Blocking Switches?

In my most recent map, the player, to progress, has to press lovely little switches like these:

http://img198.imageshack.us/img198/7964/sundermapswitchthing1.jpg

In my attempt to block the player from pressing certain switches too soon, I decided I could block them with these:

http://img37.imageshack.us/img37/2447/sundermapswitchthing2.jpg

This obviously doesn't work, as the switch can still be activated through that. Whoops.

So, other than making these little barricades a lot thicker, is there some other method I don't know of that could help me block the player from pressing them?

(GGGMork described a technique regarding a dummy sector and a scrolling floor, though I haven't been using anything other than the regular Doom 2 tags at this point, and would rather not have to. I want to keep to standard vanilla tricks.)

I'm pretty sure if you make them shoot-triggers (instead of use), the block would work as is (though I've seen instances where you can shoot across the air and trigger a shoot switch above (even though you missed the switch and just shot through the air across the line).. I don't think you can shoot over the top of the switch and trigger a switch from below (or something, maybe it depends on port/complevel).
Otherwise if ceiling height = floor height for the blockade right in front of the switch line, that should block it (might look weird with a tall column coming out of the sky though). Unless someone else has a better idea.

Could you put a trigger line inside the switch, then have the skull face line do something repeatable and non-important, just so it lights up?

DuckReconMajor said:

Could you put a trigger line inside the switch, then have the skull face line do something repeatable and non-important, just so it lights up?

What good would that do, though? The trigger line inside the switch would be permanently blocked by the skull face dummyswitch, unless he was either using ZDoom (lines don't block use) or he used the Boom PASSUSE flag, and in that case he'd be in exactly the same situation he's in now. :P

So, if you can't press two switches at once, why not makes the outer walls of the barrier switches?

DuckReconMajor said:

So, if you can't press two switches at once, why not makes the outer walls of the barrier switches?

Because it wouldn't help ZDoom (which might not be the target port, but since a lot of people use it anyway a universal method would be much better)?

Also note that with your current barriers if there's arch-viles around those could throw you on top of the switch and you could still activate the switch. ;) Conveyor belts would probably be the safest bet here.

yea, make the outer barrier random switches that do nothing (and I mean not a switch texture but a switch 'special' with the texture you are using currently). this will block the ability to activate the switch until the player gets closer and can pass through this dummy switch, in other words, once the barrier is gone. That should work fine and be the easiest way to go.

NaturalTvventy said:

yea, make the outer barrier random switches that do nothing (and I mean not a switch texture but a switch 'special' with the texture you are using currently). this will block the ability to activate the switch until the player gets closer and can pass through this dummy switch, in other words, once the barrier is gone. That should work fine and be the easiest way to go.

Aah, I didn't quite understand what DuckReconMajor meant until you explained it.

I just tried it in ZDoom, and it does work! Yay! Will any ports spit at me for not assigning them a sector tag?

I guess the only problem would be if the player hops and top and hits the switch... but I highly doubt that would happen by accident :P

Putting 2 switch lines close together isn't a good solution imo. Now you'll likely need to be really close for the switch to work (the dummy switch will still block you being able to press use on the real switch, even if the blockade is down, as long as its in front of you in prboomplus at least afaik). So you'd walk up to the switch at a distance that feels about right, press use and wonder why it didn't work. Walk closer, press use, now it works.

gggmork said:

Putting 2 switch lines close together isn't a good solution imo. Now you'll likely need to be really close for the switch to work (the dummy switch will still block you being able to press use on the real switch, even if the blockade is down, as long as its in front of you in prboomplus at least afaik). So you'd walk up to the switch at a distance that feels about right, press use and wonder why it didn't work. Walk closer, press use, now it works.

Hah. Crap. I just double checked myself, and you're quite right.

In fact, given how far back I'd need to put the second switch to make the real switch work, I'd be better off making a larger blockade of some sort.

Which I think is my only realistic option here, unless there's some other rare vaillila trick I don't know about, but it doesn't look likely.

What is the switch supposed to do? If it is a "SR lower to highest floor", you could indeed prevent an early use by just having a sector adjacent to the target sector with the same floor height and give that sector the same tag the switch barricade has, so it lowers with it. The "blocked switch" still would make the clunk noise, even if it seemingly does nothing, though.

LogicDeLuxe said:

What is the switch supposed to do? If it is a "SR lower to highest floor", you could indeed prevent an early use by just having a sector adjacent to the target sector with the same floor height and give that sector the same tag the switch barricade has, so it lowers with it. The "blocked switch" still would make the clunk noise, even if it seemingly does nothing, though.

Basically, the switch you see in the first shot, would lower that little metal barrier surrounding what is an identicle switch in the second screenshot.

As for your idea, can you think of a wad that's already used that approach? I swear I've seen it used before...

Instead having switch #1 lower a barrier to switch #2, could you have switch #1 raise (a hidden) switch #2 out of the floor? Yes, if the player knew that switch #2 were there then he or she could activate it, but that would be cheating -- also, the switch wouldn't appear on the automap until the sector separated itself from the surrounding floor.

Insane_Gazebo said:

In my most recent map, the player, to progress, has to press lovely little switches like these:

http://img198.imageshack.us/img198/7964/sundermapswitchthing1.jpg

In my attempt to block the player from pressing certain switches too soon, I decided I could block them with these:

http://img37.imageshack.us/img37/2447/sundermapswitchthing2.jpg

You like showing pics of your map, don't you o_O