Lead Character?

Is there a way to make certain actions only doable if a particular character is in the lead? 

Here's a few examples of what I'm talking about: 

  *You can only talk to animals if ranger Tiko is in the lead. 

  *You can only pick locks if thief Jean-Luc is in the lead. 

  *You can only read ancient texts if sage Duran is in the lead.  

Is this doable?  I know you can make conditions based on whether or not a character is in the party, or whether or not a character is a certain class, but can you make a condition based on whether or not a particular character is the lead or "player" character?

I'm pretty sure I've seen this on the forums earlier, but I don't remember quite where it was, sorry.

I think it was a conditional script call, but I think you can get the desired result also if you manage to tie the leadcharacter to a variable.

This can be used in two easy steps:

Step 1: Setup an event on the map.  Make sure it is set to parallel process.  Now, under the command list, set a Control variable. Choose the Game Data option and choose the Party option, then select Party Member 1 (the first choice on the dropdown list).

Step 2: Add conditional branches on all events you want to be Actor Specific.  You'll look for when the variable is a certain number. This number is equal to the Actor's ID.

In the database the actors are in a list. The first actor on the list has ID of 1, next has ID of 2, and so on.  So, set the condition branch to look for when the Variable you setup is equal to a certain actor's ID.

Example:  Actor ID 1= Eric,  Actor ID 2= Natalie

                 The event that represents Nataie's mom will only give you an item if Natalie is the leader.

                 In the event, setup Condtional Branch: Variable [001 Leader ID] == 2

Just setup your conditional branches as normal.  Now, when the player switches the leader of the party, the events should do different things.

i would just use a conditional branch to check if there in the party i dont know if you can check to make sure there the Leader 

Personally, I don't think it makes sense, from a story perspective.  Let's say I'm going somewhere with my group of friends.  And we all come up to a door whose lock we need to pick.  If a friend, say, Charlie can do it, he'd just walk over to the lock and pick it, even if I were the leader of the group.  Why would Charlie not pick the lock merely because he's not the designated "leader"?

The only time I think it might make sense from a story perspective is when talking to NPCs.  Then, technically, we could say the "leader" is the designated spokesperson so s/he then speaks for the entire group.  That might impact how the NPC dialog goes...

I remember Final Fantasy 3 doing precisely that and didn't like that idea there, either --- that your entire party could only pick a lock if a Thief character was in the first slot.  It just didn't make sense to me.

You can do a script call to check the leader without using a variable:

$game_party.leader.id == x

I don't know. I thought it was nice that we couldn't set off mines if Mira was in the lead in KotOR II.

It all comes down to execution. Done well, it adds to the game. Done poorly...

I believe thanks are in order for dihnbat and Uzuki, I was playing BOF3 the other day and noted that a character, Rei, was able to pick locks and nobody else, I spent at least a day total trying to work it Myself, 3 hours scouring the SE for potential anwsers and 2 hours searching for scripts to this, then I found this! makes things easier when there is a community of knowledgable folks around eh, Captain? In closing "doesn't this just beat all?"

@Dragon Brother , please refrain from necro-posting in a thread. Necro-posting is posting in a thread that has not had posting activity in over 30 days. You can review our forum rules here. Thank you.