Movers
UnrealED2 Tutorials by EZkeel

E-mail: EZkeel
Accompanied files : Movers.UNR
(Demonsrates a perpetual mover using 2 movers - a dispatcher could also be used)

1) Preparation
2) Placement
3) Movement
4) Properties
5) Other_Movers
6) Tips

Introduction

Movers are an essential part of any map you create. These can range from simple doors and lifts, to complex items such as exploding walls and machines. There is a great deal of possibilities when using movers, and I know I’ve only scratched the surface of what is possible. In this tutorial my aim is to go over some of the basics needed to create these.

Preparation

1) The first thing you need to do is build the item you want to become a mover as a normal static object in a separate area from the world you are creating. Build a box, say 1024 x 1024 x 1024. This will be where you create the brush that you eventually want to be a mover. (We'll call this the "build room")

2) Build an object in the usual way by using cubes, cylinders or whatever you want, with all the textures set just as you want them.

3) Now, reset your cube brush so that it surrounds the whole of your object with room to spare.
(Make sure that your cube isn't touching the sides of your build room). e.g. Your object might be another box which is 64 x 64 x 32. Make your surrounding brush 80 x 80 x 50, that will be fine.

4) Now click on the "intersect" icon. If you've hit the right button your red brush should have snugly wrapped itself around your object to mimic it.

Placement

5) The next step is to drag this brush to wherever you want to put the mover. Once you're in position, click on the mover icon that looks like a sheet with arrows coming from it. If you've hit the right icon, your new mover should appear in your view screens as a purple outline.

Movement.

6) To make your mover actually move, you need to tell it where it’s moving to. Click on your mover brush and you should see it highlighted as an even brighter purple.(Make sure you click one of its lines and not on one of its vertices, I'll explain later).

7) Now, while your pointer is positioned on that brush, right click with your mouse. You should see a drop down menu. One of the menu items should read "key frame". Click on that.

8) When you first added your mover to your map, it will be automatically positioned at "keyframe 0" That is its resting position. Click on key frame 1. This will be your movers first destination (frames 2 onward are further sequential movements). Now move your highlighted mover brush to the position you would like it to move to.

Note:
If you are rotating your brush. It will rotate on its "swivel point". The swivel point can be seen as a vertex that is a small star. To change the swivel point, just click on a different vertex and it will rotate on that. Now reset your brush to key frame 0

Mover properties.

9) With your mover highlighted, press F4 (or click on mover properties by right clicking). A box will appear with all the properties of your mover. Here are the things you need to add information to
(I don't bother with the other properties).

EVENTS:
Event:
When the mover has finished its moves, you might want it to trigger something else.
Just write the tag of the other event in this field.

Tag:
If this mover is triggered by something else, other than it being hit,
you'll need to give it a name.

MOVER:
BeDamageTriggered.
Set this to true or false depending upon whether you want it to move when
its shot at. (You will also need to set Object to "Trigger toggle")

BeDynamicLightMover.
This is also true or false. This means that it will respond to light as it moves
(set as true) rather that stay at one fixed light setting. It will receive the light
at wherever you have set the swivel point.

BeTriggerOnceOnly.
Again, true or false. If you only want it to move just once, then set this to true.

Bump event.
If you want something to be triggered when you bump into this mover then put its tag here.

Bump type.
This mover can respond to either the player, another pawn such as a monster, or anything

DamageThreshold.
If you want the mover to take a battering before it actually shifts, give it high health in this field.

EncroachDamage.
If you get in its way when its moving and you've set it to "stop" or "return on encroach" It will hurt the pawn by the amount you put in this field.

KeyNum.
Your mover might have more keyframes than just 2. If so, you might want to start it from any of those. Put that number in this field. Usually you would keep this as 0.

MoverEncroachType.
Can be set to: Stop, Return, Crush or Ignore. This should be self explaining. Your mover will react in one of these four ways if a pawn gets in between the mover and its destination.

MoverGlideType.
Can be set to "Glide by time" or "Move by time". "Glide" creates a gradual transition between the frames (slows down and speeds up between each frame). "Move" starts and stops instantly.

Move time.
This is the length of time you want it to move between each frame.

NumKeys.
If you're mover, has more than one frame, you'll need to tell it how many in here. Remeber that "0" its resting position counts as 1 number. (That's why its usually set at 2 by default - open and closed)

OtherTime.
Haven't got a clue what that does! %-o

PlayerBumpEvent.
Place the tag name of one of your events in here, if you want your mover to trigger something the moment it starts moving.

ReturnGroup.
Dunno !

StayOpenTime.
Once your mover has finished its move (and if its set as a timed mover), it will stay open for the length of time you put in here, and then it will return through its frames.

WorldRayTraceKey.
You got me there! Your guess is as good as mine.

MoverSounds.
Use the soundfx browser to find an appropriate sound for your moving object to make when it is activated.
"Opened","Opening","Closed" and "Closing" all need to be one shot sounds and the move ambient sound needs to be a looping sound effect.

And finally...
the only other property you really need to be concerned about is this one:

OBJECT:
Its sub-property "Initial State", has to be set to one of the following:

Stand Open Timed.
This is used for lifts and anything that wants to move when a player stands on it. It will stay open for as long as the "StayOpenTime" is set for.

Bump Button.
I don't think anyone knows what this does !! :)

Bump Open Timed.
When the player walks into this mover, it goes through its frames, and stays open like the "Stand Open Timed"

TriggerPound.
Something will trigger this mover off. (You need to have another mover or a trigger with its event set to this movers tag) This mover will continue to move through its frames only as long as someone is still using the trigger. As soon as you leave the trigger, your mover will go back.

TriggerControl.
Is initiated only by a normal trigger actor.

TriggerToggle.
I use this a lot. Another trigger or mover (or a shot) will set your mover off. It will stay open until something triggers it a again, and then it will return.

Trigger Open Timed.
A trigger or mover will set this one off, and it will stay open for however long you want it to and then it will return.

That's basically what there is to making a mover.
Once you've added it to your world, and set its properties however you like, press F8 to rebuild and then you should be there.

Other Movers

Be sure to check out the "Brushes" section in amongst the actor class browser. Under movers you'll notice different kinds of movers such as, "Attach mover", "Gradual mover", "Loop mover", "mix mover" etc. I have a limited understanding of these, but in short here’s what I do know:

Attach mover.
This is used to move actors so that they mimic the mover brush. The mover and actor should both have the same "Tag". Checkout the Unreal level called "Gateway" if you have the Unreal CD. There’s a cool ship that moves around outside the window which is moved using this approach. The same is done in Nali Castle with a bombing space craft.

Elevator mover.
An "Elevator Trigger" should trigger this (see tutorial on TRIGGERS). This mover will move directly to the specified keyframe designated by the trigger. Very useful for puzzles.

Loop mover.
This will give you a mover that cycles its keyframes. When it reaches its last key frame, it will move directly to keyframe 0 without retracing its steps. This is NOT a perpetual mover, but with some careful planning it can be.
Study the UNR file in the ZIP to find out one way to do this. (hint: both movers trigger each other in an eternal cycle).

Gradual mover.
This will pause for different lengths of time between each keyframe, it looks like it can also trigger different events after each keyframe too.

Mix mover.
This has a combination of different functions from the other mover brushes, so that different abilities can be combined.

TIPS

Rotating movers
You may have seen maps with brushes in them that are continuously rotating (The impossible triangle in my map DM-deCyberEscher for example). Do do this, create a mover in the usual way but don't us the key frames. Instead adjust the settings in the "movement" properties of your mover. As a good bench mark for rotation, add a weapon to your map and check out the movement properties for that and copy that to your mover.

Disappearing movers?
If your map contains a lot of movers, you'll eventually find that whilst they are still solid, you can't actually see them in the map, or perhaps they flicker a great deal. A common way out of this problem is to right click on any mover in your map and choose "select all movers". Once they're all selected right click on one again (so that you can adjust all the movers at the same time) and choose "order ... to last" Then rebuild and you may well find that your problem is solved.

EZkeel
(Simon West-Bulford)