[CF-Devel] Equipment musings

[Mark Wedel]

Tim Rightnour wrote:
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      On 07-Jul-02 Mark Wedel wrote:
     
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       For some races, this doesn't make too much sense - if the dragon can't use
     
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     a 
     
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     weapon or shield because of his strange physiology, it doesn't make much
     
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     sense 
     
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     that he can use a bow.  My solution in that case is to just give him 0
     
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     'arm's, 
     
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     so he can't use bows, shields, or weapons.  I think that is the right
     
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     approach, 
     
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     but this obviously weakens him some.
     
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      Why not have the dragon "ship" with a pair of claws, that cannot be unwielded? 
     
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      This opens up the theoretical possibility of going to a dragon umm.. shop, and
     
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      having your claws sharpened/impregnated with steel/etc.
     
     
  The code that will be checked in will make it extremely easy to add new body 
parts.

  In probably 10-20 lines of code (even documented where), you could add 
something like a 'body_dragon_claws' body location.  Then it is just a matter of 
updating the dragon arch to actually have those claws, and creating some items 
for it to use.

  In practice, that could get done for all races that has strange physiologies - 
the Q could have a 'dragon torso', and thus need to go to hard to find places 
(or very expensive places) to buy armor that will fit on it.

  You could create 'dragon bows' for example that go on a slot that only dragon 
has.  Its very extensible.

  However, such changes would need to have to be carefully thought out.  The Q 
is a bit different of a race because it can't wear armor.  If you now give the Q 
a dragon torso, dragon head, etc, and it is now able to wear armor analagous to 
the human, it isn't so special - especially if there is a 'dragon speciality 
shop' in town that sells that type of stuff.  The Q would still be at somewhat a 
disadvantage simply because all the best artifact armor would still only be for 
humans.  Of course, that lasts until someone decides to make really good 
artifact armor for the Q.

  However, it still does provide for many more areas of balance.  Letting some 
races, like the fireborn, use more rings/amulets than a human normally could 
makes it a bit more different than the other races.

  And even in my Q example above, if carefully done, it would probably still be 
a good thing - being able to get some extra protection at low levels could be 
useful, as long as his choices are severely limited - it might give him a bit 
more chance of survival, or at least make survival a bit easier.