Hammer Feature Requests

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Features

  • Allow the sequence(integer) keyvalue to be set by a dropdown...this would be useful for ragdoll initial position...it'd also be useful to have the first frame of the sequence show up for ragdolls.
  • Add a "pivot" point for rotation, like UED.
  • Drag and drop of map files onto Hammer, to open
  • Implementation of variable falloff on displacement tools
  • Simple lighting preview in 3D view
  • Hammer <-> HL2 compatibility (able to run both simultaneously without any problems)
  • On this line of thought - Fix up the wc_ commands and developer environment ingame for HL2 <-> Hammer compatibility?
  • Updated HL2 FGD (some entities that are used in the sample maps aren't in the HL2 FGD, info_light_relative for example)
  • Option for compile window to retain last known screen position and size.
  • Icon in Texture browser to indicate custom material.
  • Ability to view the different channels of a material seperately. (Red, Green, Blue, Alpha, it's normal/bump, and specular map)
  • Ability to Copy material name and path from Texture browser.
  • Ability to 'play' the map while in hammer.
  • Ability to see func_monitor previews.
  • Ability to see prop wireframes in the 2D views, not just bounding boxes.
  • A 'model browser' containing a search field to search for models. If not, at least a 'model search' feature in the model viewer would be nice.
  • Proper material folder filtering exclusion.
  • Displacement verticies editable or viewable in orthographic views.
  • This goes into the 'going beyond hammer' but make hammer more like UED, in that hammer could be turned into more of an IDE than just a level editor.
  • Windows Scripting Host support with Hammer functions and objects addressable. Macro menu to host shortcuts to script files.
  • Run the compile tools in seperate processes or threads than the hammer GUI, and add a "Cancel" button to cancel the compilation process.
  • Automatically hide and show items placed or deleted from and in VisGroups
  • Ability to move tool handles in the 3D view. In particular, resize brushes, move entities, etc. (Maybe with axis constraints, to deal with 2D => 3D spatial translation? [Perhaps something similar to the gizmo-style handles in 3dsmax?])
  • Bookmarks bound to keys (e.g. numberpad) to jump to different areas of a map.
  • A ruler feature to measure the distance (in units and real world units) and angle between two or more points.
  • More intuative on-the-fly visgrouping. i.e. Ability to select multiple brushes and entities, right-click, select "Show only selected entities and brushes", then when you're done working, right-click again and select "Show all entities and brushes".
  • Ability to type in and retain a texture scale of 3 or 4 decimal places. This would allow scrolling the x or y of a texture after choosing to "fit."
  • Cubemap entities whose range can be specified by a volume so that one cubmap can be used in a wide room and avoid conflict with cubemaps in rooms above or below.
This is unreasonable...it'd require new sdk and game code for all mods...unless of course it could all be done with engine
  • A model browser similiar to the material browser. This would avoid needing to know what folder a model is in to find it. The jpg's would need to be rendered when the model was processed rather than the modeller having to create and save a jpg. Dimensions of the model, polycount, and texture size would be helpful. Checkboxes could be selected for static props, dynamic props, etc.
  • In the terrain menu, when painting geometry, buttons would be much easier than a drop down menu for choosing x,y or z. This requires less clicking and would especially make it easier to switch from x to y when moving things at an angle.
  • Painting geometry becomes troublesome when the viewing angle you need to see what you're doing is an angle that puts several verts in the path of your cursor. A solution for this would be a hotkey that, when held, locks onto the vert the cursor is currently on. This would prevent moving unseen vertices, unknowingly.
    • This is already in hammer, hold down shift and paint geometry - Dredfurst
  • A graphical view of entities and their I/O connections as a flowchart could be helpful for debugging...
  • ...or a database-like view of entities, allowing the user to view and edit many entities at once.
  • Ability to have models with a set animation in the editor, which would show even if the editor is restarted (example: in the model tab for npc_alyx, scroll through the list to Idle01, restart the editor, and shes still in Idle01)
  • Have shift+z maximize the viewport that the pointer is over, not the "current viewport".

Bugs

  • Long file names can't be seen in Face Edit dialog.
  • Face Edit dialog loses focus when cursor moves off the dialog.
  • Hammer crashes if you startup a game without minimizing it and then reopening it before the game opens.
  • Point At... button for angle keyvalues only set "angles" keyvalue.
  • Occasionally the editor closes without warning or error.
  • Editor becomes unstable and/or crashes on a fairly regular basis, often when adjusting overlays, deleting or working with move or keyframe ropes, when moving large amounts of brushes or entities, or doing large amounts of displacement modification.
  • 3D view black models issue fix (failing to draw model textures because of video card limitations)
  • Painting alpha values across multiple terrain brushes sometimes will not paint one of the selected brushes even though the points are lined up and sewn.
  • Autosew does not remember and display it's state correctly - The autosew button in the terrain menu defaults to unchecked. If you check the box, close the terrain tools and then reopen the terrain tool, the box will be unchecked but autosew will still be on. If you check the box, autosew will actually be turned off.

Dialog redesign proposals

I think thumbnails would still be good—ts2do (talk) 18:09, 12 Oct 2005 (PDT)
Me too, but they should be for every model then (I'm looking at CS:S and DOD here), or have a more automated process for taking them, as I suspect VALVe has. Any way to take shots automatically with MV in a batch file or something? --RabidMonkey 18:57, 12 Oct 2005 (PDT)
The thumbnails fail to give a fair representation of what the model looks like, or the scale. Some kind of integration with HLMV would seem to be the best proposal here. --PiMuRho 08:00, 13 Oct 2005 (PDT)
Upon further consideration, the thumbnail view is nice and it's not something I'd want to lose. I made this alternative to marry my old proposal with it, applying a three-pane approach. Thank you for the feedback! --Cryovat 16:13, 13 Oct 2005 (GMT+1)
Yes...what's this skin size thing though?? a model can use multiple materials—ts2do (talk) 11:27, 13 Oct 2005 (PDT)
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