This page will hold detailed descriptions of how a lot of things in QubeKwest work. Some of these things may end up too big to stay here and if that happens I will move them to their own pages and provide links from here. Originally this page compared QubeKwest things to Minecraft things but I’ve decided that a lot of those comparisons aren’t especially useful and I’ve thus changed the purpose of this page. To save some typing as I go, I will abbreviate QubeKwest as QK.
Geographical
- World geography in QK works in a 3-tier addressing system.
- At the top level are clusters. Each of these holds an 8x8x8 collection of chunks.
- The next level down are chunks. Each of these holds a 16x16x16 collection of blocks.
- The bottom level is blocks. These describe what everything in the world is.
- 1 block equals 1 cubic meter. (Though they may not end up completely full for a number of different reasons.)
- A world in QK has block positions that range from -274,877,906,944 to +274,877,906,816 blocks along all 3 axes (X, Y, and Z).
- Travel along all 3 axes is possible by walking, digging, or climbing.
- North faces -Z. South faces +Z.
- East faces +X. West faces -X.
- Up faces +Y. Down faces -Y.
- World address space uses blocks within chunks within clusters.
- Cluster addresses range from -2,147,483,648 to 2,147,483,647 along all 3 axes.
- Chunk addresses range from 0 to 7 along all 3 axes, within a cluster.
- Block addresses range from 0 to 15 along all 3 axes, within a chunk.
- There will be additional considerations such as biomes or other types of features like castles or trees, but they are not part of the world address space. An example would be that you could be standing on block 7, 4, 10 of chunk 3, 6, 5 of cluster -12, 2, -73.
- The core reason for this arrangement was the desire for logical structures with different needs.
- Blocks can be used for high speed network updates because they are small and individually addressable. This makes them great for block updates, which are what happens when you are standing in the world next to someone else that is building something.
- Chunks can be used for bulk network transmissions that are small enough to be fast or to be batched together, but large enough to be useful individually.
- Clusters are designed for long term world storage. They represent a single file on the disc of the server. Since each cluster holds 512 chunks, the number of files needed is considerably less than if I were storing smaller pieces of geography separately.
- Sea level is at 0 on the Y axis. This represents the height that would typically have oceans.
- In very deep ocean trenches, water will begin to crush you without a pressure suit at around -10,000 on the Y axis.
- Below the surface you will find increasing amounts of lava as you go down. Aside from random pockets of lava, the depth related lava starts appearing at around -25,000 on the Y axis. At around -50,000 on the Y axis there will be literally nothing except lava.
- The atmosphere will have clouds at various heights, typically they can be found between 500 and 5000 on the Y axis.
- Above the surface the air will get thinner as you go up. At around 10,000 on the Y axis you will begin to suffocate without breathing help. At around 50,000 on the Y axis you will begin to die without a pressure suit.
Chronological
- A game day in QK is 60 real minutes long and is divided into 4 parts.
- Day is 40 minutes long. (Few or no monsters, generally safe.)
- Dusk is 4 minutes long. (Monsters start appearing, relatively unsafe.)
- Night is 12 minutes long. (Many monsters, generally dangerous.)
- Dawn is 4 minutes long. (Monsters start disappearing, relatively unsafe.)
- The sun moves through the sky at an even pace for 48 minutes (dawn, day, and dusk combined). The sun’s location under the world is accelerated at night due to the shorter portion of the day that is the night.
- The moon moves through the sky during the night and much more slowly due to the longer portion of the day that has the sun up.
- A year in QK consists of 4 seasons of 4 months each.
- All 16 months are exactly 16 days long.
- There are 12 lunar phases. These follow the same schedule for every month of the year.
- Each month starts with a new moon for 1 day.
- The moon then waxes through phases one per night until the seventh day of the month which has a full moon.
- The full moon lasts a total of 3 nights.
- After the full moon, it then wanes through phases back to a new moon again at one phase per night.
- The last 2 nights of each month have a new moon.
- Unlike the moon as we know it here on Earth, the QK moon phases advance left to right instead of right to left, for no reason at all.
- In QK, the calendar is shown as a date in the form: YYYY-MM-DD
- All parts of the date are zero based.
- The first day of the epoch is 0000-00-00.
- Time in QK is shown in the form: HH:MM
- The clock is a 24 hour clock with 60 minutes per hour. There are no seconds.
- The first time of the day is 00:00.
- There are no AM or PM like markers for the day.
- Individual ranges on the date and time are as follows:
- YYYY (year) range is 0000 to ∞.
- MM (month) range is 00 to 15.
- DD (day) range is 00 to 15.
- HH (hour) range is 00 to 23.
- MM (minute) range is 00 to 59.
- All fields will take up at least as many characters as shown above (zero padded if required). While I predict this will never occur, years will add extra characters if required.
- Here is a list of game time frames in real time:
- Minute: 2.5 seconds
- Hour: 2 minutes, 30 seconds
- Day: 1 hour
- Month: 16 hours
- Season: 2 days, 16 hours
- Year: 10 days, 16 hours
- 0000-00-00 00:00 through 9999-15-15 23:59: 292 years, 86 days, 16 hours
Kwest Realms
- Quests take place in player constructed Kwest Realms.
- Kwest Realms are instanced worlds connected to the main world through portals.
- Being instanced allows them to be repeatable even if partially destroying them is required to complete the quest.
- Instancing also allows them to be played multiple times simultaneously without them interfering with each other.
- Unlike the main world (which goes on effectively forever), the Kwest Realms are a fixed size.
- Kwest Realms work as follows:
- Size depends on the number of Kwest Points that were spent to create it.
- Measured in clusters, and can range from exactly 1 cluster all the way up to a 16x16x16 clusters.
- They can have any number of quests in them, but only one “End Quest.”
- End Quests signify that the Kwest Realm has been beaten or solved and should end (the turn in of the end quest occurs automatically and does not require an NPC).
- NPCs can be purchased and set up as story tellers or as the beginning or end of quests in a Kwest Realm.
- The portal that leads to each Kwest Realm is at a fixed point in the normal world.
- Entering it always takes you into the same Kwest Realm and usually to the beginning.
- Exiting the realm from either the beginning, or by completing the “End Quest” puts you back in the normal world near the linked portal.
- It is possible for a player to “quit” a Kwest Realm at any time without finishing it.
- To discourage this behavior:
- Players will put in their home instead of near the entrance portal.
- They will not be allowed to return to the same instance of the Kwest Realm that they quit.
- They will not be allowed to return to the same Kwest Realm (a new instance) for 4 hours.
- To discourage this behavior:
- Instanced Kwest Realms last indefinitely while there are still active players within them.
- Once the End Quest is completed the instance will automatically expire in 1 hour.
- If you are still in a Kwest Realm when it expires you will be moved to its portal in the normal world when the 1 hour expiration arrives.
- If an instance is not beaten, but has no players inside, it will expire automatically in 1 hour.
- When constructing Kwest Realms, Kwest Points can be spent for:
- NPCs (There are no NPCs by default.)
- Additional quests. (The “End Quest” is free and provided when the Kwest Realm is created.)
- Kwest Points are earned in the normal world by:
- Doing normal things such as digging, building and crafting.
- Killing monsters in combat. (Other things are earned by killing monsters inside Kwest Realms, and thus do not provide Kwest Points.)
- When setting up a Kwest Realm there are several things you can configure.
- You can select whether or not the Kwest Realm can be altered by allowing no changes, adding blocks, destroying blocks, or adding and destroying blocks.
- You can choose what time it is in the Kwest realm. It can be a fixed time or time can run normally from a set starting time.
- You can choose what season it is in the Kwest Realm.
- You can decide how player inventory is handled. It can be allowed in from the outside, it can be allowed to leave with the player upon completion, or it can be fully isolated to the Kwest Realm.