What I think Forge Should Be Like in Halo 4

Community General Discussion
1

PLEASE DO NOT QUOTE THIS POST!

Ever since the announcement of Halo 4 came there have been countless threads made that that explain what the OP thinks forge should be like. Well, many of these ideas are good, none of them are the absolute answer. A few of the better ideas won’t make it into the game because Microsoft would make very little money on DLC. Well, I have an idea that is the best of both worlds and then some. Microsoft will still be able to sell DLC, and it will please many forgers who are frusturated by the terrain of Forgeworld.

Starting Up Forge
The Forge lobby will stay the same, but only on the surface. Once you click on the Game Options button a menu would appear like this:

Forge Options
Respawn Time
Editor Traits
Base Traits

When you click the Forge Options button, a menu like this will appear:

Theme (Covenant, UNSC, Flood, New Mombassa, New Alexandria, Delta Halo, Alpha Halo)
Map Type (Firefight, Multiplayer)

Making Your Map

Now that you have all the game options set, it’s time to forge your map. I have devised a system that will allow terrain editing, but will also be hard enough to use that Microsoft will allow it.

There will be a whole new category of Forge Objects called Terrain. This will include things like hills, ditches, and other terrain editing tools. In the object options menu you will be able to edit it’s shape like what is done now for territiories and such. You will also be able to do this with and structure pieces, which I will explain in detail now.

All structure peices have editable shapes except for buildings. This will work just like Terrain and Objectives. Here’s a list of the blocks that could be included:

Block
Block, Cone
Block, Sphere
Block, Sphere, Half
Block, Cylinder
Block, Triangular Prism
Block, Invisible

With these blocks, some inclines, and some decorative peices, Forgers could buld almost anything they wanted without running out of blocks or walls. Also, There should be more shape options, such as oval, donut, triangle, and sphere.

Some other things to inlcude would be

Swithces
Ambient Life
More Scenery
Visual Effects (Fog, Smoke, Fire, ect.)
Crashed Vehicles
Decals (Human Blood, UNSC Insignia, Covenant Insignia, Alien Blood, ect.)
Dead Bodies
Boundries (Anti-Gravity Boundary, Special Trait Boundary, Slip Boundary, Callout Boundary)
Night and Sunset FXs
Undo, redo, copy, paste, group, lock object, mirror, despawn timers, and highlight options would also be a must. You could also be able to make your own custom objects by grouping them together and saving them in the Custom Objects category. You could download and upload custom objects via file share.

Vehicles
Some vehicles never before seen in Forge should appear. These would even include brand new features!

When editing the object options of a vehicle there will now be an option wether the vehicles is Normal, Fixed, or Phased. When fixed they float, and when phased they can actually be phased through objects. Colors would work for everything as well, not just the mongoose.

The new vehicles would include:
-Transport Falcon/Hornet
-Transport Warthog
-Scout Warthog
-Pelican
-Phantom
-Spirit
-Forklift
-Cart
-Shadow
-Elephant

Your Monitor
The monitor is as important to Forging as your Spartan/Elite is to playing. So why don’t we give it a little love? Here are a few suggestions on how to do this:

Give the monitor a laser weapon.
Make colors customizable and emblems appear on the monitor.
Make it faster, especially if larger forge maps are in the game.
Give us a few gametypes where it’s usable, more on this below.

Forge Gametypes

Ever since Halo 3 a gametype where one person is the montior helping out their team has been wanted. Some might say that this won’t work because the monitor could just move the blocks around on the map, this is where they’re wrong. This gametype will only work if the lock object (the object cannot be moved, deleted, or fliped until unnactivated) feature is included in the game. Here’s exactly how this would work:

One person at random would be selected to be the monitor. What they can and can’t forge from their pallete is customizable in the game options. The monitor does no gamage, so they can’t just go around splattering peopls with a tank. They cannot select anything that has been locked by the creator of the map, if the map creator wants them to be able to move stuff they simply don’t lock it. The monitor would not be able to edit the object options or delete anything. This obviously wouldn’t be fit for matchmaking, who knows what your monitor will do. But in custom games there could be some really fun games.

Thanks for reading, please post your feadback!

2

I thought since no one has replied they must not like it but now that i read it i believe this r some great ideas u though of.

3

Thanks, anything you don’t like? I think I might take out the AI testing. Although it would be helpfull, it’s not very likely to be put in. I might add a complete list of Forge peices that I think should be put in the game.

4

> Ever since the announcement of Halo 4 came there have been countless threads made that that explain what the OP thinks forge should be like. Well, many of these ideas are good, none of them are the absolute answer. A few of the better ideas won’t make it into the game because Microsoft would make very little money on DLC. Well, I have an idea that is the best of both worlds and then some. Microsoft will still be able to sell DLC, and it will please many forgers who are frusturated by the terrain of Forgeworld.
>
>
> Starting Up Forge
> The Forge lobby will stay the same, but only on the surface. Once you click on the Game Options button a menu would appear like this:
>
> Forge Options
> Respawn Time
> Editor Traits
> Base Traits
>
> When you click the Forge Options button, a menu like this will appear:
>
> Theme (Covenant, UNSC, Flood, Forerunner)
> Map Type (Firefight, Multiplayer)
>
>
> Making Your Map
>
> Now that you have all the game options set, it’s time to forge your map. I have devised a system that will allow terrain editing, but will also be hard enough to use that Microsoft will allow it.
>
> There will be a whole new category of Forge Objects called Terrain. This will include things like hills, ditches, and other terrain editing tools. In the object options menu you will be able to edit it’s shape like what is done now for territiories and such. You will also be able to do this with and structure pieces, which I will explain in detail now.
>
> All structure peices have editable shapes except for buildings. This will work just like Terrain and Objectives. Here’s a list of the blocks that could be included:
>
> Block
> Block, Water
> Block, Lava
> Block, Cone
> Block, Sphere
> Block, Sphere, Half
> Block, Cylinder
> Block, Triangular Prism
> Block, Invisible
>
> With these blocks, some inclines, and some decorative peices, Forgers could buld almost anything they wanted without running out of blocks or walls.
>
> Some other things to inlcude would be
>
> Swithces
> Ambient Life/AI
> More Scenery
> Visual Effects (Fog, Smoke, Fire, ect.)
> Crashed Vehicles
> Decals (Human Blood, UNSC Insignia, Covenant Insignia, Alien Blood, ect.)
> Dead Bodies
> Boundries (Anti-Gravity Boundary, Special Area Boundary, Slip Boundary, Callout Boundary, ect.)
> Night and Sunset FXs
> Civilian vehicles
> Vehicles from past games
>
> Undo, redo, copy, paste, group, lock object, mirror, despawn timers, and highlight options would also be a must. You could also be able to make your own custom objects by grouping them together and saving them in the Custom Objects category. You could download and upload custom objects via file share. All of these things would help with forging maps so much.
>
>
> Testing Your Map
> Now that you’ve finished building your map you have to test it. This is the essential part of map making that most players skip or do very little of. This is mostly caused by the few amount of people they have to test it. One way to counter this would be with AI testers.
>
> These AI testers could be all player models that are in the game, and that could be changed via custom game options. They would pick a loadout randomly and help test which weapons/vehicles are OP/UP. Ofcourse they’d never be as good as actual players, but they could help increase the number of quality maps in the File Browser if done correctly.
>
>
> Thanks for reading, I’d be happy if even half of these options made it in. Please post your feadback!

asome idea this should be the whole forge,i also want to see custimiable monitor like monitor or sentinal and eye color if enemblum could be in eye piece

5

Thanks, I was thinking about adding something like a red montior if you had incliment weather, but I didn’t. I’lll definately add a section about the monitor when I edit the OP. Once I think it doesn’t need anymore editing I’ll post this in the feedback thread, so critisize and suggest away. :slight_smile:

Also, can you remove that quote from your post? it gets rather annoying while looking through the posts.

6

There is one thing, one thing I have never seen suggested. How about a despawn time? Like after 30 seconds a wall to a room could despawn to open upo a larger part of the map for any gometype?

7

You don’t know how much I want ai testing. My friends are so immature and just want to play infection all the time. Yeah, its fun but I want to make good maps and be given pointers on how to make them better.

8

Love… The… Idea. :3

9

It sounds like an ok idea but honestly I think more than anything there needs to be more objects, vast varieties of different stuff that you can place, Reach did an ok job of starting this off (with bases and other objects). Honestly editing terrain is cool BUT I don’t think there should be blocks of water/lave/ect, while the idea would be good- I believe it would take away from map building. So far people have done AMAZING stuff with the tools they’ve been given so I don’t see 343 making huge leaps in map editing.

10

This whole thread has some good idea’s however most of them wont be possible on the xbox as they would require specialist software. Take the AI for example, you cant add AI to a map through a single ingame button. AI requires intense coding and certain software in order to get it right. not to mention the variables. Some of the idea’s are very good though, for example the terrain alteration.

11

Thanks for all the support, critisism, and suggestions. I’ve updated the OP with 2 new sections and a lot of other new things. Be sure to read through it again and give me some feedback!

12

LASER FACE!!!

13

I would rather Forge be a Computer Program that allows you to fully create the geometry, structure, and layout of the map. Then place exact weapon/object placements without fiddling with your thumbsticks/coordinates, and without the game engine creating issues such as drag.

It aught to allow you to skin every line/surface you create from a well of categorized skins that appear in the game, spawn sounds from categorized sound pools, and spawn gadgets such as water sources, as well as creating “dedicated zones” with separate water levels. You can also change the lighting of any sector you create, and define properties such as texture opacity to create custom windows/interesting barriers. As well as applying “fog/effects” to sectors to change hue, coloring, and maybe even create backwash/esque sight hindering and weather effects.

Once your map is finished, you can transfer it into Halo Reach via your file share.

This concept is inspired heavily by a program I used to create/edit maps in Doom II called Doom Builder (look it up if curious).

You had the slightly limited ability to create nearly ANYTHING. Even manipulating the game engine to create multiple stories that exist in the same vertical space, which was physically impossible in vanilla Doom 1 and 2.

Possibilities were limited almost entirely by imagination.

Now unlike Doom Builder you wouldn’t necessarily be able to input your OWN textures/skins/sound/objects. But that’s simply because the Doom Community over the years is… trustworthy. The Halo community is still vast and immaturity still flourishes.

But even then I’d certainly say having access to ALL THE RESOURCES IN THE GAME to create your maps, and being able to shape those resources in any way you see fit is alot better than a limited selection of objects/effects.

You may even be able to unput scripted events! Doom Builder had this function. Fully functional doors, switches, traps, earthquakes, map-changing happenings, elevators, treadmills etc. Anything you want to be interactive is possible.

14

I personally would love a computer editor, but unfortunately, it’s not too likely to be implimented. While people like me and you may be able to use it easily, the majority of the community won’t. That is the single reason why I didn’t use that as my basis for this. Also, Microsoft would not be able to sell DLC with all the amazing forgers out there making complete maps, terrain and all, with that program. Even if Microsoft did, it would just be remade and available to the masses for free. If only 343i wasn’t limited by Microsoft, we could have all this and more…

15

Well not necessarily, there is still matchmaking remember. And only DLC and select community maps will ever make it there. They may be forced to pull a Halo 3 and force players to buy it to play pretty much any playlist. But sales can still be forced, and most of the community will be near oblivious to alot of Forge maps like they are today, so they will easily go and buy the DLC to continue enjoying Matchmaking games.

Not only that, this program COULD theoretically be a small, easy to install/low PC requirement program, that pulls all it’s resources from an online server. Basically, in order to Forge you will need little more than a crappy computer and the internet. Both of which you will need to transfer your map through File Share anyway. And I’m sure even casual forgers will find this system much easier to work with than Forge. Especially if their imaginations are still limited to the small things that can be made in forge. Which hopefully this would… expand.

16

the undo, cut, copy/paste buttons would be so nice in forge.

17

> Well not necessarily, there is still matchmaking remember. And only DLC and select community maps will ever make it there. They may be forced to pull a Halo 3 and force players to buy it to play pretty much any playlist. But sales can still be forced, and most of the community will be near oblivious to alot of Forge maps like they are today, so they will easily go and buy the DLC to continue enjoying Matchmaking games.
>
> Not only that, this program COULD theoretically be a small, easy to install/low PC requirement program, that pulls all it’s resources from an online server. Basically, in order to Forge you will need little more than a crappy computer and the internet. Both of which you will need to transfer your map through File Share anyway. And I’m sure even casual forgers will find this system much easier to work with than Forge. Especially if their imaginations are still limited to the small things that can be made in forge. Which hopefully this would… expand.

If 343i could pull it off that’d be amazing. Might I suggest posting this in the feedback thread if you havn’t already.

18

May be a good idea… I’ll just hit the ole’ ctrl/c ctrl/p, I am NOT typing all of this again.

What feedback thread btw? If I saw one I probably would have already… Is it not pinned somewhere?

Nvm, found it in General Discussion.

Feedback posted.

19

Well for the gametype I think it could be more like this

“Escape” is the name.

You have to build a map like an escape the building map.

Doors should slide open "Will be labeled as “Door”

Doors that only the moniter can open will be labeled as “D_Moniter”

Doors that can only be opened by Spartans will be labeled as “D_Human”

Little data pad looking things will be labeled as “Keypad”

Little data pads that are broken will be labeled as “KP_Broken”

The last door you leave is labelled as “D_End”

A hole booby trap will be labeled as “H_Trap”

Fake data pads that electricute you will be labeled as “KP_Trap”

Landmines that are normal. Have to be labeled as “Mine_R”

Landmines that are completely invisible, are labeled “Mine_AC”

O.K now that that’s out of the way.
the game starts in what ever the spawn points are. The monitor is randomly chosen. And has a laser. Also moniter traits can be customized. Like color of it. Change it’s size, and it has some of it’s own armor. it could maybe look like wheatly. from portal 2. Anyway, doors (Have a waypoint by the way.) regulary open if you get too close to it. Doors that only the moniter can open, act differently than regular doors.
1st. The moniter will have too hack it. takes time (Changeable time)
2nd. It doesn’t automatically open. you have to press the reload button to open it.
Door that only open by humans is really self explanitory, But you have to press the reload button.

Now Keypads there spawn seqeunce has to be the same as the door you want it. So first door is SS 1, etc… You don’t need a keypad but you want it to make it harder. When you press it there’s a screen with a keypad of letters or numbers (your choice changed by gametype) and you can edit what it says! For example Your changing the game options and and you go to Keypad #30 (limit is 500) and you type in what the keypad code is. Then you type in what the keypad directions say. “This one’s leaving, maybe better coming.” the code would be BUNGIE! Now a broken keypad must be fixed by the moniter, takes time (What you want)

Booby traps. They trick you and appearently you die. And the gametype must be set to one life. The moniter can see booby traps though. There H.U.D is like ODST VISR Mode. the booby traps are outlined. and a waypoint says TRAP. you forge a hole in the ground with a kill boundry. then you cover it with anything. Set it too H_Trap. and when someone steps on the cover it disapears and someone dies. Fake data pads electricute you when you press it. Landmines ka-bloom! Etc… Make more 343i traps. If this is invented.

When you ave gone through the last door it’s GAME OVER.

I thinks it’s pretty cool and feel free to add or ask anything you want.

20

Nice idea, it would be nice to see it happen!