Probably obvious question about item storylets

Hi, everybody!

I’m new, and I apologize if this has been done to death already–I can’t seem to find it in either forum or manual, but perhaps my search skills are failing me.

So I just discovered StoryNexus, very excited, have wanted something like this since I was fifteen and trying to write things in AmigaBasic. I’m working on my world, and I have encountered a problem.

So my characters are all stuffed animals, and once you’ve hit a certain amount of damage, you Come Unstuffed. Fine, good, no problem. This is supposed to move you to another setting where you are repaired by sinister voodoo-doll-like creatures with sewing needles, who then return you (somewhat changed) to the primary setting.

However, there’s a disposable item that’s basically a healing kit, and it occurs to me that of course players are going to want to try to use this healing kit while they are dead, because naturally you’d try to fix yourself. (And also because if they can find a way to break it, someone will try it.)

But you’re in a different setting. So you try to use the item and you get a blank screen and you’re completely stuck.

And you can’t link multiple item storylets to an item.

Is there a way to temporarily disable an item? I can conceive of a possible (somewhat inelegant) workaround for unique items, like my Pointy Stick—remove Pointy Stick upon death, set a circumstance that says “Temporarily misplaced your Pointy Stick!” and when you return to life, you lose the circumstance and get your Pointy Stick back–but not how to do that with stackable items.

It’s making me think maybe I need to avoid item use storylets completely and just use pinned cards activated by having the item in the first place, but I hate to lose such a neat function!

Ursula: welcome to StoryNexus! A few things here:

First, usable items are setting agnostic. They trigger the same way no matter what setting you’re in. If you’re getting a blank UI when you use an item, it might be because the triggered storylet isn’t properly set as ItemUse in its Category dropdown.

There’s a pretty good workaround to prevent items from being used in Menace states. When the card that transfers your characters triggers, have it set a circumstance quality to 1 (e.g. In the Land of Nod) that denotes they’re in the Menace. Have the card that transfers them out remove the circumstance. Then lock the item’s branches to Land of Nod Max 0.

Voila: can’t be used in the Menace state!

Try giving the player a quality “voodoo!” when entering the alternate setting and removing it when they leave. Limit the healing branch of your item use storylet to be available when this quality is max 0. Add another branch with a different result or locked with impossible but visible when your voodoo quality is 1 or greater.

Hope that works for you!

Thank you, Gordon! I didn’t have that set, which explains why everything was exploding. And now I can go dismantle that workaround I was trying…

Happy to help. :) Sounds like an interesting game. Looking forward to it!

Hello!

Love the concept. I do hope you can play as a stuffed elephant. My favourite toy when I was small was a cuddly elephant. And yes, I belong to the AmigaBASIC era, too.

You appear to be experiencing a surfeit of assistance at the moment, but I can’t resist adding to it to say: The blank UI which you get if you don’t select ItemUse has also confused me a great deal in the past. And it is a bug, because the manual claims you are allowed “to have storylets that work only in particular settings (eg a bell that summons help only in the Enclave) or that work system-wide (eg a note you can read anywhere)”. So you should report the problem to support@storynexus.com, which hopefully will put some pressure on them to fix it ;-)

Cheers
Richard

[quote=Gordon Levine]Ursula: welcome to StoryNexus! A few things here:

First, usable items are setting agnostic. They trigger the same way no matter what setting you’re in. If you’re getting a blank UI when you use an item, it might be because the triggered storylet isn’t properly set as ItemUse in its Category dropdown.

There’s a pretty good workaround to prevent items from being used in Menace states. When the card that transfers your characters triggers, have it set a circumstance quality to 1 (e.g. In the Land of Nod) that denotes they’re in the Menace. Have the card that transfers them out remove the circumstance. Then lock the item’s branches to Land of Nod Max 0.

Voila: can’t be used in the Menace state![/quote]

This is a great idea, and one I’m going to be stealing when I need it.

Also, Richard: fantastic concept. I too can’t wait to try it out. If you’re looking for someone to help you write the game, message me: I’ll be more than happy to help.

[quote=Richard ]So you should report the problem to support@storynexus.com, which hopefully will put some pressure on them to fix it ;-)
[/quote]
It’s been pointed out to me by another forum member that this was an extremely clumsy turn of phrase.

What I meant was: when several people have spent time trying to resolve the same issue (which I happen to know is the case here), it’s helpful if they report that they’ve had problems, because that provides the information needed to move it up the priority list. But that’s not the same as “put pressure on”, and I don’t know why I put it that way.

Thanks to the person who flagged this up, and my apologies to anyone at FBG I’ve offended.

Cheers
Richard

Looking forward to this (especially if it involves anything like Rough Seams and Pludwump and the Great Plushthanga…).

I think I can pretty much promise that…grin