Idea for a building that could be packed with lore material

desrik · 2013-12-20T19:47:21.000Z

A data-center. Small building packed with computers, some working some not. The building would also have a few counters and metal racks, possibly a locker or two, that would spawn various computer related items. ( USB drives, processors, RAM, copper wire, etc. ) The spawn should be somewhat less rare than an LMOE shelter. Terminals could be used as a place to let the player read some of the lore. ( Maybe the data-center is an NSA style information database? ) This would require, in simplified sense, a way to spawn the lore like we do item groups. I would say create a data/lore folder, and seperate all of the lore into different jsons. Each json would be thought of as a ‘lore group’. When the terminal is set to spawn lore from a specific ‘lore group’ the game would spawn a random amount of lore entries from said ‘lore group’.

What do you guys think? Maybe this would give some incentive to come up with more detailed and varying lore.

Dominae · 2013-12-20T20:01:59.000Z

Adding terminals to libraries (what library doesn’t have computers now … let alone in “the fuuuuutuuuuure”?) with a way to look up lore via news articles or whatever would work too, if a full-blown data-center wasn’t put in.

desrik · 2013-12-20T20:05:22.000Z

That could be an idea for other lore spawning locations. Have a lore group of newspaper articles, but instead of using computers, add in one of those slide machines you find in libraries. You would use it to look through the spawned newspaper lore.

Inadequate · 2013-12-20T20:09:24.000Z

Isn’t the Cataclysm supposed to have happened in a very short period of time? Certainly not a long enough period for newspapers to do a proper write-up beyond the initial confusion, I always thought. Online news sources, maybe, but not print articles.

desrik · 2013-12-20T20:20:20.000Z

Inadequate:

Isn’t the Cataclysm supposed to have happened in a very short period of time? Certainly not a long enough period for newspapers to do a proper write-up beyond the initial confusion, I always thought. Online news sources, maybe, but not print articles.

4 days after the outbreak IIRC, but that’s not the point. Why would the lore be limited to after the cataclysm? I’m thinking the data-center should be an NSA style information warehouse. Data gets collected over the course of time, some data is sent to one center, other data is sent to another center. That’s the reasoning behind the very low spawn chance. There isn’t supposed to be a data-center in every city. I’m thinking maybe 1 to 3 maximum. ( In the area of the map that debug will reveal)

Inadequate · 2013-12-20T20:24:43.000Z

Well, I’m largely referring to the slide machines. It’s my understanding that most of the work done pre-Cataclysm was largely covert, and probably wouldn’t be written up in mainstream papers. I mean I guess you could have writeups on the state of world politics and such, but that’s a pretty minor detail compared to the otherworldly stuff.

And I don’t know if it needs to be that rare, it’s not like there’s much of practical value that you can’t find elsewhere.

desrik · 2013-12-20T20:36:43.000Z

I see what your saying about the slide machines, but as for the rarity of the data-center I was intending the center to be a secured ( not turrets or anything, but possibly at least a military id ) and discrete ( middle of nowhere basically ) as it would be a top-secret information ‘vault’. Archives of outbreak information secretly obtained from the labs, millitary weapon specs and information, maps or special intrest location ( LMOE, lab, bunker, etc ), and some general military lore for flavor.

Dominae · 2013-12-21T22:36:05.000Z

Inadequate:

Isn’t the Cataclysm supposed to have happened in a very short period of time? Certainly not a long enough period for newspapers to do a proper write-up beyond the initial confusion, I always thought. Online news sources, maybe, but not print articles.

… and thats assuming newspapers still exist. They’re already old tech now, imagine “the not-too-distant-future” lol

Having recordings of news programs, or being able to pull up some stuff on a PDA could work, too.

Ferodaktyl · 2013-12-21T23:40:00.000Z

i don’t get it, don’t we have the computers in labs as lore dispensers ?
the only pick i have with them is that you can milk 1 computer for all the lore, instead of having only 1 piece or 2 available / per lab

Inadequate · 2013-12-22T01:31:21.000Z

Well, it certainly can’t hurt to flesh out the lore a bit more. The data center could focus on the military side of the story, while the science labs tell the story from the scientist’s perspectives. Like how the miner’s log in the mine tells the story of the miners.

desrik · 2013-12-22T03:24:01.000Z

Inadequate:

Well, it certainly can’t hurt to flesh out the lore a bit more. The data center could focus on the military side of the story, while the science labs tell the story from the scientist’s perspectives. Like how the miner’s log in the mine tells the story of the miners.

That’s a good idea. I was thinking more along the lines of a lore catch-all, with randomly picked bits of lore. Go in one data center, read some random lore, go to a second data center, read some random lore thats different from the last data center ( Minus the rng spawning the same bit of lore both times ). The general idea is to turn all computerized lore into a workable format akin to the fliers. Then pick a random category and a random number of lore entries from that category.

Zireael · 2014-02-01T18:10:43.000Z

I love the data-center idea. There was a thread floating around Lab with bits and pieces of lore, it could be useful.

As a matter of fact, I’d like to have the lore condensed somewhere, in a thread or on the wiki.