New Event Commands (request them here!)

[Ghabry]

Currently there is space for 999 event commands in the range of 2000-2999.

There could be some basic grouping at least:

• Map related: 2000-2099
• Battle related: 2100 - 2199
• Language related: 2200-2299

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Set Auto Battle Algorithm - One event command

• Arg0: The ID of the algorithm to use. -1 is "LDB default"

Value must be saved! (see #2331)

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Change Language - One event command

Changes the language of the game

• Text parameter: Identifier of the language

Value must be saved!

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Show Message (Plural aware) - Requires 3 new event commands

Proposed idea:

Lets say we have the message

ShowMessage      "You found \v[1] piece of cheese"
ShowMessage_Cont "Tasty!"

and the source language has one plural form.

The result is with Plural Support:

PluralIndicator    [Variable|VariableIndirect] [Forms]
ShowMessage        "You found \v[1] piece of cheese"
ShowMessage_Cont   "Tasty!"
PluralMessage      "You found \v[1] pieces of cheese"
PluralMessage_Cont "Tasty!"

The Variable in PluralIndicator is used to decide which message is shown. Forms is automatically set by the editor: It contains the number of forms. When the project main language is changed this allows quick patching of all of them.

The Indicator is generic enough to also allow it's use in e.g. ShowStringPic

see also https://www.gnu.org/software/gettext/manual/html_node/Plural-forms.html

[omarinhcag]

About the current ideas:

• Would it be useful to be able to set auto-battle algorithm per actor?
• There are some non-RM games that implement conditional messages through message codes (i.e. "Today is {\v[1]==1 ? his : her} birthday!"). Might work for plurals, though would need each developer to implement them properly.

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Save/Load information
Being able to read a savefile slot and store some of its properties as variables.

• Arg0: save ID. Can be a variable.
• Arg1-n: Variable IDs to store savefile data (party members, level/s, playtime, etc).

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Take screenshot
Stores a screenshot as image using a string as filename. Accepts a variable as part of the name, or adding a timestamp to the end of the name.

• Arg0: Base filename
• Arg1: Naming suffix. Modes: no suffix (just base name), variable (variable value as suffix), timestamp (timestamp added to the end)
• Arg2: Variable ID

[elsemieni]

It's easy say ideas, implementing them is another story... Anways, since this is just a brainstorm, I will say some good, bad, awful and "Oh man, shut up!" ideas.
EDIT: I will strike ones I believe those I guess are already implemented elsewhere (Maniacs for example), then, potentially at Player.

Switches/variables related:

• Math evaluation (input-like parameter with a similar parser than messages i.e. \v[3]/cos(\v[5] ). It will be float based and the results must be casted to int ).
• Get Variable by Name (with \v[3] notation compatibility ).

Pictures related:

• Take screenshot (@omarinhcag 's idea is not bad, however, I was thinking it more like output to an Image ID rather than a file).
• Create image from data (You can specify an output Image ID and a range of variables to generate an RGB Image - advanced and VERY SLOW! but at the same time very powerful since you are converting Pictures into a framebuffer ).
• Rotate image (by a fixed value).

Audio related:

• Seek BGM / Memorize BGM position (taking memorize BGM to the next level... it can be complicated due to audio backends, specially MIDI one).
• Stop single sound (Stop all playing sound instances from a filename. With that you can even do a RPG Maker module tracker ;D ).

Event related:

• Check passability by coordinate (tasty for making engines like tactical ones or another).
• Spawn Event from Map (Map ID, input coordinates and output coordinates for current map).
• Get Event ID by Name (some werido will find this useful to find events for something I guess).

System related:

• Save/load savefile (parameter: Save ID).
• Get mouse/touch position (long history short. Output to 2 variables coordinates).
• Get extended input (Extending the input to backend capabilities ... you can use SDL at our side to this! )
• Call OS command (use with caution) (Options: wait until finish) - Can be used for custom interfaces, for not saying Steamworks (?) - DANGEROUS.
• Load raw file (loads a X file (\v[3] notation available) and outputs Y bytes to a variable starting from Z - DANGEROUS).
• Save raw file (outputs X bytes from a variable starting from Y to a Z file (\v[3] notation available) - DANGEROUS ).

[Br4ssman]

• Change size of tile (grid): Maybe a custom value is very dangerous, but alternate among 3 sizes could be great.
  - Conditional Branch "if event cannot move": An easy way to handle events that stop or cannot complete their movement routes. New command "Wait for Single Movement" #3221
• In swap event, I'd add the possibility to swap the main event (hero/player).

EDIT, new ones:

• Summon Event: Basically it brings an (or massive) event(s) to the current map from other map.
• Core events: Imagine that you have a series of events that you want to repeat in all maps (for example, the arrow of a bow in an action RPG, an event which identifies the ID of each map, your position...). In these cases you could mark the event as "core", so when you create a new map, core events are instantly generated with the new map (you can eliminate them after if you don't need them in that particular map).
• Set Move Route: It could be interesting use Vars like Switch ON/OFF. Besides, "Wait" command here could be adjustable (Wait: x0.0, x0.1, x0.2, etc).

[Soeufans]

This is a special request, as an enginner in RPG maker 2000 and RPG maker 2003.

I created lots of engines, like CMS, CBS, and ABS, and i always encountered a major problem, and its a "wait" proces to block all that is in progress... its a special "wait" comand or a "going into a pause like when you go to the default menu and all process in map STOPs"

lets try if i can explain correctly in english...

An option that you can stop all process (auto, parallel process etc...) forsefully like when you open the default menu, so you can do in that "event menu" a new engine to create a CMS, CBS whithout being anoyed whith the actual event process in the maps or comon events from BDD

For example, i do an ABS like my Soul Blazer engine, but of course, there are lot of "parallel proces" like enemies moving, atacking, animations etc,,, with the grafics moving and sounds, and if i call for an CMS engine, these process i can stop them, but not all... due to some factores to make the ABS working correctly

But meh... anyways, here are some command ideas.

Upgrading Commands:

Command: Control variables
Desire: Get coordinate screen/map from Picture
Explanation: A way to get the position X and Y from a ID Picture used in the game

Command: Show Picture and Move picture
Desire: Get a new "position default"
Explanation: A way to ignore the coordinates from the ID picture selected if only you want to change the color (or someting else) from that picture without worriying to know about their coordinates

Command: Show Picture and Move picture
Desire: Additive, multiply, subtract etc...
Explanation: Like in maniac patch, a way tu make a picture being Additive, Substract, Multiply etc... Added as part of MP support

Command: Show Picture and Move picture
Desire: New wave effect
Explanation: A way to customice better the wave effect, like changing to vertical to horizontal, number of waves, or something else...

Command: Show Picture and Move picture
Desire: Skretching
Explanation: A way to skretch a picture, for example, a picture of 16x16, to skretch it to 32x16, selecting the central point of skretching manually or by variables

Command: Display text setting
Desire: More customization
Explanation:
1º An option to reproduce a Sound when a character is shown (like in my Text engine)
2º An option to change Font from text, using a Font or a Picture preset
3º Changing the position of the message text Using coordinates or the 3 presets positions from default maker
4º Adding more lines, in Default, only 4 lines are shown,
5º Adding move scroll text options, like when you see traditional credits from a movie, that goes down to up.

Command: Call Event as a parallel process
Desire: A Command to call an event like if it was a "paralell proces"
Explanation: When you call for a comont event, you must wait for it to finish, with this option, you can call an common event, without waiting to be finished

New Commands:

Command: Change Individual Tile
Desire: A Command to change indivually a Tileset from the map from X and Y coordinates with coordinates or preselected
Explanation: In 2k and 2k3, you can chante a Tileset, but it affects all the same tiles in the map, with this command, you only change one tile on the map or with variables, for example, a tile from a rock, that is in the position in the coordinates 12X 15Y you change it for a hole, insted of changing all the rocks tile in the map.

Command: Mouse input
Desire: A way to activate or deactivate the use of the Mouse, using coordinates, images, sounds for clicking etc...
Explanation: you can use the mouse, and the coordinates of the mouse are stored in variables X and Y Added as part of MP

Command: Mode 7 view
Desire: a Mode 7 view of a map or Picture
Explanation: Like in some games in Snes, like Fzero, FF3, Terranigma etc... You can configure the angle of view, the central position and the deep, i think this would be more complicated to do hahaha

Command: Particle command
Desire: a Particle command to do particle effects
Eplanation: You can make particle effects with coordinates, configure number of particles, origin and destination coordinates, image to be used, sound to reproduce

Command: Pause BGM
Desire: To pause a BGM and to continue reproduce in another time
Explanation: Making a commando to save the position of the music, pause it, and you can continue reproduce it on another moment

Command: Show number
Desire: A command to show numbers entered or by variable, and shown on X and Y position
Explantion: Doing engines, theres a lot of events i must do to show numbers for my custom engines, with this command:
1º: you can show numbers from a variable using the font default or by picture
2º: you can select the position coordinates X Y manually or using variables
3º: If possible you can do a "show numbers" and a "move numbers" command, like the "show picture" and "move picture", to create some animation if desired Show String Pic can do this and more

And this is an 2 EXTRA for the editor:

Problem 1º
In the Commont Event page in the BDD, all common events ar listed to 0001 to 9999, so you must scroll a BIG list of 9999 comands, and it gets so annoying scrolling a bar to get to a specific common evento
Solution:
Make a different view of displaying common events like in bubblescharts or something else, that will help to arrange the lots of common events listed in a list form 0001 to 9999, with this, you can arrange better if a common event is from a CBS, CBS and other engines

Problem 2º
In the sintax of a variable, the limites are 9999999 to -9999999
Solution:
Make a nearly infinte number :) Supported as part of MP

[Ghabry]

Scene Push & Scene Pop

This one is complecated, needs lots of incompatible data format changes and no global state (!) but it solves one fundamental problem: Custom menus and battle systems are painful to implement:

When you have them on an extra map and you teleport to it then all event positions are reset when teleporting back (and you can abuse this type of menu to e.g. skip "On Touch" events by calling the menu while walking on thie tile).

The other solution is overlaying the Menu/Battle on top. Disadvantage: You can't use the map at all, must be entirely Picture based.

In both cases running events will cause chaos, you must somehow terminate and continue them.

For this I propose Scene Push/Pop.

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Semantics:

The element on the top of the scene stack (not to be confused with the stack we use for Scenes in Player, when I talk about a stack here I mean a stack of Maps) is stored in the well-known fields of the LSD.

All parent maps are stored in such a way:

New field easyrpg_scenes which is a list of EasyRpgMapState with the following elements:

SaveSystem system;
SaveScreen screen;
std::vector<SavePicture> pictures;
SavePartyLocation party_location;
SaveVehicleLocation boat_location;
SaveVehicleLocation ship_location;
SaveVehicleLocation airship_location;
SaveInventory inventory;
std::vector<SaveTarget> targets;
SaveMapInfo map_info;
SavePanorama panorama;
SaveEventExecState foreground_event_execstate;
std::vector<SaveCommonEvent> common_events;

So is a copy of everything When the Scene Push happened except for std::vector<SaveActor> actors;

The pushed map starts with a completely empty state (from the database, as if you started a new game).

To be decided:

• Inheritance options to define which state is copied and which state is cleared from the parent (no reference support for simplicity)
• A "shared" option would make sense for Switches and Variables.
• "Parameter passing" upwards
• "Return values" downwards

When invoking Scene Pop the map returned to continues event execution right after the Scene Push command and implicitly does a Wait 0 (Map Refresh)

[mateofio]

Scoped Variables and Switches

I don't know how exactly this would look, but I have (and probably alot of others do too) use cases for scoped variables and switches. In hh3 I have a very ugly and poor manual way to allocating a range of variables and calling common events to clear them

My use cases include:

• local variables that only exist for current running event

One way to implement this could be to use negative id numbers for this feature. This would allow all existing event commands which reference variables and switches integrate with the feature very easily.

The implementation would be a simple stack for each called event.

You would want either a command or some builtin functionality to the map, battle, and common event to declare the variables. This would allow editor to provide the necessary syntactic sugar to display the local variable names and also allow re-indexing if you change the local variable set.

For re-indexing, editor should warn you if any indirect variables are accessed as it can't guarantee that doesn't break.

• Parameter passing to call event commands

A simple extension to the previous. You would need to enhance the CallEvent command, or create another CallEvent command to support parameter passing.

Events should define up front what parameters they take, and the editor dialogue to call them requires you to assign either constants, pre-existing global variables, or pre-existing local variables.

Editor will need some way of checking for all call sites if you change an events parameters and give you a convenient report of where they all are so you can fix them.

• Map Groups - Local variables and switches which get reset when you exit a "dungeon"

I have this use case where I have a set of dungeon variables which are used for puzzles, traps, games without random encounters which place enemies etc.. which reset when you exit the dungeon. To save on RPG_RT variable space, I reuse the same reserved set for each dungeon and have carefully managed common events resetting them on enter /exit which is super painful and error prone to manage.

How you would implement this in practice is an open question. Here are some ideas.

First, you need to define what a "dungeon" or more generally a map group is.

A few options:

1. Use the treemap heirarchy directly, and define a map as a "map group root", and so all children are in the same group.
2. In the ldb, define a set of "map groups". Then, each map can specify which group it is a member of, or inherit from the parent. This requires more work to setup the mapping, but gives you maximum flexibility. Each map group could define the number and names of it's map group variables.
3. Store the "map group" data within a map / LMU file. And have a ability for other maps to reference /inherit that group. I think I like this better than using the LDB.

Wherever the map group is defined, the map group object needs to define the number and names of it's local variables.

Next, we need to define what variables are "map group local" variables. This could again be some reserved negative range.

Once you have this, the teleport code can detect anytime you change map groups and reset all the map group variables for you.

I would also create event commands to do this reset explicitly, so you could for example choose to have the escape /teleport spell run this sequence or not.

• Local variables and switches which get reset anytime you change maps

A version of the above, without groups. Useful for map specific puzzles etc.. Could be implemented the same way as above

Possible variable mapping range, and how they might be saved.

Id	Purpose	Saved Where?
0	Sentinel - invalid variable	N/A
1 to INT_MAX	RPG_RT compatible Global variables	LDB as before
-1 to -999999	Call stack. -1 is the first local on your call stack, up to -N. You can specify -(N+1) to your the callers local variable (or 0) etc..	SaveEventExecFrame::variables
-1000000 to -1999999	Map local variables	SaveSystem::map_variables
-2000000 to -2999999	Map group local variables	SaveSystem::map_group_variables

Common Event run once per map

Like how you can use "Erase Event" to run map events once, I want to have common events that run some code everytime I change maps, but only once.

This could be done in a few ways

• Add a new "once per map" trigger type to common events
• Add a new feature "set switch on map changed", so that anytime you change maps a switch gets set. This can be then be used to trigger whatever events you like, or other things. This could also be combined with the "map groups" idea above to run event code whenever you "exit a dungeon"

[Ghabry]

I'm not a huge fan of "inband signalling".
How about: For access most event commands already have a "value or variable" parameter to specify whether the value is constant or read through a variable. This could be extended to "indirect variable (\V[\V)", "local variable" etc.

For writing I would also prefer additional parameters or an entire new field "out_parameters".
When empty: standard behaviour. (assume 0 - target is global switch/var)
Otherwise: DBArray<uint8_t>[type1, type2, type3] (you need multiple out, look at e.g. "Get Event Location".

[Br4ssman]

Would it be possible a conditional branch + batch function?
Like: @> Conditional Branch: Switch [0001...0003] is ON @> : Else @> : Branch End

[elsemieni]

Would it be possible a conditional branch + batch function?
Like: @> Conditional Branch: Switch [0001...0003] is ON @> : Else @> : Branch End

Looks like there's a interesting feature request here: Assign Switch value by reference (in editor you can only set ON, OFF or toogle, but not v[x] value, where x is a variable ID). You can do it with variables without much issue actually but not with switches.

In resume:
switch[a] = switch[v[x]]

[Br4ssman]

Make hero/vehicle event editable.

I guess these are a Ev0000, and maybe it could be dangerous, but perhaps the left side (not the event command side when editing an event) could be interesting to editing by double click for more configs.

[Br4ssman]

Animate event graphics when the graphic is obtained from the chipset.
This could offer the possibility of having 16x16px events animated as a chara.

[Soeufans]

New command:
Change parallax settings:
A way to configure even better the settings of a parallax, to narly be like in pictures, but in parallax, that upgred could be grat to make better maps with scrollings, parallax only works under tiles, not above them, or make the "Show Pictures" setting, as a "parallax"

Here are some upgrades:

Set movement route
When you select the event to move, a way to select it by Variable too

Set event location
When you select the evento to change his location, manually or by variable, a way to select the event by Variable too.

Creating a Event
When you create a new event, the ID is fixed automatically, a way to edit and change his ID number manually

[gadesx]

• Picture movement with scroll&loop like panorama in map properties.
• Picture:Wave effect fix, if there's up or down scroll the effect speed go faster.