activator Last edited 2 months ago2024-02-20 15:31:53 UTC

In GoldSrc entity system, the activator is the initiator of the entity events.

For example, when a player walks into a trigger, the player is the activator. In multiplayer, only the player who walks into a trigger is the activator. If a trigger has "Alow Monsters" flag on, then monsters that walk into them become activators.

Activators are use to preserve or keep track of the initiator of the entity events. For example, env_fade can be made to only apply to the activator with the "Activator Only" flag. In multiplayer, it is used to award points to players who uses environmental traps or something like func_tank.

This allows a chaining of triggers e.g. a trigger targets a trigger_relay, which targets a game_text, which displays text to only the activator by default.

However, this activator chain can be broken when:

• Delay is introduced (using "delay before trigger" property)
• Using multi_manager

Therefore, care should be taken to make sure entities that affect activators aren't targeted in the above ways. For example, a multi_manager targeting a game_text will crash the game unless "All clients" flag is checked.