Smeerkat's UED Tutorial - Dispatchers

NOTE : I would consider this an advanced Unrealed tutorial. To attempt this technique, you must already understand the basic principles of Triggers, Movers and Special Events.

[Unreal Tournament] Dispatchers are handy actors, not only for single-player maps but also for teamplay maps like CTF and Assault.

Dispatchers allow you to set off multiple events in a chain, so that you don't have to go from trigger to trigger. You select the order in which the events go off, and you also select the time frame between each event.

For this tutorial, I used my own map, DM-Moonraker as an example. Inspired by the James Bond movie of the same name, the map has lots of fun triggers and special events. I used a Dispatcher to set up an explosion that liberates the Redeemer at the top of the space platform.

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 		Actor Class browser > Triggers > Dispatcher
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 		IMG 1: In UED, open up the Actor Class Browser, and expand the Triggers class.


IMG 2: Add a Dispatcher actor to your map. Right-click on the Dispatcher, and select "Dispatcher Properties".

OutEvents are the Tags of events, e.g. movers, breaking glass, explosions, smoke generators, etc.

OutDelays are the time, in seconds, between each event that is listed in OutEvents. So you'll notice that the first OutDelay is 0 seconds, because I wanted the explosion and the earthquake to happen at the same time.

Events > Tag > dispatch1 : I have a regular Trigger actor (that would have Events > Event > dispatch1) somewhere else in the map, that sets off this Dispatcher.

One more note about the OutEvents : when you set up each special event (explosion, smoke generator, breaking glass, etc), you select the name of the Tag. Choose the Tag names well, so that you'll always remember what the events were. Observe that I have an event tag called pinkfloyd; that's an ExplodingWall event. :)
OutEvents - a sample
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 		IMG 3: In IMG 2, you will see an OutEvent tag called booth. Here is an in-game screenshot of that booth, which is in fact a mover.

When the Dispatcher sets it off, the booth will move instantly to a spot off the map. The next OutEvent is pinkfloyd, which is an ExplodingWall. I set the corresponding OutDelay to be 0 seconds, so that the two events will happen simultaneously. This gives the player the illusion that the booth has exploded.

IMG 4: Another OutEvent tag is called start2. Commonly used in Assault maps, what I've done here is set up secondary PlayerStarts. These PlayerStarts, located at the top of the space platform, are not active at the beginning of the game, only when the Dispatcher is set off.

You only have to do two things to the PlayerStart actor: set Events > Tag > start2, and set bEnabled=False.

IMG 5: Yet another OutEvent tag is called holysmoke1. This is a SmokeGenerator. I select the number of smoke puffs, rising velocity, and time (in seconds) between puffs. I also gave it a nice hissing sound.
In-game screenshots of the Dispatcher in action
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 		IMG 6: The glass booth, before the Dispatcher is activated.

IMG 7: One of the pads (a mover) that sets a countdown to activating the Dispatcher.

IMG 8: Kaboom! The explosion goes off, the earth shakes, the booth moves, the glass breaks.

IMG 9: Next OutEvent: the SmokeGenerator, with puffs of smoke and hissing sound.

IMG 10: I only set the SmokeGenerator for 100 puffs total. Here you see the smoke clearing.

IMG 11: Players can now grab the Redeemer, and Players can spawn here now.

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Have any questions or comments about this tutorial?
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