City_Fire effect question

[TP_Fritz]

I'm attempting to do something perhaps a little unorthodox.  I have a mission where an airfield is attacked, and the incoming attack aircraft randomly select which of the several targets to hit with their bombs.  One of the targets available to them is the fuel dump.

 

What I'm trying to do is create a realistic effect that if / when the fuel dump is hit with bombs, it not only explodes normally, but also triggers a city_fire effect.  So, when the bombs hit, the fuel tanks blow up and a second later there's a huge fuel fire with dense black smoke.

 

Getting the effect to work - for the most part - was fairly simple using JimTM's effect sustainer and instead of having the city_fire effect be triggered by the Mission Start MCU having it triggered by the OnKilledEvent of the fuel depot (in this case block # arf_gsm_2).  The planes come in, drop their bombs, and whoosh - the tanks explode with the bombs and then a thick pall of smoke billows up over the field.

 

However, the problem is that the actual fire in the city_fire effect is active before the effect is actually triggered by the OnKilledEvent.  I haven't been able to figure out a way to stop the fire from showing up before the trigger... the fire remains after the OnKilledEvent is fired, which is what I wanted, but I need to find a way, if possible, to stop the flames showing before the trigger.

 

Is this possible?  Or does the city_fire effect display flames regardless of its activation status?

 

I've tried this same effect with the city_firesmall effect, and it works (sans flames of course), but it looks funny with smoke just roiling out of the ground.

 

 

Here's the mission just about 10 seconds after the mission starts:

 

 

And after the OnKilledEvent trigger fires it:

 

 

Here's the mission files (if needed):

CityFire.zip

[JimTM]

Make sure that that the "Out A1" and "Out D1" MCUs in the effect sustainer are object linked to the city_fire effect. For details, see the effect sustainer documentation on pg. 290 of the editor manual. In particular, see the last paragraph on pg. 291.

 

Also, you wrote

"...instead of having the city_fire effect be triggered by the Mission Start MCU having it triggered by the OnKilledEvent of the fuel depot..."

I'm not sure if this means that you removed the "Begin" mission begin MCU from the effect sustainer and replaced it with an OnKilled input to the T1 timer. If you replaced "Begin", you must put it back and direct the OnKilled input to the "In Start 0s" timer instead.

Edited January 24, 2018 by JimTM

[TP_Fritz]

I'll take a look at your manual here in a minute, JimTM - thanks for the response.

 

In answer to your comment, yes - I did replace the Begin Mission MCU from the sustainer... I removed it completely and linked the Fuel Tank block object directly to the T1 Timer with an OnKilledEvent link.

[JimTM]

...

 

In answer to your comment, yes - I did replace the Begin Mission MCU from the sustainer... I removed it completely and linked the Fuel Tank block object directly to the T1 Timer with an OnKilledEvent link.

That's your problem then. The "Begin" MCU triggers the MCUs that turn off the fire at mission start.

[TP_Fritz]

Okay, I've done all that, but I'm not sure I have all the connections to the effects set up correctly after following your manual and the posts here.  The fire almost immediately disappears after the mission starts, and doesn't reappear until after the fuel dump is destroyed, but once the effect starts, it lasts for 16 seconds, then disappears for about 4 to 5 seconds, and then reappears.  It continues to cycle like this until the mission ends.  I'm not sure what I'm doing wrong.

 

Here's how I have it set up - I've pulled the two effects apart so you can see the links:

 

Here's the mission itself if you need to see anything in more detail.

CityFire2.zip

[JimTM]

Object link the "Out A1" activate trigger to both effects; you only have it linked to one effect.

[TP_Fritz]

That did the trick - thanks so much Jim!

[JimTM]

Glad to help cerebus06.