Stuff required for this guide:
Contents:
Getting Started
Once you've installed the Gladiator you'll probably want to quickly get into a game yes?
Well here's a mini-guide to start your first deathmatch going.
Go to the Win95/98 'Start Menu' and click on the section labelled 'Run...'. This will launch the 'Run' dialog.
From here you can enter command lines to launch any program (including games such as Quake II) and it's from here that we'll get your first Gladiator game going.
With the 'Run' dialog loaded click the button labelled 'Browse...' and find your Quake II directory (probably C:\quake2\) and then find the file named quake2.exe inside that folder (it should have a green 'Q' icon') and double-click on that.
Now the text in the 'Run' dialog in the box next to the 'Open:' label should show the path to your quake2.exe (e.g. c:\quake2\quake2.exe). If you click the 'OK' button now Quake II will launch in single-player mode, using the standard Q2 code (not what we want).
So we need to add some text after the quake2.exe to tell Q2 to run in Gladiator bot mode and DeathMatch. Firstly add a space after quake2.exe and then add +set game gladiator after that. By doing this your telling Q2 to load the Gladiator code rather than the original Q2 code.
But we still need deathmatch running before any bot fragging can begin. So put a space after the +set game gladiator and the type in +deathmatch 1. And there you go if you run Q2 now you'll be running the Gladiator Bot code and be in deathmatch mode ready for some fragging.
There's one more step though, if you load Q2 with that command line then you'll be taken to the Q2 console rather than a map, so after the +deathmatch 1 add +map xxx where xxx is the name of a map (for simplicity put in q2dm1 one of iD's own deathmatch maps).
Now if you load that command line (click on 'OK') Quake2 will load up with the Gladiator code running, in deathmatch mode and will spawn you in the Q2DM1 map. All you need now are some bots to kill...
Adding Gladiator's is pretty simple thanks to the menu system, and to get to that bring down the Q2 console (using the ` key [next to 1 on your keyboard {usually}]) and type in menu, press enter and the Gladiator bot menu should load.
Push the console back up (using ` again) and take a look at the menu that should be in the center of your screen. You can navigate the menu using the arrow keys on your keyboard and select options using the enter key.
Select the 'Bots' option (at the top of the menu list) and that should take you to the next page of the menu. On here you'll see several options, but for now just highlight the 'Add Random' selection and press enter.
This will add in a random bot out of the 18 or so bot characters included with the Gladiator. You should see some text in the top left corner of your screen informing you that 'xxx has entered the game', (where xxx is the bot's name).
To confim this just press 'F1' or the key you have bound to the keyboard and you should see your own name plus another, which will be the bot's.
With the first bot in the game you can now press the Escape key to close the bot menu and begin to play your first Gladiator bot match. If you want to add more bots just go back to the menu using the steps above and add in a couple more.
There is a limit of four bots at the moment (on some maps the limit is only 1) and if you try to add more than that a message will be printed telling you that more bots cannot be added.
Gladiator Bot Menu
The Gladiator Bot Menu (accessed by the menu console command inside Q2) is split into several sections, all leading off the front page menu page.
The first listed selection is Bots, and selecting this will lead to a menu with several options, outlined below:
- Add Bot: This page will let you pick individual bots (instead of adding them randomly), by their name. Useful if you want to find easier or harder opponents instead of getting a 'picknmix' selection from your computer.
- Add Random: Want your CPU to select the bots for you instead? Use 'Add Random' and each time you select a random bot (selected from the Gladiator Bot characters) will be added.
- Remove Bot: This page will let you remove any bot in the game, just highlight whichever bot you want to remove and press enter. The bot will be disconnected from the game.
- Remove All: For whatever reason if you want to clear all bots out of your game then use this option and the bots will vanish just like magic (well almost).
The second selection on the main page is RA2. RA2 stands for Rocket Arena 2 a Quake2 mod that the Gladiator Bot has support for.
By selected RA2 you will taken to the RA2 section of the menu where you can set various options for playing Rocket Arena 2 with the bot (although it won't start a game for you).
The explanations of the various options on the RA2 menu are shown below:
- Bot Arena X: This menu item shows which arena inside a Rocket Arena 2 map a bot will be spawned into when they are spawned (preferably you want the bot spawned into the arena your in).
By pressing enter while Bot Arena X is highlighted it will change the arena from 1 up to 6 and the bot will be spawned into that arena.
- Below this are several options that list weapon names. By selecting any of these you can turn them on or off, which affects whether they will or will not be given to each RA2 player when they spawn in a map.
All weapons except RailGun and BFG are normally turned on but it's up to you really.
The final part of the menu is the Help selection. By using this some menu help will be given but if you've already read through this guide you won't need it. So there.
More Gladiator Features
As well as standard deathmatch the Gladiator Bot also features several more deathmatch variations that you can try:
Teamplay: The teamplay style supported by the Gladiator Bot is basically team based deathmatch. To turn it on you need to start a Quake2 server using the
Quake2 menus. Firstly load the Q2 menu and select Multiplayer. From here select 'Start Network Server' and ignoring most of the options move down to the 'Deathmatch Flags' option and press enter to select it.
You'll be taken to the Deathmatch Flags menu. On this menu are several settings that can be manipulated to affect how your deathmatch game is played. Head down to the 'Teamplay' setting and it should currently read 'disabled'. Using your left and right arrow keys you can cycle through the various teamplay settings.
What you want is 'By Model' to be shown. By having 'By Model' on it means that teams in teamplay will be determined by what model you are using (so it'll be male's against females or cyborgs etc.).
With 'By Model' selected as the Teamplay 'DMFlag' close the Q2 menu down (just repeatedly press 'escape' until you're back in Q2 proper) and launch the Q2 console (the ` key). Now to get teamplay working properly you need to reload the map you're on (or load a different one) so type in map xxx (where xxx is the name of the map you want to play) and press enter, which should load your map with teamplay working.
Now you need some bots. Go to the Bots menu and then to the Add Bot menu. What you want to do here is to add an even number of bots to both the teams you want to play. Firstly note down what sex you are playing as (either male, female or cyborg) and then once you know that add one bot that uses the model that you're using. This bot should now be on your team and won't kill you (on purpose anyway).
If you want to test that out quit out of those menus and go find the bot in the level. If he/she/it doesn't try to attack you then they're on your team.
Go back to the Add Bot menu and add in two bots that use the same model as each other but not the same as you do (so if you were male then add in two female bots). After these two are loaded you should have two teams of two (commonly referred to as a 2on2 or 2v2 match) and you can start playing.
You get the standard one frag for killing an enemy team member and you also lose one frag if you kill your team mate (just as you do if you kill yourself). Now go play teamplay.
CTF: Before you start to play Gladiator CTF you need to have the CTF client files (specifically the 'pak0.pak' in your CTF directory) either in your Gladiator directory or
in your 'baseq2' directory (although you'll need to rename it if you move it here so you don't overwrite another 'pak' file). Once you've done either of these measures then you'll be able to launch Gladiator CTF.
To do this amend your Gladiator command line, adding in +set ctf 1 (so it will now look similar to: c:\quake2\quake2.exe +set game Gladiator +deatmatch 1 +set ctf 1).
With this done you can launch Q2 and prepare for some CTF.
Once you've selected a CTF map to play and launched it, join a team and all you need to do now is to add some bots using the menus (as detailed above). The bots will automatically assign themselves to each team so that teams are even or as close to even as possible.
Now just play on.
If you don't have the Q2CTF files you can get them from this link. For a lot of information and guides etc. on the Q2CTF mod your best
place to go is Captured.Com which is dedicated to CTF.
Rocket Arena 2: Rocket Arena 2 is a Q2 modification that focuses on 1-on-1 Deathmatch in specialised arenas (several of which are contained in each RA2 map). If you want to play RA2 with the Gladiator you will need to copy/move both of the RA2 pak files into either your 'gladiator' directory or
baseq2 directory inside your Quake2 folder (renaming them if needed so you don't overwrite any other .pak files. pak's can be named pak0 - pak9 for your information) so Q2 can find them when loading from the 'gladiator' directory.
The Gladiator features basic RA2 support and here's how to get it working: Firstly you'll need to get the actual RA2 mode running.
To do this add set rocketarena 1 to your command line (see above) so that it should read something like c:quake2\quake2.exe +set game gladiator +deathmatch 1 +set rocketarena 1.
Now load Q2.
Once in Q2 you should be looking at the console, and now you need to load one of the RA2 maps. For simplicity we'll load ra2map1, so do that and let Q2 spawn you into the map. You'll be in the RA2 central area, from which you can reach each separate arena in the map.
But with the Gladiator it is easier to bring down the console and type in toarena X where X is the arena you want to go to. Again for simplicity select 1 as the arena and you should move into that arena. Now to get the bot(s) sorted.
Before you add bots using the Gladiator Bot Menu you need to set the bot(s) to spawn in a particular arena. To do this you use the console command setarena X, where X should be the arena you are located in (in this case 1). Alternitavely you can use the Gladiator menu to set the arena, by going into the RA2 section.
Either way once you've set the arena you can spawn some bots the normal way.
To start the Rocket Arena match bring down the console again and type mstart and both you and the first bot in line will spawn in the arena ready for the match to begin. After a match has ended (i.e. one of the two competitors is dead) you need to type mstart again to start another match.
If during a match you want to stop type mstop.
If you want to set some of the weapon options for RA2 consult the Gladiator Bot Menu section above, which will tell you how to do it.
Should you at any point wish to leave one arena and move to another just use toarena X but remember to remove the bots and then reset the setarena X to your new arena before spawning them again.
To get more info on RA2 the mod and download the client files for the mod (which contain the RA2 maps) go to http://www.planetquake.com/arena.
WinBSPC and Compiling .AAS Files
To play maps with the Gladiator bot you need to create .aas files which provide the bot with information for navigating the map and such (but as MrElusive loves to point out they aren't waypoint files).
There are two ways you can create .AAS files. You can load up a map while running the Gladiator and spawn a bot. Before the bot spawns the whole .AAS file will have to be created.
This is time consuming and definitely inferior to the second option, which is too use WinBSPC, a program included with the Gladiator that (among other things) allows you to create (it's really a conversion) .AAS files quicker than option one and adds more flexibility to how you do it.
Getting started with WinBSPC is easy, all you do is load the program (find it in your Gladiator directory) and from the program's main menu select the Convert... menu option.
Now you are ready to find some maps to convert. At first you'll probably want to convert the iD Quake II maps so to do this use the file dialog that should've popped up (when you clicked on Convert...) to find the pak1.pak file in the baseq2 directory (inside your Q2 folder).
Once you've found that click on it and select the OK button.
You'll now be presented with a form that tells you what compiled maps (.bsp files) were found in the pak file you selected. The maps listed should be Q2DM1 - 8.
If the first time you've used WinBSPC you'll want to convert all of the bsp's so click on Select All then click on the OK button. One the next form you want to make sure that Convert To is set to AAS the number of threads is set to 1 (with no verbose & no csg unchecked)
and all of the MAP options are uncheked. For the output folder select a directory from the pulldown list (if it matches your Gladiator folder) or use the Browse... button to find it yourself.
The process for converting the files into .AAS (don't worry it won't affect the original files) will now begin and can take some time so go eat your dinner, shampoo the cat or wax polish your Granny while your waiting.
Once the conversion is done go check that there are some files with the .aas extension in your Gladiator directory. If they aren't make sure there were no errors during the conversion process (check the black panel in WinBSPC which tells you what the program is/was currently doing) and that
you didn't output the files into the wrong directory (if you did just move them into your Gladiator directory).
You're still not totally done, but there's only one small thing left. Launch Q2 (in Gladiator mode) and go to one of the maps you just created an .AAS file for. Now add a Gladiator and in the top left corner of the screen information should be printed about 'storing reachability' and a % marker should tick up from 0% - 100%.
This is only done the first time you use the .AAS file with a bot, after that it won't happen again. That's it, you can now go convert some more maps if you want...
There is one other way to compile .AAS files, which is don't, let someone else do it for you. Currently there is only one site - Fred's Q2RFD - that offers pre-compiled .AAS files for you to download (the 'storing reachability' etc. has also been done for you)
so if you have a low power PC or just don't want to create the files there should be a nice collection for you there. Once you've downloaded the .AAS' you want, just unzip them into your Gladiator directory so they will end up in the same place as any .AAS files you've compiled yourself.
Full Gladiator Command List
OK, here are all the console commands and console variables that can be used with the Gladiator (and descriptions of what they do).
Console Commands:
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addbot |botlib| |name| |skin| |charfile| |charname|*
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This adds one bot.
|botlib| - the name of the bot library
|name| - name of the bot
|skin| - skin used by the bot
|charfile| - file with the bot character
|charname| - name of the character
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autocam
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Enters Automatic Camera mode
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cyclecam
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Cycle's the camera through each player and bot in the game.
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menu*
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Loads the Gladiator Bot Menu for easy configuration and bot spawning
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mstart
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Starts an RA2 map in Rocket Arena 2 match
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mstop
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The opposite of mstart.
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observer
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Turns on|off observer mode
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observerhelp
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If you need help with the observer mode use this command
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removebot |name|*
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Removes the specified bot.
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setarena X
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Sets the arena for a bot to spawn in to whatever number X is (1-6) in RA2 mode
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setcam |name|
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Sets the camera to the specified bot/player.
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teamaccompany |name|
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In teamplay asks the bot specified by |name| to group up with you.
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teamhelp |name|
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In teamplay asks the bot specified by |name| to help you out
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toarena X
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Moves the player to the arena number specified by X (1-6) in RA2 mode.
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*Only administrator's (i.e. the player running the server [if playing on your own PC you're the administrator]) can use these commands with success.
NB: The addbot & removebot commands can only be used on dedicated servers, and need to be preceded by an sv (e.g. sv addbot).
Console Variables:
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autolaunchbspc (0/1)
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Enables/Disables the automatic launching of WinBSPC to create .AAS files.
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botfile |filename|
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Specifies the file that contains the bot list to be used in the Add Bot menu.
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ctf (0/1)
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Enable or disable Capture the Flag mode.
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mstart_auto (0/1)
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Enables/Disables auto restarting of matches in RA2 (instead of repeatedly having to type mstart)
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notchat (0/1)
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Enables/Disables bot chatting
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noitems (0/1)
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Specifies whether items should be available or not available in RA2
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ra (0/1)
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Enables or disables RA2 mode.
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rogue (0/1)
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Turns on|off the game mode letting you play using the Rogue QII mission pack
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serveronlybotcmds (0/1)
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Specifies whether bot commands (such as addbot) can be used on the server
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xatrix (0/1)
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Turns on|off the game mode letting you play using the Xatrix mission pack code.
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NB: For some of these variables you may need to use set in front of them (e.g. set ctf 1).
And that's the Gladiator guide, hopefully it's been of some use to you. If you're still having problems with the bot check out the Gladiator Bot site (particularly their web board, useful for asking questions)
or if you want, contact me with details of the problem your having.
cube
