Help needed with a fling panel instance
I'd appreciate some help with an instance for a fling panel I'm trying to create. It consists of four arms (models/anim_wp/room_transform/arm64x64_interior.mdl with the trustflings_platfor_b## animations). They'll push a panel out of the wall and rotate it 45?.
I'd prefer to keep the panel separate from the instance. That means I have to parent it to one of the arms. Is there a convinient way to do this by using the replace functionality in func_instance? I've tried to use a logic_auto within the instance to set the parent and the attachment, but without success.
Also, there's a func_door with the tools/toolsinvisible material under the arms that opens out so the player and physical objects can't pass through the arms when they're extended. The problem is that the func_door also blocks hard light bridges, which looks odd.
And lastly, is there a list of animations for fling panels somewhere? By that I mean animations suitable for 128?128 or 64?128 size panels. It's hard to find something useful. For example, the animations I mentioned above do unfortunately only extend the arms, not retract them.
Sadly can't help you with all your current problems.. but what i can tell you... is that if you open the portal 2 authoring tools you can open the model viewer... select the model you are using atm and it will show you all of it's animations.... but beware, there are hundreds of animations! 
Yes, I know there're a lot of them, hence the question. Although you can preview them, it's hard to know how they can be made working together, like the ones with the trustflings_platfor_ prefix.
You can set them to work together by using input/output to SetAnimation and then the animation name? I believe I did that in CS:S/HL2.
Else take a look at the mp_coop_doors reference vmf there is, there are some fling panels with a logic_auto connected to the instance.
I know how to use them. What I meant was that it's hard to know which animations that are meant to work together on a 128?128 or 64?128 size panel as stated in my first post. Besides, the mp_coop_doors map doesn't contain any fling panels (?).
I've dug through the FGD file a little and it seems like the "Name" property of entities are of the "target_destination" type. I thought I might have had the wrong parameter type, but still no luck. Maybe it has to do with the order Hammer inserts the instances? Maybe the "Name" property can't be found at the time of insertion so it's ignored? Has someone been able to parent entities in one instance with entities in another?
I don't really like instances very much so I hardly ever use them, (which means this will probably not solve anything,) but you could create an info_target and parent it to one instance and have the other instance parented to the info_target.
I tried the following:
I have two instances, one for the four arm models and one for the panel.
- In the arm instance there's a "logic_auto" which sets one of the arm models as parent for a variable called "$panel" of type "target_destination". The attachment point (with a maintained offset) is set 0.1 seconds after.
- In the panel instance I set the parent of the panel brush to "$parent", which also is a "target_destination".
- In the map, I place an "info_target" and put its name in "$panel" and in "$parent".
This doesn't work. I'm starting to wonder if it's impossible for an instance to parent entities outside it to entities inside it. Maybe prefabs is the only way to go 
EDIT:
I took advantage of the debug features in-game and apparently Hammer modifies the variable when it's used as a parent's name. So what should be "my_panel_name" is now "my_instance_name-my_panel_name", despite it's not a name of an entity inside the instance. Any ideas on how to circumvent this? I still need the prefix for the other entities inside it.