BFME II Tutorial - Capture Flags for new Factions!

Today, I did a little research into the capture flag. After examining all the codes in relation to it that I could, I found a way to add a flag for new factions! Don't believe me?

Ta-da! I am almost sure no one else has done this...

Want to know how to do it for your mod?
EXPLANATION: It is actually really simple. While browsing through captureflag.ini, I saw this:

Behavior = AIUpdateInterface ModuleTag_03
		AILuaEventsList		= CaptureFlagFunctions
	End

Well, I had seen this a million times before, so I didn't think anything of it the first ka-jillion times I saw it. However, that was because I had no clue what on earth the LUA did. After seeing 2Play's and TDP's orcs, and hearing how they did it, I thought maybe I should check it out. Well, in scripts.lua, I saw this code:

function OnCaptureFlagGenericEvent(self,data)
	local str = ObjectCapturingObjectPlayerSide(self)
	if str == nil then
		str = ObjectPlayerSide(self)
	end


	ObjectHideSubObjectPermanently( self, "FLAG_ISENGARD", true)
	ObjectHideSubObjectPermanently( self, "FLAG_MORDOR", true)
	ObjectHideSubObjectPermanently( self, "FLAG_WILD", true)
	ObjectHideSubObjectPermanently( self, "FLAG_MEN", true)
	ObjectHideSubObjectPermanently( self, "FLAG_ELVES", true)
	ObjectHideSubObjectPermanently( self, "FLAG_DWARVES", true)
	ObjectHideSubObjectPermanently( self, "FLAG_ANGMAR", true)

	if str == "Isengard" then
		ObjectHideSubObjectPermanently( self, "FLAG_ISENGARD", false)
	elseif str == "Mordor" then
		ObjectHideSubObjectPermanently( self, "FLAG_MORDOR", false)
	elseif str == "Men" then
		ObjectHideSubObjectPermanently( self, "FLAG_MEN", false)
	elseif str == "Dwarves" then
		ObjectHideSubObjectPermanently( self, "FLAG_DWARVES", false)
	elseif str == "Elves" then
		ObjectHideSubObjectPermanently( self, "FLAG_ELVES", false)
	elseif str == "Wild" then
		ObjectHideSubObjectPermanently( self, "FLAG_WILD", false)
	elseif str == "Angmar" then
		ObjectHideSubObjectPermanently( self, "FLAG_ANGMAR", false)
	else
		ObjectHideSubObjectPermanently( self, "FLAG_NEUTRAL", false)
	end
end

This looked very interesting, so I couldn't help but extract the Capture flags W3Ds and open em up in RenX. Here is what I saw: The Flag Pole, and the "Neutral Flag", then all the Flags. I Imported the SKL file, and saw how the bones were arranged. Thats when it hit me that I could make one for Rohan. I quickly made Rohan a flag, stuck a texture onto it, and bound. (When I bound I just bound all the flags to one of the bones; I didn't want to sit there all night binding them to their individual bones. No Negative effects have turned up because of this.). I added it into my .BIG, and made an asset. Then, I edited my LUA to look like this:

function OnCaptureFlagGenericEvent(self,data)
	local str = ObjectCapturingObjectPlayerSide(self)
	if str == nil then
		str = ObjectPlayerSide(self)
	end


	ObjectHideSubObjectPermanently( self, "FLAG_ISENGARD", true)
	ObjectHideSubObjectPermanently( self, "FLAG_MORDOR", true)
	ObjectHideSubObjectPermanently( self, "FLAG_WILD", true)
	ObjectHideSubObjectPermanently( self, "FLAG_MEN", true)
	ObjectHideSubObjectPermanently( self, "FLAG_ELVES", true)
	ObjectHideSubObjectPermanently( self, "FLAG_DWARVES", true)
	ObjectHideSubObjectPermanently( self, "FLAG_ANGMAR", true)
	ObjectHideSubObjectPermanently( self, "FLAG_ROHAN", true)

	if str == "Isengard" then
		ObjectHideSubObjectPermanently( self, "FLAG_ISENGARD", false)
	elseif str == "Mordor" then
		ObjectHideSubObjectPermanently( self, "FLAG_MORDOR", false)
	elseif str == "Men" then
		ObjectHideSubObjectPermanently( self, "FLAG_MEN", false)
	elseif str == "Dwarves" then
		ObjectHideSubObjectPermanently( self, "FLAG_DWARVES", false)
	elseif str == "Elves" then
		ObjectHideSubObjectPermanently( self, "FLAG_ELVES", false)
	elseif str == "Wild" then
		ObjectHideSubObjectPermanently( self, "FLAG_WILD", false)
	elseif str == "Rohan" then
		ObjectHideSubObjectPermanently( self, "FLAG_ROHAN", false)
	elseif str == "Angmar" then
		ObjectHideSubObjectPermanently( self, "FLAG_ANGMAR", false)
	else
		ObjectHideSubObjectPermanently( self, "FLAG_NEUTRAL", false)
	end
end

Put it in-game, and tested. Viola! A capture flag for a new faction!

Edited by Solinx, 14 January 2007 - 03:18 PM.

amazing

Figured this out ages ago, but good job I guess

Good job! This can help some people wanting to do this i guess.

Good job, i never knew this but now my fellowship can have a flag atleast!

yay Fing

You lack humility but congrats for sharing your discoveries and explain them.
This one deserves to be added to the new faction tuts.

i also knew about this, but by the soudns of it alot did not, so goob job

lol... Last time I checked nobody knew As for Grim, I do lack humility a bit I guess.... I am just happy when I come up with something. I think the biggest "up" to my announcing discoveries to the world are that newer modders can actually learn from them. One of the biggest things I have heard from new modders is that they are disappointed that we (the pros) come up with great techniques, and find out little secrets and them keep them to ourselves. I, however braggy it may sound, try as hard as possible to compile everything I learn into tutorials, so that future generations may learn from it. It might not seem like I have released that many tutorials, but I have like 20 of them that are WiPs... Whatever

If that was aimed at me/Tom not posting about this, I actually though it was relatively straight forward, and expected most people to know :/. Oh well, I suck at writing tutorials anyway.

Thats the problem with modders. We all expect people to look at something and for it to auto-matically make sense. Not everyone is at our level of skill. I wonder why people assume that most modding principles are straight forward... If they were straight forward, then why are there still newbies? There are some magnificent people who can look at a segment of code for the first time and understand it. Sadly, the number of that group of people is extremely small. I mean, extremely. How else is anyone supposed to learn what modding is? If you discover something that doesn't look like it has been found before (do a search for it, if no topics turn up, then it hasn't been found) post it! Just say, "Look, I got a capture flag in game. I did it by editing the LUA." If you had said that, (two sentences) I could have saved myself from much headache. Try not to take anything for granted. Someone who is familiar with INI coding might look over that piece of code and have no idea it could be edited. I didn't even know what .BIG the LUA was located in before last night! The only reason I even dreamed that it could be linked to the LUA was because of 2Play's randomizing script... How do you expect anyone new to modding to find that out? For all I knew, the LUA was something hidden in game.dat, uneditable to modders. . .

i'm glad you learned something from my script, but in my turn (sp?), i learned that stuff from DLotS

but in my turn (sp?), i learned that stuff from DLotS

I can say that I discovered it myself, but there were already a lot of people knowing it before me. You're never the first one when it comes to coding

I think he did a good job, he figured it out on his own and came here to share. That's what this place is allow about. Great job Fin. I share your enthusiasm for making, the obsure, understandable for new modders.

I suggest to admins this be tweaked and make into a tutorial for BFME2.

does it need skining?

There are plenty of Rohan Banners in-game, take your pick and UV map a flag to match I simply made a 2-D Flag shape, made it 3D, copied it and flipped it, attached them together and UV mapped them to match a Rohan Banner texture I extracted. Overall it took around an hour (including the binding and whatnot)

Thanks Fin, I was one of those who didn't know

Next step: Make capturing flags a mission, then make the one who holds all flags the winner of a skirmish game.

Result: Capture the flag with BFME 2

I think you can do both, knowing you are good with WB.

Solinx

Will make this into more of a tutorial soon, then post on main site, if thats ok with you Fin, or you can make it more of a tutorial your self

I'll do it

Hmm...Maybe someone could use this to create a proper flag for the Arnor faction?