User:TheSatanicSanta/Mystcraft Wiki import/Mystcraft Wiki:Grammar

Ages in Mystcraft are written with Symbols that are then expanded according to a Grammar. The symbols that you write are considered to be an incomplete description of an age; they are converted into a complete sentence that fully describes the age by the grammar.

In order to understand how the grammar works, you need to understand modifiers. A simple approximation is to think of "adjectives" and "nouns" in English. Some symbols in Mystcraft are considered modifiers, and must be placed before the symbols that they modify.

Most modifiers will modify similar modifiers that come before them; for example, "South Direction" followed by "West Direction" will turn into "South West Direction".

With very few exceptions, there can only be one modifier of a given type active at a time. For example, there is only one direction on the stack at a time; there is only one duration on the stack at a time. The biggest exception is biomes; there can be any number of biomes on the stack at a time, and several biome controllers will consume all of the biomes on the stack. The next most common exception are blocks; describing a world, for example takes two blocks.

The grammars parsing of your symbols is stacked-based. This means, that if you were to do (this is considered bad writing, do not follow this example) "stone block, gold block, tendrils, island world", then the tendrils symbol would take the gold block, and the island world would take the stone block.

Basics of an age
Each of these occurs exactly once in a completed age.

Required decorations of an age
Each of these will occur at least once, however, "dark" versions exist that are not drawn. As long as one of each is provided, no random ones will occur.

Optional decorations of an age
Because there is no dark feature in this category, there is always a random chance that this will be added.

Large, Medium, and Small Features
A minimum of one each is needed in each age. "Lacking Large Features" will not cause any instability, and will prevent a random large feature from being selected. The medium and small versions, however, will increase instability.

.. List of features ..

.. Exact sizing is not yet known for most of them ..

Specials
Most of these are similar to the instabilities of the same name. However, they will continue to occur even if instabilities are turned off.

Modifier behavior
All of these blend by averaging.

Directions, Duration, and Phase all behave similarly. Blending opposites (for example, North and South, or rising and setting) will generate the middle point, but which of the two middles will depend on the order of the two symbols, and the type.

Directions
List of Directions

Duration
List of Durations

Lack of any duration longer than two-times.

Phase
List of Phases

Color
Colors are blended on a strict RGB model.

List of Colors

Biomes
Used by both Biome Distributions and Floating Islands.