# Idea: Skateboard vehicle and skate backpack

**URL:** <https://discourse.cataclysmdda.org/t/idea-skateboard-vehicle-and-skate-backpack/6143>\
**Category:** The Drawing Board\
**Created:** [May 16, 2014, 1:26am UTC](https://discourse.cataclysmdda.org/t/idea-skateboard-vehicle-and-skate-backpack/6143 "2014-05-16T01:26:18Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 17\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![fishy1234555](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex016/user_avatar/discourse.cataclysmdda.org/fishy1234555/32/50_2.png) [@fishy1234555](https://discourse.cataclysmdda.org/u/fishy1234555)\
**Post date:** [May 16, 2014, 1:26am UTC](https://discourse.cataclysmdda.org/t/idea-skateboard-vehicle-and-skate-backpack/6143/1 "2014-05-16T01:26:18Z")

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I propose we make a vehicle like the fold up bicycle that is a skateboard. As far as I know, the code would be really easy to make as it already exists. (e)xamine the skateboard to open menu – select pick up – converting it into an item. It would simple increase your speed and take up like little space and weight.

Ideally multiple boards should exists for the sake of more speed or maneuverability (turning radius). The way to make them foot powered would be with a set of trucks and wheels. Could all be maintained(via vehicle construction) with a skate tool. Craft your own with two x four decks mounted with blades! Or go old school and thrash through the wasteland! Must implement terrain type slowdown for skate vehicles. ie: Asphalt would keep the highest speed for skating, while dirt or grass would slow you.(not a crucial component) And then when z-levels hit the playing field…

If thats no good, then just make a couple of different boards and make them a craftable item.

Yes I’m suggesting crafting and picking up skate vehicles. I think it needs a bit of work to exist, but would totally add a great transportation method. Take the weight and volume, generate it into an item with a single description every time. “This is a skate board.”

Alas, the skate backpack. It simply allows you to load it with a skateboard on the straps on the bag. Really, it would be more suitable if we could put roll-mats and that kind of stuff there too. It wouldn’t take up volume as its outside the bag, but weight would still factor.

SKATE~OR~DIE

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**Author:** ![Birdie](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex016/user_avatar/discourse.cataclysmdda.org/birdie/32/97_2.png) [@Birdie](https://discourse.cataclysmdda.org/u/Birdie)\
**Post date:** [May 16, 2014, 3:48am UTC](https://discourse.cataclysmdda.org/t/idea-skateboard-vehicle-and-skate-backpack/6143/2 "2014-05-16T03:48:26Z")

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Yes please!

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**Author:** ![FunsizeNinja123](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex016/user_avatar/discourse.cataclysmdda.org/funsizeninja123/32/118_2.png) [@FunsizeNinja123](https://discourse.cataclysmdda.org/u/FunsizeNinja123)\
**Post date:** [May 16, 2014, 7:56pm UTC](https://discourse.cataclysmdda.org/t/idea-skateboard-vehicle-and-skate-backpack/6143/3 "2014-05-16T19:56:12Z")

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Think about a person just finding a skateboard and riding it without any experience.

“You fall off your skateboard!”  
“You feel unsteady on your skateboard!”  
“You run over a bush!”

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**Author:** ![Datanazush](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex016/user_avatar/discourse.cataclysmdda.org/datanazush/32/1055_2.png) [@Datanazush](https://discourse.cataclysmdda.org/u/Datanazush)\
**Post date:** [May 16, 2014, 8:02pm UTC](https://discourse.cataclysmdda.org/t/idea-skateboard-vehicle-and-skate-backpack/6143/4 "2014-05-16T20:02:53Z")

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I support this entirely because this means that I can hunt down NPCs while yelling “SKATE OR DIE DUDE.”

"You either Skate!

Or you die!"

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**Author:** ![Zenone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/7bcc69/32.png) [@Zenone](https://discourse.cataclysmdda.org/u/Zenone)\
**Post date:** [May 16, 2014, 9:23pm UTC](https://discourse.cataclysmdda.org/t/idea-skateboard-vehicle-and-skate-backpack/6143/5 "2014-05-16T21:23:53Z")

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you read my mind dude

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**Author:** ![fishy1234555](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex016/user_avatar/discourse.cataclysmdda.org/fishy1234555/32/50_2.png) [@fishy1234555](https://discourse.cataclysmdda.org/u/fishy1234555)\
**Post date:** [May 17, 2014, 12:25am UTC](https://discourse.cataclysmdda.org/t/idea-skateboard-vehicle-and-skate-backpack/6143/6 "2014-05-17T00:25:24Z")

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So what sort of work would be entailed to make this happen? Even if it is only a single board. I imagine falling from your board would be a good addition.

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**Author:** ![Senrain](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex016/user_avatar/discourse.cataclysmdda.org/senrain/32/11388_2.png) [@Senrain](https://discourse.cataclysmdda.org/u/Senrain)\
**Post date:** [May 17, 2014, 7:05am UTC](https://discourse.cataclysmdda.org/t/idea-skateboard-vehicle-and-skate-backpack/6143/7 "2014-05-17T07:05:50Z")

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Hah. I imagine falling off your board would hurt, especially if you go ramming into zombies or bushes.

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**Author:** ![KA101](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/278dde/32.png) [@KA101](https://discourse.cataclysmdda.org/u/KA101)\
**Post date:** [May 17, 2014, 7:10am UTC](https://discourse.cataclysmdda.org/t/idea-skateboard-vehicle-and-skate-backpack/6143/8 "2014-05-17T07:10:20Z")

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> [@fishy1234555](#):
>
> So what sort of work would be entailed to make this happen? Even if it is only a single board. I imagine falling from your board would be a good addition.

Probably the biggest problem is a standing vehicle; all current DDA vehicles have you seated at the controls. After that is the direct foot-power component (a reskinned bike crank would be overpowered, but dial it down a bit; try the hand rims from the folding wheelchair?).

Several others, I’m sure, but those are what immediately come to mind.

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**Author:** ![fishy1234555](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex016/user_avatar/discourse.cataclysmdda.org/fishy1234555/32/50_2.png) [@fishy1234555](https://discourse.cataclysmdda.org/u/fishy1234555)\
**Post date:** [May 17, 2014, 7:26am UTC](https://discourse.cataclysmdda.org/t/idea-skateboard-vehicle-and-skate-backpack/6143/9 "2014-05-17T07:26:59Z")

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So i am going to have to make a new vehicle material for this. Even if you cant ‘mod’ it or else it will weigh to much with steel frames. I was thinking have the board take 1 space and having the deck with seat and control code just goulash-ed together and the bicycle pick up to item as well. A set of trucks, so maybe we go (1)set of trucks or (2) trucks on one space with 4 wheels. What code is vehicle menu and is it easily accessible/if anyone knows how to do this and wants to help that would be cool too? It couldn’t to terribly difficult. Its just an entirely different kind of vehicle only loosely based on working vehicles of Cataclysm.

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**Author:** ![KA101](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/278dde/32.png) [@KA101](https://discourse.cataclysmdda.org/u/KA101)\
**Post date:** [May 17, 2014, 7:29am UTC](https://discourse.cataclysmdda.org/t/idea-skateboard-vehicle-and-skate-backpack/6143/10 "2014-05-17T07:29:02Z")

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> [@fishy1234555](#):
>
> So i am going to have to make a new vehicle material for this. Even if you cant ‘mod’ it or else it will weigh to much with steel frames. I was thinking have the board take 1 space and having the deck with seat and control code just goulash-ed together and the bicycle pick up to item as well. A set of trucks, so maybe we go (1)set of trucks or (2) trucks on one space with 4 wheels. What code is vehicle menu and is it easily accessible/if anyone knows how to do this and wants to help that would be cool too? It couldn’t to terribly difficult. Its just an entirely different kind of vehicle only loosely based on working vehicles of Cataclysm.

Vehicle components are largely JSON, as I recall. Check around in data/json and see what you can find!

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**Author:** ![kevin.granade](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex016/user_avatar/discourse.cataclysmdda.org/kevin.granade/32/1316_2.png) [@kevin.granade](https://discourse.cataclysmdda.org/u/kevin.granade)\
**Post date:** [May 17, 2014, 7:40am UTC](https://discourse.cataclysmdda.org/t/idea-skateboard-vehicle-and-skate-backpack/6143/11 "2014-05-17T07:40:40Z")

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Ideally it’d be a magical single component that supplies everything, place to stand, controls, and muscle-powered locomotion. IIRC from the wheelchair though, the vehicle system got cranky about a single component doing all that stuff, so it’d have to be broken up into several. Nothing too difficult though.  
I just had an idea, maybe we can just put in a special override that lets you kick-drive any single-square vehicle?  
I think this would make shopping-cart fans happy too.

The folding bicycle code already handles turning vehicles into items so you can pick them up, at most I’d say you want to have it described differently so it’s just picking it up instead of “folding” the skateboard.

Used to be this kind of vehicle was a pretty poor experience because you couldn’t see which way you were going, but now we have both an indicator and automatic view shifting, either of which does a pretty good job of it.

> Its just an entirely different kind of vehicle only loosely based on working vehicles of Cataclysm.

I don't know if I'm understanding you correctly, but if you're planning on implementing a separate vehicle system just for this, forget it. The vehicle system is already about 10,000 lines of pretty complicated code, not even counting part definitions or modifications to other code to make it work seamlessly. A second vehicle system would have to be really amazing to have a chance of going in. If instead you mean modifying the existing system to also fit this use, groovy.

Definitely need to get around to the “hard to drive on terrain” set of features.

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**Author:** ![RAM](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/b9bd4f/32.png) [@RAM](https://discourse.cataclysmdda.org/u/RAM)\
**Post date:** [May 17, 2014, 7:45am UTC](https://discourse.cataclysmdda.org/t/idea-skateboard-vehicle-and-skate-backpack/6143/12 "2014-05-17T07:45:17Z")

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In my experience, one tile of wheels is the same as no tiles of wheels. Dragging seems to work just fine with no casters. So a single-tile drivable vehicle would not be possible under traditional rules. On the other hand, there isn’t really any compelling reason that one couldn’t sit in a shopping trolley and push themselves along with a stick, or just stand on the back of it with a counterweight in the basket and kick themselves along quite capably. So the real addition here would be kicking as a vehicle power-source… Also vehicle controls on a skateboard would be a bit silly, and as I understand it collapsible vehicles currently require such…

P.S.  
Three ninjas…

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**Author:** ![fishy1234555](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex016/user_avatar/discourse.cataclysmdda.org/fishy1234555/32/50_2.png) [@fishy1234555](https://discourse.cataclysmdda.org/u/fishy1234555)\
**Post date:** [May 17, 2014, 7:53am UTC](https://discourse.cataclysmdda.org/t/idea-skateboard-vehicle-and-skate-backpack/6143/13 "2014-05-17T07:53:40Z")

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[quote=“Kevin Granade, post:11, topic:6143”]I just had an idea, maybe we can just put in a special override that lets you kick-drive any single-square vehicle?  
I think this would make shopping-cart fans happy too.

> Its just an entirely different kind of vehicle only loosely based on working vehicles of Cataclysm.

I don't know if I'm understanding you correctly, but if you're planning on implementing a separate vehicle system just for this, forget it. [/quote]

Definitely do kick powered override, but what about boards that are like 3 spaces long? More speed/less acceleration. Kick drive by vehicle weight and strength based and by position on vehicle. The former would need to be seen in char.creation and the latter simply used vehicle square type. I assume you cant push from your seat, but if you pushed on the door you could roll it.

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**Author:** ![kevin.granade](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex016/user_avatar/discourse.cataclysmdda.org/kevin.granade/32/1316_2.png) [@kevin.granade](https://discourse.cataclysmdda.org/u/kevin.granade)\
**Post date:** [May 17, 2014, 8:20am UTC](https://discourse.cataclysmdda.org/t/idea-skateboard-vehicle-and-skate-backpack/6143/14 "2014-05-17T08:20:58Z")

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A three space long skateboard…  
That’s like a surfboard on wheels.  
A longboard would still be a one-square vehicle, additionally I don’t see a pressing need to have a variety of different types of skateboards 😛  
You can already move around vehicles from outside them by dragging or pushing, if you’re strong enough. Driving them is a different thing entirely.

As to the point about wheels influencing dragging, we’re planning on doing that, but haven’t gotten around to it yet.

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**Author:** ![RAM](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/b9bd4f/32.png) [@RAM](https://discourse.cataclysmdda.org/u/RAM)\
**Post date:** [May 17, 2014, 8:49am UTC](https://discourse.cataclysmdda.org/t/idea-skateboard-vehicle-and-skate-backpack/6143/15 "2014-05-17T08:49:56Z")

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Pretty sure that I have seen folk pushing a long stack of maybe a dozen shopping trolleys and stepping onto the back to take a brief ride. Pretty sure that a three-tile long kick-vehicle would be plausible, even if a skateboard is less-so. The pressing issue is that you actually need to move the thing, so acceleration from kick-power should be abysmal, and mere mortals should not be capable of kicking forward a standard motor-vehicle. So there should be strength-based limits on the masses that can be moved by way if kick-power, but if The Incredible Hulk wants to drive Fred Flintstone’s car then I do not see any compelling reason why the vehicle should be the unrealistic component of the scenario.

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**Author:** ![Jakers](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/3ab097/32.png) [@Jakers](https://discourse.cataclysmdda.org/u/Jakers)\
**Post date:** [May 17, 2014, 11:08am UTC](https://discourse.cataclysmdda.org/t/idea-skateboard-vehicle-and-skate-backpack/6143/16 "2014-05-17T11:08:44Z")

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Grab a machine gun and open fire as you peacefully roll down the zombie infested-streets on your skateboard of DOOM.

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![BevapDin](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex016/user_avatar/discourse.cataclysmdda.org/bevapdin/32/228_2.png) [@BevapDin](https://discourse.cataclysmdda.org/u/BevapDin)\
**Post date:** [May 17, 2014, 11:18am UTC](https://discourse.cataclysmdda.org/t/idea-skateboard-vehicle-and-skate-backpack/6143/17 "2014-05-17T11:18:53Z")

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Engine, wheel and tank are mutual exclusive, because they all have a size associated, which is stored in the same variable, and therefor the tank would have the same size as the wheel or the engine. And they use different scales so it gets really weird.

But how about this:

`
[
    {
        "type" : "vehicle_part",
        "id" : "skateboard_frame",
        "name": "skateboard frame",
        "symbol": "H",
        "color": "red",
        "broken_symbol": "#",
        "broken_color": "light_gray",
        "damage_modifier": 10,
        "durability": 200,
        "item": "frame",
        "difficulty": 3,
        "location": "structure",
        "fuel_type" : "muscle",
        "power": 30,
        "flags": [
            "MOUNTABLE", "CONTROLS", "FOLDABLE", "BOARDABLE", "PEDALS", "ENGINE"
        ]
    }, {
        "type" : "vehicle",
        "id" : "skateboard",
        "name" : "skateboard",
        "parts" : [
            {"x": 0, "y": 0, "part": "skateboard_frame"},
            {"x": 0, "y": 0, "part": "wheel_caster"}
        ]
    }, {
        "id": "skateboard",
        "type": "TOOL",
        "symbol": "0",
        "color": "light_gray",
        "name": "skateboard",
        "description": "This is a skateboard..",
        "price": 350000,
        "material": "aluminum",
        "weight": 907,
        "volume": 8,
        "bashing": 10,
        "cutting": 0,
        "to_hit": -5,
        "max_charges": 0,
        "initial_charges": 0,
        "charges_per_use": 0,
        "turns_per_charge": 0,
        "ammo": "NULL",
        "revert_to": "null",
        "use_action": {
            "type": "unfold_vehicle",
            "vehicle_name": "skateboard",
            "unfold_msg": "You place skateboard on the ground.",
            "moves": 50
        }
    }, {
        "type" : "vehicle_part",
        "id" : "skateboard_frame_2",
        "name": "skateboard frame",
        "symbol" : "o",
        "color" : "dark_gray",
        "broken_symbol" : "x",
        "broken_color" : "light_gray",
        "damage_modifier" : 50,
        "durability" : 70,
        "wheel_width" : 6,
        "item" : "wheel_caster",
        "difficulty" : 1,
        "location" : "structure",
        "flags" : ["WHEEL", "MOUNTABLE", "VARIABLE_SIZE", "FOLDABLE"]
    }, {
        "type" : "vehicle",
        "id" : "big_skateboard",
        "name" : "big skateboard",
        "parts" : [
            {"x": 0, "y": 0, "part": "skateboard_frame"},
            {"x": -1, "y": 0, "part": "skateboard_frame_2"},
            {"x": 1, "y": 0, "part": "skateboard_frame_2"}
        ]
    }, {
        "id": "skateboard",
        "type": "TOOL",
        "symbol": "0",
        "color": "light_gray",
        "name": "skateboard",
        "description": "This is a skateboard..",
        "price": 350000,
        "material": "aluminum",
        "weight": 907,
        "volume": 8,
        "bashing": 10,
        "cutting": 0,
        "to_hit": -5,
        "max_charges": 0,
        "initial_charges": 0,
        "charges_per_use": 0,
        "turns_per_charge": 0,
        "ammo": "NULL",
        "revert_to": "null",
        "use_action": {
            "type": "unfold_vehicle",
            "vehicle_name": "skateboard",
            "unfold_msg": "You place skateboard on the ground.",
            "moves": 50
        }
    }
]
`  
You need the debug menu to spawn it. The item is copied from the folding bicycle and the values (weight/valolume/…) are probably all wrong. As are the values for the skateboard\_frame. But it works nicely, safe/top speed: 8/23 mph.

Vehicles with more than one square require a valid wheel configuration, skateboard\_frame\_2 acts as wheels for this. See “big skateboard”, currently no item for it.

“Folding” a vehicle cost 500 move points (5 turns), regardless of the vehicle type.

This is just a simple sketch, someone else might add the recipes/items/values/… and make a PR. It is not very good as it is now. The big skateboard is more like a bicycle (and will probably always look like it). Also the cruise control can be set to multiples of 9 mph only, so the skateboard is either not moving at all or moving at 9 mph, or you have to manually speed up/down. 9 mph seems to be about twice as fast as a zombie.

Note that this puts many functions into one vehicle item: “CONTROLS” & “BOARDABLE” & “PEDALS” & “ENGINE” but this is purely for the internal mechanics.

Also: you don’t need a seat, the code only checks for a part with the “CONTROLS” flag.

“falling off your skateboard” would be a nice addition.

Pushing/kicking a shopping cart to make it move sounds awesome.