VFX scripts are giving me a hard time.

[tuah]

I believe this might be the hardest part of the game I'm making. As many have done before, I'm trying to make add-ons through VFX. I've gotten the script right once, but it was a script to make it appear on the event, and it worked very nicely other than that I forgot to put Apply Together.

As for trying to put them on characters, it's not going so well. I've created the effect of a sword moving back and forth with the left arm (at intervals of 30F per full swing in both directions), and it worked quite nicely. The problem is that when I create a script for it, it just doesn't show up. I've tried all applicable event setups (including no event), along with script forms, and none of it has worked.

What scripts have you done to get this working?

Also, I want to make some items that appear on your character when you put them on. Would it be correct to make a variable to check if the item was on, and if so, then apply the VFX?

Hmmm... maybe this would be easier if I tried it together...

[manji]

maybe try making an action script, placing the VFX's appearance on a party character, then putting the event inside the enter map slot in game settings/adv. that way it always appears on a character.

i think that was mentioned somewhere on these boards before. maybe that could help? i don't know.

[tuah]

AH! An action script! That's what I was doing wrong. I'll try it out in a minute.

[Doan the Nado]

I don't think action scripts can affect party members. The thing to do is in the To Map/Facing script (an already pre-made one that should be called from every map's Enter Map script), apply your member's VFX. Make sure to do this after using Apply Together, or you will create an infinite loop. Set the repeat to 0, so that it goes on forever. Let me know if that helps your problem.

[tuah]

You're right, Doan, it didn't work...

I tried the thing you suggested, and aside from my mistakes in the animation, it worked well.
I do find that making it through the map/facing could get kind of difficult. Is there a way I could incorperate them together, but in a separate script?

Also, I'm still having trouble figuring out a way to apply the effect only when a certain item is equipped. I mainly just can't figure a way to ask the system whether the item is equppied or not.

[rpglover88]

Just simply make flags for each item. Put it all in one script. Make sure its SBC: Flag[blah,blah,blah]=on then the VFX. And when you wanna turn it on or off put it into a script that turns them on or off at the end. When you make the script make sure to call the script at the very bottom of the To Map/facing script. Hope this helped

[Rodak]

I use called scripts from the To Map / Facing script.

That works well and is easier to organize.

As for item equipping, there is a place to apply a script when you equip an item, so turning on the above mentioned flag could be done there. But there is no place to apply a script for unequipping items.

Check Dungeon Warden's FAQ for a variable that tracks the equipped item's database number.

I don't know it exists, but it should. And I recall seeing such a thing, but do not trust my foggy old memory.

Good Luck with it.

Peace.

[tuah]

rpglover88 said:

Just simply make flags for each item. Put it all in one script. Make sure its SBC: Flag[blah,blah,blah]=on then the VFX. And when you wanna turn it on or off put it into a script that turns them on or off at the end. When you make the script make sure to call the script at the very bottom of the To Map/facing script. Hope this helped

Well, I was thinking that would be a good idea, but I don't know how to designate the flag to check whether the item is equipped or not.

[rpglover88]

Ok, well make an item bag script. Make conditions to see if its on the character. if on= then use your VFX. If off then remove it. That might not make so much sense. Try Rodaks. His worked better than mine.

[tuah]

Well, the problem is that I can't figure out how to make it check if the item is worn... That's probably the only problem at this point. ^^;

[Doan the Nado]

How many member VFX do you want to display? I will assume you are displaying only the party leader, because that will make the script much easier. Bear with me, because it's been a while since I scripted, but you're going to want to do something like this:

Data: Variable 53 [Member Order] = 0
Use Member Order
Load Member Info
SB: Condition Variable 129 [Weapon Equipment] = #
Apply Together
Members > Screen Effects > Apply VFX
SB: End

# - the item number for the weapon that you are checking for. Also, if you are actually checking for armor, you should be using a different variable (such as armor equipment). One final note: there is actually a better way to do this using one of the script commands, but I can't remember what it is. Something where you select an item from a list and it puts its number into a variable. This helps because if the item number changes by deleting an item, you don't have to go back and change the script.

Okay, so now for the explanation. Setting the Member Order variable to 0 indicates that you are interested in the Party Leader. Use Member Order checks who is in slot 0 and places their corresponding Member Number into Variable 86. Then, Load Member Info gets all of the information for the member specified in Variable 86 and loads it into variables 97-133. Variable 129 now holds the item number for the equipped weapon, so you can use a script branch to see if the weapon is one which should apply a VFX to your Party Leader. If so, the VFX will be applied.

I hope that all makes sense. Any questions, feel free to ask me. You can simply call this script from the end of your To Map/Facing script, and then your To Map script won't look so messy.

[tuah]

Yes, it all makes sense now, Nado, thank you!

I've already got how I'm going to set up the script planned in my head, and now all I need is to play around with motion of the VFX a bit, and then I'm ready to create the visual aspects of the game!

[Doan the Nado]

That's good to hear. I'm glad I could help.