WorldBuilder TotW #10: Blockers

Cool stuff. Great graphics! Thanks MB

Thank you for the guide. All of them in fact are great. I've learned so much from you and OnkelSam. But these tips of the week are really helpful. I look forward to a guide about making Mud maps and Snow. For a newbie like me its a bit tricky.

Hello,
first of all thanks for all the helpfull tutorials and tips.
Now my problem: i tried these blockers and the sight and movement blocking function is working fine, but the shoot blocking function isn't working at all. I can shoot and throw granades through them.
Is there anything to do to enable the shoot blocking function, before they work?
I hope you could help me with this.

THX mastermitb

Hello,
first of all thanks for all the helpfull tutorials and tips.
Now my problem: i tried these blockers and the sight and movement blocking function is working fine, but the shoot blocking function isn't working at all. I can shoot and throw granades through them.
Is there anything to do to enable the shoot blocking function, before they work?
I hope you could help me with this.

THX mastermitb

Hey mastermitb!

So, it turns out that the shot blockers that have been imported over from vCoH's WorldBuilder do not function in the same way that they should. What they were designed for was to block all shot weapons (not including grenades, which can go through and over ANY object), but now the mechanics of changed: tanks and AT guns can fire through objects with Attack Ground, which means that they can circumvent the blockers.

However they will still work to prevent infantry firing through.

I'm afraid that there is no way to stop this besides using Sight Blockers instead, to prevent units knowing that the enemy is on the other side of the blocker.

Also, please ensure that you have not assigned a blocker to a team! It must be neutral!

Does the blocking effect apply to the whole volume of the rectangular frame you get when you select the block, or just to the vertical plane where the word BLOCK appears?

You're right to mention this! The blocking should apply to the whole rectangle frame.

If you hit shift+f5, it will show the size of the area that it blocks on the ground in impass (red). The size of the BLOCK lettering signifies its height.

Thanks. I have a map with some steep-sided flat-topped hills, and units at the foot of the hill are always shooting at units set back from the edge of the top, which they shouldn't be able to see.

Here's a view from the side:

        ____*___
       /
      /
     /
__*_/

The asterisks show the positions of the shooters.

Looks like I need to embed a block in the ground, with the top front edge right along the top edge of the hill:

        ____*___
       /| |
      / |_|
     /
__*_/

The rectangle shows the top, bottom, front, and back of the blocker's box.

I assume this would let units walk over the top of it. However, a problem could still develop if the corner of the hilltop gets shot away enough to expose part of the box. Maybe I'll try it with a LOS blocker instead. (Unfortunately, I don't see any shot blockers that aren't also movement blockers.)

They really should treat the ground mesh as a sight/shot blocker. Maybe it's too computationally expensive?

Thanks for the tutorial. This stuff is really interesting to learn and play with.

Update: I tried the sight-block-only object per the instructions below, and it doesn't project the undesired impassibility onto the terrain above the blocks. I played a game and didn't notice any abuse, but I'll need to play several more to be sure.

A few units were still just barely clipping the corner of the hilltops with their shots, so that may mean that I sank the blocks too deep. (Or maybe they had a spotter, so the sight blocks were irrelevant.)

I'll do some more experimenting and then update the instructions if I think it's working OK.

This didn't work - it projects impassibility to the terrain above the blocks.

I'll leave this post for now, in case someone figures out a workaround.

Easier said than done...

I haven't tried it in a game yet, but here's the easiest way I can figure out to do it in the worldbuilder:

• Set the overlay to the 5m grid, to help you see the curvature of the landscape better.
  
• Create an object spline:
  
  • Start by using a wall such as concrete_l_04. This is important because the thin wall sections make it easier to see where to align the spine with the terrain.
    
  • Set it to wall mode / adjustable to terrain.
    
  • Unless the ground is perfectly level, set the spacing to -0.75/-0.75. The resulting overlap will make the stairsteps between the sections smaller.
    
  • Line it up with the crest or edge of the hilltop until you're satisfied.
    
  • Now switch the spine to ebps->gameplay->designer_objects->objects->6x12_sight_shot_blocking_uncrushable instead of the wall.
    
    • In addition to having the desired properties, this one is really nice because it shades the whole volume blue, making it easy to see it when you sink it in the ground later.
      
    • The wide blocks won't match the terrain as well as the fence did, but unless you're just placing a few blocks you're only sacrificing a little accuracy to avoid a whole lot of headache.
      
  • Uncheck wall mode and click Apply Changes.
    
  • Now click Bake (at top of the right panel) to convert it from a spline to objects.
    
  • Leave it as it is for now.
    
• Do the above for the whole map.
  
• When they're all laid out, use Scenario->Blueprint List to select all instances of the sight/shot blocker.
  
• Put your camera where you have a good view of some of them, an sink them into the ground by holding 'h' and mb-1 while pulling down with the mouse. Sink them until they just barely disappear under the terrain.
  
  • Notice that since they are all selected, you will be lowering them all by the same amount. You will again be trading a little precision for a whole lot of convenience.
    

If you're a perfectionist (and what map maker isn't?) you can sink one spline at a time until most of it disappears but a few corners stick out, then select individual blocks to sink further if you think their exposed corners will be a problem.

OTOH, if your terrain elevation isn't extremely convoluted, just sink things until all the corners disappear, and the blocks should be pretty close to where you want them. If one block is a bit too low it just means there will be a LOS a little further back on the hilltop, but probably not enough for anyone to tell the difference during a game.

Hopefully this will save a lot of annoying behavior in the game.

I'm confused at what you're trying to accomplish with the above post, which seems far too complicated for the result you're aiming for.

In essence, there is no way that you can have "layers" of impassibility. If something is impassible because of an object, it stays that way (unless destroyed). This is the age-old answer to why units can't travel under bridges.

However, if you're annoyed at units who are shooting through the lip of a cliff, when they shouldn't be able to see units above or below it, there are several simple work arounds.

Firstly, use the Line of Sight Blocker. This blocker blocks only the outline of the object itself, and infantry can walk over it. Once units have walked past the blocker, they will fight as normal. However, this has a flaw, in which if a unit has stepped over a blocker, they will now be blind to everything behind them. Try to place the blocker "in" the cliff, so that nobody can actually walk over it. Only have it so that they can see over it.

Secondly, increase the height of your cliff, and place a grove into the cliffside. Infantry on high ground can now see over certain objects (and this is well worth testing to get the desired effect). Infantry on the lower ground cannot see a thing, but will become aware of the enemy on the cliff if they are fired upon. This offers a very unique "I hold the high ground" advantage, in that you will always get the first shot.

Thirdly, place impass on the cliff itself, or line the cliff with support walls. This is the least effective method, and units will still often shoot through the floor, but a number of shots from the lower ground will instead hit the support walls, giving another pseudo-advantage.

I came to the same conclusion re using the LoS block.

The method I posted was "complicated" because I'm trying to avoid positioning about 200 blocks one at a time. I did about 60, it was really easy (after figuring things out), and it worked pretty well except as mentioned I needed to set them a bit higher.

So many awesome Worldbuilder Tips and Guides... you guys now have your own GUIDES category! Keep up the great work!