This file will try to sum up the ideas about SKILLS and COMMANDS
for the Musicians' Guild. (with reservations of typos)
=======SKILLS========= Cur/Max
theory................ 0/ 50
| morporkian.......... 0/ 50
| djelian............. 0/ 50
| klatchian........... 0/ 50
| lancrean............ 0/ 50
| common.............. 0/300
instruments........... 0/ 50
| percussives......... 0/ 50
| | drums............. 0/300
| | rocks............. 0/ 50
| | other............. 0/ 50
| wind................ 0/ 50
| | flutes............ 0/300
| | horns............. 0/300
| | other............. 0/ 50
| stringed............ 0/ 50
| | guitars........... 0/300
| | violins........... 0/300
| | other............. 0/ 50
| keyboards........... 0/ 50
| | pianos............ 0/300
| | other............. 0/ 50
| vocals.............. 0/300
special............... 0/300
showmanship........... 0/300
points................ 0/300
The primaries are the ones with "0/300", the non primary "0/50".
"Theory" is for understanding music of other nationalities.
If you are proficient in the "djelian" skill, you could play
a song from Djel better than a person who has put all his efforts
into the "klatchian" skill. "common" represents the rules that all
musical styles have in common, so, if you have lots of that skill,
you get a bonus when playing any kind of music.
Shouldn't common come before the others?
These skills influence points, and it helps you being able to
play/compose harder songs, because you understand them more.
The skill would also determine the complexity of the songs, if you
choose to mae it an easy, medium or hard song, etc.)
They can also influence your chances of getting your songs on
jukeboxes (more on this laters).
"Special" is how many songs you can have in memory.
"Showmanship" is charisma, how you perform on stage.
It's still uncertain how this skill will work.
"Points" defines how long a player can play without getting tired,
or lose concentration. Magic instruments (more on this later) would
use them ofourse, and when training your skills in classrooms.
COMMANDS
These commands should be available in one way or another:
remember (song) - learns a song scribed down.
evaluate (instrument)
scribe (song) - scribe down the song and arrangement on paper.
play (song)
stat (song) - gives the statistics of a song.
sing
forget (song)
compose (song) - see COMPOSING
tune (instrument)
repair (instrument)
try (instrument) - instruments with tuning knobs goes out of tune
after a certain number of use, and time passed.
songs - lists the songs memorized.
Each instrument has random variable attached so that they may suit
a certain musician more than another. Obviously more expensive
(and better crafted) instruments would have a nicer sound, and
therefor would be more likely to be suited to every musician than
cheaper ones.
The effect I'm trying to get is that some musicians play better on a
certain type of instrument, and, in fact, on certain individual
instruments... one particular violin suits one particular violinist more
than any others. This would lead to a try before you buy type situation,
where a musician would have to try all three violins in a shop to find out
which suits them the most.
"stat" will show the following information on a song:
*Song: (the name the song will be refered to, like set_name() )
*Title:
*Song description (ie: fast and happy)
*Complexity (depends on your skill in theory, ie: easy)
*Instruments: The instruments the song can be played with.
If the song isnt in your style, you can re-compose it and setting
these things they way you want it. See COMPOSING on this.
ADVANCING SKILLS
Musicians mostly advance with TM's. Both songs, instruments and vocals
have a difficulty. The more difficulty(complexity) compared to your
skills, the greater chance for TM's but it will sound pretty bad
when performing, and vice verca.
Then we can have teachers and classes too. A more advanced way is this:
A realistic way would be that the guild would have instructors in the
various primaries, and would teach them at a high(ish) price.
First you would pay for a certain amount of teaching time for
a certain skill, then you would enter a sort of "learning" mode where
you have a high chance of getting a taskmaster advance in the certain
skill, higher than discovering something on your own.
Other suggestions on skills are :
conducting
choir
orchestra