User talk:Fate

Proposed status effect file: eAthena supports 255 `stun effects' (which, if enabled, indicate that the player can't move) and 32 status effects. Presently, 5 stun effects and 14 status effects are being used, though our tmw setup only exploits one of the status effect flags (concentration).

To visualise status effects, I propose five possible measures:

• start/stop text messages
• icons on the top of the screen
• particle effects for startup/during the effect and at the end
• sound effects during startup and at the end (and possibly looping during the effect)
• full-sprite dyeing, i.e., applying a colour filter, to base sprite, equipment sprites, or all sprites. (This is potentially expensive-- unless we cache, it increases the number of blits from one to three per modified image.)

status-effects.xml:

 <status-effects>
   <stun-effect id=... &rest; />
   <status-effect id=... &rest; />
 </status-effects>

where &rest; is a set of name-value pairs out of the following

• icon-id= ... (icon id index into a status icon file graphics/sprites/status-icons.xml / graphics/sprites/status-icons.png)
• dye= ... (dye colour-- this is potentially expensive and might be toggled in the gfx options)
• dye-alpha= ... (dye alpha value, default 128)
• dye-range= body | equipment | all (whether to dye the player's body sprite/face, equipment, or both)
• particle= ...
• end-particle= ...
• audio= ...
• end-audio= ...
• message= ...
• end-message= ...