ZDoom

by **Graf Zahl** » Thu May 12, 2005 2:29 am

Sphagne wrote: In the real life I am a programmer and if I suggest a feature, I could have done it myself in a moderately organaized Pascal-based program without much hassle, but I do not know any C, (not much as it would count anyway), and I do not know about the Doom code.

Being a programmer doesn't help much. At least you admit that youz don't know Doom's code and from most of your suggestions this is obvious. So, since you already know Pascal it shouldn't be too hard to go to C(++) from there. I needed less than a week to familiarize myself with that language and after getting used to the different syntax I had no desire to go back to Pascal's rigidness. If you do that you can start to analyze the (Z)Doom source and maybe do your great features yourself.

You are often telling me to ask a programmer to do the job, so here is my suggestion: (dear Graf, please budge off and let other people have an opinion)

For any of my suggestion, I know how to implement them in a moderately organized program, but I do not have the time and means to change the doom code directly, so:

Knowing how to implement it in another program doesn't help much. Let's not forget that Doom's source is not the cleanest and most organized code available. On the contrary: Parts are rather messy and heavily depend on global variables and other stuff one should not use in organized code.
I think it's obvious that this makes it much harder to add complex stuff to these parts of the engine.
I can't speak for Randy but aside from messing around with Doom I have to program other stuff to make a living and I don't think it looks differently for Randy. So that leaves not much time to develop new things to add to Doom. And now make a guess which kind of features gets dismissed first in such a situation. It's really not that your suggestions are unreasonable as such but think about when someone who isn't really interested in doing so has to spend a few hours each day for weeks on it. Believe me, it won't work.

Meet me in the thread: (Lets develope: "Monster Sight Calculation")

It would be coming soon, and with other people's help, hopefully would add some stealth features to ZDoom.

If you can pull that off without breaking anything else so it becomes usable I'll be impressed. And that would be a useful new feature which I think many mappers would have liked on occasion. The only problem is that the current AI system isn't really suitable for it - but before .90 it would have been even harder because any sound made by a player persisted forever in a level.

by **Sphagne** » Wed May 11, 2005 10:02 pm

First thing first: I wonder, in your real life, do you always speak for other people and would not let them to speak for themselves? You do not like Nazzis but your hunger for domination is a bit like them.

OK, I have come to a decision: I will change my method. Let's see if this feature suggestion forum can become a little more useful than the current state.

In the real life I am a programmer and if I suggest a feature, I could have done it myself in a moderately organaized Pascal-based program without much hassle, but I do not know any C, (not much as it would count anyway), and I do not know about the Doom code.

You are often telling me to ask a programmer to do the job, so here is my suggestion: (dear Graf, please budge off and let other people have an opinion)

For any of my suggestion, I know how to implement them in a moderately organized program, but I do not have the time and means to change the doom code directly, so:

Meet me in the thread: (Lets develope: "Monster Sight Calculation")

It would be coming soon, and with other people's help, hopefully would add some stealth features to ZDoom.

by **Graf Zahl** » Wed May 11, 2005 6:41 am

Sphagne wrote:I did not want to answer such a biased response, but I thought that it may seem that I was persuaded that my suggestion was total crap, which is not the case so I decided to answer them, but dear Graf, please cut it now and ignore this thread after this moment.

No, I won't ignore it.

Please do not make the mistake, because almost *all* my suggestions are geared toward enhancing the level designer's hold and control over the environment and the monsters, and have nothing to do with RPG elements.

Some of those suggestions may help developing RPG elements but they are all general purpose, and can be used in any other project.

So please do not throw that "RPG: word at my face again, and if you want you can search my previous posts for the proof, so Strife and other programs are out.

The fact that they might be used in other projects doesn't counter their RPG origin. Oh, I have seen most of your suggestions. They are mostly highly specialized stuff that either necessitates significant rewrites of existing code or requires more work than it is worth.

As for the "complete rewrite of the engine" part, some of my posts are about more than one additional feature for ZDoom, and each part would not require too much of work, but the sum may become complicated.

See, there's the problem. It's mostly badly structured masses of texts with a heap of suggestions - some good, some not so good and some simply not doable with a reasonable amount of work. And you are wondering that nobody cares anymore?

And that is not the case for all my posts, but a portion of them, and the phrase "90%" is just a random number that you have thrown in, to stress your point, I gather.

It's a random number that represents my impression of your suggestions.

I can only remember 3 major and far fetched threads that now I know, they were not very logical. Those were about: DoomScript, Universal Level Structure, and New Monster AI.

Let's not talk about those. You didn't help your cause at all by posting them in the first place.

As for all the other suggestions, I can still vote for them if needed be.

These suggestion would not change the monsters' AI logic, but would give the levels and monster designers the option to enhance them if they liked, and please do not speak for other doomers about their tastes for dumb monsters, because this may not be the case.

And none of these suggestions are about changing the AI code directly, but give the level designers the options to bypass some of them and infuse some fake AI via some ACS programming and environmental designs. so please dont stress about changing the AI code, because that is not my suggestion.

Nobody ever said it's impossible. But let's be honest.

1. Randy seems to be more interested in other parts of the engine than altering the monster AI or enhancing DECORATE. (Randy, if I am wrong plese correct me.

)
2. The long delays between versions (like 2.0.63->2.0.90 and 2.0.96->?) make it very hard to motivate myself to submit more complex stuff. Without it I could have done much more enhancements to DECORATE as I have. Too bad that in the 2 months between 2.0.90 and 2.0.96 I didn't have much time. And now we're back to a long wait and again nothing important will happen for the following months.

Except for that "Monster Sight Calculation" suggestion that could have been done with about 20-30 lines of code scattered through out the entire code. Just 1 or 2 for AI change.

And maybe this about seperation of the hate target from the destination target, and those would not break any current map because these are just options that could stay unused like in the current maps.

Except for the fact that the code is a mess that is severely prone to side effects.

And how many time should I stress that almost *all* the current ZDoom features are used by just a postion of the level designers, so this one can be added to them.

Wrong. That's only true if you count all of the Doom mapping community. ZDoom mappers make good use of what is there. Granted, there are some that aren't used that frequently but those are the ones with limited functionality or which have been added due to personal feature requests (like Thing_ProjectileIntercept. It was made for Daedalus and so far nothing else has used it.)

And please do not repeatr that if these additional specials are available, all the level designers may use them at most only 2 or 3 times in a level, because that is just your opinion, and I can response that maybe they would be overused so that it would cause some computer speed issue in those levels.

And I dont think that many of the level designers may want to make new decorate monsters to just add this feature for a single monster, but if it was available in the level structure, ready to be used on any current monster, they would use it extensively.
[/qupte]

No, they won't. The currently available death special isn't even used that frequently because it isn't that useful after all. And a monster's death is a much more noteworthy attempt than going into an attack, pain or whatever state - something you normally really don't care about - except in highly specialized situations like boss fights.

As for adding another lump to implement these features, please let Randy decide about it. This is his port.
This won't be added as a separate lump. It's way too much baggage for way too little benefit. As part of a new level format (if it ever comes) it might have some merit but as soon as you start adding more bloat to support little useful features you will lose the interest of most mappers for sure.

Lots of these features may not be too hard for Randy to implement, and maybe he has not thought about them, or may have nt enouigh free time to spend on them, so I write about them to be there so that maybe he would eventually reads them and say "Hey, lets try this one!".
Don't overestimate your importance. Most likely your posts will be ignored - like they have been in the past.

Summary: please do not speak for Randy and other people in these forums, are you their advokate, and representive?
I don't speak for Randy, I am just expressing my point of view about this. And what I don't see right now is a good cost-to-benefit ratio - especially if you had to add more and more new lumps to the game.

As for that "Hitler" thingy, sorry if that has hurt your feelings, and I would not do it again, but if you do not want to get hurt again, please stop hurting other peoples feelings.
You know, if in real you'd say something like that to me, you'd be in trouble. Being compared to Nazis is something most Germans don't tolerate whatsoever.

I think a lot and come out with some bad and some good ideas and represent them here just to be answered by an extremely biased person that dislikes me so much that can not answer me fairly.
Oh, you poor little boy. Now go home to mama and cry your eyes out.
Seriously though, it's not you I have problems with. It's the way you present your ideas.

There are 4 kinds of feature requests:

1. Short and precise descriptions of a feature. Those are most likely being accepted or dismissed based on their practicability. If those can be done they will most likely be done.
2. Vague descriptions of a concept (like 'I want a dodge state', or 'ZDoom should have auto-update. That would be cool'.) Now, if for some reason it can be done, no problem. But expect some heated discussion if there are reasons why it can't be done as easily as it can be said.
3. The 'Here's the code' kind (my favorite ) Seriously, what prevents a programmer from accepting these and adding them. This way you can even get complex and work intensive stuff in the game.
4. The Sphagne kind (Yes, I'll name it in your honor ): Long winded treatises of more or less useful stuff. But in the end the usefulness doesn't matter because it's just too much to digest in one piece. Like it or not, there is a high probability that these are just being ignored, especially if the programmer who has to do it doesn't see the merit behind all this. So, thus I repeatedly suggested to you to go the '3.' way. If you find a programmer with the necessary enthusiasm and time to do it for you you just need to submit the finished code and everybody will be happy.

What's more, he would say me "Nobody likes your posts." "All the people here think this or that", "Randy would not do this.", and so on...

And that would piss me big time. My advise, do not do it again.

Then be pissed. Sorry, I can't help you there. If nobody likes your posts you'd better think why they don't like them.

by **Sphagne** » Wed May 11, 2005 5:37 am

I did not want to answer such a biased response, but I thought that it may seem that I was persuaded that my suggestion was total crap, which is not the case so I decided to answer them, but dear Graf, please cut it now and ignore this thread after this moment.

Please do not make the mistake, because almost *all* my suggestions are geared toward enhancing the level designer's hold and control over the environment and the monsters, and have nothing to do with RPG elements.

Some of those suggestions may help developing RPG elements but they are all general purpose, and can be used in any other project.

So please do not throw that "RPG: word at my face again, and if you want you can search my previous posts for the proof, so Strife and other programs are out.

As for the "complete rewrite of the engine" part, some of my posts are about more than one additional feature for ZDoom, and each part would not require too much of work, but the sum may become complicated.

And that is not the case for all my posts, but a portion of them, and the phrase "90%" is just a random number that you have thrown in, to stress your point, I gather.

I can only remember 3 major and far fetched threads that now I know, they were not very logical. Those were about: DoomScript, Universal Level Structure, and New Monster AI.

As for all the other suggestions, I can still vote for them if needed be.

These suggestion would not change the monsters' AI logic, but would give the levels and monster designers the option to enhance them if they liked, and please do not speak for other doomers about their tastes for dumb monsters, because this may not be the case.

And none of these suggestions are about changing the AI code directly, but give the level designers the options to bypass some of them and infuse some fake AI via some ACS programming and environmental designs. so please dont stress about changing the AI code, because that is not my suggestion.

Except for that "Monster Sight Calculation" suggestion that could have been done with about 20-30 lines of code scattered through out the entire code. Just 1 or 2 for AI change.

And maybe this about seperation of the hate target from the destination target, and those would not break any current map because these are just options that could stay unused like in the current maps.

And how many time should I stress that almost *all* the current ZDoom features are used by just a postion of the level designers, so this one can be added to them.

And please do not repeatr that if these additional specials are available, all the level designers may use them at most only 2 or 3 times in a level, because that is just your opinion, and I can response that maybe they would be overused so that it would cause some computer speed issue in those levels.

And I dont think that many of the level designers may want to make new decorate monsters to just add this feature for a single monster, but if it was available in the level structure, ready to be used on any current monster, they would use it extensively.

As for adding another lump to implement these features, please let Randy decide about it. This is his port.

Lots of these features may not be too hard for Randy to implement, and maybe he has not thought about them, or may have nt enouigh free time to spend on them, so I write about them to be there so that maybe he would eventually reads them and say "Hey, lets try this one!".

Summary: please do not speak for Randy and other people in these forums, are you their advokate, and representive?

As for that "Hitler" thingy, sorry if that has hurt your feelings, and I would not do it again, but if you do not want to get hurt again, please stop hurting other peoples feelings.

I think a lot and come out with some bad and some good ideas and represent them here just to be answered by an extremely biased person that dislikes me so much that can not answer me fairly.

What's more, he would say me "Nobody likes your posts." "All the people here think this or that", "Randy would not do this.", and so on...

And that would piss me big time. My advise, do not do it again.

by **Graf Zahl** » Tue May 10, 2005 5:34 am

Sphagne wrote: And correct path for the ideas is not "Find yourself a programmer that would do a job." or "Do it yourself.", because if we wanted to and could do this, we would have not posted the thread in the first place, and what is this forum for?

That wouldn't be the case if 90% of your feature requests wouldn't necessitate a complete rewrite of some basic engine code. Doom is not an RPG and the engine is not designed to handle an RPG. RPG elements are vastly beyond the scope of what Doom (and Heretic and Hexen and even Strife) stand for and (not just) in my opinion are far too specialized to invest any work in. Fact is, you need them but most likely nobody else. So if you want to do an RPG you have 2 choices:

1. Make it for an engine that natively supports such elements.
2. Extend the engine yourself (or find someone who does it for you)

but in such a case you do NOT:

endlessly bug the programmer of a source port to add this and that and whatever because it's 'so cool' and 'everybody might appreciate it'.

The fact is, most Doom mappers map for Doom exactly for the reason that Doom is a simple-minded action game. You don't have much control over the enemies and those enemies have a rather basic AI that is aptly described with the word 'cannon fodder'.
Rewriting the AI code (even for more or less trivial things) is not an easy matter due to side effects of the changes which might break many existing maps. Just look at MBF. Its AI enhancements are cool on the surface but in reality many of them make some maps impossible to finish because the monsters no longer behave as expected. So they have to be switched off and become useless.

Heil Hitler!

Now that's [censored word]. Please don't do that again or I get real angry.

As for my original suggestion, I have thought about it and reached the conclusion that it can be implemented, even if we do not have a complete change of map format, by just implementing my suggestion about SPECIALS lump.

Has anybody thought about the possibilities *if* those specials and misc. states were to be implemented? I am excited just by thinking about them.

I believe you. But that still doesn't change the fact that it is a feature that will only have limited use. For the 2 or 3 actual monsters where you need it you still can as easily create a monster that handles it directly in the DECORATE states. The one thing we most definitely do NOT need for this is yet another lump that has to be maintained while editing a map.

If my other suggestion about separating the Hate Target from Destination Target were to be implemented as well, then wow, by combining the two suggestions together, we could infuse lots of fake artificial intelligence into our dumb monsters, (Via some ACS scripts).

Now there's the big problem. This would necessitate a significant rewrite of lots of interconnected code throughout lots of files if you wanted to implement this cleanly. It may be cool (because admittedly the current 'goal' code sucks big time) but don't you think Randy wouldn't have done it as it is if it was that easy?

by **Sphagne** » Tue May 10, 2005 4:30 am

Thanks for the tip, I know, I have a lot to say and I can not manage them in the right way.

by **Zippy** » Mon May 09, 2005 11:58 pm

Sphagne wrote:Currently I am on the black list and most of my posts here would be answered by Graf in a way that would result in an argue between him, and me, so that nobody else would want to join in and add comments to the suggestion, resulting that the thread would loose all the benefits of a forum.

Actually, I'll be honest. I don't really read your posts because they resemble the essays I write in school in several ways. Being very long is the most notable thing. Having something that is a clear, concise, and straightforward summary of the idea would do a much better job of getting my attention and interest, and then if I was interested in it I would try to get into the futhur complex details. Basically I think if you had your ideas better seperated into a kind rough summary (which would address the basics, some examples, and quickly try to prove how this would be really useful), with the complex details seperated somewhere else (seperate post, seperate page, spoiler tag, past some bold delimiter, whatever) everything would be more presentable and more convincing for me to take my time to read through it.

And I think I can be pretty objective about this. I haven't been on these forums for that long, so I have no previous history with "who's who."

by **Sphagne** » Mon May 09, 2005 9:34 pm

David Ferstat wrote:The problem that I foresee with the majority of your suggestions, Sphagne, is that they're going to require an awful lot of work to implement, and (agreeing with Graf Zahl) I have trouble seeing how they're really going to be useful enough to justify this labour.

But Graf and I have reached the conclusion in this case, it is not the case.

Graf Zahl wrote:More often it will be denied because it requires too much work. That's not the case here (it will most likely be forgotten because I don't expect that the new level format required for this will ever go beyond the planning stage - but this is something where I'd like to be proven wrong.)

-----------------------------------

Currently I am on the black list and most of my posts here would be answered by Graf in a way that would result in an argue between him, and me, so that nobody else would want to join in and add comments to the suggestion, resulting that the thread would loose all the benefits of a forum.

I thought about the problem and reached a probable solution, and this formula can help others as well:

Well, his posts have some good points in them and not all the answers are bised arguments, and most of them have some degree of common sense in them, as I said before nothing in this world is just 0 and 1.

So I can stick to the good points of his argues and ignore the rest, and treat the thread as if they were not posted at all, and try to change the thread back to normal forum discussion, and continue to comment on the original suggestions.

This way I have not argued with him, and hopefully, it would not result in open war of words between the two sides, and if other people would join in, that would help a lot in changing the atmosphere to normal forum discussion.

So please lets help each other to be able to take full advantage of a feature suggestion forum.

By the way, wildweasel, on the second look, there was nothing covert about your help. You were just wise enough to cut the argument with someone who does not want to see your point.

Thanx again.

-----------------------------------

Dear Graf, there are lots of suggestion threads in this forum, that you have VETOed in the bud, and some of them were useless, so there is no problem there, but some others might have reached to a useful stage, and even some of them might be useless originally, but if you had let them to go on, they might have resulted in another useful idea, who knows.

So please quit VETOing the suggestions it the bud unless it is fully obvious that the thread is useless and would not reach a useful conclusion. Even in such a case, you can let the people around here to play with useless ideas, no harm there.

You can just ignore them, and do not forget that some of these people are a lot younger than yourself, so let the young play around, and the future is in their hands, and these playings around would result in more experiance, not to mention a more lively forum.

If you have some suggestions and arguments to help them around and guide them to the correct path regarding their ideas, then go on, and I do not deny that you have helped them around before, but please do not VETO the threads that are useless in your oppinion, Randy can lock any thread that he wants to, if it gets out of hand.

And correct path for the ideas is not "Find yourself a programmer that would do a job." or "Do it yourself.", because if we wanted to and could do this, we would have not posted the thread in the first place, and what is this forum for?

Heil Hitler!

-----------------------------------

As for my original suggestion, I have thought about it and reached the conclusion that it can be implemented, even if we do not have a complete change of map format, by just implementing my suggestion about SPECIALS lump.

Has anybody thought about the possibilities *if* those specials and misc. states were to be implemented? I am excited just by thinking about them.

If my other suggestion about separating the Hate Target from Destination Target were to be implemented as well, then wow, by combining the two suggestions together, we could infuse lots of fake artificial intelligence into our dumb monsters, (Via some ACS scripts).

Ask me how, if you like.

Cheers.

by **David Ferstat** » Mon May 09, 2005 12:36 am

The problem that I foresee with the majority of your suggestions, Sphagne, is that they're going to require an awful lot of work to implement, and (agreeing with Graf Zahl) I have trouble seeing how they're really going to be useful enough to justify this labour.

Now, don't get me wrong. I'm not a programmer, although I've done some programming in C. I don't know how difficult and laborious this work will be. But I've got an idea, and it doesn't look pretty.

You have to remember that, for every suggestion that Randy sees, he has to perform a cost/benefit analysis. He has to decide firstly, how much work is involved in implementing it, and secondly, what the expected benefits will be.

Now, while we don't hear from Randy anywhere near as often as we'd like (we like to tell ourselves that he's busy coding the next version) we do have Graf Zahl, who, like Randy, is a programmer, is familiar with the Zdoom code (which gives him a good idea how difficult a feature may be to implement) and is also familiar with just how Zdoom gets used.

If Graf Zahl says that something will be difficult to implement then I'm inclined to agree with him. For myself, I also fail to see how some of these suggestions will be useful to more than a coule of people.

Now, as we should all here know by now, Zdoom development has run up against some brick walls. We can't add any new line types, as the current map format has run out of space to store them. Actors are fast running out (if they haven't run out already) of data that can be stored with each one.

Until Randy finishes his current project, which is converting Zdoom from fixed point to floating point numbers, and adding the vector math class (things I barely comprehend) and then, hopefully, implements a new map format, then all your feature requests are, at best premature. Right now, there is no capacity to implement them.

Unfortunately, every time you request them we have to go to the trouble of telling you, and every other person who reads the thread, just why these seemingly excellent suggestions are not going to be enacted.

by **Sphagne** » Sun May 08, 2005 9:26 pm

Nobody decides to argue with you openly and make you an enemy, look at me for an example.

As for your step by step answers to my statements, please stand aside and read them with a neutral eye, (if you can do so) and see if they are logical (and not one sided).

Can you understand me at all?

Thanx wildweasel, for your covert help in my cause.

by **wildweasel** » Sun May 08, 2005 3:41 pm

Thank you, your answers have proven most informative.

by **Graf Zahl** » Sun May 08, 2005 1:31 pm

wildweasel wrote:
Graf Zahl wrote:Why should I bother with something dull like that? But unlike some people I am not interested in reinventing the entire game. Enhancement yes but why turn it into something that is no longer Doom?
Pardon my intrusion on this war o' quote boxes, but I must ask the one question that has stuck in my mind.

At what point does Doom become something that is no longer Doom? It will always have the fast-paced action, the hordes of cannon-fodder monsters, the weapons, and the abstract level designs. And so long as at least one of those remains, Doom shall remain Doom.

So tell me - how far must one go to turn Doom into not-Doom?

At the point where the change necessitates a fundamental rewrite of how the game works.

And to be quite honest with you, I am utterly sick of seeing somebody innocently request a feature, only to have it denied because "it's not Doom."

More often it will be denied because it requires too much work. That's not the case here (it will most likely be forgotten because I don't expect that the new level format required for this will ever go beyond the planning stage - but this is something where I'd like to be proven wrong.)

by **Belial** » Sun May 08, 2005 1:00 pm

Heh, for me using mouselook is enough to make Doom not-Doomish at all.

by **wildweasel** » Sun May 08, 2005 12:36 pm

Graf Zahl wrote:Why should I bother with something dull like that? But unlike some people I am not interested in reinventing the entire game. Enhancement yes but why turn it into something that is no longer Doom?

Pardon my intrusion on this war o' quote boxes, but I must ask the one question that has stuck in my mind.

At what point does Doom become something that is no longer Doom? It will always have the fast-paced action, the hordes of cannon-fodder monsters, the weapons, and the abstract level designs. And so long as at least one of those remains, Doom shall remain Doom. And to be quite honest with you, I am utterly sick of seeing somebody innocently request a feature, only to have it denied because "it's not Doom."

So tell me - how far must one go to turn Doom into not-Doom?

by **Graf Zahl** » Sun May 08, 2005 11:27 am

Sphagne wrote:Let's bet, with high stakes, if this feature is implemented, and also your intermission suggestion, that this would be used a lot more often that the intermission feature, (in the long time I mean).

The intermission stuff is necessary to fix bugs that can't be fixed with all the special cases coded in there. Within 2 hours I was able to crash the intermission screen 6 times due to various minor oversights.

All the features that Randy has implemented in ZDoom are used by a portion of the people that use ZDoom.

And that's exactly the point where a port author has to decide what's important. Anyway, it is not that your suggestions can't be done by a mapper right now. The only problem with state specific actions is that right now it is not that flexible. But it can be done! Has anybody used it so far? At least I haven't noticed.

For instance ACS, this was only used by a very few percent of map designers, to an acceptable level of usage, but recently there are more and more people using this feature.

Strange. I know only a handful of ZDoom specifc maps that don't use ACS. It is probably the most used feature of ZDoom - and the one that draws most mappers here.

Your DECORATE features were not be used much, but now they are being more and more popular.

So tell me why the first major thing that was done after 2.0.63a was released (the first version with stable DECORATE support) was a huge monster pack that squeezed everything out of the format that was possible? It seems to me that custom monsters are the most used new feature ever. All the latest big ZDoom projects used this to some degree.

Terrain lump, New Fonts, Fake water teleportations, Transfer lights, and lots and lots of ZDoom features are used only by some select map designers, but they are available to be used.

One word: Documentation! Before the Wiki was started nobody knew how to use it. Hence nobody used it.

If Randy wanted to be like you, ZDoom would be a Windows port of original Doom, with no additional new features.

Why should I bother with something dull like that? But unlike some people I am not interested in reinventing the entire game. Enhancement yes but why turn it into something that is no longer Doom?

And these new features would not be used a lot at first, but they would be more, in near future, and a lot more than the intermission screens, or lots of those other feature suggestions, in this forum.

I doubt that very much. Doom is an action game first and foremost where you run around and kill monsters. Only in the rarest of circumstances you need more control over a monster in such a game, namely for some few boss enemies. And for those class specific coding is normally more than enough because with carefully placed ACS_Execute's and tid selection you can do a lot more than you think!

Have you really read the first post in this thread? Can you understand the extend of its usablity? I can post lots and lots of scenarios, that could only be made after implementing these features, general scenarios that can help any one.

The state specific actions can already be done in a limited fashion that would be sufficient for 90% of all projects.

Thing_JumpToState might be useful but don't be surprised if it can't really be used for monsters because they tend to jump elsewhere in their generic code pointers. In the end it comes down to the old question again: How much does the AI system have to be changed to make something work?

And I am sure that these are not *that* hard to implement, yiou can look at my implementation suggestion for an example.

I never said that. But first the new map format has to be done. I'd say let's talk again in a year or two when that may be done.

I think that you can not look at my suggestions with a fair and unprejudiced look.

Guess why! This is not the first time you posted an overlong piece of text that is hard to follow and contains highly specialized feature requests.

So please let other people declair their opinions in feature suggestion forums and do not think it is your domain of power to rule, and I am sure Randy can think and decide about these matters without your help.

What other people? So far nobody showed the slightest hint of interest.

ZDoom

Special Behaviors

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