RA2YR: Warheads: Rocker=yes
by CannisRabidus. Published: 6/14/04. Last update: 6/14/04.

If you have a heavy-duty unit dealing heavy-duty damage, it can be good to give the player some visual feedback that the weapon packs some punch by making the unit that's getting hit rock back from the impact. Making this happen is easy. Here's some info that will help you understand how the Rocker= property works, so you can get the effect you want.

Rocking is set by a flag on the warhead - yes or no.

Then, the amount of rocking effect is determined by the Damage= setting of the weapon using a Rocker=yes warhead, regardless of the Versus= percentage of that warhead. Therefore, the extent of rocking is not determined by the amount of total damage done.

For example:
Weapon Damage=100 X Warhead Versus=200% does 200 damage.
Weapon Damage=200 X Warhead Versus=100% also does 200 damage.

Further, whether a vehicle rocks or not, and the amount of rocking if it can rock, is influenced by the attributes of the vehicle that is made to rock. Vehicles which do not tilt (SHP-based vehicles, and voxels which are Tilter=no) will never rock no matter what. Only voxels which are allowed to tilt can rock. Vehicles with smaller Size= values will rock more than those with larger Size= values (this is not determined by Weight=, as is often believed).

Then the rocking vehicle must ask itself 'which direction do I rock'? Rocking direction is based on a direction from the center of the warhead's impact, which probably explains why rocking is worse from impacts on adjacent cells than for direct hits (rocking trying to occur in all directions, leading to effects mostly cancelling out). Further, a vehicle is much more likely to rock to the side than forward or back (this seems hard-coded, probably for appearance purposes).

Finally, the area that the warhead affects is an issue. Warheads can do area damage, and the wider the area, the wider the rocking effect can cover. Also, how that area effect tapers off, from its center, to the outer edge of the effect, determines how visible the rocking can be depending how far the affected vehicle is from the warhead impact. Splash damage that does little damage at its perimeter edge will cause little if any rocking at that edge, while splash damage that does full damage at its edge will show a full rocking effect at that edge. In fact, rocker effect often extends beyond the radius of the warhead's damage. This means it is possible to rock vehicles on adjacent map cells, even though they aren't being damaged.

Once you think you have your formidable weapon set up, you will need to test it in the game, and this is why:

Fast ROF on the weapon means that with successive shots, new rocking effects can be imparted on the target, before the target has settled back down. The targeted unit might rock more with each shot... and maybe flip. If it flips, it dies. Maybe you think this would be cool. Maybe it would look n00bish.

Many units firing the same Rocker=yes warhead at the same target can have a cumulative rocking effect. So, you might set up a weapon/warhead to give a nice healthy rocking action to any heavy (large Size=) tank that you shoot. But what happens if several units with this impressive weapon gang up on a single little (small Size=) unit? The unit is likely to flip. If it flips, it dies. If fast ROF is added (see above), this gets worse.

Experiment with lots of units with your new weapon/warhead against the smallest Size= unit that can tilt, to see what can possibly happen... In other words, set up a worst-case-scenario so you can see if you're carrying this rocking business too far.