Hello! I'm Spasman, developer of Boring Man. If you're here, you're probably curious about learning about the fancy new map editor for Boring Man v2.0.0!

The new map editor in the rewrite is much more powerful. I'll list of some of the new exciting features:

• Testing feature that will let you test your map in a single click, no more moving map files around to test
  
• Animated tiles, which you can set the animation speed for
  
• Fun new map objects such as moving platforms and conveyor belts
  
• Copy, cut, paste and undo functions for all of your ADHD needs
  
• Renovated UI and control scheme, feels like a real map editor now
  
• Workshop support, upload your map and share it with the world. If your map is on the workshop, players will be able to download it directly when joining a server that is using the map
  
• Polygon and wall tools for customized collision objects
  
• Logic gate system that will let you push buttons, open doors, set off traps, and much more

With these new features along with a much more polished map editor, this should vastly expand the community's ability to create and share custom maps.

But.. how do you use it? Well that's what this guide is here for. This guide will work similar to the old map editor guide, as in its not designed to be read from top to bottom. Instead, open this guide when you want to learn more about an object and function, and use Ctrl + F or table of contents to find the specific piece of information you want.

Well now that we're acquainted, lets get started.

To get to the map editor, open Boring Man and on the first menu select "Boring Editor"

Once you do that, you should get the map editor screen similar to this


This is the map editor! If you used the old map editor, you can probably notice that it looks very similar. Why fix it if it ain't broken?

There are 5 tabs at the top of the grey menu which organize the different functions and menu options you have for the map editor. Each tab has its own section you can check out below.

The map editor does not controller support, a mouse and keyboard are recommended but you can easily make maps on a laptop and track pad as well.

Here is a list of important controls you should know:

(Left-click) = Select menu options and objects in the map, also used to place new objects. Hold Left click while your mouse is over your map to make a green selection box that selects multiple objects.

(Right-click) = Right-clicking an object will open its properties & functions menu

+ = Show additional right-click menu options if available, such as Selecting All of the same object type, or Deleting All of the same object type that has been right-clicked.

(Middle-click) = Middle click and drag your mouse to move the camera

(Mouse-wheel) = Zoom in and out of your map

+ (Ctrl + mouse wheel) = Adjust global (default) depth for objects. See the Depth section for more details.

+ (Alt + Arrow keys) = Zoom in and out of your map

(W, S, A, D) = Move the camera left right up or down

(F1) = Show or hide the hotkeys cheat sheet

(F2) = Enable or disable Logic Mode. See the Logic Gate section for more info.

<Image of F3>

(Space) = Snap object type cursor to its own sprite size instead of the grid

(Alt) = Hold Alt to enable precise placement of objects instead of snapping to grid

(Arrow keys) = Move selected objects by 1 pixel left, right, up or down

(Ctrl + C) = Copy selected objects

(Ctrl + X) = Cut selected objects

(Ctrl + V) = Paste selected objects

(Ctrl + A) = Select all objects in map

(Ctrl + W) = Toggle fill tool, if the selected object type is compatible

(Ctrl + R) = Rotate selected object type or held object if compatible

<Image of CTRL+R+ALT>

<Image of M and N and CTRL keys>

(Ctrl + S) = Quick save your map

(Ctrl + Q) = Flip held or pasted objects vertically

(Ctrl + E) = Mirror held or pasted objects horizontally

<Image of grid TAB keys>

<Image of CTRL+R+ALT>

The FILE tab has functions related to managing your map files. You can save, load, test and even upload your map to the Workshop from here.

All maps loaded and saved from the map editor are located in the 'custom' folder in the 'maps' folder of Boring Man's exe file directory.

In most cases, you will find the directory at the file path below:


or


Below I will explain each menu option's function.

Clicking this menu option will create a new, blank map. It will ask if you want to save your current map before starting a new one.

If you have already saved your map, clicking this will quickly overwrite your saved map. If you have not saved your map yet, it will function like the "Save As" option.

Opens the save window for saving your map. You can name your map whatever you like, Windows file saving permitting. If you do not want to quick save your existing map and instead save it as a different file, then click Save As instead of Save.



This will load any saved maps you have placed in the "maps/custom" folder, mentioned above.

This will allow you to test your map on the fly in its current form. When testing a map, all networking functions are turned off and the game mode and the amount of bots to test with can be configured in the CONFIG tab. For other game settings, the map editor will pull the server settings currently being used for when you host a server. Mutators are also enabled by default so you have quick access to all the console commands.

Clicking this will begin the process of uploading your map to the Steam Workshop. The Workshop thumbnail setting and the ID of your Workshop map can be found in the CONFIG tab. There are some requirements before uploading a Workshop map, such as placing the right spawn points, the editor will tell you these requirements if theyre not met. This option will not appear on non-Steam versions of the game.


Opens this guide.

Quits the map editor and returns to Boring Man's main menu.


If your map is a climb map, this is the current 'beaten' status, which determines if your Climb map will have the "Beatable" tag in the Workshop browser. For more info, check out the "Climb" section below.

The CONFIG tab has options related to configuring your map editor settings, such as the grid display and the camera.

You can show or hide stuff like certain objects, object information and the background. I will go through each setting and explain what each does.

Enabling this will display extra information overlayed on the object, such as the material (for footstep sounds), the type of object (normal, healing, lethal, etc), and the depth if the object interacts with depth.

This will hide or show objects that are categorized in the "ASSETS" tab. You should disable this if you want to see nothing but tiles displayed. Any hidden assets will not be selectable and such.

Similar to above, this will hide or show tiles instead of assets.


This will display or hide the sea water/lava if its enabled. See the "Sea Level" section for more details.

If you have background images, you can choose to hide or show them. They will also reflect your parallax settings in the MAP tab. See the MAP Tab section for more details.

This will set what you want the default collision type to be when creating collision objects. See the 'ASSETS: Part 1' for more details.

This will set what you want as the default collision material. Material only effects which footstep and landing sounds played. See the 'ASSETS: Part 1' for more details.

This will set what game mode you want to test your map with. It will pull other server settings from whatever you have set when hosting a game. If you have Climb Map enabled in the MAP Tab, this will be overridden with Climb as the test game mode.

This will set how many bots you want in your testing session.

Toggle whether to draw the grid or not.

Set the size of every cell in the display grid. This has an effect on what your objects snap to when placing them from the ASSETS or TILES tab.

These options are for setting the offset position of your grid. Basically, its the starting position of where your grid starts. If you have misaligned tiles or assets, then setting the offset could help you place them nicely easier.

The MAP Tab has settings that are related to your map. This includes things like the map name, the map author and if it's a Climb map or not, and much more.

This is the name of your map. It's what appears on the scoreboard in-game and when players see your map on the server list. Please keep it appropriate if you are uploading to the Workshop.

This is the name of the creator of the map.... aka you! If you don't want to use your in-game name, then you can change the Map Author name to whatever you'd like. It appears on the scoreboard in-game.

These 2 settings set the overall size of your map. By default its 10112 x 2944, which is twice the amount of the old map editor's map size. (The rewrite has x2 the internal resolution then the old version). Yes, that means you can make vertical maps! Weeeiirrd!!

Set what background sound loop you want the map to play to set the mood.

Alternatively, placing an audio OGG file called 'ambience.ogg' in your map's folder next to the 'bmap.txt' file will overwrite the Map Ambience setting and play that audio instead! Woah!!

You can include the ambience.ogg file in your Workshop upload by placing it in the folder you save your Workshop map to before uploading. Check out the image below to see what I mean.



Certain requirements are needed from OGG files before they can be played successfully, similar to the OGG files used for custom hit indicator sounds. I'm not sure what they are, but you can easily convert any audio into a compatible OGG file with Audacity[www.audacityteam.org]

In Audacity, simply load what audio file you want into Audacity (File -> Load) and then export it as an OGG file (File -> Export -> Export as OGG). The default settings usually work fine. This should work the same with the hit indicator OGG files.

Toggle whether this map you're making is a Climb map or not. Climb maps have a very specific function for Climb mode, so they need to be separate from other maps. See the Climb section below for more details.

Set the Workshop thumbnail image to an image you have in your 'images' folder. See the "TILES" section below for details on how to add your own images to the map editor.

This setting will create a copy of the image in the root map directory called "thumbnail.png" and it is also displayed when players are voting for a map, not just as your Workshop thumbnail. So make it good!


The images in the map voting menu are the 'thumbnail.png' files in each map directory

If you have no thumbnail selection made, then the map editor will attempt to take a screenshot of your map view and use that as the thumbnail instead. Pretty convenient!

If your map was uploaded to the Workshop, this is the workshop ID that was saved. If you lost the original map file for your Workshop item and need to update it, you can set the workshop ID with this setting and update your item. To get the ID of an existing workshop item, you can get it in the Workshop item's URL. For example:


The underlined numbers is the ID of this linked Workshop item, which is 1825563737. Copy paste this number into the text field when you click Workshop ID and the map editor will check if you have ownership of this item and then allow you to update to it if you do have ownership.


If your map is on the workshop, then clicking this will open the Workshop link, using the Workshop ID mentioned above. If it hasn't been uploaded or doesn't have an ID set, then you will get an error.

Enables 'sea level' mode, where you left-click a certain height on the map to set how high or low you want the sea level to be. If you want to disable the sea system, right-clicking while setting the sea level or placing it lower then the maximum map height will disable it. See the "Sea Level" section for more details.

This toggles whether you want your sea to be made out of water or lava. You can only have 1 type of sea at a time, but you can still place water or lava objects despite what type of sea you have. See the "Sea Level" section for more details.

This is the draw depth of the sea water or lava, sea depth works exactly the same as other features in the map editor that use depth. See the "Sea Level" and "Depth" sections for more details.

For more details on how backgrounds work, see the "Backgrounds" section below.

Not written yet!
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Asset objects are the meat and potatos of your map. Assets make up the collision for where players will walk on and fall onto, where players spawn while either on a certain team or in a game mode like Deathmatch, and much more.

There are a lot of assets to go through, so this will be split into parts.

Collision objects are what makes your map 'tangible'. Players, whether they know it or not, use collision objects to move, jump, wall jump, take cover and basically just gives them a place to stand on. Boring Man wouldn't be fun if everyone just fell through the map forever!


Collision objects have two attributes you can configure, the Material and the Type.

The material is quite simple, you can set what the collision object is 'made of', if you can bear with me. All it really does is set what footstep and landing sounds to play when a player is moving or landing on it. Defining material on collision objects is optional, but it will definitely make your map more immersive.

The type is a little more complicated, but very powerful.

<Image of updated block types>

Different collision types do different things when a player is touching it, and I will explain what each type does below:


These collision types also work for Trigger Areas. Scroll down for more info on Trigger Areas and the 'Barrel Check' collision type.

You can change an object's material or collision type by right-clicking the object and clicking the "Type" and "Material" options. If you select multiple objects, and if they all have the same Material/Type, you can right-click one of them to change the type/material for ALL the objects selected. Neat!

Platforms are a new type of collision object in Boring Man. If you've ever played a game like Smash Bros, you might know about how platforms work in that game, and it works just about the same way here. A player can jump up through platforms and stand on top of it. They can shoot through platforms, and fall through them by double tapping the Crouch button.

To create a platform, select the Platform Tool and then click the place on your map where you want the platform to start. Then, move the mouse left or right to resize the width of the platform, and click again when you are happy with the width.

If you made a mistake, you can edit the platform by right-clicking it, and selecting "Set Platform..", this will enable resizing that platform again.


<Image of updated platform types>

Using for precise placement and other placement hot keys work with platform creation. Platforms also work with collision types, so you can have platforms that heal, restore ammo, etc. Platform's colors will appear more faded compared to normal collision objects, so you're able to tell the difference.

Are the default blocks, ramps, and terrain not cutting it for your super cool map? You can make brand new collision objects by using the polygon tool!

The polygon tool is quite powerful, but can make a map feel clunky when used incorrectly. The polygon tool, like many things in Boring Man, is based off of Soldat[www.soldat.pl], specifically the polygon system in Soldat's map editor.



Basically, you can create a triangle collision object by clicking three points on your map. Additionally, polygon points can be "snapped" to other polygon points or the corners of non-polygon collision objects, including platforms! Wow! It makes creating unique collision structures very easy. And like platforms and other collision objects, polygons work with collision types as well.

There are some limitations though, you can't make a single polygon too big because Game Maker needs to create the triangle as a sprite to generate the collision mesh for the object, and stores it into graphics memory. For low end computers, this can be asking a lot, so the size of a single polygon is limited. If you want a big polygon structure, then multiple little polygons is much better.


Secondly, you may find it difficult to use tile images that came with the game since the stock maps were made before a time the Polygon Tool existed. At some point I would like to figure out how to overlay textures over the polygon for easier visuals, but thats just an idea for now.

The wall tool is the biggest weapon in your arsenal when it comes to optimizing your map. The wall tool, similar to the polygon tool, allows you to create a rectangular collision object of any size you want. Works with collision types, as expected.



Simply click the starting point for your wall, then click another point to set the width and height of the wall. You can edit walls by right-clicking them and selecting "Set Wall..".


The Wall tool is good for optimizing your map because instead of placing a row of 15 collision blocks, you can make a wall thats 15 blocks long instead, effectively reducing your total object count for your map down by 14.

There's nothing wrong with using the default collision blocks, but if you have a big and complicated map thats giving you low FPS, a good place to start for optimizing would be replacing any lined up blocks with the wall tool.

See the "Ladders" section in part 2.

See the "Conveyors" section in part 2.

Continue to part 2....

A continuation of showcasing the objects categorized in the ASSETS Tab. A lot of these objects interact with logic gates, so if you're unfamiliar with those you should skip down to the "Logic Gates" section.

Check the Backgrounds section of this guide.

Doors are a fun new object in Boring Man which you can use to lock players out of certain areas or stop projectile spam in another.

There are a few types of doors, specifically automatic, manual, horizontal and vertical. The horizontal and vertical attributes simply define if the door is upright or sideways, like a trapdoor.

When it comes to Automatic (Auto) and Manual doors, things get a little complicated. Whether a door is automatic or not has an effect on the logic gate system and what the door does when it's activated by a logic gate.



By default, all doors are locked and will remain closed until activated by a logic gate. When a logic gate activates a door, the door becomes 'unlocked' and players can pass through it.


With an activated automatic door, the door will remain close until ANY player approaches it, when that happens then the door will open automatically. These doors are meant more for competitive play, the doors are useful in blocking snipers since a player would need to be near them to have them opened.

With a 'manual' activated door, the door opens and stays open for as long the logic gate is activated, even when there are no players nearby it. These doors should be used for puzzles or contraptions and shouldn't be relied on for constant or competitive use like Automatic doors.


You can tell the difference between an auto door and a manual door in the map editor by looking for the big red "A" on the door, which means its an auto door. You cannot tell the difference in-game.

Lastly, you can set the color of the detailing on the door, for either your personal preference or to help you color coordinate certain doors with certain other logic gate objects. You can do this by right-clicking the door, and selecting "Set Color".

Another new map object for the rewrite, conveyor objects move players and objects left or right automatically, when activated by a logic gate.

Lots of objects can interact with a moving conveyor belt, such as dropped weapons, barrels, CTF flags, grenades, etc...



There are two conveyor belts to use, one that moves left and another that moves right. You can tell the difference in the map editor by the yellow and blue arrows.


You can set the conveyor belt move speed by right-clicking the conveyor belt object and left-clicking the Move Speed option to increase the speed. You can decrease the speed by right-clicking the Move Speed option instead.

When deactivated, conveyor belts will not animate, emit sound, or move players/objects.

The conveyor belt tool works similar to the platform or ladder tools, but for placing conveyor belts instead. As always, it is preferable to use this tool if you need many belts in your map as tool-placed conveyors are one long object which helps performance. Really you should always be using the tool, and the single placement objects should be replaced in the ASSETS menu at some point.

Floor spikes are very simple map objects that will instantly kill any player that touches them.



Blood will cake the spikes when a player dies to them, and use whatever blood color that player had. Floor spikes have no logic gate interaction, and should be used when you really don't want a player in a certain area.

Ladders! Boring Man wouldn't be Boring Man without the abundance of ladders. Ladders are pretty simple at face value, players can climb them and jump off of them. More competitive players will know all of the tricks associated with them, such as ladder hopping and ladder rolls. But as a map author, there are only a few things you really need to know about them.



There are two different ladder objects. Metal and Wooden, the only difference between them is the sound they make when a player is climbing them. I might add more.

Ladders are also invisible, similar to collision objects. They use to be visible in the old version, but since ladders have become pretty important, making them invisible gives map makers the option to make their own ladder sprites, which don't even have to be ladders at all. Theres also nothing wrong with using the default ladder sprites.

Bots recently learned how to wall jump, but they still prefer to use ladders in most cases. Placing waypoints along ladders will trigger bots into using them if they need to go up. You can check out the Bots & Waypointing section for more info on how the AI works.

The Ladder Tools can create singular ladder objects of any length. The Ladder Tool is much more preferred for optimizing your map vs. placing individual ladder objects. Left-click anywhere on your map to place the ladders starting position,then move your mouse up and down to adjust the length. When done, left-click again to create the ladder.

Moving platforms are a new map object in the rewrite, and something I've struggled to create successfully for many years!

Moving platforms function similarly to platforms created with the Platform Tool, where players can pass through them and stand on them.



But they follow a rectangular path, allowing players to ride on top of them! Creating a moving platform is similar to creating walls with the wall tool. Click the starting position for the platform, then click again the set the width and height of the platform's path.


Moving platforms need to be activated by a logic gate to start moving, otherwise they will just sit there and do nothing. You can set the speed of the moving platform by right-clicking it and then setting the "Move Speed" option, similar to conveyor belts.

Continue on to part 3.

Continuing to part 3 of the ASSETS Tab

Teleporters in the rewrite work very similarly to the old teleporters, however many more game objects can interact with them, such as weapon drops, drones and more.

When you place a teleporter, you will then be asked to click a position where the teleporter sends players and objects to. You can see the current teleporting position for a teleporter by the white line that comes out of it. If you need to reset the position, right-click the teleporter and select the "Set Teleporter.." option.

<Image of teleporters here>

Teleporters are deactivated by default, and will need an active logic gate attached to them to be usable. Teleporters do not activate outputted logic gates in any way. See the "Logic Gates" section for more details.

These are 'neutral' teleporters, that everyone can use. See the 'ASSETS: Part 4' for more details on team teleporters.

Windows are mostly for decoration, but they still have some gameplay oriented properties. Windows can shatter from explosives and most projectiles. Players can also go through windows and shatter them if they are moving fast enough.

<Image of windows here>

There are vertical and horizontal windows you can use, but unfortunately you cannot rotate them or use them diagonally. This is because the game's collision isn't very flexible with solid collision, and to make it more flexible would be very costly computer specs wise. I don't see it as worth it.

Windows can be rebuilt by resetting them with the RESET gate or a TDM round restart. See the "Resetting Objects" in the Logic Gates section for more details.

When windows break, any output logic connections will be activated. There is no input logic gate interaction. See the "Logic Gates" section for more details.

If you've played the old version, you may recognize this object from the shooting range. You can now use it for your maps, and possibly make your OWN shooting range maps!

<image of wood targets here>

Wood targets have 100 health, just like a player with default health would have. The target visually breaks down as it takes damage. Wood targets can be reset with a RESET gate or a TDM round restart, see the "Resetting Objects" in the Logic Gates section for more details.

Wood targets can activate output logic connections when destroyed. There is no input logic interaction. See the "Logic Gates" section for more details.

This map object is still a work in progress.

Weapon cabinets allow players to change their loadout while they're still alive. Weapon cabinets only work when the current match allows loadouts, so for example players would not be able to use weapon cabinets in Weapons Deal.

<Image of weapon cabinet here>

Weapon cabinets by default, are closed and locked. Players can not use them when in this state, and need to be unlocked by an active logic input connection, similar to doors.

The weapon printer is something map makers can use to give players certain, specific weapons. When you place a weapon printer, right-clicking the object will let you set the weapon you want the printer to give out by cycling the "Weapon" option.

<Image of weapon printer here>

You can also set a 'recharge' timer for the printer, in case you don't want players printing weapons too frequently. Right-click the weapon printer and select the "Set Timer" option.

Weapon printers are completely client side, when a player prints a weapon, the recharge timer will only trigger for them. The weapon printer will still be available to other players, so players aren't fighting over 1 printer. I may add an option later where you can set it to only allowing 1 player to use it at a time.

Weapon printers are powered off by default, and require an active logic connection to be used. See the "Logic Gates" section for more details.

The Zombrains Printer is a weapon printer that only spawns during Zombrains mode. This printer requires money to give a player a weapon, and you can set a specific weapon to sell, or if its a random weapon every time the map loads.

Right now, the weapon prices are set by the game, but at some point I would like to allow you to set your own price, similar to the "Z.Cost" feature for buttons and levers.

Explosive barrels are pretty simple at face value but they have some unique properties. When a player shoots or damages an explosive barrel, it will explode and do 200 damage. Once the barrel explodes however, it will be 'used' and can't explode again unless its reset by a RESET gate, TDM round or from falling off the map. See the "Resetting Objects" in the Logic Gates section for more details.

<Image of explosive barrel here>

Explosive barrels can also use the "Barrel Check" trigger area. When any barrel enters this type of trigger area, the trigger area will activate any output logic connections. This, combined with objects like the conveyor belts, can be utilized to make puzzle maps or something similar out of explosive barrels.

The classic laser trap. Laser traps are dangerous and loud devices that can kill any players that touch it. They can also destroy drones, generators, resupplies, turrets, detonate barrels, and more.

Laser traps are hitscan, similar to the Railgun, where their hit detection is just a straight line towards a certain position. When your map is loaded, the laser trap will "shoot" in the direction its rotated towards and end its laser once it touches. You will know which side the laser will come out of in the map editor by looking at the red laser detailing on the laser trap object itself.

<Image of laser trap here>

Laser traps can update their line collision, so you can do things such as closing a door in front of it to block the laser. Laser traps are off by default, and need an active logic connection to be turned on. See the "Logic Gates" section for more details.

The shark is the only wildlife seen in Boring Man thus far, and are very dangerous to scuba divers. Sharks will wander around their 'home base' which is their starting point. If they wander too far, they will turn around (most of time).

<Image of shark here>

When a player strays too close, they will begin 'stalking' the player, and then lunge if it gets close enough. Touching the shark anywhere will instantly kill the player. Players can deal damage to the shark and scare it away.

The sharks CAN die, but they have a lot of health. When the shark dies, it can activate any output logic connections attached to it. You can revive the shark by resetting it with a RESET gate or a TDM round restart. See the "Resetting Objects" in the Logic Gates section for more details.

The spike traps are dangerous objects that can surprise and kill reckless players. When a player steps on a spike trap, it will 'click' to warn the player and then suddenly shoot up spikes.

<Image of spike trap here>

There are two types of spike traps, manual and trigger. Similar to doors, these two types of spike traps operate differently when activated by logic. 'Trigger' spike traps are probably what you're familiar with, when active from a logic connection, it will wait for any players to go over it before triggering. You can tell when the spike trap is a trigger trap in the map editor because it will have a red "T" in front of it.

The 'Manual' spike trap is different where it will not wait for a player to walk over it and instead trigger right away as soon as it receives an on signal from a logic connection. The manual spike trap will not trigger again until all logic connections attached to it are turned off. See the "Logic Gate" section for more details.

Continue to part 4...

Carry on...

The swinging axe is a very simply object, it is a giant ceiling axe that will swing back and forth and kill any players that touch it.

<Image of axe here>

The axe has no logic gate interaction.

The Empty Sea map object is a weird object but I will try to make sense on what its purpose is. When you have the sea level enabled, you can place Empty Sea blocks to 'empty out' areas of the sea.

<Image of empty sea oil rig example here>
The flooding interior of the Oil Rig map is actually an area of Empty Sea objects

For example if you wanted to make an underwater structure like a submarine, you would place Empty Sea objects along the interior of the submarine so there wouldn't be water inside of it. Once the player leaves the Empty Sea area you've made, they will begin swimming again (or die to the lava, depending on the Sea Type). See the "Sea Level" section for more details.

Similar to the old version, these objects are the classic way of adding water or lava to your map. Players can swim in water blocks similar to when they enter the sea, and lava will kill players and destroy objects accordingly. Neither water or lava objects have logic gate interaction.

<Image of lava and water here>

Water and lava objects don't have individual depth, instead they follow the depth value you set in the MAP tab "Sea Depth" setting. See the "Depth" section for more details.

Player spawns are.. pretty important! They dictate where players will respawn when they join the game or die and respawn. There are 3 types of spawn, normal, USC and The Man.

Normal spawns (Player Spawn) are possible locations players can respawn in a 'team neutral' setting such as playing Deathmatch or Weapons Deal. They are also used by Survival enemies and zombies in Zombrains.

USC and The Man spawns, as you can guess, are used in team-based settings. USC players will use USC spawn points in team-based modes like CTF and TDM, and human players will use USC spawn points for Survival and Zombrains. The Man spawn points are really only used for team-based game modes for The Man's team.

<Image of player spawns>


If there are no normal spawn points, then the game will use team-based spawn points instead, if they exist. Vice versa, if there are no USC/The Man spawn points, then the game will use normal spawns instead (and then use enemy spawn points if neither normal spawns or team spawns exist). Players will not be able to spawn if you do not have any spawn points in your map.

B-Man uses flag objects a lot for it's built-in game modes. These flag spawns dictate where the flags will go in your map.

<image of flag spawns here>

They are pretty simple, you can only have 1 spawn point for CTF flags and the Climb flag, but can place as many spawn points as you like for TDM and Take Over. With the latter, the spawn point is randomly selected when its time to spawn a flag. Flags will simply not appear when they have no spawn point, so don't forget to place them!

If your map does not feature Takeover spawn points, it will use Survival Objective spawn points (see below) instead since I believe they share similarities in how they should be properly placed for the AI

Ammobox and medikits help keep players alive and restore their resources without dying and respawning. These spawns should be used sparingly, so players can't constantly be giving themselves full health an ammo. Drones can also pick up these objects, and once they do they are considered "destroyed" and will begin the timer to spawn a new one, just like after a player picking it up.


<Image of ammobox and medikit here>

When a player needs health or ammo, they can touch a pick up object and press the Action key to begin picking up, which takes a few seconds. When the pickup object is used, it will activate any output logic connections until a new pick up object spawns to take its place. Pickup objects can be disabled by the server admin running your map, so use logic gates on them wisely.

For Survival and Boring Royale, chest spawns are used to determine where chests should appear at the start of each Survival wave or Boring Royale match.

In Survival, not all spawns are used each wave, depending on how many players are in the match. Chests don't use the same spawn point twice, so if there are a lot of players and every chest spawn is used, then not all possible chests spawned and can make Survival difficult. I would recommend placing at least 25 chest spawns.

All power ups work the same in the map editor, so I won't explain what each one does. When a player collects a power up, it will begin a respawn timer and activate any output logic connected to it. Once the power up respawns, the logic connection is deactivated again.

<Image of powerups here>

Power ups can be disabled by the server admin running your map, so use logic gates on them wisely.

Under the "Base Equipment (XYZ)" sections in the ASSETS tab, you may notice the generators, resupplies teleporters and turrets.

<Image of generator here>

Generators are fairly simply objects can be used to manage output logic connections. The generator can take damage from players, and also be repaired by them, depending on what team they are on. Players friendly to the generator can repair them with their fists or with the Wrench.

Generators will activate logic connected to it when its NOT destroyed, simulating a 'powered on' state. Once destroyed, the logic connections will turn off. In the old version, which didn't have a logic gate system, the generators were hard-coded to power turrets, teleporters and resupplies that belonged to its team, but now you can attach it to much more and allow them to manage more features for a base.

Generators are 'mechanical', so they will be instantly destroyed by EMP attacks.

Resupply stations heal friendly players near and restore their ammunition and third slot equipment, if necessary.

<Image of resupply here>

They need to be powered on by a logic connection, and can output a logic connection which is determined by if they're destroyed or not.

Base turrets are big scary automated guns that will blast anything it thinks its an enemy. This includes enemy players and drones.

<Image of turret here>

Note that turrets can spawn in Climb mode, USC turrets will be friendly to players while The Man turrets are hostile.


Similar to the resupply, the turret must be powered on a by an inputted logic connection, and will output a logic connection determined by if its destroyed or not.

You can have team-specific teleporters on your map. These teleporters can only be used by their respective teams, and will not interact with enemy players.

<Image of team teleporters>

They also only appear in CTF and Climb, where as neutral teleporters are available in all game modes.. These teleporters do *not* interact with game objects like neutral teleporters, however they can still interact with friendly drones. See the 'ASSETS: Part 2' for more details.

This is a spawn point object for Barkeep in Survival. At the start of each Survival match, the bar's location is randomly selected from one of these spawn points. If no spawn point is present, then the bar will not spawn at all. Players will know if the bar exists on the map if they receive a message from Barkeep when they join.

<Image of bar with vices>

Players generally don't like being attacked while using it, so it is recommended to place the bar's spawn points in high places or places hard to reach by the AI. Enemies should not be spawning near the bar if there are enough Player Spawns away from it for them to use.


Players can purchase vices from the bar, and when bought the vice is physically spawned for the player to pick up. The bar will check whether the left or right side is clear of any collision and spawn the vice there. If both sides of the bar are blocked, then the vice will spawn in the direct center as a last resort. You should be mindful that the bar isn't sandwiched between too walls or in a narrow space, as accidental vice pick ups could occur if it has to resort spawning in the center.

The Survival Objective spawn point is used for the various objectives players need to complete to pass a wave in Survival. There are only two types of objectives in Survival as of writing this, defending the flag and defusing bombs. The bombs and the flag will use Survival Objective spawns to create themselves each wave. If no Survival Objective spawns are placed, then the survival objective system is disabled, similar to Survival Classic.

<Image of bomb/flag>

The objective spawn points can be pretty much placed where you desire, but to make your map challenging on Survival, I would recommend placing them in low places or places easy to reach by the AI, opposite of the Survival Bar spawns. The objectives should also be somewhat distant from any Survival Bar spawn points, so that using the bar remains relatively peaceful.

Remind Spasman to reveal this section once appropriate.

In Zombrains, survivor players must escape via helicopter to win the match when time is up (and helicopters are enabled for the server). The helicopter spawn object is used by the escape helicopter to randomly select a landing zone.

<Image of heli>

When arriving for pick up or leaving, the helicopter will draw itself at a depth of -201, which is 1 value lesser then the lowest depth your objects and tiles can go which is -200. This guarantees the helicopter is ALWAYS drawn in front of your map as it is arriving. When it has come to a stop and opened its door to accept passengers, the depth is changed to 1, which is 1 value more then the player depth of 0. This will draw the helicopter behind players while still drawing itself in front of any tiles and objects with a depth greater then 1. There's no way to change this behavior because it will most likely always work the best on every map made.


The helicopter spawns should be somewhat easy to reach, and somewhere accessible by the AI so the landing zone is 'hot'. Keep in mind players need to touch the open doorway on the helicopter to escape, so make sure it isn't blocked by any walls or hazards.

Check the Bots & Waypointing section of this guide.

Check the Logic Gates section of this guide.

So you've placed some collision objects and maybe some fun assets in your map, but when you go to test it, everything is invisible! Why?


To make the visual environment of your map, you must use the tile system. Tiles are not true objects, they are light weight objects with the simple task of displaying an image, static or animated.

Tiles can be *any* image you want! You may have noticed some crazy Workshop maps, like someone making a map out of a Mario or Sonic level. These kind of maps use the power of tiles.

To add custom images to the map editor to use as tiles, you must place .png files into Boring Man's 'images' folder. You can find this folder in most cases below:


or


You can also modify some visual attributes for Tile objects, which are good for creating different looking tiles without needing to make new images. For example on Flak Freightliner, the giant cargo crates are all 1 image file but set to different colors.

<Image of flak freightliner>

Setting the blend on 3 different instances of this sprite averted needing the map to load multiple, big cargo sprites which can hammer lower end GPUs, and also saved me time in needing to make new images. Tiles can also interact with logic, you can click Tiles in Logic Mode by holding down (Spacebar). See the Logic Gates section for more info.

<Image of tile right-click>

You can rotate tiles by pressing (CTRL+R) while selected + dragging them. You can hold down (ALT) for more precise rotation.

There are more attributes to change by right-clicking the Tile object. I have listed them below:

Set Color..
This will set the 'blending' color of the tile. What this means is it won't magically make palette swaps out of any image you want, but will 'overlay' a color over the whites of your image. Trying to use any ol' image with this feature will make it look darker and washed out in 99% of the cases.

But you can get a lot out of setting the color blend if you have properly gray scaled tiles, like mentioned in my Flak Freightliner example.

<Image of raw sprite>

The single cargo sprite being used is colored as a light grey.

Set Opacity..
This sets the visibility of your tile, with 100% Opacity being fully visible. This can be useful for making tiles more subtle against the background without needing to update it or make new tiles through your art editing software.

Set Size..
This can set the size of your tile, stretching or squishing it towards where your mouse is. This can be useful for making different shapes out a Tile, such as for grass/foliage, or mirroring a tile to face another direction.


Additionally, you can download the Tile Starter Pack by clicking the "Download Starter Pack" option at the top of the TILES tab. This will download a pack of premade tiles from my website, and automatically install them to the 'images' folder. The images are from existing stock maps, and you're not required to use them at all. If you want your map to stick out, I would recommend trying to make your own art.


When you add new images to your 'images' folder, Boring Editor will need to know that. You can tell Boring Editor to 'reload' the images folder to update any changes you make to the 'images' folder, such as adding or removing files. This function is performed automatically when Boring Editor starts, and when the Download Starter Pack function is used.

A new feature in Boring Man is the ability to add animated images to maps. Adding an animated image is almost the same process as adding static images, but you need to do some work on the image file you want to add before you can make it animated.

First, Boring Editor will only accept .png files, so .gif files will not work. It's dumb I know, but its just the nature of Game Maker at the moment. Instead of loading an animated GIF file, you will want to import a PNG file that is a "strip". Below you will see the tile image file for the animated bouncepad in Boring Man Fields 1:



Every frame is nicely aligned in a cell-like pattern. This is how you import animated images.

So what if you made or found a nice little GIF to use for your map, but you don't have it in strip-form? There are many ways you can convert a GIF into a strip, but I will show you one method to get you started. If you don't have a GIF file on hand, you can use this really stupid GIF.[i.imgur.com]

1. Get your GIF file and go to https://ezgif.com/gif-to-sprite/
   
   
2. Upload your GIF
   
   
3. When its finished uploading, you should be able to see some new settings
   
   
   
4. Checkbox "Stack horizontally" and make sure the output format is "PNG"
   
   
5. Click "Convert to sprite sheet"
   
   
6. Right-click the sprite sheet and click "Save As". You're done!

Doing the above to the le funny cat gif will give you this strip image below:



Great! Now that we have a strip image to work with, how do we import it into Boring Editor?

1. Place the strip image into the 'images' folder like any other image you import.
   
   
2. You will now need to rename the image. You only need to prefix the image file with "stripX_", with "X" being the number of frames the GIF/strip image is.
   
   
3. In this case with the cat GIF, the GIF is 4 frames long, so we can rename the strip image file to "strip4_dancingcat.png"
   
   
4. When you're done, return to Boring Editor and click "Reload Tiles" in the TILES tab.
   
   
5. You should now have the tile called "strip4_dancingcat.png". Place it on your map and look at at that jerk dance!! You did it!

<Gif of dancing cat in Boring Editor window here>

You can name your animated tile just about anything as long as it starts with "stripX_". The cat is dancing pretty fast, if you don't want that then you can adjust the animation speed by right-clicking the animated tile and using the "Anim. Speed" option.


At 100%, the animation speed is 60fps. The animation speed is delta-timed, meaning it will always play at the same speed at different FPS rates.

Hopefully sometime in the future you will be able to import GIF files themselves!

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