NEW FEATURE: Supply Drop

[Lamron]

Something new for you guys to play with: Supply Drop. This was a huge amount of work, with tons of scripting, custom icons, and custom audio. But its pretty cool, so its worth the trouble.  I don't have a working TV anyway (fried by power surge), so what else was I going to be doing today?

Here's how it works. Select "Supply Drop" from the Killstreaks menu. It requires 3 kills.

After you earn it, you'll see a new icon above your HUD weapon info. To the left of it is the key you have bound to it, as a reminder. In the game Controls menu, this key is labeled "Air Support". Hit that button and you'll get the confirmation radio message and text. The drop zone marker will appear at your feet. You must be outside to use it, if you're someplace the Helicopter can't drop the box, you'll get a message saying so.

Unlike other Killstreaks, you don't have to use it right away. You will keep it even through being killed and respawning, so you can use it whenever convenient. You can not earn a second Supply Drop until you use the one you have.

This helicopter will not shoot at anyone, and cannot be shot down.

After the helicopter comes and drops the box, an icon visible only to you will appear above it. So if you're killed while waiting for the helicopter, you can easily go and find it. Get close to the box and press USE. You can open Supply Drop boxes belonging to other players, but the process takes longer, and there is a 25% chance that it will be booby-trapped. 

You will randomly receive one of the possible contents of the Supply Drop box.

Current possibilities:

- Max ammo for ALL weapons you are carrying, and either Last Stand or Martyrdom.

- SAW + Reflex Sight.  High-ROF belt-fed machine gun without movement penalty.  Starts with 100 round belt. When it runs empty, it will be taken away and you'll switch back to whatever you were using before.  If you happen to have Scavenger you can get more ammo, as long as you never run completely empty.

- LAW 72 + 3 Rockets.  HUD ammo will show zero, but script will give you another when the first one explodes until you have fired all five. This is necessary to allow the guided missile script to work correctly.

- 90 Second Steath Suit.  Same skin the Ninjas get, but you keep whatever weapons you have.  Not vulnerable to EMP, but expires after 90 seconds.

- Juggernaut Suit. Take only 25% of normal damage.

- Air Strike. Takes the slot your Supply Drop was in and uses the same button. Can be held through death/respawn and used when you want. Air Strikes cover a large area, its easy to get caught in the blast yourself if you're not careful.

- UAV


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KNOWN BUGS:

- Helicopter sometimes flies through tall buildings or other objects: Can't be fixed, minor cosmetic issue.

- Hanoi map crashes server because it is not properly set up for helicopters: FIXED

- Sniper rifle and G11 scope toggles don't work after using Supply Drop: FIXED

- Shipment2 map doesn't have the crate model compiled into it. I could fix this, but it would cost an XMODEL. Solution: Supply Drops disabled for this map.

- Not a bug, but helicopters on the Luna2 moon map look silly. Solution: Supply Drops disabled for this map.


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What would you like to see in the box? I'm open to suggestions for items or upgrades as possible Supply Drop rewards.

[Lamron]

Supply Drop contents update:

- All crates now include full health in addition to whatever else they have.

- Air Strike has been replaced by Mortar Barrage. Smaller damage area, but MUCH more accurate.

- Added: UAV Radar

- Added: crate containing 3 perks: One random Upgrade Perk, PLUS one random Skills Perk, PLUS either Last Stand or Martyrdom. The script will pick something you don't already have, so you should always get something useful.

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I completely re-wrote the randomizer for the crate contents. It was picking randomly, but random doesn't work the way people expect. When random numbers are generated, people tend to expect an even distribution of possibilities. So if five random numbers are generated and three of them are the same, the user is not satisfied with the "randomness". This is a flaw in thinking because past results do not influence future results. If you roll a die 7 times without seeing a 1, you may start thinking you are "due" for one, but you aren't. This tendency for the human mind to try to find patterns in randomness is what keeps casinos in business. Often someone asks for "random", but what they really want is "unpredictable".


Why does this matter? Because of this I sometimes have to create pseudo-random scripts that are not truly random, just unpredictable to the user. This may be more technical than you care about, but here's what I did to make it work in a way more satisfying to the player:


First I created an array containing each of the possible items (currently 7).

Then I used a shuffling routine I wrote MANY years ago to re-arrange every item in that array.

The new shuffled list still contains only one of each possibility.

Then a random number is used to determine the index on the array where you will start.

The first time you receive a Supply Drop, you will get whatever is in that array index.

Then that index number is incremented (wrap-around), so that you get the next item in the shuffled list the next time you open a crate.



The end result of all this is that you will never be able to predict what you will get next, but you won't get the same item again until you have gotten one of everything.

[Lamron]

For some reason the helicopter doesn't want to follow instructions after its owner dies (too depressed?). This was causing problems when you called for a Supply Drop and died before it got there, or after it dropped the crate. I think I've figured out a better way to handle it to ensure these functions all work.

These events should no longer confuse the supply helicopter:

Killed while calling for the Supply Drop.
Killed while it's en-route.
Killed while it's leaving after the drop.
Killed while opening the crate. (if you die before you can complete the opening, the crate stays and can be tried again)

These new fixes also mean that the crates will now stay until someone gets them, instead of disappearing after a while or when you call a new Supply Drop. So it is possible to have more than one crate on the ground at a time now. The icons that help you find them and the triggers all work independently, so multiple crates and helicopters at once shouldn't conflict.

[Lamron]

"Juggernaut Suit" added to the possible contents.

"Three Random Perks" removed from list.

"Full Ammo Restock" now includes either Last Stand or Martyrdom.