HardLife, PSL and v0.3+ Cost-System integration (Patreon)

Working on the costs-table for items and activated powers, will post a more detailed update on the costs-system later, but this ties in to all types of resources and works consistently across all object-types, including characters. The very first entry on the table is the cost of 'self', intended for things that are destroyed/sacrificed/consumed on use. There is also a 'use' entry, for things that have a fixed number of uses/servings; a 'charge' entry for things that have a rechargeable or replaceable power system (provided a compatible energy type can be successfully applied), which also covers depleting an enchantment; a 'wear' entry for normal wear & tear/durability loss (objects that are repaired/mended will lose a bit of max-durability each time) - may also be applied to joint-strain/damage, but organic objects GAIN max-durability on repair, instead of losing it (replaceable party come in with full durability, only things that are sewed, soldered, welded, glued, or otherwise refurbished instead of being replaced with new parts, suffer maximum-durability loss/permanent-fatigue of the materials); there are also entries for different blends of karma, primary-stats (used to level up powers), elemental energy, secondary-stats/qi-energy, and metabolic/bio-energies, nutrients, etc. (the latter will only work with/affect metabolisms that use those resources).

The various resource costs fall into distinct categories like: permanent loss/use of a finite resource (such as consuming an item), temporary loss/depletion of a self-generated energy (just requires rest/time/metabolism to recover - recharge rate is based on YOUR power levels), and use of a renewable resource where the rate of recovery is fixed or otherwise not directly influenced by your power.

Things can also expend mass during use, and other metrics will likely also be on the costs table, particularly as activation costs for some types of spells. Some things may cost 'height' to activate, and, since costs can be negative, there may be some that cost shortness, rather than tallness, thus increasing height rather than depleting it. We may even wind up with some fun/wacky costs like, "casting this spell will require the sacrifice of 1 cup-size from your primary bust".

This also opens the door for things like blood-magic. :evillaugh:

There will likewise be an effects-table/system that ties in with the costs. Later this may be expanded to allow cost-substitution, using a similar reagent in an alchemical brew or as a spell component should have a similar, but distinct, effect. And, there is always the possibility of some degree of chaos/randomness in the effects, not only in potency, but also meta/mutated effects triggered, not unlike a wild-mage.

Back to general system discussion, in order to make the HardLife engine fully PSL-system complaint, there will be a few background adjustments in formulas. The core measurements will be converted from Imperial to Metric, though the default system selected for display will still be imperial (might open that option up for a vote if enough people want it).

Also, due to both technical limitations and scalability concerns, especially with the introduction of weapons, the calculation of secondary-stats/qi-energies will go from a multiplicative 2-dimensional array, to an additive system. So, rather than 'power' being SPD*STR, and thus hitting the javascript mathematical limit when stats are at e153+ (~154 digits), you will be able to raise stats to e307+ before breaking javascript (~308 digits), losing only 1 digit for a 2-dimensional calculation, instead of half of them.

There was also a need to adjust the scaling rate on lifts, to bring the progression numbers back inline with the intended power-level estimates (10 = average; 20 = fit/trained; 30 = athlete/professional; 40 = all-star/champion; 50 = record-holder/master), especially since we will also be instituting a skills system that can increase the amount of weight you can handle with good form/practice.

Likewise to the changes to Qi-energies, Karma will be re-scaled so that each point is a significant quanta, bringing it inline with the intended minimum activation cost of 1.0 unit. (the drain and heal powers may, for example, cost as little as 1 point of the appropriate karma, depending on the power-level of your target; the drain power will also be scaled to reflect this, rather than the current micro-drain implementation, it will grow with your power level).

I'm still working on the sequence to discretely implement these changes without tearing the whole game apart, and in the meantime will be adding more content to the current engine, where possible, and expanding on/refactoring it as the systems are updated toward engine v0.30+. We had quick pseudo-systems for v0.10, which we began to expand on for v0.20, and we are now replacing them with what should be permanent systems properly aligned with the PSL role-playing rule system that I've been designing/refining for the past 21 years.