[azureblue]

wow, this plugin very useful for doctor class when using survivor talent plugin. worked perfectly!
thanks alot marttt ! nice work !

[ChrisP]

Originally Posted by Marttt Hi @ChrisP, thanks for feedback and the snippet code. I will check. I already have played on XPMod server and it has nice features and concepts. For dummy entities, I recommend using an "info_target" entity which is less expensive. The problem with the HP laser is that I have to calculate the angles for each player every moment to teleport it correctly for the player's view. I know someone with a similar plugin and AFAIK is not public but is better than mine. I have the HP Sprite plugin aswell, which is good but need FastDL to use the custom sprite.

You could use TE_SendToClient to send only to an individual client instead of using TE_SendToAll. I suppose the entity count could get out of hand pretty quickly though, because I bet you're doing multiple beams for each health bar and you would need two dummy entities per beam. Might not want to run that on a 8v8 server or more, but could be feasible for normal servers. I suppose a hybrid approach could work if the entity count starts to grow beyond a certain amount.

Unfortunately, info_target didn't work when I tried it. Maybe I'm missing something, but the only thing that made it work for me is prop_dynamic with a model set. I have guesses as to why, but honestly, I'm not sure why prop_dynamic works and the others I've tried don't. I should poke at it more to find the most performant working option.

[xZk]

I think the problem here is not exactly attaching the TempEnts to other entities, but controlling them so that the hp bar looks good, which must necessarily be recreated for this purpose. Although a long time ago I was also trying and it is possible to recreate it by relating it to 2 ents and to be able to change the size of the laser by moving those 1 of those 2 entities to simulate the hp bar, but I had the problem that in certain viewing angles the bar is inverted for which I left it abandoned.
here is the code in case someone is interested:

PHP Code:

int CreateSpriteBar(int entity, float height = 2.0, float width, float duration, int color[4]){
    float pos[3];
    GetEntPropVector(entity, Prop_Data, "m_vecAbsOrigin", pos);
    pos[2]+=80.0;
    int ent = CreateEntityByName("env_sprite");
    if (ent > 0)
    {
        DispatchKeyValueVector(ent, "origin", pos);
        DispatchKeyValue(ent, "model", SPRITE_WHITE);
        DispatchSpawn(ent);
        SetVariantString("!activator");
        AcceptEntityInput(ent, "SetParent", entity, ent);
        AcceptEntityInput(ent, "HideSprite");
    }
    pos[2]+=height;
    int ent2 = CreateEntityByName("env_sprite");
    if (ent2 > 0)
    {
        DispatchKeyValueVector(ent2, "origin", pos);
        DispatchKeyValue(ent2, "model", SPRITE_WHITE);
        DispatchSpawn(ent2);
        SetVariantString("!activator");
        AcceptEntityInput(ent2, "SetParent", ent, ent2);
        //AcceptEntityInput(ent2, "SetParent", entity, ent2);
        AcceptEntityInput(ent2, "HideSprite");
    }
    TE_SendBeamBar(ent, ent2, width, duration, color);
    return ent;
}

TE_SendBeamBar(int startEnt, int endEnt, float size, float duration, int color[4])
{
    TE_SetupBeamEnts(startEnt, endEnt, g_iLaserMaterial, g_iHaloMaterial, 0, 0, duration, size, size, 1, 1.0, color, 0);
    TE_SendToAll();
}

stock void TE_SetupBeamEnts(int StartEntity, int EndEntity, int ModelIndex, int HaloIndex, int StartFrame, int FrameRate, float Life, float Width, float EndWidth, int FadeLength, float Amplitude, const int Color[4], int Speed)
{
    TE_Start("BeamEnts");
    TE_WriteEncodedEnt("m_nStartEntity", StartEntity);
    TE_WriteEncodedEnt("m_nEndEntity", EndEntity);
    TE_WriteNum("m_nModelIndex", ModelIndex);
    TE_WriteNum("m_nHaloIndex", HaloIndex);
    TE_WriteNum("m_nStartFrame", StartFrame);
    TE_WriteNum("m_nFrameRate", FrameRate);
    TE_WriteFloat("m_fLife", Life);
    TE_WriteFloat("m_fWidth", Width);
    TE_WriteFloat("m_fEndWidth", EndWidth);
    TE_WriteFloat("m_fAmplitude", Amplitude);
    TE_WriteNum("r", Color[0]);
    TE_WriteNum("g", Color[1]);
    TE_WriteNum("b", Color[2]);
    TE_WriteNum("a", Color[3]);
    TE_WriteNum("m_nSpeed", Speed);
    TE_WriteNum("m_nFadeLength", FadeLength);
} 


[ChrisP]

Thank you xZk! env_sprite works for a dummy entity replacement and I'm sure this is much lighter than using prop_dynamic. I'll be using this for Rochelle's rope and any other similar use cases in the future.

Also, I like that you took a different approach to what I was thinking. You put the beam start and end points vertical instead of horizontal, which solves the issue of needing to adjust angles for each client because the sprite rotates to each client's view automatically. I played around a little bit with your code and made it work, but with what might be a deal breaker for some. The health indicator bar has to be in the middle of the health bar. If this is acceptable, then it only needs two dummy entities per client health bar and don't have to mess with rotation. Cool Stuff!

[Marttt]

Plugin updated (1.0.9)

1.0.9 (14-November-2021)
   - Added center align laser option. (thanks to "xZk" for the code snippet)
   - Removed outline lasers.

[thewintersoldier97]

Great plugin My buds and I loved this, pretty sure other folks played on my sv feel the same. Excellent work Marttt!

[little_froy]

nice work for 4+ survivors game.