you could have a separete entity for each vehicle with a dropdown menu for armor and engine. An integer value for each side for armor. Not sure what would be best for weapons though.
Just make it so that the same restrictions are put on map-based vehicles as are put on player-made vehicles. If you try to make a vehicle with 50 layers of armor, or put a railgun on an artillery tank, it outputs an error to console and doesn't spawn the thing. (My vehicle weapons script has a 24x salvo missile launcher, which shows up in my build menu, but any server will tell me my tank is invalid if I try to build a tank with it. :p ) As for the 'huge menu in hammer' issue... The script presets outline what you need. Vehicle type, armor, engine, plates on each side, etc. Weapons might be difficult, but you don't necessarily need to put all the options on the table.
While using scripts is a good way to handle it, as well as allowing other level designers to use the presets, it can be abused, for example, if a server owner modifies his copy to spawn a different vehicle, or a vehicle equipped with much more powerful weaponry. You could limit this by using entities specific for each side and vehicle, but no matter how many options you put into the entity, there will always be a degree of editable content in those scripts. Some might say it's good, but if the level designer sets up a vehicle in a certain way, he probably doesn't wants somebody else changing it and wrecking all the balancing he's done in the map. What i'm trying to say is, it will take a lot of planning before map-spawnable vehicles can be added.
with a sourcemod plugin it could be as easy as CreateEntityByName and setting key values, and i garuntee i would sploit this the first weeek of it being out for shits and giggles. If you can code it in couldnt you add bounds? ie. Code: if(chassis==HEAVY&&rightarmor>6) rightarmor=MAXARMORSIDE_HEAVY; so that if set above a certain # it would revert to the max or min. You could probably do weapons like spawnflags are done.
Not like you break enough of Empires already. But thanks for proving the point that idiots like you would break an easy idea of adding spawnable vehicles in. Warned for this post. Don't flame other members
[rant] Don't be such a dick, owning is one of the few people keeping empires fresh, his plugins try out new aspects of the game without making permanent alterations. They may be a crude way of implementing stuff, but they work, they're interesting, fun and new. And even discarding those plugins, plugins such as !id (tells you builder of a wall or turret) has been such a help with getting rid of griefers, I literally could say that after a month with this one, we virtually never have this problem anymore. So stop being a dick to one of the few people really trying to keep this mod going during the long wait for 2.2, at the very least give some feedback rather than "this sucks" *why?* "just does.". [/rant] Warned for this post. Don't flame other members
Alright, statement came out rude. I still agree with what I said. I will admit some of the plugins he has made is very good for Empires, but he also made a lot of plugins that are still in use today that screw with the game.
Also, I think this needs to be said, but, Please don't take my statement as "IT WILL BE IN THE NEXT VERSION". I said I was going to look into it. There's some back-end changes that I want to do for 2.3 would make a possible implementation very easy, but, 1) They aren't done, and 2) It's low on the priority list. If it's simple to do, it will be done, however, If I get into it and it's hacked together, not pretty, and downright crappy, It probably wont see the light of day.
He's just saying that so when it is actually implemented in the next version you will be even more surprised OMG BUSTED!
Nachos... Are you joking? This was obviously sarcasm was it? When are Blimps, Atomic Bombs, Missile Silos, Laser Rifles, Missile Tanks, Tesla Guns and Repair Vehicles being implented?
Are you serious? What about vehicle hijacking? It adds a whole new dimension to game play. E.g. if BE leaves an unattended rail heavy next to their comm... Why take that out? In all seriousness, I really like the hijack plugin. I think it should become a feature of Empires in 2.3.
Everyone is missing the point Nachos and JALAPENOS. Jalapenos was our server before juicebox, we took jalapenos down and put juicebox up, jalapenos may come back up.
