Ash: Phoenix

[FinaleTI]

Hm, I was just about to ask if you can delete external variables, then just before I posted I decided to check the docu just in case even though I was 99% sure you couldn't...and then I found out you can . This will make things much easier (ie creating temp appvars for extra storage and then deleting them.)

I'll think about changing the limit: there'll be plenty of cushion time to decide since the only data in the save file following item data are quest flags (which I can use bits for if I want to lol)

Yeah, creating temp appvars really helps. I actually use 3-4 different buffers in Nostalgia's battle engine (L6 and two appvars, plus the occasional use of L3).

[DJ Omnimaga]

Wow that looks great! One thing you need to make sure for menus, though, is that key sensitiveness is not too high for when you start holding arrows down. Else, it might become a bit hard to control. Final Fantasy 1 for the Nintendo had this problem during battles.

[squidgetx]

^Fixed now.

Progres is inching along; though I'm really busy this week so it should pick up speed by November. Move selection can now deal with <8 moves (before it couldn't) similarly to how the item system deals with <25 items. Also the interface for the battle screen has been polished, the enemy data is structured properly (no sprites yet though)and I've got pseudocode for the damage inflicting written out on paper. Hopefully by the weekend the damage code will be done and I can work on xp/lvl up, loot and battle sprites

[DJ Omnimaga]

Cool! For 8 moves make sure when there are blocks like this:

Code: Select All | Copy To Clipboard

1 2

O  O

That you cannot go between them when moving diagonaly. I think for that you need to check vertical and horizontal collision separately. Just making sure since I had this problem before when coding Metroid X.x.

Good luck!

[squidgetx]

Oh, actually i was talking about the battle engine: when you are selecting a move before it would let you scroll all the way down the list you knew less than 8 techniques. So if you only knew 5 moves, the other 3 would be garbage/corrupted moves.

8 directional movement would be awesome if I could get it to work...on the other hand I think I'm going to be getting very close to the code limit with this project and the mapper runs fast enough so that you CAN hold down two arrow keys and move diagonally (right 1 square, up 1 square, right 1 square,etc.) so I think I'll only look at that later....

[DJ Omnimaga]

Oh ok I thought you meant for a walking engine, my bad X.x.

As for the code limit, you could maybe use either an APP or you could use the Illusiat 13 technique with XCOPY. It would not be a pure-Axe game anymore but your executable code limit would rise to 164 KB on 83+, 480 on 84+ and 1540K on SE calcs. (If you run an ASM program from a BASIC one, the executable code from the ASM program no longer counts, so by splitting your game in chunks you can get around that limit. I guess that's one of the advantages of TI-BASIC

[squidgetx]

Well I'll definitely be using an app, no questions about that. The battle engine with item/stat screens as subroutines currently sits at 6kb with estimated 1 kb of data that may be moved to appvars later. The map engine sits at 3kb with 500 bytes of data that will be moved to appvars later. NPC text, the rest of the sprites/tiles will be in external appvars as well, so I guess that leaves around 7 or 8k left for the rest of the battle engine, trigger tiles (NPC convos and bosses), warp tiles (doors, entrances etc.), and some menu stuff (which might involve a custom input routine :X ). Maybe I will be able to get to 8 dir. mvt after all

[squidgetx]

mmmm double post but AAAAAAHHHHH I GOT THE DAMAGE FORMULA TO WORK!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

my excessive happiness might seem...excessive but this is a major breakthrough (for me anyway). Coding the battle engine is all downhill from here

[ztrumpet]

Nice!  Congrats!

[meishe91]

This looks really cool! Good luck on it. And congrats about the battle engine, that always makes things a lot easier when things like that happen Keep up the great work.

[DJ Omnimaga]

mmmm double post but AAAAAAHHHHH I GOT THE DAMAGE FORMULA TO WORK!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

my excessive happiness might seem...excessive but this is a major breakthrough (for me anyway). Coding the battle engine is all downhill from here

GLad to hear. I hope you did not get too much trouble getting around integer overflow problems (when your atk+the magic atk is too high for the enemy defense, it causes over the 2 byte range, causing damage to loop back in the negative ranges (since a 2 byte integer is -32768 to 32767). Some console RPGs got this problem.

[squidgetx]

Well I tried as much as I could to keep it under. level 100 max attack/weapon/magic boosts (896 atk) vs something with less than 21 def with the best technique (15 power) would cause some overflow errors. However, 1) the residual damage (ie, if calculations reach ~70000, calculating off of ~5000) is usually enough to kill something that weak anyway and 2) it is very very hard to get max attack (255). I'm using something similar to the pokemon EV system which means that your stat gains are affected by what you kill. So unless you only kill certain types of monsters for the whole game, your attack will be much closer to 200 at lvl 100 which lowers the chances of overflows. Oh and 3) damage is always positive. No negative damage; I'm using a different set of code for healing/recoil techniques

speaking of which, most of the side effects of moves are now done including healing, stat boosts, recoil, and class advantage bonuses, although getting the turn rotation to work is being annoying. Hopefully I'll get a screenie showing off some animations by this weekend

[ztrumpet]

Oh and 3) damage is always positive. No negative damage; I'm using a different set of code for healing/recoil techniques.

So this means damage can go up to 65535, right?

Hopefully I'll get a screenie showing off some animations by this weekend

Awesome!  Good luck.

[squidgetx]

Yes, damage can go up to 65535....if you hack your appvar to get jacked stats lol. The damage formula's highest amount of damage possible (normally) I think is around 35000 though.

[DJ Omnimaga]

Well I tried as much as I could to keep it under. level 100 max attack/weapon/magic boosts (896 atk) vs something with less than 21 def with the best technique (15 power) would cause some overflow errors. However, 1) the residual damage (ie, if calculations reach ~70000, calculating off of ~5000) is usually enough to kill something that weak anyway and 2) it is very very hard to get max attack (255). I'm using something similar to the pokemon EV system which means that your stat gains are affected by what you kill. So unless you only kill certain types of monsters for the whole game, your attack will be much closer to 200 at lvl 100 which lowers the chances of overflows. Oh and 3) damage is always positive. No negative damage; I'm using a different set of code for healing/recoil techniques

speaking of which, most of the side effects of moves are now done including healing, stat boosts, recoil, and class advantage bonuses, although getting the turn rotation to work is being annoying. Hopefully I'll get a screenie showing off some animations by this weekend

Ah I see, glad to hear.

And nice progress. Can't wait to see more progress. Hopefully it might eventually get its sub-forum if it gets signifiant progress (engine done and just more maps/story to add)