Jun 21, 2011

Tips, Tricks, & Trivia

I came across a thread that had one post with interesting tips & tricks that I wanted to save for myself. But instead of keeping it on my desktop, I thought I would post it here for all of you to enjoy as well. If anyone wants to send me additional ideas to post in this article, I would be glad to look over what you have and include it if it seems unusual enough.



Tips & Tricks
Most of the tips and tricks in this article are useless for competitive and standard game play forging, since they are "tips and tricks", and therefore not commonly known to the player community. (If you see a tip or trick here that you discovered, please do not get upset with me for not crediting you with the find. I am not going to make any effort to give credit to where I learn of these, because I don't know who really discovered some of these; and I am not taking any credit for any of them myself. I am just trying to make a collection here for everyone to enjoy.)

Invisible Wall 

If you place a Coliseum Window more than 50% through the terrain above the cave. It will be rendered invisible. Players can stand on it and shoot through it. But cannot see it.

Explosive Control Panel

If a shield door is between a player and a landmine who are close together, then the player can detonate the landmine from behind the shield and won't get killed. Handy for creating detonator switches which can destroy bridges of fusion coils or set off other traps, without killing the player who touched the landmine.

Multiplying Cannon Strength

If you merge more than one vehicle cannon, the cannon will double or triple in strength, causing you to fly higher. Be warned though, merge too many and you'll suffer frame rate lag. I also believe this is true for gravity lifts and man cannons as well.

Portal Style Teleporter High Speed Exit

Momentum is conserved through teleporters. Meaning if you fall into a teleporter from great height, you will come flying out horizontally at great speed from the receiver node. Portal style!

Using Spot Light / Tractor Beam In Game

You can set the player traits when they are in the hill in KOTH, Territories, or Safe Haven, in such a way that you can make unique game plays. One such game I was involved with recently used humans as inmates in a prison. The zombies were guards. One of the zombies would fly a falcon over the prison grounds shining a spot light downward. This spot light was the hill marker with -100 depth downward, and the map emulated night with special effect objects. Any human in the hill would no longer be invisible. The spot light would "shine" on him in the dark.

Another person had claimed to come up with the idea of using the hill marker from the falcon as a tractor beam. It gave the person in the hill little gravity, maximum jump, and created a teleport effect. When they jumped up the tractor beam would appear to suck them away. There would be a teleporter fixed over the playable area so when they jumped, they would jump high enough within the tractor beam to reach the teleporter zone and teleport to a specified area somewhere on the map.

Gauss Warthog Can Shoot Through Blocks

Most of us never think about this, because the way maps are designed it never really occurs where we witness it. But some have found a glitch where the Gauss Warthog can shoot through some blocks. In particular, a battle ship map was made on this glitch using Coliseum walls to act as the wall between the two sides. You can shoot at the enemy, but you cannot see where they are - just like in the game. The shots travel right through the Coliseum walls.

Players Without Weapons in their Hands

I saw a machinema once in which a player appeared to have nothing in his hands, but it turned out to be an expended energy sword (just the handle). Yet, there is a way to create a player without any weapons in their hands for machinemas. 
  1. Add Invasion to your backdrop (map).
  2. Add weapons that are gated when moving to phase 2.
  3. Make phase 2 time limit as long as possible (to make your shots).
  4. Pick up two such weapons, then advance to phase 2.
The weapons that the player was holding and carrying are gone.

Try different weapons to see which arm positions are best for your shots.

Of course, you need to consider this when making an Invasion map, so that your players are not left without defensible means.

Also, see Tei Fields' alternate approach in the comments section below.

Trampoline

The orange side of one-way shields can be used to slow falling players down and even allow them to jump on it like a trampoline. If they are going too fast however, they can slip through and die from fall damage.

Stacking the shields can each contribute to slowing a player down from a free fall. Knowing the height of the fall and the amount of slow down is critical if you wish to avoid (a) dying and (b) bouncing.

This is best used in maps where a player has no control over deciding if they should fall into a shield or not. Otherwise, many players may not know what to do. Confusion is not a desirable feature for any forge work.

Floating Against The Ceiling

By careful placement of a one way shield underneath one or more blocks so that it shines blue down, you can jump up and stick your head to the ceiling (the bottom of the blocks) and appear to float in the air. In this position, you can move as you normally do when walking.

Jet Ski

Placing grids at certain points underwater can allow only hovering vehicles to drive past. All other vehicles blow up. Ghosts and Revenants sway when placed low enough.

Plasma Launcher and Portable Barricade 

Shooting a plasma launcher on a portable barricade will cause it to deflect.

Turrets In Infection

On infection games, the turret will spawn on the map only if you set the game type to allow vehicles.


Trivia

The following really fall under trivia, because they are really useless for forging. I footnote the reasons I believe they are useless for forging most maps.


Walking Through Walls [1], [2]

Vehicles and turrets can be used to make players walk through walls. Simply place the vehicle or turret just on the other side of the wall so that the player can mount it or grab it, and when the player operates it through the wall, they can slip through the wall. Once on the other side, they can hop out of the vehicle or let go of the turret.

Running On The Edge Of The Grid [3]

It is possible to run on one pixel. The smallest side of the grid, can be walked across and its only about 1 pixel thick. You can probably do this for any edge, even the corner edge of a tilted coliseum wall.

Surviving Falls [4]

Overshields can allow you to survive fall damage and even let you walk through kill balls. As long as your shields are recharging you are safe. Your even safe for a little while longer, but safety does run out.

Outside Forge World (Or Other Canvas) [1],[2]
You can go outside the map boundaries by pushing teleporters at their edges. Their are certain locations in forgeworld where you can survive being about 3 meters underwater, however it has killspots surrounding it.

Drop Shield and the Kill Ball [5]

If a killball is next to a dropshield, any Spartans inside the dropshield are safe.

Ditching A Falling Vehicle [5]

If a player ditches a falling vehicles at the last second, they do not suffer fall damage however the falling vehicle may crush them before they have even touched the ground.

Hidden Land Mines [1]

If you spawn a structure and move it so a landmine is merged through it, then the landmine will be inside the object, you cannot see it and it will not detonate when shot, however you can hear it and it will detonate and kill you if walked over.(This one borders on trivia, as it may prove difficult to make such a map intuitive and not frustrating to players who cannot see nor navigate the mine field.)

Unstable Fulcrum [3]

If you place a Covenant barricade on a small pivot accurately and in the right spot. It will balance with normal physics on, but if a player jumps on it it will quickly become unstable and topple. Handy for making unstable platforms or even a seesaw.

                                                  


[1] There is only one thing worse than a map that appears to malfunction - a map that was designed to appear to malfunction. It can be very frustrating to come to a point in a linear path and not know how to move forward, all along having the answer in front of you, simply because you did not know of a "trick".

[2] Bungie/343 may fix these and then any map that incorporates these tricks will no longer function as designed.

[3] Many players will fail to find enjoyment on maps that even give the appearance of requiring a high degree of expertise to play well.

[4] Many players' first impression will be negative if success with a map requires a technique that is not commonly known.

[5] A piece of trivia, pretty much dependent upon the player and not the map itself.

4 comments:

  1. There's another way to drop whatever weapon you're holding that works in any game type that I've seen so far:

    1. Grab Hologram, either as a map-placed AA or from the Loadout.
    2. Use a turret and rip it off of the tripod.
    3. Press the Hologram button and the melee button at the same time. You may want to jump when you do this to prevent simply picking the weapon up when you step on it. If you're holding two weapons, you'll simply change weapons.
    4. Stay away from where you dropped your gun for a while; it'll despawn, and if there are no other weapons on the map you should have free reign. Stepping on any weapons will result in picking them up.
    5. Use with the 'lower gun' button combo to give the impression of a relaxing Spartan/Elite.

    Dunno if you'd heard any of that before or not. Figured it could be useful.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Actually, this works with just about all armor abilities. However, some (such as sprint) will lead to you picking the dropped weapon back up. I find Evade works best, because you can evade backwards, away from the dropped weapon.

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  2. Put a fixed coliseum wall on a grid. Next put a fixed man cannon ( try all the cannons) set the cannon to normal and the wall right afterwards. if you're not already flying, touch the lift then the wall. enjoy. BTW, .. it helps to be invincible. The armor lock glitch ways you down. Always remember to experiment... but behave your self!

    ReplyDelete
  3. Awesome article. You could add the "Trivia" where a kill ball whose core is covered (for example by a block) renders the kill ball safe to enter, and acts as a one way bullet shield (Bullets and grenades can only go outward).

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