Teams

Before this: World Control, Shuffling

A game mode can sort players into teams, and a circuit can do the sorting itself. This lesson splits everyone in a lobby into two random teams at the press of a button, then builds pads that let players pick their own team.

Needs admin to load: it uses Get Team By Name and Set Player Team.

Code
Run
Under the Hood
Modify
Make
Good to Know

zone "Zone Ref" -> chip lobby
button Held -> chip pick

Code

@left in lobby: zone
@left in pick: exec
var players: character[]

on pick {
  players.fillFromZonePlayers(lobby)
  players.shuffle()
  let red = GetTeamByName("Red")
  let blue = GetTeamByName("Blue")
  for i, p in players {
    if i % 2 == 0 {
      p.SetTeam(red)
    } else {
      p.SetTeam(blue)
    }
  }
}

players.fillFromZonePlayers(lobby) fills the array with every player standing in the zone, replacing what was there.
shuffle() puts them in a random order, as in Shuffling, and the i % 2 split from there puts the even places on Red and the odd places on Blue.
GetTeamByName("Red") finds the team with that name, and p.SetTeam(red) moves a player onto it.

Five players stand in the lobby. How many end up on each team? Press again: can a player land on the team they were already on?

Run

Set up the world’s game mode with two teams named exactly Red and Blue.
Compile the chip and paste it in-game. Give a brick an Attached Zone for the lobby, and place a Button.
Wire the Attached Zone’s Zone Ref to lobby and the Button’s Held to pick.
Stand in the lobby with your friends and press the button. Each player moves to Red or Blue. Press again for a new draw.

Under the Hood

Open the chip. The chain is Get Players In Zone, Shuffle Array, then two Get Team By Name gates, each with its team name typed in. The loop is a For Each Array microchip with a Modulo and a Branch inside, and one Set Player Team on each side of the Branch.

The two teams are found once, before the loop. Their Team outputs reach the Set Player Team gates through two pins on the side of the loop chip, the same way any wire crosses into a chip.

A team is an entity: a reference to a thing in the world, like a player is. Set Player Team takes a player in its Player State input. The loop’s players are characters, and a character wired into that input stands for its player.

Modify

Pin the teams. p.SetTeam(red, pin = true) pins the player to Red, so the game mode’s own team sorting does not move them later.
Tell each player their team. Inside the loop, after the Branch, add p.ShowChatMessage(...) with “You are on Red” or “You are on Blue”.

Let players choose. Two pads, one per team, each with its own Attached Zone:

@left in redPad: zone
@left in bluePad: zone

on ZoneEntered(zone = redPad) -> (character) {
  let red = GetTeamByName("Red")
  character.SetTeam(red, pin = true)
  character.ShowChatMessage("You joined Red")
}

on ZoneEntered(zone = bluePad) -> (character) {
  let blue = GetTeamByName("Blue")
  character.SetTeam(blue, pin = true)
  character.ShowChatMessage("You joined Blue")
}

Make

Make a captain draft. Two captains each stand on a pad. Every press of a button moves the next player from the lobby onto the team whose turn it is, alternating Red and Blue, until the lobby is empty.

zone1 "Zone Ref" -> chip lobby
zone2 "Zone Ref" -> chip redPad
zone3 "Zone Ref" -> chip bluePad
button Held -> chip pick

Good to Know

SetTeam moves a player whatever the team’s join rules say. A team that was not found is empty, and an empty team takes the player off their team. Check the team names in the game mode if players end up on no team.
Pinned players stay where they are put. Use SetTeamPinned(false) on a player to let the game mode sort them again.
With one player in the lobby you only ever see Red. Test the split with friends, or check the Shuffling lesson’s typed-in names first.

See GetTeamByName, SetTeam and Zone array fills in the reference.

Next: Persistent Players.

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