Apache Helo Vehicle Beta Test!

[Kangus]

well, one idea with the rotors all breaking off at once is that the helicopter gets pushed away from whatever it hit when one breaks... another alternative would be to put in a delay after a blade breaks off before another one can... a third would be to scrap it and just only do the cool stuff with the rear rotor...

 

[EvilDrWong]

Thats too bad cutting people up with rotors sounded like a real slick idea... the tail rotor thing would be cool.. but that also means that youd have to extend the collision all the way back there... which could end up being real weird on some maps with restricted space on the spawn pads...
Dont quit though, this vehicle kicks ass! Hands down the best custom vehicle out there.

 

[mccann]

You go Eyegore! Nice additions... you'll be a programmer yet!

But, it does sound like the new implementation with the rotor blades breaking off is too fragile (or too realistic) with not enough benefit. The Raptor can slam against anything.

To add to Kangus's suggestions regarding the rotor blades:
1) Up the HitPoints. As the Apache takes damage, things can break off making it more difficult to fly. A blade hitting a wall wouldn't cause the blade to break off right away... only after taking 1/2 the damage would things like that start to happen. (healing bring them back?)
2) Give some kind of warning sound that about to hit with rotor blades... or maybe that they did hit.


Eyegore... something else we might want to do is get the model leaning forward a little more when flying forward full speed. Would you agree? (Let me know if you need any more help with anything.)

EvilDrWong, I didn't notice the ambient sound issue... i'll need to listen for it again. Is that when someone is shooting at you from the Helicopter or when you are in it?

 

[Eyegore]

Thanks!

Thanks for the ideas too. And mccann for all the programming and online testing help the other day too.

I think I'll try a damage factor for the rotors - though I can't get them to scale down - at least it looks that way.

The collision thing sounds complicated - maybe that should be incorporated into hit points instead? I'd probably need help with some of that - or are there any other item's that sport the breaking off things functionality I could check out.

I went ahead and posted the latest model (just use the same link) - but don't feel obligated to DL yet, with the rotor issue, I'm working on that now...

Oh, yeah, Mccann - I stiffened up the chopper a bit so it's not so wobbley as well, but that also affected the forward leaning a little - I'll take a look at some of the propertys before heading to work. I'll probably drop an email asking for a little help - Also, i fixed the ambient sound issue when I posted the 2nd time - it was the rocket projectiles. When rapid firing for extended period of time, you would get this deep rumbling sound - I just turned it off. Much better.

 

[Postal]

how about a delay between breaking blades, you break one, then you cant break the other till 2 sec later, or something like that

 

[Eyegore]

YEEEEEEEEEHHHHHAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!!!!!!

I got the tail to bust off!
I got the tail to bust off!
I got the tail to bust off!

YEEEEEEEEEHHHHHAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!!!!!!!!

 

[EvilDrWong]

showoff

 

[mccann]

Awesome!!! that will be cool!

 

[Eyegore]

OK folks - I just uploaded the latest version. This includes:

Tail breaks off when health drops below 300 (increased health to 800 so there'd be time to use the chopper before it gets squirrely on you. Maybe I should drop to 700?)

Added wires to the mesh where tail breaks off (see screens posted)
When tail breaks off, TurnDamping goes to -20, which causes uncontrollable spin.

I want to put some particle effects coming out of the tail stump to finish off the effect, but other than that and maybe some minor tweaking, she's about done.

Use the link from the first post to DL. Here are some screens...

 

[Eyegore]

OK,

Now when the tail breaks off, sparks and smoke come out. In addition, because the copter is spinning out of control, so does your view, thus you can't really hit anything. About all you can do is hope to get to a low enough altitude and bail out. I also adjusted the forward pitch when throttling and decreased the health to 700 - that gives you 400 health worth of fighting power.

I'll be zipping the final version up tomorrow and will let you know when the final version will be available.

 

[Fallen Angel]

this is very very good. But you should try implementing some of the lil stuff from BigCheese's Apache. e.g Rotars snap. but I pregfer this a helluva lot more than the other one =O this one is sexeh

 

[Kangus]

hmmm... the tail snapping works nice, but its now feels like its suffering from the "way too much health" syndrome again :/ I know that technically its still only like 400 of usable health, but 300 health of uselessness seems a bit much
maybe if you take both thresholds down by like 100 health? or maybe you take the max health down by 200, and make it so the tail only breaks off if the chopper takes a heavy damage hit(of say over 50 damage or more) once it gets below the 200 or 300 threshold... or maybe only if the hit is taken from the rear?
Just thinking outloud here...

 

[Eyegore]

I know what you mean, but I think for me that maybe bacause I made the model and stuff, that I want to be able to see the broken copter in action cuz it's so much fun. I have to think about the practical playability of it, which is where you know you guys come in. I'll bring down both threshholds by 100 points and the heavy damage thing, like you suggested. I tried to get the thing to be only a rear hit, but I don't understand the collision well enough to do that yet. Do vehicles only have spherical collision boundaries?

It may mean less time to see the glory of my work (if that's what it can be called, but if it means better gameplay, then that's what it'll be!

I haven't yet uploaded the latest version, with the sparks and spinning view and all, but I think the entire project will be done tonite, so I'll upload it then.

Thanks for the crits!

I'm going to enter this in the MSUC for the Vehicle category, doubt it'll win, but after, I'm going to work on a first person model - you know, cockpit and all. I was also thinking it might be cool to add a radar to show where other enemy craft may be.

Just thinking out loud...

 

[EvilDrWong]

vehicles can have either cylinder or primitive collision... and from the looks of it the apache has cylinder collision. Heres a quick bit thatll let you break off the tail only on a rear hit

    HitAngle=(Rotation.Yaw - rotator(HitLocation - Location).Yaw) & 65535;

    if((HitAngle<44768&&HitAngle>20768))
        log("buttsechs");

stick that in the TakeDamage and tweak the values there till youre content... should work just fine.

 

[Eyegore]

Cool - got it working! - Should be done tonite with the whole project!

 

[Kangus]

I'm going to enter this in the MSUC for the Vehicle category, doubt it'll win, but after, I'm going to work on a first person model - you know, cockpit and all. I was also thinking it might be cool to add a radar to show where other enemy craft may be.

Just thinking out loud...

Cool, I really think it'll spruce it up to perfection if you add that cockpit model. In fact I'm just generally glad you plan to keep working at this thing until its done instead of abandoning after MSUC

 

[ROFL 451]

instead of abandoning after MSUC

My Suck Up Crap?

 

[Eyegore]

Yeah, the first person cockpit models are cool with the guages and lights and stuff. It'll be good Modelling and Photoshop practice

 

[Fallen Angel]

=O is there such a thing as Surpassing perfection?

If there is, this will be it.

 

[Eyegore]

Here are links to screens and download of the version submitted to MSUC.

Screens:
http://www.icosometricdesign.com/Projects.htm
DL:
http://www.icosometricdesign.com/downloads.htm

Still working on some other stuff, 1st person view mesh and other minor tweaks.

Then onto other projects...