General Hammer Editor Tips

    Throughout the course of mapping I've slowly discovered incredibly useful hotkeys/strategies that I feel embarrassed for having taken so long to find. Many of these small things can be the difference between hours of work or the click of a button. I'm not sure this is the right spot to put this, but here's a list of a few useful tools/tricks that usually aren't covered in tutorials. I hope other people will add to the list (and refine my additions) as I'm sure I've barely scratched the surface hardly being better than a beginner myself. Some of them might be obvious, but they were things I missed starting out and had to learn over time.

    Right click on selected objects and click flip horizontal/vertical to, well, flip horizontal/vertical

    With a face selected in the face edit tool, alt+right click on a second face to apply the previous face's settings and align the second face perfectly with the first (especially useful for aligning textures on slanted/rotated brushes)

    Keep everything to as large of grid units as possible, it makes things easier to deal with and improves vis compile times

    Don't bother running vis for most compiles

    Put rad in fastmode for non light-related compiles

    Turn small detail brushes into func_details to lower vis compile times, do this early in production, not late or it all builds up

    In tools>options>2d views set "default to 15 degree rotations" and hold down alt whenever you want to rotate by less than 15 degrees

    Consistency is key; if you make a corner using one method, keep using that method, if you make a wall one width, keep using that width, etc. etc. (excluding of course variations for aesthetics) This is one I see needed A LOT when I look at beginner's maps, when you're mapping you should have OCD

    Completely finish a detail's settings (visgroup, playerclipping etc.) BEFORE copying it all across your map (or use a func_instance)

    Try to keep vertices on the grid even if it means you won't get a perfect cylinder/slant/whatever

    If you have to clip/rotate something off the grid use a func_instance or group it with an on-the-grid skip brush (you can use the skip brush to move around the group without losing the proper off-grid alignment)

    I hope these will be helpful for any beginners stumbling across this, they've been very helpful for me.

    A few things about the camera that made editing so much easier and wish someone had told me sooner:

    When your cursor is over the 3D view you can press Z to toggle a WASD movement + Mouse Aim flying mode. I use this constantly.

    When a object is selected press control E to center all 2D views on it and control shift E to point the camera at it. I'm also always using this.

    You can hold down left click in the 3D view and it will cycle through all objects under the mouse instead of just selecting the closest one.

    You can press X in the 3D view to get handles that allow you transform and rotate in 3D. Useful for getting props at the exact right angle which is tricky to do using the 2D views.

    The most important ones I've learned recently:

    copy, then "paste special" to paste between maps and get the object in the exact same location. Makes a huge difference in speed.

    the "eyeball" buttons, to hide objects. I seriously recommend exploring the various ways these are useful, they really open up the tools substantially.

    If your verts get "split" and become wild, you can select the individual verts of the box in the 3d view, which allows you to avoid overlapping selection problems.

    Quote from BanJaxe

    You can press X in the 3D view to get handles that allow you transform and rotate in 3D. Useful for getting props at the exact right angle which is tricky to do using the 2D views.

    Interesting, hadn't seen that one.

    The holding of z in the 3d view is definitely a big deal for movement in that view.

    I prefer to use spacebar for hold instead of z for toggle.

    Another tip, if your 3d view fps plummets, it's probably because you accidentally hit c which enables radius culling. Just hit c again to get your frames back to normal.

    Quote from FMPONE

    If your verts get "split" and become wild, you can select the individual verts of the box in the 3d view, which allows you to avoid overlapping selection problems

    What do you mean by split verts?

    Some I use all the time.

    Shit + Z to maximize and minimize the current viewport.

    Ctrl + H to hide all unselected geometry. Then U to unhide.

    Ctrl + Shift + E to centre views on selected geometry in 3d view.

    Crtl + E to centre on geometry in the grid view.

    Hold Shift and drag a selected object to duplicate it, I get a lot of use out of that one. This plus the X trick to get handles in the 3D view kind of replaced the brush tool for me, easier to clone and resize.

    Control + M to get the manipulate dialogue window, where you can type in a value to rotate an object on any axis.

    Alt + Enter: brings up the Object Properties

    There's also a pretty comprehensive list of hotkey here: https://developer.valvesoftware.com/wiki/Hammer_Hotkey_Reference

    The 2D selection box you drag in a 2D view can be manipulated in the other views to create a 3D selection box (otherwise it assumes you want everything on the other axis by default).

    I think I'll grab all of these and put them into 1 video in another week or so, A lot of this is super useful!

    ctrl + shift + r = brings up a find / replace dialogue. This saved me years of wasted time renaming things - works wonders on the thighs.

    So I have a question whose answer would fit perfectly with this topic: howtostairs?

    But seriously, the basic concept is rather simple and way back when I looked up the good ol' stairs tutorials on youtube, but what about the theory and methodology when stairs get more complex?

    I'm not quite sure how to describe my gripe with stairs, but hopefully other mappers will associate. What are your guys' methods for dealing with stairs?

    http://puu.sh/34SIX.png

    There's an example at my latest attempt at a stairway, I ended up just making it an odd off-grid slant. I'm not sure if I'm being clear, but whenever I go to make stairs that are even moderately complex, all sorts of difficulties come up.

    Quote from JeanPaul

    8 tall and 12 deep for default source stairs. Whats off grid about that?

    The size of my stairs is usually determined by the height distance I need to cover, so it doesn't come out so simply. And the addition of landings and corners and such confuse me further, I unfortunately am not sure how to describe my problems as my very problem is I don't entirely understand what's going on with stairs.

    Quote from garthbartin

    http://puu.sh/34SIX.png

    There's an example at my latest attempt at a stairway, I ended up just making it an odd off-grid slant. I'm not sure if I'm being clear, but whenever I go to make stairs that are even moderately complex, all sorts of difficulties come up.

    Most probably "Snap to Grid: 1" is also one of your problems here

    Quote from garthbartin

    The size of my stairs is usually determined by the height distance I need to cover

    If you follow all the general measures, standardly-dimensioned stairs should work fine for you, you certainly shall not increase the step height just because you have to cover more vertical space: build more ramps... if they are too many, there's probably something wrong with the general idea and you should break it up(?). I don't think Valve does make you climb more than 3 ramps in a row

    Shift-dragging certain entities (path_track and I think keyframe_rope as well) will create a copy of that entity and automatically set the "Next Keyframe" field to the new one.

    This is especially useful for creating payload tracks in TF2

    Quote from FMPONE

    the "eyeball" buttons, to hide objects. I seriously recommend exploring the various ways these are useful, they really open up the tools substantially.

    I'm not sure what you mean by eyeball?

    these?

    Quickhide objects (H)

    Quickhide unselected (Ctrl+H) this one I just figured it out... it's amazing. Basically Isolation mode like in 3Ds max

    Quickunhide everything (U)

    I also really like Ctrl+F to split a face in 2 vertice (must be in Vertex tool to work)

    same with Alt+E when using vertex tool ( this one allows to scale selected vertices )

    In the 2D viewport configuration:

    Arrow keys nudge selected object/vertex. This one is my new must have. you can quickly move your selected objects While ensuring they stay on grid. It also works in the camera view!

    Reorient primitives on creation in the active 2D view: This one is great as well when you make primitives such as curved roads and cylinders, torus.

    Ctrl+G to group

    Ctrol+U to ungroup

    Creating user visgroups..

    Ok last thing I find very very useful is pressing O (letter O) while clipping tool is activated. This show all the mesurements of your cuts before you press enter.

    I wish I knew some of this stuff years ago, but I can only blame myself for not looking. Oh the pain I could have spared myself.

    Many thanks for sharing this great information.

    Once upon a time I made an asymmetrical castle. I decided it should have been bigger, so I painstakingly copied the different pieces of the castle and rotated them over the course of an hour such that the castle had been reflected horizontally into twice its size. Later that day I discovered the "flip horizontal" feature.

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