98a doesn't just have really huge updates to keep you entertained. It also has quite a few smaller things that are just as important. Such as..

DECORATE additions

Sometimes the small things create some interesting possibilities for modding. These new states for DECORATE will truly give you the ability to create some new and unique projects.

Idle State
Instead of having monsters go back to their spawn state when doing nothing, adding an idle state creates the opportunity for quite interesting monster activities (Zombies cleaning their guns anyone?)

Active & Inactive states
You want INTERACTIVE decorations? Just include Active and Inactive states for their appropriate times, and they'll do their thing as soon as you use the decoration!

That's all for this preview. Keep your eyes peeled for some additional updates that will surely pique your interest, and enhance your Skulltag experience.

Oh DAMN, that's why my Idle states weren't working before...

Well, keep the job up, it's nice to know about these features. lol @ zombies cleaning their guns

Should we go ahead and post some more?

"player.weaponslot"s

Bye bye, KEYCONF, we had a great run.

It's a small update, but it is still a good update, as I long to see some unique things out of monsters and other custom actors.

i really like the updates and the decitation you guys are putting to this. this is very awesome.

Although the pitch parameter in A_FireCustomMissile is in the ZDoom SVN, hopefully it will be added in the 98 series. When that's put in, high-speed projectiles can finally have an upward/downward pitch boost that actually works!

OMG so cool. I'll see what I can do in my future decorations in 98a. Keep up the good work!

...There are more additions to DECORATE than just new states, right? Though I do love how we'll now be able to implement idle enemies sneezing or swatting at "flies" in the air. (ha, Goldeneye) I've been anticipating the "PICKUP" actor flag for a while now, along with a few actions. Yes, no?

You can already do this with jumping from the Spawn state.

I'm intrigued by this. Is it just catching up on ZDoom features or something new to Skulltag? In the latter, is it really all that's needed? Won't that screw up the switching/switchable decorations from Hexen?

Just some of the ZDoom stuff included in 98a.

when this is released?

So this preview basically means 98a will have a more recent zdoom version built in.
Actually I thought these states were already in skulltag. Oh well.

They are already in 97e for quite a while, we are just reporting some of the enhancements so that more people get aware of them.

I was curious because the description made looked like something that, in ZDoom, actually requires the brand-new activation flags combined with USESPECIAL to work as simply.

This actually sounds awesome for the idle states, so we aren't subject to dancing-in-place animations when they're inactive or after killing the player. If Idle states are going to be added, are all Doom monsters going to have some sort of custom idle animation?

The no-dance effect can be done without the idle state actually. the spawn state just has to use a single frame type, or whatever frames would fit for standing still.

I believe the original doom monsters wont recieve custom idle states with the new release, however since there will be support for it, people could then do mods that actually put in idle states for them.

You can't change the original actor's behavior without screwing up dehacked compatibility.

I'll try to find some way to implement this in my personal project.