New to the forums and currently trying to figure out how to implement an element of chance to choices in a story I'm starting to contribute to. Is this still something being worked on? The randomization/dice rolls would be an absolute life saver for implementing stuff.
Basically yes. Though there are some other things to implement and I don't know how much free time Friedman has to work on CHYOA. As a workaround... if there are no further calculations necessary, you could ask the reader to roll a dice and then choose the respective chapter. (E.g. "1-3", "4-5", "6")
I know I might be super late to this thread, but in my defense I did not know what is chyoa back when this thread started. I just have one question. Aren't immersion variables essentially an input field for string. I know you can use immersion variables as part of a game variable but you could just restrict the use of " and use "" as a way to represent strings.
I'm just spitballing here, but perhaps two game modes would work. Keep the current "Light" version but add a "Game Mode Enhanced" version. That way authors who are happy with the current game mode can keep doing their thing and those that have programming (I almost want to say Microsoft Excel) expertise can opt for the enhanced version.
It sounds like you can just ignore the Function or Formula options, and stick with what's currently available. Much like how in Excel, you can simply input data; you don't need to know a single thing about Excel formulas or functions. That is, unless I've misunderstood something.
I'm not saying that there needs to be any physical barrier between the two, but it seems there are authors who are intimidated by these more... mathematical options. I feel that there's a rift between writers who want to make a story and (for want of a better word) programmers who want to make a game or a visual novel (I'm actually keen to see what the almost Dungeon Master level of... You know what? Imagine giving someone access to the kitchen of a five-star restaurant: Knives, pasta makers, Kitchen Aids, the whole shebang. Now imagine giving someone access to a campfire and a Cooks Knife. Some people are going to thrive in the first instance and fail in the second, and others are going to thrive in the second instance and fail in the first. I don't think that it's necessarily bad to have these fancy formulae in CHYOA, but I understand that a lot of authors will be daunted by it. And the limitations of the current Game Mode have created some memorable scenarios. I just think it would be a helpful filter to be able to say "This story has crazy multi-dimensional Game Mode data that your input factors into" (and that authors have access to, because I know that some are jonesing for random number generators), or just "There are boolean, numerical, and percentage inputs that factor into this story." It makes sense in a search criteria format, it makes sense in an author format... I just think a second "Game Mode" option would encourage programmer-minded authors to make more stories while not discouraging authors who are more comfortable with the way things are now.
Yes, but immersion variables are set on a per story basis and available everywhere. The reader would need an input field within the chapter to type in a string variable. So the only use would be to precalculate strings to use them in the chapter. Not sure about that. That's similar to using text templates. (I think there is a suggestion about that somewhere.) Well, in my implementation, the formula is just another option "Σ" beside +, -, and =. Instead of entering a value, there is an input field. (I think it adjusts the size if the formula is longer.)
Again, you can simply not select the 'intimidating' options. Nothing from the original Game Mode is being removed. Really, it's already about as separate as you can get without banishing the new features into obscurity. To make for a more fitting metaphor, imagine the campfire is in the fancy kitchen. You can just use the fire and knife if you want. Nothing's stopping you. The presence of other, more advanced tools doesn't affect your ability to stick with what you know.
I think I like that idea. I'm pretty sure someone who would be intimidated by the formula options would steer clear of that one, unless they were Greek and wanted to know what "S" was...
gene.sis, are there any plans to make variables visible throughout the chapters for editors? For example, at the moment, if I declare a set of variables in chapter 1, then edit chapter 20 I would either have to have a notepad with all the variable names or constantly check chapter 1.
There are no plans for that. I think there are some similar suggestions on the Suggestions subforum. The problem is that you can't really say what variables have been used before due to possible loops. There might also be a lot of variables. Hm... maybe there could be type away in the input field with all variables that have ever been used in the story. (Not sure how that would work with draft chapters.)
It could be a good thing to just have a sort of notepad inbuilt into the right of the edit UI, like with customisable name variables -- maybe a system where it's a bunch of variable names as dropdown menus, which can be expanded to show a description of the variable and what its various states mean. The variable names and descriptions would all have to be user-inputted of course, but I actually think that's better than just including every variable, because it means you don't have to scrounge around with all of the once-off variables that aren't important (like "don't let them choose this option twice" variables). Plus, this way you could have it set up and organised in the way best suited to you -- the dropdown menus could feasibly give any variable information an author wanted to type. These notes could even be used for stuff like character bios and story documents aside from Game Mode stuff, and could be really really useful in this way for collaborative stories as well as personally-run ones (maybe only story owners can edit/approve additions to the notes thingy, just so no public stories get it all deleted).
Hey, first of all this sounds great. Ideas: 1. An option for inaccessible chapters to be invisible, rather than just greyed out. 2. An option for chapters to link to different chapters depending on the current variables. Both of that would more or less achieve the same thing, I'm currently working on a relatively complex story, and a feature like those would certainly simplify the whole thing. Also, given that this thread was started in 2016, I was wondering if the formula parser will ever get implemented, or if it already is and I’m just too stupid to activate it…
That's actually possible already. It's a story option for Game Mode stories. (Only the story owner can change that option.) If "Show inaccessible chapters" is activated, those chapters are grayed out. If it's deactivated, they are invisible. That's possible as well. You create several Linking Chapters with respective Conditions, so each Linking Chapter will only be accessible if the reader's Score meets the conditions. And if the Linking Chapter have different Destination Chapters, the reader will be taken to different chapters depending on their Score. (It probably works best with "Show inaccessible chapters" deactivated as it would only show the options where the conditions are met. So if you have 5 options with the same name but mutually exclusive Conditions, it would only show the option once.) It is not implemented but still planned. But before that's done, the site needs to be restructured to make it less resource-intensive.
