Pardon my being hypocritical here but, read the whole bible. Things make a bit (pun not intended) more sence that way.

Have you bothered to look at the NCB guide I mentioned earlier?

@pac, on Jan 13 2007, 06:49 PM, said in OnStart Control Bits:

But there is a limit on how many characters you can have in an 'OnXxx' field. I think it's about 256 characters, or something, so it's not too much to worry about, but potentially there is a limit which would force you to trigger off additional things to set the remainder of the bits (etc).

As I recall, the limit is 255 for set strings, 254 for test strings. No idea why there's a difference.

@lonewolf, on Jan 15 2007, 11:34 AM, said in OnStart Control Bits:

...

thats more of an in depth build off of the basics. ive been to lazy to get to the basics.

The basics: NCBs (Nova Control Bits) are like little flags in the game. If a given bit is set, it means a certain set of circumstances have occured.

Essentially, a given mission will only start if certain bits are in the state it requires them to be in (either set or cleared).

The simplest use of NCBs for mission string progression is for each mission to, for instance,

Mission 1
Start if b100
OnComplete !b100 b101

Mission 2
Start if b101
OnComplete !b101 b102

etc. Each mission clears the bit it required, then sets the next one.

Of course, you can get far more complicated arrangements than that simple linear setup. And how bits are set can affect plenty of things aside from missions, so you do have to be careful.

If that isn't basic enough for you, you really do have no buisness messing with bits.

@lindley, on Jan 22 2007, 04:30 PM, said in OnStart Control Bits:

The basics: NCBs (Nova Control Bits) are like little flags in the game. If a given bit is set, it means a certain set of circumstances have occured.

wow i think i get the jift of it thanks!.

so iif i wanted to start out a char with hypergate access it would be !b770?

@lindley, on Jan 22 2007, 10:30 PM, said in OnStart Control Bits:

(...)
Mission 1
Start if b100
OnComplete !b100 b101

Mission 2
Start if b101
OnComplete !b101 b102

etc. Each mission clears the bit it required, then sets the next one.
(...)

Good basic explanation (I'm considering putting a NCB guide in my guides, but I have other stuff to do these days...), your system works but traditionally (including in EVC and EVO, albeit with different fields of course), it is more like:

Mission 1
Start if b100 & !b101
OnComplete b101

Mission 2
Start if b101 & !b102
OnComplete b102

The end result is the functionally the same (but at the end of the day not the same bits are set).

@lonewolf, on Jan 23 2007, 06:06 AM, said in OnStart Control Bits:

wow i think i get the jift of it thanks!.

so iif i wanted to start out a char with hypergate access it would be !b770?

Err... No. Pilots start out with no bit set, so you are not going to change anything by clearing a bit which is cleared to begin with. You have to give him the ränk with ID 147, by putting "K147" in the OnStart string.