Two small things which would improve Arcanum

Well, I can't seem to figure out the problem with the orc idle. I've tried several methods and conditional statements to account for the oddest of deviations from normal conditions (under which it should be working) but I can't figure it out. There's no problem with the sound file....race type == orc and Is Current Looped Object a monster of specie 2 doesn't seem to be working. I can't tell, at this point, if its the conditional statement (meaning the Arcanum coders fucked up) or something with my script. One thing I hate about Arcanum coding is that debugging can be such a blind thing because of the little errors and unknowns that are thrown into the game engine as to what works or doesn't work.


Also, it appears that 'monsters' are not counted as "animals" or "undead"...since their flag isn't set. They're lumped into the group category of "NPCs", which is why they were coughing and blinking....if the script cannot detect that it is an animal or otherwise, it automatically assumes it's a sentient critter.


However, all monsters belong to the 'monster' faction after you place them in world-ed. So for the time being, that's the best fix I can come up with. If the game designers took out the "monster faction" from the faction of a monster like an Arraya or a Fleshy Mass, then it will play a human fidget sound...however, I think blinking at least won't be a problem anymore.


I also added in a check that prevents the PC from playing any idles. Also preventing NPCs from playing idles when polymorphed, in dialogue, or in combat.

I also fixed sheep idles. They will play their sound now.


There you go Muro, let me know if you break my script somehow. I'll look into the orc problem again at a later time.

Just re-download the file and over-write everything. I only updated the snd_user.mes and 503FidgetOVerWrap.scr files.

 

Something must have went wrong, I'm afraid.

I redownloaded and overwrote the files. The result? Kite play their idle animations normally, but they don't play the kite fidget sounds. Instead, they play other sounds such as earth fidget, fleshy mass fidgeting or hellbeast fidgeting. Those were the ones I was able to recognise, anyway. It's possible that they sometimes play their animation soundless as well.

I checked if other monsters share the same problem. Dragarons do, so do gowraths and arrayas. Void lizards seem to work correctly, though.

As for lizard people, it's hard to tell. The lizards at the Mysterious Ruins in Vendigroth seem to work as they should, playing lizard animations and sounds. As for the Bedokaans, all I've seen them do was yawn like humans while blinking. Not sure if there is a distinction in the files between Bedokaans and those lizards or was it just my luck.

 

Kite's are counted as monsters I suppose. Unless they missed the monster specie check in my script because I forgot them or....screwed it up somehow.


When it comes to monsters such as Kite's, Bedookans, arrayas, etc....there's no reliable method to detect them or their specie type. Something the coders left out....unless the 'is a mosnter of specie N' command has more than 31 types....something I'll have to go and test later.