Two at once

A Vicious Muffin · Post by **A Vicious Muffin** » Mon Oct 30, 2006 1:40 am

This is kinda random and stupid, but is there any way to have two flags at once? This just popped into my head, and i have no idea on how to run servers and such, so is it possible? Oh yea, and not like dumb combinations, like obesity and narrow at the same time, or totally dominating ones like wg and l.

Hannibal · Post by **Hannibal** » Mon Oct 30, 2006 1:52 am

...no.

only with a server mod and/or plugin.

BinarySpike · Post by **BinarySpike** » Mon Oct 30, 2006 2:48 am

Technically, no. BZFlag is unable to have two flags at once. People might disagree, but technically speaking, based off of flag classes, it is impossible technically to have two flags at once. It is like this...

There's a box, you can fill it up with one cup of water. You pour two cups of water in, when you put the second one in, the first one spills out and goes down the drain. That's exactly how it works in bzflag code

A Vicious Muffin · Post by **A Vicious Muffin** » Mon Oct 30, 2006 11:57 am

I see what you're saying. I like the explanation binary

. So what you're saying is that not only is it impossible, it would be too complex to cycle through flags (ex: L to GM to WG while N and SR at the same time.

BinarySpike · Post by **BinarySpike** » Mon Oct 30, 2006 7:25 pm

Vicious, it's impossible to have multiple flags at the same time without modding the client to "fake it"

You can have WG and High Speed at the same time, because those are client-created effects... while GM and SW at the same time is impossible because both are handled by the remote client, the server, then the local client... all three would have to register that, and it's impossible to store that data without major mods to the server and *all* clients.

Although with /set you can "fake" a narrow or tiny, you can't fake a laser... I heard the devs were putting _defaultShotType or something in 2.1.x but I'm not sure (where the default shots are laser or GM)

Ck_asdf · Post by **Ck_asdf** » Mon Oct 30, 2006 10:44 pm

Too complex to cycle through the flags? What about mouse wheel? Right now, it's set to scroll content in the text box, but people could use page up/down if they really need to scroll that area.

I was talking to my teacher, and he said that he thinks he's seen a server where people had two flags. I think he said one was narrow, and the other was whatever people picked up - he said that people naturally got narrow when joining the server, and then picked up another flag off of the ground. And he said that when people got blown up, two flags would shoot out of the tank instead of one.
So he says, anyway ... perhaps a specialized plugin for that server?

/edit/
Oops, that question was already answered.
/edit/

BinarySpike · Post by **BinarySpike** » Mon Oct 30, 2006 11:27 pm

Ck_asdf wrote:Too complex to cycle through the flags? What about mouse wheel? Right now, it's set to scroll content in the text box, but people could use page up/down if they really need to scroll that area.

I was talking to my teacher, and he said that he thinks he's seen a server where people had two flags. I think he said one was narrow, and the other was whatever people picked up - he said that people naturally got narrow when joining the server, and then picked up another flag off of the ground. And he said that when people got blown up, two flags would shoot out of the tank instead of one.
So he says, anyway ... perhaps a specialized plugin for that server?

/edit/
Oops, that question was already answered.
/edit/

Narrow can be "faked" using /set
As for the two flags, probably a plugin... although I think it would have been posted about...

Gerbil · Post by **Gerbil** » Sat Nov 11, 2006 5:50 am

Two nights ago a player was flying with Wings and firing GM. Watched him for five minutes.

It is possible that it wasn't wings he was using but had a hotkey to change "ground level"--though he changed altitude enough it looked like it might be wings.

Was very smooth and non jerky.

Ck_asdf · Post by **Ck_asdf** » Sat Nov 11, 2006 6:06 am

Not much of that made sense, gerbil. How to change ground level?

Oh, well...

BinarySpike · Post by **BinarySpike** » Sat Nov 11, 2006 7:22 am

Wings cheat with the GM flag...

Changing ground level will get you screwed up and crash bzflag

Ck_asdf · Post by **Ck_asdf** » Sat Nov 11, 2006 8:49 am

Not that I'd actually do it on a regular basis, or anything ... I'm just sometimes curious about various things people do to be all crazy and all that.
Purely on an educational level.
That's fine, though ... have a great evening!

This is only tangentially related, but how do I make the world weapon GMs lock on?
(We're already talking about GMs, so this IS kind of related

)

Gerbil · Post by **Gerbil** » Sat Nov 11, 2006 10:32 am

I'm a gerbil--I don't know how to change ground level. It was an old hack in days gone by and there were no wings back then--you would just see guys with 10x normal high speed driving 60 units up in the air with a tiny tank and gm.

A lot of things are different now but I am sure that can be tried. A lot of hacks do crash the client or server. I just mentioned it in case a dev was watching and wondered if it was two flags or a flag hack and tank hack.

Post by **L4m3r** » Sat Nov 11, 2006 10:49 am

Was that at MoFo FFA, Gerbil? I saw someone doing that the other day (and banned him). Looked like a simple wings cheat, while holding GM. The wings cheat is used a lot, but players usually aren't that blatant about it.

Anyway, plugins can be used to do a very select few flag combinations... but it is messy. For instance, one of my servers used a plugin that converted ST shots to IB shots, effectively combining the stealth and IB flags. This technique does not always work well, though... for one, the client does not see the change, so if you change the shot type to one that behaves differently (like L), there will be an inconsistency in how the shot is seen- the shooter will see a normal bullet, but everyone else will see a laser. This would be very powerful, because the shooter would not be likely to kill themself with rico like they would with a normal laser. Or, if you change a shot to GM, it'll be useless because the shooter won't be able to lock on.

Jeff has complained about the messy and hackish nature of this system, and hopes to have it changed for 2.1, if it hasn't already been done.

But anyway, this is only a special case...

Also, you can change or hand out flags any way you like- the plugin API can give flags to and remove flags from any player at any time. In that respect, you are really only limited by what you're able to observe via the API.

A Vicious Muffin · Post by **A Vicious Muffin** » Sat Nov 11, 2006 3:32 pm

Yesterday I saw about 4 or 5 people using this cheat on different servers, (mofo, nativity in black, boxy war...etc) it really takes the fun out of the game when someone cheats like that. Can't they just learn how to play? I guess not. Anyways. Thanks for answering my question.

Zelgadis · Post by **Zelgadis** » Sun Nov 12, 2006 8:07 am

nah.

its more funny with one flag.

With 2 flags you are to strong, not very good.

ducatiwannabe · Post by **ducatiwannabe** » Fri Nov 17, 2006 3:45 am

I think you can have two flags as long as they both don't affect your shots.

For example, you could be really fast, or have shield, or whatever else all at the same time, I think. Lots of things can be done by /set or a plugin. However, to have laser and shockwave at the same time...belh...anyway, this is already over, I guess.

Yeah, I've seen that cheater at about four servers now. Recently.

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