Several RPGVX questions Options

[TheSilentSniper]

I've recently gotten back into RPG making, just playing around with it in my spare time. I'm currently working on a small project just for myself before I start moving on to bigger and better projects. I looked through several script collections on various forums, and got pretty much all I need, and I have managed to get them all working conflict-free. With that said, there are a few things I still need to do before I can begin actual work on the project. Maybe I overlooked a script that has one of these functions, or there might be a way around it with events and such. Either way, I'm not sure. I have no idea how to write a script, so I'd appreciate it if the answer would be understandable to someone with little knowledge of scripting (all I did was edit a few to make them compatible whenever an error popped up :/ )

1. I'm looking for a way to assign a rank to an actor by level. Every level, the rank name will progress by one. Such as, Private at level 1, Private First Class at level 2, etc. I was hoping for this rank name to be displayed on the actor's status screen somewhere. Maybe have the level tracked by a variable, and then if level = 1, then... etc. Not as if I know how to exactly do that, but it's an idea of how to go about it possibly.

2. Erase an actor (aside from the main character) from the party upon death. Or rather, if they are not revived before 3 turns or so, they are erased from the party. What I am trying to accomplish here is, the main character can recruit mercenaries to join his party. These are expendable, and if not revived in time (by turns or the end of the battle - whichever is easier), will be removed from the party and need to be recruited again.
EDIT: Setting a common event, a conditional branch stating If [actor] is incapacitated, then remove [actor] from party. Else, nothing. This could work - resurrection items could be used on the main character if he has a party member there to use it. However - how do I get this common event to constantly be checked during battle?

3. Require a certain level to use an item or equip a weapon. I've seen many scripts for this, but they only support requiring a certain stat, skill, health value, etc. I just want to have the actor require a certain level to use certain healing items, or to equip certain weapons. As they level up, they can use more powerful items that they will then need as the older items are more outdated, and they will have to purchase new weapons to stay on top of their enemies. However, this prevents a player from being able to access very powerful weapons or items at a low level that they may receive from random drops.

4. What is a good way for adding icons to the sheet? I've tried in the past, but I can't see where the boundaries are for icons, so they end up overlapping. I'm talking about editing the IconSet, by the way.

5. I found a few neat sprites for objects, but I don't really know how to implement them. One is a sprite of a box being opened that I found while searching for new 'treasure chest'-type objects. Here's the link to the page:
Modern World Accessories
How do I take these images and set them as an object that can be interacted with by the player, causing the animation to play and an item to be given to the player?

6. A way to choose at the very beginning an actor who will be the main character. Basically, a character select screen with the picture of the character and name. Also, a way to enter a custom name would be ideal.

7. A way to start a random quest. Basically, there will be an event of a quest-giver, with several pages - each with a different quest. Upon talking to the giver, it will pick a random page and start the quest, varying from fetch quests to kill quests. Once the quest is completed, talking to him will start another random quest. They are repeatable, and give a random reward, so it may be possible to get the same quest twice in a row - that, I don't mind.

That's about all I need to know to really get this project underway. I apologize if this is in the wrong section, if so, please simply move it to the correct area.

Thank you for the help, I hope most of these aren't too difficult to set up.

This post has been edited by TheSilentSniper: Jul 7 2012, 01:49 AM

[Tsukihime]

1. don't know about events, but with a scripted approach you would add a call to the actor's level_up and level_down methods to update the rank based on the current level. All level changing should be done through those two methods and if someone is explicitly changing the level directly, I would just call it bad coding on their part.

2. You can use the "span" in the troop event page. Just use the "turn" span and have it call a common event that checks your death statuses and update the appropriate variables, and removing actors as needed.

3: can't imagine how difficult it would be to just add an extra case checking for level

4: Use an image editor that supports grids and snap-to-grid functionality. GraphicsGale for example has it. Photoshop also I believe. Most decent editors should have it. Just set the grid size to 24x24 or something ( don't know the size of VX icons) and just snap your icons to the grid

6: Up to you really. Scripting and eventing both have their merits.

7: Really depends on the quest system you are going to use and how quests are implemented in the system.

This post has been edited by Tsukihime: Aug 8 2012, 09:03 PM