ANNOUNCE: PVP script pack released

[deadsmell 10]

ok, well ive found that by using the "wizard" and selecting sector control it basically provides a template you can use for mission making.

Thing is when i try to edit it, i can move everything around and stuff, but i cant delete anything. Sector control starts you off with like four or five sectors, and I would like to have only one sector for king of the hill. So basically if i could just delete the excess sectors i might be in business, i remember doing it in flashpoint, but as much as everything is still the same, its so much different.

I suppose i could improvise, and either just lump all the sectors together (i dont know how well that will work with the scoring side of things though) or i could arrange the sectors into a line, a frontline if you will.

If i cant delete the excess sectors in the "wizard editor" im thinking the frontline solution is probably the best bet.

Any help or feedback is greatly appreciated.

The other question i have, is if i make a game like the one described above, would i still be able to utilize this scriptpack to make the minefields and stuff?, and what would i have to do differently to make it work?

Looks to me like sector control could potentially be the best gametype, unfortunately it also appears to be the least played (go figure). This is frustrating. :)

EDIT: SBSMAC wrote: "*edit* You can try changing the value of the _steps variable in line 36 of camControl.sqf. Default value is 60 but you may find it smoother with values down to around 20. Beyond that and you'll probably notice the camera 'lurching' in steps as it orbits." - Thank You

Edited July 16, 2009 by deadsmell

[sbsmac 0]

The scriptpack already supports DM and TDM. I think that all that is rquired to support 'king of the hill' (a single player has to hold an area) and 'sector control' (a team has to hold an area) is for me to add the capability to score based on presence in an area. This is very straightforward and I'll look at it tonight.

[--DST-- Anth 10]

What about Join in progress lets say its clear weather at the begining and you want it to get foggy towards the end. Connecting players half way through the game will have clear weather and already connected will have foggy?

How to make 3 flag c&h maps?

[sbsmac 0]

Good point about the weather - I think this is taken care of on the server but if not it's trivial to synchronise it on JIP.

3-flag C&H - yes, the scheme i have in mind should be able to deal easily wiht this. I never played a lot of C&H so can't remember the scoring system used - did you have to actually take the flag or just be in the areas? Feel free to suggest a scoring scheme and I'll look at implementing it. I expect I'll set it up so that adding markers called 'hold', 'hold_1' etc will allow any number of holdzones.

I've also thought about how to implement automatic vehicle respawn for those who want it. Probably a marker called 'vehicle_park' will allow any vehicle placed within it at game start to be automatically respawned.

[--DST-- Anth 10]

C&h the flags were neutral to start with then when you were in the area they would be taken then I think it was a ticker counting down to 0 depending on how many flags you had cant remember exactly myself but im sure it was like that there was not many good c&h maps around in ofp one that audi made was pretty strange name gyhspy or summit like that.

Currently making a ctf map then will be looking at a c&h map when I time.

If you know how to do jip please explain cause I have no clue.

Edited July 16, 2009 by [-DST-] Anth

[Inkompetent 0]

Good point about the weather - I think this is taken care of on the server but if not it's trivial to synchronise it on JIP.

Weather was not syncronized in ArmA afaik. Maybe it is in ArmA2 though. I'm not entirely sure. Could need some research. But at least it's easily syncable with a looping publicVariable once or twice per minute :)

[RN Escobar 0]

nice to see this has been released again MAC, i might have to delve into the editor and knock up some CTF's

OT - where the f**k is the SBS site? has the URL changed in the last week?

[sbsmac 0]

Lo esco mate. Yes, it's back and better than ever ;-) And there seems to be enough interest in it now that I'm more motivated to maintain it.... C&H and other game-modes also coming soon...

http://sbs-clan.co.uk/ is the address you are looking for though it seems a bit unreliable right now - probably Tax pressing the wrong buttons on the control panel again !

[RN Escobar 0]

http://sbs-clan.co.uk/ is the address you are looking for though it seems a bit unreliable right now - probably Tax pressing the wrong buttons on the control panel again !

yeah thats the URL i have been using but it appears to have dropped off the DNS world.

ah well, can you PM the TS info and i'll catch you and the other guys that way instead

[deadsmell 10]

all that is rquired to support 'king of the hill' (a single player has to hold an area) and 'sector control' (a team has to hold an area) is for me to add the capability to score based on presence in an area. This is very straightforward and I'll look at it tonight.

Yeah I have team based play in mind, not a free for all, that would suck. Id like to make TKOTH. team king of the hill. Sorry I should have been a bit clearer.

sbsmac wrote: "3-flag C&H - yes, the scheme i have in mind should be able to deal easily wiht this. I never played a lot of C&H so can't remember the scoring system used - did you have to actually take the flag or just be in the areas? Feel free to suggest a scoring scheme and I'll look at implementing it. I expect I'll set it up so that adding markers called 'hold', 'hold_1' etc will allow any number of holdzones." - FYI I think that by default when using the sector control gametype, all flags start off as neutral, and a member from either team approaches the flag pole, and then raises their teams flag, thereby giving their team control of the sector. Your idea to just make it so if a player is in the zone, their team has control is great though.

"I've also thought about how to implement automatic vehicle respawn for those who want it. Probably a marker called 'vehicle_park' will allow any vehicle placed within it at game start to be automatically respawne" - great idea, that prevents the mission maker from placing an over abundance of vehicles for guys to just screw around in

It was also mentioned that C&H (whatever that is) is scripted so that the hold locations have to be taken in some sort of alphabetical order, that could be a cool concept when creating frontlines maps like i described in an earlier post. I however would just want to make sure there was no AI whatsoever participating in the game.

EDIT: Also, I think it would be very helpful for noobs like me if you could include some sort of list in the pdf of what to name the markers for all the different functions they can do etc. I hope that makes sense, and I know this must require a considerable amount of effort on your part to put together so I hope im not asking too much, its just a suggestion.

@RN Escobar, when I first glanced at your sig, I thought it said "muslim servers" lol.

Edited July 16, 2009 by deadsmell

[sbsmac 0]

First the good news... I have reproduced the 'zombie' problem when using vehicles!

The bad news is I'm tearing my hair out trying to figure out why it happens (I think it's something to do with the way the server synchronises data with clients) and am also banging my head against the desk trying to get multiple clients with the same cd key to connect to a single server (http://forums.bistudio.com/showthread.php?t=80315) so that I can check the exact behaviour.

So... I had hoped to have the extra gamemodes tonight but it's now looking unlikely :-(

>Yeah I have team based play in mind, not a free for all, that would suck .. so TKOH

Here's what I have in mind for scoring...

There is a single flag in the 'scoring zone'

When a member of the team picks up the flag they get some number of points (100)

For each second that the flag carrier is within the 'scoring zone', they get a point

If the flag carrier moves outside the scoring zone, the flag is automatically returned to the flagpole

At the end of the game, the team with the highest number of points wins.

So it's a bit like 'protect the VIP' - a team has to look after its flagcarrier.

>Your idea to just make it so if a player is in the zone, their team has control is great though.

After thinking about it, it's probably cleaner to consider a zone is controlled only if the flag has been raised by a team. Otherwise you end up with players hiding in buildings etc. With a flag, you have a focal point to contest.

>t was also mentioned that C&H (whatever that is) is scripted so that the hold locations have to be taken in some sort of alphabetical order,

Yes, you're describing 'advance and secure' which is a variant of C&H - should be a relatively straightforward extension.

>Also, I think it would be very helpful for noobs like me if you could include some sort of list in the pdf of what to name the markers

Excellent suggestion and thanks for the other ideas. BTW, I'm more than happy to accept help, particularly on the documentation! :-) PM me if you want and I'll send you the word-doc source for it.

*Edit* Ok, I have a workaround for the 'zombie' effect now so vehicles are now possible. Also, I have a simple King of the Hill mode (not team based) working. Will think about proper C&H/A&S modes tomorrow.

@inkompetent

Yes, publicVariable'ing the server weather was what I had in mind. Looks slightly complicated by the fact that you now have weather, overcast, fog, rain and time to sync (and I may have missed one or two) some of which can't be changing simultaneously.

Edited July 16, 2009 by sbsmac

[dustoff 0]

Looking forward to to them all , sorry I brought the zombie thing other wise you would have em out lol.

I am looking forward to the c&h and a&s .

Currently working on nice pow camp type mission and will use your stuff to pull it together.

I will think of names tonight

I figured out how to work around the zombie thing too so its not a big deal .

what I was thinking if its possible is to have one flag , one team defends and the other has to take it away to a safe zone or zones. Scoring would be strange but your vip idea seems inline

Edited July 16, 2009 by dustoff

[.kju 3239]

What about a project space at dev heaven sbsmac?

Would this be useful?

Request_your_project_space

[Taxman 10]

Having a prob with nameservers on site esco buddy.. if u cant get in on www.sbs-clan.co.uk then try www.specialboatservice.alphafrag.co.uk just for the time being.

Sorry its off topic..

Nice one mac matey..

[sbsmac 0]

Thanks kju. Indeed, this looks very interesting.

[deadsmell 10]

After thinking about it, it's probably cleaner to consider a zone is controlled only if the flag has been raised by a team. Otherwise you end up with players hiding in buildings etc. With a flag, you have a focal point to contest.

I agree.

PM inbound, not sure how much help I can really be, but id be happy to help in any way i can.

[Inkompetent 0]

After thinking about it, it's probably cleaner to consider a zone is controlled only if the flag has been raised by a team. Otherwise you end up with players hiding in buildings etc. With a flag, you have a focal point to contest.

A good idea, but it would be nice if there was a choice. Either a flag-cap, or a normal 'secure area'.

Makes more mission designs possible, and variety is nice :)

[mugaben 10]

How do i use the minefield? I dont get it. I created alot of markers named Minefield_N (1-47)

I copied bordercontrol.sqf into my missionsfolder and into a folder named ctf.

The [] spawn compile preprocessfile "ctf\borderControl.sqf"; i copied into my init file. What am i doing wrong?

[sbsmac 0]

>What am i doing wrong?

The scriptpack isn't (yet) structured in such a way as you can pick and choose. The minefield functionality relies on library functions in lib/pos.sqf and lib/region.sqf (and probably there are other dependencies).

In short, as described in the manual, you need to copy the _entire_ set of files into the mission folder.

If you're trying to do something not supported by the script pack, let me know and either I will add it or will try to explain how you can do it.

BTW - I haven't yet checked whether marker names are case-sensitive, but you may need to use 'minefield' with a lower-case 'm'.

[mugaben 10]

Allright ill try that, thanks for the quick respond. :)

Great job by the way.

[sbsmac 0]

V1.5 now released, King of Hill and C&H gamemodes now supported.

See first post and manual for full details

@dustoff - note zombie problem is now fixed I think

@deadsmell - King Of the Hill is not actually what you were after I think. Your 'team king of the hill' is really just C&H with a single flag?

*Edit* Oops - V1.5 was missing some files - V1.6 released instead.

Edited July 18, 2009 by sbsmac

[Gloopy 0]

I'm getting an issue where once I test the mission (editor or multiplay) with all the sqf files in place I get a "lagspike" or freeze every 2-3 seconds, I'm running fraps and the FPS drops to 0 for a second then goes back up to my normal of 40-50 for a few seconds then freezes again, only happens when the scripts are active and not if i'm just testing the mission with no scripts in the mission dir.

It happens during the intro and once you've spawned, making the mission unplayable. Haven't tested on another PC but definitely seems to be linked to the scripts.

p.s, love the scripts, I struggled for a long time in ArmA to make any kind of PVP mission.

Any ideas anyone?

Thanks in advance

[sbsmac 0]

Hmm - that's very interesting. I had some similar behaviour the other day but put it down to general Arma2 performance oddness. It's been fine at other times and I haven't been able to reproduce it so I'd ignored it up to now. Can you PM me a link to the mission that's showing the problem and I will work on it as a priority ?

[dustoff 0]

C&H sounds nice , going to start working on something for that ..

allready have a nice heavly fortified POW camp almos finished and this will work well .

Question will C&H work for 3 teams ? And I take it are no limits as to how many flags you can have .

[deadsmell 10]

=

@deadsmell - King Of the Hill is not actually what you were after I think. Your 'team king of the hill' is really just C&H with a single flag?

Looks like you got it right man. Cant wait to check it out.

Im gonna start experimenting with it now. Thanks alot. I will report back, although my isp must be working on their servers or something cuz my internets been on the fritz all day. Hopefully theyre done now.