Held Item Modifiers

Held Item Modifiers

Modifiers add procedural motion to a held item: sway, bob, inertia, recoil, lowering and more. They are set per item, so a pistol can kick and sway differently from a rifle, and a cup does not need Wall Retract.

Held Item Profile

Modifiers live in a Held Item Profile asset. Create one from:

Create > Game Creator > Full Body Awareness Controller > Held Item Profile

Use one profile per kind of item, like one for rifles and one for pistols, or one per weapon. Assign it to the Profile field of a Held Item.

Items without their own profile use the rig's Default Profile. Setup Selected Character creates one with every modifier.

The modifier list works like Game Creator's own lists. Add Modifier... opens the picker. Each entry has a checkbox to turn it on or off, and can be collapsed, dragged, duplicated, copied, pasted and deleted. To leave a modifier out for one item, give that item a profile without it, or with it unticked.

Modifiers fade in and out when you switch items.

Values From Game Creator Properties

The values you are most likely to change during gameplay are Game Creator decimal properties. They can come from a variable, a stat or anything else. In the tables below, these are marked Yes in the Property column.

Inside these properties, Self is the Character and Target is the held item. When the item has no Held Item component, Target is the Character.

For example, point Recoil Kick's Strength at a "Recoil" stat that a weapon attachment lowers.

Tuning values like frequency, damping, limits and blend times, and the poses, stay plain numbers. This keeps the Live Preview nudge buttons working.

Placement In View

Changes where the item sits in view. Without this modifier, the item sits where the animation holds it.

Fixed works like a Counter-Strike view model. The rig's Hip Position and Hip Rotation do not apply to it. The quick motion of the animation, like the run cycle and reload gestures, still plays around the fixed pose, as much as Animated Hand Motion allows.

Look Pitch options:

Lock To View turns the item with the eye instead of the shoulders. The rig's Hip View Lock and Hip Max Up and Down are ignored for it. Looking far down, the arms can then reach into the body.

Look Sway

The item lags behind fast mouse or stick movement and springs back.

Movement Bob

Procedural bob while walking and running, on top of the animation.

The bob follows the character's footsteps when Sync To Footsteps is on in the rig's Locomotion section.

Breathing

The item rises and falls with each breath. It follows the Breathing rig on the character, with its Exertion and Rate. Without that rig it breathes calmly on its own. When the rig is switched off, the item stops too.

Inertia

The item lags behind when you start, stop, strafe and fall, and rolls into strafes.

Jump And Land

The item dips when jumping and kicks down when landing. Bigger falls kick harder.

Recoil Kick

Kicks the item and the camera for every Shooter 2 shot and every Recoil Kick instruction. Each weapon can kick in its own way. Shooter's own aim recoil is separate and still works.

By default the kick springs straight back, which suits light weapons like pistols. For a heavy weapon like a sniper rifle or a shotgun, set Recovery Time to 0.4 to 0.8. The kick then snaps out and comes back slowly. Hold Time keeps it at its peak for a moment first. The Frequency and Damping then only shape the snap.

Check While Aiming on weapons that are mostly fired through the sight. Set it high enough to feel the kick there.

Lower When Sprinting

Lowers and tilts the item into a carry pose while sprinting, and raises it when you slow down, aim, shoot or attack.

The character counts as sprinting above the rig's Locomotion > Sprint Speed.

Carry Pitch options:

For a lowered carry that moves the whole arm, use more Lowered Position, down and a little back, and less Lowered Rotation pitch. The position moves the whole arm, while the pitch mostly bends the wrist and forearm.

Wall Retract

Moves the item out of the way when it would go through a wall.

The inspector only shows the settings of the chosen mode.

Put enemies and other characters on their own layer and leave it out of Layers, so the item does not pull back when you walk up to them.

Attack Offset

Moves the item while attacking. Use it to bring a melee swing closer to the view without changing where the weapon sits the rest of the time. It is not in a new profile by default. Add it to the profile of a melee weapon.

It needs Lock Hand To View on the Held Item, and works with the Melee Integration, which tells the rig when an attack plays. Use the Hold Pose preview and the nudge buttons in the Live Preview to set it.

To see the offset on a real swing, pick a Melee Skill in Preview Skill and click Play Attack. Turn on Loop to play the Skill again each time it ends. The nudge buttons stay open while it loops, so you can move the swing and watch the result. The Skill plays the same way as in the game, so it can also hit objects in front of the Character.

Striker Sync records the weapon after the offset is applied, so the hits follow the moved swing.

Switch Modifiers Off for a While

Use the Active Held Item Modifier instruction on the Character, for example to turn off Movement Bob during a cutscene. It applies to whatever the Character holds and fades the motion out. Choosing Breathing also switches the chest breathing of the Breathing rig.

What Stays on the Camera

The camera's own motion, like head bob, the landing dip and strafe roll, stays on the Camera Shot. The camera kick for shots is part of the Recoil Kick modifier.