17

Quick question.. It never has made sense to me before, but figured I'd ask it out of curiosity to see if anybody knows the answer.

Why does being born on the last day of Mayan make your character 17, not 18?

If there is no plausible answer, then the best bullshit answer wins :)

Comments

  • Because its the end of the year pretty much and gotta wait another year for it to actually hit 18?
  • Aedin said:
    Because its the end of the year pretty much and gotta wait another year for it to actually hit 18?
    But IRL if I'm born on December 31st, and have to wait until the next one for my birthday, it doesnt make me -1!
  • So far, I'm winning. Take that, @Sarapis
  • JonathinJonathin Retired in a hole.
    I was so confused when I saw 17 as a post title with Sarapis' name next to it on the main page.
    I am retired and log into the forums maybe once every 2 months. It was a good 20 years, live your best lives, friends.
  • Now Sarapis is doing like this. 


  • As I'm sure you're aware, the crew that runs child abduction to pass them through the flame to become adventurers have a quota.

    Unfortunately, centuries ago, the escalator that was carrying the batch of Mayan 25th children got frozen. Trapped on the now-stairs, the children had no idea what to do, and some say they're still there trapped to this day.

    But! Quotas are quotas, so the crew had to pull the children from the next year to take their place. Obviously, since they're from the next year the end up passing through the flame a year early than the children slotted for every other day of the year.
    image
    Cascades of quicksilver light streak across the firmament as the celestial voice of Ourania intones, "Oh Jarrod..."

  • Sarapis said:
    @zuko Our math works differently than real-world math. It's the addition of humgii. Changes everything.
    Confirmed: In-game dates coded as humgii.
  • TectonTecton The Garden of the Gods
    Keep this thread on the down-low, if the Humginati (or is that Illumigii?) hear about it, we're all doomed.
  • Jonathin said:
    I was so confused when I saw 17 as a post title with Sarapis' name next to it on the main page.
    I thought someone was trolling me actually, as 17 is my favorite number and Sarapis has made no secret of the fact that said number underlies much of Creation.
  • One possibility I've considered is that birthdays might not be assigned right when a character is created, but only at the next "date tick", i.e. the following in-game midnight. So a new character wouldn't have a birthday initially, but at the first midnight after his creation, the birthday would be set to (current day - 1) and (current year - 18).

    So let's say you have a character created on the 25th of Mayan 518. On the next midnight (date is now 1st of Sarapin 519), a tick happens and sets this character's birth day to 25th Mayan in the year 519-18=501. Thus, this character won't turn 18 until the 25th of Mayan 519.

    Another character is created on the 24th of Mayan 518. On the next midnight, the characters birth day is set to the 24th Mayan in the year 518-18=500. Thus, the character is already 18 years old.

    But this is probably all wrong and it's just about humgii math after all.
  • Iocun said:
    One possibility I've considered is that birthdays might not be assigned right when a character is created, but only at the next "date tick", i.e. the following in-game midnight. So a new character wouldn't have a birthday initially, but at the first midnight after his creation, the birthday would be set to (current day - 1) and (current year - 18).

    So let's say you have a character created on the 25th of Mayan 518. On the next midnight (date is now 1st of Sarapin 519), a tick happens and sets this character's birth day to 25th Mayan in the year 519-18=501. Thus, this character won't turn 18 until the 25th of Mayan 519.

    Another character is created on the 24th of Mayan 518. On the next midnight, the characters birth day is set to the 24th Mayan in the year 518-18=500. Thus, the character is already 18 years old.

    But this is probably all wrong and it's just about humgii math after all.
    That was my first thought, too, but you definitely have a birthdate/age at character creation, at least if it's not 25 Mayan. I didn't think to create a character last night to check, and I probably won't remember/want to bother in a couple weeks, but I'm guessing it's the humgiis.
  • I always assumed its so that you don't have a 19 year old character a day after creation

  • Antidas said:
    I always assumed its so that you don't have a 19 year old character a day after creation
    You wouldn't, any more than you currently end up with an 18 year old character a day later. You'd turn 19 on 25 Mayan of the next year.
  • Hrm, well, then we'll have to entertain some other options. Let's assume that dates are internally stored as a single integer number, increasing by one for every day past a certain starting date.

    So, say, the starting date is 1st Sarapin 0 and would be represented by datenumber 1. An Achaean year has 300 days. To convert datenumbers into Achaean format again, Achaea uses the formula:
    year = floor(datenumber/300)
    month = mod(floor((datenumber-1)/25),12)+1
    day = mod(datenumber-1, 25)+1

    Whenever a character is created, the game subtracts (18*300=5400) from this person's datenumber, then converts this new number into Achaean format.

    Let's say a character is created on datenumber 200,000. The game would then set his birthday to datenumber 200000-5400=194600 and convert this to: 25th of Lupar(8) 648.

    Another character is created four in-game months later on datenumber 200,100. The game would set his datenumber to 194700 and convert it to: 25th of Mayan(12) 649, making him one year younger than he's supposed to be.

    So the issue would be that the humgiis stole the correct year conversion formula that should have been: year = floor((datenumber-1)/300) and changed it to year = floor(datenumber/300).
  • Eld said:
    Antidas said:
    I always assumed its so that you don't have a 19 year old character a day after creation
    You wouldn't, any more than you currently end up with an 18 year old character a day later. You'd turn 19 on 25 Mayan of the next year.
    this is what I get for not thinking before I post lmao

  • Iocun said:
    Hrm, well, then we'll have to entertain some other options. Let's assume that dates are internally stored as a single integer number, increasing by one for every day past a certain starting date.

    So, say, the starting date is 1st Sarapin 0 and would be represented by datenumber 1. An Achaean year has 300 days. To convert datenumbers into Achaean format again, Achaea uses the formula:
    year = floor(datenumber/300)
    month = mod(floor((datenumber-1)/25),12)+1
    day = mod(datenumber-1, 25)+1

    Whenever a character is created, the game subtracts (18*300=5400) from this person's datenumber, then converts this new number into Achaean format.

    Let's say a character is created on datenumber 200,000. The game would then set his birthday to datenumber 200000-5400=194600 and convert this to: 25th of Lupar(8) 648.

    Another character is created four in-game months later on datenumber 200,100. The game would set his datenumber to 194700 and convert it to: 25th of Mayan(12) 649, making him one year younger than he's supposed to be.

    So the issue would be that the humgiis stole the correct year conversion formula that should have been: year = floor((datenumber-1)/300) and changed it to year = floor(datenumber/300).
    But 200,100/300=667, so that second character is created on 25 Mayan 667, not 666, and is still 18. The humgiis in that scenario have just bumped the New Year up to 25 Mayan instead of 1 Sarapin.
  • edited February 2015
    Not if a different conversion is being used for character birthdays and for displaying the current date. I would assume that the current date is correctly converted with (datenumber-1)/300, whereas the function that sets/displays birthdays uses datenumber/300.

    But it is a bit weird, since one would assume that internally, the age of a character would still be calculated by subtracting the internal storage variable of birth from the current internal storage variable. But perhaps this isn't actually the case, and birthdates are actually saved in "Achaean format". Or there's even a re-conversion happening there.

    There are really quite many possibilities there, but I don't think that a date format conversation error is entirely out of the question.
  • Hm, true enough. I was assuming, somewhat optimistically, that there would be a single function to be called any time the conversion needed to be done, and that if it were wrong, it would have also been noticed elsewhere, but it's entirely possible that that's not the case, or that that bit of code happens to do it itself (and incorrectly) or something else. But yeah, an asymmetric format conversion is certainly plausible.
  • Eld said:
    Hm, true enough. I was assuming, somewhat optimistically, that there would be a single function to be called any time the conversion needed to be done,
    That's probably how we'd all do it if we designed such a system from scratch with knowledge of all the intended functionalities it needs to have now. But we all know how it is with code that slowly grows and grows. Something that later became important was once just an inconspicuous little line that nobody felt the need to make an autonomous function for - and then it simply stuck around over the years and since it never caused any actual harm, it was left untouched.
  • Iocun said:
    Eld said:
    Hm, true enough. I was assuming, somewhat optimistically, that there would be a single function to be called any time the conversion needed to be done,
    That's probably how we'd all do it if we designed such a system from scratch with knowledge of all the intended functionalities it needs to have now. But we all know how it is with code that slowly grows and grows. Something that later became important was once just an inconspicuous little line that nobody felt the need to make an autonomous function for - and then it simply stuck around over the years and since it never caused any actual harm, it was left untouched.
    Yeah, when I said "that bit of code happens to do it itself", I was more thinking "that's got to be a pretty ancient part of the codebase, and could easily have some relics that have survived for whatever reason".
  • KresslackKresslack Florida, United States
    A slave is a slave. Whether they are 17 or 18, Sartan does not care. Suffer in the Suffering.


  • CaladbolgCaladbolg Campbell County TN
    Sarapis said:
    Jonathin said:
    I was so confused when I saw 17 as a post title with Sarapis' name next to it on the main page.
    I thought someone was trolling me actually, as 17 is my favorite number and Sarapis has made no secret of the fact that said number underlies much of Creation.
    We need 9 more Cities and Oh, we have 17 classes no wonder you guys keep saying we don't need any more.

    tbh I thought this was going to be a thread based on underage mudsex though.

  • They only want you when you're seventeen. When you're twenty-one, you're no fun.

    They take a polaroid and let you go. Say they'll let you know. So come on.
    image
  • Good song, though I like Felix da Housecat's "droyds mix" of it better than the original.

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