Hey, can I just say, I'm super excited that so many people are interested in learning to put some maps together?
I don't know, it just makes me happy to hear it.
It's a great thing and something I really wanted to see happening too. It's part of why I was so keen in getting everyone involved in the design of PM.
Happy to get together on TS3 to chat about mapping, I'm sure the more experienced mappers would join us too.
Basically, just try shit, find out it doesn't work, look up a tutorial on youtube/reddit, make it better. Repeat till you have a map. Literally nothing will work how you wanted the first time you test it, troubleshooting is 50% of the mapping experience bs SDK is buggy and weird.
SAVE REGULARLY. BACK UP EXTERNALLY TO YOUR COMPUTER. Trust me, you will lose enough hours of work through other stupid mistakes/bs valve bugs etc - don't lose your whole map. SAVE and backup every few hrs.
Mapping takes loads of time, for even things you previously thought insignificant. It's hard only because it takes time, effort and patience, but obv its also really fun.
Feel free to send me a message on steam if you have any questions, but a skilled googler is a skilled mapper.