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Emberwork machines: hunt, gather, mine
Nine more emberwork parts turn warmth into work on the Grown, on what lies on the ground, and on the rock itself: a flame jet that breathes fire, a snare stone that grips, a lure lantern that calls, a belt that carries, a gleaner that picks things up, a sorter that knows what to let through, bellows for a furnace, a harvester for a field, and the blast charge, which digs a room in one breath. Wire them the way you wire a lamp: a lever, a plate, a heartbeat stone, a relay.
Machines wound, people slay
This is the one rule every machine keeps, so it is first.
- No machine takes a Grown below a tenth of its life. A flame jet, a blast charge, a spout's bolts, your Home's spikes and its ballistas: all of them stop there. A Grown held at that tenth is wounded: it bleeds (a drop of blood at its shoulder) and it is yours to finish.
- Only a person's blow kills it. The kill, the XP and the loot are whoever strikes it, by the usual rules: the loot is theirs to pick up first. A machine never pays anyone.
- In a raid on your Home, your Home's defences and machines kill its raiders as before. That is the only exception: a raider of a raid that is on, harmed by the spikes, ballistas or parts of the Home it raids. Any other Grown, and any raider outside its raid, is only wounded.
- Lava and fire are the world's, not a machine's, whoever poured or lit them: they burn as they always did, and a Grown that dies in them pays nobody.
- A ballista (and a spout's bolts) passes a wounded Grown by: it has nothing more to give it.
The parts
| Part | What it does | Use it | Made from |
|---|---|---|---|
| Flame jet | Points, like a relay. While warm, a flame 3 tiles long out of its front (it stops at a solid block). Grown in it lose 6% of their life a second, down to a tenth. It never sets anything alight. | (a Hammer turns it) | Stone, an iron bar, stone; dust, charcoal, dust; 3 stone |
| Snare stone | Set it in the floor. While warm, a Grown that steps on it is held for 3 seconds (it can still bite whoever is in reach). The same Grown at most once in 6 seconds; never a great one. | An iron bar, dust, an iron bar over 3 stone | |
| Lure lantern | While warm, the Grown within 16 tiles that no player is within 8 tiles of walk to it, 12 at most. Never raiders, great ones, a dungeon's Grown, an event's Grown, someone's quest target, or any on town ground. A warm lure glows and lights the cave like a lamp. | An iron bar over glass, a glowcap, glass over ember dust | |
| Belt | A floor that runs left or right. Unless warm it carries the drops and the Grown standing on it 3 tiles a second; warm, it stops. It never carries a player. | Turn it round | 3 iron bars over stone, dust, stone (makes 4) |
| Gleaner | A copper box. Unless warm, every half second it gathers the drops within 3 tiles that its owner could pick up, into a store like a chest's (27 kinds). | Open it | Copper bar, gap, copper bar; copper bar, dust, copper bar; 3 copper bars |
| Sorter | An item chute that passes only the kinds it was taught, up to 5. Warm, it stops. | Teach it what you hold; with an empty hand, make it forget | Dust, an item chute, dust |
| Bellows | Points at a furnace. While warm, its owner's own furnace there smelts twice as fast, and burns its fuel twice as fast. | (a Hammer turns it) | Plank, an iron bar, plank; plank, dust, plank; 3 planks |
| Harvester | Points. Each warm pulse it reaps the ripe crops in the 3 tiles in front of it, puts the harvest into the chest behind it, and plants a seed again in every furrow it emptied. | (a Hammer turns it) | 2 iron bars over dust, a stick over 2 stone |
| Blast charge | Warm it, or let fire or lava touch it: 2 seconds later it bursts and breaks what its owner could dig within 2½ tiles. A third of what it breaks drops for its owner; the rest is lost. | At the Anvil: 3 ember dust, 3 blast powder, an iron bar and 50 gold |
All nine are solid blocks. The jet, the sorter, the bellows and the harvester point away from you when you put them down (a belt runs away from you); a Hammer turns the ones that point. Hover any of them to read it: where it points, whether it is burning, holding, calling, running, what it holds or passes.
The flame jet
- The flame reaches up to 3 tiles in front, and stops at the first solid block, at land nobody is near, and at its ground's edge: a jet on open ground never breathes onto a Home's land, and one on a Home's land never breathes off it.
- It reads warmth at its back and both sides, never at its front.
- People: a jet burns players in its flame as fire does, by the rules of machines (below). On your land it burns anyone, you too; on open ground only you and your other characters. Hold a lever, not your breath.
- It never lights a block, a plank wall or a crop: it is only flame.
The snare stone
- It holds a Grown whose feet are on it while it is warm: pinned where it stands for 3 seconds, then let go. It can still bite whoever stands close; it just cannot walk.
- Each Grown is held at most once in 6 seconds, so a snare slows a crowd down rather than locking it in. Great ones step right over it. Grown that fly never touch it.
- Held, it is drawn with the iron jaws shut on its feet.
The lure lantern
- A lure calls only the Grown nobody is watching: none with a player within 8 tiles. Walk up to the crowd and it forgets the lure and turns on you, as Grown do.
- The ones it drew first stay drawn first; after that, the nearest. A lure draws 12 at most. It lets them all go the moment it cools, is broken, or nobody is near enough to see its land.
- Never raiders (they want your Home Stone), great ones, the Grown of a dungeon or of an event, someone's quest target, sleeping ones, ones already going for something of their own, or any standing on town ground.
- The Grown come right up to it and snap at it. That does it no harm.
The belt
- It carries what rests on it: a drop lying on it, a Grown standing on it (the tile under the middle of them), 3 tiles a second its way, until something solid is in the way.
- Never a player. It does not push you, and it does not count against you anywhere: stand on a belt as on any floor.
- Never a Grown onto a town's ground. A Grown on a belt that runs into a town stops at its edge (Grown keep out of towns, and nobody may be struck back there); a drop is carried on.
- A held Grown (a snare's) is not carried. A warm belt stops.
- Use it (right click, F, a tap) to turn it round: by those who may build there, as any setting.
The gleaner
- What it takes: the drops within 3 tiles on its own ground that its owner could pick up at that moment: nobody's, its owner's, their group's while they are online, and anyone's once its 15 seconds are over. Its owner's other characters count as its owner. Gold goes to its gold.
- What it never takes: a trade pack, anything with upgrades, power or wear on it, a quest's keepsakes, essence or a lost page (those are for a hand: your essence and your codex).
- Its window is a chest's: on a Home's land anyone who may build there opens it; on open ground only its owner (and their other characters).
- Item chutes, sorters and chest gauges treat it as a chest.
- Broken, what it held goes back to its owner, as a spout's does: into their bag if they are near, else by letter from the Warden House. Nothing is lost or doubled.
- Warm, it rests.
The sorter
- A sorter is an item chute (one thing every half second, from behind it to in front) that moves only what it was taught. The rest stays where it is.
- Teach it: use it with a thing in hand, and it passes that kind too (5 kinds at most). Use it with an empty hand and it forgets everything. Only those who may build where it stands can teach it.
- It holds nothing of its own, and works for its owner exactly as a chute does: between things its owner may open, a furnace only while they are online.
- Warm, it stops.
The bellows
- Furnaces are each player's own, so bellows blow only on their owner's own furnace, and only while the owner is online.
- Twice as fast, twice the fuel: a furnace that would smelt a bar in 4 seconds smelts it in 2, and its charcoal is gone in half the time. A furnace with nothing in it burns nothing.
The harvester
- Each warm pulse (a lever pulled, a heartbeat stone's beat, a relay's pulse) reaps the ripe crops in the 3 tiles in front of it, on ground its owner may build on. An unripe crop is left to grow.
- From each crop: 2 to 4 of what it grows and 1 or 2 seeds. One seed goes straight back into the furrow (a fresh crop of its owner's); the rest goes into the container behind the harvester (a chest, a spout or a gleaner its owner may open). With no room, or nothing behind it, the harvest drops where the crop stood, for its owner to pick up first.
- A harvester never reaps a crop on ground its owner may not build on.
The blast charge
- Lighting it: warmth (a pulse, a lever, a plate...), or fire or lava touching it (set beside it, or it set beside them), or another charge's burst. Its fuse burns 2 seconds. A lit fuse is not kept through a restart.
- What it breaks: every tile within 2½ tiles that its owner could dig there with their best pickaxe: the very checks a pickaxe makes. Never in a town, never in a dungeon, never on ground its owner may not build on (someone else's Home, an old plot); never ore their pickaxe is not good enough for; never bedrock or anything else that cannot be dug.
- What it never breaks: chests and every other container, stations, doors and gates, the Home Stone, its defences, beds and holders, crops and soil, emberwork parts (another charge in reach is lit instead), and land nobody is near (it is never even looked at).
- What drops: a third of the tiles it breaks, chosen at random, drop for its owner; the rest is lost. (A tile whose drop would fall into land nobody is near is one of the lost ones.)
- Who it hurts: Grown within 3 tiles lose 40% of their life (never below a tenth: see above) and are thrown back; players within 3 tiles lose 40% of theirs, by the rules of machines.
- At most two bursts a second in the whole world. Many charges at once go off one after another, half a second apart.
- Its owner's pickaxe: the best pickaxe in its owner's bag when they put it down (and when it bursts, if they are online).
The rules of machines for players
The flame jet and the blast charge hurt players by the rules every machine keeps (a ram's push, a spout's lava, a drop-floor):
- What counts is where you stand: the ground under your feet must be the machine's own ground. A machine never harms anyone across the rim of a Home's land, either way: a charge on its last column does not reach the open ground beside it, and one just outside does not reach onto it.
- On a Home's land, a machine of that land harms anyone on it: strangers, guests, its owner. A guest who falls on someone else's land loses nothing.
- On open ground, a machine on open ground harms only its owner's account. It never hurts another player there.
- They never harm someone at peace, or anyone in a town or standing on a town's ground (deep under it too).
Limits
- Every part counts against the emberwork limits (400 on a Home's land, 150 of yours on open ground), and fades on open ground after 2 hours like any build.
- A machine far from everyone sleeps: a lure calls nobody, a gleaner gathers nothing, a belt carries nothing, until someone comes near.
- A harvester's tiles and a burst's count against the world's tiles a signal tick, as a ram's do.
- Raiders never break these parts.
A few machines
A Grown funnel
A lure lantern at the far end of a corridor of stone. Along the corridor floor, belts all running toward the lure; near the end, a snare stone in the floor, and two flame jets in the walls pointing into the last three tiles. Wire the lure and the jets to one lever by your door. Pull it and walk off a little way (the lure calls only the Grown nobody is near, but it sleeps if nobody is near enough to see its land): the Grown come down the corridor, the belts hurry them on, the snare holds them in the flames, and the jets bring them down to a tenth. Come back, pull the lever off (the jets cool), and finish them yourself: every kill, every bit of XP and loot is yours.
(Put a gleaner beside the end of it, and what they drop when you finish them comes to you there.)
A smelter that runs itself
A chest of ore with an item chute pointing down into your furnace; a gleaner by the door of your mine, and a sorter taught iron ore and copper ore from the gleaner into the chest of ore, so only ore goes to the furnace and the rest stays in the gleaner. A chest of charcoal with a chute into the furnace's side, a chute under it into a chest for the bars, and bellows pointing at the furnace, wired to a lever: on, it smelts twice as fast while you are online.
A field that harvests itself
A row of soil with wheat on it, a harvester at the end of each row of three, pointing along it, and a chest behind each harvester. A heartbeat stone set to 10 seconds, wired to all of them: every beat reaps whatever is ripe, drops the wheat in the chests and plants the field again.
A wide shaft
Dig a narrow shaft straight down, one tile wide. Climbing back up it, put a blast charge against its wall every two tiles, and a lever beside the top one. Pull the lever and stand well back: each burst lights the next one below it, half a second apart, and the narrow shaft becomes one five tiles wide, a third of the stone dropping for you to the bottom. Ore your pickaxe is not good enough for, and anything that cannot be dug, stays where it is.