Pedstrains and traffic path nodes

[Yurchik]

Hello everyone. I looked around forum, found few similar topics but no answers were given or not exactly what i mean... so

As i know in gta sa peds and cars are following some special points, called "path nodes", i think you, Developers, know what is it and how its made.

For some reason they were removed from mta, exactly to prevent desync with traffic etc. I understand that making full traffic that will be same for each client is very hard and you got another things to do, but i wonder if it possible:

Path nodes are loaded, but no cars are spawned randomly. You can assign any created by script car to path, and then some client will handle it's physics (same as with car physics goes, closest client handle physics of cars, and if no clients around car goes freezed).

example:

 bool nodeAssign ( vehicle car , int nodeid ) -- puts car onto path, returns false or true, as usual 
int / table nodeGetNext ( vehicle car ) -- reads next available path node for specifed car. Returnd false if no car/car is not assigned 
int nodeGetClosest ( float x , float y , float z ) -- returns id of closest node 
float , float , float nodeGetPosition ( int id ) -- returns position of node with specified id 
bool nodeSetNext ( vehicle car , int nodeid ) -- sets next node for car on it if car is on... emm... how's that... juction 
int nodeGetCurrent ( vehicle car ) -- returnd current node of car (i guess getting car pos and then getting nearest node may be fail sometimes, as example on complicated junctions or bridges) 
-- userfull but harder to make ideas 
int nodeCreatePath ( table nodes ) -- crates 'path' as list of specifies nodes 
bool nodePathAssign ( vehicle car ) -- assigns car to  path , car will route between nodes in that path 
bool carDriveTo ( vehicle car , float x , float y , float z , float speed , bool thaffic_behaviour ) -- just like similar SCM opcodes, car drives and follows path nodes  

I hope it's enough understandable

sorry for my bad english)

[diegofkda]

Best suggestion in the latest months... that would be very good, I see it's possible! Wait to an MTA dev.

[lil Toady]

That's scriptable though, and there've been a number of resources that implement similar functions.

[Yurchik]

Yes, i know, i can create ped that will drive car throw thousands of stored somewhere nodes, avoid obstacles using raycasting, make some way to handle it's physics by script to avoid its freezing when too far from player, or another way, i can record myself, store it to file, and then play ,but it will be a tank, extra-heavy vehicle that ignore everything and everyone. But why? Why if its already exist in gta sa, but just cutted off to avoid desynced cars? Of course i respect your job, you did a lot to make mta the best mp mode for gta, but this function could be very usefull as for freeroam servers, same for rp.

[lil Toady]

cause mta completely disables SCM

[AGENT_STEELMEAT]

There is a AI traffic resource floating around that creates cars driving around SA, just like singleplayer. You could look around for it, and use the data from that.

[Zango]

Take a look at arc_'s GPS resource which contains some of the functions you are looking for.

It would also be a strange turn for MTA to create functions that will move the vehicle around etc., as this should really be handled by script as all the functions are there and easy to use.

I do think however making the path data available via MTA is a good idea. The vehicle path data is just around 3MB, and it would be unnecessary to always transfer these by script if available in GTASA (and of course retrievable by MTA) but I'm not sure that's possible if SCM is disabled, as mentioned above.

[AGENT_STEELMEAT]

I think traffic node data might be in GTA San Andreas/data/Paths

[qaisjp]

Download options: "Download path node data"

edit: forget that. make it downloaded automatically on mta install.

[DiSaMe]

If MTA used path data from GTA SA, then those files would need to be checked to avoid desync if the player with modified paths joins. I don't see a need to install path data with MTA either. Everything can be scripted. And it's not just possible, it's plausible.

First, unless modified, file only needs to be downloaded once from the server. It's not a big problem to wait a few minutes once if that results in better gameplay.

Second, it's not even necessary for the client to download the path data from the server. Better use element data to store the coordinates of nodes which the ped is going to follow, or think of another comfortable way to send only the data which is being used. Then only simple things will need to be done client-side.

Third, making all traffic system in the resource gives server owners more functionality. They can make their own custom paths. Data from GTA SA can be converted into format easier to read from scripts. Remaking all nodes may be even better. I once had put ped paths all over San Andreas, using my own simple path editor. This is how it all looked:

. It took me a little more than a week to make ped paths. Not so long. Car paths may take a bit longer to make, but it's still not a big problem. A big advantage was reduction of node count as I didn't put them on the straight path.

And finally, server owners just seem to be lazy. For example, the function to get ped joint positions has been in MTA for a long time. Yet, some people repeatedly asked to make a function for attaching objects to ped bones "because SA-MP can do that", instead of thinking a little bit and making such function themselves. Then I scripted it when I was making a gamemode and kept it in my resources for a few months, hoping that maybe somebody will make something like that too. That didn't happen, so I put the function into the separate resource, did some work to get it ready for usage from other resources and released it. And when people said "finally someone made this", I felt disappointed about them, as they wanted it, but didn't make it themselves. Is the same going to happen with NPC traffic? Maybe yes, but it won't be me who will make it.

In conclusion, MTA doesn't need to change. Community does. Only a small part of MTA potential is used by many servers, so we need to use more of it before we ask to increase it. What I like the most is people making great scripts and using them in their own servers rather than releasing them - that's what makes the servers original. Players are attracted by variety and originality, so MTA can hardly become more popular if every server uses the same resources. People don't get annoyed because they need to wait for download to finish before playing. They get annoyed because they need to wait for download to finish just to find out that the server has the same stuff, nothing exceptional. I'd rather wait 20 minutes to join an original server with unique gameplay than 1 minute to see that it's not even worth playing.

[qaisjp]

Well, ould be nice

Edited December 1, 2011 by Guest

[karlis]

If MTA used path data from GTA SA, then those files would need to be checked to avoid desync if the player with modified paths joins. I don't see a need to install path data with MTA either. Everything can be scripted. And it's not just possible, it's plausible.

First, unless modified, file only needs to be downloaded once from the server. It's not a big problem to wait a few minutes once if that results in better gameplay.

Second, it's not even necessary for the client to download the path data from the server. Better use element data to store the coordinates of nodes which the ped is going to follow, or think of another comfortable way to send only the data which is being used. Then only simple things will need to be done client-side.

Third, making all traffic system in the resource gives server owners more functionality. They can make their own custom paths. Data from GTA SA can be converted into format easier to read from scripts. Remaking all nodes may be even better. I once had put ped paths all over San Andreas, using my own simple path editor. This is how it all looked:

. It took me a little more than a week to make ped paths. Not so long. Car paths may take a bit longer to make, but it's still not a big problem. A big advantage was reduction of node count as I didn't put them on the straight path.

And finally, server owners just seem to be lazy. For example, the function to get ped joint positions has been in MTA for a long time. Yet, some people repeatedly asked to make a function for attaching objects to ped bones "because SA-MP can do that", instead of thinking a little bit and making such function themselves. Then I scripted it when I was making a gamemode and kept it in my resources for a few months, hoping that maybe somebody will make something like that too. That didn't happen, so I put the function into the separate resource, did some work to get it ready for usage from other resources and released it. And when people said "finally someone made this", I felt disappointed about them, as they wanted it, but didn't make it themselves. Is the same going to happen with NPC traffic? Maybe yes, but it won't be me who will make it.

In conclusion, MTA doesn't need to change. Community does. Only a small part of MTA potential is used by many servers, so we need to use more of it before we ask to increase it. What I like the most is people making great scripts and using them in their own servers rather than releasing them - that's what makes the servers original. Players are attracted by variety and originality, so MTA can hardly become more popular if every server uses the same resources. People don't get annoyed because they need to wait for download to finish before playing. They get annoyed because they need to wait for download to finish just to find out that the server has the same stuff, nothing exceptional. I'd rather wait 20 minutes to join an original server with unique gameplay than 1 minute to see that it's not even worth playing.

now that's a wall of text!

I agree with you.

[Sharingan]

It would be good if peds waste players' internet resources. I mean, when you spawn, 10 peds are spawned in your current zone at least, wasting your internet resource like a normal player but in nodes paths/positions. Like GTA 4 Multiplayer. I think it doesn't waste a lot of server bandwidth like a server-side ped.

[DiSaMe]

Peds don't use as much bandwidth as players, do they? Some things such as control states aren't synced for them.

[AGENT_STEELMEAT]

Peds can have control states. They use less BW, but IMHO using clientside peds synced manually would yield better results.

[karlis]

as i said already, a syncing algorithm synced by randomseed would work the best, literally no bandwidth used.

harder to implement tough.

[AGENT_STEELMEAT]

synced by randomseed

...what

[DiSaMe]

Peds can have control states. They use less BW, but IMHO using clientside peds synced manually would yield better results.

I once created a plane and a driver in it using runcode and made the ped accelerate, but another player was the syncer and that produced the results showing that control states aren't synced: I saw the plane moving out of starting position, but it kept quickly returning back, what means the syncer saw it not accelerating. In such case, if control states were synced, I would have seen accelerate control state getting synced back to false, but this didn't happen.

[AGENT_STEELMEAT]

Then you were doing it wrong.

[DiSaMe]

Doing WHAT wrong?

[AGENT_STEELMEAT]

Everything.

[DiSaMe]

The plane and the ped were visible to both me and another player, I saw the ped accelerating and another player didn't. That's enough to prove the control state isn't synced. But if you say otherwise... Then I'm glad we have a good way to save bandwidth with no negative impact on gameplay: doing everything wrong.

[Sharingan]

Post your code, maybe something's wrong.

[DiSaMe]

What can be wrong here? I did that exactly like in

video, only with another player being the syncer. I'd also like to see how you tested all of this and got different results.

[Wojak]

just tested it myself, and even if my friend was a syncer vehicles where driving like they should...

vehicle and controlling ped must be server side, vehicle must be in syncer range (140 m radius) control state script must by runing on the syncer computer (if you are not the syncer and run a script on youre computer, this will not be synced...)