Overview: A grappling hook, ideally, gives you a linear trajectory to a target within a certain range. This is distinct from the typical jumping trajectory, which is parabolic. With the tools at hand, a linear path is rather difficult to achieve. It's also desirable to have some finesse to the thing, so that strategy is necessary and cheap tactics are discouraged. The way I've implemented it, this grap gun works by triggering a series of zero-damage explosions behind the Master Chief, which propels you forward. The end result is a somewhat linear trajectory, but not quite. It's far from perfect, but you'll find it's fairly usable once you get the hang of it. It's also easy to tweak, if you have your own ideas of how it should behave.
Thanks to xbox7887 for Yelo, the developers of Entity, and ExileLord, whose gravity gun was the inspiration.
If you use this or something similar in a future mod of yours, please give due credit to CaptainPoopface as well as the above parties.
Instructions: Patch Zanzibar with the sppf. Use the SMG. Sorry, photos don't show it so well, but it looks EXACTLY like the SMG, with the shotgun HUD. If someone wants to make a vid, that would be great. The pictures are cheeky, but they show you about how far you can go with one grapple, including a grapple to higher ground and a grapple to lower ground. It's not SLC, but I may post a tut if there is sufficient interest. It isn't hard to make, although it took considerable trial and error.
Bugs/Features
* Replaces the SMG, because as weapons go, the SMG is a pile of steaming hot poo. At least this way you can get some use out of the thing. Also, the SMG looks as though some kind of harpoon or other contraption might plausibly emanate from it.
* Doesn't have a sexy skin, and doesn't shoot any kind of cable or contrail or other graphical indication of where you're going. Focus on the gameplay, or make believe you're shooting a very strong, ultrafine silk cable that no one can see, even you, unless you squint really hard.
* You can grapple "anything." Including the sky, or anything near or far. This is weak, I know, but it's a necessary consequence of the implementation.
* Does not support multiple grapples. I originally wanted to be able to grapple in one direction, then turn and grapple in a new direction in midair. In practice, it is very difficult to manipulate the physics for this to happen, without also introducing a very easily exploited system that would encourage noobs to fly all over the place at all times.
* Behaves strangely when you shoot while standing very close to a wall. Also tends to cause easily destructible objects to...uh, destruct. So watch out for those fusion coils.
* Enabled as a third weapon, so you can still hold whichever guns you like.
* NOT dual wieldable in order to prevent cheapness, although you can throw grenades, and if you are skillful, you can change guns in midair and do a drive-by. See below.
How to Use
* The Master Chief must be rising in the air as the trigger is pulled, or you will just scoot a slight distance on the ground (the ground has very high friction forces to allow you to instantly change directions while running). If you shoot as you are falling, you will not be able to rise at all. Pushing jump and shoot at the same time will maximize your range but will give you a parabolic trajectory. Shooting just before the Chief reaches his top jumping height will give you a much more linear trajectory, but you won't go as far.
* For shorter grapples, try feathering the trigger so that you only get two pulses (each clip offers at most three pulses). Then you can use the last pulse for correction if needed. You can also try holding the shoot button, then jumping just before the third pulse.
* It is hard to grapple directly downward. Probably not something you'd do a lot of anyway.
* If you shoot while running sideways, you will fly in the direction of your strafe and slightly forward. This is not at all realistic for a grappling hook, but hey, it's part of the functionality, so learn to use it.
* If you are running backwards and aim 45 degrees above the horizon (halfway between horizontal and straight up), then jump and shoot at the same time, you will be launched high in the air with a slight backward impulse. Use this to get on high ledges, which you can't grapple to using a forward motion. Also use it to get a bird's eye view and drop a nade or rocket on some doomed souls.
* After the first pulse, your direction is essentially determined, no matter which way you turn or move with either thumbstick, even as you continue firing. Use this to your advantage. Let's say someone is ahead of you and on the right, and you are planning to grapple straight forward past them to a ledge. Run forward, jump and shoot at the same time, then, while still holding the right trigger, reach over with your left thumb to turn yourself and aim with the right joystick, as your right thumb reaches up to push Y to change guns immediately after the last pulse. If you get it right, you'll have them in your crosshairs with some hangtime to spare. It's a very quick motion, but you can easily get the drop on someone if you are slick enough. You can also vault over someone who is charging you and plant a few bullets in their back before they can even say, "Wow, I just got jacked." You may have to adjust your look speed to make this feasible.
* The way Halo projectile physics works, when you are moving forward and you shoot, your velocity is added to your projectile. When you are moving backward and you shoot, your velocity is NOT subtracted from the projectile. This is not consistent with Newtonian mechanics, but it was probably done to prevent people from shooting a very slow rocket by falling while looking up, for example. But what it allows you to do is throw a very fast grenade or rocket while grappling forward, or still be able to toss a grenade at someone while grappling backward.
It just takes some practice. If you think it should propel you farther or not as far, adjust the number of shots per clip or the forces in the jpt tags. Play with it, and let me know what you think.
so this is just spawning a projectile behind them with no damage and high force.... right?
that way has been done before. I was thinking more like zelda hook shot way, that would be cool
MilyardoX2 wrote:so this is just spawning a projectile behind them with no damage and high force.... right?
that way has been done before.
If it's been done before, how come nobody told me? I searched here and elsewhere and didn't find anything. Someone could've saved me some time, sheesh. You can somewhat get the Spider-Man effect if you turn on wall walking. But I prefer not to.
I left the explosion effects in because I wanted to clearly telegraph to other players when someone is using the grap hook, as opposed to just jumping. You could easily null them out though.
I suppose it is vaguely like a very localized jetpack, but man that sounds lame. You use it like a grap hook. It commits you to one trajectory instead of letting you change directions at any time, its range is deliberately limited, there's no hovering, it requires discretion, etc. Besides, when you say "jetpack" these days, people think you're either shooting the ground or flying a banshee in some fashion. F that. This is more fun to me than any jetpack/flying mods I've played, and requires more skill. Meh. Use it or don't, it's up to you. It's on all my maps now.
