Circle 4.x suggestion from a lurker

From: Gavin Hoffman (gavinhoffman@YAHOO.COM)
Date: 12/16/02


Greetings,

I've been a happy armchair implementor and coder since bpl 9 or so, and one thing that I would love to see is a more modular approach to spells and skills (forgive me if this has been discussed and I missed it).

In general, spells modify characters, mobs, items, and the world in general (depending on what spells you implement in your world). Why not take an approach similar to world-building? Select effects individually or in combination that create the overall spell. Effects include PC/mob stat changing (i.e. current hit points, max hit points, str, int, etc), item stat changing (currently can be done with things like dgScripts, but I think it's kind of a kludge), room/zone stat changing.

Generate a whole list of effects that can be added to spells. We do it for rooms, we do it for items, we do it for mobs. Why not spells? Why not skills?

I'd love to see that kind of modularity. How many people have had builders/players beg them and/or their coders to make new spells? Why do the coders have to do it, when the vast majority of spells can be expressed in terms of something more basic? More complex or unique spells will still require that new code be written, but I think a great many spells and skills could be covered by this system.

The drawback is an obvious one. You get 400 variations on the fireball in a single game. But, as has been discussed at length, that falls under the imagination of the admins and his/her builders and coders.

I'm not sure if this violates the currently-held concept of a "simple" server, but I think it would lower the barrier of entry to those creative types who want to be able to build more exciting spells lists for their players.

Thoughts?

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