Alchemy

Some thoughts!

Several types or levels of materials:

  • Common materials (lvl0-1)
    • Earth, stone, grass, sand, wood, coal
    • Extremely low monetary value
  • Base metals (lvl 1-3)
    • Lead, iron, copper, nickel, zinc, tin
    • Low monetary value
  • Fine metals (lvl4-7)
    • Steel, bronze, mercury,
    • Significantly improved monetary value
  • Noble metals (lvl6-10)
    • Gold, silver, platinum, palladium, iridium
    • High monetary value
  • Royal metals (lvl10-12)
    • Unobtanium, adamantium, vibranium
  • Base minerals (lvl1-5)
    • Quartz, magnetite, fluorite
  • Fine minerals
    • Beryl, spinel, topaz, opal, pearl, aquamarine
  • Noble minerals
    • Diamond, emerald, ruby, sapphire, amethyst
  • Royal minerals
    • Gallicite, Empirite, Tecnorite

Alchemy is not for 1.4.0 but should be okay for 1.4.1 and here are some more questions, each with their own answer:

  • Should alchemists have a rank, power or some other kind of defining trait that sets them apart?
    • Don’t know if I want to give them a different rank (though it would make some sense) but maybe some bit gets flipped and they have a display “Alc” for their power column
    • This is kind of pressing because I really actually don’t know what to do about this. The options are:
      • Hide the value somewhere it doesn’t belong like clan==-2 for necro (but where even??)
      • Create a new stat like the medical skill
      • Create a unique power (this limits it to unpowered soldiers, which ?!?!)
      • Go without identifying alchemists at all
  • How do you make a new alchemist?
    • When you first assign a soldier to the alchemy team they have a secret rating from 0-4 (non-linearly?) assigned to their starting alchemy score
  • What does Alchemy give you?
    • Recipes are discovered that can convert lower things into higher things
    • Spells can also be discovered that the research team can
  • What are some sample recipes?
    • Dirt and clay into copper
    • Copper and quartz into iron
    • Iron and coal into steel
    • Steel and lead into titanium
    • Titanium and hematite into platinum
    • Platinum and magnesium into adamantium
  • How is the Alchemy body of knowledge advanced?
    • Alchemy research is organized into labs
      • A lab can have associated costs, equipment, resources, etc
      • A lab has a principal investigator (PI? maybe?)
      • A lab can have multiple slots for researchers
      • The lab produces more knowledge than individual each working in their own lab (to a point)
      • The lab produces alchemy points every day that add to a total
      • The points pile up but if a lab is shut down a bunch of those points go away because knowledge is a living thing
        • This should only be tied to founding a lab, the lab should be optional since at first everyone is a PI
        • A lab is a strict bonus to how much knowledge is generated, and that bonus is dependent on the personnel, equipment, etc
        • But if the lab is empty it shuts down and all that bonus knowledge is lost (maybe unless the lab is assigned to make writeups or something?)
  • Do we want alchemy artifacts?
    • I think they’re a cool idea since they would let you do alchemy outside the alchemy team maybe? Or something cool.