blueprint

[split orbit]

I think I messed it up by trying to make it "modular"

Atleast during the startup of the Inventory

Cause its calling for Columns and Rows but thats not set until the Inventory_Widget is created

Which won't be an issue when opening containers later, cause the event for "OnOpen" will be called then to do all that and set it up correctly

Its just that on Event Begin Play doesn't work for what I need

[dawn gazelle]

I think you need to work things to be more modular.
Like your inventory UI, just the inventory component that you have without duplicating it.... All that would require for input is: An inventory component.
From that inventory component you would both know what items are contained within the inventory and how many slots the inventory has. Your UI should then be able to generate what it should look like from that whenever component you "create" the widget with.
When you bring up a "swap" UI, all that really should be required is that you feed in two inventory components. The storage you're pulling from and your inventory, so that means you can reuse the original widget you used just for your inventory to make up both sides of the swap UI. As far as transferring items between , that just requires a bit more dealing with the drag and drop operations if you hadn't already set them up to use target components.

You should definitely not use beginplay to create these things. It should be when you need them. So pressing "I" for example is when you create your inventory widget.
Interacting with a container item is when you create the swap ui. If you just want to test, then put that on a keybind too for now, like pressing "Y" opens the swap UI and feed in a test component on your character.

[split orbit]

I think the reason why I used Begin Play for the Inventory is because it is a static constant size and would never change

The Containers on the other hand are variable and change depending if you say open a Wooden Chest or a Iron Chest they could have completely different row/column values.

As for what I was attempting to do, I was basically trying to create a pseudo container for certain slots on my character equipment screen. But as I found out doesn't work because it would have to be set as constants Column/Row value before being created

Setting it to 2x2 removes all those errors

Before the Drag/Drop issues that I have to fix but thats another issue

[slim sorrel]

The asset '/Game/Game/Blueprints/Game/PBH_Base_GameMode' (PBH_Base_GameMode.uasset) failed to save.

Cancel: Stop saving all assets and return to the editor.
Retry: Attempt to save the asset again.
Continue: Skip saving this asset only.

This kind of useless error reporting is about to make me switch to unity.

I have been stuck with this project dead in the water for two days on this, and I have no idea whats causing it.

[icy dragon]

Good luck redoing things from square one in Unity, because this error can be as simple as the file being unable to read/overwritten on disk.

[slim sorrel]

I have tried restarting my PC, assuring I don't have two instances of the editor.

[icy dragon]

I know restarting PC won't change a file's read only attribute, so no magic bullet

[slim sorrel]

The error doesn't even give me a reason why that asset is having trouble.

[dawn gazelle]

I haven't done anything like this, but I imagine using an inventory component for each piece of equipment or even for all of them is a bit wasteful of the component as you likely:

1. Care more about the "type" of equipment going into the slot. (Don't want people equipping helmets on their feet)
2. Don't care about the physical size of any particular item (as they're meant to go into the slot they're meant to go into, so it doesn't matter how big they are)
3. Not sure if you're doing diablo-esque style items where some may be 1 handed and others 2 handed, so that's something else that needs to be managed, like swapping in a 2 handed weapon while you already have two separate 1 handed weapons.

I think if I had to, I'd make a separate component entirely that handles equipment, and only stores the data that your inventory component normally would, but instead stored in a map of equipment slot -> inventory item. When you do a drag and drop operation, the UI can validate if it's the right item type for the slot you're trying to drop it into. If it's valid, and there's something already in the slot, swap it around, if not, set the value in the map to what you dropped into it, and display whatever visuals.

[icy dragon]

Check in File Explorer if the uasset file is flagged as Read only.

[dawn gazelle]

I haven't done anything like this, but I imagine using an inventory component for each piece of equipment or even for all of them is a bit wasteful of the component as you likely:

1. Care more about the "type" of equipment going into the slot. (Don't want people equipping helmets on their feet)
2. Don't care about the physical size of any particular item (as they're meant to go into the slot they're meant to go into, so it doesn't matter how big they are)
3. Not sure if you're doing diablo-esque style items where some may be 1 handed and others 2 handed, so that's something else that needs to be managed, like swapping in a 2 handed weapon while you already have two separate 1 handed weapons.

I think if I had to, I'd make a separate component entirely that handles equipment, and only stores the data that your inventory component normally would, but instead stored in a map of equipment slot -> inventory item. When you do a drag and drop operation, the UI can validate if it's the right item type for the slot you're trying to drop it into. If it's valid, and there's something already in the slot, swap it around, if not, set the value in the map to what you dropped into it, and display whatever visuals.

That component can also handle applying any effects, setting up your player with whatever weapon, etc.

[slim sorrel]

So you have no idea what causes this or how to fix it, and you feel that guesswork is fine, and that the error message and causation of this error is just okay as is?

Your right I must just be stupid.

[split orbit]

I was only making an item "container" for a few of the slots as you can put different sizes/combinations of that item type in that slot

Such as like Diablo 2 Charms, basically a dedicated section for those specific types that are only effective when inside that area

To be exact, only 3 of them needed a 2x2 grid the rest are just actual "slots" that are set in and done

[icy dragon]

It won't hurt to check things around ┐( ˘_˘)┌

[candid nest]

hey i am using this but still my ai is not spawning it was spawning before but not now i have plug this it in begin play and it is inside my game mode

[icy dragon]

But hey, no one's stopping you from clicking this https://unity3d.com/get-unity/download

[dawn gazelle]

Try changing the collision handling override. It may be in a spot that it can't properly spawn.

[candid nest]

can u explain how to do that sorry i am currently noob

[slim sorrel]

You are a useless pos.

[candid nest]

it is spawning but going down down down

[icy dragon]

Whatever you say ¯_(ツ)_/¯

It took at least 5 fricking minutes to check the .uasset file in File Explorer

One could even speedrun it down to 1 minute

[dark crow]

No need to be rude in the first place, won't get you anywhere

[icy dragon]

🤫 don't tell him that, at least make it spoiler

[gentle urchin]

I mean, its clearly stating the issue, not sure what else youd want the editor to inspect and report back on..

[queen urchin]

Hey guys. I have a "Top view game". And I have a pawn with camera. And a landscape that is not flat. I want that pawn to move right on the landscape (so camera wont be under landscape anytime. Probably any ideas how to make so?

[icy dragon]

Wasn't Character Movement Component handle the collision?
Or are you not inheriting from Character class?

[gentle urchin]

If all else fails just delte it and make a new GameMode 😄

[icy dragon]

Guys, spoiler tags
||We know that in many cases people barely put any logic in Game Mode||

[gentle urchin]

cant recall spoiler tag :(

[tawdry surge]

Depends on the game. I made a rail shooter and like 90% of that game's logic in in the game mode

[gentle urchin]

Type of game doesnt change peoples practices in this context i think

||Spoiler?||

[icy dragon]

Wrap in double pipe symbol ||

[icy dragon]

||yes||

[teal goblet]

Hey Anyone got a second to checkout an issue with Ragdoll and Forces?

[tawdry surge]

Well something like my example it wouldn't make a ton of sense to make half a dozen manager objects to handle enemy spawning, game timer, score, player progression, ui updates, etc..
Easier to stick it all in the game mode and have it handled in one globally accessible place.
But I'd never do that in an rpg project

[teal goblet]

I can make my enemy die and go into Ragdoll but I cannot aaply a force to make him fly through the air

[icy dragon]

#legacy-physics might know more about it

[remote meteor]

usually apply impulse will work

with physics enabled

unless its specified to be ignored in the same physics menu where you enable physics

[tawdry surge]

^

[remote meteor]

usually my game flow and setups/streamingmaps/etc i place them in game mode, game state as its name implies, the state of the game, game time and such,

player health and such on player state

🤔

but thats just me i guess

[icy dragon]

I do absolutely nothing in Game Mode lmao

[tawdry surge]

I avoid it in multi-player because it's a server only object, and communication with it takes extra steps.
But single player games, its just convenient

[icy dragon]

Even my game being single player, I still do absolutely nothing on GM
I do most of the questing in Flow Graph and have Game Instance serve as volatile memory of the game

[tawdry surge]

So if you for example, have a quest where you gotta race or box or something outside the general rules of the game.
I'd simply load the level with the racing/boxing game mode assigned.
How do you do it?

[remote meteor]

depends on the level switching option i guess, if we use load level streaming, i can use game mode to handle the streaming part and continue

if just usual open level, an entire separate game mode is also possible

[icy dragon]

I just pass the inputs around, and spawn a manager actor specific to the minigame, as I'm not switching persistent level because of open world design

[remote meteor]

the concern i had was, i need a seamless loading screen with bgm playing, hence i opt for level streaming

[icy dragon]

Also in my GDD, I had majority of the minigames (except board games) pretty much reusing existing mechanics with some minor differences.

Example, fight club minigame would reusing the normal combat but disable access to items/magic, disable equipments prior to the fight, and cap the max HP. Racing would use the existing free roam riding system, but has checkpoint on the road and forfeit conditions.

[tawdry surge]

Open world makes it a little harder because you can't change the gamemode without changing the persistent level, which I find annoying, but soon to be irrelevant with gameplay feature plugins in ue5. (Some time this year hopefully)

[charred grove]

hello everyone. i need help on making a game like clash royale, anyone willing to give me a hand? in ue4

i have many questions

and i dont know who to go to since theres no specific tutorial on what i need.

[faint pasture]

If you're brand new, start much smaller.

[charred grove]

im not brand new, i have a 3d thir dperson

that i added many stuff to

but idont know how to do other certain things

such as the one i want to do now

like, i already know how to blueprint a character with pc keybindings and its own actions on each key

but

deploying a card from a mobile phone

is something im not familiarized with

idk if you know what i mean

its like a card game

[remote meteor]

first you need the units

[charred grove]

where you deploy an actor, that walks forward and damages the tower

[remote meteor]

means you need AI

[charred grove]

yes

[remote meteor]

then you need the cards to know what actor to spawn when you deploy them

[charred grove]

how do i make a widget, to grab cards from and deploy them? on a phone

correction, widget i know

but the action of deploying the card

[remote meteor]

a drag and drop operation i guess

[charred grove]

with mobile

oh okay

drag and drop its calledi couldnt find any on that

[remote meteor]

on drop to the main widget

[charred grove]

ohhhhh yes

true

thanks

[remote meteor]

cast from viewport to world

[charred grove]

its what i need some insight

[remote meteor]

do some checkings

spawn units

[charred grove]

nice thanks

i screenshotted and ill follow along

do you mind if i ask any question evry now and then?

[remote meteor]

just ask here i suppose

[charred grove]

ight ty

[remote meteor]

maybe you can use button press for unit spawnning first

i would iron that part out

then figure how to do drag and drop and spawn at particular location

[charred grove]

ight yes its better until i get the base structure done

[fair magnet]

is there a way to add actor components like that?

[faint pasture]

Yes but idk if construction script might complicate things.

[fair magnet]

doesn't have to be in construction

I'm just used to "initialize" things there

okay lol... I just didn't find this node... weird I searched for exactly this...

[round sail]

can someone help me with the MakeRotFromX node. I cannot seem to get my head around it ?

[worthy carbon]

Hi there! I’m searching for a tutorial how to make an hotbar like “ press 1 to use you’re rifle and press 2 to use you’re shotgun” but i cannot find it… does someone knows a good tutorial or know how i can make it?

[faint pasture]

What's the problem? It'll return the rotation that results in x being aligned with that input, with roll zeroed out

[brazen pike]

This series worked for me: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dnoMQF1ZqtQ Just ensure you can see it at all times, set everything to align to slots and that the numbers on the keyboard are input to set the selected index slot to whatever you want.

Then you can skip the whole drag and drop part because you wont need it

[worthy carbon]

Thanks!👍🏻👍🏻

[brazen pike]

But this is also for an inventory. If you just want static items (like call of duty for instance) then you COULD use variables in the player blueprint working mainly with bools but I'd recommend against it since you'd need to redo the entire system if you want to make it dynamic

[queen urchin]

Its just not a character. More like just an invisible pawn with a camera

Yep, forgot to mention - its not player's pawn. Its just a dummie with a camera, not a character (rn its an invisible ball 😄 )

So its like "How can pawn be always on terrain"

[icy dragon]

So basically a freecam pawn?

[queen urchin]

Yep. Just not in 3 dimensions. You cant just fly around. Only XY plane

But the problem is - terrain is not flat so rn this freecam pawn can be under terrain

[icy dragon]

You could do an evil linetrace hack downwards to adjust the elevation.

[queen urchin]

Yeah, implementing it rn. I just wanted to ask if there is smth better than that 😄

[tawdry surge]

I'd just use a character with the sk mesh set to none so you can let gravity in the cmc handle it

[queen urchin]

This pawn should move really fast in some cases. Not sure that I can give it to gravity. + it sounds not cheap

[fair magnet]

Playerstate is being activated before the actual player is being created right?

[brazen merlin]

Line trace does sound relatively simple. You want something smooth vs cmc which might jitter. And you can control how often it updates and only to check when moving. Move input is already a tick.

[trim matrix]

Hello! How do i get the angle between two vectors (not position vectors) without having to deal with dot method?

[queen urchin]

Well, rn I just added line trace for every pawn movement. So it will check only when its moving. Should do the trick

Thanks

Looks pretty smooth btw

[brazen merlin]

I think delta rotator returns the angle between two rotators

[subtle light]

anyone here familiar with dispatcher functions?
UMG events aren't bind automatically like they're supposed to, I suspect this may be because the widget has to be spawned at runtime but I don't recall if Actors and other objects have this issue when spawned during runtime.
what's the correct way to do this without having to manually bind to a custom event? or is this simply not possible?

[brazen merlin]

You should bind the event on construct. Either here in your main widget or if you have a widget button class, in there.

What im looking at now also doesnt make sense.

[gentle urchin]

Not plugged in for starter but that might be for pic only..

[maiden wadi]

On a side note, all UI is spawned at runtime.

[gentle urchin]

Bad habbit of many

[subtle light]

it's for pic only, I typically plug that into beginplay

[gentle urchin]

Pause ai widget is created first i assume?

Before binding to it

[subtle light]

cannot spawn UI in construction. seems like I have to go with manual custom events and binding instead of using the built-in events.

but yeah, pauseUI is setup in beginplay before any binding would occur.

[maiden wadi]

I'm confused though, why do you need that binding? You already have quit running on a button press.

[gentle urchin]

Could just let the ui quit game

[subtle light]

just to make it cleaner and use UE's own event dispatcher bindings.

[brazen merlin]

Little confused why this is also in SCPPlayerController and not a widget

[maiden wadi]

But.. you're calling it from a button press aren't you?

Like, this is intended to be a button that quits the game?

[gentle urchin]

Show the dispatch call aswell..

[subtle light]

I have the pause/resume function built into the player controller and decided to put the whole thing in there, so that the UI only calls dispatchers.

it's a pattern I want to be able to use in the future too. this way the UI doesn't need any references to the player controller, etc.

[gentle urchin]

It doesnt if its just self contained either

[brazen merlin]

But if you can call quit here...

[subtle light]

so in this specific instance, I can call quit on the UI itself, but it's obviously not something I want to do for pause/unpause and other functions so I'm just trying to be consistent.

[gentle urchin]

Moving this ui to another project

Means setting up the dispatchers again

Pause unpause can also reside in the widget

Pause usually comes from controller in my projects but unpause is just reversing what the controller does

[maiden wadi]

I would just seriously put the QuitGame directly on the button's OnPressed/Clicked. There are other bindings that things can use to save or whatever when Quit is called.

Forcing it into the controller is indirection.

[subtle light]

it's just easier to have in the controller, since there's other stuff like setting the mouse cursor and input mode. otherwise the UI and player controller both need references to each other.

[maiden wadi]

The UI needs the controller, the controller doesn't need the UI.

[gentle urchin]

The game should work without the ui

[subtle light]

where would I create and spawn the UI then?

[gentle urchin]

Hud class 😄

[subtle light]

lol fair

[maiden wadi]

You can do it in controller, but there's no reason to keep a pointer around to a simple window. I do all of my widget managing in AHUD or AHUD actor components. But for a pause menu, it should just be something you can throw on screen and forget about until it's closed.

Widget's construct can pause game, Destruct can unpause. Buttons can directly do other things, etc.

And like Squize said earlier, doing it without direct bindings or with as few as necessary allows portability.

[subtle light]

so for the pause inputaction, do you typically go
playercon > HUD class > UMG visibility
or
HUD class > UMG visibility

[icy dragon]

I have the logic for pause menu almost entirely within the widget BP, including quitting.
It's strange to see it done in Player Controller, because I'm assuming this is even more convoluted mess of references

[maiden wadi]

Personally, I have static getters for my HUD in library functions. HUD itself would have "ShowPauseMenu". Any other button in game could call GetHUD->ShowPauseMenu. And I also enable input in my AHUD class from it's owner controller, so say, escape or P could also call the same ShowPauseMenu

[subtle light]

where do you get the inputaction pause key then? UMG doesn't support inputactions.

[maiden wadi]

It does though. Through Input Components as well as direct windows keys.

[icy dragon]

Also built in focus/navigation rule exists.

Assuming you have to press a button to quit the game

[maiden wadi]

Every UserWidget has both OnKeyDown which is sent directly from OperatingSystem, and they also have an InputComponent that you can bind action events to through the player controller.

Probably OnKeyDown for a pause menu. Pause disrupts normal controller inputs.

[icy dragon]

I personally don't use the built in navigation system, but uses a plugin instead that allow for keyboard/gamepad navigation, it goes more than the built in one

I know I already commit massive heresy on #umg

[gentle urchin]

Set it up customly instead using listen for input bindings

But perhaps i should check out the built in navigation again in the future

future me nods

[subtle light]

either I couldn't figure out how to use it, or built-in navigation was a complete dumpster fire as of 4.18-4.22 ish give or take. I ended up writing some inheritance spaghetti for custom mixed mouse/gamepad navigation lol.

[rich prairie]

I have a npc. I can't remove its Movement Component.

How do I make it dynamic / static?

Setting it to dynamic works perfect, but then I get the normal error code

Mobility of /Game/Maps/1_StartMap/UEDPIE_0_1_StartMap.1_StartMap:PersistentLevel.Qgiver_Chest2 : CollisionCylinder has to be 'Movable' if you'd like to move it with CharacterMovementComponent.

[subtle light]

luckily my other projects have only needed exclusively navigation or pointer.

[icy dragon]

TBH I found the built in navigation kinda limited for my purpose, and I can have procedurally built menus

[subtle light]

movement component is hard-built into the character class, as far as I know, inherited components can't be removed.

[icy dragon]

The built in navigation system is pretty much the same since 4.5

[gentle urchin]

Same. Im gonna have to hit a wall before i look at it again tbf

[subtle light]

I had so many problems with wrap-around, where manually specified widgets to wrap and focus wouldn't work. I gave up on it pretty shortly after.

[icy dragon]

This plugin works for me, but I don't know if this is going to work in 4.18. i use 4.27 so it works.

https://github.com/goncasmage1/UINavigation

[subtle light]

ended up implementing an entire selection system that exists outside of UE's - I had to go back to UE's system for binding inputs using inputkeyselector, but that was it lol

[ivory sky]

hello, I need some help, is this the right channel to ask for it?

[icy dragon]

And I can hear someone in #umg screaming from the distance because of that plugin lmao

[icy dragon]

If it's about actor BP, yes.

[ivory sky]

ok so, I have an actor I'm trying to teleport, but when I do so a component (skeletal mesh) won't teleport with it, I saw that if I change collision from collison enabled to no collision then it works, but if I change it after it's spawned, like this
https://i.gyazo.com/a86931939fbf842d422738d154cb3b10.png
it still won't work

any ideas on how to fix it?

[maiden wadi]

Collision won't change anything about teleporting with the actor. Is that SkeletalMeshComponent a part of that actor?

[icy dragon]

Are you teleporting with Set Actor Location?

[brazen merlin]

in other words, show more of your bp because this isnt enough

[maiden wadi]

Sounds more like a case where it has been detached, or attached with wrong settings.

[ivory sky]

yes

[ivory sky]

I'm basically teleporting the actor to where a line trace ends

[brazen merlin]

thats not really the point. a picture is worth a thousand words (usually)

[ivory sky]

Ye I just gotta figure out how to fit it all in

https://i.gyazo.com/2c44bad82a9421272e4ee6ad8a9b7a0e.png
https://i.gyazo.com/0c0ffc98598a559b71e496bb08676d6f.png
https://i.gyazo.com/81002730136d329960d34fe65d86c345.png

I Know some part of the code are not really well written but I dont care rn

[brazen merlin]

there is also https://blueprintue.com/

[ivory sky]

Thanks

[icy dragon]

Well, if only the interpreter doesn't suck...

Like, I swear I have hard time reading through BP graphs there

[trail ginkgo]

Quelqu’un maîtrise l’animation du saut ? Merci de me contacter j’aurais besoin d’aide

[brazen merlin]

yeah.. can always grab Blueprint Graph Screenshot (or whatever its called) from marketplace for free

[ivory sky]

https://blueprintue.com/blueprint/aiw6wknj/

[icy dragon]

フランス語は話せません、ごめんなさい

[maiden wadi]

What is TeleportComponents?

[ivory sky]

I wanted to try to teleport them seperately but if theres a fix that one is complitely useless, so dont mind it

It didnt do anything in my original code

[brazen merlin]

why are you doing this on tick vs another event? why does a while loop need to be performed while on tick vs another event? does this require constant updating, why?

[rigid storm]

Any general rules of thumb about which type of component to choose? I'm trying to add an upward force that simulates bouyancy when an object collides with a zone representing a fluid. I want it to be re-usable across objects

i don't know if thats a Primitive Component because it involves physics or an Actor Component because its abstract behavior

[brazen merlin]

both sound pretty good. I think actor comp can have a visual, not sure about primitive

[rigid storm]

I guess you can build an Actor component into any of the other components, right? because the other ones descend from Actor

[icy dragon]

Actor Components descend from UObject (I think), but as with other Actor Components, you can use it to build an Actor

[rigid storm]

alright. makes sense. So, in unreal, whats the general mechanism of re-using small bits of behavior? Do game objects have multiple blueprints on them (e.g. one for moving around, one for responding to gravity, etc) or do objects only have one blueprint each?

if its the latter, how does one modularize? can you, like, bundle up parts of a blueprint?

(i'm a Unity refugee, if you can't tell)

[maiden wadi]

Highly depends on the case. In the case of making an object bouyant, I think that depends on how you want to go about it. Cheapest would probably be two different components. A non scene component ActorComponent with the actual logic, and then a separate class of SceneComponent used to define the buoyant points on the actor. They could probably even be an editor only set of scene components that set an array on the ActorComponent that handles the actual flotation. Not sure if that's doable in BP alone.

[brazen merlin]

i could guess after the first question.... Unreal has a mixture of COP and OOP concepts, so the situations inform the direction

[ivory sky]

ye basically I needed this actor to follow the player camera, I used the while loop because its the easiest method I found so the actor won't be inside the wall

[full flax]

hey guys...I have a blueprint actor class I've built for my door assembly...it currently has a frame, door, and transom static mesh and there's two public floats for transom and door open ratio. Eventually I'd like to have a trigger for clicking to open the door, etc...but for now I'm trying to place it properly...I have another blueprint actor class for one floor of my building...it contains all the static meshes for the floors, ceilings, walls, etc...I am now wanting to move the doors into this blueprint class...but when I do I can't seem to find how to expose each doors public open ratio variables...am I going about this all wrong?

[rigid storm]

interesting, yeah this is more or less exactly what I planned to do, including the editor only portion. As long as I have a set of offsets, I know how to do the math to apply rotational impulse, etc.

So I guess I'm probably gonna need to bite the bullet and get into C++, yeah?

whats the general guidance there? do people that use C++ tend to go C++ only for everything, or is a hybrid approach pretty standard?

[maiden wadi]

Depends on who you ask. I like both.

[full flax]

I can see the child class in my outliner but it won't let me select it

[rigid storm]

hmm. well. I guess the last reasonable question to ask is what the best way for me to RTFM is. Do people typically learn this stuff from sample projects? Are there good docs that explain this stuff?

I feel like almost all the materials I encounter are too beginner oriented.

[brazen merlin]

can you select it from the details?

[icy dragon]

A bit tangent: is OOP in Unity that uncommon?

[brazen merlin]

lol, read that wrong

it is that uncommon though

[full flax]

yes, but I don't see the open ratio variables

[brazen merlin]

welli hope you exposed them

[rigid storm]

the COP in unity is still OOP in form. There's a direction to move away from OOP into "data oriented design", but thats a whole other frustrating conversation.

[full flax]

they're exposed in the door actor class...do they also need to be exposed in the building floor actor class? if so, how?

[brazen merlin]

i dunno, i dont fully follow your initial problem

[maiden wadi]

The shortest answer is that defining asset usage in C++ is a fucking nightmare. Requires static references and such that both clutter code, look ugly, and don't change when you decide to move assets around in your project. C++ is fantastic for math. BP math is okay for simple equations, but get four brackets in and it's just annoying. For the defining assets, that makes BP shine for spawning particles, or creating widgets, or setting materials. BP is also MUCH cleaner for timers and async calls with callbacks like loading soft objects. You'll find a balance.

[full flax]

how do I access the public variables of a child actor in a parent actor

if I place the child actor directly in my level I can just click on it and drag the sliders to open the doors...but when I place the door actor inside my building floor actor, I can't seem to find those variables.

at least not in the level instance...I can find it if I open the building floor actor in the editor

[rigid storm]

hmm. and I imagine there are ways to call into C++... static methods, I guess? from within BP?

[spice lynx]

Your child actors in the BP are child actor components

They don't actually exist in the level, they are spawned in by the BP. This is why you can't see their exposed variables

[rigid storm]

there are free functions in C++? oh thank god.

[full flax]

is this a bad way to do things? I've tried asking for guidance on structuring this thing before to no avail...so I just figured I'd dive in and start organizing...

[icy dragon]

Sorry, I meant UFUNCTION(BlueprintCallable)

[full flax]

right now I have hundreds of doors in my level, and I was hoping to organize them into actor groups.

[maiden wadi]

BP and C++ is a one way street. C++ cannot access anything defined in BP. There are small ways around this like BlueprintImplementableEvents, and BlueprintNativeEvents. You can also define default variables in C++ and then set them in a BP child class, and use them in C++. And for access from BP, you just need to make your functions a UFUNCTION and BlueprintPure or BlueprintCallable. You can call them directly on the object in question. Though there are also Libraries where you can define static functions the same way and call them anywhere in BP as well.

[spice lynx]

I mean some people will advise you to stay very far away from CAC. The same can be said for PIE, some parts of UE just don't work as well as they should.

That being said, based on your use case. It's fine to use CAC. You just need to be aware of the limitations. Just like with level instances, the children don't live in the level you see them in at the editor

[odd ember]

have you come around to not using them then? 🙂

[spice lynx]

they live inside the parent BP/Level instance, so you can't reference them from other places of your level

[spice lynx]

Nope. I had no choice 🙂

[rigid storm]

C++ cannot access anything defined in BP.

oh, but you can define functions with inputs, right? like, little input pins that you can pipe into from BP when calling the function?

[icy dragon]

Speaking of which
https://www.unrealengine.com/en-US/onlinelearning-courses/converting-blueprints-to-c

[rigid storm]

🙇 🙇 🙇 🙇

[odd ember]

that thumbnail is blasphemy. not using dark mode smh

[full flax]

I don't even know what CAC and PIE stands for

[gentle urchin]

Yes! And you can make blueprintimplementable events which can have return values and whatnot

[odd ember]

child actor component and pie (any type)

just kidding, it's play in editor

[full flax]

haha!

mmm pie

[ivory sky]

Any help?

[maiden wadi]

Yep. As long as it is a BP exposed type. EG you can't use a uint16 for example. Integers in BP are only uint8 bytes, and int32 signed integers.

[icy dragon]

Won't be inside the wall? Can't you do the check once before teleporting?

[full flax]

well as I said, I currently have hundreds of doors and windows directly in my level in the editor...it's a nightmare...and I can't imagine trying to access a specific door or window at game time via any logical convention...so I was hoping to make each floor of my building have it's own doors and windows as children...what's the best way to expose this type of structure?

[odd ember]

ideally each door is an actor that you spawn attached to a door frame

same for windows if they need functionality

[ivory sky]

I need to know the "amount* of actor being inside, I tried to calculate it but didnt manage to get it, also since the player can look to another wall you need to check it again

[maiden wadi]

Also a good response to this is to point out that everything you get in BP by default is pretty much a C++ function written somewhere and just BP exposed.

[rigid storm]

interesting. Okay, Well this has been really helpful.

Thanks a ton, @maiden wadi @icy dragon @gentle urchin !

I'm off to learn about converting blueprints to C++, and then to figure out how to create editor only behavior to capture a set of offsets that I can deliver to... I guess another component to handle logic. I'm not 100% sure of what "component" implies in Unreal yet, but conceptually this is a direction

[odd ember]

a component is a class that attaches to an actor

[spice lynx]

Don't have them all be part of the same BP

You shouldn't cram an entire floor into a BP

[full flax]

ok...is that something that is handled by the level or the building floor actor? Currently my building has floor actors that contain only static meshes. For example, one ward has 26 windows and 20 doors...I have 8 wards on the male side and 8 wards on the female side.

[spice lynx]

All those windows and doors should be BPs of their own, places into the respective (sub)level

[odd ember]

it's like components for ECS

except a bit heavier on the logic

[rigid storm]

its definitely not like components in ECS

[spice lynx]

What's the reasoning for making floor actors?

[odd ember]

depends how your setup is

[rigid storm]

that much I am sure of haha

[odd ember]

ECS components only use data, but principally the use case is the same

[full flax]

organization of hundreds of static meshes...no one could tell me a better way to do it...and I saw in a William Faucher video about separating walls and ceilings and such for lumen that you can collect them into actor components...so I did.

[odd ember]

the idea is it's a freeform class that is easily attachable to an actor

which is analogous to an entity

[full flax]

What's ECS?

[odd ember]

entity component system

[rigid storm]

components and systems in ECS are a very specific implementation concept that is not the same as COP

Although I am extremely excited for the Mass engine to come out so I can do some actual ECS

[odd ember]

it's a design pattern that allows for very lightweight data structures to be managed by systems

[icy dragon]

Enhanced Chip Set

[full flax]

sheesh...are there any good tutorials for building levels in UE5 that cover this stuff?

[icy dragon]

Wait no, this isn't Amiga channel

[odd ember]

analogous

[rigid storm]

I mean, yeah. But in the same sense that functional programming and OOP are analogous

[odd ember]

modular kits are generally hellish. the idea is to use them for the blockout, then once you're satisfied with use case, convert them into a building proxy

[rigid storm]

they're both ways of modularizing behavior, they just accomplish it totally differently lol

[odd ember]

it's a design pattern, not a paradigm

[full flax]

I tried to tell you I'm ready to move past blockout...but I can't find any resouorces on HOW to properly structure a level like this.

I don't even know what to search for.

so I just pop in here and ask questions that usually end with me discovering I did a WHOLE LOT OF WORK that I now have to delete and do over "properly"

[spice lynx]

Try #level-design

[odd ember]

if you're ready to move beyond that, you need either an artist or to do it yourself. measure out the rooms or export your modularly built structure back into something like blender

[rigid storm]

right. okay, sorry I didn't mean to make this into a debate. the reason I'm saying they aren't similar is that it doesn't actually inform me about the specifics of modularization in Unreal any more than the literal word "component" does

[odd ember]

then build a single mesh out of that

[icy dragon]

You ever heard meddling Unity kids saying Prefabs?

[odd ember]

that mesh will be a proxy. a proxy is the art version of a blockout

[odd ember]

components attach to actors in a many to one relationship

[ivory sky]

Any updates?

[full flax]

so all the 3d modeling I've done as what I thought was final in-game art asset is what actually?

I have the entire building built in blender already

[odd ember]

well then you may as well bring it in 🙂

modular kits are prototyping tools

[full flax]

I did! now I want to organize it all

and be able to interact with them...so I've been putting all the static meshes into actors

[odd ember]

that's good

but so

anything that is static

you can leave as a single unified structure

anything that requires interaction needs to be separate

[full flax]

well I had to break it up into a bunch more static meshes than I initially thought so they can be properly lit by lumen.

and culled/optimized by nanite

[odd ember]

okay well I'm not familiar with lumen

or nanite

all of that seems extremely experimental

[maiden wadi]

@rigid storm In short. Actors are UObjects, and ActorComponents are UObjects. As UObjects, they share a lot of similarity in underlying code. However they differ in their implementations. The easiest way to look at it is from the top. When you open a level, you open a UWorld. this UWorld can spawn Actors which it saves in it's array of known actors in the world. An Actor similarly creates ActorComponents and maintains and keeps track of them.

[brazen merlin]

its recommended to break up your walls and ceilings and floors, seems like overkill though

[full flax]

well I'm not releasing this anytime soon...so I want to work with the new stuff

[icy dragon]

Even then both touted to be the holy grail of filmmakers and archvizers

[full flax]

it looks fantastic...I just want to organize it so I can start workign with game logic

[brazen merlin]

epic: "lets make our next engine... not about games"

[odd ember]

well I'm going by the notion that anything UE5 is in for some rough beta testing, and I don't get paid by epic to that 🙂

[icy dragon]

Which I can't relate because I'm not a dedicated filmmaker (more in level with homebrew machinimas)

[maiden wadi]

Nanite is going to make the Casting hate skyrocket. 😄

[icy dragon]

That's what Unity Technologies would say.

[odd ember]

can't blame them for wanting all that filmmaking coin

[full flax]

well I have to step away for a bit...called into a meeting...I'll get back to this I guess...

[odd ember]

you need to cast to use nanite?

[brazen merlin]

i swear ive read multiple sources that talk about how much more money is made in games industry than film nowadays

[rigid storm]

@maiden wadi and blueprints implement individual components? or whole actors? or both?

[gentle urchin]

Ms just bought blizzard for 600billion

So some value must be made..

[icy dragon]

Yes, and then Virtual Production become a thing

[maiden wadi]

No, but people are bad at keeping their assets in line now. Wait til their assets are allowed to be that stupid large.

[icy dragon]

Even more so with the hardcore endless mode of COVID going on

[maiden wadi]

Actors do. A "Blueprint" is just another name for a class.

[brazen merlin]

Covid... covid... like CommVid?

[icy dragon]

Linear media makers and enterprise guys gotta turn their head around, and see how games technology somehow strive through

[brazen merlin]

wait a minute... there's no D in virus 😱

[rigid storm]

okay.. so an "ActorComponent" is a component that attaches to an actor, or class that implements an Actor to which one attaches components?

[odd ember]

yes but COVIS sounds too much like a pet name

[icy dragon]

Let's not get into the rabbit hole of blueprinty things, like animBP, material BP...

[maiden wadi]

They're still all just classes.

[brazen merlin]

actor component attach to actors

[brazen merlin]

or you could have a Child Actor Component to attach another Actor to an Actor

[maiden wadi]

Think of an Actor as a class that manages ActorComponents. An ActorComponent can be something that either displays something, like a StaticMeshComponent, or something that modularizes code, like the CharacterMovementComponent.

[odd ember]

pls

CAC should be deprecated

[maiden wadi]

#define deprecated "Destroyed in Unholy Fire"

[rigid storm]

is there some other method of parenting actors that is preferred?

[brazen merlin]

ive been using CAC without issues

[odd ember]

a component is a class for repeat logic to be stored that can be attached to an actor. for instance, a health component could exist, and that could be applied to any actor that requires having health

[odd ember]

AttachTo

[icy dragon]

Attach To

And for the love of crap, stay away from Child Actor component if possible.

[rigid storm]

alright, awesome. this clears up a lot. I think the primary confusion was that a lot of tutorials design the entire actor within one blueprint, so I didn't know if Blueprints == Actor == ActorComponent

[brazen merlin]

thats because compartmentalization is a skill lacking in most people, especially newbs

[odd ember]

blueprint == class/object, actor == WorldObject?

basically an actor is an object with a transform, so it can exist in the (game) world

[maiden wadi]

Not always true.

GameMode, GameState, PlayerState, etc.

[icy dragon]

That word is as mouthful as floccinaucinihilipilification

[odd ember]

they too have transforms and exist in world

[maiden wadi]

Mmm. No, not all of them. AInfo actors do not have a location.

[brazen merlin]

yeah but caramelization is a real word, floccinaucinihilipilification sounds like some failed pharmaceutical product

[maiden wadi]

In fact. Technically actors don't have a location either. They use their RootComponent to get location.

[brazen merlin]

well i looked it up, literally exists to just be the longest word

[odd ember]

https://docs.unrealengine.com/4.27/en-US/API/Runtime/Engine/GameFramework/AActor/

[brazen merlin]

An Actor*

[odd ember]

I refer you to the docs

[icy dragon]

Ironically I found Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwllllantysiliogogogoch to be less mouthful than that

[maiden wadi]

Spawned in a level doesn't mean that it has to have a transform. It means the level maintains it by keeping a pointer to it to keep it alive.

[brazen merlin]

yeah but many european countries just smash words together for convenience

[rigid storm]

I can't tell if this is a joke or an autocorrect error, but I laughed

[maiden wadi]

The actor itself doesn't have a location. It gets it from it's root component.

[brazen merlin]

it was a joke, and both caramelization and compartmentalization are real words 😛

[brazen merlin]

my eyes!

[odd ember]

so can an actor exist without its root component?

[rigid storm]

caramelization is not a real word. And compartmentalization is a skill that I could use more of. But that's what therapy is for

[odd ember]

ahem https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/caramelization

[rigid storm]

nonesense. everyone knows caramel is only a fictitious word designed to start pronunciation fights

[odd ember]

just like birds aren't real, gotcha

[brazen merlin]

birds are not real

they're a fabrication of false belief - there are only flying lizards

[shadow crescent]

good evening fellow creators!

[brazen merlin]

you want #graphics lol

[shadow crescent]

I do?

I am far better at coding than graphics, lol

[brazen merlin]

too bad coding is listed under Programming and not Content Creation

[shadow crescent]

boo hoo

lol

[trim matrix]

Someone worked on FVector::EvaluateBezier before https://docs.unrealengine.com/4.26/en-US/API/Runtime/Core/Math/FVector/EvaluateBezier/ . I Want to create splines at runtime for pathing with this if it possible but I cant find even how to get started 😦 .

[odd ember]

this looks like #cpp

[brazen merlin]

API? Math? F? definitely #cpp

[ivory sky]

bump

[trim matrix]

Trying out there . Thanks

[lilac yarrow]

I have setup different characters using different assets from the stylizedmodularcharacter, I have setup a system to change the body parts by string, and then merge all of the skeletalmeshes in one mesh.

My problem here is with or without the merging of the meshes, I am unable to save my structs, I have tried making a savegameblueprint, yet my player model never retains the struct, and always loads the default settings set to that struct.

[odd ember]

🤔 🤔 🤔

[odd ember]

structs are generally not great on the side of BP. you can try SetStructMembers

[lilac yarrow]

Thank you will try now

[odd ember]

but this function... why?

[lilac yarrow]

What would you recommend instead of struct

Because I have a character creation that creates body parts from the skeletalmeshes and then merges them into one mesh

[odd ember]

I recommend doing save utility in #cpp

[brazen merlin]

you can do SetMembers in bp

[odd ember]

and hope for the best

[lilac yarrow]

I see, I am quite wet behind the ears, and just hacking at it, so I can improve, I have been doing this for years, but my learning curve is slow

[lilac yarrow]

Thank you

[odd ember]

structs are generally meant to be static read only data in BP

you can set them but it's an awkward process and they will sometimes bug you out, especially when it comes to setting (and later retrieving) pointers

[brazen merlin]

yeah, otherwise, if they are all skeletal mesh components, put them in an array and remember what each index corresponds to

[lilac yarrow]

I have them in an array, but I want to save that array without the indexed pointer

[brazen merlin]

i didnt see an array in the pics, and i dont really understand why not

[lilac yarrow]

regular blueprint from stylizedmodularchar

[brazen merlin]

ewww, are those structs in a struct?

[lilac yarrow]

and a widget on top

[brazen merlin]

i guess they did it this way for good reason

im all for automation and streamlining, but there's a limit, usually that limit is workability/ease of use

[maiden wadi]

Random side note with the savegame loading. You can delete almost half of the function.

[lilac yarrow]

Thank you

[near wolf]

can someone help me add rotation to steering wheel ? Thanks

[smoky ice]

Does anyone know what would cause a BP node to need to be refreshed every time I load up the UE editor?

[near wolf]

I made it rotate, but it rotates instantly not slowly

[smoky ice]

This seems to happen every time, it's not even my code 😄

[novel rock]

Are you using a vehicle controller? https://docs.unrealengine.com/4.27/en-US/InteractiveExperiences/Vehicles/SimpleWheeledVehicleMovementComponent/

[odd ember]

this looks like you don't have that plugin installed anymore

or it didn't install properly

[smoky ice]

I've had it in for months now and that call exists elsehwere, I moved this call into a function on a BP and this seems to happen now. In fact that same function works just fine when called within another BP, I'm a bit confused this go round tbh

[odd ember]

well move it back then

[smoky ice]

no issue

[odd ember]

your player controller is different

my take is

you moved it somewhere it doesn't belong

and that's why it's giving you issues

[smoky ice]

Potentially? It's calling the same gameplay statics however

[odd ember]

apparently not

[smoky ice]

well yes, apparently not, I get that, I was just seeing if there was something I might be missing. This works once refreshed.

It's not the normal compile issue I see

[odd ember]

if the node is redded out like that it means it doesn't exist

so it's likely wrong scope

also as far as I can see it's not a gameplay statics

it's steam API which is different

[smoky ice]

Sorry I meant the PlayerController call that feeds in

[near wolf]

this you send me is about car tires

not steering wheel inside the car

[smoky ice]

The function is in a UBlueprintFunctionLibrary, which I assumed was fair game

[odd ember]

why have you moved it

let's start there

[novel rock]

Attach steering wheel movement to tire steering and multiply or divide as needed.

[near wolf]

that is what im trying here

but im not that familiar with blueprints

right now it rotates, but instantly, it does not rotate slowly

[novel rock]

How are you moving your vehicle?

[paper galleon]

This looks like a press release turning. Shouldn't you be using axis events

[smoky ice]

It was being called directly within a UObject BP and because I'm working on crossplay I've abstract this behind a generic object that's steam specific, with epic and others being C++ implementations.

[near wolf]

I followed a tutorial, the car tires turn normaly and they work, but now I wanna attach a steering wheel to them

that rotates with them

[odd ember]

if you have cpp integration, double click on the node and check where it is from

saves me loading up the editor

[smoky ice]

It's called from a BP of mine, but it references this UBlueprintFUnctionLibrary call in the AdvancedSession lib

[odd ember]

okay, any chance of the .cpp?

[novel rock]

Attach input move right axis value to steering wheel rotation. Idk what axis x, y, or x. Play with it

[smoky ice]

So I call this node from a UObject and it works, I moved it to another UObject and it can't find it

[near wolf]

it does not find such blueprint

[odd ember]

have you tried spawning it instead of copying it over?

[near wolf]

it's not there when i search for it

[smoky ice]

Spawning a node? I'm not familiar

[odd ember]

getting it from the context menu

[smoky ice]

ah

yes

[odd ember]

rather than using copy paste

[smoky ice]

I just tried that

even when disconnected I get the error

[odd ember]

I don't actually see the error, I don't know if you have posted it?

[smoky ice]

^ you mean like this correct

[odd ember]

yes

I mean if it spawns in red

there is something wrong with the scope or with the plugin

[smoky ice]

It doesn't spawn in red sorry

only when I open it up again

[odd ember]

does it work otherwise if you compile it?

[smoky ice]

Yep

[novel rock]

What tutorial where you using?

[smoky ice]

If I refresh or run with the node disconnected it works

This is the first time for me in years that I legit can't tell what the diff is that causes this 😄

[near wolf]

I used one for the car movement, but it has nothing in common with the steering wheel now. Im trying to add it on my own

[odd ember]

faulty plugin, BP bugs, could be anything at this point

[novel rock]

Can you send me a link to the video or documentation?

[smoky ice]

Yah all I'm really seeing in the log is:
LogLinker: [AssetLog] H:\BattleAxe\Content\BattleAxe\Online\BP_OnlineSystemsShim_AdvancedSessions.uasset: Failed to load '/Script/AdvancedSteamSessions': Can't find file.

I don't even get an exception running with VS open

[bright harbor]

so i might just be bad at math, but how would i take a trace that points at the floor and rotate the player to the face the linetrace hits. that’s what i tried https://media.discordapp.net/attachments/221798862938046464/933204464163237938/Screenshot_56.png

[near wolf]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BKbKfF0jTLY

[odd ember]

https://tenor.com/view/well-there-it-is-jeff-goldblum-gif-14058551

I'd try #cpp and see if they can help you out

sounds like the plugin is missing or corrupt or some such

[smoky ice]

Yah...but only for that BP 😄

Thanks I'll ask them there

[odd ember]

sure

[novel rock]

did you do the entire tutorial?

[near wolf]

yes

[novel rock]

these are both the same Key Inputs

[near wolf]

yes i know

one is for the steering wheel, other one is for the tires

[brazen merlin]

not quite, both are for steering, and both are for tires

[near wolf]

it does not let me use only one key input for both

[novel rock]

do you have any of these options?

this would make things a lot easier for you.

[near wolf]

but it does not find such function

i looked for input axis move right

and is not there

[novel rock]

you would need to change from VehicleMovement (inherited) to WheeledVehicleMovementComponent4W Under Components

[near wolf]

ah but this will undo all the stuff i did on the vehicle movement

i just draged out one for a test

and I still don't have a input axis moveright function

[novel rock]

crate an empty actor class BP > then add WheeledVehicleMovementComponent4W > then add wheels under wheel setup > then try and add input movement direction ( right or left idk what you prefer)

[near wolf]

input axis left or right does not appear

[novel rock]

anything happen when you type in move?

[near wolf]

it does not find the function we need

i think we should try some other way

the wheel rotates, just need to make it slow

[near wolf]

i don't have that bro

[novel rock]

try this

[near wolf]

ok

and now what

[novel rock]

you can either use this vehicle or try my instructions again. those inputs should be there now if not then idk.

[near wolf]

i copied it from that blurpeint

to mine

so i made it rotate but still it goes instantly

and not rotating slowly

[novel rock]

what dose the BP Class look like?

[near wolf]

what do you mean

[novel rock]

take a screen shot of your blueprint.

[novel rock]

try removing the Multiply node. connect it directly.

[near wolf]

does not work

[novel rock]

then multiply by 1 or 10 or 20 or 0.1 play with it

[near wolf]

this just shows the angle that the steering wheel rotates

[novel rock]

that's no wat you want?

[near wolf]

i want it to rotate 90 degrees but slowly

not instantly

[novel rock]

do you have an Xbox 360 controller?

[near wolf]

nah

[novel rock]

I guess you cold use with Event Tick and lerp values over time. I recommend looking into lerps.

[wary wagon]

are there any tricks for breaking when a blueprint variable is set

[odd ember]

breaking how?

[wary wagon]

like c++ data breakpoint in visual studio

(break when value is set)

pausing execution and showing which blueprint called the variable's setter

[odd ember]

F8 while the node is selected

[wary wagon]

my binds must be different, is it accessible from the dropdown menus?

[hexed cloak]

Why doesn't my timeline that has a length of 5 play for 5 seconds?

Lol

[icy dragon]

Right click on the node.

I believe the hotkey is F9

[near wolf]

im going bed now, ill try tomorow ,thanks for help

[novel rock]

I wanted to be cool and use Is valid but i don't think it will work in this situation

[lilac yarrow]

I cleaned it up and ran it with an array but still same problem, the current skeletal mesh will not load

[novel rock]

Ignore me i guess you can do this with no errors.

[short agate]

It could also just be that i'm not handling things properly on my end

[abstract summit]

Somebody know why , when i change camera like that of my firstPersonCharacter he desapear

when i eject i saw him but in game he is invisible ?

[charred grove]

hello guys

why is the top tower

stretched by the camera?

also how can i give it a bette rlighting?

such as this

just a sec

just like that

colorful

cuz i tried to set lighting, but it gives it a realistic lighting which its not what i want

[icy dragon]

Are you trying to transition from first person to third person? Or switching to another player character? (a la Battlefield Modern Combat)

[languid hemlock]

i got an actor called itembox and want it to get collected and if it gets collected to add the Blueprint HackerItem to the Character

[abstract summit]

juste switchin camera

[icy dragon]

Then you can simply set active the TP camera and deactivate the FP camera.
Set View Target With Blend is mainly for swapping to another actor with camera.

[languid hemlock]

heres my itembox blueprint and the second pic is my hackeritem blueprint

[abstract summit]

look

i see the raycast but no the mesh

just why..

[pallid axle]

yo where does the output print to un unreal

[abstract summit]

print

[pallid axle]

I know how to print in blueprint but where does it show on screen

[tawdry surge]

Output log and/or upper left of the screen

You can adjust how long it is on screen from the print node

[pallid axle]

alright guess I'm using the print node wrong

[tawdry surge]

Not sure how, but I'm sure there's a wtf video for it if you're having trouble with it

[pallid axle]

man programming is a lot easier then blueprints

[tawdry surge]

Haha idk how you figure that. I've taught 8 year olds how to use blueprint. Never had anyone under 15 get past functions in a text based language

[pallid axle]

welll maybe I should of learned blueprints first but they kinda lame tho

[last abyss]

https://tenor.com/T7KM.gif

[tawdry surge]

Lame how? It vastly easier to debug and track logic, and typically runs as fast as c#
C++ is good for some things but quick prototyping isn't one of them

[pallid axle]

I feel more free when not using visual scripting idk

[fluid stratus]

If anyone might be using easy ballistics plugin. How might one change ammo types? I though set ammo could work. But it has not changed the ammo and in fact is preventing firing from happening.

[odd ember]

then don't use them. be free

[tawdry surge]

Well that's kinda the difference between lower and higher level languages..

[carmine thunder]

I am trying to respawn the coin. I think I have done almost everything correct but the coin doesn't respond to collision and neither it gets destroyed

[zealous fog]

Why are you casting?

[carmine thunder]

to know who is colliding with it

respond only if its a player

[zealous fog]

But you arent checking whether the hit actor is the player

Youre checking if the player is the player

[carmine thunder]

okayyy

[zealous fog]

Which it always will be (assuming its always thirpersoncharacter)

[carmine thunder]

yeah

thirdpersoncharacter

[zealous fog]

So this cast will never fail

You gotta connect the other actor node

Your coin is now spawning at the exact location where the cylinder is, and is probably colliding and thus not spawning, you can try selecting another collision setting

Or spawn it with a little offset, so you can see if it is spawning at all

[carmine thunder]

other actor node to where?

coin's shape is cylinder

if it gets destroyed then it wouldnt collide

[zealous fog]

These are really the basics you should get familiar with first

https://youtu.be/EM_HYqQdToE

Probably one of the most recommended videos on this discord

haha

[carmine thunder]

i assume other actor node to object ?

[zealous fog]

Yes, but its good to understand why you are doing it as well

[carmine thunder]

I am mostly in c++ and i have to do bps because I dont have much time left now 😦

and i am vv new to Unreal 😦

[zealous fog]

Take you time while starting out

Dont get yourself stressed while learning haha

[carmine thunder]

somehow i covereed behaviour trees, blackboard in 2-3 days

with cpp

but rn i have to wrap this up with BPs

so i need help

[zealous fog]

Transform is location, rotation and scale

[carmine thunder]

i did connect it to other actor to object

[last abyss]

can 2 components of the same actor call begin overlap on eachother?

[carmine thunder]

looks like this now

[zealous fog]

Not what object it should be/look like

[tawdry surge]

Are you trying to spawn another coin from the current coin after the current coin was destroyed?

Cuz that's what it looks like

[carmine thunder]

i want to spawn the same coin

spawning is the 2nd thing. Rn it's not even triggering the collision and getting destroyed

[tawdry surge]

Just set hidden in game on/off.
Destroying it will give you a new instance

[carmine thunder]

oh that sounds like a solution 😮

[tawdry surge]

That has to do with the collision settings on the collision volume and the player character

[zealous fog]

You have the destroy actor node somewhere else?

[tawdry surge]

If the volume is ignoring pawns it won't fire when the player overlaps

Not unless you actually want to destroy it

[carmine thunder]

by default is it ignoring pawns?

[carmine thunder]

it's destroying self

would set hidden will deactivate the box colliders at the same time?

[zealous fog]

Where?

[tawdry surge]

It depends on the blueprint class you made. I always just check.
You can destroy it but then nothing else inside the BP will fire because it's been destroyed.
You'll have to spawn a new one from somewhere else

Not actually sure

Have to try it to remember

[carmine thunder]

blueprints were made to make life easier 😦

[zealous fog]

Also, I wonder if you really wanna get the world transform of cylinder? What actor is the cylinder? Is it like the coin purse or what

[carmine thunder]

in cpp i could do object pooling to avoid new instances

[zealous fog]

They are easy but you cant expect to just finish something quickly in a whole new way of programming haha

Dont let this discourage you

[carmine thunder]

cynlinder is itself a coin

[zealous fog]

But then you are spawning a coin with the exact same transform as another coin

So you would have it collide with that other coin

[tawdry surge]

Thats still an option in BP. Look in the advanced section of the spawn node..
But you still have to spawn it from outside itself

Once it's destroyed then it's done executing logic

[carmine thunder]

why is it another coin. THe motive is that the player collides->coin despawn-> after 10 secs it respawns at same location

[zealous fog]

Then you should cache the location when the coin is destroyed and then respawn it at that location

[carmine thunder]

okayyyy

[zealous fog]

If its easier for you, you could always spawn the coin immediately and then change visibility after 10 seconds

But then you have the collision issue again

[carmine thunder]

yeah collision issue in that thing

is respawning that annoying with bps?

[zealous fog]

No, but if you dont know how blueprints work, and youre expecting to know how they work immediately, probably yes

[carmine thunder]

lol it means yes then 😛

[zealous fog]

Well, then dont expect to know how BP work immediately without practise and you should be fine

The video I sent earlier will really cover a lot of things that you are trying to do

Event dispatchers (and the correct time to use them, probably not in this situation you are in), casting, and interfaces (probably what you should be using atm)

[carmine thunder]

okayyyy

what's the opp of set hidden

when i want to unhide

interfaces are powerful

for designs

[zealous fog]

You could~~ probably~~ find that on google

[tawdry surge]

It's still set hidden. You just make it false instead of true

And I'm pretty sure there's a set collision enabled node as well

[carmine thunder]

uhm that should help

but first it's not triggering collision

let me check volumes

@tawdry surge cylinder is set to block all

and the box comp is for checking collision

isn't the opp of sethidden is setvisibility?

[tawdry surge]

Ok so grab the cylinder from the components window, drag it on to the graph, pull off the return/output pin, type set enable collision. Set to false or none or whatever

[carmine thunder]

no maybe

[carmine thunder]

okayy

[tawdry surge]

And no. Look at your set hidden in game node. There should be a check box at the bottom. Just uncheck it to set unhidden

[carmine thunder]

would this work too?

[zealous fog]

You can always check documentation

https://docs.unrealengine.com/4.27/en-US/BlueprintAPI/Rendering/SetVisibility/

Just google the node + ue4

[tawdry surge]

If you want it to have no collision all the time sure

[carmine thunder]

yeha the cylinder shouldnt collide

but the box collider should work

[tawdry surge]

Then you can set it directly like that in the details panel

[zealous fog]

Similarly, here you can find out all about collision https://docs.unrealengine.com/4.27/en-US/InteractiveExperiences/Physics/Collision/

<@&213101288538374145>

[tawdry surge]

The box collision will have it's own collision settings

Make that overlap the pawn and it should work just fine

[charred grove]

hello guys

i cant make my drag and drop actor on world work

i got main widget, i got the widget image for the actor, and i got the blueprint for the actor

i dragged the red square, and its supposed to spawn a cylinder

but nothing spanws

on mouse button down

on drag detected

on drag cancelled

[lyric pumice]

https://youtu.be/Z3FNvOmx3TE

[timber terrace]

Hey guys, i am getting a weird issue where my cast isn't working

the weird part is that is only works with one weapon and doesn't work with the other

[bright harbor]

im only trying to get my player to lay flat against the ground no matter what the surface is, but it's just not working, anyone know why?

[last abyss]

you sure the trace is hitting the floor, not the player?

[empty needle]

How do you make a function in blueprint return a reference?

Instead of a copy?

[high yew]

my content browser is opening the folders inside of it and puting it in the parent folders.

[bright harbor]

i believe so, it’s been told to ignore self

[last abyss]

I guess start by visualizing what the trace hits, then see what the look at rotation would result into and how the rotation would be when you apply it to the mesh

[bright harbor]

i’ll keep trying, thank you for the help

[empty needle]

Anybody have an idea on how to pass by reference?

[brazen merlin]

you should check out how incrementInt works. It takes a reference, manipulates that var, and returns the updated result

[empty needle]

I'm trying to make sure that I always return by Ref on the struct.

I have a actor that I'm using as a Global Variable basically.

[brazen merlin]

then use set-by ref var

[trim matrix]

hello guys

so i created a base widget

[agile edge]

how do I reduce find all

[trim matrix]

in this how i can add name

i mean adding name asper we input

[agile edge]

ctrl+shift+F it seems to be stuck "searching" too many things or something

[brazen merlin]

try asking again in #umg but be a bit clearer

[trim matrix]

just like this

[languid hemlock]

um i need sum help with ma blueprint my game is a 3d fun racer game and im creating an object which inverses controls for the other racer either 1 or 2 depdning on who has it

simpleplacing it in the level doesnt do anything

have i done something wrong?

[brazen merlin]

the way move input works is by how much has been pressed (noticeable with a joystick) Scale Value means how much it should be moving 0-1 is like 0-100% movement. You want to get what this value is from the target player and invert, so you are close 🙂

[blissful grail]

So, I have a GameMode that has an int variable that represents how many objectives have to be completed. I want this to vary from map to map, but rely on one GameMode. What is the recommended approach to handling this? Is there somewhere else that I save the number of objectives to be completed and then the GameMode just reads that in BeginPlay?

[languid hemlock]

oooh :0 both my players share the same movement file you could say but uh i use the car template from unreal and i dunno what value i should exactly get from the file

@brazen merlin here for example is my movement file

[dawn gazelle]

Probably level blueprint if you want to keep the gamemode the same. Pass the variable from the level to the game mode on begin play.

[blissful grail]

Well, one instance of the map might require 1 objective, and another might require 5. Same map, just a different value.

[brazen merlin]

that doesnt look like movement

[blissful grail]

How would the level BP help in this scenario? It too is tied to the map. But I need this value to be configurable.

To be settable prior to the actual loading of the map.

[languid hemlock]

i dont know what this file exactly is for as i havent looked at much of the unreal car template :(

but it basically controls the players speed

or well the cars rather :p

[brazen merlin]

its called SetMeshesVisibility

[languid hemlock]

oki i clicked on it hmm and then?

i cantseem to find speed values there aswell

[brazen merlin]

i have no clue whats going on, sounds like you need to get more familiar with bp basics, try something else, come back to this feature later

[languid hemlock]

the thing its for an exam which i gotta finish tomorow xd

[brazen merlin]

oof

[dawn gazelle]

Each level's blueprint can have a different value which you can then pass to the game mode.

[languid hemlock]

i found this now

[blissful grail]

I understand this. But this would require that I just duplicate the exact same map if I want one version of the map to have 1 objective requirement, and another version of the map to have 3. Which is the exact problem that I'm trying to solve. Avoiding duplicating.

Picture you have a map selection screen. You can select "Neighborhood" with 1 required objective or "Neighborhood" with 3 required objectives. They are the exact same map, the only difference is the required objective count. It seems awfully silly to duplicate the map just to change 1 value.

[brazen merlin]

you're better off doing it in the player class instead of HackerItem. What your HackerItem should do is set this variable to -1.0, run the delay, then set back to 1.0. It's sort of what you are doing but less nodes

so for your HackerItem, onHit, cast that hit actor to PlayerClass, from that return, set the var to -1, delay, then set to 1

[dawn gazelle]

In that scenario, when you select the neighborhood, you can store the number of objectives of that neighborhood in the game instance. On beginplay in the gamemode of the actual level, read the game instance for the values.

[simple trench]

So I am quite new to unreal engine. I have an enemy ai as a character and it has a gun mesh on its right hand. how would i make it shoot a bullet out of that?

[brazen merlin]

sounds like you get to start learning about anim montages, spawning, and projectile movement components

[blissful grail]

That's what I'm currently doing, but I was hoping for a more elegant solution rather than the game instance storing so many different variations.

[languid hemlock]

im honestly so confused rn :( could i send you the files and pay you maybe >w<

[dawn gazelle]

You could use a data table to store the values for each neighborhood, and just read the appropriate data table row when selected.

[brazen merlin]

i feel the sending of files is going to be a bigger hassle

[languid hemlock]

could i still dm you tho? >w<

[brazen merlin]

ehh, id rather you learn 🙂

[languid hemlock]

oki i try

but like the onHit thing what shall i remove in the current BP from HackerItem

[brazen merlin]

#blueprint message

[brazen merlin]

and the var i am talking about is the one in the picture, which is made in your player class

[blissful grail]

You actually just gave me an idea. Data Asset. They're not meant to be written to, sure. But I can do it in this case because there's only going to be one instance that won't be shared. So, on the level selection, it shows the required objective count, then upon selection, set the variable in the appropriate data asset. The GM reads from this assigned GM on Begin Play.

[languid hemlock]

there ´s no onHit tho qwq only event hit

[brazen merlin]

sorry, thats what i meant

[languid hemlock]

aaah oki

how do i do that cast the hit actor to my player Class as it doesnt seem to work as theres no player class

[brazen merlin]

the Hit returns Other and you cast it to whatever the name of your player class is called

[languid hemlock]

like this?

[brazen merlin]

nope

[languid hemlock]

hm how then? 🤔

[brazen merlin]

Whats the name of your player class?

The bp where inputs are performed for movement?

[languid hemlock]

BP_KartPawnBase

[brazen merlin]

Cast to that

Should be blue not purple

[languid hemlock]

hmmm

cant figure it out qwq tried deleting em and this also doesnt work :(

[languid hemlock]

maybe theres a reason why its purple because of idk my settings or something? >.>

because i havent found issue7fix7explanation on why its like that

[brazen merlin]

you want blue, it should be as simple as dragging off from Other and then typing "cast BP_Kart" to get the cast node for your player

[languid hemlock]

how much would you want regarding payment because im honestly dumb funded :(

[brazen merlin]

nah i want you to learn this, this is for school

[languid hemlock]

yea but its just the problem that ive lookedalot and theres no video on howto get it to purple

[brazen merlin]

no not purple, you want blue

[languid hemlock]

yea i meant blue sry qwq

imma try a new blueprint from scratch

should i use actor or pawn for an item? >.>

[brazen merlin]

just to reiterate what i mean
( first picture is in your player class)
( second is your hacker item class - do not cast to MyCharacter, cast to your player class BP_Kart)

[languid hemlock]

down is the Player and the above is the HackItem im guessing? >.>

[brazen merlin]

i thought i made that clear up above

[faint pasture]

Of those 2, Actor of course. Pawn is for things that the Player or AI will control/possess through the PlayerController/AIController

[languid hemlock]

sry was stupid rn xd

[languid hemlock]

aaaah oki thx :3

[faint pasture]

Pawns are Actors too though, brush up on the class heirarchy

[languid hemlock]

gosh its still purple qwq

whyyy are you such a pain to use unreal :(

[dreamy basin]

Can Anyone help me to create a vortex which pulls players towards the vortex projectile

[near wolf]

hey guys, im doing a blueprint for rotating steering wheel inside a car. But right now it rotates instantly. Any ideas how to make it rotate slow with the tires?

[willow phoenix]

you need to put it on a timeline/tick to rotate smooth

and steering value is pretty sure either 0 or 1

[near wolf]

I already have steering tires, but im not sure how to connect the steering wheel to them

so it rotates together with them

[split orbit]

Ok so, i am trying to figure out my issue from earlier a bit better.

I have a Function called "GetPayload" which basically gets the itemobject that is currently being dragged around.

IS it possible to make this function.... (idk how to word this so hear it goes) not bound to a blueprint? So it can be accessed by any blueprint I call it to?

[viscid python]

Can anyone point me in the right direction on how to get a UI element dynamically "pointing" to a coordinate/actor in my 3D environment? Like this UI here: https://images.igdb.com/igdb/image/upload/t_screenshot_huge/sbkqzir28hzjnbrudajr.jpg

[maiden wadi]

There are a few different ways to do that. You could make a static white arm and offset the rest of the widget and then just place the widget at the actor's screen location. But honestly I personally find it much easier to just do a little math and use DrawLines in a UserWidget's OnPaint override.

[viscid python]

Thanks for the answer! I'm too much of a beginner to pull off what you described, however 🤔 I want to do something like this (not specifically for weapons but that's the example) https://cdn1.epicgames.com/ue/product/Screenshot/SS1-1920x1080-4416a5e718793a208a25e10f0cd06e7b.jpg?resize=1&w=1920

This is a store asset for 30€, I'd buy it just to see how it is done but the author seems long gone and the Discord is abandoned. So no support or anything and I'm not sure if it's worth it. I don't even know what to look and search for on Google, however 😅

[wary shadow]

Hi there, what’s the easiest way to pass a bool variable (flag) from a widget BP (let’s say a sort of menu) to an actor BP?

I’m able to set the variable depending on the button clicked, but I don’t know how to access it from the actor BP

[north hedge]

Theres multiple ways, If the BP was part of the player I'd spawn it via the players input and then create a reference to the player via the spawn actor bp that way you can just set the variable directly through it via the player reference if its singleplayer

Anyone know why VR controllers would be working perfectly fine in editor but not overlapping/gripping in a Quest build that averages about 50 fps?
Its not making any sense

[wary shadow]

Thanks for your reply. Up to now I’ve a starting level with the menu, depending on the button chosen I several environments, the actor BP is the same for each new environment but I’d like to change some features of him depending on the level opened

[north hedge]

You could do on a switch on Gamemode Begin Play, iirc its called on each new level load. But google that first because its been a while

[zealous fog]

I've had some issues with collision in editor vs in build

I changed the collision boxes a little bit, the problem was that the collision seemed to be more accurate than in editor

And the overlap wasn't happening in game because the boxes weren't actually touchinf

[north hedge]

Cheers, I might move them away from the hands to see if its an issue with that

[zealous fog]

Could always print t string to see if the event hits

[north hedge]

Yeah I have it printing overlapping actor and a few other vars we have that are assigned on grab/overlap

and everything but the overlap hit actor is being ignored

[maiden wadi]

I can't give a tutorial really, but I can generally tell you how I would do it. If your classes are set up correctly, pretty much all of your weapons would have a base class. Each weapon can extend from that, but the base class would have an array of attachment points of some kind, struct or whatever and probably has the names of sockets in it or has a GameplayTag or Enum that can look up socket names from a map or datatable. What this allows you to do, is have these weapons spawned, but pass them into a widget in the form of the base class and still access that information from them. You could pass that into one large widget like here in the green box. Allows you to set the weapon's name there, and get it's attachment points. You would have that large widget create six smaller ones, one for each attach point and one for each attach points box. Some screen space math could solve spacing the boxes out from the weapon at angles. You use some converting functions to get the weapon's socket locations on screen and convert that to the widget's canvas' local space and set the widgets where you need them. After that it's as simple as using OnPaint to draw the line from the outer edges of the box widget to the attachpoint widget. It is exceptionally complex work but definitely worth trying for if you're into UI design.

Random fun note.. This isn't easy work, which makes me surprised this person went lazy and attached the line to the bottom of the square widget here instead of just figuring the square's outer closest to the attach point.

[viscid python]

Thanks for this excellent explanation! 🙂 Would I also be able to just display it in the game? I would not want it to be in a separate screen/widget. But I guess so, since you said the actual squares with the pointer are basically separate widgets (than can be displayed... anywhere I guess?)

[viscid python]

Maybe the author liked the idea that it attaches to the bottom centre of the square or something like that 😉 As far as I found out, it's a professional game developer who also founded/owns (?) a studio.

[mint comet]

been trying to move the camera on the Z axis, but it's not working, am i doing anything wrong?

[gentle urchin]

Constant wants a live current location i think

So get component relative location

[brisk garden]

Wondered if someone could tell me how I can create a very basic "dialogue system"?

Basically I have this UMG/widget that I want to use. When I click on the button "Next", the text in the bottom box should change to a different (pre-set) text.

How can I do that? All tutorials that I look up cover completely different dialogue systems

https://youtu.be/ZZK1oOq2WW0?t=13

The result I want to achieve is basically this.

Just 1 button that goes through the whole conversation up until the end

[maiden wadi]

Perhaps. Professional just means you got paid for it. To me it just looks tacky. 😄 I'd have at the very least, put the line going over the container at half or quarter alpha to give it the impression that it's behind it.

[zealous fog]

Maybe he just finished the whole system and figured I've done enough work 😂

[maiden wadi]

You could potentially do this in game as well. Slightly trickier. Could use WidgetComponents and some particle ribbons I think for a more dynamic approach.

[viscid python]

Could I use the blueprints from the weapon assets in the store and display them ingame?

[maiden wadi]

Probably. That's the greatest thing about programming, you can do anything you want. 😄 Just depends how much work you want to put in.

[viscid python]

I absolutely want to see this in my game, and it will be done 😎 As of now I just don't have all the knowledge and experience in Blueprints I need 🤔

I'm glad to have some information on what to do and what to even look for now, thanks to you and this channel 😉

[calm iris]

Attached a game camera to a camera rail, works as intended when moved manually in the editor, but how do you make the camera start moving along the track when pressing play?

[runic parrot]

Hi! does anyone know of a way to make a double progress bar?

i want to show how much hp something has and how much it loose, on the same bar

[icy dragon]

You might want to look for visual novel like system.

[gentle urchin]

Easiest done with material unless you wanna move into Slate territory

[gentle urchin]

Easiest done with material unless you wanna move into Slate territory

Surprised the original bar dont support multiple colors/values

[maiden wadi]

I'm lazy. I'd just drop two progressbars in an overlay

[gentle urchin]

I expected more from you 👆👆

😂😂 nvm.

[shadow crescent]

quick Q ... can we have more than one Begin Play in a blueprint graph?

or should I keep it all together?

currently using sequencers but wondering if I can separate

[odd ember]

begin play only exists in one place. however nothing is stopping you from separating out custom events that be called on begin play

[shadow crescent]

right

I have seen that a few times in tuts

very handy

[near wolf]

Hey guys , anyone know how can I make a steering wheel rotate with the tires? I already got working tires, but need to set up the steering wheel

right now it rotates instantly and not slowly with the tires

[worthy carbon]

Hi! Can someone send me the best tutorial for how to learn blueprints and animation etc

[tight schooner]

@near wolf Can you get the relative tire angle from the vehicle movement component? Or if not, from the tires themselves?

I'm not familiar with the vehicle movement component so I'm just speaking in terms of general troubleshooting

[near wolf]

im not that familiar too, I followed a tutorial for the tires, but now im trying to setup the steering wheel on my own somehow..

[tight schooner]

Though from a car pov, it's usually the steering wheel input that drives the tires, but if you're doing an arcadey thing then I get it

If it's cosmetic and doesn't need to be accurate at all, you can use FInterpTo or FInterpToConstant to smoothen the steering wheel motion

Independent of what the tires are doing

[near wolf]

it needs to go with the wheel, because I will have character driving and rotating the steering wheel

[foggy escarp]

its part of the vehicle wheel component.

[near wolf]

but im not sure how to connect the steering wheel with the tires

[calm iris]

How do you play sequence as soon as you press play in the editor?

[foggy escarp]

with the angle you can convert the steering angle directly with the roll of the steering wheel.
Or the better way would be to simply have the steering wheel be a 5th wheel type that's also turning but has no collision.

[near wolf]

but I don't have any bones for the steering wheel, it's just an object that I want to rotate

[foggy escarp]

Then you could just have a tick to keep the same rotation as the vehicles steering angle.

[near wolf]

yeah but how to do that? And do it slowly. Because right now it rotates to the same angle as the wheels, but it just does it instantly

[gentle urchin]

Nvm, didnt actually read up!

[foggy escarp]

being that sterring angle is based off of a percentage, you would have to convert it.

[grave relic]

Anyone that can help me with this spawner issue? So ive got a weird bug, i have a spawner that spawns civilians any value from 1-9 is fine, but then the spawns get caped at 9. So if i say spawn 100 civilians i will still only spawn 9.

[near wolf]

can you show with example please? im not sure how to do it properly

[foggy escarp]

sure

[maiden wadi]

If you're asking why this doesn't spawn 100 and only spawns 9, I assume that it's a collision issue. You're spawning around a tiny point, and the default only tries to place actors so far away from that place before it'll fail spawning. You can set the CollisionHandlingOverride, but you should also try to spawn them on the navmesh in a decently sized area.

[grave relic]

@maiden wadi Thx solved it like this 🙂

Works like a charm

[split orbit]

I have a Inventory_Widget that has this inside it (First picture)

Then I have a Component that calls for the variables from that Widget

For some reason it returns 0 for the values... what am I doing wrong...

It returns the values correctly inside the InventoryGrid_Widget

[maiden wadi]

I highly recommend you change your design process. Widget should not ever dictate the size of that inventory array. Further the Inventory should not care about that widget, it should never know that it exists. Instead, your Inventory should have a single Size value. The Inventory component can be passed to the Widget, and the Widget can arrange it's own grid based on that size and the contents in the inventory.

The general design flow should always be that UI never affects gameplay data directly. Gameplay classes should absolutely never care about UI. UI should be able to call functions on gameplay classes to affect them and get data from gameplay classes to display their data.

[split orbit]

I am trying to make it modular so that I can just not have to recreate it EVERY time I make a new Inventory/Container

[maiden wadi]

But that's exactly what you've done though. Your container has an inventory widget in it. And that means that there's a widget for every container. Instead, you should have dozens of containers and a single widget.

[split orbit]

I am beyond confused at this point then, 12 days of trying to fuck with this to get it to work in ANY way.

[maiden wadi]

Widget should be able to take any container pointer and populate itself from that container.

Here. Lets start with this. What is the goal here? Look at a chest, press F, open inventory?

[split orbit]

I haven't even gotten that far 😦

[maiden wadi]

But is that the end goal?

[split orbit]

Yeah, i guess?

[gentle urchin]

Its hard to design something without a goal in mind

[maiden wadi]

Start with the trace. Need this in your Pawn. Can be converted correctly to an interface function later for more interactions but this is the singleminded goal right now so a cast to the class is fine.

[foggy escarp]

here's without any interpolation

the axes I'm using here isn't quite right, but its close to the idea.

[split orbit]

The problem is, I am trying to make the framework before actually populating "Chest Actors" in the world.

I am trying to recreate something I saw and then expand upon it.

I have no way to verbally explain it apparently, cause I just keep looping myself

And I sent you a PM, I apologize

[maiden wadi]

I'm aware. But you need to be able to look at the chests first. After that, once you have them, populating the world with them is just a simple generation code or level design placement.

[split orbit]

The problem here is I can't make them and populate them in the world without first creating the framework in which they work on

I don't know how to describe it and am failing every step of this I am sorry

"Container" is the term I am using to describe a Grid in which Items can be stored

The Player Inventory is one of these

A Chest, is one of these

A 1x1 Equipment slot is one of these

I understand later I will need to tie a widget to an actor that on use of F pulls up a specific variation of the "Container" tied to said Actor

[maiden wadi]

Your inventory itself just needs to be an ActorComponent. This can exist on your chests, and on your player character. How you transfer data between them is up to you.

[gentle urchin]

^ Was about to say

ActorComponent is your inventory

[split orbit]

It already is an ActorComponent

[gentle urchin]

easily moveable between projects

Widget is purely a cosmetic visual thing for the player

and should have next to 0 effect on the inventory itself

[maiden wadi]

Then follow along with me for a moment. Make yourself an Actor class for the base class of your containers that will exist in the world. Like Chests, Drawers, Shelves, etc. Place a default Inventory Component on it.

Should look like this relatively.

Later on you can subclass this and add visuals, like making a child class of this class and naming it Chest, and adding a static or skeletal mesh of a chest.

[split orbit]

Already lost me

My brains fucked

And am anxiety ridden

[maiden wadi]

It's perfectly okay. 😄 Just start with the actor class. New Actor, name it whatever you like. ContainerBaseActor, ContainerParentActor, whatever.

[split orbit]

Thats what I had for my "Chest" box

[maiden wadi]

That'll work fine for now. That has your InventoryComponent on it?

[split orbit]

Yea

[maiden wadi]

Does your InventoryComponent have a size specified for it in itself?

[split orbit]

Nope

Thats the issue I am having

Each "Instance" of object has a different Columns x Rows value

[gentle urchin]

Instance editable variables

[maiden wadi]

Do that for starts. Open the InventoryComponent blueprint, make an integer. InventorySize or whatever.

And yeah, make it InstanceEditable

[gentle urchin]

possibly ExposeOnSpawn if you want to expose them out in the editor and have the owner define the size of it ..

but thats.. 3 steps ahead

[split orbit]

Ok I have that already I just happened to do it from the Widget to the Component so each version of the widget pulled in

Sets the size of its own container

[maiden wadi]

You want to avoid doing anything except displaying in the Widget. Don't use it to store values.

[split orbit]

So that I could drag in the InventoryGrid_Widget into the Inventory_Widget (the actual Inventory Screen)

[maiden wadi]

The inventory size needs to be in the Inventory itself.

Widgets are volatile. They come, they go, they change often, they're not useful for storing gameplay data.

[viscid python]

Here I am bothering you again but I am just eager to know if you'd have an answer to this:

You know the standard health bars, floating over enemies in a lot of TP games. Would it be possible to attach a bar (or any ui info element) to a certain "bone" of an actor? So that your leg would have a custom health bar for example but always be shown at the position of that leg in 3D space?

[maiden wadi]

Sure. Most people use WidgetComponents for that. Just set the WidgetComponent to attach to the bone of your skeletal mesh.

[viscid python]

What, that would be it? That's possible?

[maiden wadi]

Should be

[viscid python]

Amazing... I'm so off trying that. Thank you once again!