per object type. Think of it as the limit for that object type—no more than that number of those objects can be placed on the map, or allowed to spawn on the map.

The Inventory is shown to the left of the object name in the creation palette. That number tells you how many more objects of that type can be placed on the map. If that number is 0, you may place no more.

One important note: in addition to the objects placed on the map, the Inventory counts objects which could spawn in later. For example, if a single Spartan Laser is placed in the middle of Valhalla, but the maximum respawn quota for Spartan Lasers is 3, then the Inventory counts 3 Lasers as having been placed. Don’t freak out, there’s more on this later.

Budget

Budget is an overall limit on the objects placed on the map. A Warthog is more expensive to have on a map than a fusion coil. More expensive than several fusion coils, in fact. The Budget is what reflects this.

In your bottom right corner is a little meter, and a number. This is your remaining Budget. The number is the amount of Budget you have left to spend, and the bar fills up as you spend it. If that number is $0, you won’t be able to place more objects.

In the object creation palette, the cost of an object is listed to the right of its name, as a dollar figure. No, the dollar amount isn’t how much will be charged to your credit card if you place one such object. What would we do with such wealth? Instead, it is the amount that will be deducted from your remaining Budget if you place such an object.

Note: as with Inventory, the Budget counts not just the objects placed on map, but also the objects that could spawn in later. More on this later.

Object Spawning

Most objects that you can edit in the Forge can be told to respawn if some evil should befall them. The system that manages this (colorfully called “The Candy Monitor” by our engineers) can be complex, but is worth understanding.

Respawn Timer

When an object is disturbed, it starts counting down a hidden respawn timer. Objects are sensitive things, and consider themselves disturbed if they are moved, picked up, or destroyed.

Once this timer counts down to zero, the object says “hey, I want to respawn now”. But before it does, there is a check to make sure there is not already too many objects of that same type on the map. This is where the quota, described below, comes in. If there are too many objects waiting, then the object waits quietly until there is room before it respawns.

The respawn timer usually defaults to 30 seconds, but this is a property that may be set per object, as described below.

The following document is the work of Tyson Green, Bungie’s Multiplayer Lead on Halo 3. Enjoy the first part of the Forge Trilogy.
Part 2 is now online, read it here.
To return to Halo 3 How-to click here.

What Is The Forge?

In the beginning, there was a single sniper rifle on Colossus. And it was not so good. One of the new multiplayer features introduced in Halo 3 is the Forge. The Forge is an object layout editor, a tool to allow players to rework the various weapons, vehicles, and scenery that Bungie’s multiplayer designers have thoughtfully placed around Halo 3’s multiplayer maps. Better still, the Forge is a multiplayer editor in every sense of the word: you can enlist the aid of a few friends to edit a map with you, in the same game, over the usual gamut of multiplayer situations (splitscreen, system link, or Xbox Live.) Of course, any gathering of friends inevitably devolves into shootings. Fortunately, the Forge also plays host to a variety of novel combat conditions, and even a couple of peculiar games made possible by the lax rules and on-the-fly editing.

Starting Out

Gathering a Game

Starting a Forge game is almost the same as setting up a Custom Game. Your first stop is the Forge lobby, accessed from the main menu or from any of the other lobbies via the “Switch Lobby” option. Once in the Forge lobby, you can choose the map you wish to edit, and immediately get started if you want to go it alone. If not, you can gather up to seven fellow editors (the Forge supports up to a maximum of eight players) before starting. Make sure the “Network” option (it’s right under “Switch Lobby”) is not set to Local, or else your friends will not be able to join you.  Once you’re ready to go, choose “Start Forge” and you’re in business.

Player and Editor Mode

When the Forge loads, it should seem strangely familiar. You start off in Player Mode, which has all of the same controls and abilities as a normal player. You can move around freely, shoot whatever catches your eye, and use objects as you see fit. If you brought friends with you, you can get right down to business and shoot them up a bit.

But that’s not what you’re here in the Forge for.

Press Up on the D-pad. Your HUD will change, and you’ll find yourself in Editor Mode. In this mode, you assume the guise of a Monitor, a free flying ball of omnipotence with controls similar to the free camera in Saved Films, or flying a Banshee. If neither ring a bell, there is a handy control reference on the Start button.

Unlike that most famous of Monitors, 343 Guilty Spark, you’re still vulnerable to damage, but it takes a steady shot to hit a moving Monitor. Evasive maneuvers will serve you as well as a gun, but there’s a bit more to Editor Mode than simply dodging bullets. You see, Editor Mode is where the magic happens.

Simple Forgery

It doesn’t take much to get busy in the Forge. Anyone can do it. But let’s start with the basics.

Object Manipulation

The key to the Forge is object manipulation. And the key to object manipulation is your crosshair, centered in your screen like any other weapon crosshair. All object manipulation is done in Editor Mode, so make sure you’re in that mode (if you’re not, hit Up on the D-pad to toggle in.)

Grabbing and Moving Objects

First, fly up close to an object, like a vehicle or a gun. Place your crosshair on it. If the object is editable, your crosshair will turn green, and a little hand icon will appear. This means the object can be edited, which is pretty much the entire point behind Editor Mode. With your crosshair on an object, press A. The little hand icon will close, and you are now holding that object. If you move or look around, the object will move with you. Piece of cake.

To release an object that you are holding, just press A again. It will drop and come to rest, and from that point onward, the object will appear in that location.

Tip: You may notice a small blue shape that moves with the objects you move around. This grenade-sized object represents the starting location for the object, and is the precise location at which the object will spawn (or respawn, as appropriate.)

Rotating Objects

In tossing around objects, you might wish to change the orientation of one. Doing so is simple, but does take a bit of practice. To rotate an object, grab it. While you are holding it, squeeze the Right Trigger. When you do so, your thumbsticks will change from moving you around to rotating the object.

On your Right Thumbstick, left-right will spin the object like a top, while up-down will roll it like a hamster wheel. Technical terms, I know.

On your Left Thumbstick, left-right rotates the object like a steering wheel.

Up-down is a little different from the others, and will push the object further away, or draw it in closer. This is handy when you’re working with large objects, or very small ones. Adept users can also use it to fling objects around, but more on that later.

When the object is rotated to your liking, release the Right Trigger, and you’re back to normal. Set the object down, and you’re done.

Creating Objects

Now, no amount of movement or rotation can turn a Warthog into a Scorpion, but that’s why Microsoft put more buttons on their controller. With your cursor pointed at empty space, press X. Behold, the Object Palette. Every map has its own palette of objects, carefully assembled by Bungie in accordance to mystical principles of balance and memory limitations. There are seven such palettes, and you can cycle between them using the Left and Right shoulder buttons. Most are self explanatory, but the last two (Spawners and Goals) we’ll come back to later.
For now, go to the second palette, Vehicles. Use the Left Stick or D-pad to choose Mongoose from the list. Press A. Viola, a Mongoose will appear, already in your grasp and ready to be placed wherever you desire.

There are some situations were you can’t create a new object, but more on that later.

Deleting Objects

Of course, you can delete objects too. There’s a good reason for doing so, besides removing every weapon from the map but Battle Rifles and calling it “balanced.” You know who you are. But more on that later.

To do so, place your crosshair on the ill fated object, and press Y. Without complaint or fanfare, the object will be dispatched, and space cleared to place more.

Saving Your Map

Object manipulation is all well and good, but ultimately, you’ll want to save your map to really make full use of it.

To save a map, press Start to bring up the Forge menu. Choose the appropriately named option “Save As New Map…”

Note: A stern warning will appear, graciously provided by our high powered law firm to disavow us of the inevitable cult classic map “For The Godwin”, but it should be of scant concern to most good intentioned users. Basically, it says you made it and you can share it at will, but you shouldn’t sue us for it. Please.

The keyboard will slide out, and you can name your masterpiece. Remember, proper spelling and capitalization is a sign of fine craftsmanship. And no, you can’t name your map BLAM!, or BLAM!, or even BLAM! Xbox Live won’t let you, and you didn’t need to anyway.

Hit Done, and your map is now saved to your storage device of choice. Which is a hard drive, right? Right! Good choice, sir. But a memory unit will work too, if for some strange reason you removed your hard drive. But who would remove their hard drive? That doesn’t make any sense.

Using Maps in Custom Games

Now, the real action is in Custom Games.
To play on your map in a Custom Game, head to the Custom Game lobby. If you came straight from the Forge, your map should already be selected, ready to go. If not, simply choose a map, and you’ll find your new map filed under the built-in version that your version was based off of. Just look for your neatly spelled, capitalized map name.

Sharing Your Maps

Having refined your map from raw ore to a polished blade, you might be ready to unleash it on your friends. They had it coming, right?

Once your map is saved, and you’re in a lobby, hit Start to bring up the menu. Under the Media tab, choose File Share. This is where you can share files of all type for other users to download. In addition to map variants, you can share saved films, game variants, or screenshots. Best of all, the files go onto Bungie’s hardened subterranean servers, and can be downloaded even after you turn off your Xbox, or after the surface of the planet has been glassed.

It’s pretty simple. First, choose an empty slot to upload your map into. Then, choose the map you wish to upload. Map variants are tiny little things, and should upload almost instantly.

Voila, your map is shared for all to see.

Source

Halo3Trio.com