CF: ice cubes (was Re: oddity in the pup_land raffle #2)

[David Andrew Michael Noelle <dave@Straylight.org>]

Doug wilder wrote:
> 
> Alternatively, have some "safe" way of melting icecubes that guarantee its
> contents are never damaged. Icecubes seem to be about the only containers
> that require this contents-preservation feature -- for other containers, you
> can simply open it, or if it's locked, you probably want the player to look
> for the key and not find a way to open it without using the key.
> 
> I know this sounds like a joke, but i don't mean it to be.
> 
> How about an ICE PICK? An item specifically used to chip items out of ice
> cubes.

    Try flint and steel.  Mark the ice cube, then repeatedly apply the flint
and steel until it melts.  Note: the flint and steel will get used up rather
quickly this way.

    On the other hand, it might not be unreasonable to have ice cubes melt
of their own accord, losing mass and occasionally dropping some of their
contents until they vanish altogether.  I believe there was, at some point,
a suggestion to make various food and flesh items decay similarly to the way
icor does.  If these two changes are implemented, I think they'd add an
interesting aspect, but they'd also add the need for refrigerators in
apartments, to keep your extra food and your alchemical ingredients from
decaying while you're out adventuring.
    Refrigerators could be special containers, like bookshelves, but marked
in some way as being able to stop decay, which most containers should not
do.  Alternatively, they could be small maps with some ambient temperature
indicator that would be unpleasant for fireborns, but would slow or prevent
decay.  Ambient temperature would also be a neat addition to places like the
dragon caves, where the ice cubes left over after freezing a bunch of red
dragons would vanish in moments, but the chinese dragons would be living in
a cave that was effectively a large natural refrigerator.

-- 
            -Dave Noelle,                 dave@Straylight.org
            -the Villa Straylight,  http://www.straylight.org
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