Staredit Network

Ok this is the problem. Im making an RPG and want to display text to players (for story purposes: I.E. Dialogue, History, Etc.). But after a certain point in my map (an early part btw) the messages stop working for one player. It isnt always a particular player Tho. For example P1 would bring a unit to an area that would set off the trigger to display the text. If p1 had braught the unit to the location, only p3 would be able to see the text and vice versa if p3 braught the unit. Also might I add, When both players do see the text, p3's text goes faster than p1's. So by the time p3 sees line 3, player one is just experiencing the text. Ive been given advice to add in hyper triggers, but it doesnt work and only ends up lagging my map (1300+ units). Someone also said take out the waits and use switches instead...but how exactly will switches help me? Wont I still need waits to seperate each line of text? unless there is a way to use a switch for a wait? And yes I do have the triggers set for both p1 and p3 (oh btw, its a 2 player map, only p1 and p3). And yes I did put the text towards the top. Can someone help me with this? Maybe someone has had this problem too? And for anyone whos wondering, I have tried displaying the text for all players.....And if it matters, I am using x-tra editor 2.6.


-SnIpA(MC)
Nothin' more Lethal...

This is called a wait block. When there are more than 1 waits, the waits will sort of stack on each other.

Why don't you make the trigger for all players?

or perhaps use death counters...

Hmm my bad i typod its xtra editor v 2.5 not 2.6. And I did try for all players. Someone told me to use death counters but.....Im not sure wut to do, never tried it (sounds noobish eh?) Could u tell me EXACTLY how its done?

I should seriously write a tutorial for this.

Death Counters
Death counters. There are many forms of counters. Countdown timers, minerals, custom score, razings... etc. But the one most commonly used is Death. If a unit dies, then that player's death counter for that unit increases by one. Triggers can detect how many deaths a certain unit has and can manipulate the counter to add, subtract, or set to a certain number.

You can use death counters like switches.

Trigger

Actions:

¤ Modify death counts for player*: Set* X for unit*.

You can select which player* you want to set the death for, what unit*, how to set* (add, subtract, or set) for what number (X*).

With this action, you can have conditions that respond accordingly.

Trigger

Conditions:

¤ Player* has suffered quantity* deaths of unit*.

Player* will be the player number, quantity* is at least, exactly, or at most a certain number, and unit* is the unit that you used to set the deaths.

This gives you a huge range of switches. Even more than 256. It is best to have an unused unit so that you don't interfere with the kills and deaths of the unit.

Now there is a death counter timer.
With this trigger

Trigger

Actions:

¤ Modify death counts for player*: Add 1 for unit*.

Without hyper triggers, this will add 1 death to the unit* per second.
With hyper triggers, it will add 12 deaths to the unit* per second.
This allows you to constantly add while having something to reset it when it reaches a certain number, or let it countdown to 0 and set it up again.

Ok thanks. But will that get rid of the wait time bunch up or are u suggesting that I use death counters like this:

Conditions:
player1 suffered exactly one death of zergling.

Actions:
wait 8000 miliseconds.
preserve trigger.

Is that wut I can do? That way when I want a wait I just do this:

Actions:
DisplayText: Bob- Hi BILLY!
set death for zergling for player1 to exactly 1
DisplayText: Billy- Hi Bob!

Death counters don't use waits.
You time it like this

Trigger

Actions:

¤ Modify death counts for player 1: Add 1 for Zergling.

¤ Preserve trigger.

Trigger

Conditions:

¤ Player 1 has suffered exactly 0 deaths of Zergling.

Actions:

¤ Display "Hi"

Trigger

Conditions:

¤ Player 1 has suffered exactly 12 deaths of Zergling. (This would be 1 second after the first)

Actions:

¤ Display "Hello"

Does that mean I need a trigger for every line of text? If thats the case, I think I can do it. BTW: Wuts the limit on triggers ehe its in the thousands right?

Well... pretty much. Just group some lines together. Don't make it so that every line is really that spaced...

Are you sure the all players displaying didnt work?
Make sure it it owned by all players.
Perhaps it is lag?

Thx for help. Ima go try it now. 2 million triggers here I come

Sorry Legacy but... Bull... , I Bet all my money that is not the problem, I used many time Hyper-triggers with wait, I never had this problem... NEVER. If you could spread the map or import the trigger on a virgin map, Him sure there is a little problem with 1 or 2 triggers...

True, but you can't get a death counter (in most cases) to make a randomized event happen. (This is where "randomized switchs" come in handy )


You don't need 2 million triggers. Besides, starcraft DOES (believe it or not) have a trigger limit; I think it is 63353 or something close to that. Up to 11 lines of text can be displayed at any given time when you are play starcraft (I should know; I have tested this), so you can do something like this:

Trigger

Description:

yay! less triggers!

Players:

¤ player x

Conditions:

¤ insert your condition here

Actions:

¤ Display text for current player: billy - "Hi bob". bob - "hi billy". billy - "how are you doing?" bob - "pretty good, and you?" billy "not bad, thanks." bob - "hmmm, I wonder why I am saying this?" billy - "I don't know, parhaps that is one of the great misterys of life." bob - "I guess your right". billy - "hey, did you see that? I just saw a unusual green glowing thing in the sky!" bob - "So did I. Hey, I think that is what has been making me say things that I wouldn't usually say." billy - "I agree. Lets go kill it."

You could do the same thing using a transmission (which is the same thing, but you don't need to use the wait's and the extra "display text for current player" actions). The only thing is, you need a *.wav file for this. Luckily I have attached a file that you can use for the transmissions. (Since the wav is less than 100 bytes, there shouldn't be a huge increase in your map.)

attached file: http://www.staredit.net/index.php?download=1633

umm....i prefer not to try out UR idea.....its jus...i have my own wavs and rly dont need urs (DL slow enough as it is) plus wut if I dont want any wavs playin while certain messages are on?

ADDITION:

Ok then If I email the map or somethin to u, will u look at it for me? Or are u sayin that the problem will fix if i STAR over...

the wav file is less than 1 kb (actually, it is less than 60 bytes), which means anyone with a modem can dl it within 10 seconds. In fact, the time it takes to vist SEN's main page would most likely take longer than it would to download this file. Plus, the wav is less than .0001 second, so it wouldn't mess up any of your other sounds being played at any given time.

heh i jus dled it...i dled it like 3 times thinkin it wasnt workin cause it went too quickly . Ok so explain how this will solve the problem...from my experience wavs dont stop messages, they get stopped by waits tho. So wuts the use of it?

transmissions in most cases are better than displaying text, because transmissions can display text for a player, set/add/subtract the time the text will be displayed, the wait can be included in the transmission (if you want it to be) and you can make a unit 'pinged'. this is the only trigger I know of that can 'ping' a unit. (By 'ping'ing a unit, I mean the circles that seem to blick on a unit for a couple of seconds. It has been used in tux's unit conversations and A&O Trailer.)

god damn Im an idiot....i forgot all about transmissions. Well this is my first rpg...Forgot ALL ABOUT IT!!!!!! Transmissions! ingenious! so simple it just might work! Ok Kel get a hammer, some glue, some nachos and meet me at my house in 15 minutes!

lol... if you have starforge or xtra, you could even get the transmission to 'ping' a invalid unit (such as a independent command center), although this might crash starcraft (even if the unit doesn't exsist on the map)

EDIT/addition: It is possible to make one wav block another, so that is why I like my wav (because of how short it is).

That won't acomplish anything.


Don't ever wory about the trigger max, you will never reach it.


It can't be lag.


wavs do not get stopped by waits.


Wavs don't block eachother, havn't you ever heard a music wav in a map and then heard another one play at the same time?

hehe well guess wut? same problem with transmissions....Is it possible it has something to do with the switches i set for it? cause i notied i wasnt clearing them all....but the ones i cleared never worked and the ones i left set worked. Ok that makes no sense to me too....but like my first messages worked and i didnt clear the switch after the messages happened. The ones that i had problems with tho, I did clear. That could be a factor? I mean if its yellow and creme stuffed its a twinkie right? Or a very old banana

Your complaint about the messages stopping, assuming it isn’t preserve trigger problems it is likely a trigger order error.

About player 3s text going faster. Well this is most likely a wait block, BUT wait blocks do not occur across players therefore it is another trigger causing the problem. (this trigger might be the reason they actually are firing at the same time.
Hyper triggers do not cause lag and they wouldn’t fix the problem, they can only complicate it.

Most likely if you intend on having someone help you ‘Fix’ this map they will need to see it.

I know someone mentioned redoing the triggers, that MIGHT work only because you may accidentally fix some trigger order issue or you might realize something different second way around. But you won’t learn anything from it, I personally come here to help others do better and learn to make maps, suggesting that you redo the triggers is hypocritical.

Just like that time I lost my map 4 times before I realized that I was triggering the crash in SF. Can't remember the crash now, but I do remember doing the map way more efficiently.

I am soooooo tired of this map right now. First my problem was msgs.....now my problem is msgs and BIG bugs. Like one where a brown hydra wont attack a yellow comp even if its attacked. (it attacks the human players) Yet the brown lings attack yellow units as they should *SIGH* ever since i put in the transmissions this has happened...weird stuff man weird stuff....At this point I WOULD start the triggers over if I could be guaranteed that the problem would be fixed. But I strongly fear redoin every trigger and finding that the problem still goes on. Anyone willing to check the map out for me? Its like a big sloppy melted icecream cone....not even worth feeding yer dog anymore Could be possible that i just did something rly wrong (This IS my 1st rpg) i strongly hope its something i did wrong..

ADDITION: hmm btw should i mention that i tried making it affect all players, tried usin it for player 1 and 2 (switched from p3, hopin that would solve problem) And yet it continued. Maybe if i made ceperate triggers for each player, it would help? anyone?

ADDITION: here it is.....

OMGosh you have like 1200 units preplaced and Special verison of X-tra removed over 900 of them.

Edit, wow this could take a while. Alot of triggers.
Edit 2, nevermind that wasn't special mode lol.

Edit 3, do you have the version where you used display text instead of transmissions?

Last edit today:
You know the trigger that sets the switch for the first text. ~~~First Battle (ENDS)
I noticed that trigger is owned by both players but the conditions require player 1 to bring the unit to the location. Is this the trigger your having trouble with?

PS. I converted the triggers to text so i could do a search for specific actions / conditions.
[attachmentid=3124]

ya i have the version with just messages. And Im not as much havin problem with the (first battle ends) switch. Im having trouble with every dialogue trigger.

Here is the version with just text messages:

Hey and wuts wrong with starting on special mode? I know i know....its better not to but I dont rly like doing things in order.... thanks for lookin it over btw....didnt think anyone would

Oh thats not my point, I start maps in special mode too. As long as your aware why people say that and use SF or something to snap your important units to the grid then your allright in my opinion. The reason i brought it up is my computer automatiacly opened basic staredit when downloading your map.

Well I not going to look at your map right now but, if part of the trigger fires then all of it fires. However if your trigger has a wait in it, it is possable that another active trigger can delay the trigger longer than you intended it to be. And in the case of hyper triggers (not your case) so long you think it stopped compleatly.

If your not seeing your test messages your ither being confused weathor or not a trigger is actually firing for the player it should be or another text message is overwriting it. Theres not much else that could go wrong, just find what the problem is.