Here's an idea I may never get around to trying...
The idea has floated around to animate objects that are spawned as and carry vehicle statistics, using the Zero Engine Animation system. (the anm file in your world/abc folder)
The reason to do this is a work around for getting physics to work for objects - so that i.e. if your spaceship is circling around the map the people inside wont slide around.

Anyway, my work around proposal is something like this:
Animate a dummy object instead, and recursively teleport the spawned vehicle (i.e. a chunk of Venator given a vehicle compatible odf) to the dummy object.
The more precision (smaller timer lengths between teleports) the higher the CPU cost, so don't go freezing your PC....

My opinion? Way too buggy and CPU-intensive to be worth it. Lagfest. Also, how do you steer? Also, are you aware that units can still slide out of ZE-animated objects?

Yes, that why you use vehicles.
Its not steerable. Its simply a "vehicle" acting like and object with working phyiscs.
You also, IMHO not sure, grossly overrestimate the CPU load.
There is no steering...this object is animated. Although....you could spawn a vehicle and teleport larger objects to it instead of to an animated object..., so you could turn the Capital ships into vehicles - however, you may as well just meld them in XSI into one object, if the game can handle it.

when you animate a vehicle regardless of how, whenever you exit the vehicle the animation continues on so after you land or exit your vehicle is going to to start moving around on its own like it has a mind of its own .... tried this with a LAAT... kept getting my AI killed

Ace_Azzameen_5 wrote:Yes, that why you use vehicles.
Its not steerable. Its simply a "vehicle" acting like and object with working phyiscs.
You also, IMHO not sure, grossly overrestimate the CPU load.

Are you aware that units can slide out of ZE-animated vehicles that they have not entered? Have you ever actually hopped on a flyer and seen what happens?

And it's not the CPU load I overestimate; it's the game engine's capabilities you overestimate. This just isn't feasable.

hmm, it looks like only a working tech demo will get this thing the RAHSPECT it deserves.
(or a non-functioning tech demo to make me give up...)
Oh, Fiodis I'm not trying to be hostile here.
I just saw your post. I thought you could surf on AT-ATs and IFTs and the like. Definitely not on flyers though.

Well, if it's possible, make a turret shaped like a vehicle and animate that. Turrets can be animated.

Darth_Squoobus wrote:Well, if it's possible, make a turret shaped like a vehicle and animate that. Turrets can be animated.

This specifically has been discussed plenty of times, units have no traction on animated objects regardless of what it is.

Ace_Azzameen_5 wrote:hmm, it looks like only a working tech demo will get this thing the RAHSPECT it deserves.
(or a non-functioning tech demo to make me give up...)
Oh, Fiodis I'm not trying to be hostile here.
I just saw your post. I thought you could surf on AT-ATs and IFTs and the like. Definitely not on flyers though.

Only way it could work, if is you have a AI drive the vehicle along you're path with other units on top of it.

I animated a turret (Flying Gunship) before most of you joined this site.
*Getting Crotchety, waves Cane!
But I want to make it clear that I am animating a vehicle. Not in the sense that I have an object with the MSH for a vehicle, but that I have a vehicle which is normally an object, being teleported. All very feasable.
Unfortunately, ZE is broken for me at the moment.
Has anyone ever directly animated a spawned vehicle? If so, how did they give the game the entity name? Normally this is stored in the ANM file, but vehicles have a unique refernce each session, don't they? - and the only way to get it is with an event and a GetEntityName function in LUA.

Ace_Azzameen_5 wrote:Not in the sense that I have an object with the MSH for a vehicle, but that I have a vehicle which is normally an object, being teleported. All very feasable.

bobfinkl wrote:This specifically has been discussed plenty of times, units have no traction on animated objects regardless of what it is.

You can ride on ATTEs and the like if they are being driven by units, not ZE animations.

EDIT - I apologize for seeming hostile. I assure you, I'm not. I just don't believe this can work and make no secret of it. Best of luck to you trying it, but I doubt it can work in any practical way.

As a side note - what if you animated the vehicle spawn itself, as you would any other placed object?

Ace_Azzameen_5 wrote:Normally this is stored in the ANM file, but vehicles have a unique refernce each session, don't they? - and the only way to get it is with an event and a GetEntityName function in LUA.

You can assign an entity name when you create a vehicle in the script. It's one of the arguments to CreateEntity, I believe.

Mav - I think he was refering to vehicles spawning from placed vehicle spawns (such as you'd normally find in, say, a Conquest mode). I could be wrong though.

Fiodis wrote:Mav - I think he was refering to vehicles spawning from placed vehicle spawns (such as you'd normally find in, say, a Conquest mode). I could be wrong though.

If he was asking that, then the vehicle's name is identical to the name of the spawn object itself.