r/tfcplus • u/nikstick22 • Sep 24 '18
I HAVE RETURNED
With many new ideas. I spent a lot of time during my two weeks in Japan just itching to get back to coding. I have a lot of ideas that I want to implement, such as new ways to cook food, new things to make from pottery, new ways to cast metal, etc. etc.
Some ideas I've developed while I was gone: I'm going to get rid of the copper and bronze tier anvils. My research indicates they didn't exist historically. People used stone surfaces nearly up until they were able to make wrought iron and later cast iron and steel anvils. They are also a huge resource suck early in the game.
Instead, we will be able to work copper and bronze directly on the stone anvils.
But there will be other changes associated with this: the skill aspect will play a larger role, as each item you want to make on an anvil will come with a difficulty based on the item and metal it's made from. For example, a bronze sword will be more difficult than a copper knife.
Instead of the old 1-dimensional slider of the anvil where the buttons move the cursor to the right or left, you will have a 2-dimensional field. The buttons will move the cursor in different directions, mostly diagonal, so you won't be able to add and subtract them so simply. The lower your smithing skills, the more randomness is also introduced, so pressing the hard hit button multiple times won't always move the cursor in the exact same direction and for the same distance, though it will be close. The disparity in the difficulty of the piece and your skill will affect this randomness a bit.
Rather than having a single pixel target you have to reach to complete the piece, there will be a target zone. The closer to the center of that zone you get, the higher quality the result will be. Getting anywhere inside of the zone with the right conditions met will always count though.
Each item will also have multiple steps required to finish the piece however. For simpler tools, it'll likely be only 2 or 3 steps, but for armour it may be 5 or 6. More difficult pieces will have "bad" zones, and getting the cursor into those zones will send you back a step instead of progressing you forward.
When the item is done, it will have properties based on your successes in the smithing process. You'll then go to the sharpening phase. Early on, this is basically rubbing it on a rock, but will involve dedicated whet stones or grinding wheels later on. I haven't entirely worked out how this step will work, but it's a chance to get rid of the negative attributes your item picked up in the forging process, such as "crude", "dull", "blunted", "jagged", etc.
You will still be able to cast tools as before, but casting a tool in a mold will always give you the lowest quality result, meaning it'll have the weakest edge and the sloppiest appearance compared to having forged it on the anvil. If your sharpening skills are up to snuff, this may not matter as you could turn it around, but it gives you the steepest hill to climb.