CF: Reality check: artifact containers (fwd)

[Rick Tanner <leaf@real-time.com>]

This message also missed being added to the archive, so I sent it again.

- Rick Tanner
leaf@real-time.com


---------- Forwarded message ----------
Date: Wed, 01 Sep 1999 17:18:55 -0500
From: David Andrew Michael Noelle <dave@Straylight.org>
To: Crossfire Mailing List <crossfire@ifi.uio.no>
Subject: CF: Reality check: artifact containers


    It recently occurred to me that artifact containers, such as The Luggage
and sacks of holding, present exactly the same problem as Glowing Crystals. 
Weight limits, like spell points, are an integral part of the game and are
an important means of balancing a character's power.  (Weight limits also
affect spellcasters more strongly and in more ways than fighters.)
    Unlike most artifacts, both crystals and containers are useful in large
quantities, at the cost of inventory space and management time.  Packing one
magical container inside another repeatedly, like a Russian doll, may take a
few moments, but it benefits the player in a geometric progression, each
container multiplying the strength of each container it holds by its own
strength.  

Example: Given 4 Luggage, 2 sacks of holding and 2 bags of holding,

1) Put 1000 kg of loot in the first Luggage and 980 kg of loot in each of
the others, leaving exactly 20kg capacity, the size of a Luggage itself.

Luggage 1 weighs 20kg and holds 1000kg at 50% strength, for a total of 520kg

2) Since picking up container is limited only by the "weight" of the actual
container, regardless of its contents, you can drop one luggage, open
another, and pick up the first to stack them, one inside the next, and
exceed the outer container's weight limit.

Close Luggage 1, drop it, and pick in up, into Luggage 2.
Luggage 2 weighs 20kg and holds (980kg + 520kg) at 50% for a total of 770kg

3) Repeat with the rest of the containers...

Luggage 2 -> Luggage 3.
Luggage 3 weighs 20kg and holds (980kg + 770kg) at 50% for a total of 895kg

Luggage 3 -> Luggage 4.
Luggage 4 weighs 20kg and holds (980kg + 895kg) at 50% for a total of
957.5kg

Luggage 4 -> sack of holding 1
sack of holding 1 holds 957.5kg at 60% strength, for a total of 383kg

sack 1 -> sack 2
sack 2 holds 383kg at 60%, for 153.2kg

sack 2 -> bag 1
bag 1 holds 153.2kg at 60%, for 61.28kg

bag 1 -> bag 2
bag 2 holds 61.28kg at 60%, for 24.512kg

    Congratulations.  You've just managed to reduce almost four metric tons
of loot, PLUS just over 80kg of containers, to one object weighing 24.512
kg.  Less than the weight of two longswords.  All it took was 28 mouse
clicks, less with some clever keybindings.

    How wrong is that?

-- 
            -Dave Noelle,                 dave@Straylight.org
            -the Villa Straylight,  http://www.straylight.org
Coalition Against Unsolicited Commercial Email  ==  http://www.cauce.com

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