finally stuck on something

[TheJamsh]

Okay, before i say this, i DONT want to use .dll's to power this feature, so please dont suggest them.

okay, its for a new race. all this races vehicles come down via pods/capsules from an orbiting space craft (which you order via a transmitter on the ground). The pods come down from the sky, crash into the ground, explode and leave the object you ordered behind under youre control

i need to find a way to do this, as its kind of essential for the mod... ive tried doing it in the following ways:

1) Armoury builds wingman class that can only drop towards ground, this then explodes when it hit the ground, and i use scrap class to make some object spawns, which leave behind the ship i want. Trouble is, its piloted, and on team 0. That doesnt work... if you can kill the pilot id like to know how...

2) Recycler builds spraybuilding, which flies up into sky (invisible), then creates a spraybomb, spray bomb hits ground and leaves behind vehicle. The trouble with this one is, not only does the spraybomb not explode when it hits the ground, but the vehicle is on my team, manned, yet i cant control it. (doesnt show up in group panel, even with specific ODF entries)

I didn't really want to consult the boards as this idea was designed to be in Serenesis only, but needs must as the devil drives. If anyone does know how i can get this to work using ODF magic only, please let me know.

[bigbadbogie]

As far as I can tell, neither of those will work the way you want without dll.

There could be other ways though... not sure.

[Nielk1]

Sounds pretty DLL required.

[TheJamsh]

yeh. i think ive tried everything going. it seems objects only get added to youre group bar when they are 'built' not spawned. shame but never mind...

means i have to add even more to all my .dll's now if i want it to be a race thing... gah. is there any limit in C++ as to how much code there can be?

[Nielk1]

It would seem not since the game runs at an exact number of turns per second. A CPU can blow way past the TPS of BZ2 (even in high TPS mode) and thus, a ton of code can fit into the DLL's execute loop since it could likely be executed well before the next turn. In fact, I think it was a default of 15 TPS, so you can do a number of operations per turn equal too the (# of GHZ) / (15 TPS). That is a lot of operations, even though you have to subtract all those already used by BZ2's other parts.

[Avatar]

From everything I've found there's no way to create a ship from a weapon that will automatically pop into your function keys for control.  IF they even end up on your team they can't be controlled, although the reticule will light up without doing anything.

Nope, I'm afraid you're going to have to resort to DLL for this, although it's a very simple addition to "addobject".  In the scriptor it's very simple, and in any case it can be limited to just your race, or a list of vehicles, or other limiting factors.

-Av-

[TheJamsh]

Well the issue is, ive got to squeeze that function in (for at least 30-40 vehicles because im including tracked deployables) which are ordered via separate pods from the orbiting carrier.

Ive got to add in NK1's attacher code for numerous different ships, and varying quantities of each ship (but maybe it only has to go in once??)

theres also some map-specific things in some instant matches, portals, weapon drops etc. Theres plenty of other things im having to resort to .dll for also. Not to mention im trying to get AI control very similar to G66 2.0 for ten different races, with more options and CPU recy variants... going to be tough, and a long slog at that.

I cant program in C++, but when someone has the time i can go through what i want with them and sort stuff out. I guess if im trying to reach the engines limits i was going to have to involve .dll control at some point...