Spawn Component
The SpawnComponent is frequently used to spawn instances of prefabs at runtime. The component references a prefab. It can then either spawn this prefab continuously in intervals, or at will by triggering the spawn command from (script) code.
Properties
Prefab: The prefab that will be spawned by this component.
AttachAsChild: If true, the spawned object will be attached to the owner of the SpawnComponent. In most cases this should be disabled.
SpawnAtStart: If true, the SpawnComponent will spawn the prefab immediately when it gets activated.
SpawnContinuously: If true, the component will continue to spawn more and more prefab instances. This can only be stopped either through custom (script) code or by deleting the spawn component.
MinDelay, DelayRange: The minimum time that has to pass before the component will spawn another instance, plus some random delay. This not only applies to the SpawnContinuously case, but also to cases where the spawn may be triggered from code. Meaning, this can be used to limit how often an action is allowed. For example, a gun can use a SpawnComponent to launch projectiles, and the gun code can simply trigger the SpawnComponent every time the user clicks. However, due to the MinDelay, the gun will only fire every once in a while, without having to write that logic in the gun code.
Deviation: When a new prefab instance is created, it will be positioned at the location of the SpawnComponent. The Deviation allows you to add a random rotation away from the X axis. In Plasma most components use the +X axis as their main axis of operation. For instance, projectiles fly along +X, spot lights point into +X direction, etc. Therefore the SpawnComponent tilts the new instances away from the +X axis and all prefabs should be authored to work with this accordingly.
Details
See the API Docs for plSpawnComponent for the component's interface.
See Also
Prefabs