> For the complete documentation index, see [llms.txt](https://docs.rainmad.com/llms.txt). Markdown versions of documentation pages are available by appending `.md` to page URLs; this page is available as [Markdown](https://docs.rainmad.com/resources/map-editor-place-anything/using-the-editor.md). # Using the Editor A session opens on a free camera with the prop picker along the bottom and a key bar across the top. The bar always says what the keys do right now, including rebound ones, so this page is a map of the parts rather than a list to memorise. ## Getting Around | | | | ---------------- | --------------------------------------------------------------- | | **WASD** | fly. Hold **Shift** to fly faster | | **Space / Ctrl** | up and down | | **Right mouse** | hold to fly and look, aiming at the middle of the screen | | **Alt** | hand the mouse to the camera, or take it back for the cursor | | **Mouse wheel** | fly speed | | **F7** | step out and walk what you have built. Press again to come back | | **Escape** | closes what is open: a list, then a tool, then the session | The cursor and the camera share the mouse. While the cursor is up you click panels and tiles; the game never sees those clicks. ## Placing One Prop Pick a tile and the prop is in your hand, seated on whatever is under the crosshair. | | | | ----------------- | ----------------------------------- | | **Left click** | put it down | | **Shift + click** | put it down and keep a copy in hand | | **Q / E** | turn it | | **F** | drop it on the ground | | **Backspace** | put it back | | **F6** | reopen the picker for another | The prop sits on the surface under the aim, tilted to it when the surface isn't flat. What was placed is selected, so the handles are already on it. ## Moving What Is Placed Click a prop to select it. **Shift-click** adds to the selection; the **Box** tool drags a rectangle over several. | | | | ----------------- | -------------------------------- | | **Handles** | drag to move | | **R** | move handles or turn handles | | **G** | world axes or the prop's own | | **F** | drop it on the ground | | **H** | bring it to the crosshair | | **Shift + click** | add to the selection | | **Backspace** | let go of it | | **C** | duplicate | | **Delete** | delete. More than one asks first | | **B** | undo. **Shift + B** redo | The panel on the right has the numbers: typed position and rotation, tint, collision, and the grid and snap switches. Snapping is two things: a grid the button walks through, and edge snapping that pulls a dragged prop flush against its neighbour. ## More Than One at a Time Three tools take from a pool rather than your hand. Arm one, then pick props from the grid: they go into the pool instead of into your hand, and you can add several. **Scatter** drops copies while the button is held. Circle sets how wide, speed how many a second, and there's a minimum gap so nothing lands inside its neighbour. It can lean props with the ground. **Fill area** takes clicks on the ground as corners, paints the shape as you go, and covers what they enclose when you press **Fill it**. **Along a line** takes clicks as a route and lays props down it when you press **Lay them**: a fence, a row of lamp posts, cones down a closed road. Each one faces along the route, plus whatever turn you set. All three read the same **Turn** control, which is the offset added to what they work out. A fence panel built across its own heading is corrected once for the whole run. ## The Map's Own Props Switch **World objects** on and clicks reach the map itself. What is under the pointer is boxed before you click it, in its own colour, so a click never lands on a surprise. Three things can be done with a piece of map: * **Hide** it. Gone for everybody the layout is stood up for, and it travels with the layout. * **Replace with prop.** A hide plus a copy of the same model in the same place, which you can then move, turn, tint or throw away. The game gives nobody a handle on its own scenery, so this is what "moving a wall" means. * **Look at it** in the viewer. Not everything can be copied. Most walls, floors and kerbs have no name in any catalogue, and nothing can spawn a copy of a nameless archetype, and the panel says which case it is. The **Hidden map props** list puts anything back, one at a time or all of them. ## Lights The **Light** tool puts one where you point. Its panel sets shape (point or spot), colour, range, brightness, cone and edge for a spot, and shadows. {% hint style="info" %} A light is a native call every frame, not an object. It exists while a layout is active and this resource is running. No map file can carry one. The same is true of hidden map pieces, a prop's collision switch and the colour of a light inside a drawable. The editor tags all four **Runtime**, and a session can be told not to offer them at all. {% endhint %} ## Groups Select several props and **Create group**: they move, turn, duplicate and delete as one thing, and the group's name travels with the layout. The **Placed props** list is where groups are renamed, reordered and taken apart. ## Session Settings The last button on the tool strip. What is in here is decided once and then left alone: | Row | What | | ------------------ | ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ | | **Reach** | the boundary, as a radius from a middle. Widen it, switch it off, or type the middle | | **Follows** | whether the boundary walks with what you place | | **Outline** | whether the boundary is drawn. Your screen only; the rule holds either way | | **Runtime** | whether the four things a map file cannot carry are offered at all | | **Others** | whether the other people in the session are drawn where they are working | | **Time / Weather** | held for everybody in the session. Two in the morning under a clear sky is what a shell opens at | | **World** | a routing bucket of the session's own, and whether there is any traffic in it | | **People** | who is in it, invitations, and who may change things | ## Building with Somebody Invite from the session settings. Anybody connected can be asked, permission or not, since the invitation is yours to give. They get a card with your name and the command to answer with, and they arrive in a session of their own holding your rows: every tool, their own undo, and an id range that can't collide with yours. Two roles. An **editor** can place, move and delete. A **viewer** watches and can't change anything. The host can change either mid-session, or remove somebody: their copy of the map goes with them and whatever they placed stays. The layout is the host's. Nothing a guest does saves it, and closing their window is leaving. ## Finishing **Done** asks what to call the layout, or hands the rows to whoever opened the session. See [Layouts](/resources/map-editor-place-anything/layouts.md) and [Exports](/resources/map-editor-place-anything/exports.md). **Export** on the same screen writes the build out in any of five shapes; see Import & Export. Cancel throws the session away, and asks first if there's anything to throw.