New and looking for advice.

#1 Hello,

First off, I will not guarantee the validity of my responses, as I am relativley new as well :).

Yes, you can load new terrain information. You can either manipulate the terrain with the in-game editor (in-game press F11 to open editor and then *I think* F5 opens the terrain editor) or you can make more minimal changes(to size rotation etc.) in the .mis file (ex. stronghold.mis in starter.fps/data/missions/).

To load buildings and the like you first have to build them. They can be created in programs like 3DS, WorldCraft, QuArK, MilkShape 3D, or Blender, I'm sure there's more but I can't think of them. After you create the building in whichever program you choose, you then have to export them to *.dts (for animation) or *.dif (no animation). Once you have created them, you can put them in a new folder in "starter.fps/data/yourfolder" or place them in an existing folder like "starter.fps/data/interiors". Once you have done that, you can load them into the game by starting up Torque, loading a mission, then press F11 to start the editor, then press F4. You will then see a directory tree on the right, browse to your folder, and click the new building and it will appear in the center of your viewport. You will notice the building is completely black, simply go the Edit->Re-light scene (it will bog down for a few seconds) then your building will be lighted.

As for the "prop editing" not working, what exactly are you doing when it kicks you out like that? Are you using the in-game editor?

For the modelling question, once you have the model im 3DS you can export it to *.dts with the exporter. The exporter can be found in your SDK/tools folder named max2dtsExporter.dll (3DS uses dlls, right?). For a poly count, the current orc model is around 2000-2500 polys, so I think that is a resonable number. You can play with the numbers and see how Torue handles it.

About the commercial license, I wouldn't bother until you had to. You say your serious about it, but if it doesn't sell, you just lost all the money you put into the license. You might as well wait until you need it ($250,000 in sales) then buy the commercial license.

I'll say in closing that you should use the Search as much as possible. Most questions have already been answered, and I know it's helped me alot.

Hope I helped :D

EDIT: Spelling, if I missed any, too bad :P

#2 Thanks Matthew for the information. I guess I do have another question. When I save a mission, it always has the same name on the startup window. I have 3 Strongholds and each one is a different map. 1 is the orginal and 2 are map that I made. How do I get it to show the name I assigned?

#3 Navigate to starter.fps/data/missions/mymissionname.mis and change

new ScriptObject(MissionInfo) {
         desc0 = "whatever it says here";
         name = "Stronghold";

to:

new ScriptObject(MissionInfo) {
         desc0 = "whatever it says here";
         name = "[b]new name[/b]";

#4 Thanks Chris, I know have 3 missions.