info_director

 info_director is a point entity available in the Left 4 Dead series.

It is the notorious AI Director, and must exist in every L4D and L4D2 map for normal gameplay.

The director is almost entirely automated and only exists at design-time for the few situations in which other designer-placed entities need to communicate with it, such as for forcing survivors to their respective info_survivor_position at the start of a campaign for camera intro sequences.

logic_director_query (in all games since ) can output the director's anger level, allowing level designers to adjust conditions according to how well the players are doing.

Forcing Survivor Positions

The director is capable of forcing all survivors to stand still at info_survivor_position, if they have a survivor name set.
This is used at the beginning of a campaign, to prevent the survivors from spawning underneath the map, or in finales to teleport the survivors out of the map to imply they are inside the escape vehicle.

For this to happen, go to the info_director outputs and add the following output:

	My Output	Target Entity	Target Input	Parameter	Delay	Only Once
	OnGameplayStart	!self	ForceSurvivorPositions	<none>	0.00	No
	OnGameplayStart	!self	ReleaseSurvivorPositions	<none>	0.20	No

Caveats

• Using the changelevel console command to restart the map will cause the director to ignore the forcesurvivorpositions input.

If you are restarting the map after a fresh compile using changelevel and you need to test out your intro sequence, use the kill console command afterwards to have the mission fail, this will cause the map to restart in a way that allows the info_director to use forcesurvivorpositions input, which will also allow your cameras to function.

• logic_auto cannot trigger forcesurvivorpositions unless the map was freshly loaded from the game menu as a campaign, or is restarting after mission failure.

To get around this, have the director call forcesurvivorpositions and releasesurvivorpositions on itself using the ongamestart input. When your campaign is ready for release, you can safely change it back to using a logic_auto before final compilation if you wish, since players will be loading your campaign from the game menu.

Keyvalues

Targetname:

Name (targetname) <string>

The targetname that other entities refer to this entity by.

Origin:

Origin (X Y Z) (origin) <origin>

The position of this entity's center in the world. Rotating entities typically rotate around their origin.

Inputs

Original inputs

PanicEvent

Fired when a major event happens that the director should know about.

PanicEventControlled <int>

Like Panic Event, but allows for some control of intensity, via the number of waves. Standard values are 1 for earlier maps, 2 for later maps.

 Note: PanicEventControlled only works in L4D1. In L4D2, a series of panic event (and much more!) are triggered by running director vscripts.

ForceSurvivorPositions

Make each survivor stand at an info_survivor_position.

 Note: Also hides HUD, except Survival and Scavenge specific HUD overlays.

ReleaseSurvivorPositions

Allow survivors to move freely again.

 Note: Also enables HUD again.

FireConceptToAny <string>

Fire a speech concept to any survivor that is capable of speaking it. Allows survivor dialogue to be triggered by map entities (e.g. No Mercy's elevator with parameter hospital04_path4)

StartIntro

Fire when the intro starts. Players are immune to damage while this is active. No mobs or SI will spawn.

FinishIntro

Fire when the intro ends. Players will now take damage. Mobs and SI can spawn given that the player is no longer standing in a nav square marked as PLAYER_START and/or CHECKPOINT.

EnableTankFrustration

Can be used to enable the tank frustration meter.

DisableTankFrustration

Can be used to disable the tank frustration meter.

Targetname:

Kill

Removes this entity from the world.

KillHierarchy

Removes this entity and its children from the world.

 Note: Entities already remove orphaned children upon being removed, but this input removes all children on the same frame, being marginally faster than Kill.

AddOutput <string>

Adds a keyvalue/output to this entity. It can be potentially very dangerous, use with care.
KV Format: <key> <value>
I/O Format: <output name> <targetname>:<inputname>:<parameter>:<delay>:<max times to fire, -1 means infinite>

FireUser1 to FireUser4

Fire the OnUser outputs; see User Inputs and Outputs.

Use  !FGD

Same as a player invoking +use; may not do anything depending on the entity. Can also be invoked by firing an output that does not specify an input.

RunScriptFile <script> (in all games since )

Execute a VScript file from disk, without file extension. The script contents are merged with the script scope of the receiving entity.

RunScriptCode <string> (in all games since )

Execute a string of VScript source code in the scope of the entity receiving the input. String quotation may be needed when fired via console.

 Bug: In , the code is executed in the script scope of the entity that fires the output, not the one receiving the input.

 Warning: Never try to pass string parameters to a script function with this input. It will corrupt the VMF structure because of the nested quotation marks, which then must be removed manually with a text editor.

CallScriptFunction <string> (in all games since ) !FGD

Execute a VScript function in the scope of the receiving entity.

SetLocalOrigin <coordinates> (in all games since ) !FGD

Send this entity to a spot in the map. If the entity is parented to something, it will be offset from the parent by this amount.

SetLocalAngles <angles> (in all games since ) !FGD

Set this entity's angles.

Additional inputs

The following are additional inputs only available in L4D2.

BeginScript <string>

EndScript

Begin/End a Director VScript. "BeginScript" will automatically end any running scripts, to start another one.

ScriptedPanicEvent

Run a Scripted Panic Event, a staged event similar to a finale.

ForcePanicEvent

Trigger a panic event, no matter what else is going on.

EndCustomScriptedStage

End a scripted type finale stage.

IncrementTeamScore <int>

Increment a team's score. (2=survivors, 3=infected)

CreateNewJournal <string>

Create a new journal.

WriteToJournal <string>

Add a task to the I/O Journal.

ExecuteJournal <string>

Execute all tasks in the specified journal

RefreshInitialSpawnPositions

To do: seems to teleport survivors to the positions they spawned from.

Outputs

Original outputs

OnGameplayStart

Fired when a map loads, all players join and gameplay begins.

OnPanicEventFinished

Fired when a panic event is finished.

Targetname:

OnUser1 to OnUser4

These outputs each fire in response to the firing of the like-numbered FireUser1 to FireUser4 Input; see User Inputs and Outputs.

OnKilled  (only in )

This output fires when the entity is killed and removed from the game.

Additional outputs

The following are additional outputs only available in L4D2. They focus on the new scavenge game mode and vscripts.

OnCustomPanicStageFinished

Fired when each stage of a custom panic event or custom finale finishes. Relies on vscripts.

OnTeamScored

Fired when a team places a scavenge item in the scavenge goal.

OnScavengeRoundStart

Fired when a scavenge round starts.

OnScavengeOvertimeStart

Timer has run out and game went into overtime.

OnScavengeOvertimeCancel

Time was added to the clock, ending overtime.

OnScavengeTimerExpired

Time has run out, game did not enter overtime.

OnScavengeIntensityChanged <int>

Intensity level has changed. 1 = highest intensity, decreases as number gets larger.

OnUserDefinedScriptEvent1-4

Generic user defined event fired from a squirrel script (UserDefinedEvent1()-UserDefinedEvent4())

See also

• info_survivor_position
• L4D Level Design/Panic Events
• L4D2 vscripts
• Director Scripts
• logic_director_query
• trigger_finale