[SUPPORT] Advanced Turn Based Tile Toolkit

[anonymous_user_2c1a6164]

@;325934

Thanks for the input, Shenku. So to TrueSkittles and AxelRantila, as you can see games with more factions is certainly possible, but it requires some tweaking. The main things that have to be changed are any functions or blueprint graphs that use the faction variable from units. This includes functions like Pathfinding and Find Tiles In Range, where units that are within ranged are marked and stored. It’s also important for input. When the player clicks a tile the following actions is determined by checking what faction is stored in the Pawn Array index corresponding to the clicked tile. There might also have to be adjustments to the AI. If an AI pawn finds pawns from multiple factions within range, how does it decide which one to attack? None of the changes that have to be made are particularly large, but there are quite a lot of them. I’ll happily provide support to anyone attempting to add more factions, but I recommend that they are comfortable with the basic functionality of the toolkit first.

Ok, I was just wondering. I bought it anyway and will use it in my projects.

[Shenku]

I’m not even sure what happened, but now it’s not displaying the tiles incorrectly at the start of a unit’s turn anymore… Must have been some kind of odd compiling error or something, because I didn’t really change anything and it’s fine now… I’ll try adding in some print strings as you suggested to see if I can figure out what was going on with the attacking air and random attack issues, but I think I can probably figure it out from here.

Thanks again for the assistance, I’ll let you know if I have any other issues that I can’t figure out.

[Monokkel]

@AxelRantila;326413

Ok, I was just wondering. I bought it anyway and will use it in my projects.

Ok, great I hope you’ll find it useful. Make sure to check out the tutorials linked to in the first post of this thread, and let me know if you have any questions.

@Shenku;326589

I’m not even sure what happened, but now it’s not displaying the tiles incorrectly at the start of a unit’s turn anymore… Must have been some kind of odd compiling error or something, because I didn’t really change anything and it’s fine now… I’ll try adding in some print strings as you suggested to see if I can figure out what was going on with the attacking air and random attack issues, but I think I can probably figure it out from here.

Thanks again for the assistance, I’ll let you know if I have any other issues that I can’t figure out.

Good that the problem disappeared. Hope it doesn’t show up again, though it’s often unnerving to have a bug disappear for no reason. Like I said, I see no reason why it should happen from the code you posted. I hope print strings and adding breaks to the blueprint graphs/checking variable values at various points will help you zero down on what’s causing the problem.

And don’t mention it! Feel free to ask again if something isn’t working as it should.

[xiuxiu]

@;326229

@xiuxiu: Thanks, glad you like it I assume you’re using your own custom static meshes for tiles? The easiest way to fix your problem is to make sure the pivot point of your static mesh (set up in whatever modeling sotware you are using) is at the top and center of your mesh. I did this with my own meshes as I thought it made sense that the “floor” of the grid was at the same Z location as the Z location of the grid, and so I would not have to correct for the height of the meshes in blueprint. I assume the pivot points of your meshes are in the center of your tiles, since you have to add half their tile bounds.

Thanks for reply so fast.
I agree that the pivot should be at top as floor. Please ignore my request, I’ve just found it’s hard to use it in my own project without any modification.

Any idea about fog of war? I can only show/hide them, it’s sad:(. Ok, it’s a little far from this post, don’t mind.
I am strongly looking forward to this toolkit’s new version.

Good job!

[Monokkel]

@xiuxiu;326971

Thanks for reply so fast.
I agree that the pivot should be at top as floor. Please ignore my request, I’ve just found it’s hard to use it in my own project without any modification.

Any idea about fog of war? I can only show/hide them, it’s sad:(. Ok, it’s a little far from this post, don’t mind.
I am strongly looking forward to this toolkit’s new version.

Good job!

I have a few ideas about fog of war, but I haven’t tested out anything yet. There is a tutorial here about creating fog of war that might interest you. There are many other ways to go about this, of course. One way I am considering myself is using the Find Tiles In range function to spawn tiles when they are visible, but that will take some work.

[LDodds]

Hey there, iv heard some really cool things about 4.8 are you planning on updating your kit to support it?

[Monokkel]

@;328004

Hey there, iv heard some really cool things about 4.8 are you planning on updating your kit to support it?

Yup, did it two weeks ago It should be available as an option when you download the toolkit in the marketplace. I have also sent an even newer Version to Epic a couple of days ago, that fixes a couple of small things and changes the default units to use the new one from 4.8, but the one that is currently hosted should work perfectly with 4.8.

[LDodds]

Excellent, keep up the good work!
Just taking a look at your more recent tutorials

[Monokkel]

@;328009

Excellent, keep up the good work!
Just taking a look at your more recent tutorials

I will! Working on the toolkit as we speak. The last couple of updates have mostly been bug fixing and compatibility, but the next one will be a big feature update, though that does of course take a bit more time. AI is getting a major overhaul, touch controls for mobile devices are being added etc. Hope you enjoy the new tutorials. There are almost five hours worth of tutorials at this point.

[Stormrage256]

@;317328

Ok, so the 4.8 version is up. This is not a major feature update, but makes the toolkit compatible with 4.8 and fixes a few bugs. A larger feature update is still in the works. Here is the changelog:

v1.41 (23.06.15):

1. Updated the toolkit as per the “updating to 4.8” guidelines found here. Note: some of these changes are workarounds for bugs Epic introduced in 4.8, and will be changed back when these engine bugs are fixed.
2. Fixed the Create Walls on Edges function in ATBTT_GridManager. This function was not creating walls on edges correctly before.
3. Modified Add Viewport Terrain to Arrays to allow for getting height information from placed tile actors.
4. Changed the AI controller to appropriately account for difficult terrain when choosing a target to move towards.

Just converted my project to v4.8. Thanks to the change log and the v1.41 boolean markers in blueprints, it was quite easy to add all the v1.41 changes to v1.4. Really appreciate the effort you put into small things like these.

[Monokkel]

@;328856

Just converted my project to v4.8. Thanks to the change log and the v1.41 boolean markers in blueprints, it was quite easy to add all the v1.41 changes to v1.4. Really appreciate the effort you put into small things like these.

Good to hear you find it helpful! I’m trying to add these little markers every time I add something new while I work. Might become quite a few little bools after a while, though A new update was sent to Epic a few days ago, so there will be a few more things to add (marked as 1.42). The update after that will be a bit different, though. As it is an example game it uses its own player controller, AI controller etc. By the way, Epic has fixed the 4.8 bug where “self” nodes get disconnected automatically, so you no longer have to use the casts in Unit_Parent (removing this from the conversion guide now)

[Monokkel]

Ok, another small update was uploaded to the marketplace today. Here’s what it contains:

v1.42 (10.07.15)

1. Changed the skeletal meshes of the default pawns to the new 4.8 mobile mannequin. Changed the animation of the ranged units to shotgun animations, which have a more visible attack animation.
2. Removed the casts for “self” in Unit_Parent that were added as a crutch for 4.8 issues in the last update. Epic have corrected this bug, so the workaround is no longer necessary.
3. Added a branch in the Add Viewport Terrain To Arrays function in BP_GridManager to prevent an error message from showing when getting heightmaps from tracing.

That should be all, I think. A much larger update is in the works that will add lots of new features, but you’ll still have to wait a bit for that one. I’m keeping feature updates large and infrequent so that people using the toolkit won’t have to copy my updates into their ongoing projects that often.

By the way, I’d like to remind anyone reading this thread that it is possible to rate and review the toolkit here. I don’t mean to be pushy, but I know that there are people who are just not aware of the browser based marketplace and the options for rating/reviwing. If you have used the toolkit long enough that you feel you can give an informed rating (and possibly a review) it is much appreciated (but again, no pressure )

[Anzak]

Ok I have another question. Is there a way when I set the Grid manager to be hidden to only allow the player to move to tiles that have decals. I put a floor over the grid manager and I have a grid larger than my floor. I don’t want the player to click in the air and move off the floor.

[Monokkel]

@Anzak;330040

Ok I have another question. Is there a way when I set the Grid manager to be hidden to only allow the player to move to tiles that have decals. I put a floor over the grid manager and I have a grid larger than my floor. I don’t want the player to click in the air and move off the floor.

Sure, there are a few ways to achieve this. Just so we’re clear first, though, the decals are still there in your case, they just aren’t visible to the player since there are no meshes for them to project onto. In any case, the best way to get your desired result is to set the public variable “collision plane walkable” in BP_GridManager to false. The collision plane is an invisible plain that stretches across the entire grid, so that each individual tile mesh does not need to have its own collision volume. If you make it so the collision plane is not walkable, this is the same as turning off the collision of the plane. When clicking a tile the toolit does a line trace with the PathTrace channel to see if it hits anything. If it does, it determines the grid index depending on the location hit. So if you turn off collision on the collision plane you must make sure that your floor has a correct collision volume, and that this volume is set to block PathTrace.

[Monokkel]

Small update on my work in progress stuff. I’ve got the toolkit working on my Samsung Galaxy S3 phone. The phone is a few generations old at this point so I was pleasantly surprised that the toolkit ran pretty smoothly with almost no modifications. I do have quite a few modifications in the works to make the toolkit even better for mobile, though. Here’s a short test video:

ATBTT - Mobile Test

[Anzak]

When I turn off collision plane walkable. The decals vanish and I can no longer move.

Secondly I have added a collision box into my scene. The problem is that the decals for attack do not show up there. Also if the actor is under the collision box they do not show up at all. This is still a valid area of the map it is trigger for events. The blue show up fine so it is something with how the attack is interacting with the trigger.

[Monokkel]

@Anzak: Ah, forgive me. I was thinking of how things worked a few versions ago. In addition to setting collision plane walkable to 0 set Heightmap to “from tracing” and make sure only things you want players to walk on is set to block PathTrace. This way traces will check all tiles to see if there is a mesh with visible collision under it. Alternately you can refrain from using heightmap tracing and place invisible walls right outside all edges of your floor.

[Anzak]

@, I just tried and the default for the floor is to block pathtrace. I set Heightmap “from tracing”. and I turned off the collision plane walkable. Still I can walk off the edge of the floor.

Also any ideas on why a trigger box would cause the attack (red) decals to vanish?

[Monokkel]

@Anzak: Hmm, it should work. I’ve tried it out myself. Show Default Tile is set to false, right? It should be impossible to walk off the edges if there is nothing blocking PathTrace in those locations using the instructions I provided. I hope I’m not omitting something essential.

I’m guessing the collision box blocks visibility because it is set to block RangeTrace, the trace channel that checks if units have line of sight to a tile. If I am correct in this, set the collision to “ignore” for RangeTrace and it should work.

[Mikachu_92]

Hi!

First of all I adore this kit and its the perfect starting place to build off of. Thank you so much!

I have ran into an error creating new pawns however - when i duplicate a existing pawn i get this error -
http://puu.sh/iY7qU/2d53559a8d.png

This is with no changes to the duplicated pawn whatsoever. Any ideas?