Spawned vehicles missing extra ride along characters ...

[BadgerDog]

I've got this feature pretty well operating after a few days of working to understand the programming logic.

 

By the way, this is a very nice feature of SB when trying to create a scripted storyline type of scenario. 👍

 

The question...

 

I have spawn zone created and working well.  All the designated units (people, cars, buses etc) appear, move around and then exit via "drain" zone fine.

 

I created civilian 4x4 vehicle and under its options I selected and added a "crew look" and the "extra passengers" look.

 

I then started the spawn execution phase and the vehicle appears and drives around, then exits via "drain zone" fine.

 

But... there's no bunch of passengers pile in the back?  So, I checked my "spawn zone" prototypes and the vehicle shows with the extras added.  For example, the motorcycle shows with the driver and back seater, but when SB executes, only the driver shows up on the motorcycle.

 

Next, I created some pseudo civilian infantry "grunts" and using "attach to" added them to the empty 4x4.

 

They dutifully ran to the 4x4 and mounted, so I executed SB "test" mode again.  The 4x4 appears, does its thing and exits via "drain zone" fine, but... still no passengers piled on top of each other in the back?

 

What am I doing wrong? 

 

Thanks .. 👍

[Ssnake]

Yeah, it's ... technically NOT a bug but rather an "incomplete implementation" that vehicles with passengers spawn either the vehicles OR the passengers (or both) and they will then move towards the drain zone independently. Not happy about the shortcut that the programmers took, but then again I'm burying them all the time with an avalance of new ideas and they have somehow to cope with it. Great ideas are a dime a dozen, implementing them is the hard work, so...

[BadgerDog]

Thank you Nils ... 😃

 

I really appreciate your candor in telling me about the design shortfall.  It saves me a lot of time chasing down something that doesn't have a solution on my (the user) end. 

 

It's too bad we can't have the 4x4 loaded with the same extra passengers that I can view as "prototypes", be loaded and appear in the spawn and drain sequence.  I was sure I was doing something wrong myself because I could see them run across the ground and mount up, when viewed while they were in the hidden spawn mode.

 

Ask your programmers if they'd just complete the last step to take it into the spawn and drain mode, which would complete the cycle.  In the meantime, I'll work with what they have for now, which is vehicles that only have primary crew with one person standing up in the back.

 

By the way, I have never seen a vehicle with no crew, or with all the passengers mounted, and I've run the "test" mode at least a 100+ times looking an error in my coding logic.  Just a observation....

 

Appreciate your quick response, as usual...

 

Edited August 3, 2021 by BadgerDog

[BadgerDog]

Well Nils... 😀

 

These little BOT civilian vehicles may not be able to load passengers, but they are deadly when auto spawned in a scenario. 🤣

 

I added a couple of pick up trucks, one mounted with a 106 recoilless and the other with a Milan ATGM.  The one man crew standing in the back truck bed opened up on two of my M1A's in test mode and bagged both. 🤔  I didn't realize these BOTS actually engaged and fired?  Too funny , but makes it more interesting.  I guess your programmers got that far in development before they stopped.

 

I also discovered that once you kill these BOT by fire, or run them over if you want, they don't come back?  So, once you've exhausted your number of "pre-set" prototypes, that's it until you start the scenario over?

 

Finally, every time I run "test", there always seems to be a lonely infantry type wandering around carrying an AK47 and he will also shoot at you, as well as dies if engaged.  The problem is, I don't know how he gets into the spawn zone as I don't set him for any zone, or even choose a lone infantryman?  He always has a 13 CO call sign with a 9 (or some variant) sub unit.  ie: he shows up as 13/9 when he spawns.  Not a big issue, but I'd like to permanently get rid of him from my prototype list, but he doesn't appear there at all?  Any ideas?

 

Thanks.....

 

 

PS: Even though I have the BOTS set to "travel on roads", they still decide to spawn in the middle of the woods, then try to get to a road, often getting stuck?  Is there any way of getting them to spawn on an ACTUAL road?

  

Edited August 4, 2021 by BadgerDog

[Ssnake]

6 hours ago, BadgerDog said:

I added a couple of pick up trucks, one mounted with a 106 recoilless and the other with a Milan ATGM.  The one man crew standing in the back truck bed opened up on two of my M1A's in test mode and bagged both. 🤔  I didn't realize these BOTS actually engaged and fired?

If they belong to a hostile party and not a neutral or friendly one, and if the prototype isn't set to be blind or impotent - then yes, they will move in a very predictable and non-tactical way, but open fire if given the chance.

 

6 hours ago, BadgerDog said:

I also discovered that once you kill these BOT by fire, or run them over if you want, they don't come back?  So, once you've exhausted your number of "pre-set" prototypes, that's it until you start the scenario over?  

Correct!

Units that reach the destination point of their travel in the drain zone will be returned to the actor pool. Those who don't, won't, and eventually the pool depletes.

 

6 hours ago, BadgerDog said:

Finally, every time I run "test", there always seems to be a lonely infantry type wandering around carrying an AK47 and he will also shoot at you, as well as dies if engaged.  The problem is, I don't know how he gets into the spawn zone as I don't set him for any zone, or even choose a lone infantryman?

 

PS: Even though I have the BOTS set to "travel on roads", they still decide to spawn in the middle of the woods, then try to get to a road, often getting stuck?  Is there any way of getting them to spawn on an ACTUAL road?   

a. I suspect that they are technically a passenger on the pickup trucks, and as mentioned before, passengers get treated as a separate prototype even though they were meant to ride on the prototype vehicle. And if they are soldiers, well, they carry a rifle.

 

b. you can create a very small spawn zone, or one that is big but basically outlining existing roads. That way they can't spawn somewhere out in the sticks. Of course, the smaller spawn and drain zones are, the more deterministic the behavior of the actors.

[Gibsonm]

7 hours ago, BadgerDog said:

PS: Even though I have the BOTS set to "travel on roads", they still decide to spawn in the middle of the woods, then try to get to a road, often getting stuck?  Is there any way of getting them to spawn on an ACTUAL road?

 

Also given that the spawn zone can be pretty much anywhere, you could move it to a piece of open ground, near the road, so they could drive to the road more easily.

 

The other option is a narrow, linear, spawn zone that pretty much just includes the road, if you really want to spawn in a wooded section of road.

[BadgerDog]

Mark and Nils .. Thank you ... 👍

 

Excellent answers and ver helpful.

 

I had deduced the same, but the confirmation as to how to deal with these issues is great! 😀

[BadgerDog]

On 8/4/2021 at 5:24 PM, Ssnake said:

If they belong to a hostile party and not a neutral or friendly one, and if the prototype isn't set to be blind or impotent - then yes, they will move in a very predictable and non-tactical way, but open fire if given the chance.

 

Nils.... 😀

 

Update... I discovered that the BOT defined as a Milan weapon does indeed engage, however, the 106mm Recoilless does NOT, even though it's set with fire control to engage (and with ammunition quantity set), and on normal.

Not sure if this is a "bug", or there's something else I need to do to get it to behave and engage like the Milan BOT does.

 

Hope this helps and is productive. 👍

[Ssnake]

Not sure if the 106mm gunner is "crew", or got lost during the spawn as a "passenger".

[BadgerDog]

3 hours ago, Ssnake said:

Not sure if the 106mm gunner is "crew", or got lost during the spawn as a "passenger".

 

I hadn't thought about that.. could be.  Regardless, make sure you let the development team know that they've done a fantastic job, even partially complete.

 

This function and its features with all the little BOT options makes the ability to create scenarios with scripted storylines, and in my opinion makes SB much more interesting.

 

I'll delete the 106mm for now and work with the Milan.