Duck and Cover

No, this has nothing to do w/Map Rats (tm) conspiring to inundate hapless players w/bland diatribes.

Rather, this is about saving yourself some needless repetition. Let's say you have speech lines that will be popping up in two or more of the missions in your campaign/mini-campaign. (Brahmin and Dogs were what prompted this in FoT Redux.) Rather than setting up the same six lines/node in each and every speech file, all you have to do is to open up the "generic_mission.txt" file and put the lines in there. With the lines in that file they will display in all of the missions and you will therefore only have to actually set up the nodes and assign the lines from them.

I admit it's not a huge deal, but I thought I'd put it out anyway.

I also have a sneaking suspicion that using this and Requiem's idea of a "Speech Node Template" we may be able to assign speech to Random Encounters. I'm going to do some experimenting later on today and see if it works or not...

OTB

That'd be incredibly useful if I wanted some cliched one-liners. I might just do that..

Though I will have to really consider the personality of my characters before I do it.

Gentlemen, I am happy to report that my idea of implementing speech in Random Encounters works...so far.

If you open up an actor's ENT file you will notice that the field for "Random Speech" is available, however, there is no roll-down menu available for it. All you have to do is enter something manually here, and if it corresponds to a Speech Node in a map he/she will be placed w/that node selected for his/her/its Random Speech.

So, basically, what you'd have to do in order to have them pop up in Random Encounters would be to set up nodes in one MIS file, then import that into each and every MIS file you're using for Random Encounters. The lines for these nodes would be in the generic_mission.txt file, of course.

I must add that this is still partially theoretical, since I have no idea if there are limits to the number of lines that can be put in the generic_mission.txt and my test was to place someone in a map of FoT Redux and start it up. (I had a Raider who yapped like a dog...)

I'll keep working on this, but it'll be a couple of weeks before I start actually implementing Random Encounters for the FoT Redux demo.

Cheers,

OTB

Couldn't you also, theoretically, have the player's own units say something in a random encounter if desired?

I imagine this could also be useful for encounters such as the brothers that come after you in FO1 when you kill Frog Morton (name?). Although I'd want them to be a bit more wordy :P

You can also do the text where it pops up their portrait with the text, right? I usually like to do that, since the word balloons above their head can be easily missed.

Hmm interesting OTB, well done. I wonder if click speech would also work? Perhaps having some generic 'thank you for saving us' dialogue could be included? So that when you get a random encounter where friendlies are being attacked by raiders/mutants etc you could then talk to the friendly actors if any survive.

Also you might want to try adding some reputation based campaign triggers, so if you drop to betrayer the random speech changes? Though you'd need to set up the generic actors with tagnames. Perhaps have two seperate groups of random encounters (with BOS Paladins) one friendly activated by becoming Guardian of the Wastes and one hostile, activated by becoming Sword of Despair (similar perhaps to the bounty hunters in the RPGs)?

[TBC]-PaladinHeart wrote:Couldn't you also, theoretically, have the player's own units say something in a random encounter if desired?

No, 'fraid not. The only option for entities on Player Index 1 is to assign them a Tag Name, then have them Force Speech. Random and/or Click Speech will not work for them.

Basically, all you'd be able to do would be to have them spout off something akin to the way that some NPCs in FO/FO2 would utter a line when entering a town or when near a location. That's it.

[TBC]-PaladinHeart wrote:I imagine this could also be useful for encounters such as the brothers that come after you in FO1 when you kill Frog Morton (name?). Although I'd want them to be a bit more wordy

It would also be useful for simply having enemies that chat away as they roam a map rather than mutely wandering into your squad's sights.

[TBC]-PaladinHeart wrote:You can also do the text where it pops up their portrait with the text, right? I usually like to do that, since the word balloons above their head can be easily missed.

Only if you use the "Force Speech" Action.

requiem... wrote:Hmm interesting OTB, well done.

Cheers!

requiem... wrote:I wonder if click speech would also work? Perhaps having some generic 'thank you for saving us' dialogue could be included? So that when you get a random encounter where friendlies are being attacked by raiders/mutants etc you could then talk to the friendly actors if any survive.

Y'know, I hadn't thought of that. I don't know if it would work, but it seems like it would. The big drawback that I see would be that scripting things like this would be an absolute nightmare. So many possibilities/combinations, like changing their Click Speech if/when you saved them, level of casualties they suffered, etc.

requiem... wrote:Also you might want to try adding some reputation based campaign triggers, so if you drop to betrayer the random speech changes?

Or you could simply have Rep trigger different types of Random Encounters. That would save the whole mess w/Tag Name and triggers. Remember, these would have to be placed on every map that a certain NPC might appear on. You could save work by making just one set of Triggers for all maps, though, and then exporting it to each of the maps in use, I suppose.

requiem... wrote:(similar perhaps to the bounty hunters in the RPGs)?

I'm planning for Bounty Hunters. The only question I have so far is whether or not Random Encounters can be deactivated w/triggers. It might be possible to use an identical line w/"subtract" in the "action" portion of the line. Don't know yet, though. I hope it'll work. As much as players should be punished for misbehaving they also ought to be able to redeem themselves, just like in the RPGs you could get rid of the Bounty Hunter encounters by getting your Rep back up, as long as they weren't also after you for "killin' chur'en".

Of course, I'm also of the mind that Bounty Hunters just come after high profile people, not just "evil" people...

No matter what you do, someone's going to be unhappy w/you...

Edit: And now, Requiem, it's time for your daily dose of Kipling.

OTB

OnTheBounce wrote:Y'know, I hadn't thought of that. I don't know if it would work, but it seems like it would. The big drawback that I see would be that scripting things like this would be an absolute nightmare. So many possibilities/combinations, like changing their Click Speech if/when you saved them, level of casualties they suffered, etc.

Keep it simple I say, just having their click speech to something generic, without worrying about all the possibilities/combinations, would still be an improvement over the REs as is.

OnTheBounce wrote:I'm planning for Bounty Hunters. The only question I have so far is whether or not Random Encounters can be deactivated w/triggers. It might be possible to use an identical line w/"subtract" in the "action" portion of the line.

Hmm I might be imagining things but isn't there a trigger in one of the bunkers turning some of the random encounters off?

OnTheBounce wrote:Edit: And now, Requiem, it's time for your daily dose of Kipling.

OTB

Cheers I'd not read that one before. One question though, any idea what a martini is?

When 'arf of your bullets fly wide in the ditch,
Don't call your Martini a cross-eyed old bitch;
She's human as you are -- you treat her as sich,
An' she'll fight for the young British soldier.

requiem_for_a_starfury wrote:Hmm I might be imagining things but isn't there a trigger in one of the bunkers turning some of the random encounters off?

I'll check on it.

requiem... wrote:Cheers I'd not read that one before. One question though, any idea what a martini is?

Cheers! I was going to send you that link a while back when you mentioned that you didn't get any Kipling for X-mas.

If you watch Zulu you will see the Martini he is referring to: a breach-loaded, Henri-Martini Rifle in .45 caliber.

OTB

OnTheBounce wrote:If you watch Zulu you will see the Martini he is referring to: a breach-loaded, Henri-Martini Rifle in .45 caliber.

OTB

Oh of course, and Zulu was on at xmas as well. :oops: Thanks, I gathered it was a weapon but it just didn't click.

Edit

OnTheBounce wrote:I'll check on it.

Bunker 4, after Newton it disables the Reaver random encounters, since they're now on your side. Basically when you set up the trigger to enable random encounters leave the box unchecked and it becomes disable.

Hm, very informative. I've missed that earlier somehow. Thanks OTB!