Is this possible?

[Rolina]

I was wanting to know if it was somehow possible to modify GS in a way so that even party members whom have not been gotten yet have the same amount of experience you do when you get them, regardless of how much experience you may have at the time.

For example, in GS1, Ivan showed up at level 4, and Mia at level 10.  However, I was wondering if it were possible to have them to INSTEAD have the same about of experience that your party has gained upon their joining.  So if Isaac and Garet had 115 when they met Ivan, he'd have that much as well when he joined.  And if they had 1024 total experience when meeting Mia, she'd have that much total as well.  Likewise, their levels would be as the experience dictated (Level 3 for Ivan, and 7 for Mia).

Is it possible to provide a way to do this for the GS3 edits via the editor, or do you not know enough of the code yet to be able to give a yes or no answer?

[Atrius (He/Him)]

This is the kinda stuff I'm adding a "Code Patches" menu to the editor for, good suggestion.

I'm not sure how I would do that right now, but I'll look into it.  

[weckar]

What if Isaac ad Garet didn't have the same exp when meeting Ivan?

[Atrius (He/Him)]

Trying to do something like that would be a lot trickier, I haven't even found how the weapon's sprites are chosen in battle yet.  There's absolutely nothing with the rest of the item data that would indicate which type of weapon they are, even who can equip them is defined for each item individually.

[Rolina]

Well, I figured it'd be done the same way as the sprites, so lemme know when you find out.

Lastly, I'd LOVE to know... If we were to provide enough sprites, could we make it to where it's the person leftmost in the party that shows up on the world map?  I mean, for example, if you order by Agility, like I do, instead of Isaac or Felix, it'd be Ivan on the world map?

Edit: Okay, I lied:  There's more.

Field Affects

I was always irked by how showing up at a lighthouse or elemental rock had really no affect one way or another on characters.  Is it possible to have, say in Air's Rock, Venus adepts to regain psy half as fast as normal when walking around, and for Jupiter ones to have 1.5x the recovery rate?

Also, for battles...

*HarpyA has appeared!
*HarpyB has appeared!
*Jupiter's power is strong...
*Kari's party attacks first!

For something like that, could it be done, and have a way of, say, boosting Jupiter's power by 20, and dropping Venus' by 20?  It'd make sense in areas of a strong elemental power...

[Rolina]

I said how much you got.  As in each time you get XP, everyone who has not yet joined the party gets some.  As such, it is possible, in the case of Isaac going down once, and Garet going down once, that Ivan has more than both of them, since fallen characters get no XP.


I also wanna know if it's possible to get different types of weapons to do different things.  For example, for purposes of balancing, I was planning on the following:

Axes: -15 elemental power
Long Swords: -10 elemental power
Light Blades: -5 elemental power
Scythes: Neutral (will replace staves for Spellsword characters like Ivan and Jenna in my edit)
Maces: +5 elemental power
Ankhs: +10 elemental power
Staves: +15 elemental power

If there is a way to cause the appropriate equipment types to automatically do this without having to take up all 4 affect slots, that'd be awesome.  Needless to say, I plan on making axes much stronger, as well as doing quite a bit more balancing for weapons and psynergies in the game.  I mean, they already affect what battle sprite is used.  So I wanna know if you can have them automatically affect their elemental power in a similar manner.

[weckar]

You sure seem ambitious wil this, Role. Maybe we should wait with this kind of expanding until we can control whst's already in the game?

Btw, Atrius: I'm doing some black magic on the ROM myself. If I find any interesting values I'll be sure to let you know.

[Atrius (He/Him)]

Btw, Atrius: I'm doing some black magic on the ROM myself. If I find any interesting values I'll be sure to let you know.

Nice, do keep me informed, I'd appreciate it.

[Rolina]

Cut scenes?  When they all split up and talk?  Couldn't those just go as normal?

And yes, I've got lots of plan and ideas, many of which I'd like to implement.


Like this!

Is there a way to have new types of effects?  For example, I want to try to put in an 'enraged' effect.  There's a chance you can become enraged when you get hit, proportional to how much HP you have left, and it acts like having Impact cast on you.

If your HP is >50% (in the white), when you get hit there's a 1% chance to become enraged.
If your HP is <50% (in the yellow), when you get hit there's a 5% chance to become enraged

Example:

Thunder LizardA uses Lightning Breath!
Ila takes 68 damage!!!
Aiden takes 71 damage!
Aiden becomes enraged!
Aiden's attack raises by 43!
Kari takes 42 damage.

Also, with certain storyline battles, different characters can start enraged...

Right now, though, all I want is to know if it's POSSIBLE.  If it is, great.  That way, there can be an eventual release of the editor with tools to allow such things.  If not, oh well.  But it's not like I'm programming the editor.  This is for when you've got time to check, I'm not demanding you do it right now or anything.

[Atrius (He/Him)]

Having the person who's leftmost in your party be the one you play as would cause a lot of problems with cut scenes.

I'll look into Field Effects, I can't really say anything one way or the other right now.

[Atrius (He/Him)]

Cut scenes?  When they all split up and talk?  Couldn't those just go as normal?

Nope, there's no code to add Felix if he's not already there.


No idea on the Enraged effect right now.

[Rolina]

...Huh?  'Add Felix if he's not already there'?  What are you talking about?  I'm saying we can control who's moving around on the world map, and have it NOT be the main character if we don't want it too.  SEE:  Jenna.  Back when we could move her around, and not Felix.  Basically, what I'm talking about is being able to choose who's being shown on the world map.  Like in the Tales Of games.




Do you know if we can give enemies immunity to a certain element?

I plan on taking the Balls found with the Star Magician and changing them into 'elementals'.  They show up in places that would have field effects (example:  Venus Elemental (formerly Guard Ball) would show up at Gaia Rock).  I already planned on maxing out their Power and Resistance for that element, but is there a way we could give them immunity to the element they represent?

Taking it a step further, in the Sol Sactum, where the power of the elements is at its highest, the so-called 'Sol Elemental' would show up... Is it possible to give complete immunity to ALL the elements?

This would include attacks from elemental weapons, unleashes, summons, psynergy, djinn... ANYTHING with a particular elemental attribute.  Likewise, in the room where the seal upon the star chamber was, the so-called 'Luna Elemental', being immune to any non-elemental attack.

...Don't go yelling at me for putting them.  Sol is the Symbol of alchemy itself, and Luna is its opposite, and in my story, is a Symbol representing the absence of or seal on Alchemy.  After all, before the Anemos took off, there WAS NO LUNA.  And yet, the elements were housed in the SOL Sanctum, suggesting that it already was used as a symbol.  Luna must have been there for a reason, and in that one room for a reason.  

Anywho, Sol and Luna aren't elements, but symbols.  However, the enemies I was planning to use I was hoping to force the player to use a bit more strategy with.

I'm guessing that it'd be related to how Sentinel is immune to psynergy, and would use similar code... but, well, I'm not the code expert here.  That's why I'm asking you. ^-^


Also, interesting note...

Just realized that YELLOW health starts at 25% or 20%, one of the two.  That's good, as it gives an overall less chance of the 'enraged' effect, should it be plausible.  It's supposed to be a rare effect.  So yeah, I made an error in my previous post.

[Rolina]

It's been 11 days, so I feel it safe to post again with another question.

This one should be easy.  I think.

Is it possible to give people multiple Face Icons, reflecting their emotions?  Example:

Neutral/Normal (such as in original GS)
Happy
Angry
Shocked
Hurt/Upset
Distraught/Devastated/Horrified

Or would that not be possible?  I mean, I assume what Face Icon to use is determined by the Text Editor, but I'm not the leet code expert here, so I wanna double check and ask you, just in case.

If we CAN do it, great.  We'd need to expand the part with the Face Icons, of course, but it'd still at least be doable...

If not... blarg.

[Atrius (He/Him)]

Actually face icons aren't done through the text code, they're assigned to the sprite sets.  When a message box is created it's assigned to a specific NPC (or the player's character on rare occasions) so it can automatically be positioned near them on-screen, and use their character portrait if they have one.

It'd actually take quite a bit of work to accomplish that.


Sorry for not answering the question about immunities before, I'm not sure about that one yet.

[Rolina]

Blarg... I'd have loved to have been able to do that... Oh well.  When I think up something else, I'll be sure to post it.

Also, about the 'overworld sprite display'...  Do you know if we'd be able to change who in our party is being displayed on the overworld when we're running around?  For example, in FF1, the first member of the party (or person in the top-most party position) was the one who was walking around on-screen.  When all four party members needed to be preset, scenes progressed normally, they just spit up to do it.

I'm asking about something similar to that.  In scenes, the code would designate who goes where and says what, regardless of order in the party (like it does normally).  Outside of scenes, though, when they all 'group together' into the leader's sprite, is there any way to change who's displayed while they move around?

This is assuming everyone has a full sprite set, of course.

[Atrius (He/Him)]

Like I said, if Felix isn't already on screen, there isn't any code in the cut scenes to put him there right now.  They'd each have to be edited, or Felix wouldn't appear during any cut scenes if you weren't playing as him.

Felix is the only one with a complete sprite set anyway.  Isaac, and Jenna's are closer than the rest though since all of Isaac's sprites from the first game are there, and you play as Jenna during the beginning of the game.  They're still missing some animations, like climbing the ropes you use Lash on.

[Atrius (He/Him)]

Well... The game's engine itself would easily allow it, it's just the cut scenes that are the problem.  If you could edit the cut scenes to handle it properly, it'd be fine.

[Rolina]

*facepalms*  I DID mention that the requirement would be to provide a full set of sprites for all the other characters.

So basically, if you were to do it in a way that replaced Felix and, oh, say Garet's positions, you would get 2 Garets in cutscenes and not a Garet and Felix?

Hmm... that's annoying.  I've always wanted to choose who I have running around on the world map, but I'm always stuck with Isaac and Felix, except for that ONE time you get to play as Jenna...

I mean, I don't wanna do what was done like when they REPLACED his sprite with Link, for instance, rather I just wanna choose who's on the screen...  It's too bad that they coded it in a way that prevents that, though.

[Rolina]

Oh, I see.  Well, in my homebrew game I eventually hope to make with these tools, I'll be using different characters, story, and cutscenes, so...  I guess the easiest thing to do is to have each character go to their set positions.  

So, for instance, though Kari will be the main character, if you want Ila to be the one you move around in the world map, just make her the Left-most character.  However, when a cutscene comes up, each character, regardless of order in the party, will go to their own set position.

Kinda like in ALL of the Tales Of games.



Also, here's an interesting idea.  Can we edit caps?  For example, I want to know if we can extend the Power/Resistance cap from 200, to, say, 500.  Is that possible?  How about for stuff like Enemy HP?  I site Dullahan Hard Mode as my example of why it's a good idea to look in to.



Another thing... Are the stat %ages for classes limited to multiples of ten (currently, it's 110, 120, 100, 80, etc), or are we able to enter other values, such as multiples of 5 (105, 165, etc)?

[Atrius (He/Him)]

Oh, I see.  Well, in my homebrew game I eventually hope to make with these tools, I'll be using different characters, story, and cutscenes, so...  I guess the easiest thing to do is to have each character go to their set positions. 

So, for instance, though Kari will be the main character, if you want Ila to be the one you move around in the world map, just make her the Left-most character.  However, when a cutscene comes up, each character, regardless of order in the party, will go to their own set position.

Kinda like in ALL of the Tales Of games.

Ah, alright.  I'll try to get a code patch in to set it up at some point, there are still some other problems that could come up though...

Also, here's an interesting idea.  Can we edit caps?  For example, I want to know if we can extend the Power/Resistance cap from 200, to, say, 500.  Is that possible?  How about for stuff like Enemy HP?  I site Dullahan Hard Mode as my example of why it's a good idea to look in to.

Power/Resistance is stored as a single byte, so the highest the data format will even allow it go is 255.  HP uses 2 bytes, I think it might be signed though for some reason so it's absolute maximum would probably be 32767, if not then 65535.  I would probably be possible to increase the caps, but there are still limitations because of how the data is stored, and used.

Another thing... Are the stat %ages for classes limited to multiples of ten (currently, it's 110, 120, 100, 80, etc), or are we able to enter other values, such as multiples of 5 (105, 165, etc)?

Yes they are for some reason...  I may be able to make a patch to change it eventually.