Stairs and Climbing

[Binesi]

The FPS template character has trouble with all but the thinnest stairs. I thought the easiest solution was to put in an invisible ramp in the effected models. However while the character can climb the ramps, he becomes painfully slow at it. Is there a better way to handle climbing stairs?

[Squat]

Try setting the drag and friction on the ramp surface to 0. It will get you going a little bit faster, but it's true that there's some serious control issues with the players. Most of the time it feels like you're on ice, jump is unresponsive and glitchy and any surface that isn't level appears to allow for major glitching. Most games I play let you run around with full control on the top of a hand-rail. GC's character would never in a million years get one stable foot on it. It's NOT the collision meshes that's the problem. It's the movement of the player.

Also, why is it that the AI can't even go up a 5 degree slope when a player using the same script can get up about 20 degrees?

[Binesi]

What's funny is when using the editor in walk mode I can handle stairs and slopes just fine. I wish I could use that walking code instead of the template. I'll try playing with the friction settings.

[cohen]

Sorry to dig this post up, but I'd like to post my fix for this kind of problem.  I do not believe that character movement, aside from basic collision detection, has anything to do with physics simulation.  That would be onersouly painful on computing in-game, resulting in a very bad solution.  So adjusting friction amount on the contact plane will have no effect by design. 

Here is my take: use the latest network_character.gsl script on your player object.   For quick testing, load the network character from your template directory.  This will already have the network_character.gsl script applied.  Designate this as the player by checking the "make player" button under its object properties panel >> general tab >> 'make player' check box.  Now go over to its controller tab in the same object properties panel.  There you will find the network_character.gsl script.  You can view it there, but more importantly, you can adjust all of its parameters below, with in the controller settings area.  This area lists all available parameters for the script.  To help speed things up for your 'character', double click the walk and run paramters and double those values.  To solve the problem with jumping up steps, increase the value of the jump force parameter by 2x or even 3x.

I hope this is the solution you are/were looking for.  I have also needed to make some tweeks to get the player controls working smoothly.

[gekido]

The issue is likely the position of the collision model in your character.   Are you using the old 'bv' soldier character (or a modified version thereof)?  The old system had the collision model sitting on the ground by the character's feet.  This is because the old character script was basically a ball rolling around on the ground, which is a bad way to handle character movement (our bad for perpetuating this and not correcting it earlier).

The new system uses a dynamic ray-casting system, which relies on having the 'base' collision object positioned up higher, around the characters' waist.  This way the raycast checks down below the characters feet to see if they are falling, or alternately, if they need to be pushed up.  If you have the collision object too low, then the ray doesn't have a chance to cast and figure out that the character needs to be lifted up because the collision object is preventing the character from actually moving up the stairs ;}

Solution:

- raise the collision model to about the character's waist - here's a screen showing the rough area where your character's collision model should be:

PROPER CHARACTER COLLISION SETUP

http://www.gamecore3d.com/index.php?q=gallery&g2_itemId=2736


INCORRECT CHARACTER COLLISION SETUP

http://www.gamecore3d.com/index.php?q=gallery&g2_itemId=2739

[pixel_legolas]

thanks!

[gekido]

Basically the collision object should be set as high as you want the character to be able to automatically move overtop of objects.  So if you have rocks or other props on your ground that the character should be able to climb up onto automatically, the collision object should be higher than them.

This is covered by my character setup tutorial that I'm working on.

[Spaz]

Can't wait to see that tutorial! 

[zknack]

Looking forward to the tutorial as well :-)

[Architex]

I third that buddy.