NOTE! Please stay away from this, it's dangerous to your sanity. Olorin
POTIONS
-------
(Ember's mad raving insane potion stuff)
Ok. Potions are somewhat complicated, so listen closely.
General concept
---------------
You can pour liquid into any container, however some containers leak
somewhat. This is why all the liquid handling junk is done in
/obj/container.c.
I needed liquids to have the following properties:
1) Magical effects must be in a 'continuous' spectrum and basically
infinitely variable (ie, no 'single state' liquids)
2) Players should be able to play with liquids in any normal way
(eg mixing, drinking, smelling etc)
3) Descriptions must be somewhat sensible, and dependent partially
on what the potion does (so that players will have some reference
point based on the properties of the liquid to indicate what effect
the potion will have)
Thinking about this I thought that in a simple model a potion will
have two parts to it - the 'active' part which varies depending on
what the effect is, and the 'inactive' part which is constant.
So, potions have a 'misc volume' (misc kind of being
'miscellaneous') and a 'water volume'. The misc volume has a set
of attributes describing the inactive bits of the liquid, the water
volume has a 'potion space coordinate' which has attributes
(derived from the potion space handler) related to its 'magical'
active part.
The misc volume would be used for things like 'chunky soup' which
have no potion effects, but definitely some properties that are
related to its chunky-soupiness. It would in all probability have
a proportion of 'water' in it (say something like 1/2 water), and
this could be used by a witch to brew a healing potion. In this
case the water volume would take on the properties of a healing
potion, but the misc volume would remain constant and retain its
chunky soup attributes.
Now the 'potion space' is an arbitrary, continuous space with
'regions' that have certain effects attached. The potion space
handler keeps track of the regions, and has functions to return the
effect object and attributes at a particular coordinate. At the
moment the potion space is 2 dimensional with 0,0 being the neutral
coordinate. The 'distance' from 0,0 should be roughly equivalent
to 'level of power/difficulty'. Thus a potion with a coord of (50,50)
[theoretically being roughly equiv to level 70], should only be able
to be made by a witch of level 70 or greater, and have effects
equivalent of a priest (or whatever) spell of level 70.
Ok, so what does this mean for the hapless creator?
Well, if the effect you want already exists, life is fairly simple.
All you need to do is to use /obj/container, set it up properly with
a coordinate you get from the effect (described later).
If the effect does not exist, then you will need to write the effect
and get it installed in the potion space. This is more complicated
because I (that is Ember) want to vet all effects added to the
potion space handler, and I will give you coordinates for the effect
to reside at.
Making a standard potion
------------------------
#include "potion_attrs.h"
object heal_pot;
reset()
{
mixed *misc_attrs;
if (environment(heal_pot) != wherever) {
heal_pot = clone_object("/obj/container");
heal_pot->set_leak_rate(0);
heal_pot->set_water_volume(100);
/* if you don't need any misc attrs/vol leave this out */
misc_attrs = allocate(POTION_ATTRS_SIZE);
misc_attrs[POTION_CONSISTENCY] = 50;
misc_attrs[POTION_TRANSPARENCY] = 50;
misc_attrs[POTION_NAMES] = ({ });
misc_attrs[POTION_COLOURS] = ({
({ "green", 60 }), ({ "blue", 40 })
});
misc_attrs[POTION_FLAVOURS] = ({
({ "bacon", 70 }), ({ "cheese", 60 })
});
misc_attrs[POTION_SMELLS] = ({
({ "bacon", 80 }), ({ "cheese", 60 }), ({ "toast", 40 })
});
heal_pot->set_misc_attrs(misc_attrs, 100);
heal_pot->set_max_volume(250);
heal_pot->set_max_weight(100);
/* now ... volume stuff all done, just set the effect */
heal_pot->set_ps_coord_quantity(
(int *)"/std/effects/healing/weak_hp"->query_coordinate(),
100);
heal_pot->move(wherever);
}
}
you want an explanation for all of that? How rude :)
First a few thingies:
Liquid is measured in mls (millilitres).
Weight is measured in 20ths of kgs (don't ask me)
set_leak_rate(n)
sets the amount of liquid lost per 10 heart beats
set_water_volume(n)
sets the active volume to n mls
set_misc_attrs(attrs, misc_vol)
sets the misc attrs and misc volume. The 'attrs' array has
elements as defined in /include/potion_attrs.h. This can be a
constant array, but it is clearer if an intermediate local
array is used.
set_max_volume(n)
set the maximum total volume (ie water + misc) to n
set_max_weight(n)
as per normal. Note that volume is traded off linearly with
weight, but you can have objects in the container as well as liquid.
set_ps_coord_quantity(coord, quantity)
sets the potion space coordinate of the potion to coord, and the
active quantity to quantity. The active quantity is a measure of
how 'concentrated' the potion is (basically the effect of the potion
is scaled by the quantity). 'Normal' concentration is when the
ps_quantity is equal to the water volume.
Effects have a function 'query_coordinate' on them which will
return a standard coordinate which can be used to produce normal
effects.
Attributes
----------
The attributes array has several components:
CONSISTENCY:
integer range from 0 to 100.
0 = watery consistency
100 = solid
50 = like honey
TRANSPARENCY:
integer range from 0 to 100.
0 = opaque
100 = clear
50 = milky
NAMES:
particular names like 'chunky soup' or 'ankh river water'
has standard component form of:
({ "name1", intens1 }), ({ "name2", intens2 }) ...
where each intensity is a 0..100 range, with 100 being very
intense.
COLOURS:
standard component form
FLAVOURS:
standard component form
SMELLS:
standard component form
COLOURS:
standard component form
Making an effect
----------------
Please make sure before you start writing an effect that you check to
see if there is already an effect that does what you want
standardly.
