suspended catwalk problem

[mabufo]

I have a huge problem with the catwalk...

I have attached me ropes and such to the catwalk.. it hold it up and stuff... but... it moves uncontrollably! It kills the framerate and causes lag! If you touch it, you die and are sent flying! How do I stop it from moving around so violently?
Could it have soemthing to do with the alt+enter options of the things involved with the ropes? Do I need to post more info to solve this problem? Let me know.. as I want to get this fixed way more than you do.

 

[Raeven0]

If it's physically stimulated and moving around uncontrollably, you've probably set the constraints holding it up badly or wrongly.

 

[mabufo]

The physbox constraints? Or one of the entities involved in the ropes?

 

[Raeven0]

Whatever constraints it is that hold up the physbox. Ropes exert no physical force; they're an effect only.

 

[mabufo]

The keyframe_rope entities, which is what the rope is connected to.. is parented to the physbox.. Could that be messing it up? Am I not suppsoed to parent that sort of thing to a physbox?

I have no idea what could be wrong.. it's all on default I didn't fool around with any settings.

EDIT: The rope slack is at 25.. could that possibly be making it act all crazy like?

 

[Raeven0]

Again, ropes exert no physical force. Nothing you do to the ropes will affect the physbox.

 

[mabufo]

Well, if ropes exert no physical force, I have no idea what my problem could be. The physbox is only touching the ropes and nothing else... but I'll try setting the slack to see if it makes a change.

 

[Raeven0]

If the catwalk is a physbox, and isn't being held up by any constraints, then there's no reason for it to stay up in the air at all, except that part of it be embedded in a solid object--which will cause extreme lag.

 

[mabufo]

That didn't work... I have no idea what's wrong with this... but I tell ya, it's really starting to tick me off?

 

[Raeven0]

I could check out the VMF, if you like.

 

[mabufo]

If the catwalk is a physbox, and isn't being held up by any constraints, then there's no reason for it to stay up in the air at all, except that part of it be embedded in a solid object--which will cause extreme lag.

That would be the ropes then... I guess suspending a catwalk using this method was a bad idea...

Is there a better, less buggy, way to go about achieving the same thing?

 

[Raeven0]

If you want it to be suspended from the ceiling, you need phys_lengthconstraint or phys_spring entities, and a phys_constraintsystem to ensure that they don't fight each other. Ropes, though, aren't solid; the physbox would have to be embedded in a wall or something to bounce around without falling.

 

[mabufo]

I could check out the VMF, if you like.

I think that'd be the way to go.

 

[Limpet]

He seems to be a few posts behind you Raeven

 

[mabufo]

Yeah, I noticed too.. The thing is, I think I'd screw up placing lengthconstraints.. and a constraint system, because I am 1) not sure how to do it in the first place - with parenting and the proper configurations... and 2) with there not being a tutorial anywhere on this sort of thing.. I don't think I'd be able to figure it out without detailed instructions.

 

[Raeven0]

Aha!

These phys_ballsocket entities are your faulty physics constraints. The physbox is trying to pivot around all of them, at the same time. Instead of ballsockets, try springs.

 

[mabufo]

Right, should I configure the springs in any special way - or are the default settings fine?

EDIT: OK, I changed them all to springs - and now in game the catwalk is on the ground - so obviously they are a tad too stretchy.. :upstare:

What do I change to make the catwalk stay in the air - and still not bounce around like a hanging light?

 

[Humidor]

You need to read the settings of the springs, they're really pretty straightforward. Play around with the spring and damping constants, the spring constant is basically how stiff or rigid the spring is so the higher the number the less it's going to stretch (which is what you want). The damping constant is how quickly the spring will lose its momentum, so to speak, so increasing that value will make it far less bouncy.
Hope that helps.

 

[Korpisoturi]

You could just make the catwalk a world brush and add some ropes to make it look nice. Physboxes are buggy anyway and walking on them doesn't work well.

 

[DjBourgeoisie]

an idea to fake the effect of the catwalk moving (not sure how well it would work tbh) would be to cover the area where the catwalk floor is with playerclip so they dont actually touch it (1 unit or so high) and trigger some env explosions to shake the catwalk slightly to make it look as if its moving. Again I have not done this but im sure you could find a suitable workaround and tweak this idea to make it work.