can a flag be a unit and be destructible? - making game flags destructible

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Slinx
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Post by Slinx »

Two questions:

Can a flag be destructible?


Also could I substitute a peasant/any unit/animal as a flag; but with huge life and be destructible?
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haravikk
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Post by haravikk »

Unfortunately not =(

A flag HAS to be scenery, so no making one a unit.
A ball CANNOT be carried, so no giving a ball to a unit, thus making it a moving flag.

I'm uncertain about it being destructable, I believe you can quite happily destroy them if you wish, but I don't recall ever testing to see what happens. It's possible that the flag will still 'exist' where it was destroyed, ie if someone can find where it died, it will still become theirs. If that makes sense to you?
In essence you'd have an invisible flag where the original died.
Also, if it does remove flags correctly when destroyed; I doubt the net-code was designed to factor in destructable flags/balls, so chances are doing so without at least one indestructable object could be risking the game not knowing when to end (becoming last-man standing I suppose).

So for the unit question, the answer is definitely no. The alternative would be adding a ball, and using explosions to push it around (e.g have an invisible, ambient unit move to the ball's position then trigger an explosion to push it). Not very precise, but it can provide an interesting game-play element.
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mauglir
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Post by mauglir »

Actually, I remember an old dorf riot map that Head made where you could pick up a beach ball and carry it around, and while you were carrying the ball, you earned KOTH time.

Not exactly sure how he did this, but maybe he palced a KOTH flag in the extreme corner of the map on impassable terrain and surrournded it with one invisible and uncontrollable unit from each team. Then, run some of TUNI or GEOM script to see if any team is carrying the beach ball and if true, then the appropriate unit near the flag would become visible and "capture" the KOTH flag.

This just a guess. It's been ages since I played that map, and I doubt I still have it. It might be on the idiotcollective hotline server, though (I think Head made that map as his "application" to join the Idiot Mapmaking Collective).




Edited By mauglir on 1132763443
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Sam The Butcher
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Post by Sam The Butcher »

One way you may be able to do it is. Make a copy of the spike poles (in Fear they are in monsters folder 02 cell post) the ones from Salvation holding the prisoners. Those ARE units/monsters. Replace the collections with the flags collections(you may have to use a collection editor). Set in the correct sequences. That may work.
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Slinx
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Post by Slinx »

All right, thanks.


Guess my aim was more to break up the tedium of camping when a team has more balls/flags or got them with a faster time, ie. Trow terries. (Flag rally and Bop excluded)

This way armies would be required to move around (especially to parts of the map rarely used or would even be forced to attack)if flag moved independently of player actions into different parts of the map or even walked right into enemy territory.
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haravikk
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Post by haravikk »

I'd go with the explosion version then if you're fairly okay with scripting. For that aim you could probably achieve the correct result with a single fairly large explosion to catapult a ball to another part of the map, a la wight/satchel pile. Just do that every few minutes (make sure the explosion doesn't hurt units though! Unless you want it to be that crazy ;)

Sam, unfortunately those units are actually scenery on the maps on which they are used as flags. It's possible to make scenery that has the same sequences as a unit, and also the same death projectile group, so it looks just like a unit (you can even colour it using a collection reference so they aren't oddly coloured).
However, they're still basically scenery, so no moving =(

The only time a flag/ball changes from scenery to anything else is in the case of balls, which become projectiles when they suffer damage, and become scenery again when they stop moving.
In my experiments I attempted to create balls that could be picked up, so to contest it you'd have to get the unit carrying it and kill them to take it for yourself.

However in my tests, the ball when picked up simply ceases to exist, it disappears from the map entirely, and when dropped/thrown, the unit that was 'carrying' it simply tosses a piece of smoke, as if it had never picked up the ball at all.
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Point
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Post by Point »

i think the B&G flags are monsters... they change from rebel to union i believe... scenery flags dont animate but monsters might...
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Post by haravikk »

I can't examine the B&G flags atm, but the think you need to consider when thinking about this is: "Do they move around the map?"

I'm thinking that chances are the B&G flags are just the same as ordinary flags but LOOK like units (ie use the same sequences, possibly with animation, though they'll stay in the same place at all times). The changing side would be just ordinary flag colouring, like how a normal flag changes to your team colour.
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Zeph
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Post by Zeph »

Mauglir is right this is how i did it. Hide a flag and use some scripts to actvate units around it. Thats how I did it with my Dorf Riot thingy
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Baak
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Post by Baak »

Hey Zeph - any chance we could download that map to check out how you did it? I'd like to include something along these lines in a map I'm making and would be more than happy to give you appropriate credit. :)

Also something you guys might want to try right out-of-the-box to change the nature of ball games on just about *any* map is one of the OoH Game Conversion Plugin sets:

* [color=#ff6600"]My "Balls o' Fun"
, which includes a Wacky Ball that changes the way any ball game plays (it works on all ball games and even modifies WWII, ADT, Wild West, Chimera). Get it from the OoH Downloads page

* [color=#ff6600"]My "Koth Flipper"[/color], which converts KoH Flags to KoH Balls and vice versa - also works for WWII, ADT, Worlds Collide, Chimera. Get it from the OoH Downloads page

* [color=#ff6600"]Vinylrake's "Balls o' Death"[/color], which includes some seriously awesome ball conversions including Cloudkill, Wight balls - heck there are *15* different balls in this set!! These can cause damage/death to players moving or near balls, which changes everything! Get it from VR's Myth Files page

All of these Game Conversion Plugins make the various games play very differently. For KoH Ball games you can combine my KotH Flipper with the Wacky Ball to get a Wacky KoH Ball on *any* map that normally uses a KoH Flag!

You can't just run away with the balls anymore! :D[/color]
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Post by vinylrake »

haravikk wrote:Unfortunately not =(

A flag HAS to be scenery, so no making one a unit.
A ball CANNOT be carried, so no giving a ball to a unit, thus making it a moving flag.

In working on the aforementioned Balls-o-det plugins I accidently created a STB ball that ghols can pick up and carry. I think it was related to the scenery item promoting to projectile on detonation relationship mb? [It was an accident so I don't remember the details]

It was kind of a nifty idea, but not very useable because as soon as it got picked up it dissapeared from the overhead map.
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Post by vinylrake »

haravikk wrote:I'd go with the explosion version then if you're fairly okay with scripting. For that aim you could probably achieve the correct result with a single fairly large explosion to catapult a ball to another part of the map, a la wight/satchel pile.

If you want this effect, try out the "Wight Bouncy" net ball from the Balls o' Det set of netballs.

It isn't based on time elapsed, but occassionally when the wight bouncy net ball is moved it explodes in a series of wight blasts that can send the ball sailing.

It definitely prevents camping unless you camp where the ball starts because if you move the ball much you WILL take casualties. If you clump around the ball to defend all it takes is one rogue unit to bump the ball or an arrow hitting it to wipe out most of your army.
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haravikk
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Post by haravikk »

vinylrake wrote:In working on the aforementioned Balls-o-det plugins I accidently created a STB ball that ghols can pick up and carry. I think it was related to the scenery item promoting to projectile on detonation relationship mb? [It was an accident so I don't remember the details]

It was kind of a nifty idea, but not very useable because as soon as it got picked up it dissapeared from the overhead map.
Yeah I know about that one, discovered it trying to achieve exactly what our thread creator wanted =)
Probably is that once the ball is gone, it never comes back, if you try to drop it or throw it it just turns into a puff of smoke, as if the unit had picked up the ball's contrail (masonry dust) instead of the ball, yet the ball quite clearly was taken.
Could be used with an odd unit that can "eat" balls (that sounds SO wrong) which you have to try and keep away from you or else you lose an advantage. So long as you had at least one indestructable flag it would still be a playable game-type.
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