fxReplicatorBlocker

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What is this
I've always felt the replicators to be powerful, and thanks Melv for those! But they are lacking a little, and today I finally got around to do something about some of the things I feel are missing.

This is a nifty little new object type that allows you to block out replication inside a replicator area. The idea has long been in my head, and today I saw the unused VehicleBlocker code. So I jumped right into it and coded away.

Screenshots tell it all, so here is one:


Dump some of these into your scene and you can have 1 replicator create a huge forrest, and the blockers then "carve" paths through the forrest as needed. The alternative would be to have tons of replicators and fiddling with their sizes and rotations.

Engine changes

It is quite easy to add this.

Add the 2 attached files to the game/fx dir, and then do the following changes

main.cc
After this

Con::setIntVariable("$TypeMasks::StaticRenderedObjectType", StaticRenderedObjectType);
   Con::setIntVariable("$TypeMasks::DamagableItemObjectType",  DamagableItemObjectType);

add this

Con::setIntVariable("$TypeMasks::fxReplicatorBlockerObjectType", fxReplicatorBlockerObjectType);

objectTypes.h
After this

DamagableItemObjectType =     bit(27),

add this

fxReplicatorBlockerObjectType =    bit(28),

fxShapeReplicator changes

in game/fx/fxShapeReplicator.cc find this

// Initialise RayCast Search Start/End Positions.
            ShapeStart = ShapeEnd = ShapePosition;
            ShapeStart.z = 2000.f;
            ShapeEnd.z= -2000.f;

and change it to

// Initialise RayCast Search Start/End Positions.
            ShapeStart = ShapeEnd = ShapePosition;
            ShapeStart.z = 2000.f;
            ShapeEnd.z= -2000.f;

			// Check for blockers
		    RayInfo         BlockerRayEvent;
			if (isServerObject()) {
				if (gServerContainer.collideBox(ShapeStart, ShapeEnd, fxReplicatorBlockerObjectType, &BlockerRayEvent)) {
					continue;
				}
			} else {
				if (gClientContainer.collideBox( ShapeStart, ShapeEnd, fxReplicatorBlockerObjectType, &BlockerRayEvent)) {
					continue;
				}
			}

Script changes
Open common/editor/objectBuilderGui.gui and add this somewhere in there

function ObjectBuilderGui::buildfxReplicatorBlocker(%this)
{
   %this.className = "fxReplicatorBlocker";
   %this.addField("dimensions", "TypePoint3", "Dimensions",  "2 2 2");
   %this.process();
}

Open common/editor/EditorGui.cs and find this:

%Environment_Item[10] = "fxFoliageReplicator";
   %Environment_Item[11] = "fxLight";

and add this

%Environment_Item[12]  = "fxReplicatorBlocker";

(or whatever is the next item number)

Thats it!!

In your mission editor add replicators and blockers as you see fit. Good luck and enjoy!!

TODO
I ran out of time for today, so I didnt get the blockers to properly update themselves graphically when you change their dimension. A save/reload of the level does the trick.

This should also go into the foilage replicator, but I ran out of time. I'll add this later too.