Beyond Enemy Lines (BEL) offers a simple to use ingame mission editor which is started directly out of the main menu. The Editor is easy to use and nearly selfexplaining, this guid will give you a short introduction and give some usefull hints for beginners.

The Mission Editor is in public Beta and there can be some bugs and issues or parts that are working not correct or limited. Please report all issues and suggestions you have to help making this Editor a valuable addition to Beyond Enemy Lines.

Movement: W A S D
Look: Mouse (while pressing the left or right mouse button)
Additional Camera Movement: Q / E to raise or lower the camera
Move Object: Arrow Keys
Raise/Lower Object: PageUp/PageDown
Delete Object: Delete Key


(1) Here you can increase or decrease the camera movement speed. A lower values is is better for working on small details while large values shouldbe used to travel fast across the level.

(2) This Propertie Panel appears when an object is in focus and allows the same object mainipulations as above mentioned with additional rotation options

To spawn an object you need to select the category of which object you would like to spawn. In the example above we want to spawn a Props-Object and selected it (1). After selecting the Props-Category a large scroll sction with Props-Objects appear right next to it. We select the green car (2) and it will automaticly appear on the location your 3D Courser is located (3).

Attention: The 3D-Cursor (3) is moving along a grid which makes placing objects in a row a lot easier. You can change the grid size within the Movement Grid Box (4) in the Propertie Panel.
If you move, raise or lower an object it will also move along the selected grid size.

Hint: If you are placing a large amount of objects in a row (for example a wall or fence) you should stick with the same grid size to make it easier. Recommended Grid sizes are (1, 5, 10, 25, 50, 100, 500, 1000). You are free to use any gridsize you like, grid sizes with float values (for example 5.2) are possible, but aligning other objects can get a lot harder.

To spawn a Player Start and Mission End Zone click on World Settings (1).


Click on Player Start (2) to place a player start point.
Click on Mission End Zone (3) to place a mission end zone.

The Player Start is where the player gets spawned on the start of a mission. If non is available the player might spawn under the map or high above the map and fall to it's death. The Mission End Zones ends a mission. If the player enters this zone and all mission objectives are completed (if any available), the mission is completed and the game will load the main menu.

The Vegetation System is currently in development and is subject to change.

Vegetation should be the last step on finishing a mission!

Vegetation is placed the same way as regular objects. Select the vegetation section (1) and place a single tree (2). You can move or rotate a tree like any other object in the editor. To create larger forests there are Forest Packs available (3) which spawns up to 5 or 25 regular trees on random locations within a given square.

Attention: A Forest Pack spawns instances of single trees and the entire pack can not be moved or rotated, only single trees. Once spawned you can see a outline purple box which represents a forest pack. You can delete it and it will instantly remove all it's spawned trees. Once a mission is saved and reloaded the box is no longer available and you need to remove every single tree on it's own. Place those forest packs only if you are nearly finished with the mission and think about locations and vegetation count.

There is currently no grass available. I'm still researching for a better solution for the Vegetation System as grass would be a overkill with the current system.

This is the first thing you should do before working on a mission

To change the Landscape you first need to select the World Settings (1).

Once the World Settings are selected, open the Landscape Settings (2) and selected your prefered Landscape (3). The Landscape will be changes on the fly and depeding on your system this could result in a short freeze or some longer loading times.

Once you are satisfied with your selection head back (4) to the main editor view.

Attention: If you change your landscape in the middle of the mission creation progress, all placed objects will not be removed! They are still present floating in the air above the landscape or invisible under the landscape and increase the amount of objects and can cause performance problems.

There is currently no way to manipulate the terrain in any way. New and more terrain typs will be added over the time.

Placing Mission Objectives is like placing other Objects.


Select the Mission Objects (1) and place the C4 Mission Target (2) in the level. Move it to the right spot and thats it. All Mission Objectives are set up automatically in the order you placed them.
You can not place more then 5 Mission Objectives, the 6th Objective is always the Extraction Zone (Mission End Zone).

Placing functional AI is a bit more difficult. Before we get started here are some requirements:

• An AI character needs a Waypoint to be valid
  
• Non Valid AI characters will not be saved and not placed in the actual game
  
• A Waypoint also needs to be valid
  
• A valid Waypoint is always a circle: a self referencing Waypoint A - A or a rout like A - B - C - A
  The last Waypoint has to always reference the first Waypoint as next Waypoint

Select the AI category (1) and place an AI Character (2) and two Waypoints (3) at different locations.
Focus the AI Character and setup the Weapon (4) he should use. Now focus the Waypoint the AI should walk to first. Remeber the exact name of the Waypoint (5), focus back on the AI Character and write the name of the Waypoint into the Waypoint Section (6).

Now focus the second Waypoint you placed and add the name of the first Waypoint (you the same you added to the Character) as Next Waypoint (7). Do the same with the first Waypoint and add the name of the second Waypoint as as Next Waypoint. For each Waypoint you can define a guard duration (8) in seconds. The AI as guarding at this waypoint the set amount of seconds in the rotation of arrival.

Loadout:

Select World Settings and then Loadout (1) and set the start amount of magazines for each weapon (2). Each weapon with a ammo value > 0 will be given to the player on mission start. Now select the Weapon the player should start the mission with (3). Make sure that the Start Weapon has also an ammo value > 0 otherwise it will not work.

Music:

Select World Settings (if not already selected) and then Music (4). Now Select a track for Stealth and Combat which should be played while gameplay. You can preview both tracks with the play/stop buttons right next to them.

To save a mission click on the Save Icon (1) and appropriate text for Title, Description and Author.
Those informations will be shown in the ingame menu (the Workshop has separate texts). Wenn everything is written, click on Save (2) and the misson will be saved.


To load a mission click on the Load Icon (3). On top of the loading panel is a box (4) showing all on the current system saved missions. Enter the Mission Name you want to load (5) and clock Load (6) to load it.

Hint: If you want to edit a mission of a friend, you can copy the mission into your Beyond Enemy Lines save folder. This mission will not be visible in the mission list (4) until you saved it on your system. But you can load it anyway buy writing the correct name into the selection box (5).

To preview a mission, click on the preview icon (1) and the game will load the mission for a playtest.

Attention: Save the mission before hitting preview or all unsaved progress will be lost. Also make sure to place a valid player start, otherwise you can spawn under the map or in the air and fall to your death.

The Editor has some content that will only be unlocked if you own the DLC Operation: Arctic Hawk.

If you do not own the DLC and want to place some DLC related content, it won't work. The button will show the tooltip (1) that the DLC is required to work.

However this limitation is for the Editor only. If a friend of you owns the DLC and creates a mission with DLC content, you can always play the mission without limitations.

How to upload your mission to the workshop is part of the Workshop Guid.