ai_goal_assault Wildcards (HL2 2009/Ep2 2007 SDK)

General Development Source 1
#1

Trying to structure an assault by six Overwatch soldiers for my mod. The description for the entity ai_goal_assault says that you can tie multiple soldiers into the assault by using a wildcard format: put the name, then a number at the end of the string, and all soldiers with the same naming scheme can be roped in with an asterisk in the actor use list.

From the Wiki:

Actor(s) to affect <target_name_or_class> NPCs that should perform this assault. This field supports wildcards, if they are needed. Note: Each NPC needs its own rally point, so if you use wildcards for this field, you should also use wildcards for the rallypoint.


First part of the entity setup. This wakes the soldiers, activates the assault, and, afterwards, activates a script for the squad leader to place a breaching charge.


Part two of the entity setup. This is the actual ai_goal_assault, with the wildcard setup.

Currently the soldiers refuse to budge from their starting positions, despite being told to wake and the assault told to Activate and Begin Assault.

The soldiers disobeying orders. They should all be shot. (Yes,the environment looks like shit because I’m not done with the map yet)

At any rate, I’ve been throwing myself at assaults for some time and I can’t ever seem to get them to work properly. Short of using scripted sequences for the entire thing, or linking the squad to enemyfinders around the map to let them track the player, how could I fix this?

#2

You can use the Assault input for npc_combine_s instead of ai_goal_assault.

I’ll follow up on this after I skim your post a bit more. Hold on.

EDIT: You never sent the BeginAssault input to your ai_goal_assault entity.

EDIT: Since you want to know alternatives, there’s also the aiscripted_schedule entity that you can use. It’s more for small scripted movements that don’t take the NPC out of AI in order to function. It’s less functional than both Assaults and Scripted Sequences, but it’s a nice clean thing you can do if you want simplicity (ie, you don’t need the combat functionalities of an Assault, and you don’t need the scripting control of a Scripted Sequence).

#3

It’s a very combat focused assault. The six man team is supposed to hit a coffee shop where the player is holed up. Breach and clear, all that jazz.

EDIT: I actually DID have an input to BeginAssault, but it’s supposed to trigger after the point man places the breaching charge. I’ll probably have to use either a path_corner or a scripted_sequence to move the squad to the door and onto their rally points. Then once the sequence for the breach is complete, the assault will fire as scheduled.

EDIT 2: Okay, I think I’ll go with using aiscripted_schedule to “Run Goal Path” with path corner entities. This might actually make the AI look like they’re moving in a snake formation as well, which should be cool.

EDIT 3: Okay, so that method only kinda works. The soldiers run along the goal path ONLY if they can’t see the player. Otherwise they return to normal AI. I’ll set the interruptibility to “Damage or Death” and see if that fixes it. However, the scripted sequences for each soldier that are supposed to make the soldiers go to the wall don’t seem to be working. I tried to group all of the sequences under one unified entity name for easier firing, but I might have to try individual names for each to get them working. Arg.

#4

You do realize that you can use wildcards for inputs, right?

#5

Really? I actually did not know that. I’ll try that later today and report back.

#6

I found this post very informative and beneficial to me.Thanx for sharing… :stuck_out_tongue:

#7

And he never reported back.

I think the Combine got him.

It must have worked.

#8

Yeah, I did forget to do that, huh? :stuck_out_tongue:

I think it did, if memory serves, but it’s rather inconsistent because aiscripted_schedule is so ai-reliant. Sometimes the whole team goes along the goal path and lines up on the wall. Sometimes a few of them lollygag back at spawn and randomly patrol the area. I’ll have to look at my entity setup again and see if there’s anything I can tweak.

#9

Trying to structure an assault by six Overwatch soldiers for my mod. The description for the entity ai_goal_assault says that you can tie multiple

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