[Adonthell-devel] Attribute related questions

[Kai Sterker]

It's always the same: when starting work on something new, new questions
pop up.

The first issue regards attributes and attribute modifiers:

Imagine the character equips an enchanted item, like the "Necklace of
the Axebearer" (Hardness +1, Melee +1, Drinking +1). This raises a
couple of questions:

1. Which value should be modified? The current rank, or the maximum
   rank? Or both?

   As far as Hardness and Drinking is concerned I imagine that only the
   last alternative makes sense. If only the maximum rank is increased,
   the character could increase that Attribute or Skill, remove the
   Amulet and suddenly he had a higher rank than actually allowed.

   For the same reason, you couldn't raise the current rank, as that
   might exceed the maximum. But if both current and maximum are raised,
   everything will be fine.

   It's similar for the Melee Ability. Only raising current and maximum
   at the same time makes sense. That would allow the character to use
   better weapons while the amulet is equipped.

   So is it in order to always increase current and maximum rank?


2. When increasing (or for that matter, decreasing) an Attribute like
   Hardness, this will also affect a number of derived properties, like
   Health and various resistances. Their maximum will be adjusted
   automatically, and nothing should speak against that. However, should
   their current value also be adjusted?

   I would say so. If Hardness is raised by 1 point, maximum Health will
   be raised by 10 points, and so should current Health. Right?

   But what happens when decreasing Hardness by 1 point? Imagine the
   character has a current Health of 9 and takes off the Amulet of the
   Axebearer. If we'd decrease Health by 10, he'd die. OTOH, we don't
   decrease Health, we'd run into problems if current Health is at the
   maximum: after removing the amulet, it would suddenly exceed the
   maximum, which is also bad.

   One solution could be to decrease derived attributes only if they
   would exceed the new maximum. But if you think about it, this would
   allow cheating:

   Character has Health 5 of 20. After equipping amulet it'd be 15/30.
   Remove amulet: 15/20. Equip amulet: 25/30. Remove: 20/20. Healed!

   Any ideas? I imagine the brute method (letting characters die) is
   causing the least problems; at least for us developers ;). I've
   played games where it's handled like this. Morrowind for example.



On a completely different matter, there are some bugs in the rules doc:
On page 5 it says: "Melee damage represents the amount of damage you
deal in close combat. Melee damage is given in an interval of two
numbers, the first being the minimal, the second the maximal damage you
can inflict."

On the next page, it says something like: melee damage is derived from
strength (strength * 1), but nothing more is said about minimum and
maximum.

Also, the formula for the Ranged Damage property is missing altogether.


Any thoughts or help on those issues welcome,

Kai