Wow! This is perfect! I see now what I was missing was the every tick update position of the string/rope sprite. I really can't thank you enough for helping out with this!

Solved!

The only minor issue I am having now is the rope seems to attach to any falling object, not just the one it's "meant" to attach to.

I tried placing only physics behavior on the objects, but I'm not sure how to simulate that gravity/float effect.

Place velocity and force didn't seem to move them, nor did setting world gravity. How would I achieve those effects using only the physics behavior?

Alright I have updated the capx with my latest progress. I tried doing the rope in the method suggested, but I couldn't wrap my head around it. The results were awful :D

Using containers and joints I was able to get the string to attach to the balloon, but it still will not attach to the falling object using joints. I have to pin it.

My thinking is that once the balloon and string (which are jointed) is dragged on top of the falling sprite, I *should* be able to joint the string to the falling object and it will tether it.

This is still not happening.

Also.... all of the balloons are now "resisting" touch/mouse like they don't want to be clicked. No idea why this is happening... grrr.

Ok these are awesome suggestions. Let me tinker with this and see what I can come up with. Thanks! I'll report back with some progress soon.

just brainstorming:

I would probably create a "rope" when the balloon is close enough and on mouse button released create revolute joints at both ends of the "rope".

That's exactly what I wanted to do in the first place! I tried this (you'll see parts of that design in the capx file), and spent a good day trying to get it to work. Both on start of layout and at the point the balloons spawn I tried:

Balloons Create Physics revolute joint at image point 0 to stringStart

&&

stringStart Create Physics revolute joint at image point 0 to Balloons

I believe the first is correct, but neither seemed to have any effect. I can only guess because I'm trying to use physics on a bullet behavior.

EDIT: updated topic

Hmmm... Yes, but animating them will not work because the player may have to attach many of them to the falling object depending on it's weight. So each balloon has to kind of "find it's own space" if that makes any sense.

EDIT:

For kicks, I attached the physics behavior to the balloons, and now the movement isn't negated when using the Pin behavior. They are not really behaving like a bunch of balloons should though. :(

Wow... I can't believe I missed that one! Thanks a ton for pointing it out to me. I guess I need to read that manual some more :D

The problem now is that they do indeed pin to the falling object, but not as expected. Using any method (Rope sounds ideal) still makes the balloons pop to the center of the object and stick. I need them to be well... roped :D

Any ideas why this isn't behaving as expected? The balloons only have the pin, sine, and bullet behaviors, so I'm not sure if any of that is conflicting or not.

I have an object slowly falling from the top of the game screen. Think a ball with a balloon attached. The player must grab other balloons that are floating upwards and drag them onto the falling object.

This is all working well. The player drags the balloon onto the falling object and the balloon snaps to the center of the falling object. Great!

<strike>The issue is, the balloon then starts floating away again (as it should), but I want to "tie" that balloon to the falling object, so it doesn't float away.</strike>

EDIT: Thanks to c4sp3r89, I have used the Pin behavior to get tie the balloon to the falling object.

However, the player can 'tie' multiple balloons to the falling object, and once pinned, the balloons no longer act like balloons should.

How would I accomplish this? It's driving me crazy.

Brilliant! Thank you so much!

Every 3 seconds I spawn a bullet. I either want that bullet to have a gravity of -90 or 90. Nothing else. How would I do this?

System - Every 3 seconds : sprObj | Set Bullet Gravity to random(-90,90)

That is very close, but I need the return value to be *only* one of those two, not any value in between.