Difference between revisions of "Scripting Tutorial: My Second Script"

This tutorial has been largely adapted from GhanBuriGhan's excellent ''Morrowind Scripting for Dummies''; all credit goes to GhanGuriGhan for his fantastic work on the original.

[[Image:1_script_window.JPG|thumb|left|The scripting window]]Let's have a look at the buttons in the taskbar, from left to right: ''Open'' lets you select a script to edit. ''Save'' error checks the current script and either compiles it or gives out error messages. Note, however, that the plugin and thus the script is not really saved to disk at this time. When programming large scripts you should frequently use the save command in the main TESCS window after you have saved the script here, just in case the TESCS crashes. Note also that if you edit the script and suddenly hit "save plugin" to backup in the middle of the work, your updated script will NOT be saved with it. You must save it manually first. Also, if you simply close the script window, it doesn’t mean that script will be saved. You must take care of it yourself.  

''Forward'' and ''Backward'' arrows jump to the next or previous script, respectively (in alphabetical order). If you give your scripts a common tag, that will make it easier to jump between the different scripts of your project. For example, my pseudonym is Grundulum, and he starts every script name with "GR_ShortReferencetoProject_", with that second part being a two or three letter reference to the current mod; this keeps all of the scripts you're working on neatly together. ''Compile all'' recompiles all scripts (what's this good for? Ghanburighan didn't know, and neither do I). Finally, the ''Delete'' button deletes a script,

and the last ''Arrow down'' button closes the script window.

Before we really start writing our tutorial script we should decide what we want it to do! For this tutorial we are going to make a '''Riddle Chest: The chest will ask a riddle and only the right answer will open the chest. If the player provides the wrong answer, a trap will go off, hurting the player, and the chest can't be opened.''' That’s a fairly complex undertaking, but we will take it step by step and see that it's not so bad after all.

'''Click ''Save'' again now.''' The script still doesn't do anything, but at least now we have defined under what conditions it will run.  There are a couple of things to note here.  First, we have ended the current block before beginning a new one—not so important when there's only one block, but as this script gets more complicated we'll need multiple blocks in a single script.  In somewhat more technical terms, '''Begin/End blocks do not nest.'''  The other thing to notice is the semicolon ";" on line 4.  A semicolon marks the rest of the line as ''comment''.  Whatever you type after the semicolon ''on that one line'' will be ignored when the script compiles.  If you want more than one line of comment, you must have one semicolon for each line.

But how do we ensure that the riddle is asked only the first time we try to open the chest and not every time? We now come to a very central point: the use of do-once conditions and state variables. Most of the problems that beginners encounter with scripting for Oblivion have their roots in misunderstanding how the scripts are actually executed and how scripts should accordingly be structured. So let's have a look at this in greater detail.

* '''Save the script and close the script editor window.'''

* '''Go to the Object Window, click on the + sign beside WorldObjects, click on the + sign beside Containers, and the + sign next to Clutter. Now find CupboardFoodLower from that list and double-click on it to bring it up for editing.'''

* '''In the script dropdown field, select RiddleChestScript. Hit OK, save the mod, and quit TESCS. NOTE: WHAT WE HAVE JUST DONE, EDITING AN ITEM WITHOUT RENAMING IT, IS TERRIBLE MODDING PRACTICE.  NEVER DO THIS UNLESS YOU ARE ''SURE'' YOU KNOW WHAT YOU ARE DOING!'''

After this tutorial you may ask yourself how to continue learning how to script. A good way is to look at the example scripts in this guide or at scripts that are already in the game (either form Bethesda or from mods). Try to find a script that is similar to what you want to do and then copy the script and change it to fit your needs. Read the general information on the functions page and the descriptions of the functions you may need to do what you have planned. The categorization of the functions into function types should help you to find the right ones. Finally, the official forums are a great place to find information (use the search function) or to get help on a specific problem. The rest is practicing, practicing, practicing.

[[Category:Scripting]]