blueprint

[hollow schooner]

Still not going to the cars camera though

[solar sequoia]

that's not what casting is. Once you connect the level BP stuff up to an event, you'll be able to use that reference variable because its value was set previously

[pastel gust]

hey guys, just started messing about with UE blueprints coming from a programming background - is there any way to create a local variable or something similar for storing a dynamic value? hitting my head against the wall trying to do this without having to make loads of duplicate nodes... eg having a public bool determine whether a value should be inverted. I could make a new private field and then set it as the result of a branch, but i wont need that value anywhere else so must be a better way?

[hollow schooner]

So casting is basically creating a globally-usable variable

[solar sequoia]

it's not

[hollow schooner]

Someone please shoot me

[solar sequoia]

casting tries to convert object reference types

[pastel gust]

eg this - i want to modify the axis value input based on the branch before it reaches the gthan/lthan

[solar sequoia]

you were able to set that value because you had a reference to an instance of the player controller BP. You got that reference by casting a more generic one to a specific reference

[hollow schooner]

Hmm okay

But somethign still doesnt work for some reason

The target location isnt the cars camera

[solar sequoia]

yeah, how's this supposed to do anything? you need an event

I suggest beginplay with a small delay, just to see if it works as-is

[hollow schooner]

Thats what I was wondering too

[real notch]

It doesn't get those values until they're requested. So it looks like it's immediatelty used but it's not.

[hollow schooner]

okay cheers

[real notch]

So if you use those values after the branch, that's when the gt/lt gets evaluated

[hollow schooner]

it works

[pastel gust]

just seen you can make local variables within functions, so looks like my best bet is to make a function for the inversion check

[real notch]

You could, but you don't have to. It's good to know that

[hollow schooner]

Why does beginPlay work

I woudl expect it to execute it once

[solar sequoia]

it does

[hollow schooner]

but it acts as if It were connected to Tick

I can clicl it all the time

[pastel gust]

is there another way though? I mean, without duplicating all the follow-up nodes?

[solar sequoia]

the value stays set. Referencing a variable doesn't consume its value or anything

[real notch]

I'd have to see more nodes and understand what you mean by duplicating

[pastel gust]

maybe im just having trouble visualizing how this should work, but without being able to set the result of the inversion, the logic can't progress to use it.. or something, hah

this is the next bit

so i really just want to swap the value of the float between positive and negative based on the public bool

[real notch]

Oh

Select float node

[solar sequoia]

yeah a select node seems better here

[pastel gust]

aha

[real notch]

Takes a bool and two values

[pastel gust]

that sounds like what I need indeed

thanks guys, thought there would be something simple hehe

was thinking too literally about branch as IF

[real notch]

But it is

[solar sequoia]

it's more that you don't need to execute to perform the check here

[real notch]

select float also does a branch

Just has 2 return nodes

[pastel gust]

yeah, I guess I mean that there are more appropriate nodes for some things, rather than using branch every time the logic involves an IF

which i think is what I was originally doing hehe

[solar sequoia]

a select is definitely the most common, but there are dozens of nodes you can use in as many scenarios

I suggest reading about BP flow control nodes

[pastel gust]

makes sense - it's just my lack of awareness of the node options available I think. Could have achieved the same effect using branch and setting variables, then getting them again but it would look way too messy for something so simple

[real notch]

Sharing this for future reference. Not all types have a select node.

So it's good to know how you can make your own

[solar sequoia]

I've come to realize that every time I think I'm doing something concisely, there's a better function or macro that's existed since 3.0

[junior hedge]

If you don't input an A or B wouldn't it just be null?

[solar sequoia]

default 0.0

[real notch]

It'd be whatever default you set

[junior hedge]

True

[real notch]

Whenever I have weird getters that get awkward and duplicated I make a simple function like this.

Anyway, speaking of functions... I am looking for a way to make my own delegates for blueprint functions

Like the "Completed" pin when loading assets async

[solar sequoia]

my new rule is if I ever have to do something more than twice I make it a function to save my sanity

[real notch]

(Without using c++)

[real notch]

I use the rule of three, so we're not far off 😄

Maintaining 2 locations is ok, 3 becomes a pattern. 4 means you like the feeling of pain it gives you

[solar sequoia]

That and I collapse everything I can. Sweep it under the rug and the event graph looks pretty

[real notch]

I find managing data in ue very unintuitive to do

I mean, I got the structure and all, but something like sqlite maybe would be nice?

[broken quiver]

got a question what place is the best place to put global variables in?

[tight schooner]

A manager class, whether that's a custom actor or one of the UE4 framework classes like game state, game mode, etc

[surreal peak]

Or an ActorComponent on such Class.
Or a Subsystem.

[broken quiver]

I mean I got a datatable to load

but its on the plugin

don't wanna mess up the main plugin core structure

I want something that'll load/change that data table when my level loads

by default it'll have its own datatable

but in the main project I need a way to override that datatable

also what loads first?

actor or the level blueprint?

[smoky widget]

So I'm following this Epic tutorial and in the blueprint to activate a door from a pressure plate I need to call Get Component By Class. Only it never returns the component. I'm trying to get back a BP_InteractionComponent in the door's BP which exists on the pressure plate, but the debugger shows it never returning.

[faint pasture]

Show what you have

Show how you're trying to get the interactioncomponent

That's pretty cool that Epic is doing interaction by components, I like that approach

[junior hedge]

Not doing it correctly 😭

[smoky widget]

@faint pasture like this?

[faint pasture]

Whoah that's weird, so you interact with the interaction component but it just does an interface call on it's actor instead of doing some OnInteract event. Interesting

or wait

Are they trying to cram every possible way to accomplish BP communication into one actor?

[smoky widget]

This is just a single way, right? Pressure Plate has the BP_InteractionComponent and the Door gets the very first instance in the component list?

This doesn't look very scalable either.

But I also haven't finished the tutorial.

[faint pasture]

So where does it break?

[smoky widget]

The very first image I posted, the print statement

Failed.

GetComponent by Class returns nothing.

[faint pasture]

What is Trigger?

Where is that set

[smoky widget]

Even though in the debugger you can see Pressure Plate has the component

I assumed Trigger was being set by GetCompnentByClass

[faint pasture]

Why would it do that. The first thing you're doing is checking if Trigger is valid

It's not

it's just a null pointer to an actor

[smoky widget]

But GetCOmponentByClass set the component?

[faint pasture]

That is getting TRIGGER's component

Trigger isn't anything

you probably just set it in the level editor

saying "hey door, this is YOUR trigger"

[smoky widget]

Okay, I must have missed that in the tutorial and it makes a WHOLE lot more sense.

But in the editor if I click on my door instance, I don't see trigger as a variable I can set.

I had to set that guy. But that is definitely not set in the tutorial.

[faint pasture]

Set it on the actor instance in the level

Welcome to tutorials, hence my name.

you have to make sure you're understanding the what and why, not just monkey see monkey do

[smoky widget]

@faint pasture Yeah, that's why it has taken me hours and hours to get through this hour tuturial. I keep stopping to examine what happened. Only in this case I could progress no further.

Thanks a million and this makes soooooo much more sense.

Is this a normal way of doing communication between actors?

[junior hedge]

@faint pasture do you know why i cannot set variables via viewport

I put it as instance editable but cant do it

cant remember

nvm it works now ye idek\

[surreal peak]

It's one of many

There is a YouTube stream of epic games about blueprint communication pinned to this channel

It should give you same more info

[smoky widget]

@surreal peak Cool, thank you very much.

[real notch]

Why is ue lying to me

[surreal peak]

Did you have one that you deleted

With that name?

Otherwise check the actual folder on your drive

[real notch]

I mean, maybe, but that must have been several reboots ago

[surreal peak]

Well

Did you clean up redirectors

[real notch]

I don't like cleaning in general

[surreal peak]

Like a good UE dev does after deleting moving or renaming

[real notch]

But also I don't know what that means

[surreal peak]

UE keeps redirectors around

[real notch]

I'm not a good ue dev

Thanks for reminding me

Cedric

[surreal peak]

Rightclick the content folder in the browser in the editor

There is a button to fixup redirectors

[real notch]

Did that

[surreal peak]

Can also be limited to subfolders

[real notch]

Waiting now. It's cleaning

[surreal peak]

If that's not helping then check the folder on your drive if there is something hanging around

[real notch]

Why is this needed anyway?

I mean, especially across restarts

[surreal peak]

Redirectors should possibly always be cleaned up after deleting moving or renaming referenced assets

[junior hedge]

also i am still confused on why this doesnt work, my tick event only prints 0s while the bind prints 3

[real notch]

Maybe it's a mac os + ue5 combination that doesn't work well

[surreal peak]

It's always needed

[junior hedge]

(getinv function isnt pure because I wanted to test so dont worry about that)

[real notch]

Is there a reason for it?

Or just one of those "shut up and just accept it" types of things

[surreal peak]

UE keeps redirectors around that point to where the asset was so that not everything just outright dies

You can utilize them to point to a new asset for example

[real notch]

But why across restarts

If there are no references anymore?

[surreal peak]

Restarts have nothing to do with it

They are serialized

[real notch]

I could imagine having them in your undo stack

Ah

Okay

[surreal peak]

You can even visualize them in the content browser

And open them

As assets

With the filters

[real notch]

So that's just an editor-performance thing then or something?

[surreal peak]

Probably unrelated but don't destroy an actor if you are still using it afterwards

[real notch]

Worked.

[surreal peak]

https://docs.unrealengine.com/4.27/en-US/ProductionPipelines/Redirectors/#:~:text=Objects that are placed in,assets to their current locations.&text=Moving or renaming an asset,it in its new location.

[real notch]

Ah

"that are not currently loaded"

That's a good point

But then, it's a redirector to trash?

Eh nm, I'll just go with my "shut up" version 😄

[junior hedge]

thats my playercharacter

[tame pecan]

You can't have binds like that inside a widget

[junior hedge]

the variable thats being set is in my ui, the actor that was destroyed was a coin

[tame pecan]

Also don't store your inventory in widgets

That's horrible

Widgets are not for gameplay purposes, only cosmetic

[junior hedge]

the bind doesnt work either

[shrewd briar]

hello everyone i hope you're doing well, so i don't know how to make a character look and aim at a crosshair in the screen and i would appreciate any help . Here is a picture to more clarify the goal. Note: the position displayed on screen is the impact point of a ray shot from the camera to any object hit by it.

[junior hedge]

its still 0

[tame pecan]

Print a string in the end of the addition

[junior hedge]

0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0

and if I press my bind

its 3

also you can use settext in widget lol

[tame pecan]

I think the first step is just refactor the inventory so its not in the widget

yes?

[junior hedge]

you said I couldnt

[tame pecan]

No I didn't

[dry condor]

thats something else entirely

you are talking about two different things

[tame pecan]

InputAction binds

I'm talking about

[junior hedge]

?

[tame pecan]

I don't even know how you got it in there

Shouldn't be possible

[dry condor]

well you could put them in but they shouldnt fire normaly

[tame pecan]

Since widgets dont have any InputComponent

[mild kestrel]

Hi, current floor's hit results from Character Movement always return the Default Surface Type, no matter if I Override the Phys material, The static mesh, or anything

[tame pecan]

OnLanded?

[mild kestrel]

Every tick basically

(i have always check floor checked)

[soft kite]

Hey I got 2 issues I wonder if anyone could help me with, they are probably pretty simple as I am new.

[gentle urchin]

Actually, this has somewhat changed

You're allowed to setup / listen for key inputs

[tame pecan]

Because you have disabled "Return Material On Move" in the capsule component. Current floor trace is just the return value from MoveComponent function in UPrimitiveComponent

[mild kestrel]

ooooh that was this, thanks!

Thank You so much!

[tame pecan]

So you can route inputs through the PC to widgets?

Or what do you mean? Because input bindings go through the PC and inputs in widgets goes through slate

[plain hull]

How to deform plane mesh in real-time when ball collides

[tame pecan]

There is a free plugin available this month for that. Reverse engineer it 😛

[plain hull]

Name? Let me check it
That's great

[plain hull]

I have used this already

But when ball collides with bed metris. Metris should go down and when ball passes it should retrieve original shape

https://youtu.be/SD5QNo0ESMQ

Kindly let me know how can I achieve the effect in the video as you can see in 8 sec. When ball is rolling from metris

Kindly check the video

[gentle urchin]

You can have a widget become the first target for the input routing. So i guess it has its own input component? Listen for Input is the node

[tame pecan]

Hm, you're right. TIL. It creates its own inputcomponent and add it to the stack when you run that event, otherwise its nullptr.

[tight schooner]

You could do something with vertex shading (World Position Offset) in the material graph. If the material has an input (worldspace vector) for the sphere location, it can use that to push the nearby vertices away from the sphere, thus achieving the illusion of soft body physics deformation.

On the blueprint end, you update a dynamic instance of that material with the sphere location on tick. (Or write it to a material collection parameter if the need for that arises.)

[junior hedge]

it listens for input on default

afaik

[plain hull]

Can I see any example or tutorial related to this. I will be really thankful to you

[tight schooner]

Nope I just came up with it lol. You can learn about the material graph, world position offset, and dynamic material instances separately

[tame pecan]

Yea, from slate yes

Not the inputcomponent

[junior hedge]

what is slate?

[tame pecan]

"Slate is a completely custom and platform agnostic user interface framework that is designed to make building the user interfaces for tools and applications such as Unreal Editor, or in-game user interfaces, fun and efficient. It combines a declarative syntax with the ability to easily design, lay out, and style components that allows for easily creating and iterating on UIs."

All UI in unreal is driven by slate, even the editor.

[junior hedge]

ic

[wicked sleet]

Hey guys, I'm wondering what's the trade-off between using a save game object to store data when changing levels vs just keeping that data in the game instance? Is there any benefit to either approach?

[tight schooner]

A save game is a file on disk so it persists between sessions

Game Instance only persists between level loads

[wicked sleet]

Yeah I would use a save game for persisting between sessions, but for changing levels, does it make a difference what approach i use?

[tight schooner]

Not that I know of...

Not sure what answer you're expecting

Cuz they're not entirely interchangeable. You could keep data in game instance until the player wants to write something to file e.g.

I guess loading from a save might take time?

Depending on the device?

I never benchmarked it or anything

But I wouldn't try loading and getting data on tick lol

But you can retrieve data from game instance on tick no problem e.g.

[faint pasture]

Save game can be fine for that too as you can reuse the same functionality

logically, end level 1, begin level 2 is the same as end level 1, quit, start, begin level 2

[wicked sleet]

It's just that atm I'm keeping a lot of the data in the game state and I'm trying to decide if I should move it into the game instance. I suppose youre right that it would be quicker to keep things in the game instance instead of saving it to a file 👍

[faint pasture]

What kinds of stuff?

[wicked sleet]

Essentially data relating to the party of characters in a crpg

[faint pasture]

I'm guessing you have a nice concise struct representing them?

[wicked sleet]

No but it's in the plans 🙂

[lime fulcrum]

Hey fellas!
How do you manage the ESCAPE Key to close the in game menu since Listen for input does not work when the game is paused?
Also Setting Time Dilation to 0 has some issues

[frozen spear]

Question...im using set capsule halfheight node which shrinks the char capsule towards the middle, anyone know the math to find the relative location of how much i need to move the mesh to put it back where it belongs (bottom of hemisphere touching the foot instead of in middle of char) ?

Its either very difficult or so easy that my brain cant figure it out

[ornate dragon]

Hi. Is there a way to load only specific Character Blueprint skeletal meshes when that Character is only used? Currently when ever I open a project it loads all the assets and project goes into GPU out of memory. Even though in the level those characters are not present.

[near wolf]

Hi, I have a blueprint with instance editable parameter. But when I duplicate the blueprint and change that parameter, it applies to both blueprints ? What is wrong

Variable I mean *

[gentle urchin]

Half of the adjustment ?

If its 80 and you reduce it to 40, you'd need to adjust it by 20 to keep it at the same location

erh, so for halfheight, it should be the same as the adjustment

40 reduced to 20 adjustet by 20

[gentle urchin]

Are you editing the default value or the instance value?

[mortal wharf]

I'm spawning in two actors, one that can pickup the other one. The problem is that when I spawn them on top of eachother, there is no overlap triggered, så the one that can pick up the other doesn't know that it is there. Even doing a Is overlapping actor check doesn't return anything. This is done from the leve blueprint.

Only moving outside the pickup sphere, then back in makes them overlap.

I think calling the Is Overlapping Actor later works but doing the BeginPlay of the level blueprint it doesn't.

[near wolf]

the instance

you can see on the right

medi aplayer and media source

[frozen spear]

I'll try half of the difference between the original and new size and see if that works... The capsule reduces in size towards the center of the character... So it's not as easy as just adjusting by the exact amount...

[gentle urchin]

It should be

But you are aware that crouch handles this?

[frozen spear]

@gentle urchin it's not, and I'm not using it to crouch... It's being used in an anim notify state... Crouch can't be used as it only updates on movement component update cycles... Which don't happen during anim montages

[gentle urchin]

Ill set up a test in a few min,

[frozen spear]

Okay set your capsule to 94 and reduce it to 35... Let me know what you find

[gentle urchin]

Just need the child to fall asleep 😅

Will do!

Regular char capsule?

[frozen spear]

Yeah it's just a regular character capsule

It can even be on like third person template character... The capsule needs to start at 94 for the half height... And when it's being reduced reduce it down to 35...

[gentle urchin]

I got a project for it ^^

You want bottom to stay fixed, right?

Just making sure i got it right

[frozen spear]

Right it's basically the same as it was crouching how the capsule stays down by your feet

I just can't use crouch because I'm doing it in the middle of a montage

[cinder thunder]

I have this camera movement system set up (see Picture above). It works fine, but when the camera gets to the second position, the lighting in the scene flashs. The settings on both cameras are the same. Anyone know why its doing this? The exposure is set to manual. I wonder if the exposure doesn't adjust until the motion of the move is finished and that's what's causing the flash. Its like I need to find a different way to move my camera.

[gentle urchin]

and calling crouch during montage wouldnt work? surprising , didnt expect that

[frozen spear]

It's because it only happens on movement component update... You can call it and it basically queues up for the next update cycle... Which happens after montages

[gentle urchin]

Gotcha

So at 95 my char offset is -92

at 35 its -32

[frozen spear]

So +60 in z?

[gentle urchin]

looks pretty linear to me

same diff as my halfheight

[dire stirrup]

hey. has anyone got experience with construction script unable to fill array? im trying to add vectors in array. works fine in blueprint's viewport, but it doesnt work when i put the blueprint in the scene

[frozen spear]

Ok, can i see a screen of the math for that adjustment

[frozen spear]

So i was way over thinking it

Thank you

[gentle urchin]

It would appear so 😛

[idle rivet]

hello. I am trying to find similar functionality to "Is Playing" and "Get Play Rate" but for a Niagara system instead of a skeletal mesh, and also get the total time a system loops for, does anyone have any ideas on how to achieve that?

[gentle urchin]

No worries

[main lake]

What's the XY input in this node please?

Please ping me if any answer 🙂

[uncut shale]

for some reason my ui is not spawning, can anyone help me figure out why?

[maiden wadi]

Nothing here causes UI to show. You should breakpoint the very last node calling AddPartyUnitToHUD, if that runs, then you issue isn't in this screenshot.

[uncut shale]

what do you mean?

[maiden wadi]

Click the very last node and press F9. It'll put a red circle on it. Play the game and see if it freezes and breaks when this code is ran.

[uncut shale]

it didnt break or freeze, but there was no ui added

[maiden wadi]

Then your code isn't reaching that point. Which means either you have no input in this pawn, the overlap was empty, the cast on player controller failed, or you have no units on the world deriving from PartyUnit.

You'll have to keep breakpointing backwards to see where the code runs and where it stops.

[uncut shale]

how will i tell it stops?

[dawn gazelle]

It'll pause the game and focus on the breakpoint.

If it doesn't, that means it didn't reach the breakpoint.

[fading wren]

hello, have a question, a turret is a player, so i created a character blueprint , add ability rotate left-right , and upside- downside by mouse. no problem with left-rifht rotate, but when i rotate upside-downside, that whole mesh is rotationg. does it possible to make rotate upside-downide only red part of mesh ?

[gentle urchin]

if its a separate mesh,

or skel mesh i guess

just DOT product it

[zealous moth]

as Squize said, you can only do that with separate meshes

[gentle urchin]

(joke)*

[zealous moth]

haha

[fading wren]

ok, so i can do it with skeletal mesh ? means i need animation on bones ?

[uncut shale]

it stops right here

[gentle urchin]

Personally id make it two meshes but..

[fading wren]

ok, it not a problem to separate mesh on parts, but i would like to make rotate blue part right-left by mouse at same time when red one

[fading wren]

ok, it not a problem to separate mesh on parts, but i would like to make rotate blue part right-left by mouse at same time when red one

[tawdry surge]

Parent the blue to the red then

Or vice-versa

[fading wren]

how could i parent ? you mean in blueprint ? but if i parent, i will get same problem. blue part will rotate upside-downside

blue part should rotate left-right side only

[tawdry surge]

So make that the parent component.
Moving it will move the red
Moving red will not move blue

[spark steppe]

scene root => blue part => red part

the pawn shouldn't inherit the pitch/roll and you "copy" them manually on tick from the control rotation to the red part

[fading wren]

ok, will try, not sure if i understand, but i know direction where to seach

[spark steppe]

or rather, add the input directly to the part instead of the pawn

[fading wren]

how does it possiible ?

[spark steppe]

idk how you actually handle input, one way would be an custom controller for the turret pawn

another way would be to handle the input events in the actual turret blueprint

[maiden wadi]

Now take this one off, and put on on the ForLoop.

[uncut shale]

it doesnt break there

[spark steppe]

yes

[maiden wadi]

I would hazard a guess that your cast is failing then. As if it succeeds, that should most certainly break on the for loop

[uncut shale]

well how would i fix it then?

[maiden wadi]

Find out why GetPlayerController isn't returning the controller of that type or a valid controller. First to make certain, try putting a printstring on the failed part of the cast and breakpoint that or see if it prints.

If that fails, it means the GetPlayerController is either invalid, or not of the type you're casting to. Given naming, I'd consider renaming your controller to something a little more project specific as there is already a class named "PlayerController"

After the rename, double check your GameMode or World settings, to be sure you're using the correct controller.

[fading wren]

doesnt work. bottom part still rotate upside-downside.

[fading wren]

i tried, but still whole 2 meshes rotate upside-downside

[spark steppe]

search for control rotation in the details panel, there are options to check if it should use the control rotation

you most likely want to disable that at least for pitch

[fading wren]

got it, will search

[fading wren]

doesnt work

there is no something like Control rotation

on static mesh

on details

[spark steppe]

select this

then search use controller rotation

is any of those checked?

[spark steppe]

was any of those checked before?

[fading wren]

no, it is a default stuff

did not touch it

[spark steppe]

where do you handle the input?

controller or in the events of the turret?

[uncut shale]

how would i do a printscreen?

[maiden wadi]

PrintString, not printscreen. Just right click the graph and write Print, it should show up in the list.

[spark steppe]

is that the controller or the turret?

[fading wren]

also have a controller

[uncut shale]

would i printstring under cast failed?

[maiden wadi]

Correct. You're looking for debug info to know for certain that the cast is failing.

[fading wren]

turret i guess

[uncut shale]

should i still f9 it?

[maiden wadi]

If you don't want to watch for the printstring in the top left, then yes, otherwise it doesn't matter. Either way will give confirmation.

[spark steppe]

@fading wren honestly i have no idea why your stuff applies pitch at all

[uncut shale]

it did printstring

[spark steppe]

it shouldn't from my knowledge if you haven't enabled to use the control rotation for pitch

[fading wren]

it because an event graph

[spark steppe]

what? that code should add pitch to the controller, not to the pawn/turret

[maiden wadi]

Then your PlayerController is either invalid or the wrong class, and given where this is running, I would wager a wrong class. I'd strongly advise renaming your project's PlayerController so that you can easier differentiate it from the engine level PlayerController.

[uncut shale]

well i changed the playercontrollers name to battlecontroller

[fading wren]

ah ok

[uncut shale]

it still failed

[maiden wadi]

Did the cast in your code change names to CastToBatttleController?

[maiden wadi]

What about your GameMode class? Does it now have BattlePlayerController as the specified controller?

[uncut shale]

it still has player controller

[maiden wadi]

Change that to your new name one. Your project is using an Engine level controller and not the one you intended.

[uncut shale]

when i press the interact key it changes controller

[maiden wadi]

Not following?

[uncut shale]

the code is initiated when i press the interact key

when i press the key it changes controller to the battlecontroller, but the ui fails to show up

[maiden wadi]

Are you talking about the cast?

[uncut shale]

yes

[spark steppe]

is there any helper method to get the correct rotation for a character to look into a camera?

as FOV and such make it impossible to use the camera location as reference value

[maiden wadi]

You don't ever actually change your controller. The cast is just allowing different access levels. GetPlayerController returns access to the PlayerController class. Your class inherits from that, so to access the things on your controller, you cast the same pointer to the new access level which allows more access. It's still the same object though. The issue is that you're not actually using your BattlePlayerController. And so your cast will fail when trying to cast to that. To fix that you have to change the GameMode's spawned player controller class to your BattlePlayerController. Then GetPlayerController will return a BattlePlayerController at the access level of PlayerController. Which you can then cast to BattlePlayerController to gain access to it's functions and properties.

[uncut shale]

i did that and ran the game and the camera went chest level and the ui still failed to spawn

wait nvm

[maiden wadi]

Does the cast still fail?

[uncut shale]

no the ui works

but the camera is height level instead of over the shoulder

[maiden wadi]

What all have you done in this PlayerController class?

[uncut shale]

this is it for what ive done

[maiden wadi]

I'm not really aware of controllers affecting camera views like that. Normally the character has a camera on it that is set as a view target for the CameraManager.

Does the pawn you're using have a camera component on it?

[uncut shale]

how can i check that?

[maiden wadi]

Do you have a default pawn class specified in the game mode?

[uncut shale]

yeah, its the character i move around with

[maiden wadi]

Open that class up, and check it's hierarchy in the components list in the top left. It should have a camera somewhere in it.

[uncut shale]

this bit?

[maiden wadi]

Over here. Something like this.

[uncut shale]

oh i see that

now what should i do with it?

[maiden wadi]

Is it in the correct location you want it to be, when you look at it's location in the viewport?

[uncut shale]

this is how i want the camera to be

but for some reason in the battlecontroller it changes to be in the chest

[maiden wadi]

That is certainly odd. Creating a new controller class should not do that by default. :/

[uncut shale]

yeah idk why its doing that

[maiden wadi]

First thing I'd try is disabling the spring arm's collision test setting. Maybe it's derping on another component.

[uncut shale]

this setting?

[maiden wadi]

Yep

[uncut shale]

now run the game?

[maiden wadi]

Yeah, see if the camera is behind the pawn now.

[uncut shale]

still fucked

[maiden wadi]

What camera class is that camera?

[uncut shale]

idk, how can i check?

[maiden wadi]

Hover over it, should show a tooltip.

[maiden wadi]

Weird. I'm out of ideas. Supposedly older versions had an issue with cinecameras not being able to be used by default. But yours is not a cinecamera. Only other hint at this issue is virtual reality plugin stuff messing with things. I've never experienced that bug personally. The only time I've seen a camera do that was when the camera never existed on the Pawn, or if the CameraComponent is disabled.

[uncut shale]

wait

[uncut shale]

would there be a way that battlecontroller is messing with the camera?

[maiden wadi]

None that I'm aware of. Not if all you've done is put a create widget on beginplay.

[queen sphinx]

would this option on the camera might be the issue?

[maiden wadi]

You could try changing the GameMode's controller back to the default PlayerController. If that fixes the camera, than it has to be something with the controller, but I can't fathom what it would be.

[queen sphinx]

the use pawn control option

[uncut shale]

where is this option?

[queen sphinx]

It is under cameras, 2nd pic shows where. Not sure if it help, but I see it is turned off by default.

[uncut shale]

but in what blueprint?

[queen sphinx]

I want to say your turret.

[uncut shale]

???

[queen sphinx]

oh, shoot. I confused what pictures where yours.

[uncut shale]

oh ok

what option should i change?

[queen sphinx]

oh ignore me, I thought this was the turret question

[uncut shale]

no lmao

[raven pilot]

this is horrific

[dry condor]

holy spaghetti code this is going to give me nightmares

[maiden wadi]

At least it's all in one blueprint. The real horror is when this kind of thing happens in multiple classes.

[queen sphinx]

jokes on you, that controls all the classes...

[uncut shale]

@maiden wadi would there be a way that i could get the ui without needing to mess with a controller?

because i can get the camera working, but not the ui

[maiden wadi]

Potentially. But if subclassing the base controller is causing problems, I would debug that. Controller is a pretty core class that you'll need in most projects.

[uncut shale]

how can i debug it?

[maiden wadi]

Dunno. Trial and error mostly. I'd start with changing GameMode's PlayerControllerClass back to the default PlayerController. If that fixes the camera. Create a new PlayerController, do nothing in it, and set that as the GameMode's controller. If that doesn't mess up the camera, then something in your first player controller is messed up.

It's also much easier if you have access to C++. Breakpointing in engine classes to see why the camera is not where it should be can be easier sometimes.

[uncut shale]

im gonna copy the blueprints from the battlecontroller over to the newcontroller

see if that messes things up

[fading wren]

sorry, it is me again. is it possible to switch off YAW only on this mesh ?

[uncut shale]

ok so changing all the blueprints to be the same sort of fixes the issue

just the ui doesnt fully come in

[fading wren]

but not switch off on head

?

[raven pilot]

hey, what node is this?

[maiden wadi]

Looks like a Get(Copy)

[raven pilot]

thank you

[limber wing]

Is there a quick way to automatically point a camera at a moving actor? For example, I have a car going by my camera, and I want the camera to keep the car in the center of the frame

[dry condor]

get copy or get ref

[maiden wadi]

I did that by making a simple pawn class with a camera. Spawned it as an AI, and SetFocus on the thing you want it to follow, and setting view target to that camera. For a camera attached to the player's pawn though, I think you're basically stuck changing some settings to make the camera use control rotation and setting the control rotation on tick to the look at rotation from camera to the target.

[raven pilot]

haha thanks, anthaer said samething, both right

is there a way to call a rep notify in another blueprint?

[dry condor]

a what now ?

[raven pilot]

sorry multiplayer stuff

[maiden wadi]

It's hacky. But if you just want to run the OnRep, you could set the object's OnRep variable to what it already is, that should run the OnRep. Only works in BP. Alternatively, move the logic to a new function and make the OnRep call that and then call the same function elsehwere.

[dry condor]

replication! i was wondering what rep was standing for 😄

[raven pilot]

good ideas, will be trying those

[near glen]

I have basic pawn character, how can I force it to rotate in specific direction (with default rotation speed and animation as well) without moving it?

[uncut shale]

@maiden wadi it worked, but my ui is kinda fucked

it doubled the ui for Arthur for some reason

[limber wing]

I found some nice code for this

https://blueprintue.com/blueprint/0v7unes_/

[maiden wadi]

Looks like you added it twice and didn't clear the old stuff before adding.

[uncut shale]

huh

where would that be?

[maiden wadi]

Not sure. What does your event that you call to add ui to screen do?

[uncut shale]

where would i find that?

[maiden wadi]

It looks like something you created. It's after the loop.

[uncut shale]

wait

i know what happened

one of my npcs was a spawn of Arthur

is there a way to show mouse cursor with blueprints?

[tawdry surge]

the node "set show mouse cursor"

[uncut shale]

i want to start the game without showing the mouse cursor

[harsh tartan]

Hey yall, if im creating a system that randomly generates medieval weapons out of blades and handles and stuff like that, and i want the weapon to function differently and be able to respond to the same player inputs with different in-game actions depending on what kind of parts are present (like a weapon with a cross guard handle would guard on right click and a pole handle would thrust on right click) how would i go about assembling those collections of abilities from different behaving parts into a single wieldable entity?

Ive been watching tutorials that deal with similar things like randomly generated guns from typical looter shooters, but those just involve randomly getting different skeletal meshes from an array and sticking them to sockets, but i really wish i could just make these weapon parts blueprints in themselves and just stick them and their meshes together and let them call common events from each other

I dont know if that solution is possible or viable or how id even do it

[uncut shale]

have you already started doing precedural generation?

[harsh tartan]

Ive been trying to learn about it from videos, but no im not too deep into blueprinting it

[uncut shale]

if you have, have various types of weapons, like swords and spears, and catagorize them as such

then have different categories do different things

thats how i would do it

[harsh tartan]

My want would be to do this without having to create explicit weapon classifications

I get the idea that classifying might limit what is possible?

[uncut shale]

id honestly just work on the procederal generation for now

because thats going to be the hardest part, besides animations

[harsh tartan]

What would be there to work on if i wasnt implementing their functionality? :o cause i already get how to create sockets and randomly put skeletal meshes together

[tawdry surge]

You could tag the peices and then based on the tags the weapon ends up with you can categorize it's behavior

[uncut shale]

how do i set up that node only during combat?

[harsh tartan]

Back when i was working with unity I had it figured out. You can tag prefabs in unity and can get components from game objects with specific tags. So i had this plan where i would randomly pick the parts and then have those weapon pieces only need to call common functions from eachother that would be the same across all potential parts, that way i could have the function calls be very generic and not need to KNOW what is attached to them

But i just do not know how to do this in unreal terms

Thats why i wish i could have each of these parts as separate blueprints with their own blueprinted-out behaviors

[tawdry surge]

I'm not at my pc to check, but I'm pretty sure you can tag the mesh assets
But it could be just the components

Assuming you're using a datatable for the weapon peices, you could include the tags there too

[junior hedge]

In your player controller there's a variable called show mouse cursor

[uncut shale]

yes i know that

im wondering how i can change that variable when im in combat and only in combat

[junior hedge]

Branch combat variable then set

[tawdry surge]

Get a reference to the player controller and "set show cursor"

[faint pasture]

Start by thinking about your item definition

Think about a struct that could represent your item

You could either have something like
Handle = SpearHandle
OnRightClick -> Handle.Action()

Where SpearHandle.Action() is a stab

Or

OnRightClick -> Switch on Handle.ActionType -> Do Thing

Then your item definition includes the handle. And the handle definition includes or otherwise drives the moveset

Sorta like if MyGun.Shoot called MyChamber.GenerateProjectile and passed it to MyBarrel.SpawnProjectile, or if MyGun.Shoot just inspected data on itself to accomplish the same result

Make the ability part of the item definition. Sort of like a weapon tells the character how to animate when holding it. It includes the animations for handling itself.

[uncut shale]

like this?

[harsh tartan]

Can structs store collections of functions?

Sorry trying my best to understand the explanation lol

So i would infact make these parts separate communicating actors?

[dawn gazelle]

In C++ I believe you can define functions within the structure for accessing data within it, but that's not exposed to blueprints, so in bps they're just a predefined set of data container.

[harsh tartan]

Ah shoot so i gotta type up that part?

My best guess is an array of structs where the structs contain all of the qualities of the part, but its a shame if i cant easily include the unique ability that gets used in their array entry

[faint pasture]

What's the use case?

[uncut shale]

how do i make it if battle ui is on it changes if mouse cursor is on?

i cant connect it to the branch

[harsh tartan]

I guess so i can put the ability on the part itself

[faint pasture]

How wild do these abilities get?

Are you reinventing GAS?

[harsh tartan]

Whats GAS? lol

Im in too deep and im gonna be real with you, this is about guns, i was just afraid someone of a higher skill level would see me not able to do something and then be able to realize something im working on faster and better than i could

[faint pasture]

If it's guns then that's fairly parametric

[harsh tartan]

What i want to do is create different parts that use ammo differently and fire different projectiles

So barrel governs projectile type and the body dictates how ammo is stored and used (i.e fire rate, ammo capacity, any unique mechanism like the rotation of a revolvers cylinder)

My first plan for this in unity was with a default basic revolver. The trigger and hammer were separate parts that recieved input from the left and right mouse buttons, and then they communicated to the barrel and body to do their left-mouse and right-mouse functions

Like hammer rotated the cylinder

But i want this functionality to be variable and not just apply to operating a revolver

[faint pasture]

So how many parts total?

[harsh tartan]

In one gun? Probably 3

the barrel the body and the grip

Thats why i wanted them to just be different blueprint actors that talked to eachother

[trim matrix]

what is utility editor actor component for?

[harsh tartan]

Maybe i shouldnt use sockets at all maybe i should just make separate actors and then spawn them in separately at designated points in space on the body

[sterile quest]

I am just wondering how you got the BP connecting lines to look like that rather then curved and wavy.

[solar sequoia]

are you looking to do something similar to the Borderlands weapon system?

I'm pretty sure their weapon parts are skeletal meshes on one base weapon object

[harsh tartan]

Yeah :o except with a greater emphasis on like, inner mechanisms

Yeah but i might not be able to take the same approach because their guns function widely the same

Not to discount their loot variety

[solar sequoia]

no, for sure, but they all have the same controls

I get what you mean

[harsh tartan]

Oh i see

[solar sequoia]

you might want to do something more like making the parts components, because they could run separate functionality

[harsh tartan]

Can i make custom components?

[bold shard]

Do these nodes not do what they say? Theyalways return true, doesn't matter what I put in there.

[solar sequoia]

yes, and it's incredibly easy to do so

[harsh tartan]

Oh that would be excellent then

[harsh tartan]

AAaaaah fuck yessss

[solar sequoia]

I might suggest that you make one parent component to hold the most basic stuff, like the mesh used, and then use children of that for individual functionality

[harsh tartan]

So the bits of functionality would be child of the mesh rendering component?

[faint pasture]

I'm still undecided on if MeshComponent + Code is gross or not.

That kinda smells like it should be an actor

[harsh tartan]

I think i might feel the same

[faint pasture]

Like what's the difference between a MeshComponent that has some extra functionality or an actor with a MeshComponent that has some extra functionality. Get's really weird.

That's where I like the Godot model much better, it's all just scenes in scenes with no split between actor and component

[solar sequoia]

I kinda thought actor components could have components attached, but I could only imagine the mess that would create if so

[faint pasture]

Like what if you want a part that's a skeletal mesh, do you make another one?

[solar sequoia]

Actors are probably best, now that I've looked at it

[harsh tartan]

Hmm

See switching off of unity i was considering godot as well as unreal funnily enough

Now im wondering if this would work better in their model

[faint pasture]

I like some Godot concepts but if your goal is to make a great looking game with the least amount of BS then Unreal is the place to be IMO

[solar sequoia]

I'm super happy with UE after getting into it, yeah

[harsh tartan]

Yeah i dont want to jump around too much and im committed to learning what im doing here before going anywhere else

I dont want to leave this behind without giving it a real shot

[solar sequoia]

everyone said to do Unity because it's "easier" but I couldn't imagine a better workflow than UE

[harsh tartan]

Cool cool

So should i make the gun parts actor components or actors themselves? Assuming that my root piece of the gun will be the body, the middle of the gun where everything gets attached to

[faint pasture]

I'd do actors themselvese

assuming the parts have independent logic

if you're going really object oriented with it

[harsh tartan]

They will yeah

[faint pasture]

If a part is just a mesh + some data then you can do it a different way

[harsh tartan]

Yeah very object oriented very literal

Trigger tells barrel to request ammo from body and such

[faint pasture]

You could see how a long barrel revolver rifle could be

RevolverBodyActor
LongBarrelActor
RifleStockActor

OR

Gun:
BodyMesh = Revolver
FireAction = Revolve
ReloadAction = MoonClip
MagSize = 6
Caliber = Pistol

BarrelMesh = Long
BarrelVelocity = High
BarrelAccuracy = High
BarrelRecoil = High

StockMesh = Long_Wood
StockRecoilReduction = High

With chunks of stats coming in structs

[harsh tartan]

So these are my two big options as far as designing this system?

[faint pasture]

I think it's the two main flavors of doing it. Data driven or just making actors

We are doing our weapons as a SpecificWeaponTypeBP + StatsThatCanApplyToAnyWeapon

so sort of a mix. We have a BP_1H_Pistol_Blowback but can swap the mesh and all stats out.

[tight hare]

Hey , I'm facing some error in my BP code

[harsh tartan]

Oh are you making a similar kind of game?

[tight hare]

Im facing this error

[faint pasture]

Dedicated server?

[tight hare]

Client

[faint pasture]

More like a Diablo type shooter roguelike

[faint pasture]

Is your server dedicated or listen?

[harsh tartan]

Thats pretty cool

[tight hare]

listen

[harsh tartan]

Ah i didnt get the second flavor you described but after reading through it a few more times i think its starting to make more sense. I think the first form would work best for me. Ill focus on getting these parts to communicate before i worry about making them appear together as one gun. I can probably concern myself with that later. I really appreciate the time and help that you have offered me

[faint pasture]

Just have Body or Gun spawn parts and attach to Self, and you're in business

I do the same with vehicles, vehicle spawns parts and away it goes

You'll still want a struct, it might just be like
Body = X
Barrel = Y
Stock = Z

[harsh tartan]

I just imagine they will need to have a saved place relative to the bod to spawn, and thats what made sockets useful :o

[faint pasture]

You can still use sockets

[harsh tartan]

Will the struct save the gun composition so i can store it in like an inventory later down the line?

[harsh tartan]

Oh ok cool

Ok ok awesome this is great im excited lolol

[faint pasture]

Attachment can optionally use sockets. Just author your meshes such that the sockets are ligned up. I'd have the origin for barrels and stocks and stuff be at where they should attach to socket so they can just snap

[tight hare]

Any help ?

[faint pasture]

so body holds sockets for things, which can hold sockets for things, ad infinitum

[harsh tartan]

Ye while trying to figure this out i already stuck some sockets onto a revolver body skeletal mesh

[faint pasture]

We author all our weapons so they can just snap to our weapon hand bone just like a socket, same idea.

[harsh tartan]

Ye i did infact set the origins on the example gun parts i made so they can just stick without clipping in

[faint pasture]

socket for muzzle FX, socket for case ejection, stuff like that. Socket for ADS if that's a thing

[harsh tartan]

Socked for ads like a scope attachment?

[faint pasture]

Socket for camera location if you want

[harsh tartan]

Oh wait i get it yeah

Ok cool good idea

So when i eject a case i can spawn the mesh at that point

[faint pasture]

you'll want that to be a particle effect prolly but yeah

[harsh tartan]

Ah ok

[faint pasture]

you can use bones too if they're all skeletal, depends on how you wanna do it. Just keep it consistent

attach to x at socket will also take a bone name

[harsh tartan]

I mean i put bones in all the parts so that all the meshes are skeletal and i can animate them if they have moving parts

But will bones help with attachment if they already have an origin and the body has a socket for them?

[faint pasture]

yah just have a bone for attachment points if you don't wanna mix it all up.

[harsh tartan]

Will it be fine if id rather just stick to model origins and body sockets for attachment? I dont know too much about bones besides they will be used for animating

[faint pasture]

You can treat a bone as a socket

its' basically a socket that can move

and bring parts of its mesh with it

[harsh tartan]

I see

So ill just spawn the actor with one bone end at a body socket

[faint pasture]

Just keep the same name like BarrelAttachment or StockAttachment across all your models, and things will just snap together

[harsh tartan]

Gotcha

[faint pasture]

BarrelAttachment is where a Barrel would attach, and it would have a Muzzle bone or socket where FX can spawn, etc etc

[harsh tartan]

I see. I still think id prefer to reserve bones for animating moving parts and use sockets for attachment and particle effects? I dont anticipate that creating any confusion and inconsistency

I think thats everything i need though, thank you

[devout bane]

I got a curve table but trying to figure out how to name my curves. No luck.

[hexed cloak]

Is there a way around Get Overlapping Actors not working with complex collision only meshes?

[broken wadi]

Not working how?

If you use print string on the overlapping actor does it show up?

[hexed cloak]

Nope.

[broken wadi]

Can they overlap in the first place? Check collision settings

[hexed cloak]

They can - works perfectly fine if I set it to use simple collision

[broken wadi]

Maybe your complex collision isn’t as you expect? If you enable it visually on the mesh does it look intact?

[hexed cloak]

Yes

[broken wadi]

Does it have to be the complex parts overlapping? Can you add another collider in the actor somewhere?

[hexed cloak]

It's a trigger box and an actor with a static mesh

[pulsar lantern]

https://www.unrealengine.com/marketplace/en-US/product/electronic-nodes

[faint pasture]

I honestly don't like it. For example, you can't tell which line is which in that screenshot

[pulsar lantern]

To be fair that was really bad organization and I just threw it together

[broken wadi]

Shouldn't be a problem. What does the collision detection part of your BP look like?

[pulsar lantern]

This is a more sane example

[hexed cloak]

This is all I'm calling

Works fine with simple, doesn't work with complex

Ironically, if the ownership area is build after the complex collision item, it will work. But if you place the complex collision item down after, it doesn't.

[maiden wadi]

I find this rather hard to read to be honest. Too many nodes for what is going on.

[pulsar lantern]

That's fair. It's me heavy prototyping so it's getting converted to C++

[hexed cloak]

ComponentOverlapActors worked 🤷‍♂️

[uncut shale]

how would i get an npc to turn towards the player with a button?

[hexed cloak]

Rotate to Face Entry in blackboard

[maiden wadi]

I would use focus personally.

Either works. Depends on your NPC setup. Focus sets the control rotation of the AI to a target. Very useful for aiming at stuff with or without weapons.

[faint pasture]

Do AI controllers have control rotation?

Learn something new everyday if so.

[maiden wadi]

ControlRotation is a Controller.h value.

Property^

You can set focus to a location or a specific object, really stupidly useful for AI stuff.

[maiden wadi]

If you're more curious, look up AAIController::UpdateControlRotation. Is the major function for that.

[faint pasture]

I really like making my pawns such that they are completely agnostic as to whether they are AI or Player driven, this is awesome.

Makes testing a breeze too, just possess and drive them around

Now we just need AI to be able to call input events

[maiden wadi]

To be fair, you could do that pretty easy with a pawn base class. Simple inheritance events like "UseEquippedTool", etc. Just make an AI tree node that calls that same as a player pressing left mouse or something.

Make it like Jump I guess. Where it's called locally, handle all networking internally to let designers not blow things up worrying about server/client calls.

[opal pulsar]

Hi, does anybody know of a way to have a blueprint class work like a static class? I am trying to have a certain array of structs be always easily accessible from everywhere

[maiden wadi]

I believe you're looking for DataAssets.

[bold shard]

I made an empty game state class that inherits from AGameState (which in turn inherits from AGameStateBase), and when I use it in my game mode nothing works. There is no gravity, I can't control the character or camera, its all broken and I don't know why.

The previous GS was GameStateBase, so I don't think there should be any config problems.

I am not sure how to fix this, so any advice or help would be welcome

I tried making another class that inherits from AGameStateBase, and that one works, so I guess I will just do that

[maiden wadi]

GameState has to match with GameMode. GameMode/GameState and GameModeBase/GameStateBase Cannot use GameState with GameModeBase for example.

[bold shard]

I had no idea. I saw that the GS had some multiplayer stuff in it, I assume that GM does too then, and that is why they need each other

[opal pulsar]

Ah alright, thank you, I will look into them

[uncut shale]

how do i make a second camera object that follows the player?

[foggy escarp]

A very good plugin when you learn how to use it best.

[tawdry surge]

If you're gonna use reroute nodes all over the place anyway then it isn't really even saving you any time

[little orchid]

Just get electric nodes, darker nodes..

[foggy escarp]

Its automatic with blueprint assist. This was just one hotkey

[cyan bone]

Im lerping my units between 2 different transform/position. But sometimes the destination is too far away, and that makes them go too fast. How do i lerp them so that they go always at the same speed everytime regardless of the distance?
I made that before using Set Timer event, and a float that increased consitently in the alpha.
But with timeline i get quite confused.

[tawdry surge]

Timeline length ÷ distance -> set play rate

[cyan bone]

nice will try it 🙂 thank you

but wait. All instances have different places to go to? So how can i do that?

[tawdry surge]

Oh actually get distance * .01 first
If your timeline is a length of one then it will move them 1 meter a second

Lerp inputs are your start and end points. Just update those

[cyan bone]

sorry i dont understand. Where do i put that?

maybe i should use event

[tawdry surge]

So to reiterate
Distance (start,end)-> * .01->
speed multiplier/output of the multiply-> set play rate

If you set speed multiplier to 1, it'll move at 1 meter per second
Speed multiplier set to 2 will move 2 meters per second

Every time you want them to move you just set start location (A of the lerp) to the current and end location ( B of the lerp) to the destination

[cyan bone]

Set Timer Event i mean

its cheaper also

and less confusing

[tawdry surge]

Not really but you can do that too

They don't work great at tick speeds tho

[cyan bone]

Not cheaper?

[tawdry surge]

Barely if at all

[cyan bone]

well just lower the timer tick, right?

[tawdry surge]

Nah, if you're gonna tick you should just tick or use the update off a timeline

[cyan bone]

smooth

[tawdry surge]

More expensive and it'll still only update on tick

It'll just run a few times between updates and then do it all at once

[cyan bone]

okay got it

[cyan bone]

so i will have to use your technique above ^

[cyan bone]

But here is what i dont understand. when you mention:

[tawdry surge]

You don't have to, but it's pretty straightforward

[cyan bone]

Distance (start,end)-> * .01->
speed multiplier/output of the multiply-> set play rate

this. I have like 80 distances

im lerping a group of instances

[tawdry surge]

Aren't they all moving about the same distance since they are in a group?

Its just to calculate the amount of time the move should take.

[solar sequoia]

attach another camera component to it? you can set the components active or inactive to swap cameras. There are also camera actors, which a controller can view target

[cyan bone]

But each one has his own destination.

they are a group

but they could be going to very different places

depending on the tactic

in the set timer event, i move them by percentage

[tawdry surge]

So worst case using an average distance the ones going further will hustle a bit

[cyan bone]

so they will arrive first and just wait?

thats good

thats whats needed

[tawdry surge]

Thats basically what you're still doing, you just need something to base the playtime on

Nah if they all run on one timeline then they will all arrive at the same time. So the units going further will move faster then the ones going to a closer spot.
If they are all going to their own destinations at their own pace then it'll take a bit more consideration

[cyan bone]

ok so maybe i should simplify it and make it work even if they arrive at the same time

I did this to make them attack in a natural manner

but its spline

[solar sequoia]

🍝

[cyan bone]

a bit yup. but its al dente

[tall swift]

Is there a way to compress a group of nodes in BP so that they don't take up so much space?

[solar sequoia]

@cyan bone you should try a math expression node to reduce the amount of float links

[solar sequoia]

yes

[cyan bone]

yup those are great

[tall swift]

Ah, thanks

[solar sequoia]

apparently they're much more efficient, as well. I keep forgetting to use them

[cyan bone]

ah really? didnt know that. I heard in a podcast yesterday that whats expensive about blueprints is the connections.

[solar sequoia]

@tall swift if you find yourself doing the same thing in the same BP multiple times, you can try collapsing to a function instead

[cyan bone]

... But does that also apply to pure connections?

pure in the sense that it doesnt have the white execution connection

[solar sequoia]

I get the impression that math expressions are baked in when you finish editing or something

they have the non-editable graph like BPIs do, and I think that's because there actually isn't a graph being used. That's just there for the user's viewing pleasure

[cyan bone]

ah nice, thats important

i thought it was the same

[solar sequoia]

no I believe it uses C++ for that expression or something

obviously BP already uses cpp but it skips the extra layer of BP fluff

[cyan bone]

i wish bp was just as fast as cpp. one day they will come up with something 🙂

[tawdry surge]

Its generally as fast as c# but it will never be able to match c++
The way the fundamentally work makes it impossible

[cyan bone]

so its always as fast as unity at least ?

[tawdry surge]

98% of the time yeah

[cyan bone]

awesome

[cinder comet]

would anyone know how i would approach getting 2 unique random data table rows with a specific column/category?

for example 2 random rows in the "Assault Rifles" category that arent the same

[faint pasture]

Make array out of all rows, shuffle it, get first 2 elements

[cinder comet]

was thinking of the same category/column though

so 2 random rows with the "assault rifles" category

[faint pasture]

I meant out of all rows that match whatever criteria you have

[gentle urchin]

Ditch the timeline,

Set path -> VInterpConst on tick, calculating your own speed if theres any acceleration involved

[faint pasture]

I've been saying the same for days lol

[gentle urchin]

Its the way to go for this^

Along with updating rotation

Basically a custom move component i guess

[cinder comet]

@faint pasture i know this is the wrong approach, mind helping me out real quick? 😅

[gentle urchin]

Make a function ...

[gentle urchin]

With array input, and number of elements to add

Internally clamped by array length

[hollow schooner]

Hi guys. I've made two separate Widget BLueprints, one with a layout for the interior of my car, and another Widget BLueprint layout for the exterior scene. By clicking a UI button, the user can switch between interior and exterior camera.
Whenever the user selectes the button, I also want to switch between the two UI layouts. I've got a custom event setup that should hopefully toggle between the two UI's

I'm having rouble casting the data though on button-click

The first cast is for the camera switch (that works) the second cast for the UI switch

I'm not sure what to input as an Object input for the cast

[gentle urchin]

Why not a widget switcher , again

Single widget

[hollow schooner]

Because that is a HUGE mess. I have widget switchers within widget switchers

[gentle urchin]

No biggie

[hollow schooner]

Also, it didnt work

Like, the UI switch worked, but then when I switches from one UI back to the other, the buttons didnt work anymore

[gentle urchin]

Sounds like something was done wrong tbh

[hollow schooner]

Here I am switching between the two main UI's. Each UI already has a widget switcher in it because the exterior UI has a "Folder" for the different car paints, a sepearate folder for the rims etc

This was the only pproach I could think of

its a mess, but best I could do

[gentle urchin]

Holy..

[gentle urchin]

Atleadt it looks clean :p

[hollow schooner]

Ignore the buttons on the interior not workingl, they are not hooked up yet. But when the user goes back to the outside, nothing works

[hollow schooner]

Yeah I have a bit of a tidyness tick I suppose lol

[gentle urchin]

I can slap together something i guesd

Gotta wait til after breakfast tho

30 min perhaps

[hollow schooner]

Sure thing no worries!

[gentle urchin]

Im gonna use switchers tho

4 of them probably

[hollow schooner]

I mean sure, if it works Im down

I tried, but it just didnt go well, probably because I overlooked 100 things

[gentle urchin]

Toggle interior view -> set switch 1 to 1

Toggle exterior view -> set switch 1 to 0

Toggle folder1 -> set switch 2 to 1

Etc

Actually 3 switches is enough

Need them animated?

[hollow schooner]

Sorry, was cleaning the kitchen

Animated in what sense? like a fade? I was thinking of adding one as a transition between INT and EXT UI layout

But thats something I can add myself

I need to head off to work in 20-30mins, so feel free to just ping me when you have figured out a way of making it work and I'll take a look at it this evening when I'm back. I really appreciate the help!

[compact plover]

I want to print the string by the array index order, it's in order but printed all index on my screen. How to make it print per index?

[gentle urchin]

You dont need the Get

the ForEachLoop macro returns the get as the "Array Element"

[compact plover]

Great, so how to make the string printed one by one per index?

[junior hedge]

What exactly are you asking?

Did it print in one single print text?

[compact plover]

wanna print it from first then second instead print all index

[junior hedge]

That makes no sense

So you only want 2 to be printed?

[compact plover]

if i implemented in on set static mesh it always read the last index instead of 0

[gentle urchin]

This is printed one at the time

[compact plover]

Nah... what i need is print the string from index 0 - last one by one instead print all index

[gentle urchin]

the print stack is correct

the first printed index is at the bottom of the list

if you want it reversed (For your eyes pleasure, not for engine iteration) you'd need a reverse for each loop

[compact plover]

agree... but if i change the string to static mesh array type it always read the last index

[gentle urchin]

Further, wrapping it in a simple function, makes it easy to hide it again

Adapt names to your choosing

this is the hierarchy

Very sloppy naming but its just a mockup

[compact plover]

I'll try

[gentle urchin]

last vid related to this.

[gentle urchin]

It doesnt, It always works the same way..

Iterates over the array elements first to last

when using the ForEachLoop macro

[junior hedge]

When you print a text the newer text goes to the top

Because priority of new data

[limber parcel]

why dont u just invert the array?

[limber parcel]

has the instanced mesh thing always been there or did they just add this?

[gentle urchin]

Oooold

Ancient

[limber parcel]

whats actually the difference between instanced and normal mesh component?

[gentle urchin]

Iall instances of an ism is one drawcall

Copied in the gpu or smth

While a regular mesh is 1 draw per mesh

[limber parcel]

ok so basically its better to have instanced meshes instead of normal ones as long as they dont need to change individually?

[gentle urchin]

Yes, in short

But regular ism dont support lod

Hism does

[mental trellis]

ISMs won't have individual collision either I think.

[gentle urchin]

They do

[mental trellis]

Oh? Neat.

[gentle urchin]

Or

Atleast you can get the hit instance

Does that count? Id say so :p

[mental trellis]

😛

Basically use ISMs when the only difference between meshes is its transform

And you have a lot of them.

[gentle urchin]

They also share material

Can get around it by using the per instance custom data

[thick orbit]

Hi all, I think this is the right place to ask this. I have an actor that when spawned, procedurally generates instanced static meshes to create a "dungeon" and I have a nav mesh in the level already. The problem is that when the actor spawns all the instanced static meshes, the nav mesh doesn't recognise them. If I move another object (in simluate mode) it rebuilds the nav mesh but still doesn't take into account the instanced static meshes. I've been messing around with this for a while now trying multiple different things. The only method that works is to start the simulation and then move the actor within the editor viewport of the simulation, which then takes all the instanced meshes into account and rebuilds the nav mesh correctly. Any input or suggestions would be greatly appreciated 🙂 (all done with BPs)

[limber parcel]

you need to turn on navmesh generation at runtime

[gentle urchin]

The engine supposedly auto instances now tho. A feature that xcme in 4.26 or 4.27. Havnt seen it in action but..

[thick orbit]

I've tried switching that to dynamic. I believe that used to be a tick box but now is a drop down with 3 options, from looking online anyway

[limber parcel]

ok so basically its just for legacy support now?

[limber parcel]

its some setting that you have to enable in the .ini

[gentle urchin]

I use it all the time , but i might not have to

[limber parcel]

[/Script/NavigationSystem.RecastNavMesh]
RuntimeGeneration=Dynamic
bForceRebuildOnLoad=True
bIsWorldPartitioned=True

[/Script/NavigationSystem.NavigationSystemV1]
bGenerateNavigationOnlyAroundNavigationInvokers=True
bAutoCreateNavigationData=True
bSpawnNavDataInNavBoundsLevel=True```

thats what i put in my DefaultEngine.ini

[thick orbit]

Ok, looks like I already had the first 3 lines of that in there, have just put the rest in now and restarted the editor (just in case) and now I appear to get no navigation generating

[gentle urchin]

The ism comp, is it set to a walkable nav type?

[gentle urchin]

The last line states only around invoker

Meaning you need to add a nav invoker to your char or to the dungeon generator

[thick orbit]

I haven't seen that setting before. It's set to "can ever affect navigation". if that helps?

[thick orbit]

ahhh ok, thanks

[gentle urchin]

There should also be some nav class or something

bGenerateNavigationOnlyAroundNavigationInvokers=True
``` this line *

[limber parcel]

this only works if you use nav invokers

basically it generates nav around everything that has a navigation invoker

its an actor component

[thick orbit]

Ok so I found this when editing the static mesh the ISM uses, but it is under the box collisions array which I have 0 elements in. I do however have a simple box collision on the mesh

[thick orbit]

I've just added a navigation invoker to the actor that generates the ISMs and I'm getting the same behaviour as before. A couple of manually placed objects for testing have navigation on them, but nothing on the procedurally placed ISMs until I move the actor in the simulated editor

I've also placed a test actor that has a ISM too, this behaves the same way in that it only has navigation generated on top of it when I move it, and this actor is just adding a single ISM on begin play

[limber parcel]

i think there was some setting to regenerate it in editor or something

[untold dome]

Hello guys - how can i Lerp between two points at an angle?

Instead of going straight, we go at a curved angle.

I can't seem to find any resource on this. Any links / names is enough to get me going.
Cheers!

[thick orbit]

The weird thing is, I've added a print string to the OnNavigationGenerationFinished event, and if I move other objects it is rebuilding the navigation. It's just that it won't take the ISMs into account until they themselves are moved. thank you for the input so far though, it is appreciated

[limber parcel]

no idea how to get aorund that, maybe just move them a little after spawning lol

[thick orbit]

haha, I've even tried that. If I move them using SetActorLocation it still doesn't rebuild. It's only if I move them in the editor manually. I'm just the "problem child" I guess haha

[limber parcel]

https://tenor.com/view/dumb-ding-meme-bike-gif-16911882

[gentle urchin]

Any give angle you want ? Or just some angle?

Bezier curve is probably what you want to work from https://gamedev.stackexchange.com/questions/157642/moving-a-2d-object-along-circular-arc-between-two-points

[untold dome]

Yes this is exactly what i was looking for. Thanks @gentle urchin 🙂

[tulip goblet]

hello there, can anyone tell me why isnt the mesh showing in the viewport?

[spark steppe]

did you get an support NFT?

[tulip goblet]

sorry i didnt get you

[tulip goblet]

support from who?

[fossil rampart]

anyone has leads or tutorials to add flying characters?

[jagged stone]

Is there any built in blueprint to make line traces bounces, or do you have to do multiple line traces like this? https://forums.unrealengine.com/t/line-trace-based-on-reflection-bounce/304286

[gentle urchin]

Multiple

[dense furnace]

i mean you can just make a function no need to have it built in

[untold dome]

This happens if you set the color in BP to something else. Make sure to disconnect that node unless you know it works.

[trim matrix]

hi all I am adding widget to the viewport after adding it i cannot click on the object on my map
anyone can help please

[atomic salmon]

We solved it in #ue5-general . I turns out it was an old reference for which the construction script was setting the mesh scale to 0,0,0.

Hence the disappearing mesh.

[blazing pollen]

is unreal removed the floor in the new update ?

i can not edit root without the floor

[copper steppe]

Seems like you've removed it, I've still got floors

[blazing pollen]

how to add it ?

[copper steppe]

Try the 3 lines, next to the perspective button, sometimes it under that, and then Show floor

[vivid inlet]

If I have a door that saves whether it's open or closed when last played, how do I make it so I can set what the door should be at the beginning with states in a way that it won't continuously oversight the saved status of the door? (or is there an alternative?)

[copper steppe]

The question is, how you can use the saved Open/close state? As like, if the game restarts, then it would use the open/close state from before the restart? Or?

[vivid inlet]

If the player saves it, then it should leave it at whatever state it was at the point. Currently, I think something's going wrong due to 'event begin play' setting a user defined 'Switch on' state.

It changes the original state of the door once, saves that but then it won't change it again after that.

[blazing pollen]

yeah inside preview settings thank you

[copper steppe]

Are you using the SaveGame function for saving it?

[vivid inlet]

Hmmm, that's a good point can't find one, I'll try that.

[copper steppe]

How are you saving it? 😛

[vivid inlet]

A blueprint interface, never did it this way before. XD

Wait, when you say 'SaveGame function' does it have to have 'Save Game To Slot'?

WAIT there is one

[copper steppe]

That is the function yes

[vivid inlet]

Ok yes I found it

Custom event - > save game to slot

Referencing the SaveGame Obj

And get class defaults.

[copper steppe]

Something like this, for saving and editing:

[distant token]

Thats why I prefer coding

[copper steppe]

Where, Find Buildable is a function in the save game class, where we check if the save game contains an object on the location

[vivid inlet]

Ah, thank you, I don't have this part so it seems I'm probably missing something, I'll see if I can add it in, thank you. :)

[copper steppe]

I'm saving and editing plenty of stuff this way, so just ping and I'll be there, if i'm not at work 😵‍💫

[vivid inlet]

Ah, thank you very much, I appreciate that immensely! :D

[terse bridge]

i don't even have source control but i get this error while trying to save

[queen sphinx]

@distant token oh I completely get it. If i could learn to code I would be switching for sure on some things.

[distant token]

Yes you should learn some c++

[scarlet pumice]

Sorry I'm sure this is basic but I can't figure out why I am getting this error!
I am trying to use a Timeline to animate something when hit, and it works the first time but then fails. I get this error for each instance.

PIE: Error: Blueprint Runtime Error: "Accessed None trying to read property Timeline_0". Node:  Timeline_0 Graph:  EventGraph Function:  Execute Ubergraph

[gentle urchin]

Timeline is emtpy

Timeline ref is null

[scarlet pumice]

I added a timeline node by right clicking and adding Timeline, then I added a track with some keys. How is it null?

[prisma snow]

anyone know how can fix this after packaging I got this error
LogSkeletalMesh: Error: Material with missing usage flag was applied to skeletal mesh /Game/Kintsune/Mesh/SK_Kitsune.SK_Kitsune

[small ridge]

Anyone knows a good resource about this node https://docs.unrealengine.com/4.26/en-US/BlueprintAPI/AI/Tasks/MoveToLocationorActor/ ?
I can't open it to look at the C++ behind it for some reason

[gentle urchin]

Depends on what you've done with it and how you refetence it

[gentle urchin]

Mark the material for use with skel mesh

[scarlet pumice]

Seems to be related to calling it from a Cosmetic function 🤔
If I play from Begin Play it's fine

[prisma snow]

where? can you give me more detail?

[gentle urchin]

In the material , property or details panel

[jagged stone]

How can I get the hit point a certain distance before the actual hit point on a line trace?

[gentle urchin]

Hit loc - (hit Direction * length)

[jagged stone]

hit direction being the Direction between Start and End?

[gentle urchin]

Yepp

GetUnitDirection

Is the node

[prisma snow]

it is already marked for use with skel mesh, so ? any idea?