8 replies to this topic

[aVENGER]

Hi there. I'm doing some dialogue scripting and so far, I've successfully written, compiled and successfully tested about 400 lines of reasonably complex dialogue code (VENDURIS.D > 25kb and working flawlessly) so I'm not really a newbie at these things, yet somehow, I just can't get this function (EXTERN) to work properly.

To clarify, I have two NPC's here Venduris and Zaeron who are standing beside one other. Now, I just want Zaeron to make a small comment during Vend's dialogue with the Protagonist and then the focus should return to Vend. Now, since I couldn't get it to work in the main VENDURIS.D (and as mentioned above, that file is getting quite big) I have created two new sample dialogue files VEND.DLG and ZAERON.DLG and assigned them to theirs respective CRE's for testing. here's what they look like:

//VEND.D
BEGIN ~VEND~

IF ~NumTimesTalkedTo(0)~ THEN BEGIN 1
SAY ~This is a small example for testing EXTERN.~
IF ~~ THEN REPLY ~Let's do it!~ GOTO 2
IF ~~ THEN REPLY ~No, exit please.~ EXIT
END

IF ~~ THEN BEGIN 2
SAY ~Ok, now let's see if EXTERN works.~
IF ~~ THEN EXTERN ~ZAERON~ 1
END


IF ~~ THEN BEGIN 3
SAY ~Well it should be working now.~
IF ~~ THEN REPLY ~I hope so.~ EXIT
END

// ZAERON.D
BEGIN ~ZAERON~

IF ~True()~ THEN BEGIN 1
SAY ~Come on you dammed thing...work already!~
IF ~~ THEN EXTERN ~VEND~ 3
END

Then, I compile both files wish the standard:

weidu vend.d --tlkout dialog.tlk
weidu zaeron.d --tlkout dialog.tlk

and then I copy the newly created VEND.DLG and ZAERON.DLG to my BG2\override folder. Then I summon both creatures, first Zaeron then Vend. Then Vend initiates dialogue and after I chose option 1 and the 'Ok, now let's see if EXTERN works' dialogue shows up the game crashes with this message:

BGMAIN caused an invalid page fault in
module BGMAIN.EXE at 015f:004e77f3...etc.

*Sigh* I'm guessing that I'm doing something very basic very wrong here but according to the WeiDU documentation and some examples which I've seen that code should work ok!? Can someone explain this for me...

[Grim Squeaker]

I'm not convinced you need the bit that reads: IF ~True~ THEN BEGIN. You should just need IF ~~ THEN BEGIN as it isn't the start of a conversation.

If you are having problems with EXTERN then CHAINing can sometimes get you out of it (although not always).

[Rastor]

Agreed, a CHAIN is probably the best way to do this.

Remove that ~True()~ from the Zaeron dialogue. That's what's causing the problems.

[aVENGER]

Hmm, it's definitively not the True() trigger, as I've tried a few times without it as well. In fact, I've only included that to make SURE that the dialogue gets executed although it may be completely unnecessary. I'll try with CHAIN though.

[Kismet]

You might want to check Zaeron's .cre file to see if there are any errors there (although what errors there would be that would cause a crash I couldn't tell you ). I would think that if there was anything wrong with your dialog file that WeiDU would catch it when it compiled rather than in game.

[aVENGER]

Damn, I really don't get this. Everything in the CRE and in the DLG's seams to be ok, but BG2 still crashes. I'd like to try CHAIN now but unfortunately, I can't seam to get its syntax right. WeiDU is definitely the best BG2 dialogue tool, but i's documentation can be really confusing at times.

Can someone please convert the simple dialogue which I presented above into CHAIN format and post the code for me? It would help me a lot if I cold just get to see a functional example of its use.

[Kismet]

IF ~NumTimesTalkedTo(0)~ THEN VEND 1
SAY ~This is a small example for testing EXTERN.~
IF ~~ THEN REPLY ~Let's do it!~ GOTO 2
IF ~~ THEN REPLY ~No, exit please.~ EXIT
END

CHAIN
IF ~~ THEN VEND 2
~Ok, now let's see if EXTERN works.~
== Zaeron ~Come on you dammed thing...work already!~
== Vend ~Well it should be working now.~
END
IF ~~ THEN REPLY ~I hope so.~ EXIT

As an aside, you may not want to use just numbers as statelables. I hear things can get confusing if you do that. WeiDU will convert whatever string you use for a statelable into an integer when it compiles the dialog.

[aVENGER]

@Kismet:

Thanks, that code (with a few modifications) worked, although I noticed that the DLG's compiled just like when I was using EXTERN !? Anyway, I got it to work...but only in one particular instance, but I think I'm slowly getting the hang of it. Still, I'll skip the multi-character interactions for now, until I understand this better.

@JC

Nope, I double checked that and both the DLGs and the Death Variables were in place. I think that the AI of the CREs might have interfered though, so I disabled it temporarily. Also, does it matter that they are marked as hostile (Allegiance = 255 - ENEMY) ? Anyway, as already said above, I've decided to drop the multi-interactions for now, and get back to them once I'm fully finished with the core dialogue.