Power Bar?

[Moridin]

Hey guys. A quick question from me. In a few (very few) WC3 custom maps, I've seen a power bar, which I would like to replicate.

By a power bar, I mean:
1) Player clicks something / presses some button
2) Small bar appears and floats above player's hero unit
3) Bar slowly fills up, indicating power/stamina/etc.

Hope I made it understandable.

 

[KileRatZ]

Like this?

 

[Moridin]

Yeah, that's an accurate screenshot lol .

 

[HydraRancher]

I believe they are floating texts, which are constantly being moved. However, I do not know how to make a system such as this.

 

[KileRatZ]

Yeah, they're basically floating texts. Generally, you want to store them somehow (if it's only needed PUI, global arrays would suffice). Then you simply make sure the position, color, and text of these floating texts is refreshed every 0.03 seconds (should be enough to make it look OK).

The string of the floating text is usually done as a substring of "|||| |||| |||| ||||" (but with a lot more of these blocks). You can also use ' instead of |.

For example, if this bar would show your mana and your unit has 61% mana, you use a substring which only uses the first 61% of that "|||| |||| |||| ||||" string.

It's advisable to hide this floating text to everyone who can't see your unit at the moment (otherwise, the enemies could see it while you're using windwalk or are hidden by fog-of-war).

Also, if I remember correctly, the font you're using shouldn't have a size smaller than 6.00, as some machines won't show these texts otherwise :\.

I can show you how I've done it for my map, but it's PUI and pretty much all GUI.

 

[Moridin]

Wow thanks for the responses. Now that I have a basic idea I'll go play around with it until I'm happy. Thanks for the details KileRatz....especially the "hide this floating text to everyone who can't see your unit at the moment "....I wouldn't have thought of that .