[WIP]cpl_snaketemple

Humm, I've read on penny arcade forum that people complained about a few things.

->collision (yah, but since I still haven't found any way to avoid issues, there..)
->lack of dispenser.
->no capture point for pushing.

I've done the latter two things for balance sake.(to discourage people from flocking around their cart) I'd like to know from people who ran tests if players do understand the reasons behind this, or if they find them definitively distateful. A map should be fun.

mmm, logic wise, it wouldn't be (the main elements are present). But it would be a nightmare to create the differnt spawnsroom in term of layout. (and how many, 6, 8 ?)

The spawn room mecanics creates some complex gameplay events.

If a cart is nearly a cap point, the defending team can block it easily but, as soon as it's capped, the pushing team spawns there (or if the defending team manages to cap a point, it does suddenly have to do way more walk to block the cart). But actually, you could say a team on the verge of losing has some advantage. In the turbo edition, the team with 3 CP respawns in 6-12s whereas the team with 1 has to wait 8-16s. I'm afraid going to much into a "slippery slope" mecanics may ruin the fun of this map

Blocking a cart is also a handy way to prevent the hostile team from charging their own uber speed.

Thank you FLOOR_MASTER for keeping me aware of the players'mood. Could you ask them if they would prefer the map to feature more heavily defensive spots and maybe the comeback of the cart dispenser, in what would be probably a slower pace ? Or any other suggestion.

I was going to abandon all hope about the collision. Tried with a physic_ovveride, with a trigger_punch inside the tracktrain. Then I decompiled pc_sawmill (since it wasn't a payload mode map either) and saw it had the "hl1 train" flag set to true, so I added it myself on my cart. It does seem to fix the issue (I've tried a number of times to get stuck and couldn't achieve this whereas the other cart was still buggy.

So I may consider the collision bug fixed, but I still can't figure out why. Can anyone say what this flag is meant to do ? (wikis don't say a word about this).


That said, I should try with this fix and the dispenser for next issue. Anything else ? I may consider restoring points for pushing the cart, but with (virtually) unlimited track it may be too strong.

I also found the tf_filter_playercancap. I suppose it filters out, ubered people, disguised and invisible spies. Do you want me to add it to the blocking mecanic ?

Well, I just ran a test, and one more time I'm marveled by the logic in source games ^^

So with a filter combining team and can_cap, I have the disguised/invisble spy unable to block the cart. BUT the trigger_multiple is unable to notice a modification of filtered client state. So if I'm disguised and enter the cart zone, I can't block,but when I undisguised myself, the cart won't be blocked until I leave the capture zone and enter back into it, undisguised.

Not a game breaker but still a nuisance. The OnTouching/OnNotTouching outputs needs a little polish, Valve. The more I work on snake, the more I find the logic entities hilarous.

It's doable. I wanted to keep as far away from the 8 cp limit from now, but it should be the simplier way to it. Moreover, It would let me introduce a multispeed blocking mecanic later on, if I wanted. (more players blocking = faster charge)

There won't be any problem with one team capping any point. The 7th CP was added only because I could turn both capture zone for the cart into neutral red or blue whenever I needed.

I'm also considering making the push/blocking zones a bit larger. What do you think ?

I don't really see what would be the trigger, here. Closest to what ? the teams carts? and the other cart ? This could lead to a team being near both the carts...

I've made a new build with following changes

-fixed (hopefully) collision bug
-restored cart dispensers
-setting a capture mecanic rather than a trigger one for blocking. Only players legit to cap a point can block the cart.
-modified the dynamic sign to show only 2 colored disks, (or one when both cart share the same location). This should make them more handy to understand where things are, the HUD gives the progress info
-adding back capture points for scoring. You may have capture by doing the following

*pushing the cart for some time (slower than in other payload for obvious reasons)
*doing the final push against the hostile cart
*blocking for some time (not very much though)
*triggering uberspeed (you must stand in the blocking zone when the gauge reachs 100%)

Unfortunately we could'nt test it so I won't upload it there until a first test has been passed.

The question of the spawn mechanic is not trivial, and can be asked in the case of circular capture point mode as well.

There are many possibilities for the spawn attribution.
->closest to
->oldest point owned by the team
->newest point owned by the team (the one currently applied)

I discarded the oldest point one, but it does have its advantages : it focuses heavily on the defensive side, because, until not lost, the oldest CP can serve as fortress, while the pushing team must go farther and farther. It allows engies to use teleportesr, since exit may stay stable for a long time. But at the same time, it creates an unusual situation when one team is ahead : the winning team must cross the hostile cart to reach theirs, in something like this :

RC--->BS--->BC--->RS (RC and BC are the carts, BS and RS are the spawns).

Red players coming from RS, have to go along the rest of the track, or run straight through the blue cart and the blue spawn, to help pushing.

Whereas in the newest CP mechanic, this cannot happen. When one teams takes the leads, here the situation

RS--->RC---->BS---->BC. Red players wanting to stop the blue cart may go straight and have to passe beyond the blue spawn. But it's not very important, since they were seeking fight anyway. And a good defense should be entranched somewhere in front of the road. The main issue is teleporters aren't used, because a good team will lose its current spawn quite often. Moreover, spawning players are always in situation of "pushing" their cart, instead of ending in situation where they have to "pull" it.

And finally your proposal creates another type of situation. The main issue is whereas taking a point and triggering a new spawn is something very understandable by players, "closest" attribution would be more obscure.

Maybe this topic would require another thread, dealing with unusual gameplay mechanics.

Okay, it seems, the last edition is quite violent. With an über speed covering 45% of the track, one team can easily check mate another. A bit too much in my taste (but 20 mn rounds would be quite unlikely) Additionnal ammo, renders heavy defensive strategies available. For instance crossfiring sentries + one demo held a team at bay.

I saw one player stuck in the cart, but it may have been caused by a sticky explosion. No other complaints or incident as I have saw.

Would you like this version right or one with a toned down uber speed ? (-30% for instance)

I think people like to have their uber speed be the "final blow"

I have prepared (but not yet compiled) snaketemple_a8 (yes, I give up on the gte, stuff)

With two subtle yet important changes
->uber speed cut by 1/3rd (it pass two section)
->uber speed charge time doubled to 100s. BUT charging speed varies with players (from 1 to 3, that is from 100s to 33s)

I don't know if I should compile and upload this one yet. Gameday is saturday, and I wouldn't change the file too often. and stick with the version we are testing with powerful uber speed.

snaketemple a8

With said modifications. Last test showed the previous one was really to brutal.