[PATCH] Add optional attribute to action element for beginning of sound playback

[stwf]

This is a feature request from Pureon to support having a sound file that begins at a different time than the action animation.

Here is a copy of the email

1) For siege weapons and probably other units we need a new actor time value that can be set separately from the 'event' trigger (which fires when the weapon's projectile is released). Our attack sound effects currently start on the 'event', but for catapults and some other units the sound effects should start much earlier - for example when the Roman Ballista is being cranked ready to fire, that's when the cranking sound should start.

What we have now is:

<animation event="0.75" load="0.7" file="mechanical/rome_ballista_atttack.dae" name="Melee" speed="150"/>

Which fires the sound and projectile at event="0.75" and the projectile appears on the Ballista at load="0.7"

What we would like to have is something like this:

<animation event="0.75" load="0.7" sound="0.1" file="mechanical/rome_ballista_atttack.dae" name="Melee" speed="150"/>

Here the sound would start to play at sound="0.1" of the catapult cranking + firing animation.

[stwf]

patch file

[historic_bruno]

I tested the patch with the given example of a Roman ballista, it seems to work, but I have some questions, mostly for Pureon:

• Would we need a new sound recorded that combines both the winding and firing actions in a single sound?
• Would that be a pain to synchronize between the animation and the sound, as well as meaning if the catapult can fire faster for some gameplay reason, the sound still won't be synced? (I'm sure this is something we already deal with but maybe not this obvious an example)