Wandering Monsters

Zephirius

I've been toying with a random monster spawner -
I'm looking for suggestions on how to improve it... I'm sure You guys will let me have it... lol
I know there's plenty of systems out there, but I kind of wanted to try doing it myself, I might be in over my head... not sure.

For OnHeartbeat
Code so far...

void SpawnWanderingMonster(string sResRef, location lLoc)
{
    CreateObject(OBJECT_TYPE_CREATURE, "", lLoc);
}
void main()
{

    object oPC = GetNearestCreature(CREATURE_TYPE_PLAYER_CHAR, PLAYER_CHAR_IS_PC);
    if (!GetIsPC(oPC)) return;

    location oWay1 = GetLocation(GetWaypointByTag("WP_01"));
    location oWay2 = GetLocation(GetWaypointByTag("WP_02"));
    location oWay3 = GetLocation(GetWaypointByTag("WP_03"));
    location oWay4 = GetLocation(GetWaypointByTag("WP_04"));
    location oWay5 = GetLocation(GetWaypointByTag("WP_05"));
    location oWay6 = GetLocation(GetWaypointByTag("WP_06"));
    location oWay7 = GetLocation(GetWaypointByTag("WP_07"));

    if (d100() > 90 )
    {
        switch (Random(7))
        {
            SpawnWanderingMonster("", oWay1);
            // Lots more monster stuff here
        }
    }
}

Terrorble

Day and night checks. Don't let the vampire rogues come out at high noon.

If it's a predatory beast it may be attracted to corpses and spawn near them assuming nothing else is too close.

I see the code picks a random waypoint and creates the monster, but doesn't tell it to go anywhere yet. I suppose things like random wandering, spawning in with stealth, moving/stalking to a PC's location, etc might be handled within the creature's events and not this system.

Zephirius

Thanks for the comments Terrorble. Will look into creature events. I'll have to read up on event scripting .

Terrorble

Here are a couple examples to (potentially uneccessarily - becauase that's what I do ) elaborate/clarify what I meant by some aspects being handled outside the system.

I've spent so long in my own module I can't tell you what is original or default behavior and what isn't, but the OnSpawn for creatures I think has a flag for spawning in stealth. If the creature should always do that, then that flag/variable would be set within the creature's properties.

The spawn system could set a variable (e.g. STALKER) which the creature's heartbeat script could contain the behavior for. Like moving to their location to try for a sneak attack.

NeverwinterWights

A couple suggestions so far (I added commenting to your script to explain):

void SpawnWanderingMonster(string sResRef, location lLoc)
{
    CreateObject(OBJECT_TYPE_CREATURE, sResRef, lLoc);
}
void main()
{

    object oPC = GetNearestCreature(CREATURE_TYPE_PLAYER_CHAR, PLAYER_CHAR_IS_PC);
    if (!GetIsPC(oPC)) return;

    //You can eliminate a whole list of waypoints if you have a specific naming convention
    /*location oWay1 = GetLocation(GetWaypointByTag("WP_01"));
    location oWay2 = GetLocation(GetWaypointByTag("WP_02"));
    location oWay3 = GetLocation(GetWaypointByTag("WP_03"));
    location oWay4 = GetLocation(GetWaypointByTag("WP_04"));
    location oWay5 = GetLocation(GetWaypointByTag("WP_05"));
    location oWay6 = GetLocation(GetWaypointByTag("WP_06"));
    location oWay7 = GetLocation(GetWaypointByTag("WP_07"));*/

    if (d100() > 90 )
    {
        //this doesnt need to be a switch
        int iRandom = Random(7)+1;

        //Also recommend changing "oWay" to "lWay" since it is supposed to be a location
        //and not an object. As far as naming convention goes it just makes it easier to read
        //for other people looking at your script and yourself looking at it later

        //Here you can just grab the waypoint you need without making a list if the waypoint
        //naming convention is consistant. In this case if you end up with more than 9
        //waypoints you would have to continue naming them "WP_010", "WP_011", etc.
        location lWay = GetLocation(GetWaypointByTag("WP_0"+IntToString(iRandom)));
        SpawnWanderingMonster("", lWay);
        // Lots more monster stuff here
    }
}

Hope it's helpful.

Zephirius

Cool. Gonna try this out. Thanks for the help!

4BOLTMAIN

When I do random waypoints I do this...

EDIT:
Nvm... NeverwinterWights covered this already with the Random(7) explanation.

Don't forget that Random(7) returns values from 0 - 6 and not 1 - 7.

NeverwinterWights

4BOLTMAIN wrote: »

When I do random waypoints I do this...

EDIT:
Nvm... NeverwinterWights covered this already with the Random(7) explanation.

Don't forget that Random(7) returns values from 0 - 6 and not 1 - 7.

Good catch. Fixed it.