Action Editor Validation Query

[Boris]

Dear Don:

I am preparing a bdf file with actions particularly aimed at the lower levels of the game, and have encountered this problem.

While validating my actions from within the Action Editor, I receive the message stating that I have a "gender specific clothing item on an action that is marked OK for both genders". The action requires the subject to remove their shoes. In order to do this, I have added <sc> to the text for the removal of the subject's clothing items, and have allowed for the action to remove 1 item of clothing and have ticked feet, ankles, and toes, in the Subject Clothing Tab. If both men and women can add shoes and/or high heels to their clothing during the game set-up, why am I getting this error?

Could you please consider including in your list of additional features, the ability to "Ignore" the validation of a particular action, so that one can continue to validate all actions in one sitting. The only way that I have found to allow me to continue validating after encountering this problem was to to rename the Action, ensuring the Action started with z..., thus forcing it to the end of the list.

How stable is the Java version of Bliss? Would you advise that we download and install this version? What are the main benefits of moving to the Java version?

Cheers,
Boris

[Don]

Hi,

The error message you are receiving is happening because you have specifically marked a clothing item on the "Clothing Items" tab as opposed to the Subject Clothing or the Partner Clothing tab.

The Clothing Items tab is a special purpose tab and is seldom used. When it is used, it requires referral to a specific clothing item. Because of this, all actions that use this tab have to be marked as being male only or female only. This is a bit of a weakness in the design of actions.

For what you are doing, there is no need to mark anything on that tab. All you need to do is specify that the subject will take off 1 item that will bare the feet. This allows shoes, socks, high heels, etc. to be the item that needs to be removed.

So this is actually a valid error, but I like your ignore error idea. I will add that for a future version.

The Java version offers no advantage over the standard version other than running on non-windows platforms.

Thanks,

Don

[Boris]

Thank-you Don. This worked perfectly.

I have two additional questions as a result of my bdf file editing last night.

1. I had asked you earlier about understanding the grading applied to the actions in the action editor. If an action has a 1-1, 1-1 grading, does this mean:
a. that the minimum and maximum level at which the action will appear is when both players are in Level-1, or
b. will the logic in the program continue to include the potential for these actions to come up at levels in the game?

That is, if I want to ensure that an action that does not include any categories that would result in the action being coded as level-3 (e.g. "Talking about relationship") is possible between levels 1 and 3, will your programming allow this to happen? If not, is there a work-around?

2. I suspect that someone has asked this before, but I could not find the thread. Is there a way that test the actions within the action editor againt other profiles, or are they always tested against the "Default" profile.

Hopefully I should have this bdf file completed in the coming week, and will post it for the benefit of others. I would also wish to encourage others to post their bdf files, so that we can all benefit from each other.

Cheers,
Boris

[Don]

Hi,

The 1-1 that you refer to is actually somewhat misleading. I am planning to change this display in a future version of the action editor to make it clearer. What the 1-1 tells you is actually the miminum level that this action can happen it if the player is fully dressed followed by the minimum level at which this action can happen if the player is nude.

That seems kind of wierd, but many categories are influenced by what the players are wearing. That is why the categories that appear in the action editor are different from the ones that appear in the profile editor. In the profile editor you have things like being touched (breasts) and being touched (genitals). In the Action editor you have being touched anywhere that you are bare. The game will then assign the "anywhere you are bare" to a specific category during the game. Thus the same action could have a range of minimum passion levels depending on what is being worn.

The action editor does not currently show you the maximum passion level for actions. This is because the maximum value was added later in the game, it wasn't there in the original release of the game. The action editor needs to be updated to reflect this.

The only real way that you can make sure that an action happens in a certain range is to assign it to a category that has the range you are looking for. For Instance "Talking about our relationship" by default has a range of 1-2. You could change that to 1-3 in a profile, or you could create a custom category and set that to 1-3.

The feature you are asking about to test against other profiles in the action editor is something we are working on, but it is not there yet. It is actually there (sort of) in the Java version. In the Java version of the game, if you run the action editor WHILE A GAME IS IN PROGRESS, the action editor will use the profiles loaded into the game. We are going to extend this in both versions to let a profile actually be selected in the action editor.

I am looking forward to seeing your actions. It sounds like you are working hard on them and putting a lot of thought into them. Let me know if you want me to review them for you at some point.

Thanks,

Don