[help] Managing events and switches, (and other questions about game mechanics) Options

[zshall]

Hi there,

I'm working on creating some mechanics for a small game I've thought about making in RM2K3. The specific mechanic I'm trying to replicate is one of a block being dropped in water and becoming floor. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cisVWVvUGXo for a visual example. The block collides with water, and becomes dirt. The hero runs over the dirt, and it becomes land.

As of right now, I have a single block event that does kind of what I want...

CODE

(This is pseudocode)
PAGE 1
if switch is OFF:
    move
    get x and y coordinates
    if the tile at x and y == water:
        set switch ON

PAGE 2
precondition: switch ON
no commands, graphic is tile floor

I see the "Tile Substitution" call in the list of actions, and ideally I'd use that to replace the single tile at X and Y with floor, then destroy the event, but it seems tile substitution works for all tiles as a 'find / replace all' type of deal. Is there a plugin or a mod out there that has a "find single lower tile / replace it" or is there a way to do it without a mod?

Also, this code works nicely with one block, but for multiple blocks it would appear I would need more switches. Is there a way to do this without switches? Coming from a background in more standard programming, what I'm really looking for are object classes, such that each event has its own switches and is an instance of a definition rather than every block. Is there a mod for something like that as well?

I've been using RM2K for years off and on, and besides a few games I haven't really followed the RPG Maker scene, per se. I was still using 2K until a week ago when I learned of common events in 2K3. I'm not sure I want to make the jump to XP or VX, as I'm familiar with the 2K interface and it looks like I'd need to change a lot of graphics to port everything over, seeing as the XP tile resolution is higher.

Any help is appreciated!