Some Advice for a New Map Maker?

[[J]Man]

Hello dudes!
I have liked the idea of creating my own maps because there are some good ideas out there for maps that could be placed on MHM.
I don't kno what those ideas are, but i'd be happy to make those dreams come true!
So as of now, i've only done a few lessons from this one tutorial and i already have an issue man!!

Okay, so when i'm doing a 'skybox,' I seem to lose the properties of my water and lava pits.
I make sure that i have only my sheet brush selected and then i add the special brush texture on my sheet brush but it will still remove the water and lava textures.
Not only that, but once that happens, I go test my level and everytime i click to play, i die instantly and so do the opponents.
there's no way to move in case it's a 'telefrag' either, and believe me, they are not telefrags man.
it's always as if i fell from a long distance or sumthing.
In case you want to know where i found the tutorial, it's on 'http://squacky.planetunreal.gamespy.com/'

PLZ HELP!!!

[K]

You are defiantly doing something wrong since the skybox is not connected to your water or pits in any way. because of this it is hard to tell what you have done wrong.

Best bet is delete your sky box. Get your water and lava pits done first in working condition. Then do a full build and save. Then start on your skybox. Read the tutorial very closely.

Make sure your water and lava sheets completely cover the hole the liquid is in. If it doesn't then the properties will leak out above the water/lava into the air , this is why you are dying probably. It has to be enclosed by the lava/water sheet portal.

You are building the sky box far away from the rest of your map, Correct?
It should not be touching anything.
It should be nothing but a subtracted cube of some size.
It should also have nothing in it but a skyzone info actor and a light if you are new to this.
make the walls and ceiling the texture you want for the sky.

Then in your level you select the surfaces that will be the sky "most likely the ceiling" and set them to Fake Backdrop. What ever you set to fake backdrop will be what the skyinfo actor sees like a camera.

[Hermskii]

I had the same problem on my 1st map and I quit mapping right then. You should keep trying. I'm just lazy.

[[J]Man]

I hope K read wat Herms said above. lol i'm on the verge of quitting too man.
Nah, see, they disappear by themselves and i learned that when i pressed 'ctrl+s,' i would get the sheets to disappear.
So i was like "so when i press that combo, i'm screwing my whole map up."
Yea, problem solved... but it's still not it!
I start from sctratch on the saved map before the water and lava sheets disappear, go on normally, and then they disappear dude!!
Idk how mappers survived with this problem, but i am certainly not living through this man!! Ah well, i'm gunna try again.

P.S. Kchan, thanks for all ur help so far!

[K]

Well the first thing you should know is NOT to push keys if you don't know what they are dooing to your map!

What does ctrl+s do?

If you don't know stop pushing it and your problems are over for now.

It took me allot of experimenting and a hellalot of reading , but i now map without a single freeze or a snag. If something goes wrong i usually can find how to fix quickly.

Answer some of the above questions from my previous post if you still need help. I need more info to help more.

[Hermskii]

My problem was the start the game everyone dies. My problem then was they would all fall to their deaths because they would spawn in mid air. Then I just quit. Mapping should be learned with someone over your shoulder.

[K]

You just made a boo boo when you put the player starts in the map. Very easy to fix Herm.

[[J]Man]

My problem was the start the game everyone dies. My problem then was they would all fall to their deaths because they would spawn in mid air.

Yea man, i had this problem too and i realized why it happens... or at least i noticed why it happened.
Remember when i mentioned about my water and lava sheets disappearing before? Well, when that happened, everyone died on respawn.
My only solution to that is to re-work the map to the point before that problem started in the fisrt place.
I hated that re-spawn death thing too dude.
I crushed so0o0o many Coke cans trying to know what was going on. lol

[[J]Man]

Nah K. The problem was not the player start places.
I have the link above of the tutorial I use.
Whenever i finish a tutorial, i save it as a different name.
In that way, i can always come back to the previous map mod i made in the previous tutorial so i can start over from that point which made my map all screwy.
My point? lol, i placed all my player start areas on the first tutorial and since i had tested the map after ending tutorials, no one died on my placement of player starts.
But after I do that ctrl+s thing, my water and lava sheets would disappear and then my player starts got all screwy.
Lol i hope that explains sumthing.
I have answered some of ur Qs Kchan. Thanks for all the help!

[K]

[J]Man ? you didn't answer any of the questions?
You have just repeated the same info as before.
Do you know what ctrl-s does?

The player start comment was for Herms map not yours. btw

Also frequently doing a build and saving under a dif name is a good practice. I do it often. If something does go wrong and unfixable you can always back up to a version before the problem.