CEONSS

That is some bad-ass engine sound. Though that charge sound of the Vortex might get a little annoying over time.

Wormbo wrote:This is Crusha's Nekomata mesh in action:
The vehicle you can see in the video isn't actually the Nekomata, but the Nephthys and its alt-fire mode - the Gravity Vortex. It probably still requires lots of tweaking, but I'm quite happy with the effects already.

how crazy

Some little teaser on what I have been working today:

Damn, that reminds me... Onslaught Specials 2...

Current progress on the Orb:

• Level designer can place ONSOrbPickupBases, which extend xPickupBase, in the map together with an ONSOrbHierarchyInfo actor. The OrbPickupBases spawn a ProbeActor (extending from xTeamBanner) which will then get notified by the closest PowerNode of team changes on that node.
• In the Info he can assign the OrbBases by Tag in an ordered list and set some individual properties for the Orbs of each team, like respawn time, healing power and selfdestruction time.
• The Orb will respawn after it's destruction at the OrbBase that is furthest down in the ordered list and which is near an active Node or Core of the Orb's team.
• Upon spawning, the Orb will start out very small and neutral-colored and will grow over an adjustable period of time until it's ready to be picked up. It then gets it's team color set, simply to indicate that it's ready then.
• Upon being picked up, the Node will stick to the player as it can be seen in the screenshot. It rotates in place and emits some dynamic light for the bragging rights.
• On each Tick the Orb will iterate through a cached array of PowerNodes in the map and find the closest one. It then checks if the closest one is within range of the Orb and will establish a link to it if that's the case.
• The link from the Orb will quickly regenerate health on the Orb and will reset it's UnderAttack status. So as long as a player with an Orb is at a Node, other players can spawn at that Node even while it's under constant attack. As opposed to the UT3 version, the Node won't be fully shielded from damage though, so if the entire enemy team (or a Mino or SuperWeapon) was to aim aim for the Node, it would still go down.
• The Orb will also check the Base of it's Carrier on every Tick. If the Base is a PowerNode, it will handle it accordingly.
• Walking onto an enemy Node while carrying the Orb will instantly convert it to your team and heal it to full HP. I might add a timer for this so that you have to stand on the Node for a few seconds for this to happen, since UT2k4 has faster movement than UT3 and it might be hard to prevent a bunny-hopping Orb Carrier from getting to any Node quickly, especially if he can Manta-surf.
• Walking onto a friendly Node will fully heal it.
• The Orb is destroyed when walking onto a Node with it. This will cause it to respawn at a teamcontrolled Base again.
• The Orb is dropped when it's Carrier dies or when the Carrier enters a vehicle that doesn't have "Hoverboard" in it's name.
• The dropped Orb will stay around for a while during which it can be picked up by a player from it's team again. After a while it will selfdestruct and respawn again.
• An enemy player can walk up to the Orb and press the Use key to destroy the Orb at the cost of 150 damage. A sacrifice for securing an Orb that is crucially close to a PowerNode but can't be protected long enough to selfdestruct.
• Orb has it's own Node Power effect that goes high into the sky once the Orb is fully grown up, so it can be spotted from everywhere.

ToDo/Known Issues:

• After picking the Orb up once, it's PickupMessage stays on the screen for the rest of the match.
• Neutral Nodes can't be insta-built with the Orb right now due to the time it takes for the Node to initiate the building process. Have to look deeper into that.
• Still need a fancy link beam effect for connecting a Node with the Orb. They look scary in script, since they were not really intended to be used with something else than weapons.
• Orb should show up on the radar map. I will use my existing framework for that.
• Enemy Orb should appear on the radar map as soon as it is within a certain range around a friendly Node.
• HUD stuff for countdown overlays and so on.
• Unfortunately I have no way to prevent players from using the ONS teleport system while carrying the Orb. Except for it not working on Nodes that are not at full health because those will instantly consume the Orb upon walking on them.

Some more hovertank action, prominently featuring the Nekomata and Firebug, and bots sucking badly in the Nephthys - quite literally, considering its fire modes.
[video][/video]

Wormbo wrote:This is Crusha's Nekomata mesh in action:
The vehicle you can see in the video isn't actually the Nekomata, but the Nephthys and its alt-fire mode - the Gravity Vortex. It probably still requires lots of tweaking, but I'm quite happy with the effects already.

holy shit! this looks and sounds awesome

I feel like the "suck radius" (lol) of the vortex is pretty large
Firing this on a node will be imbalanced i guess.. btw is it doing that extreme damage to nodes as well?

Whats the usual firing mode?

That was an early version, in the mean time I modified it quite a lot. The firing mode currently charges up the vortex in four steps, each requiring 2 seconds charging. If you charge for less than 2 seconds, there won't be a vortex. The Nephthys just fires the smaller point singularity projectile that is also used for the primary fire mode. Very similar to the Paladin shot, except that it constantly attracts nearby objects (the vortex also does that before it really starts up) and releases electric discharges once in a while at nearby targets. The point singularity implodes on impact, giving everything around it a push towards the point of impact. The rate of fire is also a bit faster than that of the Paladin - 2 instead of 2.35 game seconds between shots.

Ok, back to the Gravity Vortex mode. If you charge for more than 2 seconds, you get the Gravity Vortex projectile. It has a start-up delay of 2 seconds, during which it acts a bit like the point singularity projectile - slightly attracting nearby objects and releasing electric discharges at nearby targets. Unlike the point singularity, the vortex is first affected by gravity to a certain extend, but when it starts up, it raises into the air a bit and finally comes to a stand-still. During its run time , it slightly increases its sucking radius and strength (you can see that effect in the video) until it finally collapses and explodes. (The final explosion effect is still missing.) The four charge levels correspond to 4, 6, 8 and 10 seconds of run time and also the initial sucking strength and radius. In addition to sucking in objects, the active vortex also zaps nearby objects and if anything is sucked in enough to touch the vortex, that causes a momentary gravity inversion. You can call it an explosion, if you want. The real danger of the vortex are the touch explosions. If you just put a vortex next to a node or core, it will probably receive a lot less damage than you'd expect. However, if it is close enough and also sucks in stuff, it can do quite some damage to anything in range.

But as I mentioned, I am still tweaking it and what you saw in the video is stronger than the vortex is now. Also I found it to be quite hard to place the vortex exactly where I want it to be. So if you don't put nodes and cores in tights areas, it should be hard to use the maximum vortex effect against them.

In other news: The Nephthys also has a gunner seat now, which is a lightning turret that works much like the Lightning Gun with slightly higher rate of fire and damage amount.

Some early footage of the Orb gameplay:
[video][/video]

Should add some new spice and variety to ONS in some maps.
Features that are still missing in the video above:

• Proper link beam effect when linking to a Node.
• Proper effect when destroying the Orb.
• HUD message that informs an enemy player that he can destroy the Orb with the [Use] key when he is touching it.
• Message and sound that the Orb can not be carried in that vehicle.
• HUD Overlay that shows a countdown with the remaining time before despawn on a dropped Orb. (And remaining time until full growth of a respawning Orb.)
• HUD Overlay that shows the Orb on the radar map to team mates. (And to enemies too as soon as it is in a certain distance to an enemy Node.)

The internet rarely disappoints. I found these gems yesterday and decided to breathe some life into them, if only inside UnrealEd as emitters: Does anyone still remember these? You better do, because they will hopefully threaten your life in Onslaught soon.