#1: Advanced Ball Sockets.

One of my most frequently used tools is the advanced ballsocket. Now the good ol' ABS will usually not be the first thing you notice about a contraption. It usually sits in the background, completely unnoticeable until you take a good long look at the mechanics, but once you spot it, you realise how it can (very literally) make or break a contraption.

In this article, I'll be demonstrating some of my most frequently used presets and the next article will be about some of the cool tricks you can pull off with them.

The No Collide World

This one's a pretty simple trick. With the following settings, click once on the prop and then on the world. This will cause the prop to slide through the map terrain, so before you do it ensure that the prop you're using it on is frozen, otherwise the ground will swallow it up and it may crash the server if it falls far enough.

The Likewise Movement

By limiting the rotation to practically nothing, you can ensure that the two objects will always make exactly the same rotational movement, even if separated by large distances.

The Keep Upright.

Very similar to the likewise movement, except the Z rotation is free to rotate. The advantage of using a ballsocket in this manner over the keep upright tool is that the prop being kept upright doesn't have to be upright (or upside down) itself in order for it to be effective. The downside is that it can be unreliable and "conk out" in rare occasions. Simply click once on the prop and once on the world to place this sort of ABS.

These are just three very basic techniques, but this just means they have a wide variety of uses. In the next Kam's Workshop article I'll demonstrate the sorts of places you can use these ballsockets in your contraptions.