TrenchBroom Setup Guide NZP Mapping

This guide assumes basic mapping knowledge.
Check this thread if you haven't already: https://nzportable.forumotion.com/t1986-nzp-mapping-guide
Also ask for help or show off your creations in the NZP Discord: https://discord.gg/6GBGf4N
Note: This guide is current as of the 29th March 2023.


Introduction

So what the hell is TrenchBroom and why am I telling you to use it instead of JACK Hammer?
Simple, TrenchBroom is so much easier and intuitive to work with, especially for level geometry.
It flat out makes JACK Hammer look like cavemen tools.

If that tickles your interests (or you don't believe me and want to see proof),
check out this excellent tutorial playlist which will get you familiar with the tools:



Here's a screenshot of what the editor looks like:


As you can see, it's centred around the 3D view (and i'm just messing around with the clip tool here).


Getting Started

So obviously you need to download the latest version of NZP:

https://github.com/nzp-team/nzportable/releases/tag/nightly

But what else? Well for starters, download TrenchBroom:

https://github.com/TrenchBroom/TrenchBroom/releases

You'll also want to use this custom profile made for NZP which contains the necessary entity definitions as well as some nice tweaks:

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1IiP5jQsbiUojh43-XY5GwqrOh4DntRVs/view

Note: You can find the latest FGD file here for when new entities (e.g. perks or weapons) get added:

https://github.com/nzp-team/assets/blob/main/source/maps/fgd/tb-nzp.fgd

Next, you'll need to be able to actually compile the map into something (vaguely) playable so grab them here:

https://gamebanana.com/tools/5391

Finally, you'll be wanting some textures to decorate your map (unless you like seeing pink+black squares everywhere).
NZP uses the wad3 format like half life 1 and counter strike 1.6, so you can probably grab them online.
Alternatively, you could make them yourself using Wally, though that'd be outside the scope of this tutorial.

If you need something to get you started though, there's some wads in the NZP Assets Repository here:

https://github.com/nzp-team/assets/tree/main/source/textures/wad

TrenchBroom Configuration

I'd recommend you keep all this crap organised in a separate folder to make things easier to find later on.
Make a folder called "NZP" or whatever you feel like, then extract the TrenchBroom zip to a new folder
inside your mapping folder using a program like 7zip or WinRAR (if you like perpetually rejecting licence pop-ups).
Next, extract the downloaded profile and paste it into the games folder within TrenchBroom like so:



Afterwards, extract the tools folder from the ZHLT zip file.
Now go into the TrenchBroom folder and run "TrenchBroom.exe" (no jumpscares I swear).
Press "New map..." which will greet you with a list of games:



You'll need to press "Open preferences..." which will open up the settings menu.
Select the NZP profile and fill in the fields so it looks something like this:



The "Game path" is the folder containing the NZP game EXE.
As for the compilation tools, they correspond to the EXE files found within the tools folder you extracted from the ZHLT zip.
Obviously these paths will vary depending on where you extracted your stuff and what you named the folders (since your name probably isn't Abhid).

Once you've done that, hit OK at the bottom and then select the NZP profile in the "Select Game" menu and hit OK. You'll then be greeted with the editor:

Compiling

Okay, so you've watched the tutorial playlist and made a map layout, but how do you compile the damn thing?
Well, click "Run" in the menu bar ar the top and press "Compile Map...".
The compile window will appear and the list of compile profiles will be blank.

To set up a compile profile, press the + symbol at the bottom of the profile list.
Then, name your profile and press the + symbol at the bottom of the details tab and click "Export Map".
This will ensure your map is saved at the beginning of the compile process.
Afterwards, press the + again and this time, select "Run Tool".
Do this 4 times then fill in the fields like so:


The "-nowadtextures" option includes the textures with the compiled map so you won't need to supply the wad files with the map.
The "-full" and "-extra" options are usually used for the final compile before release and can be omitted during development.

Now that your profile is set up, hit "Compile" at the bottom of the window and your map will be compiled.
To test it in-game, hit "Launch..." and press the "Configure engines..." button.
Then, create a new profile and click the three dots next to the "Path" field and select the NZP EXE file like so:



Make sure to add the launch parameters so your map loads automatically:

Code:

-console -dev +map ${MAP_BASE_NAME}

Now you can hit launch and test your map!

As a little bonus, you can add a task at the end of the compile that runs the game automatically:



Hopefully this tutorial helped the three of you that still lurk here.
If any errors pop up or you need help in general, hit us up at the discord.

FIN

Some quick updates here:

You can watch an older version of this guide on Youtube below, though it refers to the old repo so things are named slightly differently there.



Additionally, TrenchBroom itself has received a number of updates including dynamic models so we can now see our custom props and perk models.