Items and creatures

Items

An item is anything that can be carried, worn, eaten or used.

Description is what the narrator says about it. Stats and effects are what it does when equipped or consumed.

Interactions are what happens when a player uses it. Simple cases need no code — heal an amount, apply an effect, be consumed. A healing draught is three clicks.

Image: docs/item-interaction.png The item editor's Interaction tab with a simple rule configured — a consumable that heals and is used up — shown as visual steps rather than code.

When you want an item to do something conditional (only at night, only if the drinker is poisoned), that is a condition and the item editor will take one.

Variables

A variable is something an item remembers between turns. Every variable has a type, and the type decides what it can hold:

Type	Holds	Use it for
number	a figure	charges, ammo, how many times it has been struck
one of…	one word from a list you write	state: a shrine dormant or powered, a door locked or open
text	any string at all	an inscription, a name someone carved into it, a log a rule appends to

one of… is the common one. Give it the values it may hold, mark which one the item starts in with the dot, and a rule compares against them by equality — so a value nothing lists is one no rule can match. That constraint is the point: it is what stops a rule gating on a state the item can never actually be in.

text has no list, and nothing checks what goes in it. That makes it the right choice for something genuinely open — and the wrong choice for something a rule needs to compare, because a typo in either place is a comparison that silently never matches.

There is nothing special about the name state. It is simply the variable most games want first. Add charge, mood, display, whatever the object actually tracks, and an item can carry several at once: a terminal that is both powered and showing menu.

Variables live on the item's Rules tab, next to the rules that read them.

Most items need none. Add one when the same object behaves differently depending on something that stuck from an earlier turn.

Plugin values on the Description tab are a different thing: numbers a plugin asked for on every item of that kind — weight, an infection meter. Those belong to the game's systems. A variable belongs to this item. See Fields.

Reading and writing one

A rule reads a variable through $.item:

$.item.state === 'LIT'        // the `state` variable
$.item.tags.mood              // any other word variable
$.item.fields.ammo            // any number variable

and writes one with a single step, set_field, whichever type it is:

$.setField({ field: 'state', to: 'LIT' })          // a word
$.adjustField({ field: 'ammo', by: -1 })           // a number, moved
$.setField({ field: 'ammo', to: 0 })               // a number, pinned
$.setField({ field: 'state', to: 'LIT', onTarget: true })  // on the item this was USED ON

There is no separate "set state" step. A state change is a variable write like any other.

Inputs

An input is what was done to an item this turn, and it is never stored. A terminal answers help, run, status, exit; a lever takes pull and push.

This is a second axis from variables, not a replacement — a terminal can be powered (a stored variable) and receive run (an input) in the same moment. Each rule can claim one input with Require input, so one item carries a different behaviour per verb.

Leave it empty for anything a player simply uses.

Equip requirements

A minimum stat the wearer must have before the item can be equipped at all — a greatsword that wants 14 strength. The item stays wearable-in-principle and simply refuses anyone under the bar, rather than being hidden.

Only meaningful alongside an equip slot: without a slot the item can never be worn, so the requirement is never consulted.

Creatures

Creatures are what fights you. The step only appears when combat is enabled in Setup.

Stats decide how dangerous they are. Loadouts give them equipment — a bandit with a sword hits differently from one without.

Loot tables decide what drops. Entries carry a chance, so a rare drop is a rare drop rather than a scripted one.

Image: docs/mob-loot-table.png A creature's loot table with several entries at different drop chances.

Effects

An effect is a status that lands on someone and wears off: poisoned, blessed, burning. Effects are their own step because more than one thing applies them — an item, a creature's attack, a location, a rule.

Give an effect a duration and what it does per turn, and every system that applies it behaves consistently.

Abilities

What a character can do beyond a plain attack. Only shown when abilities are enabled in Setup.

An ability can cost a resource, have a cooldown, and carry a condition deciding when it is usable at all.

Where the numbers come from

Damage, armour and variance are formulas you can edit — not fixed engine rules. A game where armour matters more, or where damage swings wildly, changes the formula rather than inflating every stat.

Next

• Quests without code
• Shops and loadouts