CTF Support

[AlexMax]

Capture the Flag has been around for quite a long time as a natively-implemented standard across the Client/Server ports. Since ZDoom already supports deathmatch and team deathmatch, would it be within the realm of possibility for ZDoom proper to natively support CTF as well?

[Gez]

The "CTF standard" requires team starts (I'm not sure, but I think ZDoom uses normal deathmatch starts in team deathmatch) and, obviously, flags. Zandronum uses [wiki]TEAMINFO[/wiki] to define team start numbers, default values being:
5080: Team #1 (Blue)
5081: Team #2 (Red)
5082 is skipped over
5083: Team #3 (Green)
5084: Team #4 (Gold)
ZDoom's default TEAMINFO defines eight teams (the same four, plus Black, White, Orange, and Purple), I suppose their team starts could continue logically up to 5088.

Flag sockets are standard actors (editor numbers defined in DECORATE), with these values:
5130: Team #1 (Blue)
5131: Team #2 (Red)
5132: Neutral flag (white)
5133: Team #3 (Green)
5134: Team #4 (Gold)
If we followed logically for ZDoom's team roster, finishing at 5138 for the purple flag, team 6 would have a white flag too. Doesn't matter: team flags and neutral flags never coexist, and it's not like a 6-team CTF match is anything else than a purely hypothetical prospect anyway. (Did anyone even ever play 3-or-4-team CTF? Are there even maps built for that?)

I'm mostly interested, if this suggestion is accepted, in having the existing values kept because (by request) I put them already in the ZDoom config for SLADE 3.

[HeX]

Yes there are map packs made for both ZDaemon and Zandronum that have 3 team and 4 team support for CTF.

Another thing to be aware of: Zandronum's teams consist of Red, Blue, Green, and Gold. However, ZDaemon uses Red, Blue, Green, and White as their teams.

Odamex used to have 3 team support for CTF and Team Deathmatch; the Gold team was the 3rd team. However support for it was removed seeing as nobody ever played 3-team and 4-team CTF.

[edward850]

Question: Does Zdaemon, Zandronum and Odamex all share the same CTF actors, or do they all have their own rules? Because that could suddenly be a tad complicated if we want to backport a gamemode that otherwise has no standardisation. I would otherwise gladly write up support for it.

Edit: It appears that Zandronum and Odamex both do the same thing for the first 2 teams, which means compatibility isn't a problem. Is there really a point in supporting more then 2 teams, however?
Edit2: It turns out TeamInfo can dynamically handle this. I guess it's worth actually just using that with the properties Zandro already uses. I really don't see anybody doing an 8 team CTF with an 8 player limit any time soon, but then I have been surprised once before.

[AlexMax]

Edit: It appears that Zandronum and Odamex both do the same thing for the first 2 teams, which means compatibility isn't a problem. Is there really a point in supporting more then 2 teams, however?

I doubt it. 3+ team CTF is nothing more than a maybe-FNF distraction in Zandronum and I figure it's similar in ZDaemon.

[Blzut3]

AlexMax and I actually talked about this a long time ago (around the time of the Zandronum forking IIRC), I would definitely like to see ZDoom support CTF since there's no particular reason not to and there is the established cross port "Boom CTF" standard. Only 2-way is part of the standard so that's probably all ZDoom should support out of the box. TEAMINFO can be used for additional teams. 3/4-way could be decided later if Odamex ever adds support for it. The reason Zandronum uses gold (modeled after UT) instead of white is so that 4-way one flag could be done well (which I don't know if ZDaemon even supports). It's still compatible with ZDaemon's implementation IIRC as long as you're aware that the white base is the gold team (or you could use TEAMINFO to fix the color).

3/4 way CTF does get played on a fairly regular basis for FNF, but anything above 3 teams is really hard to get going in a normal server (since CTF is hard to play with less than 2 players per team).

[Gez]

I'm bumping this thread because CTF is now an integral part of Strife: Veteran Edition and it's one feature of this re-release which would be nifty to support.

[edward850]

It uses the community standard for CTF, so that should be simple enough. I can't test anything from Veteran Edition though, as I currently cannot afford it. Disregard that, kevans91 is good people.
Edit: and I have already found the first hurdle. The expansion wad wont even load. The DECALDEF is different. This is going to be an interesting couple of weeks.

[Enjay]

The DECALDEF is different.

Has the last 21 years of fudged standards and inconsistent implementations of features taught the Doom community nothing?

[edward850]

It's still "syntax compatible" at a stretch, and certainly enough for me to branch off into separate checks, but salrjasljga;sjg. I may just black hole it for now anyway, as the the format expects rotations and some other parameters that I don't know their behaviour of.

[Gez]

VE's decal code comes from Kaiser, based on the copyright notice in opengl/rb_decal.c.

[edward850]

Guess how much code can be used from that.

[Gez]

In ZDoom, nothing of course. But you know who to blame bother with questions about the behavior of the parameters.

[Enjay]

It's still "syntax compatible" at a stretch...

But it would have been much better if it had simply been compatible, period.

[Xtyfe]

Does this mean ZDoom will full on support proper modern multiplayer? Will it make Zandronum redundant? Maybe... One day