FF Payload Experiment
 

I got a little bored today after all the e-drama on these forums, and because I can't program (lol), I decided to work on a gamemode. I wanted to mimic Playload in Team Fortress 2 which was implemented to replace Hunted. In this gamemode, the offensive team must escort a bomb cart to the end of the map while the defensive team must prevent them from doing this. Here's how it works:

- The cart moves when 1 or more blue player(s) stand(s) ontop of or next to it.
- The cart moves at a speed relative to the number of people escorting it (NOT IMPLEMENTED YET)
- The cart stops if no blue players are escorting it (because they're not on it or were killed)
- The cart can be 'contested' and stopped if 1 or more red player stands near/on it.
- When the cart reaches a certain point in the map (a checkpoint) time is added if its the first time reached.
- When the cart reaches these checkpoints, spawns are moved accordingly
- If the cart goes thirty seconds without being touched, it begins to roll backwards.
- The cart will not roll back past the first checkpoint or if it has not reached said checkpoint.
- If the defending team prevents the cart from reaching the end of the map for x minutes, they win.
- If the attacking team escorts the cart to the end of the map before x minutes is up, they win.

I'm not sure how this will work given how fast-paced FF is. I might have to add respawn delays or get rid of 'contesting'. Here's a short video demonstrating all I have got working as of now. The speed of the cart is exaggerated so you don't have to see me standing next to it for five years as it progresses to the next point. What do you think? Am I wasting my time?

YEAH. SHIT SUCKS. FUCK YOU BRIDGET FOR RUINING FF WITH YOUR TF2 BULLSHIT. ALL YOU DO IS TROLL, AND YOU CAN'T EVEN PROGRAM, DUMBO. Here's a test video. It's shitty quality, but deal with it.

IIRC, this(or a similar) type of game mode was experimented with in the Beta some time back. Personally, I like the idea. It's almost like a "Hunted" style, but with a twist. Keep working on it, Bridget.... let's see what you can do with it. :)

New co-operative gamemodes are always a good thing, something desperately needed in this game. I never played payload in TF2, so it's kinda alien to me, but seems cool enough.

Yeah I don't really care for TF2 personally, but I thought the payload concept definitely sounded fun.

It's the same thing, lol.

*COUGHPLAYTHEBETACOUGH*

Get the server to stop shitting itself, and I will. Besides, didn't I say that we played something like his test in the beta?

Has any more work been done on the coding of this? Since I saw this thread, I started working in a rough PL map, as well as a model for the payload its self.
http://img338.imageshack.us/img338/5...ogresssmal.png
As the picture shows, I haven't made the under-carriage yet, and not many details either. I'm not exactly sure what my polygon budget should be, so I've been farily conservative at the moment. The actual bomb portion of the cart is the 2 packs on the back, which are supposed to be like big detpacks. I'm thinking on having the block at the front be textured like the sg's like this is one of the Engie's crazy devices.
Another idea I had (no cart model though) is a map where the Blue team has a cart with some form of secret item on it, moving the cart between Blue bases across land controlled by Red, like a "stop the courier" type game.

Not bad. Here's a suggestion, since it's supposed to be an "explosive", instead of those little packs on the back, how about putting a pair of Detpacks there. :)

I like the look of the two big detpacks though

Awesome. I love to see new gamemodes (even if it is from TF2; payload is one of the more popular types). There's no reason the cart has to be a bomb, though. It's just a marker to show how far you've gone.

Those two "little" (They're half of the whole cart :)) packs are supposed to be detpacks, although, I could just take the lazy way out and decompile the detpack's MDL and stick it on there.

Ah. I didn't quite get that(scale is difficult to tell from the pic), but the form is what made me think "detpack". I'd think you could place the detpacks on the back(they should stay)... with a specific timer on them. If you make it to the "cap" point, they blow it up and you score, or if you don't, they blow up and take out your whole team. :lol:

Good job, so far. Let me know when it's done, I'm highly interested in giving it a try!

that model ur working on seems to be turning out pretty well. i can see it already, thoes 2 dets on the back having the green juice inside them just like a demomans detpack. this game mode should work great in FF tbh. and i think that the cart should be a bomb of some sort or else why is the opposing team trying to stop the cart from being marched into their base.. CUZ ITS GUNNA KABEWM DUH

Code's done. It just needs clean up and hud stuff. Also, a map.

http://img337.imageshack.us/img337/4...nprogress2.png
Well, it's nearing completion. It needs textures and some final detailing and probably some optimization :oops: It's currently at 2988 polys, not sure if that's too much. Also, I drew a concept for textures on it, as seen below.
http://img139.imageshack.us/img139/3...edemocart2.jpg
The quality's bad because I had to edit it slightly so my pencil drawing would show up. I've called it "The Engie-Demo Collaboration Cart"

Nice. That's not too many polies since there will only be one in the map. Can you do three or four LODs (levels of detail)?

Well...
I don't know how to make LODs. If someone can point me in the direction of a LOD tutorial for Gmax that would be greatly appreciated.

EDIT: Also, what, if any, is the scale difference between FF and real life dimensions, because currently the cart is a bout 15m long

Edit 2:Nevermind on the tutorial.

An easy way to do LOD is to just delete any small faces you have on there. If gmax has the MultiRes modifier, you can use that to create low-poly versions of models.

For scale, it's best to just get it into the game and test it out. You should make gmax use generic units rather than meters; one unit is similar to one inch. A player in FF is 72 units high and 32 units across.

http://img580.imageshack.us/img580/1...shedgmaxsm.png
Here is the finished model in Gmax. As for scale, I imported the Combine Elite model (I already had it in Gmax and I checked it against the scout's height in Garry's Mod). The top of the front block comes up to about neck level to the character. At this point, there's no LODs as I'm still figuring out how to get the main model into SMD form.

Looks really nice man. Now if only someone modded the single shotgun to not look like a toy gun... ;)