[Sesquipedalian]

I've be working on a new corvette, and have run into an extremely strange problem with it now that I've put in the docking points.  When a transport docks with the thing, it will suddenly start flipping itself back and forth along its Z axis (ie, the nose where the tail should be and the tail where the nose should be) every video frame.  This is really, really strange, and more than a little annoying.

Anyone have any idea what is going on, and how to fix it?

[CP5670]

That sounds pretty strange. Is the transport moving at all or just the corvette? Something like this might happen if the docking point is slightly misplaced so that it is inside model, making it so that the transport can never reach the point and instead keeps colliding with the corvette's hull.

[LtNarol]

really, i though that when an ai uses a 'path' it disregards all barriers of the model whose 'path' its using...I've seen an Argo go through a Moloch to get to the dock point before...perhaps a pathing error?

[StratComm]

Originally posted by LtNarol
really, i though that when an ai uses a 'path' it disregards all barriers of the model whose 'path' its using...I've seen an Argo go through a Moloch to get to the dock point before...perhaps a pathing error?

That's true.  When I was pathing the Raynor, I got the docks and their paths reversed, so the argo I ordered to dock with it approached the Raynor backwards, went through the hull, and emerged on the othe side at the dock.  And it still made the docking sound and everything.

Originally posted by Sesquipedalian
I've be working on a new corvette, and have run into an extremely strange problem with it now that I've put in the docking points. When a transport docks with the thing, it will suddenly start flipping itself back and forth along its Z axis (ie, the nose where the tail should be and the tail where the nose should be) every video frame. This is really, really strange, and more than a little annoying.

Anyone have any idea what is going on, and how to fix it?

I think the problem is with the dock point itself; FS needs points per dock, to determine alignment.  If only one point is supplied, or, more likely, both points are defined as the same, the program gets confused.  The error you described seems to match that concept up fairly well.  Technically, as long as the line established by the two points of each dock match, the two ships will join in decent alignment; FS2 establishes the "normal" docking format (what all the models use) to be that the first point is the actual dock point, and the second is aproxomately 1 meter away in the direction of the dock "top" (less for fighters because of small scale).  Hope this helps, and that it's right.

If this makes no sense, or your docks still don't work with that format, send the model to [email protected] and I'd be happy to take a look at it.

[Sesquipedalian]

Two points supplied.  The second is exactly 1 meter further into the ship than is the first (i.e. the dock is on the bottom of the ship, so the second point is one meter higher on the Y axis).

Both the corvette and the transport exhibit this behaviour, functioning as a unit. The transport docks with the corvette, and then this "flipping" starts happening. The transport, when targetted, shows up on the hud as docked with the corvette, and continues to be properly oriented and in place as far as the dock point is concerned.  It seems like something is happening to cause FS2 to get confused regarding which way is forward and which way is backward along the corvette's Z axis.

I'll send you a copy of the thing anyway, StratComm, and thank you for the help.

[EdrickV]

If you have the dock on the bottom, then it seems to me the second point should be one meter down not up as up would put the second point inside the model.

[Grunt]

Make sure that only one transport has docking order at a time.
Having several of them with docking orders may cause similar problems.

[StratComm]

Originally posted by Sesquipedalian
Two points supplied.  The second is exactly 1 meter further into the ship than is the first (i.e. the dock is on the bottom of the ship, so the second point is one meter higher on the Y axis).

Both the corvette and the transport exhibit this behaviour, functioning as a unit. The transport docks with the corvette, and then this "flipping" starts happening. The transport, when targetted, shows up on the hud as docked with the corvette, and continues to be properly oriented and in place as far as the dock point is concerned.  It seems like something is happening to cause FS2 to get confused regarding which way is forward and which way is backward along the corvette's Z axis.

I'll send you a copy of the thing anyway, StratComm, and thank you for the help.

No, no , that's not what I was trying to say.  You must place both points on (or aproximately on) the ships hull.  What I intended was that the second point should be aprox. 1 meter away from the center of the dock, in the direction that you want the top of the docking ship to attach.  You are still dealing with a colinear problem, I think.  Let me play with the model and see what turns out.

EDIT:  I fixed the dock; it was a colinear thing.  The easy check is to use Modelview to look at the dock up close; if you can't see two distinct lines for each dock, it will cause this error.