I don't know about you guys, but I for one find the normal physics in forge virtually useless, the ONLY use it has for me is for weapons, explosives, and crate placements. Here's how I propose this forge tool becomes usefull again for halo 4: Currently when an object in structures is set to normal physics, it will just fall to the ground, if left undisturbed for a few seconds, it will "lock" into place. You can delete the floor it was on, shoot it, grenade it, then jump up and down on it for 5 hours, it still won't budge. I think for Halo 4s forge (assuming it has one, and it damn well better), when an object is dropped in forge whilst set as normal physics, it should fall down to the floor, settle, but if the object is then disturbed, it will react, no matter how long it has settled for. If it is punched, it will move (provided its not too big), if its floor gets destroyed, it will fall, if it hits a grav lift, it will fly. Of course then you have the problem of item despawning, but that could be set to a timer like respawn rate is, or never happen if you wish. I think the things people could create with this would be virtually limitless. Players could make a see-saw out of a 5X1 block, a simple piviot point, and 2 stoppers so the platform doesn't slide off. This could be a great addition to a map, providing access to 4 hallways on 2 different levels. It could also be used as a trap, dumping a crate-load of fusion coils on the unsuspecting victim. People could make a block which falls down from the sky, which kills players underneath it and provides a platform for anybody lucky enough to survive. Classic halo 3 mechanisms such as the "dumpster trap" and the "pallet zombie barracade" could be remade better than ever. Hell, even a jenga tower of building blocks would be possible! (And a hell of a lot easier to build). The true forge geniuses would be able to make entirely collapsable buildings and bridges. And maybe even complex mechanical systems which just require the player standing on a block, causing a chain of events? Working drawbridges anyone? If it were possible to despawn and respawn objects every few seconds, it would even be possible to make a realistic elevator by despawning and respawning gravlifts under a platform. Like I said, the possibilities are endless. If you have any thoughts to this idea, or any more things you could do with it, feel free to post below. Thank you for reading this epicly long post.
Normal physics are useful for one specific thing for me in forge mode: getting pieces aligned perfectly on angles without doing a bunch of coordinate math. For instance say I want a bridge piece sloped at the same angle as a 2x2 ramp, but also turned 45 degrees. This is hard with coordinate editing/rotation snapping because when you turn it 45 degrees, you can no longer just rotate it up and down normally - it wants to twist off-center. But with normal physics I can do this: - Place a 2x2 ramp (or ramp XL) at the 45 degree rotation I want my bridge at. - Spawn the bridge and rotate it 45 degrees as well. - Turn off rotation snap, set physics to Normal. - Drop the bridge on the ramp. Now I have a bridge at a 45 degree rotation, inclined to the same angle as the ramp. Then just set physics back to Fixed or Phased and move it wherever it needs to go. But you're right that Normal is meaningless outside of Forge, and it would great if they implemented what you are suggesting. Actual moveable structure objects in custom games would be amazing.
What Nutduster mentioned is very useful, but doesn't always work in every situation. Sometimes you just won't have enough room to utilize it.
i totaly agree i wish that if i set anything to normal then dropped it from a height it should fall if i then reset the round it should then fall again instead of spawning on where it lands if the object isnt to big you should be able to push for example if i pick up a a block 1x1 and place it somewhere high and its on normal it should fall i then start new round it should fall from that height again.
Have you notices the lag (real and framerate)caused by movable objects? That would be so much worse if large objects were movable.
Well the beauty is, you can do it somewhere else entirely, then set the object (in my example the bridge) to Phased and move it to wherever it needs to be.
This actually sounds really usefull, it certainly saves a good 10 minutes of fiddling around with editing the rotation degree by degree. Also I hate to be a stick in the mud, but this trick could also work with fixed physics, you just place it down yourself [br][/br]Edited by merge: Have you ever played community haloball variants which feature 75 golf balls falling on you? There is no noticable lag in those games...And that would only be an issue if you overused the mechanic (as in made a whole map on normal physics), for simple mechanisms like a piviot/see-saw, a baricade, or even a small jenga tower, it shouldn't be an issue.
You don't need to use normal to do that; you can also use fixed and just push the object into place, and then switch back to phased. There are times when I've had to do it that way anyway, because for one reason or another I had to push an object up into place in fixed to get the angle (mostly when I needed to use one particular edge of an object, and there was no way to get that edge in the right place by the drop method). Besides, I like the control the fixed method gives you, anyway. No worrying about the object bouncing or rolling out of alignment (since they do tend to do a little bouncing, rolling, and/or shifting before finally settling into place when you use normal).
Personally I find it easier to drop it. With fixed on you have to push it down, and since you have rotation snap off it's easy to accidentally screw up the alignment. If I notice it shifts when I drop it, I'll do a little fine tuning afterward.
That sounds like how it works now when you let it fall and come to rest, then change its physics to phased...
I have played those and have also noticed incredible lag on some of them. It's not too bad because golf balls are simple but with something like the "tower, tall" which already causes framerate problems because of it's complexity, having many of them set to normal physics could easily cause problems. If you were around at the time you might remember overloading maps in Halo 3.
Again, thats overdoing it anyway. People with common sense wouldn't make something which lags the hell out of the game. Also when I played the toilet gametype I never noticed any lag. It was completly fine for me. The same with the tower tall. [br][/br]Edited by merge: You don't have to change its physics to phase, it will still happen if left on normal. Unless it is not a structural object.