From a post I made on the Steam discussion board:-
I want an invisible entity I can place in my maps at the same locations as my waypoints. Any knowledgeable soul have guidance for me?

Corrosion suggested the invisible_wall script which I tried, but . . .

I am failing entirely in my quest.
I have opted to use the shovel in the scenery pack.
I have renamed it's dbo
I have changed the fpe to get rid of the old fpi references and made aimain=invisible_wall.lua
I have changed collisionmode to 11.
I can still see it but don't collide with it.

I have also tried changing the properties in the editor to use invisible_wall.
Nuthin' I do don't seem to work...

I have also tried using the invisible wall from the easter pack, renamed it's dbo, changed the fpe to collisionmode=11.
I can't see it, but I still collide with it.

Frustration mounts >

Why are you setting collisionmode to 11? My invisible walls have it set to 0 and they work fine.

He's not trying to give it collision, he's trying to turn the collision off, he wants the object to be a hidden object ruining a script. collisionmode 11 and Hide(e) in the script should do it.

ferzackerly

Oh, in that case just put CollisionOff( e ) in the script.

What exactly are you trying to achieve though?

@amenmoses: collisionmode=11 is no longer collision off? I picked it up from an earlier thread.
And why when I use Hide(e) is my shovel still visible? I tried it first on a bowl in the abandoned apartment set and concluded that it didn't work because those models only have .DBO's, not .x's, but it didn't work on the shovel either.

Aarggggh!

invisible_wall.lua works on the eggs from the Easter pack, on the walls from the easter pack, but not on the shovel from Scenery or the bowl from abandoned apartment.

It's this kind of thing that causes unrest

Are you making them active?

Shovel works fine for me btw.

Made it active, Physics off and issimobile=yes attached invisible wall script and it's magically disappeared.

Okay.
Slow on the uptake. Shouldn't have selected a static entity.

Problem solved.

I don't mess about with fpe files if I can avoid it.

What I'm doing is experimenting to see what I could achieve in terms of npc behaviours, were I able to access waypoint proximity in the npc script - or vice-versa. For instance - when the npc approaches this point he gets killed by the autocannon, (do we have one in the plethora of assets?), giving the player the insight that he shouldn't approach that location without finding some means of disabling the defenses.
No idea whether any of that is feasible but finding out will give my laggardly brain something to chew on - probably for quite a while, (so no Ah - you can do that like this's please ).

unless you are planning on using free-form paths you can already do this with the normal waypoints - there's code there already even to tell the NPC's to move to the next point.
if you want to use a free-form path (i.e. for flight / movement not restricted to entities or terrain) then sure, use an invis object.

tell if you're close to a certain point is done like this
(nodeIndex is the number of the node along the path (i.e. how many points/dots there are in the path - set the number to the one you want to trigger the event) *note i'm not sure if you start counting from 0 or 1*



this doesn't really suit your example, you should just use a proximity to the cannon or a zone

@smallg: bad example, I agree. How about making the npc stop and change animation - maybe sit down on a chair for a while, get up and run away?
Thanks for the code, but it seems to me about as opaque as it could possibly be, relying upon a knowledgebase that I cannot, nor ever will be able to call upon.

I know you were trying to help, but now I'm to have to go find something else to occupy my mind.

What's about a trigger zone, when npc approaches it, the cannon will be activate.

not really sure why it would be opaque, it's using the normal method to get distance based calculations, all answers on the subject will use it in some form, trial and error is your friend, just change the numbers and see what happens

to trigger sitting down for a while (for example) you just need to trigger the state to do so...
i.e.
this code would be used to trigger an entity to change to "sit" state when he reaches node 5 on the path
(note it doesn't actually work, it's just theory - you would need to add code to actually walk the path and animations etc)


if you need it broken down then essentially these lines
local patrolx = AIPathGetPointX(ai_bot_pathindex[e],nodeIndex)
local patroly = AIPathGetPointY(ai_bot_pathindex[e],nodeIndex)
local patrolz = AIPathGetPointZ(ai_bot_pathindex[e],nodeIndex)
are just getting the point's location in GG - i.e. the same as if you had an invis object at some location and called
local patrolx = GetEntityPositionX(e)
local patroly = GetEntityPositionY(e)
local patrolz = GetEntityPositionZ(e)

the next part just works out the difference between the object/node and the NPC
local tDistX = g_Entity[e]['x'] - patrolx
local tDistZ = g_Entity[e]['z'] - patrolz
local VertDist = math.abs(g_Entity[e]['y'] - patroly)

and finally get those values as 1 value rather than 3 (or 2 in this case as height is dealt with separately in the next step)
local DistFromPath = math.sqrt(math.abs(tDistX*tDistX)+math.abs(tDistZ*tDistZ))

then that value is compared to some distance you want the NPC to be within
if DistFromPath < 25 and VertDist < 95 then

Or use utillib which has functions to do that stuff in already.

Sorry for my responses to everyones helpful replies.
Brain rot is obviously now well advanced in my cranium.
Ciao.

?utillib?

utillib.lua, it is one of the libraries I have provided that gives a variety of useful functions.

I did post a tutorial showing how to use it but I can't find it.

Basically you add:
local U = require "scriptbank\\utillib"
at the top of your script and then use the functions from it like this:
if U.PlayerCloserThan( e, 200 ) then

That looks very useable. Where can I find it?

it's part of the core scripts, you will have it already, just add the code amen posted to another script to start using it

Doh!
Found it.
Not working on the right PC.