[BlueFlames]

I tend to agree. Mission debugging for me tends to consist of 2-3 playthroughs  of a mission followed by a loud shout of "You bloody idiot!"

Seems that there isn't a compilation thread of such moments, or if there is, it's quite well and truly dead.  In light of that, let this thread be our (new?) confessional, where we may relate to each other our sins of idiocy committed in FRED, as we spot them.

My most recent forehead-slapping moment occurred last night, while checking over the last mission of Artifice once again to find out why some fire-beam events weren't causing any beams to fire.  The following code seemed correct (with a little anti-spoiler censorship) for a chained event....

Code: [Select]

$Formula: ( when
   ( true )
   ( fire-beam
      "GTD [ship name]"
      "turret09"
      "[target name]"
   )
   ( fire-beam
      "GTD [ship name]"
      "turret14"
      "[target name]"
   )
)
The targets were certainly in range of the beams....  The firing ship had free beams and unlocked turrets....  I just couldn't wrap my head around why this wasn't working for the last three or four runs through the campaign.

Finally, the problem hit me, like it was the most obvious thing in the world.  GTD [ship name] was gone.  GTD [ship name] departs midway through the mission, and GTD•[ship name] arrives to go all beam-happy on its target.

Lesson(s) learned:  Always watch those ship names, when scripting events around ships that perform tactical jumps.

[haloboy100]

Lol....amazing things happen to FREDers

[FUBAR-BDHR]

My current one since starting to use FRED2_Open and especially switching back and forth between TBP and FS2 is saving the newest version of the file in the wrong dang directory and wondering why your changes don't show up in game.

Then there's always the making a simple name change in notepad and either making a typo or forgetting to change all the events that reference that name.

[Clawandfang]

Yes...
I used to make a load of changes, and then forget to save at all before loading up Freespace. Hours of my finite time on this world wasted...

[Dark Hunter]

Nothing tops the "URA Moron 1" code. 

[Clawandfang]

Nothing tops the "URA Moron 1" code. 

Um...
I'm guessing that this is a code given to people with the intention of annoying them, and is incredibally funny when they complain that it doesn't work?

[Flipside]

Nope, it's something automatically inserted by the Fred code, I think it's if you forget to name a ship or the like...

[colecampbell666]

What about the one that happens when you put two Saths two close together?

[Dark Hunter]

Nothing tops the "URA Moron 1" code. 

Um...
I'm guessing that this is a code given to people with the intention of annoying them, and is incredibally funny when they complain that it doesn't work?

It was discovered by someone trying to crash FRED, IIRC. You know that if you do not name a ship, FRED will just call it "<class of ship> 1" or something similar? Well, he tried renaming Ulysses 1 to Ulysses 2 before placing a new Ulysses, thinking that when FRED encountered a ship already called "Ulysses 2", it wouldn't know what to do with the ship being placed. FRED just called the new ship "URA Moron 1".

Essentially, FRED calls the user a moron for trying to trick it.

[blowfish]

What about the one that happens when you put two Saths two close together?

What happens when you put two Saths too close together?

Do you get a third Sathanas? *runs*

[haloboy100]

What about the one that happens when you put two Saths two close together?

What happens when you put two Saths too close together?

Do you get a third Sathanas? *runs*

LOL!

[Nuclear1]

Ugh, I've fallen victim to the loss of two hours+ of work when I forgot to save. I save now pretty much after every event/message/ship placed out of paranoia/habit.

[FUBAR-BDHR]

You do know FRED makes backups when you go in and out of certain areas.  Look for the backup.00* files. 

[colecampbell666]

That's what those are!

And the URA Moron 1 thing happens (I'm pretty sure) when you put two Saths exceedingly close together.

[Jeff Vader]

Didn't it include any big ships that were intersecting each other?

[karajorma]

That's what those are!

And the URA Moron 1 thing happens (I'm pretty sure) when you put two Saths exceedingly close together.

I suspect you misnamed one of the saths and caused it the regular way actually.

[colecampbell666]

I haven't tried it, I read it on a forum somewhere.

[karajorma]

Then don't say you're pretty sure unless you know

1. Who said it
2. How likely they are to be wrong.

[NGTM-1R]

I think my favorite so far, and I get this more often then I'd like since I like to shut off a few turrets to simulate a ship taking damage, is forgetting how once a ship is in the process of blowing up previously turret-locked or beam-locked weapons will start shooting again. I know this, and I give a second set of sexps for it to "re-lock" them so they don't ruin my suspension of disbelief. But about half the time I forget and when I go to test the mission realize that.

Far more often then I like, it even mocks me by having that "last gasp" beam shot kill me or a ship I'm supposed to be protecting, thus triggering a mission failure just to add insult to injury.

[karajorma]

That sounds suspiciously like a bug to me. I can't think of any good reason why locked beams should unlock on death.