Able Ability System Info and Support Thread

[ExtraLifeMatt]

Is it possible to pass data from one ability to another other? I'm trying to prototype some abilities that don't seem to map into the way Able works, so I'm looking for recommendations. I like the system but it feels like it has a narrow band of utility when it comes to setting up abilities, particularly abilities that involve more than 1 phase of state.

For example, I have a "ground pound" ability that is split into 2 abilities. I'll call them Pound_Air, and Pound_Land for reference

Pound_Air - The first ability is activated when the character is in the falling state and they press the attack button. This ability loops and starts an animation with the characters fist raised in preparation. It also has a branch which checks for whether the character has landed. When the character lands, this ability branches to Pound_Land

Pound_Land - This action immediately starts an animation, effects, and sounds for pounding the ground, as well as some radius queries and damage tasks.

The problem is that the Pound_Air needs to perform some logic that results in some information that Pound_Land needs, such as evaluating whether the landing (based on velocity, etc) should be a heavy or a light Pound_Land, and there doesn't appear to be a mechanism to pass data between abilities. Requiring different

It looks like the closest thing available would require modifications, and that would be the key value set on the ability context, and extend the branch task to copy the key/value set like it does the targets, but it doesn't feel ideal. It also doesn't feel ideal to make a bunch of individual ability elements just to account for the different phases of a broader ability concepts. It'd be great if these abilities were authorable similar to how montages are authorable, with several discrete 'sections' that represent different phases of an ability. In that case the in air and land could be part of a single ability, which is far nicer to work with and also limits the scope for issues like this where data sharing is necessary.

Have you set up some non trivial abilities like this? And if so, how did you resolve these issues?

Sorry for the delay on this, I swear Epic only sends every other notification.

No, currently there is no way to pass information from one ability to another. The way I got around that in the Chain Lightning example is just to store that info on the target (or the player itself) and the other ability just asks the player for the info. You could pass in the old context into the new ability to let it grab whatever, but I currently don't have that setup.

Also, why does the code of UAblBranchTask ultimately pass the current context ability to the CanBranchTo function? I thought for sure it would pass the desired destination ability. Otherwise having multiple branch tasks within the same ability wouldn't be distinguishable from each other in the CanBranchTo code. Am I missing something here?

It should pass the current context and the Ability it wants to transition to. If it's not, that's a bug (although I swear that was fixed recently). I'll verify again.

Hi
Does able ability system allows additive animation playback? So we can layer one animation over another, and possible by body parts?

Layering your animations is driven entirely through the Animation Blueprint system. Able does have a special animation node that will blend between animations you call in Able (if you're using that mode) so you can dynamically blend between sword swings or what ever, but if you want to actually break it up so the top of the skeleton does one animation while the lower half does another - you'll have to set that up yourself.

[Kenyon1977]

Hi
Does able ability system allows additive animation playback? So we can layer one animation over another, and possible by body parts?

[JSwigart]

Also, why does the code of UAblBranchTask ultimately pass the current context ability to the CanBranchTo function? I thought for sure it would pass the desired destination ability. Otherwise having multiple branch tasks within the same ability wouldn't be distinguishable from each other in the CanBranchTo code. Am I missing something here?

[JSwigart]

Is it possible to pass data from one ability to another other? I'm trying to prototype some abilities that don't seem to map into the way Able works, so I'm looking for recommendations. I like the system but it feels like it has a narrow band of utility when it comes to setting up abilities, particularly abilities that involve more than 1 phase of state.

For example, I have a "ground pound" ability that is split into 2 abilities. I'll call them Pound_Air, and Pound_Land for reference

Pound_Air - The first ability is activated when the character is in the falling state and they press the attack button. This ability loops and starts an animation with the characters fist raised in preparation. It also has a branch which checks for whether the character has landed. When the character lands, this ability branches to Pound_Land

Pound_Land - This action immediately starts an animation, effects, and sounds for pounding the ground, as well as some radius queries and damage tasks.

The problem is that the Pound_Air needs to perform some logic that results in some information that Pound_Land needs, such as evaluating whether the landing (based on velocity, etc) should be a heavy or a light Pound_Land, and there doesn't appear to be a mechanism to pass data between abilities. Requiring different

It looks like the closest thing available would require modifications, and that would be the key value set on the ability context, and extend the branch task to copy the key/value set like it does the targets, but it doesn't feel ideal. It also doesn't feel ideal to make a bunch of individual ability elements just to account for the different phases of a broader ability concepts. It'd be great if these abilities were authorable similar to how montages are authorable, with several discrete 'sections' that represent different phases of an ability. In that case the in air and land could be part of a single ability, which is far nicer to work with and also limits the scope for issues like this where data sharing is necessary.

Have you set up some non trivial abilities like this? And if so, how did you resolve these issues?

[ExtraLifeMatt]

Tell me on the versions of ABLE on marketplace direct download? You had a major update you said that require redo of all abilities.. what version up is the update? is it live? do you plan more changes like this in the future?

No update requires a redo of all abilities. Able 3.0 changed some things GOING FORWARD, but the old stuff still works just fine. And no, I don't plan to make any more large changes. v3.11 is the latest I believe.

[AngeIV]

Tell me on the versions of ABLE on marketplace direct download? You had a major update you said that require redo of all abilities.. what version up is the update? is it live? do you plan more changes like this in the future?

[ExtraLifeMatt]

It think it was asked a couple times in the ue4 marketplace so I'll bring the question here because I'd really like to know.

Able was written while GAS was still in development / being used by Paragon. I was frustrated with the lack of documentation and a decent editor, so I just created my own system from scratch. The main advantage Able has over GAS is it makes no assumptions about what type of game you are building and the editor is super easy to use. GAS was very much driven by Paragon at the time and the Editor was fairly non-existent. I haven't gone back to GAS over the last year and seen the current state, but I honestly haven't needed to. I use Able for all my own stuff.

[Levitikon217]

It think it was asked a couple times in the ue4 marketplace so I'll bring the question here because I'd really like to know.

What are the advantages of this over Epics own gameplay abilities system?

[ExtraLifeMatt]

ExtraLifeMatt That is understandable. Some other plugins have 4.23 beta branches in their repos already. I'm not sure when 4.23 will be fully released, but I'm excited for it.

In theory, you may be able to just open up the Able.uplugin file and change the engine version to 4.23. As long as there weren't any crazy signature changes by the engine guys, you'll be fine. But yea, I'd wait if you can.

[Decriment]

ExtraLifeMatt That is understandable. Some other plugins have 4.23 beta branches in their repos already. I'm not sure when 4.23 will be fully released, but I'm excited for it.

[ExtraLifeMatt]

Hi, does anyone know if Able is compiled on VS2017 or 2019?
What I really want to know, is which VS version is the most stable for Able to compile on at the moment?
Or is the latest VS always recommended to use by default?
Thanks in advance for any advice given

VS2017, although 2019 should be fine.

ExtraLifeMatt Hey, I'm stuck with UE4.23 due to how my other dependencies. When do you think you can get to pushing a patch?

I tend to wait for the official release before I build the patch, just to avoid working on a moving target. But generally I try to submit an update within 24hrs of the release.

[Decriment]

ExtraLifeMatt Hey, I'm stuck with UE4.23 due to how my other dependencies. When do you think you can get to pushing a patch?

[SyphFX]

Hi, does anyone know if Able is compiled on VS2017 or 2019?
What I really want to know, is which VS version is the most stable for Able to compile on at the moment?
Or is the latest VS always recommended to use by default?
Thanks in advance for any advice given

[ExtraLifeMatt]

Hi, I hope you can add "Duplicate Task" feature, it's very useful, thanks!

Sure. Should be do-able.

[MichaelLiew]

Able 3.0 has been submitted. Notes / Overview below:





3.0 is a monster that touched pretty much every part of Able (and definitely the Editor aspect). Overall I'm happy with how much cleaner things are (both visually and under the hood) and the ability for users to customize Able to their specific needs has never been better. 3.0 started as a 2 week re-skin but became a 3 month beast but hopefully people get lots of use from it.

That said, I expect bugs. I wanted another week or two of bug fixing but 4.22's released forced things out a bit quicker than I expected. I've tested things as best as I can, but you guys will likely hit issues I just don't have local tests for. Please be patient and let me know as soon as you find something. I'm already working on 3.01 with a few more art tweaks and such, so hopefully now that the meat of 3.0 is out, I can be a bit quicker on updates. I'm also pushing out the marketing refresh (store page and such) I wanted to do until Able 3.0 has a bit of time to cook out in the wild, so bug fixing is my entire priority.

Thanks for all your support and keep the feedback coming!

Hi, I hope you can add "Duplicate Task" feature, it's very useful, thanks!