Sandbox 2 Manual
ContentsIndexHome
PreviousUpNext
Rope Tool Reference

Rope Tool Reference

Ropes can be used to attach objects together or to hang objects from. They react to objects around them, but will not affect those objects. 

 

Using the Rope Tool

The rope tool can be found under RollUpBar> Objects > Misc

Turn on follow terrain and snap to objects. Place the rope by using the left mouse button. This works in a similar way as placing a road. 


A rope can be edited using the edit rope button in its properties. You can move points in the normal way, add points by ctrl-clicking and remove them by double clicking. 


When in edit rope mode, you will notice that a point can be colored green or red. Green means the rope is validly attached, and red means the rope is not attached to anything. 

Attached 


NOT Attached 


Dynamic Tessellation / Subdivide

 

As of recently, there are two rope simulation modes, with dynamic tessellation on and off. Without dynamic tessellation rope, segments are asset-based and are simulated as rigid sticks. In this mode the rope cannot properly collide with objects when it's tied with both ends and strained. With dynamic tessellation the rope has SegCount segments (independently of the actual rope asset), and each of them can have a maximum of SubVtxCount internal vertices, created at collision points. More segments make the rope less likely to tunnel through thin objects, but increase the simulation cost. Refer to the art documentation on how to author rope assets for these two modes 

Properties

 


 

Rope Params

 

Smooth 
Defines if the rope will be smoothed out or not 
Num Segments 
The number of segments of geometry used to in the rope along its length 
Num Sides 
The number of sides around the circumference of the rope 
Texture U Tiling 
Texture stretching in the U direction 
Texture V Tiling 
Texture stretching in the V direction 
Bind Ends Radius 
Specifies whether the ends will be automatically attached 
Bind Radius 
The environment around the ends of the rope will be tested using a box of this radius to find places for the rope to attached to 

 

Physics Params

 

Max Subdiv Verts 
Maximum number of subdivided vertices per segment 
Physical Segments 
number of rope segments in physics (can be different from the number of segments used for rendering) 
Mass 
This affects how strongly the rope will react to bullet hits. When interacting with solid physicalized objects, it is always treated as weightless 
Tension 
specifies tension in the original state. A positive value will cause the rope ends to pull together, negative will add slack to the rope (-0.02 is a good starting point for experiments) 
Friction 
The friction effective in a non-strained mode. In a strained mode with dynamic tesselation, this that prevents the rope from slipping until it tilts too much 
Friction Pull 
How strongly the rope opposes movement in its pull direction (when strained with dynamic tesslation). Keep this value either small enough (0.1-0.3) to get some resistance, or large enough (5-10-100+) to make sure the rope sticks firmly in most cases. Intermediate values can lead to unstable behaviour when the object the rope rubs against (ex. a pulley) is light enough compared to the objects it is tied to 
Wind x, y, z 
Simulated wind, additional to any area-specific winds around 
Wind Variance 
How much the wind varies 
Air Resistance 
must be set in order for wind to take effect 
Water Resistance 
How the rope interacts with water effectively damping when under water 
Max Force 
the rope will detach itself when this strain limit is breached 
Check Collisions 
Will the rope have collision with other obejcts/bullets 
Ignore Attachment Collisions 
Makes the rope ignore collisions with the object it is attached to 

Other Road Tool Parameters 

Click here for the Miscellaneous Parameters reference guide, here for the Miscellaneous Entity Parameters guide, here for the Entity Links guide and here for the Entity Events guide.

Copyright © 2008 Crytek GmbH. All rights reserved.