Is it possible to "activate" a trigger ladder? Or does it have to be 'available' at all times? 

you have actually use a func_rotate_train to hack in a ladder that becomes activated.

i'm going to assume you're making a ladder that starts in a retracted position and then through a button extends so the player can use.

first build your ladder and turn it into a func_movewall.
now create your func_ladder brush.

give both those entities the same targetname.

now create a func_rotate_train and set the target to match the movewall and ladder. the func_ladder will move in tandem with the func_movewall. 

you have actually use a func_rotate_train
you can actually use a func_rotate_train

i neglected the mention (although it's implied): make sure to tick the "visible" flag on your func_movewall or else your ladder model is invisible. :P 

A full system for locking and unlocking entities is something I wrote some test code for, right after the last version of Quoth got released. So it's something yet to be incorporated.

If you only need the ladder initially disabled, you can safely use the info_notnull hack. Give your ladder a classnameof info_notnull (as a brush entity) a targetname, and then set

"use" "trigger_ladder"

On firing the targetname event, the entity should spawn up. You can then killtarget it to remove it. By duplicating the ladder entity with different targetnames you could do it a finite number of times(if you were careful). Being able to switch it on and off any number of times is not yet possible, but it will be! 

Ah, that's a clever trick Necros! Yeah, the hipnotic rotating entities allow you to move triggers as attachments. One small warning - the trigger_ladder has an associated "outwards" vector to help push the player onto the ledge above/away from the ladder when they jump off. This does not adjust for the rotation of the entity, so make sure the vector is correct in the final position. Also, don't get tempted to allow players to hang on while it moves! I suspect bad things will happen... 

Necros: I think I have handle that.

Preach: that vector shit IS something I'll probably have to keep in mind - thanks! 

Just out of curiosity, is there any easy way to get a key to activate something other than a door in Quake? 

(without using any hacks, which Im sure other mappers here will be able to tell you about) you can make a door target another item. So you could make a door behave like a button by setting the sounds and directions so it moves like a button, but when you finally get the key you need to open the door, you touch the door and the door moves like a button would and triggers something else. I did this in starkmon IIRC :) 

Just give it a target - everything with that targetname will be activated. 

The question is a bit unclear - you want a key to activate lifts, trains, or whatever?

Do like Ricky says for standard Quake. Use a door that looks like a button.

The clean solution would be to have something like RemakeQuake's item_key/trigger_lock combination, where the lock can be everything. If you're ready to use your own progs.dat, you can rip this stuff from the RMQ source. 

I agree, I wasn't too clear.

What I actually want to do is activate some rising steps (which are really 6 individual doors) a few seconds after the actual keyed door is opened.

I may have been doing something wrong, but I didn't have any luck making a relay the target of the keyed door. I'll go back and try that again.

I'm trying to keep it simple because I'm at the 256 model limit. 

Have the key door target the first stair, but set "delay" to about 3.

Have the first stair target the second, the second the third, and so on, setting "delay" on each stair to 0.5 seconds or so.

Just off the top of my head. Shoot me if I'm wrong. 

Delay doesn't work on doors like it does on triggers. A func_door entity always fires its target immediately. You can either use different speed values for each step, stagger some trigger_relays or add a "use" "multi_trigger" field and corresponding delay values to each step/door. 

Argh, then it's a RMQ thing again. Oh well. It gets confusing.

Listen to negke. 

Why not trigger all the steps at the same time and give them all the same speed? They're all different heights so will stop moving at different times anyway - resulting in a choral sound effect. 

Sometimes the most obvious solution is the hardest one to find... 

I only know because I'm using one in a current map. 

lol. 

I put a keyed door on the floor. It has the lip set so it doesn't actually move. Its right below what was the original keyed door. It's targeted to a trigger_relay and the original keyed door, both named "tryagain". The relay has a delay of 3 seconds and targets the six rising steps.

This works okay. It's not exactly the effect I wanted but I can fool with it from here.

Funny thing, I had the keyed door inset in the floor and it wouldn't get triggered. There were no other brushes overlapping it or anything, it was just like a piece of the floor. I had to move it above the floor to get it to work. I'll have to try that again because I just remembered I also changed it's angle from 0 to "up". Maybe that had something to do with it. 

While testing my level I 've come up to an odd point of setting the skill level.

I counted all monsters and took their health count together. Then I counted all ammunition and tried a relation with their availabillity to match the health count.
But as the TE_DAMAGE of all weapons differs this isn't the right way to handle.

I can count the ogres and enforcers to reclaim their rockets and cells, but as they are also gibbable this is only temperary.

Is there an easier way to gain the outcome? 

Use monstercount / (pi*thumb), then substract the release date.

Or just play the map and add enough items so that you can get through smoothly. Then declare this as Hard and scale down the difficulty settings from there. Then see how the testers do. 

You have to take into factor the players level of accuracy. According to teh games I play, my accuracy = 20-40%. So it is meaningless.

Always just play, play, and play again. Then get l00ts if testing done. :D 

Well I played rather several times only the hard and nightmare are the worst.
So I thought if I

TE_DAMAGE * ammucount = all monsters health + random

could compare it mathly. 

There's too many variables to make an equation of it. Unless you want to get alot more complex than 4 variables.

What negke says works :) 

Wasn't quite sure where to put this :P

TF2maps has finished their TF2 swamp theme pack that contains new models/textures/blah which you can download and use for free, its very high quality stuff!

http://swamp.tf2maps.net/