What's the difference between:

begin drumif ( MenuMode == 1 )	Returnendifif ( OnActivate == 0 )	ReturnendifPlaySound3D "drum"End

and

begin drumif ( MenuMode == 1 )	Returnendifif ( OnActivate == 1 )	PlaySound3D "drum"endifEnd

Is the first one more efficient somehow, or is it a less efficient convoluted 'double negative'. (Bethesda seems to use both styles if you look at, say, shrineFelms vs shrineGhostgate).

I think the first method is more efficient, actually, because it just keeps on returning if the conditions aren't true. The second one, on the other hand, will just keep on checking and checking until the condition is true. I mean, it's not really a big difference performance wise, not anything that would ever be noticeable, I don't think.

Is that in fact what happens? I'd always assumed that OnActivate meant nothing would happen (no script processing) until you actually dealt with the object. The logical extension is to ask, if not, then why isn't EVERYTHING (scripted doors etc.) written the first way? As it is, if ( onactivate == 0 ) seems to apply mostly to shrines and 6th House bells. I think you're right that it probably wouldn't make much difference. Still, I'm curious.

Every script currently loaded (global script, script on item in inventory, script attached to object in currently loaded cells) is run once per frame. In either of those scripts above, the value of onActivate will be checked every frame unless MenuMode == 1.

Which way a script is written will come down to the preferences of the script writer. In simple terms you want to run the fewest instructions required at any given time, and in terms of the two scripts shown I doubt there would be any difference between them (the second would give a small space saving). You could rip out the compiled scripts, and assuming you know the op codes and the clock cycles required to run them, calculate the most efficient, but I still think any differences will be inconsequential.

Also bear in mind that readability can sometimes be at least as important as script efficiency.

Personally, I would write it the second way since I consider the second return in the first script redundant.

Well, well. Okay.


That's what I was inferring.
Well put, folks. Thanks.