"Detected" question

[SEAL84]

Hey gang, I have a question regarding triggers.

I want to set up a west detected by east trigger - standard "oh there he is, sound the alarm" stuff - but I want to loosen the standards just a bit.

What I mean by that is I want to afford some kind of grace period between actually being spotted and sounding the alarm.  I've seen this done somewhere but I can't remember exactly how it was set up.

I want to set it up so that the enemy must have a constant knowledge of the player for a certain length of time before the trigger is fired, so that there's the possibility that the player can kill the detecting unit or just run away out of sight.

Possible?  How?

[Planck]

Not 100% sure on this, but maybe you could use the Countdown fields to induce a delay before the trigger is activated.


Second thought....that isn't quite what you were after methinks.
Try Timeout instead.


Planck

[SEAL84]

Neither countdown nor timeout works...

Set up a desert island staring match between me and a Russian and the alarm went off no matter which setting I had it on.

What pissed me off even more was that I had the trigger set to min 60 and max 90, yet it would go off after about 30 seconds by my watch....wtf?  I even shot him as soon as the mission started and sure enough the alarm sounded after about 30 seconds....

[Rokket]

Seal, this does work (I use it) even tho countdowns are in it. It's from some tut, I think it was the Edit Ref in PDF format from a ways back. This will give you the delay and seem a bit more realistic.

requires 4 triggers (repeat #3 and #4 for each sentry area, with diff names)

#1 ALARMSOUND (this simulates a bullhorn speaker, I usually put at main base area)
1 x 1 (or whatever)
Repeat
TYPE: none
Present
Countdown (put in what you want, I usually go for between 10-30 secs - those are seconds markers in trig Min/Med/Max)
FX: alarm sound from effects menu
CONDITION: alarm

#2 ALARMOFF (this is the off switch, right next to "alarm")
same as above mostly, but:
COUNTDOWN (however long you want alarm to sound - I always figure in real life somebody'd turn it off after awhile, maybe 30-60 secs)
CONDITION: alarm
ON ACTIVATION: alarm=false

#3 ALERTSENTRY
Repeat
SIZE: as big as the area you want to cover (I use what you can see from the sentry point for distance), usually make elipse so as to not cover obstructions - like a hill or something)
ACTIVATION: West DETECTED by East (like you were saying, because this is more real than an automatic trip)
Countdown
COND: this
ON ACTIV: alertsentry1=true

#4 SENTRY
Repeat
same size as #3, placed right on top of #3
Present
Countdown
CONDITION: alertsentry1 AND ((alive loon1) OR (alive loon2)) AND alive radio1
ON ACTIV: alarm

EFFECT of all that:

West trips trigger, if East detects, after a countdown and at least one loon is alive and the radio is alive, then "alertsentry1" becomes true, and this makes "alarm" true, which makes the actual alarm trigger scream. At same time, the alarmoff trigger starts, but doesn't come into effect for X seconds, and when it does, it turns "alarm" to false, so alarm stops. This is more real as you were saying: East spots West, takes some seconds to make radio call to base (or run to Office or something), then once base gets the alert msg, takes some seconds to turn on alarm itself.

This really does work. You can make more or less complicated.  Have a designated radio operator report back to base, etc. I've added a radio, so if West kills just the radio itself, there can be no alarm

The tut talked about making even more complex by putting in a callback thing, where base checks in every 15 mins, if no response, alarm. I haven't opted for that.

I use #3 and #4 for each sentry point, covering an area, rather than just one big trig blanketing everything (beause of the obstructions and the interest of more realism.)

I hope this helps. If you have trouble, I can put it into a tiny sample mission and you can see the countdowns do work.  Good luck.

[The-Architect]

Great work Rokket. It works a treat.  ;D