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sargejohnson has contributed to 834 posts out of 438952 total posts (.19%) in 1,493 days (.56 posts per day).

20 Most recent posts:
Halo CE General Discussion » suggestions for site May 15, 2013 10:47 AM (Total replies: 130)

Quote: --- Original message by: P3

Also, it's not such a good idea because trolls would have another way to troll people by rating someone as bad.
Edited by P3 on May 14, 2013 at 05:45 PM


Maybe allow only older users to rate, and allow one vote per account per day? Limits the amount of damage from abuse. Is there a way to improve this?

Quote: --- Original message by: Maniac1000
That is not a reputation thing.
Reputation points wont stop spammers or trolls. Ignoring them is the only way.


And yes, this is the only guaranteed way to deter trolling and spamming. Its impossible to stop trolls and spammers completely but at least damage control is possible and more effective with the suggested measures in place, and in combination with Maniac1000's suggestion would be a very effective deterrent.

Speaking of which, I got some of my ideas from here:
http://www.cracked.com/article_16765_5-ways-to-stop-trolls-from-killing-internet.html
Yes, its a comedy site, but it makes some valid points there. 1 and 2 are a little extreme though, and even I would personally oppose those.

Edited by sargejohnson on May 15, 2013 at 10:51 AM

Halo CE General Discussion » suggestions for site May 14, 2013 09:51 AM (Total replies: 130)

Just a few suggestions, but before that...

I understand how hard it is to grant random users permission to the administrative tools of this site due to mistrust, because any sane person would not do so for the same reasons. You can't trust any person to not somehow abuse these tools and cause serious damage to the site. Also, I do understand that Dennis has real life issues to tackle, and that this site isn't his only job. Basically, he's the guy who kept this forum online for us (not to mention the community, but that's a story for another time), and managing a site with many users isn't exactly easy.


That said, I have a few suggestions (they are imperfect, but then again when was antivirus perfect?) that would help to improve the security of this forum and (hopefully) reduce the amount of troll and spam content of the forum.

1. As previous users have suggested, a reputation system to let the community play a part in stopping trolls and spam.

2. Limited privilege use for the administrative tools of the site (ie. at most "Delete this topic" and "Delete this post") for selected moderators. These moderators have to apply for the position, and meet certain criteria before even being considered. For example,
- Having consistent post and forum activity, such as at least 1 non-spam post every 2 weeks with no record of spam/trolling/malicious activity.
- Having shown reasonable maturity in posts and forum activity, such as using proper grammar and spelling where appropriate.
- And other considerations.
The moderator should be approved by Dennis himself, and (in the future, should there be a community of moderators) supported by at least 2 other moderators. The moderator's permissions can also be revoked at any time by Dennis.

3. Captcha (I recommend Google's ReCAPTCHA as doing so also helps with translating books into OCR format for digital storage, so its two birds with one stone there) for every activity on the forum, such as posting and creating new topics, possibly at logins as well to prevent bots and detect account brute-forcing.

4. Scheduled "fuzzing" (ie. penetration testing) and logging of activity of the site to reduce the amount of security loopholes that people can exploit and as a result abuse the site.

If any one has issues about these suggestions, feel free to point them out and suggest better options.

Halo CE Technical / Map Design » AI & Wraith May 9, 2013 05:41 AM (Total replies: 5)

For the Wraiths being indestructable, that may have to do with the Wraiths allowing only damage from explosive weapons, eg. the Rocket Launcher/Fuel Rod Gun. Do a few more tests and see if that's the case. If so, you need to edit the Wraith's .vehicle tag, specifically the .model_collision_geometry.
To do so, open up the Wraith's .vehicle tag in Guerrila, and look for a field called collision geometry. Open whatever file is referenced by that field, and in the new window that opens look under flags. Uncheck/check whichever flags you want (they should be pretty self-explanatory), save the tag and open the map again in Sapien before recompiling the map.

To make the Elites move around in a Ghost, you need more than just firing positions for their encounters. You also need to ensure that the vehicle allows the AI to do so. Open up the Ghost's .vehicle tag in Guerrila, scroll all the way down until you see a section called $$$ VEHICLE $$$. In that section, under flags, ensure that "driver power wakes physics", "ai driver can-sidestep" and "ai driver hovering" is checked, and that "ai unused" is unchecked. Save the Ghost's .vehicle tag, and open the scenario in Sapien before recompiling the map.

Halo CE Technical / Map Design » AI & Wraith May 8, 2013 10:58 AM (Total replies: 5)

Quote: --- Original message by: Kraavchenko
How exactly or can I have the AI use the Wraiths?


The AI you have must have animations to enter the Wraiths. One way to do this is to make new animations for the AI's bipeds. This has the advantage of ensuring that their animations make sense when they enter the Wraiths, but doing so will take a longer time and require some skills in animating using software such as 3DS Max.

The other option involves changing the Wraith's seat label to something that your AI has existing animations for using Guerrila. For example, AI Spartans can use a variety of animations such as W-driver, W-passenger among others, so to allow them to be able to pilot Wraiths you need to change the Wraith's seat label to, say, W-driver instead of wraith-driver. To do so, open the .vehicle tag of the Wraith, look for a sections called SEATS and under it look for a field called label. Modifiy this field to an animation that your AI has.

Regardless of which option you choose from the above, you also need to tell the AI to actively seek out the Wraith(s) ingame and enter them before they can use the Wraith(s). To do so, you can use command lists or scripting.
The former can be done within Sapien (look under AI -> command lists and create a new instance. Under the new command list you just created uncheck the option "Allow initiative", and under commands create a new command with atom type vehicle, modifier driver and appropriate vehicle distance ie. the distance within which you want your AI to enter the Wraith's driver seat. Finally, under the specific spawn points for the AI encounter you want as the Wraith drivers, make sure that their command list field is set to the name of the command list you just created.), but has the disadvantage of making the AI enter ANY vehicle with a driver seat within the command list's vehicle distance radius, Wraith or not.
The latter requires some scripting knowledge, and that you know the name of the encounter/squads within the encounter you want as the Wraith drivers, as well as the ingame object name of the Wraiths. I would suggest you look up the Halo Scripting Bible (http://hce.halomaps.org/index.cfm?fid=2809), see the available commands and create your own script, but generally should look something like this:

### Anything after the 3 hexes is a comment, so remove them.
(script continuous wraith_enter_script  ### This makes the script continuous, but you can also make it startup.
     (vehicle_load_magic wraith_encounter\wraith_squad W-driver wraith1)
     ### This method makes the AI teleport into the Wraith immediately, but looks unnatural.

     (ai_go_to_vehicle wraith_encounter\wraith_squad2 wraith2 W-driver)
     ### This method makes the AI walk/run to the Wraith, but isn't immediate.
)


Quote:
Also how do I get my AI to walk around, instead of standing in one place after spawning?

For this, the AI encounters need to have firing positions. They can be randomly placed at a reasonable distance from each other, such that they are close enough for the AI to register them as accessible firing positions but far enough to allow for movement.

Halo CE Technical / Map Design » Can't Connect to Dedi Mar 19, 2013 02:03 AM (Total replies: 8)

From personal experience, even if you change the ports that your Halo CE game and dedi executable runs on, you won't be able to connect to your own server if said server runs on the same computer as your game.
The few possible ways to connect to your own server would be to:
1. Run a virtual machine and install the Halo CE dedi server in it, run it and then start up your game outside the virtual machine and connect to it.
2. Get another computer and install and run the Halo CE dedi server in it, then on your Halo CE game computer run the game and connect to the computer running the dedi, or
3. Get an external server host, and install and run the Halo CE dedi on it, then connect to it from your Halo CE game computer.

For 1, you can get something like VMWare Player(https://my.vmware.com/web/vmware/free#desktop_end_user_computing/vmware_player/5_0) or VirtualBox (https://www.virtualbox.org/wiki/Downloads), install an operating system in it, then install the Halo CE dedi in it and run the dedi from there. Do the usual firewall and port forwarding stuff, but this time point it to the virtual machine's internal IP address, and ensure that the virtual machine appears on your actual LAN (not the virtual LAN that VM software usually creates to allow the VM to share your comp's IP address. Doing this requires you to use bridged mode for the VM on VMWare).
For 2, do your port forwarding and firewall stuff as usual, but point it to the dedi's comp instead.

Halo CE Technical / Map Design » Rate of fire problem Mar 15, 2013 06:14 AM (Total replies: 7)

Quote: --- Original message by: Jesse
If I recall correctly, halo doesn't allow you to use odd firing rates. Teh lag knows more about this than me, but I think firing rates went from like.... Oh hell I don't even remember, I just know that there was a major issue with the firing rate multiples.


So you're saying he should try, like, 14 or something?

Halo CE Technical / Map Design » Rate of fire problem Mar 11, 2013 06:15 AM (Total replies: 7)

As in, under Triggers -> firing -> rounds per second? Or Triggers -> Firing Effects -> shot count lower/upper bound? The former is the correct one.
Also, did you open and save the file in Guerrila as admin? Especially important if you are using Vista and above comps, and your Halo CE directory is in C:\Program Files (or Program Files (x86)) \Microsoft Games, which requires admin permissions if you use UAC.

Halo CE Technical / Map Design » Rate of fire problem Mar 10, 2013 01:59 AM (Total replies: 7)

I suppose you have tried changing the .weapon tag's fire rate in Guerrila?

Halo CE Technical / Map Design » Waiting for space to clear message Mar 10, 2013 01:56 AM (Total replies: 1)

RPG Beta7 can only play on certain gametypes. Try Slayer, Team Slayer and then CTF and see which gametype(s) have no problems.

Halo CE Technical / Map Design » Open Sauce questions Feb 13, 2013 04:16 AM (Total replies: 13)

I don't really think you need to use taggroups.map and the other data_files thing to make a map that can be played normally, is bigger than the 128MB limit and is .yelo.

It consists pretty much of you doing the following:
1. Using os_tool.exe instead of the normal tool.exe to compile your map.
2. Switch on the flag for use-memory-upgrades when you compile, ie.
cmd > "C:\Program Files\Microsoft Games\Halo Custom Edition" os_tool build-cache-file-ex "" 0 0 1 path-to-your-scenario
where - "" is the mod_name, which you don't need
- 0 0 1 is to set the relevant flags, since all you need is the memory upgrades (which change the map file to .yelo instead)

Yes, the other person would need OS to play it, but at the very least your map should be reliable and less crash-prone than maps compiled with tool pro.
Edited by sargejohnson on Feb 13, 2013 at 04:18 AM

Halo CE General Discussion » Nova Mapping Team - We Are Recruiting! Jan 26, 2013 11:14 PM (Total replies: 196)

@OP:
Plasma pistol looks different, is it a reskin or an entirely new weapon altogether?
What SP map are you working on? Does it use existing BSPs or are you creating a new one?
PS: Not too sure if you are planning to improve on the imprisonment map, third pic seems kinda dark, is it intended?

Would suggest your team focus on one project first instead of working on multiple projects at once, that way you would have actual progress to show in less time and be less distracted, and show team viability. Also, you might want to be more specific about what you are working on.

Halo CE Technical / Map Design » Black Screen issue when joining a server. Jan 19, 2013 11:28 PM (Total replies: 2)

Are the XG Clan servers running OS/HAC on their servers? If they are, and they are using features specific to OS/HAC (which means that only players running OS/HAC would be able to join the servers properly), that could be the issue.

Otherwise, do the usual stuff:
1. Update your graphics card/network card drivers.
2. Check if Halo is using anti-aliasing, and if so turn it off from your graphics card control panel.
3. Update Windows and install all updates.
4. Reinstall Halo CE with the installer and update it with the 1.09 patch, both downloaded from this site.
5. Run Disk Cleanup and CCleaner (you can download this here: https://www.piriform.com/ccleaner), both the registry check and the file cleaner.

I would suggest doing these in order, and test Halo only afterwards. Come back here after you try these steps, and tell us what happened.

Halo CE Technical / Map Design » UI Won't Change! Jan 18, 2013 03:25 AM (Total replies: 3)

You might want to check your compatibility files, they may have the default ui.map file and are probably preventing your new ui.map from overwriting.

To check, go to the maps folder where you place your Halo CE maps, then look for a button called "Compatibility files" near the top of your Windows Explorer window. Click on it, and if the ui.map is there delete it.
Close the Explorer window, and open a new one and get back to the Halo CE maps folder. Overwrite the ui.map there with your new ui.map (you should get a UAC prompt telling you to confirm this action, if you haven't touched the default UAC settings and/or disabled it), then start Halo CE up and tell us what you see.

Halo CE General Discussion » Open Sauce Sapien help? Oct 15, 2012 08:50 AM (Total replies: 12)

What are your DEP (Data Execution Prevention) settings?

Halo CE Technical / Map Design » AI have fear of player but not with bipeds Oct 14, 2012 12:10 AM (Total replies: 4)

For your flood encounter(s), do they have firing positions near your player?
Alternatively, you might want to follow the AI Encounter Following tutorials here, with the "encounter following" as your flood encounter and the "encounter to follow" being your player.

Halo CE General Discussion » Error in map Lumoria_b.c.d Oct 7, 2012 12:01 AM (Total replies: 10)

Do you have other addons installed for Halo CE (such as Open Sauce, version changer etc.)?
Also, try updating your graphics card drivers and Windows as well.

Halo 2 Vista General Discussion » Halo 2 windows live on windows 7 Oct 6, 2012 11:52 PM (Total replies: 6)

Maybe we should ask how exactly H2V isn't working for him before we start providing solutions...

Anyway, @OP what do you mean by it not working? Did H2V install fine without any error messages? What is your install process (ie. did you use a actual disk or an ISO)? What happens when you run the H2V exe? We need more info here.

Halo CE General Discussion » Strange lag on multiplayer servers Sep 30, 2012 12:33 AM (Total replies: 1)

(I am going to assume that your network configuration is correct, and that you have allowed Halo as a firewall exception and forwarded the appropriate ports.)

The hardware or firmware of your router may not be able to handle the network stress that Halo generates when playing online. Your wireless network card may also be overstressed or requiring new firmware.
Generally, a rule of thumb when playing any online game is to use a wired connection instead of a wireless connection due to better reliability. Try using a wired connection and see what happens.
If you cannot switch to a wired connection due to some circumstance, the only recommendation I can give you is to update the firmware of your router and your wireless network card and see if this problem happens again.
If the problem still occurs, then I suggest that you upgrade both router and wireless card.

Edited by sargejohnson on Sep 30, 2012 at 12:35 AM

Halo CE Technical / Map Design » How do you change the map description? Sep 25, 2012 09:12 AM (Total replies: 9)

This what you're looking for?
http://hce.halomaps.org/index.cfm?fid=3159

Halo CE General Discussion » RELEASE - Halo CE Script Extractor Sep 2, 2012 01:05 AM (Total replies: 11)

Might want to use the {code} and {/code} (replace { with [ )tags, they allow formatting.


Time: Tue May 21, 2013 7:46 PM 203 ms.
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