Monsters, zombies and so on

[icebreakr 3107]

Charon: Zeds should simply ignore tanks as they are not even there.

[Drew 10]

I am not sure what to do with tanks.

Naturally the zombies can`t attack the crew if they have everything shut.

So should they surround the tank anyway and try to reach the crew even though they will never make it?

That way they are also much worse targets for the gunner.

Or should they completely disregard all tanks and just wander around looking for cars and humans?

The good news is that they can be run over by vehicles, for some reason vehicle collision check is still active which is weird.

Mission makers should make tanks a very rare thing to keep the balance hehe.

Make a Zombie Tank :D

[giorgygr 61]

btw...humans ability to "sneak" on Zeds will remain?

..or silenced weapons ability to NOT "draw" to much attention??

Edited November 5, 2009 by GiorgyGR

[charon productions 10]

btw...humans ability to "sneak" on Zeds will remain?

..or silenced weapons ability to NOT "draw" to much attention??

Remain?

CZM was not based on knowsabout.

I cannot tell if silenced weapons will draw attention in general.

Some tests showed unfortunately that knowsabout is bugged.

I have seen a group of 10 infected run by 1 meter next to a human

and in TroopMon2 i saw no many times no knowsabout-value change at all or it went to 0.051 !

So initially 1.5 was the value to use, if knowsabout would work as intended.

But since it does NOT, the critical knowsabout value had to be set back to >0

to prevent zombies from standing next to humans without attacking them while still necessitating them to at least having spotted the humans and not just run straight to them like in a lame "domove getpos target" script.

Edited November 5, 2009 by Charon Productions

[giorgygr 61]

Yes..of course u r right about CZM...(my bad the word "remain")

The "spotting" ability of the enemy (Zeds now) is still dependable

by "seeing" and "hearing" skill of the unit? (Zed) like human enemy troops?(!?)

*sorry about my Engl.-I m trying my best :D

[charon productions 10]

Yes..of course u r right about CZM...(my bad the word "remain")

The "spotting" ability of the enemy (Zeds now) is still dependable

by "seeing" and "hearing" skill of the unit? (Zed) like human enemy troops?(!?)

*sorry about my Engl.-I m trying my best :D

What else should it be dependent on?

Anything of a more complex nature , non-hard-coded to recognize humans would create huge lag on a per unit check basis.

[Aelin 10]

Charon: Zeds should simply ignore tanks as they are not even there.

sry icebreakr but I disagree:if they are attracted by cars they must be attracted by tanks too

[rasdenfasden 12]

sry icebreakr but I disagree:if they are attracted by cars they must be attracted by tanks too

They should be attracted even more because of the noise.

Also, having barely read this thread I'll ask some potentially stupid questions:

Is someone working on a Zombie module that automatically spawns them near the player? That would be really useful. Also, will they be "fast" or "slow" zombies and how much damage will they take before they drop?

[NeMeSiS 11]

I think they should just stand around tanks without attacking them, unless there are better targets around. (Though depending on your method of targetting this may be rather hard to achieve)

Simply ignoring them would be too weird IMO. And it would be too easy to exploit it, even if you dont do it on purpose.

Anyway, i am really looking forward to this. :D

[Scrub 0]

Wow, well done! I can't wait to make a long term (like Chernarus Life) mission using the infected for the recently.. well, infected - and use zombies for the 'old-timer' infected. Would let you know a bit more how old the infection is in the area you are in.

As for the tanks, my opinion is to have them crowd and attack like normal, noisy things that they are.

For the animations, if you do find an easy way to port into A2, a few different attacks like hitting, tearing, and biting would be great. I know, 'and the world on a platinum stick while you're at it' ;)

Great effort!

[charon productions 10]

@Nemesis and Aelin: Good points! I guess i will make them surround the tanks too. They will perform attack animations, but those wont do any damage to the tanks at all.

@RasdenFasden: Some answers are given in this thread already.

http://forums.bistudio.com/showpost.php?p=1481563&postcount=171

http://forums.bistudio.com/showpost.php?p=1473521&postcount=61

http://forums.bistudio.com/showpost.php?p=1473784&postcount=70

About the spawning module, sure it can be written.

Right now the whole thing is more focussed on a single incident of infection and it`s rapid spread across the island. So the objective is containment or eradication of the infection, which is hard enough with the infected units when they have enough civilians around to infect.

[Uglyboy 10]

They should attack tanks, if they are too close not even the commander MG can target them, if they just ignore the tanks, the crew have all the time in the world to aim for the heads and wipe out the whole infection. Maybe do something like " they ( imaginary ) reach the hatches of the tank and try to open them to kill the crew ", scripted like ( after X time there is a random change that one of the crew become infected and infect the others ). Something like that would make tanks less invincible and usable in zed missions.

[Psilocybe 3]

I wouldn't be opening any hatches with all those zed heads around. However if you have them in game, lower their fuel/ammo. Running out in z-town would suck. Especially when the only place to resupp is in such places.

[giorgygr 61]

@Uglyboy

Hmm..in a REAL scenario of our..fictional theme here..i can't see ANY way

that Zed's could possibly harm a tank..

If it was a "Stryker"..maybe lots of Zed's will manage to turn it upside-down (scripted)

but..the tank is SOME tons of iron heavier .. :S

[Uglyboy 10]

Hmm..in a REAL scenario of our..fictional theme here..i can't see ANY way

that Zed's could possibly harm a tank..

If it was a "Stryker"..maybe lots of Zed's will manage to turn it upside-down (scripted)

but..the tank is SOME tons of iron heavier .. :S

I've not said anything about upsided down tanks :confused: Just the zombies trying to open the hatches over it ( from where the crews enter ). Gameplay wise it's the only way to make tanks usable in game without having them like invincible killing machine

[giorgygr 61]

Ok..

I m trying to explain here HOW we can achieve "Simulation" in a "Fictional theme"

So..IMHO ..Tanks should NOT be disregarded by hordes..although "out of harm".

(lol if u were IN a tank in the center of the city with Zed's loose...i bet you had check TWICE

if the hatches are sealed properly :D :D )

Beyond this point..any mission/map-maker could decide to use (..or No..)Heavy armors

in his mission/s ;)

Edited November 5, 2009 by GiorgyGR

[das attorney 857]

I wouldn't be opening any hatches with all those zed heads around. However if you have them in game, lower their fuel/ammo. Running out in z-town would suck. Especially when the only place to resupp is in such places.

Good idea :) Fuel could be limited for the Tanks to offset their invincibility. Maybe there could be only certain places in which tanks/vehicles can refuel. Those places should be swarming with the infected too!

I think though that heavy weaponry like tanks shouldn't really be the star of the show though. This is a Z-mod and game unbalancing weapons like tanks should only be used sparingly. I guess this is maybe more up to the mission designers and less to do with the design of the mod itself. :)

[charon productions 10]

Let`s agree on that a zed mission just sucks if there is an abrams or other tanks inside or at least with very limited ammo and fuel, maybe even highly damaged.

The LAV25 is really good to get the team into a hot zone to rescue survivors.

[Uglyboy 10]

Of course, my point was "tank doesn't get any damage, the zombies "open" the hatches and the crew is screwed :p yet the tank is still in 100% condition, but with this "weak spot" the tanks should be enjoyable in zombie mission let alone the "ZOMG i pwnd 1032 zumbie " type of fun :rolleyes:

[b00ce 160]

You do realize that the hatches "lock" from the inside, right? They aren't just flaps that flop around everywhere.

[charon productions 10]

Hehe i guess this is more a cinematic idea, because there is countless war movies where some dude jumps onto the tank, opens miraculously the hatch and dumps a nade inside (Even Saving Private Ryan).

[nicolasroger 11]

My opinoin is make the zombies surround tanks and make the tank crew invincible.

[Uglyboy 10]

Can't be the Zombies just uber-strong? :D I haven't said it's realistic ( said the guy in a zombie thread :rolleyes::D ) but wouldn't be less realistic that USMC forces misteriously doesn't have any abrams and have to fight the hordes with fuel leaked- out of ammo LAVs? that way we can have both :) and of course, it's up to mission design to decide wheterver have abrams or not, just this way you CAN have abrams in the mix and have a nice mission too, ( the low ammo-fuel is always a nice and easy compromise anyway, i agree on that )

[charon productions 10]

Okay, i had the chance to test the human tracking scripts now on Icebreakr`s excellent island addon Panthera to see if this works with custom islands too.

With further refinements it now works quite well:

Still trying to figure out a way to realize the safezone.

Ideally it is a rectangular trigger that the mission maker slams onto his to protect camps/houses.

Then the whole thing would become a location if it isn`t already in a location.

I have made a test with a camp on green mountain on Chernarus and the zombies do open the gates.

This is lame and there must be a way to suppress the gate open animation of the map placed object.

EDIT: I have found a way, but it`s nearly impossible to make that generic, the mission maker must take steps to identify the gate object for the script if he wants them to be locked.

However if for some reason a player opens the gate the zombies must have the chance to pour in inside and eat away. Interesting scenarios can be if a human enters the safezone but is infected ;)

Edited November 6, 2009 by Charon Productions

[Pauldarrington 9]

hey charon i just read though the whole 20 pages and im very impressed with the work you have done, all the video's look fantastic if your looking for beta tester please drop me a pm.

thanks