SIG, Quicksand ??
The toaster cracked me up when I first saw it, hehe, certainly one of the best applications of a ramp as a truck launcher.
The <a href=http://uk.geocities.com/sigagex/Launch.htm>big ramp as a launcher</a> really doesn't work well, though it's a good lesson in the chaos a large steep ramp can deliver.
Launchers in general: Placing a ramp high in the air does transport a truck up to that height instantly, but in my opinion these thing work best when truck is travelling at a high velocity, then the forward launch is more impressive, as well as controlled.
Being a Traxx 1.2 user until Traxx 1.4 became freeware I never experimented with Ramps until getting 1.4, and I've spent very little time in Traxx since that time. However, I have played around a bit, and I re-tested something today....
"I tried horizontal ramps but no luck"I've determined that ramps retain their original orientation no matter how much you tilt them, meaning you can only ever rise vertically. You can rotate them so they face one direction or another as a wedge, but to tilt them on the side or even to the point of being upside-down they still behave as if they were in the default horizontal position.
This is hard coded into the game engine and cannot be changed, sorry SIGage.
Ramp data is listed in the .SIT file and looks like this:
*********************************************
ipos
4397.50,200.00,3501.00
theta,phi,psi
0.00,0.00,4.56
length,width,height
164.00,64.00,220.00
mass
0.000000
bvel
0.00,0.00,0.00
p,q,r
0.00,0.00,0.00
*********************************************
The only values that apply are the ipos (world position) and l/w/h. Giving one mass does nothing, they won't move. Giving one velocity does nothing either. Traxx will let you change the theta/p/p (tilt) but it does nothing to change the ramp's nature as I stated above.
Ramble:
Note the middle ipos value of 200 above, that is the value used for all models and ramps to define the height above the terrain. As I stated long ago in my "manually tweak the .SIT file" thread you can change this value to place models higher than Traxx will allow.
Ever place a model on terrain that is at the maximum height of 255 and then try to raise it higher but Traxx wouldn't let you? One way around that limitation is to place a model on terrain at a lower altitude then raise it's "above ground" value, then drag it to the heights and it will retain it's distance above ground. This trick pushed to the limit still only allows you to reach a height of 255 above the terrain, but by manually editing the .SIT file you can raise things to any height you desire.
Well, if you raise a ramp to 13000 your truck will pierce the cloud ceiling itself. ;-) It's silly but it works, though it's likely to crash many a persons game if their hardware can't handle it.
Most of you know the Ctrl-Y "slew" mode accessible after typing GOLD, and that holding the Shift key will speed up your movement, but have you ever gone straight into the air and kept going? At some point you reach the vertical limit of the world itself, the cloud ceiling if you will. Know what happens when you pierce it? You enter a phantom realm!
Don't believe me? Stop reading now and try it, or keep reading for a description....
When you pass through sky limit you pop up through a phantom of the original terrain, hit Ctrl-Y again and as you drop you will pass though this phantom terrain on your way back down to the real terrain. In fact you can keep going up through several phantom layers, and then drop back through them, which can take several minutes of freefall as you might imagine.
See what you discover when you don't race? hehe. Practically, one could raise a truck launching ramp well above the usual maximum for an interesting effect, without being too silly.
On ramps - ValveJob wrote the following of "rampology" in the readme of his bizarre "adults only" (my description) track Blood Dance:
{quote}
It's going to be pretty rough sledding here unless you know your basic rampology:
Low and Level-- hit the ramp straight on.
More Air-- take the ramp at an angle.
Tilting Back-- brake on the ramp
Tilting Forward-- slow on the approach, then accelerate on the launch.
The "Slam Dunk"-- same as above, but wait till the front wheels are in the air before you floor it. You'll get back to the ground really fast.
{/endquote}
> "Has anyone ever created a 'bouncy' object or edited the properties of a RAMP?"
Bouncy bouncy bouncy? Nope. Though applying a different mass/weight value to objects can provide a variety of interesting effects (one of the cleverest I've seen was a Pac-Man maze by old SIG here).
As for odd object reactions, there is something very unusual I've seen on occasion. The fence posts in Farmroad have done it, as have some octagonal stumps that I've made. When they lie sideways on the ground and are hit by a truck they sometimes start rolling, and as if they were a tyre they roll clear away across the landscape, picking up speed as they go! It's crazy. In the case of a (square) fencepost I once saw it just kept on going, over hills and looping the terrain, speeding past me on occasion. It would be neat to be able to set such things in motion automatically or on command. I've sometimes run into a model repeatedly to try to get one moving, but without success. I assume the weight may be a factor in enabling this.
[This message has been edited by Winterkill (edited 20-07-2002).]
