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Design notes. |
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|
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Prince onefang's ice castle was designed as if Prince onefang designed it |
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himself. The general principle is that it is made from enchanted icecubes. |
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Like an igloo, this does not cause the internal temperature to be very low, |
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so everybody can quite happily live inside. The enchantment stops them |
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from being carried away, melted, or otherwise vanished. The floor at ground |
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level is also enchanted, to stop spells & prayers, and to make everybody |
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feel good. The layout is designed to make it look like the university face |
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used to represent the castle from the outside. The icecube face changed |
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between the server version I started this on and the version I am using now, |
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let's hope that the university face doesn't change. The icecubes looked |
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better in the previous version. |
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|
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The suites don't fit into the university layout, but I fixed that by putting |
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them above the clouds, with a very thin elevator going up to them. |
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|
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The icecubes use the same total internal reflection principle that make fibre |
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optics work. Like fibre optics, a 90 degree bend causes a flaw that lets light |
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leak out. Like fibre optics, light comes out of the ends. I may not have been |
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consistant. On the other hand, some places needed more light, so I either |
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put in a brazier or lit up an icecube as needed (provided a flaw for light to |
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leak out of). The source of the light is not on the map anywhere. |
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|
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No icecubes on the outside of the castle are lit up, because Prince onefang |
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doesn't want the place that easily found. For that reason, and the fact that |
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elves like living in the middle of large woodlands (Prince onefang is an elf), |
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the castle is in the middle of the Dark Forest, with no paths leading to it. |
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Moving the castle to somewhere else will be tricky, as there are many maps |
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with unblocked views of the forest. |
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|
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A lot of attention to detail went into this, I hope that players appreciate it. |
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|
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I ignore some of the map making guidelines, but so do a lot of the standard |
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maps. I ignore the shop guidelines because the high price of powerful items |
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provides balance, no need to keep them out of shops when PC's can't afford |
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them anyway, assuming the system calculates prices correctly. Prince onefang |
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wants his shops this way, gives him a reason to go shopping. It also represents |
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the kind of thing that the Prince will dump at the shops after his own |
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adventuring, he is their main supplier of +3 and +4 items. |
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|
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Yep, I created a town, but it is not your standard town. |
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|
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Some areas are for Prince onefang only. The lever that closes the main gates, |
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and the treasures on display (both in the same place) are the main ones. |
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Portals to these and other places are in the suites unique to onefang when |
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he is a PC. Prince onefang should be played by the DM, with DM privs set, but |
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you should not need them much. |
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|
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Some areas are designed to only allow access if Prince onefang opens the door. |
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This allows the Prince to be a rich and powerful patron to anybody that meets |
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his criteria. Currently, they must be elven worshippers of Lythander. A |
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quest or three may be added later, when I can think of some. These areas include |
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the part behind the temple that contains the standard equipment handed out to |
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onefangians, and the private magic library at the top of the mall. Force |
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"onefangian" is given to anybody that is let into the behind the temple area |
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via the door. Force "onefang" is only held by Prince onefang. The standard |
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equipment is all godgiven, so onefangians must carry it around always, or lose |
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it. The spell and prayer books in the private library are nailed down. Check |
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the quality of them though B-). |
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|
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One quest currently under construcrion is to find out what happened to the |
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party of onefangians sent to clean out the ants. While the Prince should |
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really clean out the dragon section himself, he could take the newly |
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baptised onefangians with him. See "Floyd of Pink" below for another quest. |
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|
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The altars to Lythander in the residential areas can be reconsecrated by anyone |
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with Wisdom 20 or higher. In the suites, the server operator should do that |
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with an editor. |
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|
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The strange looking flooring on the malls ground floor represents wear patterns. |
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|
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Sometime between server version 1.0 and 1.4, the nearby nest of dragons seemed |
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to have given up hope. Now they just sit there and let you attack them. While |
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probably it hasn't been updated since some server behaviour changed, it at least |
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fits in with the onefang plot. He cleared them out once, has now setup camp |
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close to them, and with the Whisker on display to rub it in, so now dragon morale |
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is low. |
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|
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The Imperial Post Office scripts don't work on my server, something dodgy with |
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the database stuff. Using a database for this is overkill, and everything else |
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in Crossfire is text based anyway, so I converted the scripts to use |
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text files, and renamed them so they can live with the originals. |
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|
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SERVER CODE CHANGES |
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|
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common/button.c - fix inv checker object matcher |
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common/map.c - fix inv checker (FIXED in 1.5) |
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server/skills.c - fix written text not initialized |
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common/time.c - added tod_to_errmsg() to support web page |
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server/weather.c - creates weather image each tod tick and major tweaks |
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common/living.c - adjusted SP,GP per level |
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server/skill_util.c - adjusted exp from using skills |
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|
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TODO |
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|
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Finish ant farm. |
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|
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Make castle flyer friendly, if possible, tiling might do it. Replicate more |
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stuff upwards, tiling will do it. Tiling is limited to 12 squares between tiles. |
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Tiling would have helped a lot, but the LOS restrictions make it tricky. I |
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looked at tiling, lighting effects are broken, LOS restrictions have to be broken |
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(but only for one more map), and the maps would end up too fragmented. Next time |
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I need a break from serious programming, I'll try to add map stacking. That is |
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putting a smaller map on top of a larger map, and tiling effects as per usual. |
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The changelog mentions map overlay, which may be the same thing, but it is not |
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documented anywhere that I can find. |
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|
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The tiled dragon map consistantly crashed the server when the dragons attacked. |
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|
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Do junk mail B-). Do basic RFC headers, Python has RFC libraries, include |
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date, postmark (name of map sent from). |
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|
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Do money orders, cheques, interest, loans, ATM / card / PIN, B-Pay, |
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account keeping fees, credit cards, government tax, etc. |
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Use this as a source of income for onefang. Deposit boxes that can hold |
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jewelery, keys, scrolls, and other small valuables. |
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|
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Have an IPO in every major city, complete with long queues. In /onefang/suites |
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have Karen give writing paper with IceCastle letterhead as a free service. Have |
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a crazy postal worker in some post offices armed with a crossbow. |
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|
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Let's go crazy, pawn brokers, loan sharks, bank robbers, photo copying service. |
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|
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BIG WORLD |
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|
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Big map world_110_118 34,24 - 38,27 = university arch as before. |
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Extend the forest from the Dark Forest area, to around these lakes, and |
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to the other lakes to the south west. Basically, the entire north west |
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end of the valley. forest.pl will extend the forest, see it for details. |
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|
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While I have converted the ground level map to Big World, none of the other |
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maps have been converted, so we still have breath taking views of the small |
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world maps. Overlays may do the trick for these. |
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|
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For aome strange reason, when dynamiclevel is set to 1 or above, the Ice castle |
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will be invisible sometimes. I like it B-). |
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|
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The dragon lord maps look to be in about the same sort of position relative |
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to the new castle location, so everything should still link up. DragonLord |
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city is at world_111_117 31,43. AntFarm now becomes part of under_world. I |
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should double check the scale of things here. |
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|
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There is a bit at the top of the world that looks like an obvious place for |
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a protected harbour. I should search out such places, and also places where |
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people and animals would normally form tracks, then add harbours, harbour |
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cities, animal and walking tracks. Then we can setup trade routes, and have |
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a proper civilization grow. |
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|
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Write some animal foraging code, to form animal tracks the natural way, and |
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have animals changing the landscape like the weather does. |
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|
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FANCY MAGIC ITEM (Floyd of Pink) |
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|
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Actually, it's five magic items that combine to produce their effect. Basically |
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the effects of Amulet of Bling Bling, the left and right onefang rings, plus |
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speed and levitation boots. They all look identical (big pink / purple gem), |
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and have an identical name (opal of flawed beauty), but you have to put |
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them on in the correct order, in the correct place. Otherwise, all hell breaks |
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loose. You cannot wear them while sleeping, otherwise you wake up with one HP, |
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no SP or grace, not wearing the items, and something is summoned to fight you. |
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The correct places are - one on each foot, one on each hand, and one for the |
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soul (head, neck, or body). The various enhancements are distributed logically, |
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dex for the hands, speed for the feet, live saving for the soul, etc. Once you |
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have them placed correctly, a backpack of utopia appears on your back, and |
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disappears when you remove any item. There is a small chance that everything |
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in the backpack disappears with it. A bigger chance that it all spills out on |
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the floor, but mostly it all will remain in the pack for the next person who puts |
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it on. The items are scattered randomly at the end of ten of the most dangerous |
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maps. Rumours and clues detail the various attributes of the items, and all ten |
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locations. Sprinkle Pink Floyd lyrics into the clues. |
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|
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Each item has a story, as you look deep into the gem, you see a flaw in the shape |
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of "several species", "small, furry animals", "a cave", "a groove", "a pict". |
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That is their order, although the places each is worn are chosen randomly and stored |
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in a file. The five monsters carrying the gems are "Dave" (Dave), "Mr Wright" (wight+), |
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"Nick" (galeo troll+), "Syd" (cunning gnome+, and crazy), and "Roger" (Evil master) |
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|
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Don't rely on the unique flag to make sure there is only one of each. Each gem gets |
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a unique identifier, but only the first five are part of the item, the rest are |
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"opals of flawed beauty" and their flaws look like a cow, brick wall, prism, dog, |
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sheep, pig, worm, gnome, dark side of the moon, and other Pink Floyd icons. |
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|
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The story. A powerful ancestor of Prince onefang had them made for his own use. |
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His lover was kidnapped and killed by someone. Ancestor got drunk and went on a |
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rampage, where he lost each item one at a time. He didn't clear out the areas |
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he rampaged through, and they rebuilt stronger than ever. |
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