This is the attack appearance editor.

Use the Up and Down arrow keys (or PgUp, PgDn, Home, and End) to navigate through the menu.

Use the Left and Right arrow keys to change values, or you can type in numbers.

You can also hold the ALT key and press the left and right arrow keys to change which attack you are editing, or while holding ALT you can type an attack ID number.

Picture: This is the sprite set used by this attack in battle.

Palette: "default" is the palette you used to draw the sprite, but you can change it by pressing ENTER or SPACE if you want to browse other palettes to use for the sprite.

Attack Animation: Here you can choose between several different animations with the left and right arrow keys.

* Normal - The attack appears over
   the target.

* Projectile - The attack moves from
   the attacker to the target.

* Reverse Projectile - The attack
   moves from the target to the
   attacker.

* Drop - The attack falls straight
   down from the sky and lands on the
   target.

* Ring - When used against a single
   target, 8 attack sprites appear in
   a ring around the target, and move
   inward. When used on multiple
   targets, one attack sprite appears
   near each target and moves in a
   circle around it.

* Wave - When used against a single
   target, a horizontal row of attack
   sprites moves across the screen
   past the target. When used on
   multiple targets, a diagonal row
   of attack sprites moves across the
   whole screen.

* Scatter - An attack sprite appears
   over the target and then moves
   away in a random direction.

* Sequential Projectile - The attack
   sprite starts at the attacker, and
   moves to strike each target one
   after another before flying off
   the oppostite side of the screen.

* Meteor - The attack falls
   diagonally from the top of the
   screen and strikes the target.

* Driveby - The attack moves across
   the screen from the attacker's
   side to the target's, striking
   the target as it passes.

* Null - No animation at all. This is
   often used in chains with other
   attacks to apply extra effects.

Animation Pattern: This affects how the three frames of the attack's sprite set animate. It does not affect the movement of the sprite, only the changing of the frames.

* Cycle Forward - The frames cycle
  0 1 2 0 1 2 0 1 2 0 1 2 ...

* Cycle Back - The frames cycle
  2 1 0 2 1 0 2 1 0 2 1 0 ...

* Oscillate - The frames cycle
  0 1 2 2 1 0 0 1 2 2 1 0 ...

* Random - The frames cycle randomly
  with no pattern.

Attacker Animation: This controls how the attacker moves when doing the attack.

* Strike - When used by a hero, the
  hero steps forward, swings its
  weapon, and steps back. When used
  by an enemy, the enemy twitches.

* Cast - When used by a hero, the
  hero steps forward, shows its
  casting animation frame, and steps
  back. When used by an enemy, the
  enemy twitchs.

* Dash in - Causes the attacker to
  move close to the target, do the 
  attack, and then return to its
  starting point.

* Spinstrike - Causes the attacker to
  flip horizontally several times.
  If used by a hero, the hero's
  weapon will appear in its hand.

* Jump - Causes the attacker to leap
  off the top of the screen. The
  attacker will have "hidden" status
  until doing an attack with animation
  such as "Land" or "Run In". You can
  use both "Jump" and "Land" as part
  of a single chain of attacks.

* Land - Causes the attacker to fall
  from the top of the screen and land
  on the target, then to return to
  its starting point. This removes
  hidden status from the attacker

* Null - The attacker does not move
  at all.

* Standing Cast - If used by a hero, 
  the hero will show its casting
  animation frame without stepping
  forward. Does nothing if used by an
  enemy.

* Teleport - The attacker vanishes
  and reappears close to the target,
  attacks, and then disappears and
  reappears in its starting point. If
  this attack is used by a hero, the
  hero's weapon will display.

* Standing Strike - If used by a hero,
  the hero will show its strike
  animation without stepping forward.

* Run and Hide - The attacker will run
  away. This turns on "hidden" status
  which can be reversed layer with an
  attacker animation such as "Run In"
  or "Land".

* Run In - The attacker will run in
  from the side of the screen. This
  removes hidden status from the
  attacker.

Delay Ticks Before Attack: [Active-time battles only]
Causes a delay before the attack is executed. During the delay, time passes and other combatants can act.

Delay/Advance Attack: [Turn-based battles only]
Normally, the order in which combatants act depends on their speed. This setting lets you cause the attacker to act earlier or later than normal. It's the number of places in the turn order queue that the attacker is moved forward or back. If the delay is large then the attacker will always act last... unless someone else has an even bigger delay!

Delay Turns Before Attack: In turn-based battles, this is how many rounds of combat the attacker will wait before attacking. In active-time battles, the turn delay decreases by one every time the attacker gets a turn (after their ready meter fills up). If the attack is a blocking delayed attack it happens instead of the attacker's normal turn, otherwise it happens immediately before its action - unless there's also a tick delay.
For example, if you set a delay of one turn (and zero ticks) on a chained attack with the "Delay doesn't block further actions" chain bitset, then the chained attack happens immediately before the attacker's next attack (but for heroes, after the player picks an attack).

Dramatic Pause: This delay is part of the attacker's animation. Unlike "Delay Ticks" the Dramatic Pause always freezes time for all heroes and enemies. A Dramatic Pause cannot be interrupted by other attacks.
Use Dramatic Pause if you want the Caption to appear well before the attack actually happens.

Caption: A line of text that will be displayed at the bottom of the screen whenever the attack is used.

Display Caption: Controls how long the attack caption is displayed. Press left and right arrow keys to change this value. This can be one of:

* Not At All - The caption is not
  used.

* Full Duration of Attack - The
  caption will last until the attack
  animation finishes, so the length
  of time depends on which "Attack
  Animation" and "Attacker Animation"
  you have chosen. This includes the
  time of the "Dramatic Pause"

* ## ticks - A number of game ticks.
  NOTE: in Turn-Based battle mode,
  the battle will be paused until the
  caption has disappeared. In Active-
  Time battle mode, by default the
  battle will continue with other
  attacks, or allowing the player to
  choose an action, even while the
  caption is still displaying! Turn
  on the "Attack captions pause
  battle meters" bitset in the Battle
  System Options menu to pause the
  battle instead.

Delay Before Caption: Allows you to specify a delay in game ticks before the caption appears. This can be useful for attack animations that have a long lead-in, or for captions that are supposed to represent something that the attacker says after the attack has completed. If you are using a "Dramatic Pause" the caption delay starts counting from the beginning of the dramatic pause.


Damage Color overrides the normal/heal/regen/poison damage digit colors. It is also used for the attack name if 'Show Attack Name' is used. It isn't used for Miss/Fail text.