From: darshan
Date: 2002-01-09 21:41:02
A draft for a modular building system and the related skills
Building construction has two parts: designing what to build, and building it. The main skill is architecture.
The Architecture skill produces an abstract item I'll call a module blueprint (MB). The skill takes, as parameters, the module type (plus possible parameters relating to a specific kind of module)[1] and the desired material(s).
There will be a player command I'll call construct. (n.b: it's not a skill!) It takes three parameters - an MB, a supply of materials matching the MB's specification and a location in which to construct the module. But this isn't enough; you actually need to know how to work with the specified material. This means that if the MB says "wood", you need to know a carpentry skill, and if it says "stone" you'd better have done your masonry homework. The construct command will make these checks and behave according to your proficiency.
All this means that if you're a trained carpenter, you can make a wall out of wood; if you're a stoneworker, you can make a wall out of stone - if someone gives you the design for it. As far as skills and knowledge goes, there's no distinction between a furniture maker and a house builder. Wood is wood. =)
The idea behind splitting building into architecture and building is that construction jobs can be assigned to a large workforce: a single master builder can design the modules and deal out the MB's to carpenters and masons who then do the building.
[1]
A hilosyph wall module might require as parameters the radius of the wall, the length of the arc, the height of the ceiling apex etc etc. A chrein stone wall (ruler-straight with a profile that tapers upward like a cone) would take the width and height of the module plus the thickness of the wall at the top and bottom.