Newbie DarkRadiant Questions

[joebarnin]

As smooth as it looks, I don't think the xray technique will work for me. For gameplay reasons, I really want the player to see into the actual room that they are transported into. Xray doesn't do this (and @grodenglaive's cubemap, as far as I can tell?). I'm experimenting with func_cameraview - it looks a bit funky, but I'll try to work around it.

[datiswous]

I also tried a window with a portalsky recently. But I think you cannot specify the size for some reason, So the area you look into looks very large.

I couldn't get the cameraview working correctly when I tried in the past. Maybe the camera testmap from grayman could be helpful.

https://wiki.thedarkmod.com/index.php?title=Security_Camera#Examining_a_Test_Map

 

17 hours ago, joebarnin said:

For gameplay reasons, I really want the player to see into the actual room that they are transported into.

Why is this important? Are you suposed to see something happening with ai or something?

Edited March 10 by datiswous

[joebarnin]

46 minutes ago, datiswous said:

Why is this important? Are you suposed to see something happening with ai or something?

AI on patrol, moveable objects, lights switched on or off. That sort of thing.

If it isn't possible, I can work around it. I'm just hoping it's possible in some way that doesn't look too hokey.

[grodenglaive]

On 3/9/2026 at 7:26 PM, joebarnin said:

As smooth as it looks, I don't think the xray technique will work for me. For gameplay reasons, I really want the player to see into the actual room that they are transported into. Xray doesn't do this (and @grodenglaive's cubemap, as far as I can tell?). I'm experimenting with func_cameraview - it looks a bit funky, but I'll try to work around it.

No, unfortunately the cubemap won't work for a live view - it's prerecorded static image files.

[grodenglaive]

How would one make a light that flickers a bit, goes out for a while and comes back on? Perhaps to give you enough time to get past it. I think I've seen that in a mission. 

 

[joebarnin]

1 hour ago, grodenglaive said:

How would one make a light that flickers a bit, goes out for a while and comes back on? Perhaps to give you enough time to get past it. I think I've seen that in a mission. 

 

I can think of a couple of possibilities. One is a script that just turns the light off and on in a loop. Something like:

void flicker()
{
	while (true)
	{
		sys.wait(10); // light on for 10 seconds
		float loop;
		
		// flicker a few times
		for ( loop = 0 ; loop < 4 ; loop += 1 )
		{
			$mylight.Off();
            		sys.wait(sys.random(0.1)+.1);
           		$mylight.On();
            		sys.wait(sys.random(0.1)+.1);
		}
		$mylight.Off();
		sys.wait(5); // light off for 5 seconds
           	$mylight.On();
	}
}

You can adjust the code to change your flicker behavior. Start this in your main() with:

thread flicker();

The other technique is to use the s_shader spawnarg on your light. Several outdoor lights use this already - the light makes a humming noise, and the brightness of the light is determined by the volume of the sound. It's an inverse relationship - the louder the sound, the more the light is off. You could make a sound that is silent, then a hum for a few seconds. The hum will turn the light off, I think.

[grodenglaive]

awesome that should do it, thanks!

[datiswous]

You can also make a shader that does the flicker itself. I mean light table.

see info here:

and here:

 

Edited March 13 by datiswous

[datiswous]

Mission A Collector's Errand has one in the first room on the left after start mission.

[thebigh]

The flickering lights in the machine room? That light switches on and off in response to some trigger-timers and trigger-relays. Those also control the malfunctioning fan in that room and the gear machine by the door to the main sewer room.

[grodenglaive]

17 hours ago, datiswous said:

You can also make a shader that does the flicker itself. I mean light table.

see info here:

and here:

 

Thanks, that could be fun to play with. I had initially looked at the shader, but didn't know how it worked and couldn't find any documentation.

[sullium]

Hi, I'd like to make an objective that completes when the player picks up a fire arrow. I tried putting the name of my map's fire arrow entity into a "player possesses item" component but it doesn't trigger when the player takes the fire arrow. If I change it to point to a loot item instead (as a test), then the objective completes upon picking up that loot item as expected.

I guess frobbing the fire arrow entity might not exactly add that named entity to the player's inventory, but instead increments an ammo counter as the entity disappears. So the player would never actually "possess" the entity itself.

What would be a good/clean workaround for this? In this case it doesn't really matter if it applies to this specific fire arrow or any fire arrow, since this is the only one in the mission.

Edited April 14 by sullium

[JackFarmer]

7 minutes ago, sullium said:

Hi, I'd like to make an objective that completes when the player picks up a fire arrow. I tried putting the name of my map's fire arrow entity into a "player possesses item" component but it doesn't trigger when the player takes the fire arrow. If I change it to point to a loot item instead (as a test), then the objective completes upon picking up that loot item as expected.

I guess frobbing the fire arrow entity might not exactly add that named entity to the player's inventory, but instead increments an ammo counter as the entity disappears. So the player would never actually "possess" the entity itself.

What would be a good/clean workaround for this? In this case it doesn't really matter if it applies to this specific fire arrow or any fire arrow, since this is the only one in the mission.

Give the arrow a frob response which fires an objective completion script/trigger. If you do not know how to do that, let me know.

[Wellingtoncrab]

@sulliumin my experience weapons are not like other inventory items in that the entity which goes into your inventory is spawned and is not actually the specific entity you picked up, so you cannot rely on a named entity once they are in the players inventory. I had this problem with the sword anyway when I tried to make a similar objective for picking it up.

I ended up making the objective controlled by a script, added a frob response to the sword with the frob/response editor which fires a script when the weapon is frobbed (ie picked up), and then wrote a short map script that just set the right objective state to complete.

[sullium]

@JackFarmer @Wellingtoncrab Ah that makes perfect sense, thank you both for the quick response!

[grodenglaive]

Is there a way for an AI beggar to sit on the ground or is the chair position the only one available?

[Baal]

I have seen sitting AI on the ground in at least one mission ("Seeking lady Leicester" in a secret area). Maybe that's applicaple for your case.

[grodenglaive]

thanks, I thought I'd seen it somewhere

[datiswous]

In Oficial mission 1 A new job there is one at the start. Also In mission 2 I think.

[grodenglaive]

(from A New Job) It was pretty simple, set the AI to seated and add these two spawn args: 

idle_animations_sitting  idle_sit_beggar
replace_anim_idle_sit  idle_sit_beggar