Mission Editor, Triggers, and Time
 

i remember not too long ago someone posted a description of how the Time variable works within a Trigger using the ME.

i am playing a mission where the designed has plugged in a date to a trigger, say December 7, 1941 at 0900.
however, that date/time comes and goes and no trigger, event, nada.

so, clearly, the trigger/event does not work intuitively.

then, how does it work? anyone? anyone? anyone?
https://media.giphy.com/media/8FhXc8w45aN32/giphy.gif

The "Timer" Trigger is just that - a timer. Think of a wind-up egg timer from the 1970s. It starts at 0:00 and counts down in minutes, seconds, hours, etc. Put a timer trigger into a mission, and then go look at it in a text editor. Instead of giving you a "date" per se, it might say something like -971 instead for its countdown (hours?? I cannot remember...). Anyway, the Timer's "zero" is the date of the mis file that it is in, NOT the game's date. By default, you might have a 19380101 date, maybe a 19400101 Parameter date, and that is what the timer counts from, in spite of what the "date" shows in the ME's display. In fact, do that. Build a new mission, open the parameters menu, and change the date of the mission to something like December 3, 1943, and you'll notice that the time/date in the Timer trigger has now changed. The really strange thing comes into play when you "date" a mis file, and then the player gets assigned that mission either before or after that set date, and the timer is off still. It works fine for Single Missions or Patrols usually, but still, mis-date something and the Timer will fail. Silent Hunter 'logic'... It can be an exercise in frustration in a career file.

yes, i did notice that the "date" was converted to a number of minutes from the start of the Mission Date to the time of the trigger.

yes, now, i understand that the trigger-date-time starts from the onset of the career-mission and NOT the start of the mission-date in the MIS file, which is somewhat counter-intuitive but this IS Ubi.....

so, how does one use the Mission Date to execute a trigger (or a programmer :haha:) during a career-mission on any one particular date and time?

my first SWAG is that we would have to recompute/reenter the Mission Start Date (mis-file) to match the Patrol Start Date (UPC-file) prior to shoving off on the mission.

As i suspected, my SWAG was correct.
but this is not a technique that every player can use.:hmmm:

Exactly... lol - 'tis better to avoid the use of the "Timer" altogether. If it functioned as it SEEMS like it should, it ~would be~ quite useful... but an IF-THEN-ELSE 'logic' of some form would be more-so... sigh :salute: