Character animation without using the Animator component

[wizardpoop]

I'm picking up on a project that I haven't worked on in over 6 months and "the UCC Opsive way" isn't fresh. What I'm ultimately after is the best way to tap into the character's locomotion values and ability changes to drive subsequent animations in script (various non-baked Tweens). I am not using the Animator component and thus am currently not sure what the next best recommended approach is (if there is one).

The character is a quadruped (mech computer bug) and it's leveraging IK for its base traversal movement. I'm very happy with this so far, but my questions regarding the various animations I want on its shell are:

1. If I'm not using the Animator component, is there some base class or recommended approach for facilitating custom animations in a script?
2. Is the "UCC Opsive way" to just create a new ability (for say something as trivial as moving vs. not moving) to get the hook to the movement and Tween from there?
3. Something else?

 

[Justin]

If you don't have an animator then for movement you will not want to use root motion (on the Ultimate Character Locomotion component). For anything beyond basic movement you will need to create an ability to do that movement.

The controller doesn't include any animation logic besides using the animator so you can use any solution that you come up with.

 

[wizardpoop]

I am properly not using Root Motion so thank you for confirming. Also, thanks for confirming that there isn't a recommended or best-practice for non-Animator animation so I can remove the FOMO of "not doing it the Opsive way".