Standardising a CTF HUD.

Should there be a standard HUD for Attack and Defend CTF?


  • Total voters
    117

zpqrei

Theme Changer Extraordinaire
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Oct 19, 2008
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If you were playing Panamint Springs and Vector yesterday then we were talking about creating a standard HUD for the Contest's CTF maps. We went though the ways we could implement and in the end I made this:
hud.jpg


Basically, it's a single CTF arrow with two CP icons, so people have all the information they need about the intel. They can see what point they are attacking, where the intel is, if someone is carrying the intel, etc. What do you guys think?
 

Hanz

Ravin' Rabbid
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Jan 18, 2009
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First: I hitted the option 'Yes, but not what you suggested' by mistake, I didn't saw there was -but not what you suggested- I actually wanted to hit the option 'Yes, what you suggested'. :)

Yea, yesterday we were talking about how we could improve the HUD for this A/D ctf gametype. The thing you made looks wonderfull and I think it gives all the information the players need. I hope you can make this so I could use it in Panamint Springs! :D
 

Artesia

L6: Sharp Member
Nov 11, 2008
278
72
I would LOVE the ability to make our own custom HUDs for our maps. I was the one who voted "other" as rather than asking valve if they could make that for us, I'd prefer to know how to do it ourselves, I have a custom gametype I'm working on for cp_confinement and am forced to use a CP icon for my intel, and game_text for scoring as you can see in the Current Hud Screenshot. Making graphics is not a problem, knowing how to implement them in game is another thing.

If we could do this ourselves, it would be just one step closer to being able to bring the wide variety for maps we had back in TFC, which is what made that game great!

I'm no programmer, but what I would like are new entities where we could modify the hud...

info_hud - would have fields for red vtf and blu vtf, and X and Y position. mainly used to create the stylized frames around the main hud elements.. This entity is required for any other info_hud entities to work, and disables standard CTF/CP/PL huds.

info_hud_ctf - entity that would add a round ctf pointer to the hud, has fields for X and Y, and an option to show it as neutral unless it is being carried (basically allowing the team color to be changed on the intel status, for neutral intel games). Also has a carried XY field, which will only show when the connected intel is being carried by the player). Most importantly it is connected to a named intelligence in order to function, to allow multiple intelligence if desired.

info_hud_cp
- entity to add cp icons to the Hud, must be connected to a capture area to display, has options for materials for each team, including all locked states. all materials for all the states can be changed with addoutput commands. also has X Y and scale parameters.

info_hud_pl - this is trickier probably, as it would likely need to work as a path the cart icon would follow, to allow for circular payload hud setups... I don't know how that would work but it could possibly get its shape based on a simple custom model or something. but even without that, this would allow adding payload huds on custom X Y coordinates and scale to your custom Hud

info_hud_text
- this works much like Game_text does when it comes for custom scores but uses the TF2 font, is limited in amount of characters, possibly only numbers, possibly text size (or scale) options... optionally this could be replaced by some kind of progress bar for each team, like the PLR hud without the carts and speed zones... this is just a way to allow custom scoring.

all of these entities (except the base info_hud entity, as only one is needed and should always be drawn on the bottom) would have an index field that would specify what level it should rendered at in relation to info_hud entities should they overlap. This also limits the amount of entities that can be rendered. 1 being on the bottom 9 being on the top, maximum of 10 custom hud elements displayed at one time (9 + 1 base layer from the base info_hud)
 
Last edited:

TheDarkerSideofYourShadow

L10: Glamorous Member
Apr 12, 2008
792
286
Honestly, I would have liked if there had been a custom pack prior to the announcement of the contest. That would include things like hud, intel model, base plates, etc. You know, stuff that makes it feel like "Hey, I noticed these things, I'm obviously playing an A/D ctf map." Basically, stuff that makes it more official.

Thanks for doing this. This + errieone's cap points (and maybe his intel model) are making for some nice custom content to distinguish these types of maps from regular ol` ctf.
 
May 23, 2009
205
34
if... IF you can get valve to agree to putting something like this in then yeah we need a standardised HUD.
 

Icarus

aa
Sep 10, 2008
2,245
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That HUD is pretty sexy. I'd be all for it, and hope valve would make something like this.
 

NovaSilisko

L42: Life, the Universe and Everything
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Feb 3, 2009
502
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Do want.
 

Mar

Banned
Feb 12, 2009
607
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andysss456

L2: Junior Member
Sep 28, 2008
56
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I'd assume that the squares for the points are based on an input? so that you can have three points on the last stage for instance? Is that the plan for the hud?
 

Icarus

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Sep 10, 2008
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^ I hope so. Make the HUD as flexible as possible.

Some indication of when the CP is blocked would help, too.
 

zpqrei

Theme Changer Extraordinaire
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Oct 19, 2008
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zpqrei | TF2Maps.net: As I'm sure you're aware, there is a TF2Maps.net contest on at the moment, creating either a PLR or Attack and Defend CTF map, and for the CTF maps, we're stuck with the standard CTF hud, which I is a bit of a bother, to say the least.
zpqrei | TF2Maps.net: So could I forward this to you?
zpqrei | TF2Maps.net: http://forums.tf2maps.net/showthread.php?t=7172
zpqrei | TF2Maps.net: Any chance you could forward that on to the programmers/entity makers/HUD makers?
Robin: so you want ctf + cp maps in one?
zpqrei | TF2Maps.net: Sort of.
zpqrei | TF2Maps.net: We're making a CTF-Dustbowl hybrid.
zpqrei | TF2Maps.net: And the standard CTF hud makes no sense with it
zpqrei | TF2Maps.net: So yeah, we were wondering, as there are going to be 20+ CTF-Dustbowl maps, if we could have a HUd for it.
Robin: We'll see if there's an easy way to get what you want. A test map would also be useful.

Can I have a w00t w00t?
 

NovaSilisko

L42: Life, the Universe and Everything
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Feb 3, 2009
502
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hell-yes.gif
 

Void

Local Man Unable To Map, Sources Say
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Sep 14, 2008
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I wish Robin would add me. No response yet after I gave my Steam ID along with the BOX poster...


You should tell him you know the Crossword guy, and that I need any ideas for what to do next...
 

Artesia

L6: Sharp Member
Nov 11, 2008
278
72
did you even bring up the idea to allow custom HUDs without programing it? I'd still rather have an entity set to customize the hud, then for valve to just write this for us... that way we can make variations of HUDs...
 

NovaSilisko

L42: Life, the Universe and Everything
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Feb 3, 2009
502
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did you even bring up the idea to allow custom HUDs without programing it? I'd still rather have an entity set to customize the hud, then for valve to just write this for us... that way we can make variations of HUDs...

He did. Robin said they already have, but it might not make it to TF2.