Lifetime

Property of: Trail

Value Type: float

Description:

The Lifetime property determines how long each segment in its Trail will last in seconds. Once a segment is drawn, it will wait for the given lifetime (measured in seconds) and then will disappear. The lifetime property defaults to 2 seconds, but can be set anywhere between 0.01 and 20.

The lifetime of a trail is also used by that effect’s Trail/Color and Trail/Transparency properties to determine how each segment is drawn. Both of these properties are sequences, meaning that they define their values at certain keypoints in the segement’s lifetime and then interpolate between the values as the segment ages.

If a trail’s lifetime changes while there are still segments that the trail has drawn, these segments will immediately behave as if they always had the new lifetime. This means that if they have existed for longer than the lifetime they will be removed immediately.

Code Samples

Setting a Trail's Lifetime

This example demonstrates the the effects of setting and changing a trail’s Lifetime property.

In order to do this, we must first create a BasePart, part, which will be the parent of the trail.

Then, we create two attachments, attachment0 and attachment1, both parented to part. The positions of these two attachments, more importantly the distance between them, determines where the trail is drawn as part moves.

For these attachments to create a trail as described, we create a new Trail and parent it to part. We then connect attachment0 to Trail/Attachment0 and attachment1 to Trail/Attachment1.

In this example, we alternate between a trail Lifetime of 0.5 and 5.5 seconds by switching between the two values every 5 seconds.

Finally, to demo the property’s affect on the trail’s lifetime, the example relies on TweenService’s TweenService/Create to move part back and forth to continuously drawn a trail.

			
				Setting a Trail's Lifetime

				Expected Output
			
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			-- Create a new BasePart
local part = Instance.new("Part")
part.Parent = game.Workspace
part.Anchored = true
part.Position = Vector3.new(0,5,0)

-- Create 2 attachments
local attachment0 = Instance.new("Attachment")
attachment0.Name = "Attachment0"
attachment0.Parent = part
attachment0.Position = Vector3.new(-2,0,0)

local attachment1 = Instance.new("Attachment")
attachment1.Name = "Attachment1"
attachment1.Parent = part
attachment1.Position = Vector3.new(2,0,0)

-- Create a new Trail
local trail = Instance.new("Trail")
trail.Parent = part
trail.Attachment0 = attachment0
trail.Attachment1 = attachment1
trail.Lifetime = 0.4

-- Tween part to display trail
local TweenService = game:GetService("TweenService")

local dir = 15
local life = -5
while true do
	dir = dir*-1

	life = life*-1
	trail.Lifetime = trail.Lifetime + life

	local goal = {}
	goal.Position = part.Position + Vector3.new(0,0,dir)
 
	local tweenInfo = TweenInfo.new(5)
	local tween = TweenService:Create(part, tweenInfo, goal)
 	tween:Play()

	wait(5)
end
		
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