[MUD-Dev] Re: let's call it a spellcraft

[Koster]

> -----Original Message-----
> From: S. Patrick Gallaty [mailto:choke at sirius.com]
> Sent: Wednesday, September 23, 1998 3:29 PM
> To: mud-dev at kanga.nu
> Subject: [MUD-Dev] Re: let's call it a spellcraft
> 
> >On Wed, Sep 23, 1998 at 10:44:09AM -0500, Koster, Raph wrote:
> >> In particular, different
> >> magical components embodied one of the eight hidden "qualities" of
> >> magic--such as classical elements, etc. So hidden inside 
> >> sulphurous ash
> >> was a unit of Fire, and mandrake root carried one unit of 
> >> Death with it.
> >> This allowed for MANY possible interactions with fairly 
> >> little code.
> 
> So what happened to that excellent idea, Raph?
> How did UO end up with that fairly disappointing spell system?

The original spell system called for 150 spells divided into three
schools with some overlap, and it called for alternate reagents to serve
(for example, instead of sulphurous ash which represents 3 fire, you
could substitute three volcanic ash which represent 1 each). But the
guys who coded up the system came from a traditional Ultima background,
and so the traditional Ultima system was used...

As far as the rest of the artificial life stuff which hinged on that
setup, a lot of it was disabled because it wasn't visible enough and
therefore mostly just cost CPU cycles. We plan to get it back in
eventually though.

-Raph