Map Modding

This tutorial has been writen Quisam, and the original tutorial can be found here.

Modding Overview

feel free to share this with anyone and everyone. This information could potentially change the game as we know it.

Installing the Editor

Guide Overview/ Quick Steps-
1. Download Tools
2. Install the tools via two methods
a. Make sure Battlefield 2 is installed. Mod tools will be installed into the same directory as your Battlefield 2 game files.
b. Edit your Registry to make the install wizard think BF2 is installed into a certain directory called "BFHMods”
Finding and Downloading Tools-
The latest general release of the BF2 mod tools is 1.3. These can be found at http://battlefield2.filefront.com/file/Battlefield_2_Editor;64087
The download is 50.5MB and comes in the form of a .zip Tool

Installing the Tools-

To install the mod tools, the installer requires that Battlefield 2 is installed. Which means you can approach installation in two different ways.
1- Battlefield 2 is installed so I will have no problems installing the mod tools.
2- I don’t own a copy of BF2 so it won’t let me install the tools!
1. For those who own a copy of the game you can just open up the installer and follow all the steps to install it. The tools will be installed to the same directory as your Battlefield 2 game files

Configuring Mod Tools

Note: The BFH Games files are about 1GB. Depending on your system, this could take a while.
*If you notice, the only real difference here is XP programs are stored in ‘Program Files’, and 7/Vista Files are stored in ‘Program Files(x86)’

2. Unzip BFHeroes BFH Files**-

Even though the game is made with them, the Battlefield 2 mod tools don’t do very well with Zip Files. This means we will need to unzip the majority of the zip files within ‘C:\Program Files\EA Games\BFHMods\mods\bfheroes’.
This means we take we take file files such as "Sound_client.zip” and create a folder called "Sound_Client” which has all of the files from the zip in it.
**Winrar (http://www.rarlab.com/) and jZip (http://www.jzip.com/) are highly suggested for this process. They can be downloaded and installed for FREE

3. Creating Game Files-

To successfully install and use the mod tools we’ll need to create a set of files which help define how our mod works. To make this easy you can just copy and paste my settings and use them for your own purposes.

You will first need to create the following folders (the folder you need to create is in bold-
C:\Program Files\EA Games\BFHMods\bf2editor\mods\bfheroes\LevelEditor\
(So you will need to create the folder ‘bfheroes’ and the folder ‘LevelEditor’ within bfheroes)

LayerInit.con
C:\Program Files\EA Games\BFHMods\bf2editor\mods\bfheroes\LayerInit.con

C:\Program Files\EA Games\BFHMods\bf2editor\mods\bfheroes\LevelEditor\LevelSettings.con

4. Setting up Levels

To be able to open up levels you will need to unzip the files "client.zip” and "server.zip” within the level folder.
For example, to open Riverside Rush within the editor, you will need to open up the folder "heat” within the levels folder (C:\Program Files\EA Games\BFHMods\mods\bfheroes\Levels\heat). Then once inside, unzip "Client.zip” and "Server.zip”.

5. Setting Up Mod Inside of the Editor

Now we have to configure the mod within the editor. We can do this by doing the following-

1. Open up the BFEditor
2. Select bfheroes as our starting mod
3. Once the editor has loaded up press the mod tab at the top of the page
4. Select "Mod Manager” from the dropdown menu
5. On the Window that appears click the "Editor Content” Tab

6. Check all of the boxes next to folder icons. These are the mod resources that the editor will load every time you start it up.
CONGRATULATIONS! YOU’RE ALL READY TO BEGIN MODDING!

Actually Creating Levels in Editor

Creating levels for Battlefield Heroes with the Battlefield Editor is almost exactly like creating levels for Battlefield 2. Iif you are unfamiliar with the tools I suggest that you try looking around the internet for battlefield 2 modding guides. Trying searching this forum, bfeditor.org (a great battlefield modding resource), or google

I know some people are probably thinking "WOW WHAT A N3WB HE ISN'T GOING TO EXPLAIN EVERY SINGLE FUNCTION IN THE EDITOR". Well the reasoning behind this is there are many people who are familiar with the BF2 tools, plus there are tons of brilliant guides out there which will explain everything you need to know. And since Battlefield Heroes levels are created in the exact same way as BF2, the BF2 guides work just as good for BFH levels (for the most part).

So basically its along the lines of create new level, mess with the terrain, place objects, place control points, place spawn points, move about until you're happy, render shadows, render the map, and do some minor tweaking.

Side Note:Control Point flag Values-
0= Neutral 1=National 2=Royal

Rendering Levels and Preparing them for play

The main difference between BF2 levels and BFH levels is a file you must create called "InitLogic.con" within your level files.
1. Open up your level files
2. Open the file "init.con"
3. At the end of the file it should say "endIf"
4. copy and paste the following code after "endif"
CODE

NOTE: gameLogic.setBeforeSpawnCamera is the starting position of your camera. You can add your own camera values here.

7. Save this file as type "all file types" and name it InitLogic.con. You'll want to place this inside your level folder
(basically in the Init.con file we are saying "run the InitLogic file we just made")

When your level is ready for the world to see you must go up to Mod, hit 'Package Mod', check the box next to 'Package this level', and hit okay for the mod to be made. Wait for the level to package and you should be able to play the level inside Battlefield Heroes.