Has this ever happened in a busy, public ARMA 3 RP server before?

[Archinist]

So, lets imagine a nice busy server of 100+ people on altis or wherever. It is a normal server, everyone is having fun trolling and banning people when suddenly an admin runs a zombie script on the server causing a zombie character which customizes itself to look like a specific player, and spawns near a dead player about 10 seconds after they have been killed.

So if a man crashed his ATV in the middle of nowhere, the script would spawn a NPC zombie-like character that is hostile to everyone near the player's corpse, whilst also deleting the original player's corpse, causing the scene to look like the player had died and reanimated.

Has this ever been done? As long as people stuck to the RP, and didn't just go around trolling and randomkilling, this would actually be a very fun event.

[Zaune]

I really doubt you could do that by modding alone, but that's actually kind of a cool idea.

[TheFeniX]

Why not? Other games have done the same, though usually with the player in control of the "zombie." Zombie Panic and AvP (both old and new) are just two off-hand. 7 Days to Die supposedly has a zombie mechanic where dieing of disease makes you spawn as a zombie. If you have an available AI package, having a script spawn an NPC with equivalent stats at your death location shouldn't be too hard.

[Archinist]

Why not? Other games have done the same, though usually with the player in control of the "zombie." Zombie Panic and AvP (both old and new) are just two off-hand. 7 Days to Die supposedly has a zombie mechanic where dieing of disease makes you spawn as a zombie. If you have an available AI package, having a script spawn an NPC with equivalent stats at your death location shouldn't be too hard.

Wot? I think you misunderstood what I was saying in the OP.

[TheFeniX]

It's the same concept as what you're talking about: at the point of death (or actually, at another spawn point) when a "human" player dies, the server spawns him a "driveable" NPC of a different type. There's nothing that hard about it. Skyrim does the same thing with Animate Dead. The spell script just finds the closest viable target (a dead body) disables it and spawns a ghost or skeleton NPC with an AI package to fight for you.

Originally in World of Warcraft, the Raise Dead spell for Death Knights required a viable corpse target. If that criteria was met when the spell was cast, a ghoul would spawn at the nearest viable corpse and give you an NPC ghoul to fight for you.

Spawning things in based on an event is actually really easy scripting: Have a script running on the player for an oneven death, throw his coords into a reference what the event triggers, then spawn the NPC you want at that reference. If an admin is doing that manually, it's even easier. I could do it on my Ark server right now: spawn an AI dinosaur in on a player corpse.

I'm just saying creating the scripting for it to be automatic would be really easy. Implementing it would be wholly dependent on the engine you're using and the modding tools available to you. For Skyrim, I could probably bang that out in a few minutes and I'm terrible at scripting.

[Lord Revan]

It's the same concept as what you're talking about: at the point of death (or actually, at another spawn point) when a "human" player dies, the server spawns him a "driveable" NPC of a different type. There's nothing that hard about it. Skyrim does the same thing with Animate Dead. The spell script just finds the closest viable target (a dead body) disables it and spawns a ghost or skeleton NPC with an AI package to fight for you.

Originally in World of Warcraft, the Raise Dead spell for Death Knights required a viable corpse target. If that criteria was met when the spell was cast, a ghoul would spawn at the nearest viable corpse and give you an NPC ghoul to fight for you.

Spawning things in based on an event is actually really easy scripting: Have a script running on the player for an oneven death, throw his coords into a reference what the event triggers, then spawn the NPC you want at that reference. If an admin is doing that manually, it's even easier. I could do it on my Ark server right now: spawn an AI dinosaur in on a player corpse.

I'm just saying creating the scripting for it to be automatic would be really easy. Implementing it would be wholly dependent on the engine you're using and the modding tools available to you. For Skyrim, I could probably bang that out in a few minutes and I'm terrible at scripting.

Raise Ally in WoW (before it was changed to combat ress) worked that way (there was also a short lived talent that automatically raised the DK as a ghoul on death) so the scripting isn't a hard thing to do.

However doing this to server you're not the host on in an effort to shut it down for lolz probably isn't gonna work at least not just thru mods.

[TheFeniX]

Raise Ally in WoW (before it was changed to combat ress) worked that way (there was also a short lived talent that automatically raised the DK as a ghoul on death) so the scripting isn't a hard thing to do.

I used to love casting Raise Ally as quickly as possible on Kyle's Shaman when he died. If he wasn't paying attention, he would take the res instead of declining then reincarnating.

Making him run around going "nya NYA!" was hilarious. And, at least from what he told me, there was no way to remove the buff, so he had to ride the whole duration out.

However doing this to server you're not the host on in an effort to shut it down for lolz probably isn't gonna work at least not just thru mods.

You'd have to rely on whatever exploits/hacks are available. Alternatively, you could rely on shoddy admin such as Left 4 Dead when valve had no admin passwords on their servers since this was their first matchmaking system and they somehow forgot PC players "know things." So players were spawning in tons of witches and other such nonsense on the PC servers. Probably only time in my life I was glad to be running the console version of a game.

[Lord Revan]

Raise Ally in WoW (before it was changed to combat ress) worked that way (there was also a short lived talent that automatically raised the DK as a ghoul on death) so the scripting isn't a hard thing to do.

I used to love casting Raise Ally as quickly as possible on Kyle's Shaman when he died. If he wasn't paying attention, he would take the res instead of declining then reincarnating.

Making him run around going "nya NYA!" was hilarious. And, at least from what he told me, there was no way to remove the buff, so he had to ride the whole duration out.

you couldn't on neither the ally or self ress and the ghoul wasn't that great really (nor did it last that long). Also in case of the self-ress it was 100% automatic so you couldn't even decline it.

It's probably the reason why the self-ress was removed and Raise Ally was changed to standard Combat Ress.

[TheFeniX]

Blizzard used to allow you to troll others and even yourself. Those were good times.

Also, upon re-reading, I DID interpret Archinist's post incorrectly. I thought he said he ran into this, but he just WANTS to see something like it. I've only ever heard of it being done in Minecraft, but from cursory Googling H1Z1 supports it by default.

Funny enough, the script to do it is nearly exactly how I'd do it in Skyrim (logically, mind you) so at least I don't totally suck:

Code: Select all

    @EventHandler(priority = EventPriority.NORMAL)
    public void onPlayerDeath(PlayerDeathEvent event){
 
        Entity entity = event.getEntity();
        Location loc = entity.getLocation();
        Zombie zombie = entity.getWorld().spawn(loc, Zombie.class);
 
        zombie.setCustomNameVisible(true);
        zombie.setCustomName(ChatColor.DARK_GREEN + "Undead " + ChatColor.GREEN + ((HumanEntity) entity).getName());
 
        zombie.getEquipment().setHelmet(new ItemStack( Material.DIAMOND_ORE));

No idea what's up with the Diamond Helmet though.

[PREDATOR490]

From the offset, a 100 player RPG server - That means your going for the Altis Life / Wasteland crowd of Arma 3 players. Doing this in one of the MilSim servers would be close to impossible. Arma 3 does not handle AI very well and lots of scripts can screw performance very quickly.

I do not play the RPG / Zombie bullshit modes due to them being not my thing. The communities tend to swing between being volatile or simply boring.

That said, if a mode was invented that combined the Milsim aspect with deaths from AI soldiers or players creating zombies. An interesting concept that I would like to play but so far in my decades of playing Arma I can all but guarantee that it will not work. Between getting a server that can handle that kind of load, an admin / mod team that can properly implement it and a community that will actually play it. Such a concept would fall on its ass quickly.

[Archinist]

It's the same concept as what you're talking about: at the point of death (or actually, at another spawn point) when a "human" player dies, the server spawns him a "driveable" NPC of a different type. There's nothing that hard about it. Skyrim does the same thing with Animate Dead. The spell script just finds the closest viable target (a dead body) disables it and spawns a ghost or skeleton NPC with an AI package to fight for you.

Originally in World of Warcraft, the Raise Dead spell for Death Knights required a viable corpse target. If that criteria was met when the spell was cast, a ghoul would spawn at the nearest viable corpse and give you an NPC ghoul to fight for you.

Spawning things in based on an event is actually really easy scripting: Have a script running on the player for an oneven death, throw his coords into a reference what the event triggers, then spawn the NPC you want at that reference. If an admin is doing that manually, it's even easier. I could do it on my Ark server right now: spawn an AI dinosaur in on a player corpse.

I'm just saying creating the scripting for it to be automatic would be really easy. Implementing it would be wholly dependent on the engine you're using and the modding tools available to you. For Skyrim, I could probably bang that out in a few minutes and I'm terrible at scripting.

Actually, I was asking if a private server owner/high admin had ever done that as an unexpected event/"troll", or at least unexpected within roleplay boundaries, meaning that while the players would be aware of the event, they would still RP like normal.

So by "unexpectantly", I meant one where the players would be genuinely confused as what is happening, but still remained coherent to normal roleplaying (they didn't suddenly start trolling and randomkilling).

I guess in a poorly-disciplined server this would cause most players to think that the server was hacked and either troll or leave, in the right circumstances it could work and let people actually roleplay with it.

[PREDATOR490]

The only way what you are suggesting is possible is with the use of Zeus. The Admin would literally have to be manually spawning enemies on top of people from their god vantage point.

People can see when someone is in Zeus and it will be noticed very quickly what is going on. Additionally, spawning zombies wont really work without mods and that further restricts the community that would play this kind of game. At best, this is the kind of event that needs to be planned well in advance or as a last ditch fuck you from the Admin before the server goes out.

[Archinist]

The only way what you are suggesting is possible is with the use of Zeus. The Admin would literally have to be manually spawning enemies on top of people from their god vantage point.

People can see when someone is in Zeus and it will be noticed very quickly what is going on. Additionally, spawning zombies wont really work without mods and that further restricts the community that would play this kind of game. At best, this is the kind of event that needs to be planned well in advance or as a last ditch fuck you from the Admin before the server goes out.

Why couldn't the admin simply run a spawning script, or have the developers make a mod that hides the zeus status? Even a subtle "bug fixing" update to the server would work, along with a timed delay on the (update) script so that instead of zombies happening as soon as the server opened back up, the zombies would start a few hours after the re-opening, in order to look more "natural".

Most of the big servers have plenty of mods such as vehicle package mods and weapon mods anyway. And would you actually need mods? Surely you could spawn an enemy in ARMA 3 that simply runs at people and uses melee weapons without mods, unless you can't? I have no idea.

Anyway, I'm really talking about more of a youtube-baitish event that just makes people go "OMG! ZOMBIEZ APOC" than a proper event that would actually enhance the game experience. So basically a one-off 15-30 minute thing that be fun and exciting just before the servers go down and then forgotten about.

[PREDATOR490]

Melee combat in Arma is largely non existent since its based on a milsim that uses guns. One or two mods have tried to add melee with special moves etc. but those largely end up being fluff rather than useful, especially against the AI. Arma AI is pretty poor and suffers from them being really dumb or cheating to add challenge. This is why servers can quickly end up being wrecked when the AI is set to a point where they can literally shoot pilots out of helicopters from insane distances.

Spawning scripts have issues and need to be tested. Arma is certainly a nice game and I like it but it is extremely buggy and poorly implemented in a lot of areas. Even the high end servers slow to a halt very quickly if left running too long requiring restarts on a regular basis. Throwing a scrip that is spawning zombies all over the map randomly can quickly destroy the game for everyone.

ALIVE is somewhat close to what your going for but with Zombies and having tried to spend months building maps and seeing others try. Almost all attempts have ended in failure.

[Archinist]

Melee combat in Arma is largely non existent since its based on a milsim that uses guns. One or two mods have tried to add melee with special moves etc. but those largely end up being fluff rather than useful, especially against the AI. Arma AI is pretty poor and suffers from them being really dumb or cheating to add challenge. This is why servers can quickly end up being wrecked when the AI is set to a point where they can literally shoot pilots out of helicopters from insane distances.

Spawning scripts have issues and need to be tested. Arma is certainly a nice game and I like it but it is extremely buggy and poorly implemented in a lot of areas. Even the high end servers slow to a halt very quickly if left running too long requiring restarts on a regular basis. Throwing a scrip that is spawning zombies all over the map randomly can quickly destroy the game for everyone.

ALIVE is somewhat close to what your going for but with Zombies and having tried to spend months building maps and seeing others try. Almost all attempts have ended in failure.

Well, it wouldn't need to look fancy and well-animated, it only needs to actually work. I mean most of the "RP stuff" in Altis RP servers in ARMA 3 is quite makeshift, such as trading NPCs being just a interaction package attached vaguely (IDK if it's actually attached or not) to a an object such as a signpost, a rock, a tree or a static floating man anyway, so I doubt anyone would really care if the melee weapons are actually just invisible guns with 2 meter range, no sound, no effects and static hands still in the gun-holding position.

Or what about just making a kill circle around the zombies which instantly kills anyone within 2 meters of the zombie? How feasible would that be? Note I'm not actually thinking of making anything, but just curious.

What is ALIVE like? Is it like Dayz or is it different?

Oh, and why do Altis server developers just plop interaction menus without much apparent effort? Do many objects near the menus interfere with them and make it difficult for the player to 'grab' the menu? An example for this is a car dealer in Altis life is usually just a interaction menu plopped randomly in the middle of town, or a drug dealer is such a static man in the middle of a flat, open field.

Like just a completely open field with either a signpost or a man model in the middle of it. Why do the devs not at least place down a building, such as an old shanty-town looking place with maybe some crops or containers nearby for a drug dealer, or a urban-looking garage/building for a car dealer?

I mean I know you're supposed to use your imagination and pretend it's all real and everything, but it sometimes looks a bit off when the most important service in the game is just a metal signpost in the middle of a 20 kilometer wide desert.


Okay, for the zombie idea could it not be tested in a map with 20 or 30 friends and coworkers (for major servers)? Then just whack on a script that limits the amount of NPCs with AI that are allowed in the game, and you should be good, right?

I mean there are co-op multiplayer videos with about 20-30 real players and enough on-screen AI players to make you realise that an actual battle is probably happening, so it can't be that bad. Not to mention that even without a limiter, it would take quite a long time for the amount of zombies to really have any performance impact on a roleplaying server, as long as the community is half decent and don't treat it as a CoD FFA.