[Map Idea] MVM Payload

[Davekillerish]

I dont know entirly were to place this thread so mods correct me if this is the wrong place.
My Idea: MVM Payload, kind of like the "stop that tank" server mod. The idea of the map is that robot AIs push a payload to the place. The cart would travel 50% faster per pusher.
If someone wants to take this on I can come up with some basic map layout and what not.

 

[Uncloak and Dagger]

The robot models to be made fully functional would require a improved animations pack, and to set the models a server plugin would be needed. However, using STT's assets a map designed with it in mind but also working as normal payload could be made. So pretty much a payload map meant for it that also works for normal payload could be made. So the tank could be made, just not the robot players in vanilla.

 

[Davekillerish]

Well, I was thinking to take the short cuts that valve took when coding MVM itself. Because to the bots, its a CTF match with a capture point. They are all wanting to get to the capture area, or cap the intel.
I was thinking we place an invisible intel trigger to attract the bots to the payload, and simply have the bots play normally with a few wanting the intel and a few or most wanting to get to the catpure area or the next cap.

 

[Uncloak and Dagger]

Ah! Thought you meant the robots were just players, sorry about that. I'm not sure what the robot entities themselves are, probably just bots, so a population file or regular bots with a plugin would be what could do it. Moving the payload, changing the model and using the trigger would be probable, although the tank entity itself does use payload tracks, so it depends how much control you want over it.

 

[Digaag Wa Riz]

Well, I was thinking to take the short cuts that valve took when coding MVM itself. Because to the bots, its a CTF match with a capture point. They are all wanting to get to the capture area, or cap the intel.
I was thinking we place an invisible intel trigger to attract the bots to the payload, and simply have the bots play normally with a few wanting the intel and a few or most wanting to get to the catpure area or the next cap.

I have done lots of experiments with bots in mvm to see how I can influence their pathing. Mannhattan gets the robots to capture the gates via a func_nav_prerequisite with the destination as a path_track. You can get them to follow the payload by making the path_track stick to the cart, through use of logic_measure_movement, since path_tracks don't seem to work correctly when parented. For the logic_measure_movement, set the movement and measure references to the same entity, set the entity to measure as the bomb cart, and the entity to move as the path_track. Bots that have the appropriate tags to consider the func_nav_prerequisite should now follow the bomb cart. The func_nav_prerequisite should cover the entire areas the bots can travel in as well.

EDIT: The bots will still need a func_capturezone in order to move. I can't remember exactly what happened when I tried this (if I ever did) but parenting the func_capturezone to a moving object won't make the bomb carrier move towards it, I think they just go towards where it was originally placed in hammer.

 

[tyler]

I feel like this would ruin what makes MVM interesting, which is the separate/branching paths. In Mannhattan, the bots can take various routes toward the cap areas, but for a payload version, they'd be stuck around the cart the entire time. (I don't know if there's a way to tell only some bots to go to the func_nav_prereq; seems unlikely to me.) You could have branching payload paths to accommodate the idea, but each branch has to be exactly the same length as the other branches or the HUD gets screwed up.

I am not sure it's even possible for some of the reasons Digaag noted, but even if it was, it sounds like a hell of a lot more work for a game mode that will just be worse than stock MVM.

 

[Davekillerish]

The logic itself would be odd to setup, but I think if a few robots were to push the payload, and the rest were to simply attack it would make for some interesting gameplay.