Editor improvements: Starting position for hinges (and more parts)

[seehp]

It is nice to be able to set a starting position for the piston. I want that for at least the hinges! Please!

Also: It would be great, if we could at least 'bend' the hinges in the editor in 90° steps. That would maintain the grid but would allow us to at least roughly create vehicles as they are intended instead of having it 'fold together' after launching it.

Last: It would of course be lovely If we could actually use the real starting position in the editor, but i don't really expect that as it would possibly need heavy changes in the editor. It would be lovely, though.

[[Jake]]

I fully agree it would be an amazing feature. I think setting a 90 degree angle would be the most reasonable way to implement, everything stays on the grid. Same goes with hydraulic cylinders, the ability to place them fully compressed or at 50% would simplify a lot of things.

For example an articulated steering setup is kind of a pain when the steer cylinders on each side of the pivot need to be at half stroke when everything is point straight. Ways around it but it makes for a cluttered design.

[alvaroping1]

Originally posted by Jake:

I fully agree it would be an amazing feature. I think setting a 90 degree angle would be the most reasonable way to implement, everything stays on the grid. Same goes with hydraulic cylinders, the ability to place them fully compressed or at 50% would simplify a lot of things.

For example an articulated steering setup is kind of a pain when the steer cylinders on each side of the pivot need to be at half stroke when everything is point straight. Ways around it but it makes for a cluttered design.

activating mechanical blocks in build mode is confirmed to not be happened. It simply can't be implemented without a complete rework of build mode

[[Jake]]

Originally posted by alvaroping1:

activating mechanical blocks in build mode is confirmed to not be happened. It simply can't be implemented without a complete rework of build mode

That's understandable, a potential workaround might be to not modify a given block but have separate variants of a block. For a hinge you could have a straight hinge block, and 90 deg hinge variant block. It could be listed as one block ( the stock hinge ) and discreetly swapped out for it's variant with a toggle. A single variant is all that would be required for the hinge as it's still constrained to the grid, and it's 90 deg variant can be flipped over for use in the other direction. This way you avoid actually modifying the states of any block, it's just giving the illusion and functionally it does the same thing.

The hydraulic cylinder could be the same idea. The stock extended block and a fully collapsed block that are discreetly swapped when an option is toggled. Each variant still abiding to the grid. You could go so far as having four separate blocks to swap between states ( on a slider ) but honestly two would awesome in itself.

[alvaroping1]

Originally posted by Jake:

Originally posted by alvaroping1:

activating mechanical blocks in build mode is confirmed to not be happened. It simply can't be implemented without a complete rework of build mode

That's understandable, a potential workaround might be to not modify a given block but have separate variants of a block. For a hinge you could have a straight hinge block, and 90 deg hinge variant block. It could be listed as one block ( the stock hinge ) and discreetly swapped out for it's variant with a toggle. A single variant is all that would be required for the hinge as it's still constrained to the grid, and it's 90 deg variant can be flipped over for use in the other direction. This way you avoid actually modifying the states of any block, it's just giving the illusion and functionally it does the same thing.

The hydraulic cylinder could be the same idea. The stock extended block and a fully collapsed block that are discreetly swapped when an option is toggled. Each variant still abiding to the grid. You could go so far as having four separate blocks to swap between states ( on a slider ) but honestly two would awesome in itself.

that's not a good solution. It significantly increases the cost of maintaining things, as now every change needs to be done multiple times with slight changes, and that increases the chance of errors and amount of work required to maintain the game. Even if you only want a single variant, other people will see that variant and ask for the others, making the problem worse

Making the game automatically swap the blocks would be hard, specially when you consider having to transfer and tweak settings/logic connections. If it's not swapped automatically, it would be confussing for new players seeing what's essentially the exact same block multiple times

[seehp]

Originally posted by alvaroping1:

Originally posted by Jake:

That's understandable, a potential workaround might be to not modify a given block but have separate variants of a block. For a hinge you could have a straight hinge block, and 90 deg hinge variant block. It could be listed as one block ( the stock hinge ) and discreetly swapped out for it's variant with a toggle. A single variant is all that would be required for the hinge as it's still constrained to the grid, and it's 90 deg variant can be flipped over for use in the other direction. This way you avoid actually modifying the states of any block, it's just giving the illusion and functionally it does the same thing.

The hydraulic cylinder could be the same idea. The stock extended block and a fully collapsed block that are discreetly swapped when an option is toggled. Each variant still abiding to the grid. You could go so far as having four separate blocks to swap between states ( on a slider ) but honestly two would awesome in itself.

that's not a good solution. It significantly increases the cost of maintaining things, as now every change needs to be done multiple times with slight changes, and that increases the chance of errors and amount of work required to maintain the game. Even if you only want a single variant, other people will see that variant and ask for the others, making the problem worse

Making the game automatically swap the blocks would be hard, specially when you consider having to transfer and tweak settings/logic connections. If it's not swapped automatically, it would be confussing for new players seeing what's essentially the exact same block multiple times

I don't think they would be more confused than by all those other block combinations that are not necessary. There are many blocks that are bascially just two other blocks in that angled/rounded category. People maybe getting confused about why they are there, but I have not yet seen someone complain.

[alvaroping1]

Originally posted by seehp:

Originally posted by alvaroping1:

that's not a good solution. It significantly increases the cost of maintaining things, as now every change needs to be done multiple times with slight changes, and that increases the chance of errors and amount of work required to maintain the game. Even if you only want a single variant, other people will see that variant and ask for the others, making the problem worse

Making the game automatically swap the blocks would be hard, specially when you consider having to transfer and tweak settings/logic connections. If it's not swapped automatically, it would be confussing for new players seeing what's essentially the exact same block multiple times

I don't think they would be more confused than by all those other block combinations that are not necessary. There are many blocks that are bascially just two other blocks in that angled/rounded category. People maybe getting confused about why they are there, but I have not yet seen someone complain.

the blocks which are redundant in the aerodynamics category are visually distinct, and have different sizes. They are also simple structural blocks, making the different size quickly communicate their difference to the player. Having multiple of them doesn't have the problem of higher maintenance cost either as they can all be treated exactly the same internally by the game

[seehp]

So, the "confusing people" argument is off the table? Good.

[alvaroping1]

Originally posted by seehp:

So, the "confusing people" argument is off the table? Good.

seeing 2 physically distinct blocks are different it's significantly easier than seeing that 2 almost identical blocks are different because the connection point on one of them is tilted 90 degrees

[seehp]

A 90-degrees hinge and a straight one are very distinct. Who, out of Trailmaker's player base do you expect to not understand that? How dumb do you think the players are??

This type of reasoning seems again to be a cover-up of the fact, that the build system has a flaw, that does not allow 1x1x1 parts with more than 2 connections opposite of each other, just like the reason why there is no proper 1x1x1 block, just tubes.
It is a flaw, not a feature.

[alvaroping1]

Originally posted by seehp:

A 90-degrees hinge and a straight one are very distinct. Who, out of Trailmaker's player base do you expect to not understand that? How dumb do you think the players are??

It's not that they aren't different. It's that at first glance, they would look extremely similar. If you don't know there is a difference, and don't know how precisely how it should look (which as a new player, you wouldn't know), noticing the difference would be hard unless you specifically compare them side by side (which you would only do if you knew there was a difference)