setPos for multiple players on the same position

[galzohar 31]

Anyone knows of any problems that this might cause? Or will it always just end up finding a solution for them?

So far I have made missions with ~10-15 players setPos on the same position with nothing bad happening (as long as nobody misfires), but was wondering if there could be problems when there are more players, say 25-50. At least if we assume that the area has enough free space to contain that many players if they were to walk them by themselves.

[demonized 20]

kylania showed me a simple code awhile ago with spawning in a random pos to avoid just this:

i dont remember the exact details, but anyway:

(vehicle _this) SetPos [(getMarkerPos "base" select 0)-200*sin(round(random 359)),(getMarkerPos "base" select 1)-200*cos(round(random 359))];

i think the 200 is the max radius from the position, and 359 is a random direction from the position.

[KC Grimes 79]

I've been using the same thing as Demonized. 200 is the radius, yes, but it's also massive. I use 15 :D

[galzohar 31]

I don't really care how cluttered the players will be, as long as they don't do anything funny like dying/flying/etc. At lesat with lower player counts (up to 15) it'll simply put the players very very close to eachother, but not really cause any problems. I just wonder if anyone tried testing with more.

I'd test with AI but they behave completely different in such situations (they don't seem to have the same "anti-collision" mechanics as players do).

[KC Grimes 79]

I've tested this multiple times, actually with vehicles. Set the radius to 30 and you'll be golden.

[.kju 3245]

players can die or get stuck - do NOT setPos them into the exact same position

[KC Grimes 79]

players can die or get stuck - do NOT setPos them into the exact same position

Hence the randomness in it.

[galzohar 31]

Should 0.5m spacing be good enough then?

[KC Grimes 79]

Spacing as in the radius? If so, hell no :P at the least use 10 as the radius and you really shouldn't have any problems.

[demonized 20]

if you need them to be as close as possible you may want to just use findEmptyPosition

[galzohar 31]

Spacing = minimum distance between each 2 players, not radius to use as random :)

Anyway, I decided to just use their editor relative positions so that they will end up in the same formation that they started in the editor, since the origianl "formation" in the editor had just good enough spacing (tight enough yet spaced enough so that they don't get "pushed around").

Is findEmptyPosition reliable? Does it work similarly to how createVehicle creates the vehicle in the nearest viable spot?

Additionally, what happens when many players respawn to the same respawn marker? Does this cause similar issues to setPos or does the game handle it differently in this case?

Edited July 18, 2011 by galzohar

[demonized 20]

i think with the default MP respawn the units are placed in empty positions, not on top of eachother.

at least thats what ive observered.

just test with 20 playable AI in a MP mission with respawn, place them together and drop a LGBU amongst them.

[kylania 568]

place them together and drop a LGBU amongst them.

This is a solid troubleshooting technique for basically any problem you might encounter in ArmA2 to be honest.

[KC Grimes 79]

This is a solid troubleshooting technique for basically any problem you might encounter in ArmA2 to be honest.

It's how I fix script errors :)

[galzohar 31]

AI collision detection works differently than for players, though. But they probably deserve the GBU anyway.