RMMV Eventing Issue-- please help?

[mchoneybee]

Hey!
So I'm trying to script a scene where the player has to make correct choices while talking to a character in order to survive. The idea is that if you pick a wrong answer, the character is silent for a few moments before darting forward suddenly, and then the GAME OVER screen will show.
It seems easy enough, but for some reason, no matter what I try, the character simply stands still rather than moving toward the player-- which I consider a pretty important part of the game over. Does anyone know what might be the problem???

 

[Shaz]

We'll need to see what you're doing, in order to tell you how to fix it.

Please post a screenshot of your event(s) so we can see the logic for the wrong answer and for the NPC movement. Also a screenshot of the map might be handy, so we can see where the player and NPC are standing when this happens.

 

[mchoneybee]

We'll need to see what you're doing, in order to tell you how to fix it.

Please post a screenshot of your event(s) so we can see the logic for the wrong answer and for the NPC movement. Also a screenshot of the map might be handy, so we can see where the player and NPC are standing when this happens.

I can show what I have right now, but the thing is that I've been changing it around a lot through the process of me trying to get it to work, so... idk, I guess I'll just send what I have, yeah. Thank you!!
On the map, the player would be where that event is a little up ahead from where the npc is standing, and the npc will be two squares down from there, if that helps. I can get a screenshot of the gameplay if necessary.
Here:

 

[Shaz]

Please show ALL pages of the event. What triggers page 2 to activate? And please include the entire event window, with no cropping. I have no idea where that second image comes from, because you've removed the important stuff from it. It looks like a duplicate of what you've got in the third screenshot, but then I'm wondering why you posted it twice.

How does the event get to 2 tiles below the player?


If you have split up your cutscene processing by putting some code on that blank event, which activates the NPC event's page 1, which does some stuff then activates its own page 2, it's probably not a good way to go about it. Your doing it as a parallel process means the player can move around while it's doing its thing. Better to have the blank event be Player Touch, and just put all the processing in there. You can do a Movement Route and select the NPC event as the one to move. Then you don't have to worry about things switching to other pages or moving at the right or wrong time.

 

[mchoneybee]

Please show ALL pages of the event. What triggers page 2 to activate? And please include the entire event window, with no cropping. I have no idea where that second image comes from, because you've removed the important stuff from it. It looks like a duplicate of what you've got in the third screenshot, but then I'm wondering why you posted it twice.

How does the event get to 2 tiles below the player?


If you have split up your cutscene processing by putting some code on that blank event, which activates the NPC event's page 1, which does some stuff then activates its own page 2, it's probably not a good way to go about it. Your doing it as a parallel process means the player can move around while it's doing its thing. Better to have the blank event be Player Touch, and just put all the processing in there. You can do a Movement Route and select the NPC event as the one to move. Then you don't have to worry about things switching to other pages or moving at the right or wrong time.

Page 2 is activated by a self switch. I included both images because I realized you'd need to see the entire event window to see that after I'd taken the smaller crop already... sorry about that. i guess i didn't need to include both.
The event gets to be 2 tiles below the player because it moves forward as part of a cutscene that's on the other event pages included in that one. i've actually tried making the page shown autorun instead of parallel process, but that doesn't seem to fix it.
the blank event is player touch already, yes. i see what you're saying with that one maneuvering the npc, but i don't think that's my issue, here... everything else in the cutscene works fine. the player walks to the player touch blank event, and that triggers the npc to appear (autorun) and approach the player before the choices start appearing. the entire thing proceeds just fine and ends normally, it's just that i can't get the npc to move forward before my "game over" plays. i didn't think that having those things within the npc's event would affect that, since the code i'm trying to work out is within an "options" section, and it would be the same if i moved all of that into the blank event??

I'll include screenshots of my events-- i did create a self switch within the npc's cutscene so that i could change its image (to the sprite holding the knife), since the "change image" function in the movement route thing is kinda wonky. but, again, i don't think that should change it, since there are no changes in switches or anything surrounding the error i'm trying to fix right now.

sorry if i seem like i'm rejecting your help-- i'm grateful for your advice, and i will take it if that'll help me here.

ALSO, in page 2 of the npc's events, please ignore the "fadein" and "fadeout" commands-- i've since removed those. it was just to see if that would fix my issue, which it didn't.

 

[Shaz]

My guess is that the event won't move because it's bumping into the other event that triggered the whole thing. Try changing that final move route to turn THROUGH ON at the start, and see if it makes a difference.

 

[mchoneybee]

My guess is that the event won't move because it's bumping into the other event that triggered the whole thing. Try changing that final move route to turn THROUGH ON at the start, and see if it makes a difference.

...Wow.
That fixed the issue immediately. I can't believe I didn't even consider that, lol.
Thank you so much for your help!!

 

[Andar]

@mchoneybee
1)
NEVER have an empty parallel process like you have in one of your screenshots (second page of ev013).
that will do nothing but cause a lot of lag - literally nothing because there is no command to be processed in the event page set to parallel.

2)
NEVER split a single scene between multiple events or event pages.
In EV014, the first page is an autorun that switches to a second autorun page. That is a very bad construct, in all such cases all commands should be on a single page with the second set under the first set in place of the control switch.
Such a construct will open you to timing errors without any advantage - but a lot of disadvantages.
And timing errors are the worst in bughunting - if you continue to use such suboptimal coding you will get into trouble sooner or later even if it seems to work now.
you can follow the link "bughunting" in my signature to learn a bit more about timing errors...

 

[mchoneybee]

@mchoneybee
1)
NEVER have an empty parallel process like you have in one of your screenshots (second page of ev013).
that will do nothing but cause a lot of lag - literally nothing because there is no command to be processed in the event page set to parallel.

2)
NEVER split a single scene between multiple events or event pages.
In EV014, the first page is an autorun that switches to a second autorun page. That is a very bad construct, in all such cases all commands should be on a single page with the second set under the first set in place of the control switch.
Such a construct will open you to timing errors without any advantage - but a lot of disadvantages.
And timing errors are the worst in bughunting - if you continue to use such suboptimal coding you will get into trouble sooner or later even if it seems to work now.
you can follow the link "bughunting" in my signature to learn a bit more about timing errors...

Thank you for your input! This is my first game, and I've already gotten through a lot using the stuff that's apparently bad, so I'll try stuff out in future scenes that you've suggested and see if it works better. Is there an alternative to creating a blank parallel event page? That's what I learned to do from a tutorial (I believe SRdude's youtube series) in order to prevent an event from repeating or being triggered again.
I usually don't split a single scene between events, i just use player touch events to trigger the event that contains the scene, since it's easier to maneuver, at least for me. I do switch event pages within scenes a lot, though, because sometimes it seems necessary... i'll try to do it less, though, if it'll help with lag, though i really haven't experienced a lot of lag in my test runs, either in the editor or after it's been distributed and tested by others. I think the only timing errors i've ever had have been with sound effects/bgm, but i've generally been able to fix that and it's not a source of strife with my game right now.

 

[Andar]

That's what I learned to do from a tutorial (I believe SRdude's youtube series) in order to prevent an event from repeating or being triggered again.

no, the problem is that you misunderstood those tutorials.
what they ask you is to switch to a blank NON-parallel page, not a blank parallel page.
You can't disable parallel by switching to another parallel, so that page should have remained at action button trigger.

 

[mchoneybee]

no, the problem is that you misunderstood those tutorials.
what they ask you is to switch to a blank NON-parallel page, not a blank parallel page.
You can't disable parallel by switching to another parallel, so that page should have remained at action button trigger.

OHH. That makes sense. I thought you were telling me that it was the wrong thing to do entirely. I think this is actually the only event where I changed the last pages to parallel because i was trying to see if something would fix my issue-- all my other instances of this are still action button. I'll make sure to change this one back.

 

[Andar]

only event where I changed the last pages to parallel because i was trying to see if something would fix my issue

guessing rarely fixes any bugs - and forgetting to correct a guessed change back has a very high risk of adding additional bugs.
I think you should really read my bughunting tutorial, and not only for the background on timing problems...

and the starting point tutorial might also help you, so you should take a month or so to really work through the linked tutorials there.

 

[mchoneybee]

guessing rarely fixes any bugs - and forgetting to correct a guessed change back has a very high risk of adding additional bugs.
I think you should really read my bughunting tutorial, and not only for the background on timing problems...

and the starting point tutorial might also help you, so you should take a month or so to really work through the linked tutorials there.

I'll consider those! Generally I'm just taking my time to learn as I make this game, so I'm not in a huge rush to memorize every strategy for a month before i continue making it. I do appreciate your help, and I'll check out your tutorials when I have time.

 

[Dungeonmind]

so that page should have remained at action button trigger

Actually technically it should be changed to event touch if it’s just a blank event page. Since we're talking about bugs so much. That’s something right there that has the potential to cause catastrophic problems. For example if you are on an event that’s push key and let’s say an npc walks right next to you naturally you will want to talk to them using the action key but it will be disabled because of the empty event beneath you being set to push key activating instead triggering an empty event page . So don’t do that. Get in the habit of setting your empty event pages to event touch and avoid a whole bunch of problems later on in development. (Also make sure the empty page's Autonomous Movement Type is set to Fixed.)

 

[caethyril]

For example if you are on an event that’s push key and let’s say an npc walks right next to you naturally you will want to talk to them using the action key but it will be disabled because of the empty event beneath you being set to push key activating instead triggering an empty event page

I hadn't recognised that behaviour before, thanks for mentioning it!

It's due to the way the core scripts only admit one event trigger per action and check "below player" events before "same as player" ones. It should work with Player Touch or Event Touch; I'd suggest Player Touch since that doesn't get checked when the event moves, but it shouldn't make much difference. Supporting code excerpt, comments mine:

Spoiler: Game_Player > triggerButtonAction (rpg_objects.js)

Game_Player.prototype.triggerButtonAction = function() {
    if (Input.isTriggered('ok')) {
        // Vehicle interaction
        if (this.getOnOffVehicle()) {
            return true;
        }
        // Below Player - Action Button
        this.checkEventTriggerHere([0]);
        if ($gameMap.setupStartingEvent()) {
            return true;
        }
        // Same As Player - Action Button, Player Touch, Event Touch
        this.checkEventTriggerThere([0,1,2]);
        if ($gameMap.setupStartingEvent()) {
            return true;
        }
    }
    return false;
};

 

[Dungeonmind]

I hadn't recognised that behaviour before, thanks for mentioning it!

No problem man! Glad to help.

It's due to the way the core scripts only admit one event trigger per action and check "below player" events before "same as player" ones. It should work with Player Touch or Event Touch; I'd suggest Player Touch since that doesn't get checked when the event moves, but it shouldn't make much difference. Supporting code excerpt, comments mine:

Player touch if you are moving an event yeah. But we were talking about a blank non moving event. This should be set to event touch to disable it completely, as the player can still touch the event.

 

[mchoneybee]

No problem man! Glad to help.



Player touch if you are moving an event yeah. But we were talking about a blank non moving event. This should be set to event touch to disable it completely, as the player can still touch the event.

Wow, thank you guys for the tips! Andar had me thinking that I was simply doing literally everything wrong, but it turns out I just have a little more to learn before I'm as effective at eventing as I want to be. lol

 

[Dungeonmind]

Wow, thank you guys for the tips! Andar had me thinking that I was simply doing literally everything wrong, but it turns out I just have a little more to learn before I'm as effective at eventing as I want to be. lol

Hey man we all gotta start somewhere. The important thing is to just try and research it beforehand using google and a couple keywords like "RPG Maker MV plugin" can get you a ton of answers, surprisingly.

 

[mchoneybee]

Hey man we all gotta start somewhere. The important thing is to just try and research it beforehand using google and a couple keywords like "RPG Maker MV plugin" can get you a ton of answers, surprisingly.

Yeah, of course!! I have been using tons of different resources and looking stuff up throughout my learning process, I only had to come ask for help on this one thing... which ended up being a very simple fix anyway.