VR Expansion Plugin

[mordentral]

Hi Mordentral,

I have a help question as well if you can spare the time:

I have followed your VRPluginTemplate and noticed when I pick up objects using the template the teleport and navigation commands are still active.

I exported the VRExpansion classes to my own project, and then re-added the GameplayTags so I could define grip properties on objects, but when using my own objects with the GripInterface or using objects like the BaseGun, I am not able to teleport while moving them.

One other small question--I have experimented with adding socket grips but when I tried with the axe I get a funny bug--if my character grips the axe on its socket, it becomes super tiny in their hand. Is this because the scale I have set to 4?

For the teleport location trace I have a custom trace channel, it likely reverted to a standard trace channel when migrated to your own project and the trace is colliding with what you are holding.

For gripping at slots, how old is your build? I went in a few updates ago and updated the FindSlotInRange expansion library function to force the returned Scale3D to be 1.0f. This is because the sockets
were inheriting their parents scale instead of using their own and that was causing the Relative transform to the object to be incorrect after converting (Relative transform of 4.0 scale to 4.0 scale is 1.0 scale, with this method it retains the 4.0 scale).

I could technically return a relative position instead from the socket getting function but its more flexible keeping it world based.

If you load up the current template and set the gun scale to 4.0 it should work as you intended, if you don't want to update yet you could force the return transform to be 1.0 scale or the relative transform to be the actors scale instead as a temp work around.

Hey,

How up to date is the template packaged download on the first page?
Noticed some strange issues with climbing.
- Couldn't climb onto things.
- Can only use 1 hand at a time for climbing.
Is it an old build or did I do something wrong? Or is this intended?

gotta say I absolutely love how smooth everything else is.

For climbing I've never had "two handed" setup in the template, this is due to wanting it to feel as natural as possible. To do a two handed climbing setup you will have to detach the hand/controller mesh during the climbing move so that they stay in the same location and also change how it does the climbing movement vector to be an average of the two hands instead.

Its not actually possible to have it 1:1 with two hands since you are floating them in midair, so you lose some sense of presence, I prefer the one handed perfect 1:1 method. You can feel free to make it two handed for yourself, it would just be removing the climbing drop from the active hand and changing what vector it passes in to the plugin.

For step up, you bring the hand down to your ankles, the height is configurable, since by default collision is enabled while climbing in the template you can't just pass through and up on to objects. You can disable collision while climbing or increase the step up height to something easier to reach if you want.

[TimSkijwalker]

For climbing I've never had "two handed" setup in the template, this is due to wanting it to feel as natural as possible. To do a two handed climbing setup you will have to detach the hand/controller mesh during the climbing move so that they stay in the same location and also change how it does the climbing movement vector to be an average of the two hands instead.

Its not actually possible to have it 1:1 with two hands since you are floating them in midair, so you lose some sense of presence, I prefer the one handed perfect 1:1 method. You can feel free to make it two handed for yourself, it would just be removing the climbing drop from the active hand and changing what vector it passes in to the plugin.

For step up, you bring the hand down to your ankles, the height is configurable, since by default collision is enabled while climbing in the template you can't just pass through and up on to objects. You can disable collision while climbing or increase the step up height to something easier to reach if you want.

Thanks for the answer =)

[mordentral]

Whoot, so some new VR commits hit the master branch last night and they are really **** nice, this will likely cause some plugin changes come 4.17 (for the better).

1. They are directly implementing tracker support finally, so I can drop the special controller for trackers.
   
2. Right / Left hand steamVR presets appear to be obeyed in engine now
   
3. OpenVR mesh loading is going to be supported in engine, and at the sub component level (something I hadn't gotten around to yet), so I will likely drop the functions related to that from the plugin.
   
4. Fully customizable mirror window settings with included custom texture overlays are supported (async gameplay / custom mirrors / mixed reality support).
   
5. A mixed reality camera tracking system is added.
   
6. Oh, and new input bindings that are more generic / should support the Knuckles controllers.

4.17 is going to be an amazing update for VR.

[FatMoth]

Finally mixed reality support!!! Gonna be so cool

[kusokuso1]

I've got a slight problem with a grippable skeletal mesh child actor lagging a bit behind the hands (or possibly reacting to physics) when the player character is moving.

I thought it might be related to late update being on, but the issue happens whether late updates are always off or on. I checked the collision on the mesh and it doesn't look like it's blocking anything.

[mordentral]

I've got a slight problem with a grippable skeletal mesh child actor lagging a bit behind the hands (or possibly reacting to physics) when the player character is moving.

I thought it might be related to late update being on, but the issue happens whether late updates are always off or on. I checked the collision on the mesh and it doesn't look like it's blocking anything.

You need to up the stiffness on the constraint, the value you are using is not strong enough to overcome the sudden direction changes.

Or alternatively you can use one of the hybrid grip methods.


That being said I am not entirely sure WHY you are gripping that with a simulating grip, it appears to be something that you could simply use a PhysicsOnly grip on so that it doesn't have a constraint?

[kusokuso1]

Thanks for the help!

「That being said I am not entirely sure WHY you are gripping that with a simulating grip, it appears to be something that you could simply use a PhysicsOnly grip on so that it doesn't have a constraint? 」

You're right. There's no good reason for me to have it simulating. Sorry, I didn't read all the documentation correctly. I didn't know that PhysicsOnly grips don't simulate. Changing it to that fixed it perfectly. Also, now I know large numbers are required to effect change on constraints.
Thanks again!

[kusokuso1]

Btw, I showed this stuff to some co-workers here (at a game company I work for) in Japan and they loved the climbing bit more than anything. (I gave all props to you, of course.)

Only complaints were
①it's hard to hop up over ledges
(I'm pretty sure I just need to change the VRClimbing StepHeight and maybe the multiplier to fix)

②Can only climb grab if hand is near surface of object (even the default white blocks). Other than increasing the size of the sphere I'm not really sure how to fix this.

Regardless, both of these issues are not the fault of the plugin, just my usage of it.

After climbing, one of the higher-ups thought it'd be cool to be able to cast webs and swing like spiderman. In the docs, if I recall correctly, you said the climbing mode could be used for this kind of more custom movement mode, but I wonder how you'd get pendulum/swinging physics to work right with that climbing mode. Have you already mucked with this kind of thing?

[SoLiDioS]

I cant open any Blueprints after the instalation of the plugin do i have to code everything now in c ++? or do the blueprints still work but i have some other issue? sorry i m almost completely new to c++ or blueprints... EDIT: oookay nevermind now it suddely works...

[mordentral]

Btw, I showed this stuff to some co-workers here (at a game company I work for) in Japan and they loved the climbing bit more than anything. (I gave all props to you, of course.)

Only complaints were
①it's hard to hop up over ledges
(I'm pretty sure I just need to change the VRClimbing StepHeight and maybe the multiplier to fix)

②Can only climb grab if hand is near surface of object (even the default white blocks). Other than increasing the size of the sphere I'm not really sure how to fix this.

Regardless, both of these issues are not the fault of the plugin, just my usage of it.

After climbing, one of the higher-ups thought it'd be cool to be able to cast webs and swing like spiderman. In the docs, if I recall correctly, you said the climbing mode could be used for this kind of more custom movement mode, but I wonder how you'd get pendulum/swinging physics to work right with that climbing mode. Have you already mucked with this kind of thing?

1. Yeah change the step height, the default value in the template is pretty low (far lower for tall people or people that have issues leaning over a lot, its mid shin to lower shin height for me). It wouldn't be that difficult to calculate a step height off of someones height during an initialization period at startup as well.

*Edit* As of the last update btw the multiplier is pretty much deprecated as I am running custom capsule step up collision for climbing step up now that should ensure it is easier.



2. Default white blocks you can stick your hand inside of and climb still, the climbing and gripping checks first run a trace the size of the sphere (traces are more accurate than overlaps with fast movements) and if that trace fails it falls back to checking for overlap (if inside of an object the trace will fail so overlap is used). The problem with the non white walls is that BSP does not trigger overlap inside of it so climbing is surface contact only. Its not the largest problem because you shouldn't be using BSP for levels in the first place and collision volumes could be used around it even if you did.

If you wanted a more lenient climb detection you could bring the climb check out of the grip check code and instead check against the hand mesh or a larger collision sphere.




3. There is...um...a very unfinished grappling gun in the plugin template hidden away in a sub folder that I have never talked about. I got side tracked when 4.16 came out doing all of the updates and left it unfinished, but it works like spidermans web shooter. That being said how it functions is overly complicated (adding forces to the character directly during falling movement), it would be a lot easier to simulate the same effect in climbing mode by adding the force of gravity + a radial input to movement. I just wanted to play around with a full force based implementation.

[Haircut]

What is the best way to look over ledges? Since the capsule tries to prevent your head from going through walls, it pushes you back. That part is good, but is there a way we could allow for knee height ledges that could be peered over?

[mordentral]

What is the best way to look over ledges? Since the capsule tries to prevent your head from going through walls, it pushes you back. That part is good, but is there a way we could allow for knee height ledges that could be peered over?

Walking collision override or inset collision volumes, or not having them collide at all. Inset collision has the most over all control of those options as you can strictly define the distance / depth of overlap but retain all of the normal character features.

The only true to life method is using a waist tracker, because faking it with allowing "some" overlap just lets people walk through for that amount and doesn't force a "lean" and also somewhat breaks the methodology of how characters work.


You are free to implement it outside of those 4 options yourself with overlap on a non pawn colliding object and teleporting back if the overlap is too far of course.

[kusokuso1]

Thank you for all the info!

1. Yeah change the step height, the default value in the template is pretty low (far lower for tall people or people that have issues leaning over a lot, its mid shin to lower shin height for me). It wouldn't be that difficult to calculate a step height off of someones height during an initialization period at startup as well.

*Edit* As of the last update btw the multiplier is pretty much deprecated as I am running custom capsule step up collision for climbing step up now that should ensure it is easier.

Got it. I'll update to the latest. Are any BP changes necessary for the custom capsule step up collision to go into effect? Or is it all under the hood?

2. Default white blocks you can stick your hand inside of and climb still, the climbing and gripping checks first run a trace the size of the sphere (traces are more accurate than overlaps with fast movements) and if that trace fails it falls back to checking for overlap (if inside of an object the trace will fail so overlap is used). If you wanted a more lenient climb detection you could bring the climb check out of the grip check code and instead check against the hand mesh or a larger collision sphere.

Actually, I can't. I know a couple people have talked about this same issue in the past, and you told them how to fix it for BSP. Since I refactored all the checks and stuff to work with the equipment items I made, and how they're interacted with, I likely messed up the overlap fallback. Thanks! I'll make sure that is properly set up.

3. There is...um...a very unfinished grappling gun in the plugin template hidden away in a sub folder that I have never talked about. I got side tracked when 4.16 came out doing all of the updates and left it unfinished, but it works like spidermans web shooter. That being said how it functions is overly complicated (adding forces to the character directly during falling movement), it would be a lot easier to simulate the same effect in climbing mode by adding the force of gravity + a radial input to movement. I just wanted to play around with a full force based implementation.

I remember seeing some references to the grapple gun (either in this thread or in the template project), I just never made the connection to swinging... Thanks, I'll check it out and then see about doing the simpler "adding the force of gravity + a radial input". I was thinking trigger to shoot and hold web, grip to reel in (double-tap grip to reel out).

I wonder if there are any forms of locomotion you haven't implemented...

[mordentral]

Thank you for all the info!

Got it. I'll update to the latest. Are any BP changes necessary for the custom capsule step up collision to go into effect? Or is it all under the hood?

There is a variable to change the radius for it, but the default of 5 should be good generally.

[kusokuso1]

Thank you. 5 works perfect for me.

<I'm sure you've already thought of this>

I was curious if there was currently a way to set the step-up time. Currently it seems to happen in 1 frame.