blueprint

[icy dragon]

Get Player Controller -> Set Input Mode Game and UI or Set Input Mode UI Only

[fiery glen]

uuuh, the interface issue appears to be related to new BP interfaces being read only

not sure how to resolve that

sheesh, are interfaces just busted in 4.27? something is up

[round moth]

im new to ue4

so its prolly me

[fiery glen]

sorry, I'm referring to the other guy

[trim matrix]

Me?

[fiery glen]

yeah, trying to reproduce the issue

[trim matrix]

https://gyazo.com/a3f1f86e5d988b697e64a8bd1a339fcf.gif

[fiery glen]

I made a new blueprint interface and it's staying Read Only for some mysterious reason

[trim matrix]

You can't drag it in

Well, I can't

[fiery glen]

oooh, I misunderstood BP interfaces

I forgot they can't have anything implemented in them

you just define input/output types

all of the actual instructions are implemented in your BP that implements it

(which you probably already understand, sorry)

and yeah you need to just right click to implement the event

[trim matrix]

Nah it's all good haha

It confused me for a second until I remembered as well

[faint pasture]

@trim matrixDo you know what an interface is and how it works?

you don't implement them in the interface BP itself

[trim matrix]

It's all good, it worked

[civic herald]

Are there any good tutorials for projecting textures onto skinned meshes at a specific point on the mesh.

[icy dragon]

Not a particularly "elaborate step by step" tutorial, but enough to give a clue on how to implement it
https://www.tomlooman.com/rendering-wounds-on-characters/

[civic herald]

Thanks for most part that tutorial makes sense, but still unsure how to actually project a texture onto the mesh and it be the size i want not drawing over the whole mesh.

[trim matrix]

Would a kind of tiling work?

[odd ember]

this is so weird to have as an interface

an interface is per object

how does one object know about this question? unless it's a manager? and in that case, why the interface?

[trim matrix]

Idk

[odd ember]

well it's your interface

[tall imp]

hi, my cast to the game instance is failing and i cant find the reason why... does anyone know how i can fix that?

i was able to save and load perfectly yesterday bit then it just didnt work anymore even tho i didnt change anything there

[harsh frost]

Hi everyone, I'm tackling a tough cookie (for me anyway) here and I think I need some input. I'm trying to compare two render textures and count the number of pixel that differ between the two. I do that by sampling both texture and store the difference of both colors on a 3rd texture of the same size. "Easy" so far. I can then use Read pixel data to count the number of pixels that aren't 0 in a loop. The last part in inefficient at best, as to compare two texture of 1024x1024 pixels, I need to loop through each one of them. Yuck.

Is there a way of sampling both textures, compare each pixel, and store it in a single-pixel texture, being the sum of all difference ? This would reduce drastically the complexity as most of the work would occur on the GPU

I'm not sure having a target texture of 1 pixel will cut it 😄

Another thing would be to sample the result texture before writing to it, but I'm not sure this will fare well with massive parrallelism that occurs in shader

[odd ember]

check if you have game instance set in your project settings under "maps and modes"

failing that, breakpoints

[odd ember]

I don't know why this is in #blueprint

[harsh frost]

Well, I was thinking of doing it in blueprints 😄 I could achieve it all using them, so if I can avoid C++ code for 3D, i'm all for it 😄

unless, of course, i'm completly mistaken on the channel

(which is quite a possibility)

[odd ember]

none of this is exposed in BP

and it wouldn't be wise to do it in BP either due to performance concerns

(even if it was exposed)

[harsh frost]

well, if I can compare all pixels by blending them (using blend difference probably) and store the sum of all differences in a 1 pixel texture, i'm golden 😄 but I'm hitting a roadblock as to my 3D knowledge and the blend/UV stuff

[odd ember]

you... can't

it's not exposed in BP

it is not available

the interface between graphics shaders <> code happens in the renderer, which is strictly cpp

and if you're talking about blending in the material editor, the material editor is not the same as blueprints

[harsh frost]

oh ?

[odd ember]

the material editor operates entirely on HLSL

and is strictly for graphics

[harsh frost]

indeed, I thought that was considered as a blueprint being the same graph design and all

[odd ember]

#graphics

#cpp

[harsh frost]

I'll repost using the graphics channel then, thanks 🙂

the more I can fit in a shader to lessen the data transfer to the CPU, the better, so I'd better start here. Sorry for the mistake !

[tall imp]

ohhhhhh ye ty i thought it was set already but i confused it with the player controller

works now again xD

[shell jetty]

Really simple question. How can you limit a vector to stay inside a bounding box inside the world? I tried "Vector Bounded to Box" but it doesn't seem to work properly, or I'm just not sure how it works

[odd ember]

the real question is how you are getting vectors outside the bounds of the world

[shell jetty]

The box isn't outside the world. It's a system where I'm trying to keep an object within a certain distance of another actor

I found a way around it though. I decided to just check if the objects distance is further than a set float, and if it is I move it the object back by the difference in distance

[maiden wadi]

@shell jetty I personally find it much easier to transform the location into the box's local space. It's much easier to clamp via the box's size then because it's a matter of just clamping each axis after that. Then you can transform it back to world space.

[wispy star]

it' just clamps the input vector by the values, make sure you're using proper transforms for the input vector, as often people confused by local and world spaces

clamp(x,xmin,xmax)

[shell jetty]

Hmm, ok that makes sense. I'll use that next time

For now I'll use my workaround since it does what I need for now

Thanks for the help 🙂

[wispy star]

i'm thinking about it now, and it may not be doing what users may expect...i need to look at source

[dapper ore]

I think this is the right place? I have a Spring Arm on my Camera that is not colliding with the environment. I used the top down preset and added a camera zoom and look around. Although when I disable those 2 features it still doesn't work for me. Could someone kindly help me get my spring arm to work?

[wispy star]

holy...it is indeed not doing what people expect

[odd ember]

you'll have to show your settings

[dapper ore]

Which settings where?

[fresh charm]

Hello, can anyone explain this mystery to me?
Why I can't target my mouse on the left widget but the right one, as soon as I put the computer inside my house I can't see it anymore?

[odd ember]

on your springarm?

[digital ginkgo]

Hello guys, I need some help, I'm trying to make a virtual piano, where I input MIDI, and then it triggers a rotation on the piano key static mesh to make it look like the key is pushed.

How do I make the rotation "smooth" rather than instantly snapping into place?

[dapper ore]

@odd ember

[odd ember]

what in the living hell

[dapper ore]

@odd ember

[odd ember]

your camera collision settings are conveniently hidden away

[dapper ore]

@odd ember Can you see them in the second screenshot?

[dapper ore]

I want the Yaw of the camera reset to be the same as the character model. How can I pull that variable?

[icy dragon]

What even is this noodle

[timber knoll]

You would need to use RInterp

Or a lerp on single axis would also do

[timber knoll]

Get control rotation?

[wispy star]

@digital ginkgo I suggest you to switch to rigged skeletal mesh piano and use that for animation. as doing that by tick interpolators will make your code huge...
or, you can write a small ECS function

[jaunty solstice]

Can any Blueprint experts tell me whether its possible to detect keypresses in the Construction Script without resorting to Editor Tick?

[dapper ore]

No Luck

[timber knoll]

Construction script doesn’t work like that afaik

It’s called when changing any actor value, not based on input

But you don’t need event tick either for input

[digital ginkgo]

It's a rotation for every single note of an 88 key piano lol

I'm fairly new to these stuff, so I don't know if there's a better way to do this lol

[icy dragon]

Why not use naming convention tricks?

[timber knoll]

Animation based as Alexey suggested is your best bet

The way you have it set up would require interpolation which is going to be even more of a mess 😛

[digital ginkgo]

By rigged skeletal mesh, it means like rigging with armatures+weight painting it?

[timber knoll]

Yes

Then a simple animation can take off the rest

[digital ginkgo]

I've been wrecking my brains to get interpolation to work lol

ahhh

[timber knoll]

Interpolation isn’t hard

[digital ginkgo]

I can't get it working for some reason

[timber knoll]

But you would need to do it for all currently pressed keys etc

So it’s a lot of extra nodes in your case...

[digital ginkgo]

They are trigged by MIDI events for each note pressed

So there's no event tick

[timber knoll]

Hmmm even worse haha

Skeleton it is 😛

Will save you headache later on as well

[digital ginkgo]

[icy dragon]

Also, again, naming conventions trick.
E.g.: Bone for key 50th would be named "key_50", and you can concatenate the naming scheme and the numbers for getting the correct bone

[digital ginkgo]

I guess into blender then >.<

[icy dragon]

I did this for my musical machinima project (still WIP)

[digital ginkgo]

That is way over my head atm, but I'll look into that haha

[timber knoll]

Yeah for sure use naming convention for both skeleton and animations

[digital ginkgo]

I'll still need bones right?

[timber knoll]

You will need a bone for every key

And a root bone

[digital ginkgo]

Oh god, 88 keys

[thin cradle]

hey, I wanna make a fighting game and I've found almost all the unreal functionalities I need to do it, but there's something I can't figure out
I wanna attach hitboxes to my weapon, but also have some "floating" hitboxes that I can set the position of in my animation
problem is, I wanna keep the player character's stuff separate from each of the weapons's animations, hitboxes, etc, as in when I wanna add a new weapon, I don't wanna add all the required hitboxes to the main player physics asset, I want them to be separate
I found how to separate animations unique to weapons from the main player animation blueprint using linked animation BPs, but I can't figure out how to do that, any idea?

tl;dr I want each weapon and their animation set to have unique hitboxes but I don't wanna modify my player blueprint/physics asset/etc for each weapon, I want these to be stored in separate files per weapons

[icy dragon]

Yep.
At least you're not working on guitars and basses.

[digital ginkgo]

Just for luls, you can see the mess for every single 88 notes xD

[timber knoll]

You should have the collision in your weapon regardless

I’m also trying to figure out a way to have animations unique to weapons tho so can’t help with that

[thin cradle]

yeah, and I can kinda see how to do that for the hitboxes that'll be directly attached to the weapon, but not so much for the ones that aren't
let alone be able to visualize those when editing the relevant animations

[icy dragon]

I don't even want to think how to iterate changes over that mess.

[odd ember]

they're collapsed in the first screenshot. you screenshotted it but didn't expand it. you were complaining about collision and this is the one place you can see your collision

[digital ginkgo]

https://tenor.com/view/cat-laugh-laugh-yen-gif-20277285

[timber knoll]

Hmm how would those ither hitboxes function?

[thin cradle]

I'm sure it'd be possible to straight up like, make custom tools for the animation editor for that but I ain't ready to learn c++ just for that

[timber knoll]

You don’t haha

[icy dragon]

In a way, this naming convention trick of mine kind of stems out of my laziness, but avoiding that iteration hell of a BP sort of a side effect on my part.

[thin cradle]

@timber knoll https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A3vCY-jU_tc check this out
all the weapons have hitboxes attached to them, but some weapon also have "static" hitboxes that spawn where the weapon hits

[digital ginkgo]

You mean the naming for the bones? Would that be better than naming it based on it's note? Like C1,C#1, D1 etc?

[thin cradle]

they had even more of those "floating" hitboxes in dark souls 1 iirc

[digital ginkgo]

Wouldn't it be a pain to need to "find out" what note is key_50 is?

[icy dragon]

No, MIDI stuff don't really work that way, and I also have my own translating tools for that as well.

The notes are cosmetic as far as the MIDI backend is concerned, and I could just assemble a MIDI sequence from OpenMPT.

[digital ginkgo]

So MIDI for an 88 key keyboard goes from 21 to 108, so you are suggesting I name the bones like key_21, key_22 etc?

[odd ember]

my question is

why are you not handling this procedurally

[icy dragon]

Yeah, though with a simple math on the numbers, you can make the numbers tidy, since the first few notes are known.

[odd ember]

instead of having 88 references

that you have to manually setup

[timber knoll]

Aah so extra impact hitboxes

[icy dragon]

I already suggested the procedural (lazy) way.

[thin cradle]

yeah, that aren't attached to the weapon

[timber knoll]

Well you would just spawn them on the position based on hit info or animation

[digital ginkgo]

Because I have no idea what that means, I'm completely new to unreal and blueprints and I'm learning it as i go xD

[odd ember]

I can't see it?

[icy dragon]

Just so happens that the stars align, and I had musical machinima brewing in my draft, eh.

[timber knoll]

So basically you do an extra shape cast for one frame on a hit location or socket

[thin cradle]

cause I could always just attach 1 hitbox to the weapon and turn it off/on in animations, but not only would I not have those extra hitboxes, I also wouldn't be able to see them when I set them up in an animation

[icy dragon]

#blueprint message

[odd ember]

create an actor or object called PianoKey. then create a for loop for however many piano keys you want, spawn them and offset them

[odd ember]

that's not the same

in fact I don't know what that has to do with procedurally generating them

[thin cradle]

would I be able to see that extra cast somehow in the animation editor? also if it requires sockets, can those be added/removed from the player model when switching weapons or do I have to include all the required sockets in the main player skeleton asset?

[icy dragon]

But it works for an actual piano mesh, not some floating piano keys in space.

[odd ember]

doesn't make a difference if it's one mesh or several actors attached to each other

except ease of use and configuration

I certainly wouldn't try and configure it on a skeletal mesh level

[unique finch]

why would you want to make a piano tho

that's the real question

[icy dragon]

And by actual, I mean a model of a piano with reference to real physical piano.

[odd ember]

because dealing with 4 levels of child space sounds excruiciating

[digital ginkgo]

I want to make a virtual piano that responds to MIDI notes

[unique finch]

oh making in music in game i see 😏

[digital ginkgo]

and then I plan to use mocap of some sorts to play it with an avatar virtually

So it looks like my avatar is playing that piano

[icy dragon]

Because I just so happened to work on musical machinima involving the characters playing the instrument (though I don't have much time to continue on it lmao)

[timber knoll]

you can add sockets on static meshes actually

[unique finch]

honestly i like this idea

[odd ember]

consider what I said

I would recommend against making anythign one mesh

[digital ginkgo]

But I'm extremely confused right now

LOL

[unique finch]

it doesn't sound like a bad idea to make a piano so you can make your own music in game

[timber knoll]

and no, not able to see them in animation afaik, but you can have them enabled while playing and test them out that way @thin cradle

[odd ember]

the idea is fine. making the piano one big mesh is not

every key needs modularity

[icy dragon]

Thus the wild naming convention trick comes from , because i need to have DX7 and Moog synth model respond to the MIDI sequence, not an arbitrary piano floating in space.

[unique finch]

Hey here's an idea

make a model of a piano rig, make a animation for each note

[icy dragon]

Though if it works for you, then I won't stop you. @digital ginkgo

[thin cradle]

thats gonna involve a lot of randomly trying positions

[dim robin]

when I "get all actors of class", how can I determine the order of the elements in the array? Let's suppose it gets 3 actors, how can I know in which order they are added to the array? thanks

[icy dragon]

I'd procedurally animate them in animBP.

[thin cradle]

but I guess that could work, thanks

[odd ember]

that's really not a great way to go about it

[icy dragon]

Or actor BP, since it's going to be prerendered, and I don't give a fuck about performance in the case of machinimas.

[odd ember]

you cannot reasonably extend that

[unique finch]

ehh that's going have some odd results depending on the pivot of the bone

imagine the note clipping through the piano

lol would that be funny though

[icy dragon]

Most pianos have more or less standard key heights, easy to undershoot it than overshoot it.

[odd ember]

genuinely, the best way of to treat the piano itself as a manager, and each key as a child that you spawn procedurally. the piano itself determines what sound the keys play, each key handles its own animations etc.

[unique finch]

Doing it procedurally is good idea though, imagine wanting to have it so that if you press a key hard enough it'll hold down the note, seems even better than animating yourself

[timber knoll]

well you can actually have a preview mesh on your sockets (which would then be visible in your animation)

that might make it easier I suppose

[thin cradle]

good idea

[digital ginkgo]

I'll have a ton to learn I guess, I have no idea what you guys are talking now xD

[dapper ore]

WHOA WHOA Slow down there cowboy. I was not complaining just asking for some help. When I was expanding the menus I missed that one. My bad. Here it is sir.

[unique finch]

this thing is advanced even for someone like me

[icy dragon]

Okay, question time.
@digital ginkgo What kind of piano are you trying to have in the game? The one arbitrarily floating in space, or based on a physical, real life piano?

[odd ember]

I'm hoping you can see from that what is missing 🙏

[digital ginkgo]

This is the mesh that I have

[unique finch]

but manually moving the note downwards is the way to go without animation

[digital ginkgo]

I bought an asset off the marketplace

It has each note as a static mesh

[unique finch]

Ah just rotate the relative positon of the notes

[odd ember]

great start. all you need to do is wrap each mesh key in an actor class

[digital ginkgo]

So that's what I did, rotate the relative position

[unique finch]

Good

[digital ginkgo]

But that means it will only "snap"

[unique finch]

Ohhhhh

interpolation

[digital ginkgo]

it doesn't smoothly "push"

[unique finch]

is the thing

you want

@digital ginkgo use a timeline or use interpolation

[odd ember]

christ this is a clusterfk

[icy dragon]

Okay, here's an idea that I'm sure everyone will hate me for it.

[icy dragon]

Use the naming convention trick.

[digital ginkgo]

I tried interpolation, and it doesn't seem to work, I think it's because the notes are triggered by a MIDI event, not an event tick

[unique finch]

Ahh

[odd ember]

timelines.

for real

timeline an alpha value from 0..1, then use that to lerp rotation

[digital ginkgo]

Can you elaborate the naming convention trick? haha

[unique finch]

yes and when you release the key reverse the timeline :)

[odd ember]

it has a few drawbacks though

[dapper ore]

My 3 hours of exp tells me to click buttons. I clicked it and it worked. Thank you for helping bring that menu to my attn 🙏 ⭐

[unique finch]

yeah

[odd ember]

well done. go forth and conquer

[icy dragon]

I was thinking to just get the component names, check with a concatenated string based on MIDI input, and switch on the correct one based on the notes.

Now where's the tomatoes getting thrown?

[dapper ore]

HUZZAH

[icy dragon]

I was certain everyone will hate my idea.

[odd ember]

again. the easiest way, that would solve literally every single problem, including the mess of managing 88 individual keys, is procedurally generating the keys as actors from a class

[dawn gazelle]

^

[digital ginkgo]

Ok I don't know how to do that LOL

[icy dragon]

And this is being generous and ignoring grey notes specific things.

[odd ember]

you have the backbone of that already. every key is a mash. create an actor class and put the key in as a static mesh component

[odd ember]

you can handle each note individually by exposing parameters. if you have an array of 88 keys you can pick which key to work with

[icy dragon]

Which is so easy in hindsight, maybe 5 years old can came up with the math/offsets.

[odd ember]

you have the same amount of control, for much less repetitive code

and much less code maintenance

then on top

if you make the keyboard (sans keys) a manager. you can use that to propagate different sound choices to each key

e.g. when you want to modulate the sound per key, per octave

literally, just like a keyboard would work in real life

plus you can extend the keyboard infinitely, if you so choose

want 64 keys instead? just set it to 64 keys instead of 88

same for 102, or whatever the max number of keys is on a keyboard these days

I'm sure some organist can correct me

[digital ginkgo]

Actor class is a blueprint actor right?

[icy dragon]

Yes.

[digital ginkgo]

I think I already have it

hmm

[odd ember]

that's the entire keyboard

that is your manager class

[icy dragon]

Just have to modify it as per @odd ember precisely mentioned.

Or create a new one from scratch, I don't care tbh

[odd ember]

create new one, create a new static mesh component within, set the static mesh to be the key mesh

you'll probably need to formulate it per octave

[digital ginkgo]

But each key has a different mesh though

[odd ember]

that's fine

[odd ember]

.

[icy dragon]

Doesn't really matter.

[odd ember]

you can in fact find the right keymesh by providing the corresponding note within the octave

[icy dragon]

The white keys are at least just 3 shapes.

[odd ember]

so you have an outer loop for the entire keyboard, then you have an inner loop per octave

or alternatively, you create an Octave as a separate class that is a collection of PianoKeys

[digital ginkgo]

I think this is waaaay to advanced for me right now >.<

[odd ember]

it's advanced now, but if you do the groundwork

you'll have much less problems later on

if you do it your way, you leave yourself open for a lot of maintenance work

[digital ginkgo]

Are there like youtube tutorials for this? lol

[odd ember]

possibly?

[icy dragon]

And since keyboard accuracy doesn't seem to be your priority, use CE's method as opposed to my naming convention trick.

I'd avoid the procedural method because of the need to get very specific with the keyboard and the synth sounds.

[odd ember]

I can't vouch for them

[icy dragon]

More likely non existent.

[odd ember]

generally the quality of BP tutorials on youtube is low

[odd ember]

technically this method is procedural

but, semantics

[digital ginkgo]

I'm completely lost haha. I'll have to revisit this in the future when I learn more >.<

[icy dragon]

Yeah, generating the keys in runtime, but in my machinima case, keyboard type accuracy to the synth sound is more important, and I would have to match the key positions with the character's finger in sequencer editor.

[odd ember]

you could generate the keys at editor time as well. it doesn't make a difference. procedural refers to the fact that you are generating the keys, not when they are being generated

[odd ember]

if you're doing it now, it's worth considering getting into. it's going to take you maybe a day to completely work it out, but it'll be worth it for the weeks and months you don't have to spend changing it

[digital ginkgo]

I have no idea where to start haha

Pretty much a complete beginner atm

.<

[odd ember]

like I said, create an actor called PianoKey

[dawn gazelle]

Eh close enough...

[odd ember]

clearly a magic keytar

octaveless too, but it'll do

[digital ginkgo]

Like this?

[odd ember]

inside this actor, add a static mesh component. add a sound cue variable. Add an event called OnPressed, and OnReleased

[odd ember]

yes but singular

you are making one key. we'll use copies of this key to fill the entire keybaord

[digital ginkgo]

There's 8 different keys

How do I know which one to use lol

[odd ember]

that's fine

you just need one actor for now

once you've created that

create an enumerator

an enumerator is just a fancy way of selecting numbers by using text

[digital ginkgo]

So I just drag and drop the static mesh in?

[odd ember]

don't do anything I haven't said

at least not yet

let's get it working first

[odd ember]

call this enumerator something like EOctaveKey

[digital ginkgo]

Hold on, how do I add a static mesh component

Lol

[odd ember]

there should be a big green button in the upper left corner

that says add component

[digital ginkgo]

Oh

ok go it

[odd ember]

cool

[digital ginkgo]

How about the "Add an event called OnPressed, and OnReleased"

[odd ember]

right click on the graph, select Create Custom Event

[zealous moth]

@Authaer#5436 how would you go about a charging mechanic?
So far all i thought about was a timer based countdown or a timer based buildup where the timer is started and stopped based on input.

[digital ginkgo]

I don't see it hmmm

[odd ember]

in the event graph

not as a variable

[digital ginkgo]

Like this?

[odd ember]

yes siree

[digital ginkgo]

Why does it say OnReleased is used

[odd ember]

probably because it's used internally

it's fine

don't worry about it

[digital ginkgo]

ahh

[odd ember]

you can called it OnPress and OnRelease if you want to keep a standard between them

[digital ginkgo]

How do I create an enumerator?

[odd ember]

in the content browser

right click > create advanced asset > blueprints > enumeration

[digital ginkgo]

Oh got it, what should I name it as

[odd ember]

.

[digital ginkgo]

Ok got it haha

[odd ember]

cool

now that you have it, go back into your PianoKey actor

and add a new variable

in the list of variable types, look for EOctaveKey

[odd ember]

boom

just like that

[digital ginkgo]

What should I name it

Lol

[odd ember]

KeyInOctave or something

now that you have it, go into your construction script

get a reference to your static mesh component

you can literally select it and drag it into the graph

[digital ginkgo]

The static mesh component at this point is just empty right?

[odd ember]

yep

from you reference, drag out and find a function called Set Static Mesh

or might just be called set mesh

idk

[digital ginkgo]

Which one do I use?

[odd ember]

the latter

so there's one thing we forgot to do with the enumerator, so if you go back and open that one up

inside of it, create a new option for each key in the octave

so, C, C#, D, D#, E etc.

[digital ginkgo]

Just within an octave right?

[odd ember]

yes, but including black keys

[digital ginkgo]

Would it matter if the first key of an 88 key piano does not start with a C?

It starts with an A

[odd ember]

it matters somewhere down the line, but not here

you want to create a standard octave first

everything else is an edge case

[digital ginkgo]

Alright

[odd ember]

once the enumerator is done, go back into the construction script where we left that set static mesh function

from the mesh pin, drag out a select node

for the index of the select node, add your KeyInOctave variable

[digital ginkgo]

Like this?

[odd ember]

yep

I assume you know your octaves

so I can't vouch if it's correct

but it looks like it

[digital ginkgo]

Like this?

[odd ember]

yep

now you can use that to fill the correct key meshes for the correct slots in the octave

obviously, correct the execution thread as well

now that you have this setup, you'll want to expose your variables as parameters

so for each variable you have, in the details panel, tick the boxes for: Instance Editable and Expose on Spawn

[digital ginkgo]

What do you mean by correct the execution thread?

[odd ember]

the white line

that connects the nodes

[digital ginkgo]

Oh

[odd ember]

is the execution thread

[odd ember]

once you have done this, in your OnPress event, you can add some logic for what happens when you press the key

so, Play Sound Cue with the sound cue variable you have

if you want the whole rotation thing, we can handle that afterwards

but that's your basic PianoKey actor

[digital ginkgo]

Hmm I see

Interesting

[odd ember]

now that we have this, duplicate your piano actor

not the keys, but the actual piano

once you've duplicated it, go into it

note down the offset between keys

you'll need this

then delete all the logic and keys inside of it

[digital ginkgo]

That means I delete all the variables, and stuffs in the event graph?

[odd ember]

yes. did you note down the offset?

[digital ginkgo]

I did

[odd ember]

cool, yeah torch everything

[digital ginkgo]

Do I delete the keys static meshes as well?

[odd ember]

everything

except the keyboard mesh itself

since this is a duplicate, if you ever want to go back, you'll always have the original

once done, create a Integer variable called KeyAmount

[digital ginkgo]

is this right?

[odd ember]

small caveat here: we're making this currently as an arbirarily sized keyboard, which means you can input any number of keys, but the keyboard will always start from an octave, and the starting key will always be C

if you want to include special rules, you'll have to change some initial logic, but nothing major

[odd ember]

once you have this, create a For Loop inside the construction script

for the sake of ease of use, set the start index to 1, and the end index to KeyAmount

create a float variable called KeyOffset and set that to be the value you noted down before, as a default value

[odd ember]

inside the loop, find the SpawnActorFromClass node

set the class to be PianoKey

let me know when you've got this

[digital ginkgo]

I can't find the spawnactorfromclass node

hmm

[odd ember]

I see

it's not accessible in constructionscript

welp, that's a drag

no worries

[digital ginkgo]

[odd ember]

create a custom event inside the event graph called SpawnKeys

in the details panel for it, tick the box for Call in Editor

cut and paste the loop from the construction script onto that event instead

[dim robin]

is there any way to "get all actors of class" and sort them in an array by a name (or int, or whatever)? it looks like the array order is determined by when they were instanced

[digital ginkgo]

Like that?

[odd ember]

nope. it's non deterministic. if you need deterministic approaches you should look into making some proper logic for finding such classes. get actor of class is a hack, not a robust solution

[odd ember]

correct

now find that spawn node

[odd ember]

yep, set the class to PianoKey

and click that white arrow at the bottom and show a screenshot of that once you've done those two things

[odd ember]

ok, bit weird it says invalid for KeyInOctave

can you check you have all the keys in that drop down?

[digital ginkgo]

Oh yeah

I can

[odd ember]

cool

if you right click on your spawn transform node and select split pin or whatever the option is called

you should see it turn into a few things

[digital ginkgo]

Oh yeah

[odd ember]

now if you select the location pin and do the same

you'll get 3 float values

create a reference to your KeyOffset float from before

[digital ginkgo]

Like this?

[odd ember]

yes, almost

multiply it by index

[digital ginkgo]

wait how? lol

[odd ember]

there is an int * float node

[digital ginkgo]

oh like this?

[odd ember]

yep

see if you can spawn the keyboard actor in world now

just to test

once you've spawned it, you'll see the SpawnKeys event in the details panel as a button

the expectation is that it's spawned KeyAmount of PianoKeys at KeyOffset from each other, all being of EOctaveKey type C

[digital ginkgo]

So I drag the keyboard actor in the world

and hit spawn keys?

[odd ember]

yes

[digital ginkgo]

Nothing happens lol

[odd ember]

troubling

or perhaps not

can you try calling SpawnKeys from BeginPlay and enter into PIE?

[digital ginkgo]

Like this?

[odd ember]

err

no

but yeah I mean you can do that

but it's not elegant

[digital ginkgo]

How do I do that then lol

[odd ember]

what you want to do is get a call to that event

right click and find SpawnKeys in the search menu

you should get a blue node

[digital ginkgo]

Oh yeah

[odd ember]

put that on BeginPlay

and reconnect SpawnKeys

[odd ember]

yep

test it

[digital ginkgo]

What does enter into PIE means

Hmm, I hit play, and nothing happens lol

The key doesn't spawn

ok nvm it worked, I did not set the KeyAmount variable

But it spawned away from the piano actor and is LARGE

lol

[odd ember]

you may want to look at the original keyboard actor and check the scale of them

[odd ember]

the keys

but, so far so good

these are tiny kinks

and it works otherwise

so now we want them to form octaves

there's a few ways to do this, but for the sake of this we'll just go simple

how many keys does an octave have?

[digital ginkgo]

including black, 12

[odd ember]

12

ok

[digital ginkgo]

The scale for the keys is 0.1

How do I set it hmmm

[odd ember]

on the SpawnNode

you have SpawnTransformScale

[digital ginkgo]

Oh yeah

[odd ember]

for spawning it at the keyboard location, we'll figure that out in a second

for now

[digital ginkgo]

The size is right, but they're spaced too far apart now

[odd ember]

create a KeyScale float variable

multiply that with KeyOffset where you handle the spawn location

split the SpawnTransformScale pin into 3 floats

set them all to be KeyScale

assuming they are uniformly scaled

[digital ginkgo]

Is it like that?

Hmm the offset doesn't seem to be correct lol

[odd ember]

to the keyboard itself? we'll fix that later

for now

[digital ginkgo]

I think the origin for each key static mesh is not the same

Lol

[odd ember]

it is

it's just using world 0 atm

because we having added in a custom location

if you want to fix it, create a MakeVector node

add the current float result we have from Index, KeyOffset and KeyScale, into the X value of that

then right click on any of the 3 location floats and select combine struct pin

then use the GetActorLocation node and add it to the output your new MakeVector, then set that to your new SpawnLocation

it's not going to be perfect right now

but we'll replace it later

[digital ginkgo]

There's no combine struct pin

Oh you mean on the spawn actor node

[odd ember]

vector + vector node

[digital ginkgo]

Oh cool, it's in the correct Z now

Lol

Oh wait, actually it's not

Lmao

[odd ember]

like I said, it something that's fixable after the fact

anyway, onto the next task

right click in the graph and type %

that should show you what is known as a modulo node

[odd ember]

float

or actually

int

in the bottom field, type 12

the top pin should go into the Index of the For Loop

the output should feed into the SpawnNodes KeyFromOctave

normally we could do this differently, by taking the length of the enum. but this is complicated in BP so we'll omit it for now

[odd ember]

ffffff

try the byte version then and see if you can feed the Index into that

otherwise you can convert int to byte

[feral ice]

why does it not draw box around the stone?

[odd ember]

a bit of a faff

[digital ginkgo]

Now it's like this 😮

[odd ember]

oof

yeah okay, I forgot that keys may have different sizes

[knotty sequoia]

hi, i want to ask how can i get location of some actor in the world in the script of main character? i was trying to use this (screenshot) but i dont know ho to change the "Target" from self -> the actor. This is my first project so i dont really know how to do it, thanks

[odd ember]

so different offsets

[digital ginkgo]

Also why does it not spawn C first

hmmm

[odd ember]

yep that is a bit strange too

[feral ice]

You need some sort of reference to the other actor

[odd ember]

but otherwise, is it a correct octave? @digital ginkgo

[feral ice]

lemme try something and try to help

[knotty sequoia]

thanks

[digital ginkgo]

It's correct, only the first C is missing

[odd ember]

cool, we can make that a special case

actually I know why

first index is 1, not 0

so what we should do, (what we should have done from the beginning), is set the first index to 0, and last index to KeyAmount - 1

[digital ginkgo]

Like this?

[odd ember]

yep

[feral ice]

whoops forgot an e in the reference

[knotty sequoia]

ok thanks

[digital ginkgo]

@odd ember Do you mind if we continue this in the future? May I DM you next time? It's 3 am and I need to sleep now xD

[feral ice]

Nw hope it works

[odd ember]

just ping me in here, I'll help if I have time

but sure

you have the base of it now

now the fun part of extending it begins

[knotty sequoia]

i am not really sure if i will put it in right blueprints 😄 but i will try

[digital ginkgo]

@odd ember Thanks a lot, you've been a great help!

I divided the offset by 2

Looks like my suspicion was right

[feral ice]

This looks cool can you play any songs on it

[digital ginkgo]

I think the meshes are not made equal

lol

xD

[knotty sequoia]

how did you create that custom event?

[feral ice]

oh sorry i did not get notified, just right click in event graph and search for custom event

name it wheterver you please

[knotty sequoia]

ok, thanks

[feral ice]

there is an easier way of doing this

sorry

just use this node

[feral ice]

here

my bad, my way works fine but this one is cleaner and simpler

[knotty sequoia]

ok i will try

[feral ice]

but if you have multiple actors of the same class it will not work on of them however, there is a way around this by using the get all actors of class. It will save each actor as an element in an array. You will be able to reach each actor by accessing the array. There are a lot of videos of this. Reference ue4 on youtube

[knotty sequoia]

ok

and what should i connect here?

[feral ice]

i think this is what you want. Im taking my dog for a walk just to let you know if you have any more question ill answer them later

[odd ember]

good work

[knotty sequoia]

ok, thanks. enjoy the walk 😄

[umbral ginkgo]

quick question, how do I change sensitivity on the first person example map thing? I changed the variable sensitivity but that did nothing

[odd ember]

I don't know what you mean by that

which sensitivity? mouse?

gamepad?

camera?

movement?

[worthy carbon]

I was packaging my game but it says cook failure and than Unknown cook failure how do i fix this?

[umbral ginkgo]

Mouse, i havent used unreal in quite a bit and was messing about in the first person example project

[spark steppe]

look at the playercontroller, or character. whatever handles the input axis events

and then multiply/divide the axis value

[odd ember]

don't know, but the real question is how you think that #blueprint can help you with this?

[worthy carbon]

No i guess

[dreamy ice]

So, if i'm going to add many different systems to a player such as (leveling, inventory, quests, achievements, abilities, and more) Should I add them directly to the player/controller or should I create them in some sort of other blueprint/class and attach that to the player/controller? What would y'all do?

[odd ember]

try #packaging

[odd ember]

composition is always preferred

[dreamy ice]

I'm not sure what that means?

[odd ember]

that means that generally it's better to create components (in this case) and couple them to the player

especially if you can make a clear distinction

[dreamy ice]

That's what I figured. and if I'm doing anything that needs to live past character death, I should attach it to the controller right?

[odd ember]

e.g. inventory is very clearly defined

[dreamy ice]

yeah

[odd ember]

potentially. depends on how your game is setup. but generally the player controller has more abstract control of the game than the character (who is limited to the game world)

for what it's worth, I'm running at least 10 different components (not all on player), that I attach in a similar fashion

[dreamy ice]

I figured it was better

[chrome eagle]

Hi there!

I have a working point system - I shoot 100 target, I get 100 points.

What I'm trying to do is bring up a little text every time I shoot a target that says +100 just so theres representation that you got points (I wanted to do same for HP and time)
I'm on my HUD and trying to bind the text to the points but I can't for the life of me figure out how to bring up a variable from an actor

https://prnt.sc/1zl551j

I'm new, so this could be completely wrong I've no idea.

[odd ember]

if you shoot 100 targets and get 100 points, that's one point per target right?

[chrome eagle]

Oh, sorry no. I have targets woth 100/500/1000

[odd ember]

I see

how do you want to visualize this?

[chrome eagle]

In this BP I'm working with the 100 target

[odd ember]

can you draw a sketch?

[chrome eagle]

A sketch of what?

[odd ember]

.

[chrome eagle]

You lost me, what do you want me to visualize? I'm working on binding a variable to a text on the hud.

[odd ember]

my bad

I thought you wanted to know how to visualize the +100 points

on screen

[chrome eagle]

ahhh~

https://prnt.sc/1zl5i23 - Current HUD

The green "Score" is where I'm trying to make the "+100" pop up

[odd ember]

so where is the logic for when you achieve the points?

[eternal reef]

Can anyone tell me how to correctly set a cameras transform from one camera to another?
I can swap between two different actors (each of which have their own camera) but when I use the location + rotation from Camera 1 for Camera 2 the Actor is not centred anymore, my guess is using the camera boom? But I couldnt get it to work there either

[chrome eagle]

My 100 target actos has a 'points' variable.

((Not sure if that answeres your question))

[odd ember]

ok, but when you shoot them

how do you communicate the 100 points belong to the player

[spark steppe]

set view target with blend

https://docs.unrealengine.com/4.26/en-US/BlueprintAPI/Game/Player/SetViewTargetwithBlend/

[chrome eagle]

In my Gamemode I have a "game points" which is attached to a function:
https://prnt.sc/1zl60bt

[spark steppe]

but reading your question again, that might not be what you asked for

[odd ember]

cool

[eternal reef]

I used this node just to swap cameras right, but it doesnt save the last position of the camera before the swap its just a nice transition between the two

[odd ember]

so create an event dispatcher in your game mode called OnPointsAdded

as a parameter, add an Integer called PointsToAdd

[chrome eagle]

To clarify* When you say add a parameter, I should add an integer variable?

[odd ember]

on the dispatcher itself

[chrome eagle]

Sorry idk how to do that >.< I made the dispatcher but I don’t see how to add a parameter.

[odd ember]

it's in the details panel

the UI is a bit convoluted because it deviates from the normal

it's up top, instead of at the bottom like for functions

[chrome eagle]

https://prnt.sc/1zl6sob

[odd ember]

Inputs, with the +

[chrome eagle]

AH! 😄 sorry!

okay done

[odd ember]

cool

now in that function you showed

drag the dispatcher into it and select Call

[chrome eagle]

done

[odd ember]

the points should be the PointsToAdd from the function. you can get function parameters as a reference by typing get <function param name>

so get PointsToAdd

and hook it into the call

[chrome eagle]

https://prnt.sc/1zl78he

Do not click this.

[knotty sequoia]

bruh

[odd ember]

connect it

[chrome eagle]

Done lol

[odd ember]

go to your widget

[chrome eagle]

yep

[odd ember]

do you have the OnConstruct event?

or maybe just Construct

[chrome eagle]

"Event construct" yea

[odd ember]

Get Game Mode -> Cast to <your specific game mode> -> Bind event to to OnPointsAdded

for the red variable that pops up on the node, drag it out and type in Create Event

[chrome eagle]

done

[odd ember]

there should be a drop down

on the Create Event node

[chrome eagle]

yepo

[odd ember]

click Create new event

a new event will spawn. call it whatever

congrats, you now have a bonafide connection to when your points get added in your UI

[chrome eagle]

hmmm I don’t have "create new event"

https://prnt.sc/1zl81rr

[odd ember]

Create a matching event

ok weird

just create a custom event with the same parameters then

[chrome eagle]

https://prnt.sc/1zl8at0

So I connected my new custom event to the "bind event on onpointsadded" node and deleted create event

lol nope I'vve no clue what I'm doing xD

[knotty sequoia]

hi, i want to ask why this does not work? it should move the character to 0 0 0 if i press E and if i press any movement keys it should cancel the movement but for some reason when press E it does nothing

[chrome eagle]

Is the BP inside your player controller?

[knotty sequoia]

it is inside FirstPersonCharacter Event Graph

[chrome eagle]

shrugs Sorry, I'm clueless at all this lol

[knotty sequoia]

ok, thanks 😄

[chrome eagle]

I cant even get my HUD to work xD

[knotty sequoia]

xd

i figured it out

[chrome eagle]

NICE 😄

[umbral ginkgo]

Does anyone know why this isnt working?

trying to modify sensitivity

[willow phoenix]

whats better: having a "check if player is below x units in Z axis" on tick or a giant (i mean, GIANT) killZ volume with an on begin overlap event?

or "better performance"

im not sure how much the "im waiting for someone to overlap me" impacts the performance, but my guess is, it is better than the tick version

[dawn gazelle]

There's no point in converting to an int then back to a float. From the axis value do a float * float by your base rates and feed that directly into the inputs of the "add controller ___ input" nodes.

[umbral ginkgo]

k thx

[dawn gazelle]

Usually axis values are from 0 to 1. So if you multiply by 0.5 then it'll be half as sensitive. If you multiply by 2 it'll be double.

[dawn gazelle]

Using the built-in Kill Z setting in your world settings:

[willow phoenix]

the actor gets destroyed then? or is it an other event that gets triggered?

[dawn gazelle]

Pretty sure it's just destroyed.

[timber knoll]

you can override it for characters

also wouldn't be so sure about overlap being better than checking location on tick

[gentle urchin]

Id just do it on tick tbh

[mystic mist]

Hello! Ive got an interesting question.. well first my blueprint. I am making a door open and close via a switch. Click it, door opens, click again, door closes. Magic. Awesome. However, If one repeatedly clicks the switch while the timeline is making its move, it starts again from the start of that timeline - I don't want this to happen, but I don't know how to prevent it. I tried switching it to Play and Reverse on the timeline respectives, but all it did what just auto rotate without any animation. Anyone know how to help?

[timber knoll]

you would have to keep track of the current time

so let's say you are .5 seconds into opening

you would have to either reverse it from that point

[static charm]

just use one timeline

[timber knoll]

or play another timeline based on that info

if it's a simple open just use one yes

[silk hinge]

Hey, I've been working on UIs lately, I would like to know if there is a way to get data from a clic, Like i'm into my inventory and would like to get the data from the item I just clicked on ?

[mystic mist]

@timber knoll and @static charm thanks! that almost works, but now it does a similar thing every now and then. I wonder... Maybe I will make different switches (one for each side of the door), but it just animates open to clsoe.

or maybe Im not doing something right? XD

[timber knoll]

don't reverse from end

just reverse, will reverse it from current time

[mystic mist]

oh! ok

that makes sense

[timber knoll]

reverse from end will force reverse it from the last keyframe

[mystic mist]

makes sense. huzzah! it works! many thanks.

[dawn gazelle]

Use an overlay widget with your displayed item and a button in it. Then you can capture the click event from the button pressed.

[silk hinge]

I dont press a button, I press to open a menu, then I press the button of the menu I opened, And I need the clic the register the item data I clicked to open the menu, to use it depending on what Info were into the data

I got a drag and drop operation I dont remember how I got that, that is taking the data to move it across the inventory

I have no idea how I created that, or if it was into the Engine with those infos

[dawn gazelle]

So you're trying to get info from the inventory item after you've dragged it somewhere and dropped it?

[silk hinge]

Let me show you the thing, would be easyer to picture

so this is the inventory, I got my drap/drop working.
But now I got a drop down sub menu, with a "USE" button, I have to press an item with "Right clic" to open this menu, so I would like to get the Item data of the Item I pressed with Right clic to open the menu, to do somthing depending on Data, when I press "Use" button

And this is the blueprint I'm using to open the menu

[dawn gazelle]

I'm guessing this is what is showing the Use/Close widget?

[silk hinge]

yeah it's casting to the player to creat the widget and add it to viewport

get player pown is a terrible choice tho to reach for the player xD

[dawn gazelle]

So what I would do different, is have the inventory widget create the use/close widget and in the use/close widget you can have an exposed variable that feeds in the inventory data you want. Then in your Use/Close widget you can do what you want with that data.

[silk hinge]

My inventory widget is just a grind tho, I dont think I can do anything with that

I got one widget to greyed out the screen, one that got the lines and cells, and another that is just the Item

so those items you see are all diferent widgets

[dawn gazelle]

Are you using a base widget class for all of your item widgets?

[silk hinge]

Yeah "Item Widget" should be the base, this inventory is a tutorial base cause I really wanted to have full spacial inventory etc... But I just keep running accross all things to understand it properly xD

[dawn gazelle]

Ok. So you are storing some reference to the item in question in the widget, yea?

Like this drag and drop operation has the Item Object reference.

[silk hinge]

just the item Image (Icon) and the Size

OH wait

I got an "Item Object reference"

its the data

[odd ember]

did it work after you recompiled it? sorry I had to take a call

[odd ember]

you're converting floats to int. given the axis value goes from -1 to 1 there's a good chance it'll be 0 most of the time

[dawn gazelle]

Ok. So then again, I'd make it so your "Item Widget" widget basically does what ever is contained in the "Usage Menu" in the screenshot below (be it creating or showing or what have you) and you then need to feed that "Item Object Reference" into the "Usage Menu" widget - it can be through an event or when you're creating it using an exposed variable.

[chrome eagle]

@odd ember No problem https://prnt.sc/1zlj7rc Got errors

[silk hinge]

I think I got something let me run a test quick

[odd ember]

what's the error?

[chrome eagle]

https://prnt.sc/1zljcb1

[odd ember]

take a look at the event dispatcher in your game mode

show me how it looks

[chrome eagle]

o7

https://prnt.sc/1zljgwd

[odd ember]

hmm

have you compiled your game mode?

[chrome eagle]

pffft nope. Now I've got an error on here xD

[odd ember]

well then

[chrome eagle]

Ok well I'm a moron.

https://prnt.sc/1zljn3l

[odd ember]

show me the details panel for your dispatcher

[chrome eagle]

https://prnt.sc/1zljqe2

[odd ember]

right click on the Call node and hit refresh node

[silk hinge]

@dawn gazelle ahah
Since the Item widget is unique and I had a reference to Item object allready, I just had to get the variable, since it's specific to each item, I could just access it with no problem xD

I just didnt thought about it, thanks

[chrome eagle]

I refreashed it and it removed the ppoints to add node

[silk hinge]

Literally just had to do this x)

[odd ember]

reconnect it

[chrome eagle]

pfft ok reconnected and compiled and it works now (So confused~)

[silk hinge]

Yeah some blueprint, needs to be recompiled even some times have to restart the engine for like physical material etc...

[chrome eagle]

@odd ember Okay NOWWWW when I attach a 'craet event' to the bind event to onpontsaddded under my HUD WBP, The drop down
https://prnt.sc/1zlk3ru

[odd ember]

in this case it's just a question of recompiling every time you make a change

[odd ember]

did you create your custom event?

[chrome eagle]

I did, I was trying this again lol

hold~

ok sooo no errors this time at least
https://prnt.sc/1zlkex4

[odd ember]

if you compile your blueprint, the create event node should now have your event in it as well

so you don't have to have this long red line through going through everything

[chrome eagle]

so I've compiled it and it seems not-broken.

lol

[odd ember]

try with the create event node and see if you can get your event to show

[chrome eagle]

https://prnt.sc/1zlkv7m

I doublechecked, the text is binded. No good T^T

[odd ember]

I don't know what this is

[chrome eagle]

The bind to the score text on the HUD

[odd ember]

that's not correct

use the event

that's why it's there

the red node

[chrome eagle]

The one I named "Points to add custome event" right?

[odd ember]

yes

that's where you do your logic

[chrome eagle]

So the only way I know to bind text to anything is through these binds https://prnt.sc/1zll89f

[odd ember]

don't use those

[chrome eagle]

oh x:

I didn’t think it'd be this diffucult xD

[odd ember]

it's not

you're making it harder for yourself

[chrome eagle]

I'm new to the program mate I only know limited ways of doing stuff.

[odd ember]

whenever the event triggers, it will give you the points in the widget

so all you need to do is use SetText with the points (and a message potentially), then use a delay, then remove the text

there's also the Format Text node that can be helpful

it does exactly the same as the binding

but you get it for free

whereas the binding is expensive

[chrome eagle]

What do you mean? like processiong power?

[odd ember]

yes

[chrome eagle]

gotcha

fuq I gtg. Ty for all your help

[proper umbra]

Is there a way for me to set the variable given here?

[gentle urchin]

Pass by reference

Checkbox under the input

[proper umbra]

And then do I use set integer (by ref)?

[gentle urchin]

Yepp

[proper umbra]

ahh ok sounds good

thanks

[jaunty solstice]

I have an array of custom object. Lets call this 'Spawners'. Now I simply want to retrieve a specific spawner object in this array.
Why is there no 'Get Object at Index' node in Blueprints?

[brazen merlin]

it's just called Get

get a reference to your array, drag off from the array, type get, and it will have an index you can control

[odd ember]

but then we can't be angry over the fact that it's not called Get Object at Index 😩

[manic vessel]

Hi all, Im stabbing a character in VR with a knife .And Im using the hit normal of the surface, But I want to set a condition where it only works if the blade is in a perpendicular threshold to the Hit Normal. of the surface.. whats the best approach for this.

[brazen merlin]

ah, but what if it is not an object? it is a generic node to work with any classes

[odd ember]

Get * at Index

[odd ember]

I mean, dot product will get you what you want, but I'm not sure how you want it to be perpendicular to the normal

the normal of a wall faces outwards

[manic vessel]

I tried that. But I didnt work out. I tried to use the Dot product of the Out hit impact normal and the Up vector the the knife mesh

[odd ember]

why would you use the up vector and not the forward vector?!

[manic vessel]

In theroy I would rather use a arrow as I can apply that direction to different weapons

[odd ember]

hang it next to the mona lisa

[manic vessel]

because the knife is pointing down

[odd ember]

... the knife pointing down does not mean it's not its forward vector you're using

[manic vessel]

I will do this again with the arrow so I can use forwards vector. But Atleast I know that Dot product is a valid method.

[odd ember]

you genuinely dont need an arrow

the mesh is likely pointed towards the forward vector

[manic vessel]

In my Bp and mesh Its pointing - z

x is the the side

[odd ember]

have you checked the mesh itself?

ah nevermind

in that case you can try up vector * -1

for the down vector

if you want it to hit a perpendicular surface only, the dot product should be -1

[manic vessel]

Just found that out. By hitting with the handle It worked. so was wrong direction 👍

[rough cedar]

Anyone have an idea why my Jump fuction stopped working after updating to 4.27? If I drag off of "Pressed" I get the option to select jump. But when I click it I get this kinda node?

Says "Call unknown function jump"

[odd ember]

does the character movement component exist on your character?

has it been replace with a different character movement component?

[rough cedar]

yeah its there, i dont think its been replaced at all though.

it definitely used to work

[odd ember]

I can't say. I haven't had that problem upgrading to 4.27

you could perhaps try reparenting, then parenting back to character

[rough cedar]

just tried that. same resut

[icy dragon]

Is this prevents BP recompiling at all?

[rough cedar]

no it compiles fine

i just cant jump

it even fires the jump animation fine

[icy dragon]

Maybe the magic bullet: restart the editor

[rough cedar]

but no height

disabling animation just to see if the character moves upward shows it doesnt work

ill try restarting, but its been happening for a while now

[icy dragon]

I know it sounds so cliched, but worth a try at least.

[rough cedar]

ok

[hazy fulcrum]

Evening chaps, in a bit of a pickle. I'd like to use Set Timer to run a function that reduces the player's stamina by a given amount, but the Set Timer By Function Name node doesn't appear to allow a parameter to be passed to the function specified. Is there a workaround for this, or a better approach?

[odd ember]

SetTimerByEvent and using a CreateEvent node perhaps?

much more robust anyway

[heavy ibex]

I have a 10-faced dial (static mesh) that I am trying to rotate 36 degrees every time it is clicked. I am keeping track of the needed rotation (as an int, incrementing by 36 every time) and when I click I'm using a timeline to lerp from the current yaw to the updated rotation value. It works the first couple times (0 to 36, 36 to 72) but something weird happens when I try to go from 72 to 108 .. it seems to rotate just fine but if I print the final yaw it says it's at 72 still. Then subsequent clicks seem to thrash it around wildly. I think I must be approaching this wrong. What is a better way to lerp between rotations with an absolute final rotation? ugh this was a sloppily worded question

[icy dragon]

It's stopped at 72? I kinda doubt it has something to do with gimbal locking with FRotator struct
Can you drop screenshot of the BP nodes in question?

[odd ember]

you're running into rotator specific issues

if you can, rotate using quaternions

[heavy ibex]

Those are .. things I've never been able to wrap my head around

[hazy fulcrum]

@odd ember I'm not seeing any way of passing a float parameter into the event with your suggestion, unless I'm missing something?

[odd ember]

it may be necessary in this case. the reason it screws is because you cross a 90 degree threshold, and unreal's rotator can't decide how to represent that rotation

that's my best guess anyway

[heavy ibex]

hmm, I thought the threshold was 180. And I added some simple logic to deal with that (I thought) by reducing by 360 if I'm over 180

[icy dragon]

And more often than not, interps got screwed in 180 as opposed to 90.

[odd ember]

ah my bad, timers won't allow you to pass in a float. you'll have to capture it separately. for what it's worth, event dispatchers would

[hazy fulcrum]

event dispatchers would

Knew I was missing something obvious.

[odd ember]

it can happen arbirarily. the point is that it is unreliable, so the solution should be to find something more reliable

[heavy ibex]

quick vid of the occurrence

[heavy ibex]

ok .. quaternions ...... to google

[odd ember]

basically in rotator logic, 270 = -90, 90 = -270, 180 = -180

[icy dragon]

A bit of short sighted, but maybe you could replace Set World Rotation with RInterp To? I forgot if the node has some kind of "alpha" so that the Timeline node has something to work with, or not.

[odd ember]

to be honest, the rotator version of the lerp has a way that might work with this

so you could save yourself some headache if it does work

but quaternions are still the best option

[odd ember]

(there's tickbox for shortest path)

@heavy ibex

[rough cedar]

@icy dragon Same result 😦

[heavy ibex]

I tried this first, had the same effect. I switched to a float lerp hoping it would magically fix it

[odd ember]

in that case quats are your only hope, obi wan

[icy dragon]

I never saw that issue before, so if the magic bullet doesn't work, I have no idea.
Though, for a little sanity check, does the issue happen with a fresh Third Person BP template?

[round moth]

im in this blueprint but the windows are all messedup for some reason and i cant get to the event graph

[icy dragon]

Tried double clicking the Event Graph in the list?

[round moth]

ok that worked

but how can i make it like the other blueprint

where it is normal

[icy dragon]

You can always summon the pannels here

[odd ember]

window > load layout > default editor layout

[icy dragon]

(ignore the Enable Fullscreen highlight)

[round moth]

i did that but it changed my whole unreal

not the actual tab i did it on

@odd ember

[odd ember]

did it change it for new tabs that you open?

[icy dragon]

The panels can be summoned back in the Window toolbar menu nonetheless

[round moth]

well ima assume all new ones i make will be normal

im just confused why this one is broke

[odd ember]

so close and reopen

[dreamy ice]

so my ability system will allow players to interchange abilities. How would I go about that? Like do components within components?

[odd ember]

or close, reset to default, reopen

[dreamy ice]

i cant wrap my head around it

[odd ember]

no, you'll need design patterns for that

[round moth]

i have much less option to add

[icy dragon]

Gameplay Ability System might be the most elegant for this, but that needs C++ coding to set up. (And I actually never tried it myself)

[dreamy ice]

I really wanted to do it on my own so I knew the groundwork for it.

[odd ember]

basically you'll need to consider how to access your abilities, and make that point of access the same across all abilities

[dreamy ice]

I considered making them actors to spawn on the player but that didnt really make sense.

[icy dragon]

It can't be data only BP, parent class is one of the base classes 🤔
Magic bullet it is then.

[odd ember]

actors spawning on players does make sense, but not for abilities necessarily

[icy dragon]

Well, I did use spawn actors for special abilities, and a bunch of events stringed together.

[dreamy ice]

My worry is that won't be efficient enough for my idea. I want the abilities interchangable at any time during runtime.

[icy dragon]

Basically the ability actor's going to tell the character what animation to play, and how many damage (and element if any) to apply.

[odd ember]

no need for it to be an actor for those

[icy dragon]

It's my method, so I expect it to not work on other's project.

[faint pasture]

Do ability as actor or as actor component.

[odd ember]

I'd personally create a systemic approach where there's an ability queue or stack where abilities are put on and executed in order

an ability could be an object

since it just needs to carry data for the most part

[faint pasture]

Well yeah you can go down that route then you basically end up with GAS with extra steps and with worse networking

but abilities as actors or components works fine for someone new

[dreamy ice]

id like to store the ability code itself individually, can i nest components within components?

[odd ember]

nope

[faint pasture]

Give an example of the most complex ability you can think of

[odd ember]

they mentioned wanting to create a system themselves

[dreamy ice]

hmmmm, they're not necessarily complex all the time, but there will be many.