I ran across this last night and couldn't find anything within Coldstone(so I made a
hack around it which while it works, it is ugly and isn't as precise as I'd like). Is
there any way to generate a random number within a given parameter and assign it to
a value(such as, but not limited to, a global variable)?
In my instance I wanted a shopkeeper to have a variance of items to sell. Since I haven't
found a way to have the shop program itself generate items at random, I created 5
different shop locations, each selling similar but varied items. I then set up a
global variable called gb_randomshop. Since I didn't think the shop should be different
if the player just clicks on "Leave" and then enter's back in, I wanted a load call for
the zone, so that when the zone loads the randonshop variable would be rolled a number
0-4, and based on that number the appropriate shop would be loaded when the player asks
to see the shop.
Well, obviously I couldn't find anything like this in the Coldstone engine. The only
thing close that I could find was the random action event call. So what I did was this:
When the zone loads I call an event called "roll random shop." Within it it looks like
this:
random action event: If (random roll < 20) { (gb_randomshop = 0); }
else
random action event: If (random roll < 20) { (gb_randomshop = 1); }
else
random action event: If (random roll < 20) { (gb_randomshop = 2); }
else
random action event: If (random roll < 20) { (gb_randomshop = 3); }
else
random action event: If (random roll < 20) { (gb_randomshop = 4); }
Then I have a conditional on the npc who is the shopkeep, so that when the shop is called
for I run through a check on gb_randomshop and based on its value I send the player to
the correct shop.
As I mentioned, the above method does work. gb_randomshop is changing as the zone loads
which is what I want. However, those stataticians out there probably realize that the
chances of gb_randomshop being chosen as a given number is not an even 20% chance
all the way through, as it would be if I could just call an event that did a:
random roll: roll a die between (x),(y) and assign value to (z) -- Where x,y are
integer values and z is a variable to set(anywhere from globals to stats, etc).
If there is something like this available and I just missed it, please let me know.
Thanks
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