A question about dye-ing objects

[miirkaelisaar]

I was just wondering if there are any restrictions on dye-ing products as per custom descriptions? Like, as long as my character actually owns the items used for dying, and I roleplay the process of creating dye, I can do that for anything, right? Like, if I want a classic cobalt-blue bottle, is it okay to roleplay crushing some cobalt into powder and mixing it with alumina and pretending to put them in a kiln to heat them up and create cobalt dye powder, and pretend to use it when I make a glass bottle so it turns blue? I did something like this with different materials for a character who was dye-ing yarn for a sweater, but I just wanna make sure I'm following all the rules here, I know that like, you can't include a material that isn't really added to an object, like a golden hawk on top of your walking stick, but is it different if it's only a trace of something used as a dye-ing (or painting) material? Given that you actually have the materials and roleplay the process?

EDIT: You can't describe a bottle, sorry, but I mean, a glass necklace or something, you know?

[kicking jay]

I'm pretty sure it is. Also, relax. It's just spelled dyeing.

[miirkaelisaar]

But I hate that, it looks weird when there's an "e" right before an "ing", I'm freaking out! LOL

[NancyLee]

You can describe a bottle with a paper label. And I can't see why the glass couldn't be coloured by rping the use of certain resources.

- It's not permitted to set descriptions which are inconsistent with the object name.
- Descriptions are usually single-language only, so it should be possible to roleplay without fully understanding them.
- It's not permitted to set descriptions which make the object more similar to an object of another type than the described object is (for example, a cotton shirt cannot be long sleeved, because we have the object long sleeved cotton shirt. However long sleeved cotton shirt can "lose" sleeves when they are affected by significant roleplay matters [ragged during the battle]).
- Object descriptions shouldn't mention additional materials which are not used for manufacturing the object (for example bone earrings can't have anything about gold or iron in their description).
- Object descriptions shouldn't be changed dramatically (length of bone spear shouldn't change from 3' to 6'), but even significant changes are allowed if they are correctly roleplayed (blue coat can become red coat if you RP the dyeing process). Generally "ragged" object descriptions shouldn't become "brand new" in the description.
- Descriptions, like character descriptions, should describe only objective characteristics of the item. No implying other people's actions. (Bad description example: "These earrings are so nice that you constantly look at them."). It also is not permitted to describe actions done with the object (especially when it's not a piece of clothing). Bad description example: "This sword is always in the hands of its bearer." It would look strange when lying on the ground. It'd also be strange then being in the inventory of a character who doesn't have hands. Such detailed descriptions should be mentioned in the character description. One exception are clothes: you can assume clothes are worn the normal way. For example, you can assume gloves are worn on hands.
- It should be easy to distinguish objective descriptions with text written on an object's label. For example, the description "red bottle" is ambiguous. "*red bottle*", "*a big bottle with label*", "red bottle", or "big bottle with label: 'red bottle' " are correct.

[SekoETC]

viewtopic.php?f=91&t=25704&start=15

Cloth dyes were rejected because custom descriptions cover this, so apparently there are no plans to ever implement dyes as a hardcoded mechanic. I think it's allowed to describe clothing to be of any color, but if you decide to change the color later on then a dyeing process needs to be described. I think it should also be forbidden to describe something to be colored golden or silvery if no gold or silver is used in the manufacturing process, so yellow and gray should be used instead. Personally I would only use colors found in nature or that can be found in resources available (iron ore for reddish hues, lavender/cobalt for blue, grass for green, onions for yellow etc) but I've seen people use colors like royal blue I have no idea how to make without a chemistry set.

[NostalgicMelody7]

I feel like, as long as you actually understand the process involved with making hued objects, and you actually roleplay doing it, then it shouldn't be an issue. I know absolutely nothing about glassblowing, but what you're saying with mixing the cobalt in sounds legit enough. As long as you're not like... Trying to dye glass with ground up flower petals. That just doesn't work LOL (Unless it does... Again, what is glassblowing? Because I dunno.)

[kicking jay]

I feel like, as long as you actually understand the process involved with making hued objects, and you actually roleplay doing it, then it shouldn't be an issue. I know absolutely nothing about glassblowing, but what you're saying with mixing the cobalt in sounds legit enough. As long as you're not like... Trying to dye glass with ground up flower petals. That just doesn't work LOL (Unless it does... Again, what is glassblowing? Because I dunno.)

lmgtfy?

Actually, it's a really interesting process that I wish was better represented in Cantr. Fundamentally, you take glass, either already dyed or not yet, heat it way up until it's a blob in the back of your furnace, then pull some out on a pole. You spin and blow, so that both centripatel force and the bubble you're forming pushes it out and holds it there. As it cools, you can either reheat it for further blowing, dye it by rolling it in pellets of dyed glass or powered dye, or allow it to completely cool. Normally, using tongs, another pole, and a bit of molten glass as a glue, basically, it'll be transfered to another pole upside down so that the open rim, where it was affixed to the first pole, can be edged with a strip of semi-molten glass so it's smooth and good looking. After it's mostly cool, it'll be carefully cut off of whatever pole it's currently on and allowed to fully harden. TMYK!

[miirkaelisaar]

^^^That =) I think flower petal type things would more likely be molded glass objects maybe. But yeah I read up on the ancient processes of making cobalt dyes so I could see if it's possible in game, and I think that's how it'd work, it said cobalt oxide is mixed with aluminium oxide and heated to 1200 degrees or something, and a kiln can get up to 1200 sometimes, so I thought that could work. I even thought, if I have cobalt coins I can "reclaim them" to roleplay the crushing process, instead of just pretending to crush some cobalt. I do like to use game mechanics to support my roleplay and vice-versa as often as I can.

And I forgot about labels, isn't there a list of objects labels are used for? Is that in the game changes announcement thread? I forget..

[kicking jay]

Cobalt oxide, huh... This is just armchair theorizing, but it sounds like cobalt metals should be crushed and heated - same with aluminum, although it oxidizes easily enough that it may not need to be heated. Shucks, why not just use alumina? Same thing (i'm guessing).

[miirkaelisaar]

Yeah exactly, and that's why I decided I should use alumina instead of aluminium. Alumina is just the common term for aluminum oxide. The cobalt you can crush or pretend to crush and heat, because that's the closest you can get to cobalt oxide - in real life cobalt oxide is made from cobalt ore and the cobalt oxide is refined with aluminium to make the metal itself, whereas in Cantr you just dig cobalt right out of the ground. And then alumina you can just make like normal in the alumina refiner and then pretend to mix it with the cobalt powder and heat it to an extreme degree in a kiln. Also cobalt makes different colored pigments depending on what you mix it with and how you process it, I think green cobalt is cobalt oxide and zinc oxide, so that might be possible in game too. There's cobalt violet and cobalt yellow and some others but not possible because we can't make things like sodium phosphates or potassium nitrate. But I make sure to research "ancient methods" of whatever dye I want to make or whatever, because it's easier to determine how possible it is in cantr, seeing as it's more primitive but still has limited chemistry capabilities.

EDIT: Also you might find it interesting, I read somewhere something about cows being fed mango leaves so their urine could be reserved and refined into a dye... I forget what color, but, there's that interesting tidbit =P

[Doug R.]

Did anyone else notice that in the official "red bottle" example, the supposedly incorrect label is used as a correct example?

[miirkaelisaar]

Did anyone else notice that in the official "red bottle" example, the supposedly incorrect label is used as a correct example?

I noticed but I thought maybe I was just reading it wrong somehow and confusing myself so I didn't mention it =P

[*Wiro]

I interpreted it as:

Red bottle

Is ambiguous - is it two words that spell out red bottle, or is it an actual red bottle? Whereas:

"Red bottle"

Is not ambiguous. It is clearly a label that spells out those two words.



Because the wrong example is in quotation marks in the official guide, it does look confusing.

[miirkaelisaar]

But why does *Red Bottle* have to be in quotes too? It has asterisks, isn't that redundant? And looks atrocious. Also, do labels show, or are they just to add a description, and if you want the label to be a real label you add it to the description? Or does it show the label by default and then what you put on the label? I have yet to understand at all how labels work, even after reading all the forum topics I could find relating to it, it is just way confusing to me and I'm afraid to waste rice and stuff to test it myself, none of my characters have a lot of rice to spare.

Also why can't we make paper from something other than rice already? Really? Wood, reed (papyrus!), hemp paper??? why do we only have rice paper? It's just weird and makes paper so rare when, why should paper be rare? We already have notes that just appear out of thin air, why can't we make paper from different materials? We can make fueled vehicles and radios but we can't make wood or hemp paper? Or parchment from hides? =P

[*Wiro]

*Red bottle* doesn't have to be in quotes. It's just poorly-written I think. They put quotation marks there because it is an example, but they do so inconsistently so it's confusing..