laser beams

[shaggydavid]

can someone help me take an unused weapon and make a laser out of it so i can use it for vulture. i can do the graphical changes i need to know how to make the iscript tell it to blast from vulture to target with out breaking until it has hit the target, or maby shoot in a line twards a target, break from the vulture and fly to target while the vulture starts the attack over again.

[Protogod]

just make it have a tiny cooldown time, so the images overlap, forming a laser shape

[Durandal]

just make it have a tiny cooldown time, so the images overlap, forming a laser shape

Yes, perfect! Then the player can enjoy his horrendous fire lag.

A better option that was suggested to me when I asked a similar question was to simply use the Archon Attack overlay, and iscript on the Psi Beam, so that it appears like a laser. It should be pretty simple, but if you can't get it to work right, you could just make the archon look like a vulture and make that buildable instead.

Otherwise, your options are a bit limited.

[migidu]

i did make a tutorial on this :) :

http://www.warboards.org/showthread.php?p=574737#post574737

i dont know how to make new graphics really, but check out this. my high templar attacks with a high templar glow. :D (i didnt know how to post images then so i dont have pics to show.)

for your idea of laser. i think you want it to behave like the yamato gun?

[shaggydavid]

i would like idealy to have a laser shoot out of the vulture as a constant beam until it hits it target, then an explosion, while it is exploding start laser sequence again. if it is not posible then something like the yamato maby, im not wanting it to "charge up" like the yamato does, but rather like a normal weapon.

[Durandal]

I still think the archon beam is a good bet, with modified graphics.

[migidu]

im not saying it will be like the yamato gun charging up. im saying that it will have behaviour "fly to target". just examine the iscript of those flingys if you like. did you even check that link i gave? you'll see what i mean.

ive seen an archon before that like doesnt stop hitting its target till it dies, it was just repeat the playfram and attackwith for a lot ot times. so that in the game it looks like its holding its breathe hitting its target. til its target dies.

[Durandal]

Your suggestion is incredibly complex and doesn't really directly relate to his problem. He just wants a simple continuous-beam laser.

[shaggydavid]

Your suggestion is incredibly complex and doesn't really directly directly relate to his problem. He just wants a simple continuous-beam laser.
exactly.

[migidu]

Your suggestion is incredibly complex and doesn't really directly relate to his problem. He just wants a simple continuous-beam laser.

that tutorial tells you how to make new weapons, that's what he wants. he wants a continous laser beam which is not available in the game, so you need to make the graphics and iscript it.

okay. i'll clear it more up. sorry. i dont know why its complex. :mad:

alright shaggy, i'll give you 3 options.

#1 : you have a graphics of a laser right? substitute it to any flingy you're not gonna use. then rename it to that existing grp's name. now iscript that flingy with the behaviour you want. you could check out the iscripts of existing weapons like yamato gun (this what i meant) and iscript it similarly. then go to dat edit and apply the flingy as a graphics under the weapon tab and choose behaviour "fly to target" if its like that. then compile the whole thing.

#2 : in the iscript without editing the vulture's grp. add to your desire the attackwith # and wait 1. this will make the vulture do multiple shots in straight line. thus it would look like a straight beam then set the cooldown of the weapon in dat edit to 1.

# 3 : for the archon beam, you would edit the vulture's grp so that it will have the similar beam of the archon. i dont know how to make new graphics. set the cool down of the weapon in dat edit to 1. this will make the vulture attack very fast like its continuous.

i tried my best to make it not incredibly complex :o

[Durandal]

For option 1, you might not really need to use the iscript. You can theoretically just pair its iscript to that of any existing weapon (as most shots only have about 17 frames in them, anyway). Beware though, if the script calls any unexisting frames in the graphic for some reason, it'll crash.

Option 2 is the easiest option if you just want a laser right away, but it's also undoubtedly the most harmful. If you have a long, slower moving laser graphic, you can set the wait to much higher.

The archon beam should also be relatively simple, and uses the lesser of the iscript gruntwork. You'd just need to change the graphics for the archon beam, then go into the vulture and Archon's iscript and compare them until you find where it calls for the psibeam.

Although, the easiest way out is to just decompile the archon's and vulture's GRP's into BMP's, and then recompile the archon graphic using the vulture graphic, only copy and paste the frames three times over in the .ral, if you're using RetroGRP. Like this, for example;

vulture0.bmp
vulture1.bmp
vulture2.bmp
vulture0.bmp
vulture1.bmp
vulture2.bmp

which would compile all of the archon's frames using the vulture graphic with all the necesarry frames. I know that's probably confusing, but it's another shortcut if you don't like Ice :)