v0.13:Writing

v0.13 · Older This article is about the current version of Mystcraft. More Info

Grammar and Stable Writing

In order to better control the results of your writing, you will need to understand the Grammar. 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.

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 a sentence generator expanded it to "The red dog plays with the ball". The grammar expansion is random, and may form different expansions: "The red car narrowly missed the dog chasing the green ball" is an equally valid expansion. These expansions are done similar to sentence tree structures.

The more detail provided initially, the less the universe will inject new variations to what has been written. Writing "The red dog plays with the ball" leaves far fewer options for expansion; usually the remaining expansions take the form of modifiers. "The big, red dog plays with the ball" or "The red dog plays with the ball in the yard" would be valid expansions of the English sentence.

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. Additionally, if the grammar is unsatisfied, symbols may be added to the age which may add instability.

Modifier Pages come before the Modified Page in the symbol order; similar to Adjectives and Nouns in English.

• "This is a Red Ball." is correct, whereas "This is a 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 unused modifiers. It generates a small amount of instability for every “dangling” or “unused” Modifier page it accepts. This can be used as a “safety net” at the end of complex passages to clear all modifiers if you are unsure of your grammar.

In practice, unused modifiers are assigned usages by the grammar, so there are rarely unused modifiers by the time this symbol is applied.

Gradients

"Gradient" is an optional page that can be used to change Sunset, Stars, Sky, Night Sky, Fog, and Cloud color, and have them shift between colors over a certain length of time.

Example format with three alternating colors in the sky:

Color Pages, Length Pages, Gradient Page (Color 1)

Color Pages, Length Pages, Gradient Page (Color 2)

Color Pages, Length Pages, Gradient Page (Color 3)

Sky Color Page

Length determines how long a color will last before it's completely faded to the next color, and color page mixing are standard Mystcraft rules. You must have at least two colors to alternate between but you may add as many as needed.

• Length seems to be half as long as Celestial lengths for gradients, if you wanted to sync a color shift to a celestial, you can include the same Length pages for both.
  • (Example: 'Red Color, Full Length, Gradient Page would sync to a Celestial also using only "Full Length" for it's movement.)

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 use no pages that generate base instability, and must not have excessive ores in the ground (compared to the overworld).
    • It is common to have “pseudo-stable” ages with some instability, but not enough for world-destroying effects. This can happen just by adding glowstone (for example) to an overworld-like age, as glowstone is not a normal resource in the overworld.
    • An age an be made "more stable" by adding pages that reduce instability. For example, an age with "Charged" will have lighting strikes, but will have less instability.

• Effects will not be added randomly unless the age is unstable due to either greedy pages like "Accelerated", or grammar errors, or excessive ores/fluids in the ground.
  • 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, etc. *may* create a lot of instability.

As a quick counter example, "void world, dense ores, diamond ore block, obelisks" will not. Since it is void, there is no stone to be turned into ores by dense ores; since there is no land, there are no obelisks. It is not that these pages generate instability, it is the effect in the world. Template:Format-help

• • • 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.

Remember, instability is not automatically decay. Early instability effects are almost always surface status effects. A cave world, with glowstone, and bright lighting, might not have any noticeable effect inside the cave itself.

XComp's Notes

• "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."
• "Not fully satisfying the grammar won't produce instability directly. The symbols added by the grammar might, however."

Version Compatibility

• The grammar system above is current for Mystcraft Versions 0.12 through Current (Latest Builds)