Difference between revisions of "v0.13:Writing"

Revision as of 17:12, 10 July 2018

Grammar and Stable Writing

In order to write a stable age you will need to satisfy the Grammar when writing an Age. It’s best to plan out what kind of world you want in advance and make sure you satisfy as much of the grammar as possible.

Failing to satisfy the grammar, making mistakes, including conflicting or paradoxical passages, or attempting to write an Age with overabundant resources or advantages will result in an Age with Instability.

The simplest explanation of the grammar is simply: Modifier Pages come before the Modified Page in the page order; similar to Adjectives and Nouns in English.

• "Red Ball" is correct, whereas "Ball Red" would be grammatically incorrect.

Standard Age

A "Standard Age" layout and recommend page order example is given below. For ease of identifying which pages modify others, Modifier Pages will be in Italics, Modified Pages shown in Bold and finally pages that both Modify and can be Modified will be in both Bold and Italics:

Link Panel

Link Panel Page,

• (May have additional properties added via the Ink Mixer)

Terrain and World Type

Biome Pages, Biome Distribution Page

Block Page

• (Generates Terrain, replaces Stone/Dirt),

Block Page or No Seas Page

• (Generates Seas, replaces Water),

World Type Page

Weather Type and Light Level

Weather Page,

• (or replace with "No Weather" Page)

Lighting Page

Celestials

(Optional: Color Pages, Sunset Color Page) Length Pages, Direction Pages, Phase Pages, Normal Sun,

• (If no Sun, replace entire with Dark Sun)

(Optional: Color Pages, Sunset Color Page) Length Pages, Direction Pages, Phase Pages, Normal Moon,

• (If no Moon, replace line with Dark Moon)

(Optional: Length and Direction Pages) Color Pages, Star Page

• (If no stars, replace line with Dark Stars)

Visuals

Color Pages, Sky Color

• (Or replace line with Natural Sky Color)

Color Pages, Night Sky Color

• (For Default Night Sky, use Black Color)

Color Pages, Fog Color

• (Or replace line with Natural Fog Color)

Color Pages, Cloud Color

• (Or replace line with Natural Cloud Color)

Color Pages, Water Color

• (Or replace line with Natural Water Color)

Color Pages, Foliage Color

• (Or replace line with Natural Foliage Color)

Color Pages, Grass Color

• (Or replace line with Natural Grass Color)

(Optional: Boundless Sky and/or Rainbow Pages)

World Features and Structures

Large Feature, Medium Feature, Small Feature,

• (Or replace with Lacking X Feature, however Lacking Small/Meduim Features will result in some instability)
  • (Features will sometimes accept Block Pages to generate the material, Floating Islands also accepts a Biome Page)

Effects

(Optional: Effects Pages)

Clear Modifiers Page

• (Clear Modifiers is optional but reduces the chances of the age being violently unstable due to grammar errors, it generates a small amount of instability for every “dangling” or “unused” Modifier page it accepts, can also be used as a “safety net” at the end of complex passages if you’re unsure of your grammar.)

Additional Notes

• "Replace line" in the above example means "Remove that page and all its modifier pages, the replacement page accepts 0 modifiers"

• Additional Celestials, Features and Effects can be added, as long as they remain in the correct format.

• Native Biome Distribution, Natural X Color pages, and Dark Celestials accept no modifiers.

• Any optional sections you decide to leave out may be randomized for you, the Grammar will not be satisfied for those sections, the more specific you are the less is left to chance.
  • For an age to be “stable” it must have all grammar elements satisfied, and use no pages that generate base instability.
    • It is possible to have “pseudo-stable” ages with some instability, but not enough for decay, usually by balancing the “unstable” pages with ones that reduce instability..

Effects will not be added randomly unless the age is unstable due to either greedy pages like Dense Ores or grammar errors.

There are pages that will add instability, anything that adds ores or other rare resources, or give some form of advantage to the player will generally cause instability.

Pages like Dense Ores, Diamond Ore Block, Accelerated, etc. will create a lot of instability. When Mystcraft first loads, a dimension that is similar to the Overworld is created and is profiled to calculate a baseline for how much resources an “Overworld-Like” Age should contain.

Ages with Acceleration will cause instability, because it makes farms more efficient. Ages with Bright Lighting will cause instability, because they are easier to mine in. Ages with Dense Ores will cause instability, because they have more abundant ore generation.

All of these things will cause Instability (via Greed), and possibly lead to Decay. However, pages that intentionally make the age more dangerous actually add some base stability to the Age. Examples of these pages are “Lightning” “Scorched Surface” or “Random Explosions”, some mods will even add materials that are dangerous enough to qualify for this effect.

XComp's Facts

• "Some symbols function as modifiers for other modifiers" (ex. Red Color can mix with other colors, Half Length with other lengths, North Direction with other directions, etc).
• "Modifiers come before the symbol they modify"
• "Incomplete age descriptions will be parsed by the universe (following the grammar) and then further expanded"
  • "This is similar to if you provided the words "red" "dog" "ball" and the universe expanded it to "The red dog plays with the ball". The grammar expansion is random, and may take different expansions: "The red car narrowly missed the dog chasing the green ball" is an equally valid expansion."