Subclassed character won't tick

Development Programming & Scripting
1

I have the following base class:

TOPPlayer.h

UCLASS()
class ATOPPlayer : public ACharacter
{
	GENERATED_BODY()
public:
	ATOPPlayer();
	virtual void Tick(float DeltaSeconds) override;
};

TOPPlayer.cpp

ATOPPlayer::ATOPPlayer()
{
	PrimaryActorTick.bCanEverTick = true;
	PrimaryActorTick.bStartWithTickEnabled = true;
	PrimaryActorTick.bAllowTickOnDedicatedServer = true;
}
void ATOPPlayer::Tick(float DeltaTime)
{
	if (GEngine) {
		GEngine->AddOnScreenDebugMessage(-1, 10.f, FColor::Yellow, "Ticking (Base)!");
	}
	Super::Tick(DeltaTime);
}
... And the following subclass:

TOPAvatarPlayer.h

UCLASS()
class ATOPAvatarPlayer : public ATOPPlayer
{
    GENERATED_BODY()
public:
    ATOPAvatarPlayer();
    virtual void Tick(float DeltaSeconds) override;
};

TOPAvatarPlayer.cpp

ATOPAvatarPlayer::ATOPAvatarPlayer()
{
	//PrimaryActorTick.Target = this;
	PrimaryActorTick.bCanEverTick = true;
	PrimaryActorTick.bStartWithTickEnabled = true;
	PrimaryActorTick.bAllowTickOnDedicatedServer = true;
	//Super::PrimaryActorTick.AddPrerequisite(this, PrimaryActorTick);
}

void ATOPAvatarPlayer::Tick(float DeltaTime)
{
	if (GEngine) {
		GEngine->AddOnScreenDebugMessage(-1, 10.f, FColor::Yellow, "Ticking (Avatar)!");
	}
	Super::Tick(DeltaTime);
}
My project uses two maps + two game modes. A main menu map set to use a "main menu" game mode, and a single-player map with an override set in the world settings to use a "single-player" game mode. The main menu game mode uses the `ATOPPlayer` pawn class, while the single-player mode uses the `ATOPAvatarPlayer` pawn class...

When the “main menu” map loads, I successfully see the words “Ticking (Base)!” appear in yellow… but as soon as I click the start button, the “single-player” map gets loaded, but I don’t see “Ticking (Avatar)!” OR “Ticking (Base)!” appear on the screen at all. I’ve tried everything I could find via google, yet to no avail.

Anyone have any idea what could cause this to occur, and what I can do to fix it?

2

Right… Well to anybody who comes across this issue, this was resolved by adding the following to BeginPlay() on the subclassed character:

/* It's dirty... but hey, it works! */
auto level = GetWorld()->GetLevel(0);
this->PrimaryActorTick.Target = this;
this->PrimaryActorTick.RegisterTickFunction(level);

If anybody could clarify why this was even necessary, I’d very much appreciate it. Thanks!

3

Right, so on second thought, this did in fact fix my character class… But it doesn’t appear to be working when I subclass APlayerStart. So I no longer have any idea what is wrong. It’s like some actor classes have no problem with simply overriding Tick and adding PrimaryActorTick.bStartWithTickEnabled = true;, whereas certain other actor classes have various other needs.

I’d very much like to be enlightened about this issue!