Celtic Minstrel
543ccdc670
- String buffer referencing is no longer done via a pointer but instead by a magic value separate from the pointer system (it's still -8 though) - String buffer now stored in universe instead of scenario
343 lines
23 KiB
HTML
343 lines
23 KiB
HTML
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<h1>Section 10: Special Encounters</h1>
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<p>When you walk into a room and a description comes up, that was a special encounter
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(called a special, for short). When you enter a valley and monsters appear to attack you,
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that was a special too. When you reach a locked door, and it's unlocked if you have the
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right key, that is a special. In general, anything strange or out of the ordinary that
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happens is a special encounter.</p>
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<p>You can create special encounters yourself, and can make them very simple or very
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elaborate. It can be as straightforward as a text description, or getting an item, or
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taking damage, or as complicated as a huge branching tree of results, which depends on
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what missions the party has completed so far (and thus what Stuff Done Flags have been set
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so far).</p>
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<p>When a special encounter is run by the game (by, for example, the party stepping on a
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certain space) we say Blades of Exile has called the special. You can have Blades of Exile
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call a special in a variety of ways. It can happen when the party looks at a space, or
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steps on a space, or meets wandering monsters outdoors, or kills a certain monster, or
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even casts Ritual of Sanctification on an evil altar. No matter when or how the special is
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called, they are all created in the same way, and Blades of Exile runs through them in the
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same way. Before this will make much sense, though, there needs to be some background on
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how exactly special encounters work.</p>
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<h2>Special Nodes</h2>
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<p>The basic ingredient of a special encounter is called a special node. Each town and
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outdoor section has a list of special nodes, and the scenario itself has a bunch of them
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too. A special node is the basic building block of a special encounter.</p>
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<p>What a special node is is an instruction. One sort of special node is Display Message,
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which flashes up some sort of text. Another special node is Damage Party, which does
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damage. There is a special node for poisoning the party, and another for giving the party
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an item.</p>
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<p>When a special encounter is called, what happens is that Blades of Exile looks at a
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special node you create, and does the instruction in it (when this happens, we say Blades
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of Exile calls the special node). One thing that a special node can do is say do
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something, and then call another special node. This is called chaining. You can chain
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several special nodes together, to make a long, complicated special encounter. For
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example, suppose you want the party to be told they've been sprayed with poison gas, and
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then damage and poison all of them. In this case, you would have Blades of Exile call a
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special node which flashes up the message saying "You've been gassed!" and then calls another
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special node. This next special node will damage the party and then call a third special
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node. This third node will poison the party, and not specify any more nodes to be called.
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In this case, you have created a special encounter which is a chain of special nodes,
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three long.</p>
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<p>Each town has 100 special nodes. Each outdoor section has 70. The scenario itself has
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256. This multitude of special nodes will be the clay with which you can sculpt a wild,
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elaborate adventure.</p>
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<h2>Pointers (Advanced)</h2>
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<p>Pointers are an advanced feature of the special node engine. A pointer is a negative
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number that references a Stuff Done Flag, allowing you to directly use the value of a
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Stuff Done Flag as a parameter to a special node.</p>
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<p>When the game calls a special node, it looks at the values it has. If any of them are
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negative (more specifially, less than or equal to -10), the game checks to see if there is
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a pointer with that number. If there is, the game fetches the value of a Stuff Done Flag
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that the pointer points to, and substitutes that into the special node where the pointer
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was specified.</p>
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<p>There are 100 mutable pointers available, which can be set using the Set Pointer
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special node. In addition, there are a number of reserved pointers that are set in certain
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circumstances. Rather than referencing a Stuff Done Flag, these refer to special values of
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the encounter itself. The reserved pointers are:</p>
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<ol start=''>
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<li value='8'>This can be used anywhere a scenario message is expected to refer to the
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special string buffer. The contents of the special string buffer can be manipulated using
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the Clear Buffer special node and various Append To Buffer special nodes.</li>
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<li value='10'>This contains the X coordinate of the space the special node was triggered
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on.</li>
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<li>This contains the Y coordinate of the space the special node was triggered on.</li>
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<li>This contains the terrain type of the space the special node was triggered on.</li>
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<li value='15'>If the special node was called to determine the result of a custom trap
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effect, this pointer refers to the trap level.</li>
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<li value='20'>When a special node is called during an attack, this contains the number of
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the targeted creature, ready to be passed to a Select Target special node.</li>
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<li>When a special node is called during an attack, this contains the X coordinate of the
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targeted space.</li>
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<li>When a special node is called during an attack, this contains the Y coordinate of the
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targeted space.</li>
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</ol>
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<h2>Simple Examples</h2>
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<p>Confused yet? Understandable. Creating a special encounter is a lot like writing a
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short computer program. Writing computer programs is not incredibly difficult, but it does
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take time to learn how to do it. Time and practice. Making special encounters is not
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something you can learn to do overnight, but once you can do it, there is nothing that can
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stop you from creating a truly great scenario.</p>
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<p>And it really isn't that difficult. Here are three simple, step by step examples (and
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there are several more examples in the appendices), which will show you much of the
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process. Load up a scenario, such as the very basic scenario you created in the
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introductory chapter. Select Edit Outdoor Terrain.</p>
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<h3>Example 1</h3>
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<p>First, we're going to create a simple text message, which will appear when a party steps
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on a space. The fourth button in the third row is the Create/Edit special encounter
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button. Press it, and then click on a spot of ordinary grass.</p>
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<p>Wow. A pretty complicated dialog box just came up. This is the special encountering
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editing box. It's not as bad as it look. For now, we're just creating a text message. Press
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General (a list of special node types will come up), select Display Message, and then
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press OK. There. You are now editing a node of type Display Message. Now you need to write
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the message. Notice that two of the fields below that buttons have changed to First Part
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of Message and Second Part of Message, and that there is a button to the right marked
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Create/Edit. Press it. This is where you edit the text that will come up. Type something,
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like "You feel very weak and tired". and press return. You will be back on the special
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editing window. Press OK.</p>
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<p>That was it! Now, whenever a party steps on that space, they will see your text
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message. If they step on it again, they will see it again. Notice the space is marked with
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a small S icon. You can edit the encounter if you want. Press the same button (Create/Edit
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Special) you pressed to create the encounter, and then click on the space with the S icon.
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You will be editing the encounter again.</p>
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<h3>Example 2</h3>
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<p>Unfortunately, you probably don't want a message to keep reappearing every time they
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step on a space. It gets annoying. Fortunately, you can have a message only appear once,
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the very first time you step on it, and then never appear again. The way you do this is to
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use a Stuff Done Flag. Pick a Stuff Done Flag to be attached to your text message, such
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as, say, (3,4). This assumes you havent used (3,4) already.</p>
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<p>You are going to create a special encounter which when it is first stepped on displays
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the text message and sets the Stuff Done Flag (3,4) to 250. The Stuff Done Flag being set
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to 250 tells Blades of Exile that this special encounter is dead and done and never comes
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back again.</p>
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<p>To create the encounter, first click on the grass with white spot terrain (second row
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from bottom, fifth from right), and then place this terrain type on some grass. The white
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spot marks a special encounter. Press the Create/Edit Special button, and click on this
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spot.</p>
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<p>Special encounters that only happen once are listed under One Shots, so press the One
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Shots button. Select One-Time Text Message and press OK.</p>
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<p>This looks very similar to the earlier special editing window, with one addition: it
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now says Stuff Done Flag, First Part and Stuff Done Flag, Second Part by the top two text
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areas. This is where you enter the Stuff Done Flag this encounter will be linked to. Enter
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3 in the first box and 4 in the second to indicate Stuff Done Flag (3,4). Then press
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Create/Edit to edit the message text, and finally press OK to finish editing the
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special.</p>
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<p>You may want to run the game now to see what happens. Step on the encounter, and you'll
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see the text. After the encounter, notice that the white spot has disappeared. When you
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put a One Shot special on a space with a white spot, Blades of Exile will make the spot
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disappear after the special has been visited.</p>
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<h3>Third Example:</h3>
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<p>Finally, we will create the earlier example of a chain of specials. This encounter will
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put up a text message, damage the party, and poison them as well.</p>
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<p>Press Create/Edit Special again, and click on a spot of grass. Press General, select
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Display Message, press OK, and press Create/Edit to write some text. Write "You get hurt",
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or whatever. That was the first node in the chain.</p>
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<p>Now, we want this special encounter to do several things. We want several encounters
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chained together. To do this, we need to tell this special node to call another node once
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it is done. That is what Jump To means, at the bottom of the window. The Jump To special
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is the special a node calls when it is done.</p>
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<p>To make a special to be jumped to, press Create/Edit to the right of Jump To. The
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special editing window will reset itself. You are now editing a different special node.
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This special node will damage the party. Press Affect PCs, and select Do Damage. Now all
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of the text areas on the special editing dialog have labels, waiting for you to provide
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values.</p>
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<p>For now, type 3 in Number of Dice, and 5 in Number of Sides on Dice. Put 2 in Extra
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Damage and 1 in Type of Damage. This node will add up 3 random numbers from 1 to 5, add 2,
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and do that amount of damage to each PC. The 1 indicates that the damage is fire damage
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(damage types are described later on).</p>
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<p>Note that there is a Create/Edit button to the right of the text message area. You can
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press it to create another text message, which is displayed while the damage is being
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done. Many of the special nodes have a button of this sort, so that you can accompany the
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calling of the special node with text.</p>
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<p>Now we need one more special node. To make the third node in the chain, we need to use
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the Jump To field again. Press the Create/Edit button to the right of Jump To. You will
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now be editing a third special node. Press Affect PCs again, and select Affect Status. New
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messages have appeared by the text areas, asking for different values. Put a 2 in the
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Amount (0 .. 8) field (for a small amount of poison), and 1 in the 0 - cure, 1 - inflict
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area (since we want to cause poison, not cure it). Put 2 in the Which Status field. (This
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means poison.) Press OK. Our special encounter is now complete.</p>
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<p>Run the scenario again, and trigger this encounter. Your party will be damaged and
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poisoned, as promised.</p>
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<p></p>
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<p>This is only scratching the surface of special encounters and what they can do. There
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are If-Thens specials, which can call one of 2 or 3 different special nodes, depending on
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some sort of condition (such as whether a Stuff Done Flag is a certain value, or whether
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the party has enough gold). There are Town Specs: town specials, which can act as
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stairways to move the party from one level to another, or fill areas with fire barriers or
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ice walls. Read on, to find out the basics of special nodes, and how to work with
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them.</p>
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<h2>The Editing Dialog</h2>
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<p>There are almost 200 different sorts of special nodes. These nodes, their effects, and
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the values you need to give to determine exactly what they do are listed in the Special
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Nodes section in the appendices. Reading through these is a great way to determine how
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special encounters work and get ideas for things your scenario can do.</p>
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<p>The special editing dialog has a number of fields and buttons on it, each of which
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determine the traits of your special encounter.</p>
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<p>For all of the nodes in the fields below, if you place a -1 or leave a -1, that means
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that there is no effect. If you leave -1s in the message areas for example, no message
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will be displayed.</p>
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<p><br></p>
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<p><b>Type Selection Buttons - </b>These six buttons each bring up a list of one of the
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different classes of special encounters. These classes, when they can be used (town nodes
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have no effect outdoors, for example), and what they do are described in the Appendix on
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special nodes.</p>
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<p><b>Stuff Done flags - </b>Many special nodes either change or examine a Stuff Done
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flag. Put the two parts of the required stuff done flag in these two text areas.</p>
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<p><b>Message 1-3, Pict, Pict type -</b> Some special nodes display a piece of text on the
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screen. Other special nodes display a dialog box, with text in the middle and a picture in
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the upper left corner. The numbers for these messages and the number of the picture to
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display can be put in these text fields. When attaching a simple text message (two
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strings) to some other type of node, keep in mind that the text will display <i>after</i>
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the main action of the node. For example, a Missile Animation node with attached text
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messages will show the missile, then display the text. Similarly, a Pause special node will
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display the text after the delay is complete.</p>
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<p>Each picture and each text message has a number associated with it (for example, every
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town has 100 text messages, numbered from 0 to 99). Most of the time, you really dont want
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to have to worry about these. Fortunately, there is an easier way to deal with this. Press
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the Create/Edit button to create and edit text messages, and press Choose to the right of
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the picture test area to select a picture. These buttons only appear if you need to
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specify a value.</p>
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<p><b>Extra 1a, 1b, 1c, 2a, 2b, 2c -</b> Many special nodes require you to provide
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different values, such as the amount of health to heal or the value to set a Stuff Done
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Flag to or the number of an item to give. When you select a special node type, text will
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appear to the left of these text fields prompting you to enter a value. Often, there
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will be a Choose button to let you select the value from a list, or a Create/Edit button
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to let you edit a message or a special node to call.</p>
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<p><b>Jump To -</b> Some special nodes call a different special node which is specified in
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one of the other fields. If this doesn't happen, and a special node is given in Jump To
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(in other words, if the value there isnt -1), that special node will usually be called
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when this special node is through.</p>
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<p><br></p>
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<p>These meanings for the fields are not without exceptions. Some fields sometimes mean
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different things, and some nodes prevent the Jump To node from being called. These
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exceptions are detailed in the descriptions of the individual nodes in the node list in
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the appendices.</p>
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<p></p>
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<p><b>Inserting Special Nodes into a Chain - </b>Suppose you create a chain of 3 special
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nodes, and then realize that you forgot something. Suppose you want to bring up a text
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message, damage the party, and give them experience. You create special node 16 to bring
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up a message, click on the Create/Edit button by the Jump To: slot to assign a new node
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(you get node 17), make node 17 give experience, and then realize that you forgot to
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include the Damage the Party node.</p>
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<p>The Create/Edit button is to the right of a text field, in which you can enter the
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number of the next special node to be called. When you press the Create/Edit button to get
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a new special node, if the number in the text field is -1, you are assigned a new node. If
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the number is 0 or larger, you will start editing that node.</p>
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<p>For the example above, you can place a new special node inbetween 16 and 17 to damage
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the party. Go to node 16 (of type Text Message). The Jump To is set to 17. Instead, set it
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to -1 (enter -1 in the Jump To text field). Then press the Create/Edit button, and you
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will be assigned a new node. Make that node the desired type (in this case, Damage the
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Party), and set the Jump To field in the new node to 17. Voila! The chain is now 3 nodes
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long.</p>
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<h2>Other Ways to Edit Specials</h2>
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<p>When you select Edit Special Nodes from the Scenario, Town, or Outdoor menus, you will
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see a list of all of the scenario, current town, or current outdoor section nodes. Click
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on a node to edit it. For some dialog boxes in which a special node is asked for (like
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Advanced Town Properties), there is not a Create/Edit button. To create a special
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encounter for these features, make a special encounter in the Edit Special Nodes window,
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remember the number of the first special node in the chain, and enter it into the
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appropriate place (such as Special To Call When Town Entered in the Advanced Town
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Properties window).</p>
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<p><br></p>
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<p><b>The Limits</b></p>
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<p><br></p>
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<p>You can only have so many special nodes, and so much text in them. Each town can have
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at most 100 special nodes, which can use at most 100 text messages (each dialog box uses 6
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text messages, so these can be eaten up quickly if you aren't careful). Each outdoor can
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have at most 60 special nodes, which can use at most 90 text messages. Finally, the
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scenario itself has 256 special nodes, which have access to only 100 text messages.</p>
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<h2>What Nodes are Called When</h2>
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<p>If you put a special encounter on the ground in town, it is called when the party walks
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onto it. If you put a special encounter on a space the party can't walk onto, it is called
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when the party searches that space (such as a Trap special node on a chest). If the
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special node is triggered in town, a town special node is called. If the special node is
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triggered while walking or searching outdoors, a special node from that outdoor section is
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called.</p>
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<p>Most of your special encounters will be called when the party walks onto a specified
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space outdoors or in town. In addition, when the party sails a boat onto a special
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encounter on the water, that encounter will be called.</p>
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<p>Scenario special nodes are only called in a few different ways. You can use the General
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type special node Call Global Special to call a scenario special node. Also, when a
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special item is used, a Scenario special node is called.</p>
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<p>You can specify a town special node to be called every so many turns while the party is
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in a town (select Set Town Event Timers from the Town menu). You can also specify a
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scenario special node to be called every so many moves no matter where the party is in the
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scenario (select Set Scenario Event Timers from the Scenario menu).</p>
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<p>Very importantly, you can have special nodes called during conversation. This is
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described in more detail in the chapter on dialogue.</p>
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<h2>Time Passing</h2>
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<p>When a party begins a scenario, the scenario will be set on day 1, and they won't have
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done anything or completed any quests. As time passes and the party does things, you might
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want the world and events to change in response to what the party does.</p>
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<p>Every 3700 moves, the Day counter goes up by one. You can have If-Then special nodes
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call different nodes based on whether a day has been reached. You can also have characters
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appear or disappear based on what day it is. You set this on the Advanced Monster Settings
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Dialog, described in the chapter on Editing Towns.</p>
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<p>You may not always want things to change based on just what day it is, however. You may
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want things to happen based on what the party actually does. In this case, you can use
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Events. In each scenario, you can have up to 20 events (number 1 .. 20). An even can be
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something like a town being reached, or a treasure being stolen, or a major creature being
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killed. When something happens you want to be an Event, call a special node of type Major
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Event Has Occured. For example, if you want the killing of the Goblin Chief to be Event 4,
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have a special node called when that creature is killed. That node should, of course, be
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of type Major Event Has Occured, set to Event 4.</p>
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<p>The purpose of Events is determine whenther things should happen in the scenario or
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not. The occurance of an Event can prevent bad things from happening. For example, suppose
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you want the goblin tribe to attack a town on day 90 and kill Fred, one of the characters
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in the town. This will be prevented if the Goblin Chief is killed before day 90 (killing
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the chief is Event 4).</p>
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<p>When you place Fred in the town, bring up the Advanced Monster Settings Dialog, and set
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When Is Creature Here to Appear On Given Day. In the Day Creature Disappears field, enter
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90 (for Day 90), and for the Event Code which prevents the disappearance (the second
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field), enter 4. This character will disappear on day 90 unless Event 4 happens to prevent
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it.</p>
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<p>Similarly, when talking to characters, you can have their responses depend on whether
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events have happened or not. Suppose, Sue, in the same town, talks about Fred. Before Fred
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dies, she says something nice about him. After he dies, she says he died. When writing
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Sue's dialog, give her a dialogue node of type Depends On Time (and event). Set the day
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the response changes (the first field) to 90, and the Event which prevents the change (the
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second field) to 4. If Fred was killed (i.e. if the Goblin Chief was not killed before Day
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90), she will respond with the second text field. Otherwise, she will respond with the
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first.</p>
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<p>Finally, you can use the If-Then Special Node Type 150: Special Thing happened?, which
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calls different special nodes depending on whether a day has been reached and whether an
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Event has happened before that day or not.</p>
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<p>Using Events is a good way to spice up your scenario. By picking things that will
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disappear and people that can die and Events to prevent those occurances, you can create
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the feeling of the passing of time. This can create a real feeling of urgency in the
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player!</p>
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</div>
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</body>
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</html>
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