Incredibly helpful - Was slamming my head against the wall trying to do this in a much more basic way which wasn't working, naturally I was oversimplifying. Thanks Hammer! And thank YOU for this fantastic tutorial.
I've had a look into it and it seems as if a dropship can drop off a strider via the use of the DropStrider input (and you don't even need a template strider, just set the CrateType to Strider). However, the strider and dropship get stuck inside one another when this input is triggered. This may require a source code modification, to spawn the strider at a slightly lower position. Although, if the strider can rotate in this stuck state, it would become unstuck and will drop to the ground, then patrol around. My recommendation would be to do what Half-Life 2 did, where a strider dropship looks like it drops off a strider but doesn't, then spawn a strider later at a point where the player cannot immediately see it. The strider uses info_node_air_hint entities with a Hint type set as 'Strider Node' for navigation. Hopefully this helps!
hey sorry if im late but could you do a tutorial on hint nodes? I want to have npcs crouch to pass under an object. ( I'm not entirely sure if this is done with hint nodes since i'm quite a newbie in regards to npcs). I guess scripted_sequence would make sense here but idk feels like there should be a better way
I've taken a little look into it and I don't think it's possible to achieve what you want with hint nodes (I'm not an expert when it comes to NPC stuff!) because there's no hint types that seem to work, however it might be possible with scripted_sequence entities. Unfortunately, I haven't had much success in getting it to work, as the NPCs have a tendency to get stuck or not move at all with errors claiming that there's no route, so apologies for this!
@@TheMaster974 i see, i kinda assumed it would work since it has the crouch low and crouch medium hint options but ive figured thats just for cover. Thanks for answering
@@TheMaster974 Ah forgot to say that in the last comment, would you mind covering the hint type jump override? That would probably work for my purposes , it seems to work fine for me but only for when the combine npc has to jump down, it doesnt work for jumping up or jumping from one ledge to the other
The crouch medium and crouch low hints are for the NPCs taking cover from what I can gather, so they will only crouch in place at the hint's position. I could always look into the usage of different types of hint node, however I think there are some cases that can't be achieved, such as an NPC jumping up to a ledge (probably because there aren't any animations that handle that). I believe there are some situations that can't be done without resorting to adding animations or changing the code, which are hardly ideal options for something that should be achievable with what's already in place.
Hmm, if you did everything as suggested in the video, you shouldn't be having issues. The only things that come to mind is to see if you added something like (in the last path_track of the inbound path) OnPass SetTrack or to make sure the dropship is not getting stuck on stuff, which may prevent the dropship from moving. Outside of that, I don't really know what to suggest, so apologies for not being of much assistance.
hey man, i love all of your videos, do you think you could do a video on how to do a helicopter bomb chase sequence like the one from the canals chapter?
also i see you are using hammer ++, do you think you could make some sort of guide on how to setup hammer++ for half life 2 episode two? so you get all the resources from hl2, ep1 and ep2? since there's no official version for hl2 and the sdk 2013 one i have no idea how to setup properly
I can look into the mechanics of a Hunter-Chopper chase sequence, then do a video. If you use 2013 Singleplayer, you should have a selection of what game configuration you want to use i.e. Half-Life 2, Episode One, Episode Two, Source Test etc. regardless of whether you use Hammer++ or not. From what I can tell, the configuration for Episode Two is exactly the same as Half-Life 2, other than you point to the ep2 folder instead of the hl2 folder in regards to the Game Directory. This can be set up by going to Tools->Options then the Game Configurations tab.
@@TheMaster974 thanks so much man, you are a life savior, i just want a hunter chopper chase sequence where it drops bombs and when the player reaches the destination the hunter chopper flies off and despawns somewhere, basically exactly like the one in the vanilla game
doing some mechanical tests to see what I can put in a level. I have an idea for a map thats all combat on a razor train. Fighting your way along the top. Manning a turret mounted to the side. shimmy along thing exterior gantries. Right now I'm testing the ability for dropships to land on trains. Not working yet, but in theory this should work. Many of these markers are parentable and can be set to be moving along the same path as a parent object, so in theory, the ship should be able to fly up to and land on a cart, drop 4 soldiers, and then fly off. I should probably just test soldiers standing on top first since they might just fly off.
Interesting idea, however I think you will end up experiencing quite a lot of problems, such as a large map size and NPC movement issues if you plan on making the train move through the world. However, I think an easier way of implementing this is to use the Mapbase mod, which has the ability to parent the sky_camera entity to a func_tracktrain or func_movelinear, which effectively moves the 3D skybox while the train stays still, emulating the train moving. I cover it in this video if you're interested in finding out more and seeing what the end result could look like: ruclips.net/video/R2l20L6uqKI/видео.html
Incredibly helpful - Was slamming my head against the wall trying to do this in a much more basic way which wasn't working, naturally I was oversimplifying. Thanks Hammer! And thank YOU for this fantastic tutorial.
Thanks for the comment, I'm glad you found the video helpful!
Just want to say you deserve more love, all these tutorials are super helpful considering there aren’t many for HL2 and the Source engine in general
Thanks for the comment!
Amazing tutorial! Helped me a lot! Hope you do more Hammer stuff!
Thank you for the comment!
can you do a tutorial on strider drop ships and thier patrol rout? would be very appreciated!
I can always look into it, if I'm understanding you correctly, do you want a dropship to unload a strider and then the strider goes on a patrol route?
@@TheMaster974 yes
I've had a look into it and it seems as if a dropship can drop off a strider via the use of the DropStrider input (and you don't even need a template strider, just set the CrateType to Strider). However, the strider and dropship get stuck inside one another when this input is triggered. This may require a source code modification, to spawn the strider at a slightly lower position. Although, if the strider can rotate in this stuck state, it would become unstuck and will drop to the ground, then patrol around. My recommendation would be to do what Half-Life 2 did, where a strider dropship looks like it drops off a strider but doesn't, then spawn a strider later at a point where the player cannot immediately see it. The strider uses info_node_air_hint entities with a Hint type set as 'Strider Node' for navigation. Hopefully this helps!
hey sorry if im late but could you do a tutorial on hint nodes? I want to have npcs crouch to pass under an object. ( I'm not entirely sure if this is done with hint nodes since i'm quite a newbie in regards to npcs). I guess scripted_sequence would make sense here but idk feels like there should be a better way
I've taken a little look into it and I don't think it's possible to achieve what you want with hint nodes (I'm not an expert when it comes to NPC stuff!) because there's no hint types that seem to work, however it might be possible with scripted_sequence entities. Unfortunately, I haven't had much success in getting it to work, as the NPCs have a tendency to get stuck or not move at all with errors claiming that there's no route, so apologies for this!
@@TheMaster974 i see, i kinda assumed it would work since it has the crouch low and crouch medium hint options but ive figured thats just for cover. Thanks for answering
@@TheMaster974 Ah forgot to say that in the last comment, would you mind covering the hint type jump override? That would probably work for my purposes , it seems to work fine for me but only for when the combine npc has to jump down, it doesnt work for jumping up or jumping from one ledge to the other
The crouch medium and crouch low hints are for the NPCs taking cover from what I can gather, so they will only crouch in place at the hint's position. I could always look into the usage of different types of hint node, however I think there are some cases that can't be achieved, such as an NPC jumping up to a ledge (probably because there aren't any animations that handle that). I believe there are some situations that can't be done without resorting to adding animations or changing the code, which are hardly ideal options for something that should be achievable with what's already in place.
Thank you, you deserve to subscribe and like
Thank you for the comment!
why when dropship drop finished he not fly to path 6? help please
Did you add, in the dropship's outputs, something like: OnFinishedDropoff FlyToSpecificTrackViaPath ?
@@TheMaster974 thanks for answer, but this not work :( , i reviewed everything as you have in the video
Hmm, if you did everything as suggested in the video, you shouldn't be having issues. The only things that come to mind is to see if you added something like (in the last path_track of the inbound path) OnPass SetTrack or to make sure the dropship is not getting stuck on stuff, which may prevent the dropship from moving. Outside of that, I don't really know what to suggest, so apologies for not being of much assistance.
@@TheMaster974 ok, thanks a lot for your reply!
hey man, i love all of your videos, do you think you could do a video on how to do a helicopter bomb chase sequence like the one from the canals chapter?
also i see you are using hammer ++, do you think you could make some sort of guide on how to setup hammer++ for half life 2 episode two? so you get all the resources from hl2, ep1 and ep2? since there's no official version for hl2 and the sdk 2013 one i have no idea how to setup properly
I can look into the mechanics of a Hunter-Chopper chase sequence, then do a video. If you use 2013 Singleplayer, you should have a selection of what game configuration you want to use i.e. Half-Life 2, Episode One, Episode Two, Source Test etc. regardless of whether you use Hammer++ or not. From what I can tell, the configuration for Episode Two is exactly the same as Half-Life 2, other than you point to the ep2 folder instead of the hl2 folder in regards to the Game Directory. This can be set up by going to Tools->Options then the Game Configurations tab.
@@TheMaster974 thanks so much man, you are a life savior, i just want a hunter chopper chase sequence where it drops bombs and when the player reaches the destination the hunter chopper flies off and despawns somewhere, basically exactly like the one in the vanilla game
doing some mechanical tests to see what I can put in a level.
I have an idea for a map thats all combat on a razor train. Fighting your way along the top. Manning a turret mounted to the side. shimmy along thing exterior gantries.
Right now I'm testing the ability for dropships to land on trains. Not working yet, but in theory this should work. Many of these markers are parentable and can be set to be moving along the same path as a parent object, so in theory, the ship should be able to fly up to and land on a cart, drop 4 soldiers, and then fly off.
I should probably just test soldiers standing on top first since they might just fly off.
Interesting idea, however I think you will end up experiencing quite a lot of problems, such as a large map size and NPC movement issues if you plan on making the train move through the world. However, I think an easier way of implementing this is to use the Mapbase mod, which has the ability to parent the sky_camera entity to a func_tracktrain or func_movelinear, which effectively moves the 3D skybox while the train stays still, emulating the train moving. I cover it in this video if you're interested in finding out more and seeing what the end result could look like: ruclips.net/video/R2l20L6uqKI/видео.html