Singleton Seeks Backpack

[Max Power]

One of the drawbacks of playing a singleton is constantly running out of inventory space. Once you’ve got food, lockpicks, a few key potions/scrolls/wands, maybe an alternate weapon ... you have very few spots for loot. I gave up on potion-making a long time ago because the reagents just take up too much space.

 

What I need is a backpack. Or a scroll tube, or a potion bag, or a reagent pouch. Or a pack mule. All of these are WAY beyond my (pathetic) coding skills, but surely it can be done? Maybe something like Capture Soul – Simulacrum, but with items. Or maybe there’s a way to trick the script into stacking dissimilar items.

 

Anyone have any ideas?

[Imban]

Implementing some sort of backpack that you can take between scenarios, outside of having a second character as a pack mule, would be impossible.

 

Implementing some sort of backpack or holding space in a single scenario might be possible, but I'm really not sure how I'd go about it.

[Commodore Redmark]

Is it possisble to create a scenario for the sole purpose of housing vast amounts of treasure, and of course have it be there when you return?

[Alorael at Large]

There's no way to make a scenario do that, but you can make duplicates of items you have in a scenario. That means that you could go into the scenario, pick them up, leave, and get second copies of them (and third copies, etc.), but to be honest you'd have to delete the items from your storage scenario after retrieving them with your party.

 

—Alorael, who doesn't know any way to have a scenario rewrite itself. If you can program that, you can make a scenario that works as storage without further coding intervention.

[Commodore Redmark]

Well, I'd like it to be easier. But you win some you lose some.

[Max Power]

If the custom item (i.e., the backpack) had its own script, couldn't you just copy that script over into all of the scenarios in your game folder, and then your backpack-toting characters would be free to move among them?

 

Or am I completely misunderstanding how custom items work?

[Lilith]

Scripts on items won't carry over between scenarios even if there's an identical item with an identical script in another scenario.

[Yellow Sub]

Maybe you could use res edit to change the fact that inventory space can have more items.

[Max Power]

Re: scripts on items not carrying over between scenarios...

 

Do you mean only that the contents of the container wouldn't be preserved? Because I'd be willing to accept that. Or do you mean that even if character X had a backpack in one scenario, it wouldn't show up in his inventory in another scenario, even if it had a non-custom graphic (hmm. which one?) and the custom script had been copied over?

[Zephyr Tempest]

If you're going to make a backpack as an item, use the First Aid bag graphic.

 

Unless you use a custom graphic, of course.

[Namothil]

The second. All items with custom scripts are removed from your inventory when you leave the scenario.

[Qalnor]

Even if you could some how work out transferring it from scenario to scenario smoothly.. the core idea is beyond complex. The idea of a 'backpack' I would go as far as to say would probably be impossible. Some sort of limited storage item... maybe.. but we would be talking about a whole ton of scripting just to save a handful of inventory slots.

 

If you really want a backpack, just load up notepad, and write down any items you're 'owed', and use the character editor to add them in when you need them. This would be a million times simpler over the course of your entire life than even setting this up on the most rudimentary level.

 

It's a neat idea, in theory, but in practice? It just can't work.

 

As far as the treasure trove scenario I pondered that myself when I first started, but essentially the scenario would need to edit itself to allow this.. a thing which is not possible.

[Imban]

Or you could edit it yourself after making a withdrawal or deposit, of course.

 

However, most of my valuable but unused items end up pawned to the nearest merchant, not kept around.

[FZ]

Instead of a backpack, it must be possible to go one better: Items in BoA are currently persistent, right? So you can have instead a pocket dimension. An object that operates by saving the current location of the player, teleporting him to the storage town, and then teleporting him back on a second use. Though this could be hugely abusable, and can only be used in town mode.

[Archmage Alex]

In BoE I just put the horse graphic in place of one of the uglier PC graphics, made another character and named it Pack Horse. I used the editor to make him slithzerikai, all strenth, health and defence. In combat, just make him run away. Makes combat a bit annoying sometimes, but it works.

[Eric-Ihrno]

While you can't make a specially scripted item that stays with you, it would be easy to just edit all the scenarios you download to include the backpack item and then place a backpack right next to the starting location for you to pick up. You couldn't save items in the backpack but it would be almost as good as taking it with you between scenarios. (Just out of curiousity, has anyone used this trick to let their characters take Khoth's wands between scenarios?)

But, it seems that your main concern with the backpack is for collecting loot. If this is the case, just add a merchant NPC called "Travelling Merchant" or whatever and include him hidden in each town. Then give the characters a special ability that unhides him and teleports him to their current location so they can sell him the loot as they pick it up.

Even simpler, if you aren't that concerned with realism, it should be possible to make a special ability that transforms all items on the ground nearby into an appropriate number of coins. This would of course make it all too easy to get rich, but it would probably solve your problem.

[The Paladin Izzannor]

How could you script the item-coin node? It intrigies me, but seems impossible based on the editor's limitations.

[Eric-Ihrno]

You're right. It can't be done with the calls available. You'd need at least a call for the item number of an item on the floor and preferably a call that returns a particular item's value. You could make an ability that turns all items of a particular type in the character's inventory (e.g. iron chainmail or gold ore) into coins, but it would be limited. I think it might also be possible to make an ability that turns a character's entire inventory into money, but this would be very, very dangerous if used accidentally. You would use a loop that calls has_num_of_item for every number from 4 to 449 or however many extra custom items there are. The script would know each item's price because you'd program a bunch of SDF's in advance with the price of each item. It isn't elegant, but it soulds like it would work. Sadly, since there isn't a call char_has_item_equip that would work on items without a special class, you couldn't protect equipped items, so the character would have to drop everything he didn't want rendered into gold. Needless to say, I don't actually thing this ability would be a good idea, just that it's theoretically possible.

[jayc]

Ooooh! Cool idea -- The Midas Touch scenario! Of course it could be very annoying if not handled well.