Dungeon Master Forum

Well, I am using DMBuild, trying to make shooters. I put the wall graphic in, choose the spell, put a target to it...notin happens!

Also, I was trying to use a weapon shooter, choosing the weapon gives me every picture in the program, lots are whited out...I get blue haze, open this way, screamer, compass, door, bones, zokathra spell, halter, flask, and a whole bunch of junk.

So, what am I doing wrong?

a) Shooters need to be targeted by an effect to the face they are on - not just an activate, but say an activate to the east face (if it were facing east). Check out the shooter in level 8 of DM and its trigger beside the 'delta' room. Or look at the shooters in level 9.

b) The programme is giving you a visual representation of the hex code. Some wall items use all these values. The weapon shooter is only coded in the engine to shoot throwing weapons (rocks, daggers, darts), torches (burnt out) and boulders.

Ah, good point looking at shooters in original DM.

Agh, I set it to throw a lit torch! Better change that!

Well, I haven't looked at original DM yet, but I have gotten my torch shooter to shoot these things, Oh I can't wait to see someone play it...Oh, right, I won't be watching...level 10 it is just incase you're wondering. Oh I can't wait to see someone play it...Oh, right, I won't be watching. Haven't I already said that? Oh I can't wait to see someone play it...Oh, right, I won't be watching. Ah! Ok, now I got a bit more troubles with it:

1) How do I change the range of a shooter? I can't find the button
2) How do I add more ammunition to a weapon shooter if you can?

1) It's in 'KEYS.txt':
(shooter) NOTE! range number high = short shooter / range number low = long shooter
'l' range ++
'shift-L' range --
'w' increase power
'shift-W' decrease power

2) You can't, they have set limits (~40 weapons, ~ 80 boulders I think)

so fourty torches? It looked like 5 or 6 daggers in the Ros path in CSB.

Depends how many times you trigger it - in CSB it only triggers once every time you walk over there.

There are three kinds of shooters. The first kind
shoots whatever is available in the same location
as the shooter. If you put six daggers there then
you can activate it six times before it runs out
of ammunition. It can shoot anything. A pressure
pad if you like.

The second kind shoots predefined
objects and none need to be supplied by the designer.
It never runs out of ammunition but there is a limited
number of object types. You can see the list in CSBuild.

THe third kind shoots magic spells.

Are you sure for weapons shooters? I did tests on the PC DM engine, and it did eventually run out of ammunition (I simple set a relay to constantly fire it)

Amazingly, we are both right (the amazing part is me being right too...I usually lose here)

CSBwin = unlimited shooting
PC DM = limited shooting

So for the purposes of your dungeon ADDF, you will have limtied shots - but then this won't matter unless you were planning on having a constant stream of weapons fire anyway - 40 - 80 shots should be enough for most dungeons.

The shooter that fires anything in the wall won't fire pressure pads in PC DM - this is something that you could easily do, I am sure, in CSBwin (I assume we have to ask for it, it's not available right now)

.I usually lose here

I think you lose again.

There is an absolute limit in Atari and PC DM of how
many objects can exist. The physical limit is 1021.
I think they set the actual limit to 768. After that
many objects of any one type (weapons, for example)
exist in the dungeon then no more can be created.
This is not a function of the shooter. If you get rid
of some of these weapons (eat them, for example) then
the shooter will operate again. It did not run out of ammo,
the dungeon ran out of memory.

CSBwin allows 65000 objects of any one type as a
physical limit and 8000 as a practical limit (can be changed).

*shakes fist to the sky*
This makes alot of sense, as I am sure I could never find a definite limit to the shooters - it seemed arbitrary. Now I know why (depended on the dungeon I was testing it in).
Strange that the engine/dungeon does not just delete the older weapons piled at the bottom to make memory room for the new ones, like it does for any monster-dropped items...an oversight?

This makes alot of sense

Thanks. Some folks say I speak gibberish.

The function that allocates memory has a parameter
that says whether or not the item being generated
is 'Important'. The shooter call says 'false'....not important.
So no attempt is made to clean out other objects
from the dungeon.

The shooter that fires anything in the wall won't fire pressure pads in PC DM

I guess I may be wrong about pressurepads.
If it allowed actuators then it would shoot itself out!!!

Aha, so the shooter cannot clear away other items to make way for more shots, but I assume what is left behind will also be first in line to be deleted if an important weapon was created?

Nope. What it did was go through the levels in order.
The first time things needed cleaning up it tried to
recycle objects from level 0. The next time level 1.
Etc. It tried to skip the level the party was on so that
things did not disappear before your eyes.

Other thatn that, there was no order to the collection.
Nothing was 'First in Line' because there was no line.

You may not understand if you haven't seen Shrek 2, but Quit ripping apart the lobster!
I did run out of ammunition. And how do you throw anything(using DMBuild in you can), that's funny!

It is one of the later wall items before the end game pad
Just make sure that whatever items you put into the wall face the same direction as the shooter. And make sure you you don't fire the shooter if there isn't items in the wall, or else the game crashes

Ah kay

So I got it working(one of them) but I want it to continue, not just fire once and stop. Can I do that?

You will have to confront the trigger (actuator type five)

Set two triggers in a wall anywhere. Have them targetted by a close effect when you want the shooters to start firing. Have one trigger activate the shooter. Have the other trigger activate its own square with a close effect, at a suitable delay. You may also want to have this effect targetting a side not north.

This will keep firing the shooter indefinitely. Now, what you can do is have another floor pad, etc targetting the triggers with an open effect. This will stop the triggers. So you could set it up that the party activates the shooter walking into an area, but deactivates it when walking out of the area again. Or if they solve a puzzle.

Argh!!!! I'm out of actutator space!!!!!!!!!! It's too bad it doesn't go down when I delete some!

Wow, there should be 1024 in DMBuild! Yeah, I think I noticed that for some reason it doesn't acknowledge deleting : (

You can always switch to CSBuild and have it playable through CSBwin instead - it doesn't ahve any limits you need worry about, but it will mean you wouldn't be able to play it through PC DM.

Good idea, if I can figure out how to switch it with the DM system I have on my computer.