Proper way of destroying/KILLING/remove permanently a monster. Created 5 years ago2019-08-14 19:22:00 UTC by abbadon

Hi.
Ages ago I did use the method wich the creators of cs_italy used to "kill" the chicken to remove a cycler from a map; but, how would be a better (and less crabby) way to do it?, also, how can I made it so I can apply it to a "living" npc instead of a cycler?.

The "WHY" behind this is a mere question of trying to make disappear some monsters that, after performing an scripted sequence, will remain on the map increasing e-poly count numbers.

Since you mentioned epolys, you could flip EF_NODRAW in pev->effects.
The entity will remain in the memory, and it will "live", but it shouldn't be rendered, so you can use the same one again.

However, if you want to remove them from memory, just kill them.

Mmmmm, that´s useful!!, a couple of npcs will benefit from this method!, but what I want to REMOVE the npc even from memory, so I think the kill method will work, right?

Yes.

BIG thanks!!

I´m working on this:Because of its size I need to remove three of the 6 fingers of the "hand" to reduce e-poly count once the sequence is finished, letting only 3 of the "fingers" play their role and attack the players.

abbadon said:Because of its size I need to remove three of the 6 fingers of the "hand" to reduce e-poly count once the sequence is finished, letting only 3 of the "fingers" play their role and attack the players.

Then you should probably make the two sets of three fingers separate entities, with separate models for each finger set. Then you use a trigger_relay to kill the finger group that no longer needs to exist.

Hi Dr.Orange!!, I have thought about this option in the first place, but since each finger then have to "open" in a different angle, the task was very complex. In this version I am animating each finger sepparately, and then make them join the same scripted sequence´s steps, from that they start to behave as individuals, but I need to "kill" three of them to avoid the processor suffer because of rendering the rest of models.
Each "finger" is not too heavy, probably 1k vertex and the same number of poly, but I am optimizing the mod beacuse apparently rendering rely entirely on the CPU and it makes the mod run only at 36 fps max actually with more than 32 bots and near 70 npcs at the same time fighting each others, and a bunch of tracers and sparks!!.

You can always attach stuff to bones, though. Either via attachments or directly attaching to a bone.

Can you give me an example? I want to understand that method!

I'm surprised you haven't heard of this one before.

Basically, you can use a certain macro that calls an engine function, to attach stuff to a bone, or attachment if you use that. I'll post more about it when I wake up, as it's currently very late at my place. xd

Thanks Admer. Never heard about that !! (shame). I am still learning, you know, and that method uses CODING, and remember that coding it´s my Achilles heel...

There we go:For example, you could make a "chain" of entities that attach to each bone.
Those entities could use the 'target' as the parent bone entity.

What this means is, you would do something like this:

CBaseEntity *pParent = UTIL_FindEntityByTargetname( NULL, STRING( pev->target ) );

GET_BONE_POSITION( ENT( pParent->pev ), 1, pev->origin, pev->angles );
UTIL_SetOrigin( pev, pev->origin );

This is the most basic way. Of course, there would have to be more checks, and stuff.
For example, you can write the entity class to have m_pParent instead of allocating it in the Think() function every time.
A think function is required for the entity to update its position fast enough, basically, or else it'll appear choppy.

So here's what you could do: (alert: this isn't the finished code, it needs some extra security checks to avoid crashing etc.)

CAbbadonChain::SpawnThink( void )
{
    m_pParent = UTIL_FindEntityByTargetname( NULL, STRING( pev->target ) ); // find our target

    SetThink( &CAbbadonChain::Think ); // we've spawnthought, now it's time to attach to the bones
    pev->nextthink = gpGlobals->time + 0.1;
}

CAbbadonChain::Think( void )
{
    GET_BONE_POSITION( ENT( m_pParent->pev ), 1, pev->origin, pev->angles );
    UTIL_SetOrigin( pev, pev->origin ); // to make me physically move to that origin, after I've visually moved there

   pev->nextthink = gpGlobals->time + 0.01;
}

And of course, somewhere in the Spawn() function, you'll SetThink( &CAbbadonChain::SpawnThink ); and maybe pev->flags ^= FL_ALWAYSTHINK; if you want your entity to think every frame.
Don't forget to put EXPORT in the declarations too:

void EXPORT SpawnThink( void );
void EXPORT Think( void );

Lastly, remember that this method might be a little bit network performance unfriendly, because you're now managing 3 or more entities instead of just 1. But if it's a singleplayer mod, then go for it.

Mmmmm, maybe I am wrong, but: this way I can do a SWARM of sentinels following a "leader" simply creating a hog monster composed by a single sentinel and then make the rest of them attach to the right bone. i.e: group 1 of sentinels attach to bone 1 , group to to bone 2, and so on, right?. BTW, you have learned A LOT of coding this years!!!!, you "talk" like Solo ands Sheppard!!

I used the number 1 because each "finger" has two bones: its own bone, and its child bone. Each finger attaches itself to a child bone.
So I was thinking of a chain, where each finger has a parent and a child. Finger A is the parent, finger B is the child, but a parent to finger C, for example.However, of course, you can easily achieve a swarm like what you said. In theory, at least.
It'd look something like this:At least the way I imagined it.

I think you'd still have to change the angles, but nonetheless, it'd be a really flexible system where you can detach a group from the parent to have its own AI, for example.

Also, LOL, yeah, I learn fast when I'm panicking for my future. I've been learning programming since 2015, I just had a chance to start doing it practically last year.

Brilliant!!, I would like to see some swarm of cyber-bees in your mod, Admer!! or giant killer-wasps...

Well, something could be done about that too, though I can't say much right now.

If you need some of those models, just tell me, remember that I am quite good at modelling.