effect - BigSmoke control

[WirtsLegs]

So currently there is a editor placed static proxy for the smoke/fire effects, there are also lua functions for creating and destroying them on an adhoc basis. However both methods of producing these effects lack a critical feature to allow certain desirable usecases.

The usecase i will focus on is smoke attached to a moving object (specifically a ship), to simulate damage or simply to add smoke stack smoke on older ships.

The editor placed static object can be linked to a unit like other statics, resulting in a nice effect as the ship sails:

However when smoke is placed this way there is seemingly no way to ever turn it off, resulting in this appearance lasting indefinitely if the ship is sunk:

If however you place the smoke via the lua function trigger.action.effectSmokeBig() while you can then remove it with effectSmokeStop() it cannot be linked to an object and so does not work with a moving unit.

 

Suggested improvement:

I would like to suggest that either we get the ability to deactivate the static object placed effects(either through a traditional triggered action or maybe through the effectSmokeStop() function), or ideally the effectSmokeBig() function be enhanced to allow linking to units.

[cfrag]

40 minutes ago, WirtsLegs said:

there is seemingly no way to ever turn it off,

What happened to your EFFECT SMOKE STOP ?

[WirtsLegs]

57 minutes ago, cfrag said:

What happened to your EFFECT SMOKE STOP ?

So if you use the EFFECT - SMOKE option to create the smoke then SMOKE STOP works, problem is when you create the smoke that way it cannot be linked to a moving unit

[cfrag]

14 minutes ago, WirtsLegs said:

problem is when you create the smoke that way it cannot be linked to a moving unit

Ah, I see - an undocumented "feature" it seems. Indeed, no smoke when you link an Effect Smoke Zone to a unit. Pity. 

[WirtsLegs]

1 minute ago, cfrag said:

Ah, I see - an undocumented "feature" it seems. Indeed, no smoke when you link an Effect Smoke Zone to a unit. Pity. 

not quite, the only way to link a smoke effect to a unit is when placed in the editor (and then it works fine) but you cant remove those

other methods of getting the smoke effect just don't have the option to link them at all

[cfrag]

9 minutes ago, WirtsLegs said:

not quite, the only way to link a smoke effect to a unit is when placed in the editor

Ah! I get it! You are talking about the static object 'Effect Smoke', not the zone-based 'START SMOKE' action. 

Since that is a static object, it should be possible to find a way to make that go away. Let me experiment...

 

[Night Owl]

Seems indeed to be an omission which would be nice to correct 

[WirtsLegs]

4 minutes ago, cfrag said:

Ah! I get it! You are talking about the static object 'Effect Smoke', not the zone-based 'START SMOKE' action. 

Since that is a static object, it should be possible to find a way to make that go away. Let me experiment...

 

yeah exactly

thats what I thought as well but StaticObject.getByName() returns nil, and SearchObjects() turns up no objects in that area

seems like the static object in the editor is just a proxy for starting the effect and doesnt result in a static object in game

[cfrag]

13 minutes ago, WirtsLegs said:

StaticObject.getByName() returns nil, and SearchObjects() turns up no objects in that area

Sadly all true. I'd report the fact that a linked zone with the trigger action "smoke big" attached does not smoke as a bug. With some luck, we'll have that fixed in a couple of years...

 

[WirtsLegs]

4 minutes ago, cfrag said:

Sadly all true. I'd report the fact that a linked zone with the trigger action "smoke big" attached does not smoke as a bug. With some luck, we'll have that fixed in a couple of years...

 

that does smoke though, just you cant then link it to a unit