GameEntityTemplate

15.21 Interface

Inheritance 2 ancestors · 5 siblings · 38 descendants

MapPlaceableBase&0xd738f7c9

Class Documentation

The authored definition of a game entity: a placed object of the game entity component system, such as a turret, a camp, a light, a sound or a locator. The client creates one GameEntity from each template. The entity takes its world transform from the template's transform and its name and tags from the properties below.

Where templates come from

Templates are placed on a map through MapContainer: each chunks bucket is a MapPlaceableContainer, and every item of its items map is a placed object. The client registers every template that it finds there under a key built from the item key and the map instance. A template that is the top-level object of a bin is also registered, under its object key, but the client does not create an entity from it at map load. A script can create one with SpawnEntityBlock.

When a map container is instanced at a world offset, the client copies each template as a GameEntityTemplateProxyLink. The copy carries the offset transform and a key that includes the instance index, so every instance creates its own entity of the same class.

Components

Every property of a template whose value is a component definition (an IGeComponentDef) adds one component to the entity. The property name is the role of the component; the definition says what the component does. A pointer property that is null adds no component. An embedded definition is always present, so it always adds its component.

The client sorts the definitions once, when the template loads: the NetworkingGeComponentDef first, the ScriptGeComponentDef second, and the others in ascending order of the hash of their runtime component class name. Components are created, spawned and activated in this order and deactivated in reverse order. A definition that builds no component leaves an empty slot, so component number n always belongs to definition n.

Creation at map load

After the map loads, the client creates an entity from every template that a map container places, whether or not the server also knows the template. Only the member templates of a PrefabEntityTemplate are skipped: the prefab creates them as its children. For each template the client:

Creates the entity of the template's class.
Creates its components in definition order.
Adds the entity to the name map (by name) and to the list of every tag it carries.
Spawns each component. Components read their definitions at this point.

When every entity exists, the client activates the entities whose 0xbbe68da1 is true, with one exception: the client never activates an entity that has a networking component. That entity waits until the server activates it. Entities without a networking component activate at load.

Networked entities

When the server spawns a networked entity, the client finds the template by name and looks for the entity that it already created at load. If the entity exists, the client only updates its transform and binds the server's network id to its networking component. Otherwise it creates the entity first. From then on the server activates, deactivates and moves the entity.

Per-frame update

Entities do not update themselves. When an entity activates, each of its components that ticks (see IUpdatableGeComponent) joins the client's tick list; when it deactivates, they leave it. Every frame the client ticks that list, so an inactive entity, or one without a ticking component, costs nothing per frame. Every 0.25 seconds of game time the client also sends a periodic event to the scripts of every active entity. Show and hide fades advance in the same frame update.

Reset and destruction

When the client resets the entity world, it deactivates every placed entity without events and destroys every entity that was created at run time. Then it activates again every remaining entity whose 0xbbe68da1 is true. An entity created at run time is also destroyed when it is deactivated.

Properties

0x9e5c6a2c

Hash

Removed in 15.22

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0xbbe68da1

Bool

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Whether the entity is active when it is created. The client activates the entity at map load and after a world reset only when this is true, and only if the entity has no networking component. A child of a prefab takes this state from its parent instead. When false, the entity exists but stays inactive until a script, a sequence or the server activates it.

inheritedTags

List2<Hash>

16.1

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Tags that the entity carries in addition to tags. The client adds them first. They act the same way as tags.

name

Hash

Documentation Edit documentation

Hash that identifies the entity. The client uses it as the key of the entity name map, which script blocks and sequence inputs such as SeqInputGameEntityObject search, and to match a server spawn to this template.