[RPG Maker tutorial] Advanced Combat Event system (ACE)
What is the Advanced Combat Event system?ACE is a system of Common Events that allow you to trigger events at the start of combat, at the end of every turn, at the end of every action, and after battle has ended.
Why the Advanced Combat Event system?
ACE offers a lot of freedom in what you can do within combat, using event commands only.
Why would I use the Advanced Combat Event system when plugins exist that achieve the same thing?
[*]ACE does not risk breaking or require updating after an engine update.
[*]ACE will likely offer greater customisability over your systems than a plugin with the same base functionality would.
[*]Knowledge on how to use ACE can be applied to any version of RPG Maker, past, present and likely future too.
[*]Using less plugins lowers the risk of the plugins you are using to cause compatibility issues.
[*]Become less reliant on other people to get things done.
[*]It's completely free.
How do I learn more about the Advanced Combat Event system?
Check out the link to my Youtube playlist with guides on how to set up the system step by step, as well as videos providing example systems and skills within ACE to show some of the things it can offer. The guides are created in RPG Maker MZ, but can be applied to older versions of RPG Maker too.
Youtube playlist:
https://www.youtube.com/embed/Cnx8fXktg6U
The first video covers setting up the base of the system. This base will allow you to trigger events at the start of combat, at the end of every turn, at the end of every action, and after battle has ended.
Important to note:
[*]Every troops page must include the 2 pages that run at the start of battle, and at the end of every turn, with links to their respective Common Events. Troops without these pages will make your eventing not work in those encounters.
[*]All skills, both of player and enemy must link either directly or indirectly to the Common Event 'Battle Action'. An indirect link is when you link to 'Battle Action' within another Common Event that is linked with Skill. This is done with Skills that require their own Common Event to trigger specific effects unique to that Skill only. Do not link a Skill to 2 different Common Events in its effects tab.
[*]Think about whether your effects should trigger at the end of a turn, or after an action. If it can wait until the end of the turn, without potentially messing up a gameplay effect, then always run it at the end of the turn. Only effects that require constant checks or updates should be placed under the 'Battle Actions' Common Event.
[*]'Battle Start' should cover everything that needs to be set up before any actions are taken in battle, or only need to be set up once.
[*]If an effect, setting, switch or variable requires a reset between battles, it is generally best to do so in 'Battle End', rather than 'Battle Start'.
If you've followed the steps as shown in the video correctly, then congrats. You are now ready to use ACE to its full potential. Everything past this point in the tutorial is optional content.
CRITICAL HITS
Spoiler: Video
https://www.youtube.com/embed/65vC9KMLTRM
This video shows how to create your own critical hits, using ACE, allowing for more control over when and how they should occur in combat. The term 'critical hit' should be used lightly here, as the method can be used for any skill with a chance to trigger extra effects on a turn by turn basis.
Important to note:
[*]Make sure to reroll the variable that decides whether or not a character will perform a critical hit when applying the system to multiple characters between the conditional branches for each character, otherwise everyone will perform critical hits on the same turn.
[*]It is generally advised to switch critical hit versions of skills back to their normal versions at the end of combat.
[*]This system allows you to use different animations when a critical hit is performed!
COUNTING ENEMIES
Spoiler: Video
https://www.youtube.com/embed/eWs_NTJV0nc
This video shows how to count the number of alive enemies in combat at any given moment, using ACE, and also how to create a skill that deals damage based on that number. While counting enemies on its own might not seem very useful, it can be used as a condition to trigger certain events, skill effects or AI behaviour. Counting enemies should always be done via the 'Battle Action' Common Event.
CUSTOM STATES
Spoiler: Video
https://www.youtube.com/embed/rxLLH6Pwg0g
This videos shows how to create custom evented states, using ACE, allowing for more control over the effects and duration of states in combat. Going this route will give you a lot more control over states, but it can be fairly time consuming, depending on the total number of custom states you're going to want to work with for your game, as you'll need to create checks for every playable character and all 8 enemies.
For custom DoT states, it can be a good idea to create multiple versions of the same one, especially when working with flat numbers for them (a version for playable characters, one for normal enemies, one for mini-bosses and one for bosses). Manually apply a special state on mini-bosses and bosses to use as an identification tool.
Using custom states also allows you to play an animation for when DoT is triggered!
CHARGED ATTACKS
Spoiler: Video
https://www.youtube.com/embed/YBwuGuoVMA4
This video shows how to create a passive skill that grants a different buff, depending on whether it is an odd or even turn, using ACE. This is a very simple effect that is hard to mess up. If you have more abilities with similar effects, it might be worth using a universal turn Switch, rather than create a new one for each new passive that uses it. In that case, you would place the conditional branch for the Switch on the top, with character passive skill checks and management under it, in the 'Battle Turn' Common Event.
PASSIVE SKILL: HIT BY TARGETED ATTACKS
Spoiler: Video
https://www.youtube.com/embed/NBLIX0zlQHM
This video shows how to create a passive skill that heals the user whenever they are struck by a targeted enemy attack, using ACE. Important things to remember are to have every targeted enemy attack inflict the 'Targeted Attack' state, otherwise the effect will just not trigger on those attacks. Also to remove the state at the end of 'Battle Action', otherwise the effect will continue to trigger with every action taken in battle.
PASSIVE SKILL: BASED ON ENEMIES INFLICTED WITH A STATE
Spoiler: Video
https://www.youtube.com/embed/0v7HhX0ASk0
This video shows how to create a passive skill that restores the user's MP at the end of each turn, for each enemy inflicted with a specific State, using ACE. Again, a very easy effect to accomplish, at least when sticking to the basics. If wanting to make the effect take multiple different States into account, counts must be made for each individual State for all 8 enemies. It's not exactly difficult, but it might be a tedious process, depending on how many States you want the effect to work for.
Always reset your counter at the start of the count.
PASSIVE SKILL: HEALTH THRESHOLD EFFECT
Spoiler: Video
https://www.youtube.com/embed/VGjpWni29IA
This video shows how to create a passive skill that raises a character's defences only while their HP is below 50%, using ACE. For linking to the passive's event, it's very important to place the link below any other effects you're running that may change the character's HP (or whatever your passive's effect is being based on).
More video examples of skills and systems to come soon!
May also be willing to take up requests for skill ideas.
本贴来自国际rpgmaker官方论坛作者:Milennin处,因国际论坛即将永久关站,为了存档多年珍贵资料,署名转载到本论坛存档,由于官方帖子为英文原帖，需要中文翻译请点击论坛顶部切换语言为中文就可以将帖子翻译成中文浏览,方便大家随时查看,原文地址：https://forums.rpgmakerweb.com/threads/rpg-maker-tutorial-advanced-combat-event-system-ace.150311/
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