bugfix: Occupants killed by their containers now kill their occupants

[Stubbjax]

Closes #184

This change fixes an issue where occupants killed via the destruction of their container do not kill their occupants, and so on. For example, if a Chinook containing a Troop Crawler dies, the Red Guards inside the Troop Crawler survive and fall to the ground, which looks silly and can leave them floating in the air.

Before

A Troop Crawler dies inside a Chinook, but its occupants survive and fall to the ground or float in the air

YES_SURVIVORS.mp4

After

A Troop Crawler dies inside a Chinook, and kills its own occupants as a result

NO_SURVIVORS.mp4

[greptile-apps]

Greptile Summary

This PR fixes a recursive container death bug where occupants inside nested containers (e.g., Red Guards inside a Troop Crawler inside a Chinook) would survive when the outer container died.

Key Changes:

• Added percentDamage parameter to processDamageToContained() to enable consistent damage propagation through nested containers
• Reordered operations in onDie() for non-retail builds to call killRidersWhoAreNotFreeToExit() before processDamageToContained(), ensuring proper handling of nested containers
• Added DISABLED_HELD check in isSpecificRiderFreeToExit() to prevent nested containers from exiting when their parent container is disabled
• Introduced specific death types (DEATH_BURNED vs DEATH_NORMAL) to prevent infantry corpses from dropping out of dying containers

The fix works by ensuring that when a container dies and kills its occupants, those occupants' own onDie() methods are triggered, which then recursively kill their own occupants through the callback chain.

Confidence Score: 5/5

• This PR is safe to merge with minimal risk
• The changes are well-structured and address the reported bug correctly. The logic uses conditional compilation to maintain retail compatibility, the parameter passing is consistent across all implementations, and the recursive death chain through onDie() callbacks ensures nested occupants are properly handled. Previous review comments have been addressed.
• No files require special attention

Important Files Changed

Filename	Overview
Generals/Code/GameEngine/Source/GameLogic/Object/Contain/OpenContain.cpp	Reordered operations in onDie() and updated processDamageToContained() to use parameter instead of module data
Generals/Code/GameEngine/Source/GameLogic/Object/Contain/TransportContain.cpp	Added death type specification and DISABLED_HELD check for nested containers
GeneralsMD/Code/GameEngine/Source/GameLogic/Object/Contain/OpenContain.cpp	Reordered operations in onDie() and introduced killContained boolean for clearer logic
GeneralsMD/Code/GameEngine/Source/GameLogic/Object/Contain/TransportContain.cpp	Added death type specification and DISABLED_HELD check for nested containers

_{Last reviewed commit: 93adcf7}

[greptile-apps]

_{2 files reviewed, 1 comment}

_{Edit Code Review Agent Settings | Greptile}

[greptile-apps]

_{2 files reviewed, 3 comments}

_{Edit Code Review Agent Settings | Greptile}

[greptile-apps]

Additional Comments (1)

Generals/Code/GameEngine/Source/GameLogic/Object/Contain/OpenContain.cpp
Should use percentDamage parameter instead of data->m_damagePercentageToUnits to match the GeneralsMD implementation and ensure nested containers receive the correct damage value.

		Real damage = object->getBodyModule()->getMaxHealth() * percentDamage;

Prompt To Fix With AI

This is a comment left during a code review.
Path: Generals/Code/GameEngine/Source/GameLogic/Object/Contain/OpenContain.cpp
Line: 1307:1307

Comment:
Should use `percentDamage` parameter instead of `data->m_damagePercentageToUnits` to match the GeneralsMD implementation and ensure nested containers receive the correct damage value.

```suggestion
		Real damage = object->getBodyModule()->getMaxHealth() * percentDamage;
```

How can I resolve this? If you propose a fix, please make it concise.

[xezon]

Does this also happen with Troopcrawler in helix?

[Stubbjax]

Does this also happen with Troopcrawler in helix?

A Troop Crawler takes up eight slots and thus cannot fit inside a Helix. But we can demonstrate the same behaviour with a Helix by loading an Ambulance or Technical.

AMBO_LIX.mp4

[xezon]

This change will need to be Merged With Rebase, because the unify commit needs to be kept separate. The commit titles need to be fit to standard.

[xezon]

Is this condition correct? What if the damage dealt to occupants is just 0.5? Shouldn't that also transfer the damage?

[Stubbjax]

Why? If a Humvee could be stored inside an Overlord, and the Overlord was destroyed, would it make sense to apply that 0.5 damage to the Humvee's passengers in addition to the Humvee itself? There is no precedent for this.

[xezon]

Yes if the health of the contained transport is 0.4 and the damage is 0.5, then we want to kill the passengers of the transport as well right? Or will they be killed anyway? If they are, then it begs the question why is the damage applied in that event but not when applying 1.0 damage?

[Stubbjax]

Upon further investigation, it turns out that the DamagePercentToUnits defined in the Chinook / Helix TransportContain modules is a red herring. Setting either of these fields to a value < 100% still results in the contained units dying, which is due to a call to killRidersWhoAreNotFreeToExit (though this causes the infantry corpses to drop out like vehicles do due to the lack of the burned death type via this logic path).

Only the direct occupants of airborne containers are considered not FREE_TO_EXIT (see ChinookAIUpdate::getAiFreeToExit), which prevents the killRidersWhoAreNotFreeToExit logic from triggering for successive occupants of contained transports such as those inside contained Troop Crawlers. It would seem killRidersWhoAreNotFreeToExit was never called in retail anyway due to the DamagePercentToUnits applying first, which is always set to 100% for airborne containers (where the FREE_TO_EXIT status applies).

I've solved this by returning false if the parent container has the held status in the isSpecificRiderFreeToExit function. I've also swapped the order of killRidersWhoAreNotFreeToExit and processDamageToContained, which avoids calling redundant logic in cases where riders are not FREE_TO_EXIT and DamagePercentToUnits < 100%.