FraGnBraG Monster Hunt Dev - Temple Of Dragons

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FraGnBraG
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FraGnBraG Monster Hunt Dev - Temple Of Dragons

Post by FraGnBraG »

Hi,

I've started this thread now so that going forward (in the next little while) i have a place to post progress screenies, discussions etc for my first Monster Hunt map --- hopefully will follow somewhat the very tall maping standards set down by the likes of Derdak2rot, Nr2000, Cardiologist, GenMokai and Deathox-08, among others. Yes, one of those kinda MH maps -- nice long trek through a good amount of different scenery facing many and varied combinations of the Unreal beasts and minions ... hopefully I will have here an interesting mix of MH gameplay: ranging from swarming panic in close quarters to ranged sniping, jousting melees against tough bosses to full on assaults and also wide open field battles...

The map has 12 objectives spread throughout the map, (obviously achieve one in order to unlock the next, etc...) and these as expected bring with them various and appropriate configurations of monsters (as both your reward for completing an objective and also your PUNISHMENT ;)
Each objective is roughly an area, and each area requires a slightly different approach to fighting, and also features specific theme and action music (so that's 12 different unreal umx, so about 20 tracks altogether :)

This map is all about hunting for and collecting relics from one place and then returning these to places later on... It is actually quite straight-forward and simple in approach - not too many puzzles but you can lose your bots and get overpowered if you play stupid, lol... You are told what to do and where to go often with the big green messages :) You can't really get lost, however, it can get difficult to find ALL of monsters you need to kill (I do help you though - I have lots of counter messages, like: "...only 27 more kralls to kill!"

So typically, when you enter an area, you'll have to kill your way through to your goal, then once to take (erm, steal) the relic, you fight for your life until you've killed enough monsters to unlock the next area ... pretty standard MH stuff, imo. Hopefully each fight will be a bit different from the previous one so to keep things interesting.

Now all that said, the map basically works, lol!!!! Why am i so surprised at this?

Well this is a very large map (4500 brushes so far, 59000 nodes 1.99:1 p/n ratio). 45000 mb. There is a TON of custom artwork MyLeveled in the map, and I still have to add the huge package of Creavion plants and Trees. Once lighting, details, meshes and sounds are completed this map could well be 55000 - 60000 mb.

That would make FNB-TempleOfDragons the LARGEST File-sized monster hunt map made in UT. hmm... Perhaps not the longest footpath MH map.

I look closely at Andromeda Part1 and Part2 often -- this series of maps (including the D2R versions with all the BunnyTrack stuff)
These had a profound effect on me from the design standpoint... theme-work aside, that's the "bar" I'm going for ...
servers can come along for the ride as far as they can, but the art and atmosphere comes first, and with that the ability to play this single player or even coop - sorry but that's just me :) no boom-boy stuff in this one, folks :D

That said, so far the render seems good considering the sheer size of some of these zones. I do have volumetric lighting is several areas which does cause some lagging there, but i will probably end up eventually killing the VL (but we'll see).

In general, the map works pretty good with player plus 3 or 4 bots. The bots, however, do not work very well. They sometimes "take" the objectives for me, but often eventually get themselves stranded or stop obeying me commands. I expected this at this point in development, but these i think can be made to behave better as the map becomes more "finished" - hope so, we'll see.

With a large number of bots (example 10) the map has lots of problems and Lagged a lot. There are also times when it lags for no apparent reason. Then other times it's perfectly fine, and doesn't lag at all with 3 or 4 bots. So stuff to do i suspect with getting some MH code to play nice...

So where I'm at now is "monstering" the second half of the map... right now I have 1400 or so monsters (placed monsters plus creature factory counts). After that I will take a texture alignment pass, then a lighting pass, a final basic bot test, and then if it's still holding together I will release a BETA1...

Right now I am sufficiently interested to keep at it (Red_Fist's new map has made me feel good about doing MH mapping) so hopefully not too long to wait for BETA ... If I can get help and feedback the map has a chance to be as good as it can be... MH is very buggy, far worse than AS imo, so I have to keep learning crap as i go, lol!

Okay - here's a screenie of sorts - note that I'm in testing mode in a really long map, so both me and my hunters carry gib-guns. The match was set for 80 minutes - so completed in 60 minutes.

1 player + 3 bots, 12 objectives, one-shot kills on 1/2 the planned monsters for the map ... will be a nice hard match for 4 humans with NW.
mhtod-Shot0106.jpg
Cheers

*EDIT*

Really annoying bug...

This happens often, but not all the time.

This guy (skaarj sniper) is generated from a Factory.

He won't die no matter what I shoot him with, has no gun, somehow is "on my team" and runs around punching me and my hunters (but not actually hurting us)

Note, sometimes more than one of these "punchy" guys shows up, and they fight each other, and then lagging slowly increases until eventually the game becomes an unplayable slide show.

Tried looking at logs but no clues...

:noidea

any ideas?
mhtod-Shot0074.jpg
mhtod-Shot0083.jpg
Last edited by FraGnBraG on Fri Mar 27, 2015 1:36 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: FraGnBraG Monster Hunt Dev - Temple Of Dragons

Post by Red_Fist »

The whole sniper thing is they have to pick it up. The only thing I can think of is make a new sniper pawn with a little bigger diameter.

Have not seen the punchy thing, but if they fall off a path and you have some team stuff settings around, it might cause them to go nuts.
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Re: FraGnBraG Monster Hunt Dev - Temple Of Dragons

Post by Higor »

MH's weapon replacement system has been terrible since day 1, this is something you solve by not replacing Unreal weapons (CacusCoop, MrLoathsome's tweak, SiegeIV) or by using an advanced weapon replacement system (LCWeapons).
@sektor2111 how about we get that system working for MH505?
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Re: FraGnBraG Monster Hunt Dev - Temple Of Dragons

Post by EvilGrins »

OMG! Double-post!!
FraGnBraG wrote:Really annoying bug...
This is actually fairly standard, Nelsona/Sektor knows a work-around for that. Any of the Skaarj-military (ones without the claws) punch as an attack if they're not carrying a weapon... though when he appeared on the map he should've had a weapon pop up for him to immediately pick up; that's just default. Unfortunately, without a weapon bots won't recognize him as a threat and will often act like he's not there...

...although the unkillable thing is new to me.

Until you get it fixed, there's a simple solution. Pick your least liked weapon, walk up to him, and hit 'Q'. That's the default weapon toss key-bind. Skaarj gets whatever weapon that was, he's now killable, and either you or your bots can cap the sucker.

Temple of Dragons, eh? Are there any dragons on the map??
http://unreal-games.livejournal.com/
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medor wrote:Replace Skaarj with EvilGrins :mrgreen:
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Re: FraGnBraG Monster Hunt Dev - Temple Of Dragons

Post by FraGnBraG »

EvilGrins wrote:OMG! Double-post!!
ssssshhhhhhhhh!!!!! or no map 4 u :P
EvilGrins wrote:.... Temple of Dragons, eh? Are there any dragons on the map??
@EvilGrins - well, there's pictures of dragons, and a big stone dragon head with teeth in it, but nooo ... no actual monsters --- hey! you got some dragon monster classes?
Then there could be actual dragons in there... :) i do have some warlords... these could be changed...

regarding "punchy" dude - i think if i change zones (leave and then come back) i can kill him...
but he follows the hunters out of the area then i'm stuck with him...

i'll test a bit more to see if i can see it happen (spawning with no gun) and look up this "Nelsona/Sektor" fix ---
hey... is sektor2111 actually Nelsona?

wow that explains the vast knowledge :shock:

@Red_Fist - so you're suggesting i subclass the skaarj sniper? i can try that...
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Re: FraGnBraG Monster Hunt Dev - Temple Of Dragons

Post by Red_Fist »

If you have it set easy for MH and get new actors embedded, or .U

It all has to do with, if they don't pick a weapon up they stay a "player" until they collect the weapon then they attack normally.
So if you have some odd surface or ledge, things get weird. so the only solution is to increase the diameter of the collision radius.
There is another problem in that MH wants UT weapons, so that Unreal rifle should not be in MH. Not sure what I did but my snipers still had the old weapon and they should not. Unless I placed the wrong stock pawns, need to check I probably messed that up oh well..

So make it have a default weapon of the UT sniper rifle, or maybe increase a new sniper rifle collision instead of the pawns.
I think I had trouble making it have the UT rifle, can't remember.
If you fish around my map, it's called a "snipertrooper" I think, but use at your own risk LoL

It don't spawn holding the gun, it spawns next to them on the ground, so they have to pick it up.

I see what I did, since oldskool is always loaded for me I picked the old rifle there because oldskool puts the rifle under "TournamentWeapons"

Try my pawn see what happenes. I changed other things but only to make them stronger meaner in some way. but you have to have oldskool. I never said anything for my map but it probably should have oldskool installed as a default these days anyway.
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Re: FraGnBraG Monster Hunt Dev - Temple Of Dragons

Post by EvilGrins »

I've heard some have had some luck positioning the spawnpoints for Skaarj-military slightly above the ground, so when they spawn into the game they orient themselves in the brief fall, picking up their weapons as they come down.

Not high up, just like a foot or so... relative size unit to whatever that is in mapping.
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medor wrote:Replace Skaarj with EvilGrins :mrgreen:
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Re: FraGnBraG Monster Hunt Dev - Temple Of Dragons

Post by FraGnBraG »

EvilGrins wrote:I've heard some have had some luck positioning the spawnpoints for Skaarj-military slightly above the ground, so when they spawn into the game they orient themselves in the brief fall, picking up their weapons as they come down.

Not high up, just like a foot or so... relative size unit to whatever that is in mapping.
actually, you make a good point Grins --> the sniper is on a roost -- his guns seem to appear in front of him as if he is to run forward... i'll see about raising the spawner and watch what happens ... if it is still problematic - for example you could rocket spam the roost and the sniper might get knocked away before he grabs a gun - then i do as Red_Fist suggests and play with radius -- i have seen the sniper/trooper grab a flak cannon off the ground, so there's a possible way to deal with this without changing too much ...

thanks guys
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Re: FraGnBraG Monster Hunt Dev - Temple Of Dragons

Post by papercoffee »

FraGnBraG wrote: is sektor2111 actually Nelsona?
Can't you tell by his writing style? :mrgreen:
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Re: FraGnBraG Monster Hunt Dev - Temple Of Dragons

Post by UnrealGGecko »

I do remember playing a map with dragons in it (map made by Mars007 I believe, who visits utmappers and Hook's forums every once in a while). Can't remember the map or the u file name though. :oops:
Good luck with this map, I'm really looking forward to play it. :tu:
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Re: FraGnBraG Monster Hunt Dev - Temple Of Dragons

Post by Red_Fist »

"i have seen the sniper/trooper grab a flak cannon off the ground, so there's a possible way to deal with this without changing too much"

I think the code will only reference the original weapon, but I could be wrong. That's the same idea I had and just set UT sniper rifles around. But if I remember it introduced another problem

In any case, bottom line, is make the sniper use UT weapons. (for MH)
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Re: FraGnBraG Monster Hunt Dev - Temple Of Dragons

Post by EvilGrins »

FraGnBraG wrote:@EvilGrins hey! you got some dragon monster classes?
Maybe...
Image
Dragon monster doesn't fight so well online, MARS had to edit its projectile specifically for a map to set it up for online play.
FraGnBraG wrote:i have seen the sniper/trooper grab a flak cannon off the ground
The military-skaarj will pick up any weapon they happen across, any weapon at all...
Image
http://unreal-games.livejournal.com/
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medor wrote:Replace Skaarj with EvilGrins :mrgreen:
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Re: FraGnBraG Monster Hunt Dev - Temple Of Dragons

Post by Spectra »

FraGnBrag wrote:Really annoying bug...

This happens often, but not all the time.

This guy (skaarj sniper) is generated from a Factory.

He won't die no matter what I shoot him with, has no gun, somehow is "on my team" and runs around punching me and my hunters (but not actually hurting us)

Note, sometimes more than one of these "punchy" guys shows up, and they fight each other, and then lagging slowly increases until eventually the game becomes an unplayable slide show.

Tried looking at logs but no clues...
You can try with Danes Skaarj Fix. But it will assign only that weapon to all Skaarj Troopers and its Sub type in the map. But at least it assigns weapons and make them vulnerable.
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Re: FraGnBraG Monster Hunt Dev - Temple Of Dragons

Post by sektor2111 »

Rocky wrote:You can try with Danes Skaarj Fix. But it will assign only that weapon to all Skaarj Troopers and its Sub type in the map. But at least it assigns weapons and make them vulnerable.
Or you can put an actor in MyLevel to give them weapon (see MonsterTeam Actor previously Mylevel-ed) including SkaarjOfficer... or... change MH type...
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Re: FraGnBraG Monster Hunt Dev - Temple Of Dragons

Post by jaypeezy »

Always glad to try some new MH maps, destinationUnreal would probably be able to host your map too for playtests/once you have a final up.

Knowing your previous work I have no doubt it will be an awesome looking, well-built map. :tu: looking forward to it
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