Help with making a Skulk movement mod?

Chubby Chu

Hi.

I was wondering if someone smarter than me could give me some pointers or help on how to do modifications to skulk movement.

I'd basically like to make changes to the way the skulk jumps while leaving everything else about their movement alone. I wanted to try changing jump (only for skulk) to behave like lunge, though the distance it "lunges" you is determined by what angle you are pointing with respect to the ground, and also wheather you are on the ground, wall, our ceiling.

Would that even be possible?

I'd like to try it out but have no idea where to start.

Here is a post I made in Swelek's balance mod thread explaining what I would hope to test out

http://forums.unknownworlds.com/discussion/comment/2100986/#Comment_2100986

Thanks for any help guys!

Chubby Chu

Thought I'd copy the post from the other thread cause opening 2 windows is kinda annoying

In regards to skulk movement, has a system like the following been tired before? And if not, could it be considered, or is it even possible?

My suggestion, rework the entire movement and jumping system for skulks and other wall clingers (lerk). I’ll just discuss skulk below, but I think the same 1st jump mechanics should apply to lerk (no changes to fade, gorge, or onos are suggested here).

The change I'm thinking of:

Skulk base movement speed while running on the ground, walls, or ceiling is about as fast as a marine’s sprint speed (or whatever it currently is in vanilla).

The biggest change should be to jumping mechanics. When you press the jump key as a Skulk, have the the game now apply a variable velocity based on the angle direction he is looking in and also based on the surface he is jumping from (explained below). Pressing jump should have the skulk perform a “jump-lunge” type of movement. Holding ‘w’ isn’t required to get the velocity as described below, but ‘w’ allows for control after you leave the surface. Basically jump functions like a variable lunge. You can snap change your momentum, but you have to master your aim to do so (raising skill ceiling imo), and the faster you are going the harder that is (try to master lunge biting and tell me it’s easy).
Below I will grade the class of jump with the numbers 1 through 5. A higher number (5) is a faster jump, a lower number (1) is a slower jump. Chaining jumps together from a higher number to either the same number or lower number will slightly decrease your current velocity with each subsequent jump until you reach the regular ground jump speed (but you can move faster than normal movement speed for awhile). It will decrease it in such a way that jumping from the highest number (5), should allow you to close the distance of a large room or 2 smaller rooms quickly. However, if you jump from a lower number (1) to a higher number (5), your jump speed will “reset” to the higher number’s jump speed.

With respect to flat horizontal ground, I’ll call 90 degrees looking straight up, 45 degrees looking exactly between up and forward, 0 degrees looking straight forward, -45 degrees looking exactly between forward and down, and -90 degrees looking straight down.
There are also 3 classifications of surfaces. Ground, Wall, Ceiling. These are based on the angle its plane is at and what side of the surface you are on. If the surface is 0 to 45 degrees and you are on the top = Ground; if the surface is 0 to 45 degrees and you are on the bottom = Ceiling; anything else can be considered = Wall.

Now that the explanations are out of the way, here is what I am envisioning.

If the skulk is on the “Ground”
All jumps are Grade 1. Jumping applies forward velocity equal to the standard run speed, with an additional upwards velocity maybe to get the alien at head level if he’s looking slightly upwards from the ground (as he normally would be in close distances). Also that’s how I’d envision a rabid alien dog trying to attack, it tries to pounce on you and go for the jugular!

If the skulk is on the “Wall”
Grade 2. If the skulk jumps pointing 90 to 45 degrees with respect to ground, it applies forward velocity a bit faster than his normal ground jump speed, and an additional slight upwards velocity.
Grade 3. If the skulk jumps pointing 45 to 0 degrees with respect to ground, it applies forward velocity a little faster than before. The skulk gets no extra upwards or downwards velocity.
Grade 4. If the skulk jumps pointing 0 to -45 degrees with respect to ground, it applies forward velocity a little bit lower than a lunge would. The skulk gets no extra upwards or downwards velocity.
Grade 5. If the skulk jumps pointing -45 to -90 degrees with respect to ground, it applies forward velocity almost the same or even equal speed (with celerity) as a as a lunge would. A slight downwards velocity is applied.

And finally if the skulk is on the “Ceiling”
Grade 5. All jumps behave the same as the grade 5, -45 to -90 degree “Wall” jump (lunge speed velocity applies in direction you are facing). A slight downwards velocity is applied.

I guess 1 final note.
If the skulk jumps looking into the “Ground” or “Wall” he should slide off of it with no penalty applied to maintain forward momentum (beyond the slightly decreased speed if going from higher to lower grade rule). However friction should be applied after maybe half a second to decelerate you.
If the skulk jumps looking into the “Ceiling”, I’m not really sure how that should be handled, though I think he should be accelerated forward in whatever direction he is facing still, and probably slide along the surface a bit longer? Have friction applied maybe a second later? Idk that one is a bit tricky to envision.

So in conclusion, I think this would encourage skulks to use the walls more to lunge at maries for an attack. You would not have to wait in ambush all the time since you could lunge from the ceiling, and chain jump on the wall into a pack of marines without loosing too much speed, and be almost as fast as a lunge. The lunge research would still be useful since you can’t initiate lunge speed from the ground or if you are climbing up a wall. It’s probably pretty complex to program, but I think the mechanic would be intuitive and quick to pick up, while also providing a high skill ceiling to control it and get the most out of it.
Marine camping behind a door? Climb up a wall then do a -80 degree wall jump to the door, chain jump off the floor through the door to the next room, chain jump into the marine’s face, profit.
The current mechanics of jumping on a wall in any direction, and chaining together wall jumps to increase speed while not gaining or losing any vertical distance just seems stupid to me lol. How would that even work in reality? I know this is a game, but come on… Gravity should effect everything imo.

Sorry for the wall of text.