Forge

Forge is a Halo 3 gameplay mode that allows for both playing and designing multiplayer maps.

Background
A multiplayer-only tool, Forge will allow players to customize multiplayer maps, changing and resetting spawn points, weapon spawns, weapon timers, vehicle spawns and timers, vehicle spawn points, and add existing geometry to the map’s existing structure in the form of crates, boxes, fusion coils, lifts, teleporters, turrets, etc.

The amount of items you can drop is regulated by an economy budget system, with different items having different values and each map having an overall budget that the items you place cannot exceed. By deleting existing things off of a given map, you can actually place more things. Players can modify and create their versions of maps, save them and share them with their friends, but that’s only half or so of what Forge allows.

In addition to functioning as creation-driven tool, Forge is also a playspace. Up to eight players can be on a given map at a time, shifting back and forth between their chosen multiplayer model and the Forge model – a Monitor. Players can play actual games in Forge, goof around, kill each other, play Slayer where each team designates a Monitor to supply weapons, vehicles, equipment and cover on the fly.

Throughout the time you're editing you can press up on the D-Pad and change to your multiplayer model and play.

Once you're done with the editing you can start a party over System Link or Xbox Live and see how it works. You can build crate towers, grab a vehicle underneath a teammate, or have a friend jump on a crate and move it throughout the map.

All items spawned on forge will have a price, with weapons, crates and smaller items being cheaper than vehicles. There is a spending limit to the map which restricts total items than can be spawned.

As revealed in Bungie's 8/27/07 Podcast, you can add items in Forge that aren't available in a regular match. One example is the Yellow Powerup, the alternative to the Overshield or the Active Camouflage.

The Yellow Powerup is completely customizable in its effects; it can cause the interacting player to run faster, jump higher, grow an overshield/active camouflage, and even change the player's color. Effects aren't limited to one or two at a time, but rather a number of effects can occur simultaneously. The hosts described it as equivalent to an "instant juggernaut." Another object unique to Forge are teleporters.

While playing as a monitor a health bar is shown at the top and its basically the same amount as a Spartan's.

Useage
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.

Advanced

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.

Respawn Quotas

OK, stay calm. This part will seem a little complex, but its really pretty easy.

All object types have a quota. That is, a maximum number of them that can be on the map, and also a minimum number. When an object wants to respawn, it makes sure that doing so would not result in more objects of that type than the maximum allowed. For example, this is how you can make sure that no more than one Shotgun is on the map at a time, but still place three locations around the map where it could spawn at.

Likewise, a minimum number can be set, in which case objects will respawn immediately if fewer than this number are on the map. For example, we like to set minimum counts on Mongooses, to make sure they’re always available.

To edit the quotas, you can select the type of object in the creation palette, and press X to bring up the summary. This screen tells you how many objects of that type are on the map, what your minimum and maximums are, and also how much of your Budget is being spent by objects of this type. Only the “Run-Time Minimum” and “Run-Time Maximum” can be edited here, the other numbers are just for reference.

Remember: the Budget counts the “Run-Time Maximum” when adding up the cost. You might only place one Sniper Rifle on the map, but if your maximum is set higher than that, a new Sniper Rifle could spawn in.

Is that all clear? If not, don’t worry about it—the Forge always sets the minimum and maximum to safe default values, so you’ll never have to bother with this if you don’t want to.

Object Properties

Almost every object placed on the map has a few properties specific to itself that you can edit. To do so, place your crosshair on an object. Then press X. This brings up an Item Properties window which contains a list of properties to edit. This list isn’t always the same—a weapon has different properties than a vehicle, or from a piece of scenery. But there are some common ones: -   Respawn Rate: This controls how many seconds it takes for an object to respawn. You can use a very low number to make an object respawn quickly, or a very high one to make it less common. You can even tell it to never respawn, in case you want something that only shows up at the start of a round. -   Place At Start: This controls whether the object starts on the map, or if it spawns in later. If you set this to No, then the object will not be there when the game starts, but its respawn timer will start counting right away, so it will appear after a delay. -   Symmetry: This cryptic option controls which types of games the object appears in. A Symmetric gametype is generally one where both sides are equals, like Slayer or Multi Flag CTF. An Asymmetric gametype is the opposite, where the sides have different goals, like One Flag CTF or Territories. Clever use of this property will let you set up a map that plays great for Multi Flag CTF, but also works well for One Flag CTF.

Forge Options

Like Custom Games, the Forge does have a few options that you can set up in the pregame lobby. As with custom game options, you access these by pressing X in the lobby.

First, the bad news. That option at the top, the one called “Allow Editing”? In theory, this option would let you restrict editing to the Party Leader, and prevent everyone else from editing. In practice, ah… ahem… well, not so much. That’s what we call a “feature”. It’s like how sometimes, when a plane lands, the tires blow up. Halo 3 is that plane. This was one of those tires.

But the good news is that the other options work smashingly. The Editor and Player Traits are pretty straightforward, and offer a list of traits that you can apply to players in both Editor and Player modes. So if you’d like to go about your editing duties while your test subjects shoot lasers at you, you can tweak those Editor traits to make yourself invulnerable, or invisible.

And the Respawn Time option should be pretty self explanatory. It’s really only there in case you want to get really serious about playing serious games in the Forge, and three second respawns won’t cut it anymore.

Trivia

 * You take the form of a monitor (like 343 Guilty Spark) while you are in Forge mode.
 * It has been stated that the Elephant will not be among the objects that can be spawned due to its size and specific purpose on maps.
 * Forge will keep track of stats and kills. It has been confirmed by Bungie that you can save your creations. Also, if your creation is liked by Bungie, they will put it up to be downloaded by other players for use.
 * You will be able to create teleporters with more than one destination portal; providing the ability to create such interesting features as a "Schroedinger's Teleporter" - where an "IN" portal could send you to either a power-weapon spawn or a bottomless pit.

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