Head Boxes and Dead Boxes [Updated 1/1/22]

[Hey Doomer]

I had a few ideas in a mod I called "events" that I cleaned up and put into this: Head Boxes and Dead Boxes.

I've played Zombie Army Trilogy long enough to know headshots never get old. Doom needs that, and it needs a slow motion element along with it that motivates the player to get more headshots. Can I transfer this excitement to Doom? There are mods with headshots and mods with slow mo, but nothing quite like ZAT. This is my attempt.

I added a DECORATE headshot hitbox to zombies and imps with a headshot counter on the HUD. Every time you pop one, the counter adds one. Every time the counter reaches a threshold set in Options a PowerTimeFreezer powerup is given as a bonus with extra time for headshots and a countdown indicator on the screen. The more headshots you make, the more time you get. Simple.

Headshots during the powerup are allowed but don't add to the total. Can't have your cake and shoot it too.

Dead Boxes is a slight expansion on my idea of stackable corpses. When a monster dies it spawns a tiny bridge. If enough die on top of each other they pile up. These boxes have a minimal amount of health and can be shot out of the way if they become an obstacle.

The Options menu can enable or disable either effect, and the "Bonus" slider affects the cutoff for the bonus (every 5, every 10, etc) and duration. Wait longer, get more time. You may need to turn off or turn down autoaim in game options for this to work well.

Update 12/9/21

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The problem with using a modified actor class is it isn't compatible with existing mods. One or the other has to be tweaked. So I added a simple ThinkerIterator to make monsters jump over the boxes. The hitboxes take care of themselves. This should be universal in that sense, now.

Aaaaaaaand: I noticed the time freeze was in effect after a respawn, so I reset that. Simple:

Code: Select all

	override void PlayerRespawned(PlayerEvent e)
	{
		player.mo.bNoTimeFreeze = true;
	}

Changelog

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12/14/21 - Moved the thinker declaration and definition into the findJumpers() function.
12/20/21 - Optimization: moved countdown printing inside condition.
12/24/21 - Optimization: moved PowerupTimeFreezer.DoEffect() to fix extreme slowdown; testing.
12/31/21 - More optimizations. No lagging so far.

Update 1/1/22

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This lagged several hundred ticks beyond duration in DoEffect() loop. Fixed by removing from inventory. Removed inverse effect. Looks better IMO.

Is it better to trigger bullet time whenever or work for it?

Now at v1.4

[thugsta]

Since i assume people use mk-crits for universal headshots, is there a way for your tweak to be part of a extension patch/addon to that?

[Hey Doomer]

Since i assume people use mk-crits for universal headshots, is there a way for your tweak to be part of a extension patch/addon to that?

Interesting mod that takes a somewhat different and more detailed approach. (It didn't work for me, but then I'm using Zion.)

Rather than aiming at an actor replacing a monster's head ("HeadshotHitbox") mk-crits does this:

Code: Select all

				// get the lower and upper bounds of the "head".
				double headLower = monster.Floorz + monster.Height-(monster.Height*headshot_height);
				double headUpper = monster.FloorZ + monster.Height;
				// check if the inflictor (i.e. puff, projectile, etc.) is within the bounds of the "head".
				if(inflictor.Pos.Z >= headLower && inflictor.Pos.Z <= headUpper)

That seems like a good alternative, and I'm sure there are advantages to it. I considered it but thought DECORATE was simpler and somewhat harder to hit. (It might be interesting to hit a Cyberdemon in the head with a rocket!) I also capture the headshot in WorldThingDamaged and make it a flat-out fatality. Not editorializing, just explaining why I don't see it happening.

[determin1st]

what about design from the scratch..

if it's possible to determine

- the moster kind/class
- monster's angle
- the point where projectile hit (how much resolution?)

then, doable.. but damage system should be designed too, maybe two of them, realistic (will also require a skeleton, maybe organs location) and simplified (damage points based)

realistic is idealistic, but, maybe balanced with *magic* syringe injections, like, monster will die from almost any shot but, if it has recovery syringe, it may use it to cancel the death state, which will occur based on time interval (bleeding it's called, but not really bleeding)

[Hey Doomer]

what about design from the scratch..

if it's possible to determine

- the moster kind/class
- monster's angle
- the point where projectile hit (how much resolution?)

then, doable.. but damage system should be designed too, maybe two of them, realistic (will also require a skeleton, maybe organs location) and simplified (damage points based)

realistic is idealistic, but, maybe balanced with *magic* syringe injections, like, monster will die from almost any shot but, if it has recovery syringe, it may use it to cancel the death state, which will occur based on time interval (bleeding it's called, but not really bleeding)

Sounds like a good project. Now get to work.

[determin1st]

later later, i'm working on projectile ricochet

[Caligari87]

what about design from the scratch...

Hideous Destructor does almost all of this to one degree or another using the position calculation method (similar to mk-crits), so yes it's very possible. Black=miss, Green=normal hit, Red=critical damage, blue=50% chance to miss.


But that's a separate discussion. Let's keep the topic to the original mod posted here.