Bots!!

Does anyone have some simple bot scripts i can mess around with. I am not good at scripting yet, i can only edit scripts but i would like to learn how to make a bot.

Thanks

One of my favorite topics.

What sort of bot? Robots are not really possible in SL yet, but droids are.

When I say robots I mean "real" robots, like ones with joints that move around and so on. The limitations of physical objects and additional problems with joints don't permit a real practical robot-robot to be built. I've tried and failed numerous times, though I did get an arm sort of working once.

An NPC that has some basic poses, like an Infobot, is a good start. Sort of a static NPC that can rotate and maybe has a few different basic movements. I used to have little "canyon droids" floating around Gibson a long time ago, and a bot in an info booth that would rotate to face the speaker. This was more just scripted actions and poses, pre-defined pathing, and standard sensor recognition though vs. any actual "AI", as it were. Sort of like animation in an old Sinbad movie.

The Vorago Droids in my Varney build use node-pathing logic, similar to simplified Unreal pathing, to move around randomly, avoid props, and use doors. When they detect an AV, they compute a shortest-path-to on available nodes and attempt to collide with the AV to inflict damage (you only get hurt if you're wearing a game HUD, there's no actual "damage" so don't be afraid if you go look and they chase you). The bots in my Warcraft-ish game are sort of a combination of the two, and they can fight each other

The capability of the Vorago droids pushed the limitations of the memory cap frequently, forcing me to make them less sophisticated than I would have liked (i.e. their movement is 2d). They actually use two scripts to do their thing. I've found some ways to cut some corners recently though, so can possibly expand their weak little brains perhaps.

Anyway, before you get started with bots, you'd need to ensure a decent level of LSL expertise in a number of areas related to physical and non physical movement. Once you see how some of those patterns work, it sort of becomes obvious how to build a basic droid bot thing. Overall though, anything more than a model that follows you around (like a simple pet) isn't "easy" even for a high end scripter.

If you're interested, maybe I'll hold a bots basics class some time, insofar as what I know about the subject.

It won't be cheap ;p

Yeah. Bots are like anything else in SL... Example; when you build a Car, you don't need to build the drive axle/engine in order for it to work. Of course it would be possible to create a robot that can move around on its own, perhaps even randomly, but getting it to have avatar-like movement would be impossible. I would reccomend doing a robot which legs operate in a tank kind of way, using some sort of tread system. This way, sliding seems more of a credible kind of transportation. You could animate the treads so that they rotate based upon your speed, like many people do with car wheels.


By the way, I have been scripting for a long while, a robotics class would be kinda neat