Noisemaker Arrows

[teh_saccade]

Hi,

I'm having some problems with noisemakers since ... 2.04/2.05.

The AI will not react to them unless they are in:

1) same location
2) arrow is in same "visportal area"

Sometimes, it has happened that I've included a noisemaker to shoot through a door to lure a bunch of guards to investigate - it alerts them - but they do not go through the (open) door to investigate.

Instead, they will search the room in which they are in - running around like high alert - and then immediately head toward any noise the player makes (eg, a footstep).


Am I doing something wrong?

I've noticed this in others' maps too...


It's strange, because a broadhead stuck into the floor / hitting a plantpot or whatever through the open door will cause the guards to investigate, but the noisemaker will not function as it used to.

// apparently a) means smiley

Edited November 28, 2017 by teh_saccade

[teh_saccade]

Figured it out - it's a portal and height thing.

Seems if a doorway's visportal is red and the arrow lands inside it, it doesn't work as well as if shot through when it is green/open.

Also, if the arrow lands up/down a level - like shooting it halfway up a flight of stairs that have bannister with AI at top and bottom (eg, the pub stairs in mission#1) - it might be that occasionally the AI don't hear it through a doorway or (sometimes) in the same room. Doesn't disturb anyone in the pub nor the one-eye'd guy upstairs. Definitely doesn't attract the outside guy.

Shooting a noisemaker outside the pub will bring almost everyone - including the guy upstairs... Esp if done twice to put them further away.

Shooting a broadhead to knock over the candle next to the two guys in the pub will attract pretty much everyone to investigate.

Can't figure out the distance thing... Sometimes a noisemaker will now attract people from across the map and not disturb a guard who is right next to it... Still testing, but it does appear that height and/or doorway is factor in it working as it did.

 

Edited November 29, 2017 by teh_saccade

[Springheel]

Some of the visportals in A New Job have a sound_loss value attached, which affects how easily sound travels through that portal. From memory, the stairs have one, and the front door does as well.

 

Seems if a doorway's visportal is red and the arrow lands inside it

 

 

How can you shoot an arrow through a red visportal? It should only go red if the door is shut or you don't have a line of sight to it.

[teh_saccade]

Lean out of cover to acquire target / open portal, shoot, lean and step back into cover to close portal before arrow passes through.

Space, time, distance, velocity, etc... Physics stuff.

You said it yourself - line of sight - simply break it before the projectile passes through.
Doesn't even have to be long range.

It's not only A New Job, Springheel (which is very thi4f / dishonored - thought I was having flashbacks - really nice build. Both ghosted (fastest option) and killed everyone [including the contact, which fails the mission] and even managed to get the boxes from the start onto the roof of the place - nice couple of explorer's loot pieces too - safe was very elegant, good hunt for the combination find - though idk why not weapon scrollwheel instead of inv [] - and excellent demonstration of TDM as thief-like stealth game. Only found one or two glitches...).

I picked that mission because it was short and I know it has noisemakers to lure everyone on the map out of the pub and then block the door with a candle. Also because of the portals you mentioned being a good example of "noisemaker's not working when they oughta".

It's pretty much every mission with a noisemaker and especially a few maps of my own where I'd normally shoot through a couple of doorways and now the guys aren't noticing it...
But stick a broadhead into the floor of the room or shoot that plate on the table to send it flying and everyone's interested in what that was...

It's difficult to trade-off between sound dampening through doorways / vp's and allowing the player freedom to operate as they wish, rather than follow the script. Go here, do this, then this, sneak here.
If you get caught, you're either screwed or you have to run a massive circuit to the magpie's nest and go in the back way (unless you can score three hits on an armoured guard's face in a swordfight while fending off 2-6 other attackers...).


I'm not sure what's changed, but perhaps in these other missions there is something similar happening.

Something to bear in mind if offering noisemakers (over eg, simply chucking an inventory/environment object or hitting a wall or something), perhaps.

There's something about the direction of TDM's maps in the past year or so that is tasting like very nice looking, but rather tasteless bread with varying amounts of butter.
It's... almost become like running routines and errands, new stuff new stuff, instead of facing new or inventive challenges using stuff we have stuff we have.

Then again, maybe I should just shut up and scrub up the first campaign mission as a standalone and put my money where my mouth is, instead of just uploading .maps as code and deleting stuff or just playing for fun, myself and a few mates...

(if it wasn't for 2.05 messing up all my traps, and I'd figured out all the scripting for jobs board, maybe the first part of the campaign would be done... // pete atdm:"mandatory_snipe_about_2.05_mover_damage = 1")