Talk:Ultima Underworld special items

Mandate and other concerns

1. What is the mandate of this article? It has "special items" in its name but there's talk about weapons and armour which are usually thought of as every day items. What's not a special item if everything on this page is special?
2. The language is not always very formal, but I think it would be a waste to address than until #1 is
3. I don't think there should be "takeaways" sections. Readers are expected to derive their own conclusions and, even though you can find plenty of failed examples, the wiki shouldn't be giving advice.

--The Ultra-Mind (talk) 10:16, 15 April 2025 (MDT)

Be aware that this is a technical details article, it's told from the perspective of the game engine, not the game player, so there may be a discrepency in terminology and language.

On the special item term: Every object in the game has an entry in the table in FILEcomobj.dat, these are common objects with common properties, such as mass. Any object with uncommon properties needs an additional entry in the tables in FILEobjects.dat, which has their non-common properties. These are the special items. For example armors have a defense value and a paperdoll slot, these are not common object properties, therefore they are special items. Weapons have damage values and skill uses, these are not common object properties, therefore they are special items. Containers have a capaticy value, this is not a common property, etc.

On your question of what is not a special item, anything that's not in that table. Most game objects are shown in this image. Anything in there that's not on this page is not a special item.

The takeaways is what I expect someone to be able to determine by looking at the tables. They are a summary of observations that I hope would be common knowledge and not need to be discussed. For example if someone asks what is the best weapon in the game, I could just link to the table and they might come back and say that well the jeweled sword doesn't have the highest damage, then I would have to explain that there are other factors than max damage involved. Having it written out there saves me that discussion.

I understand what you say about the wiki not giving advice, and I agree. I've seen several articles on here that have editorial commentary instead of "just the facts". I mean to go through and clean them up when I find time. But the takeaways on that page I thought I wrote fairly objectively. Please tell me if I'm wrong.

--Sir Robin (talk) 13:10, 15 April 2025 (MDT)

In fact that is why the page was named "special items tables" because the goal was to discuss the data in the tables in the objects.dat file, AKA the special items tables.

--Sir Robin (talk) 17:55, 15 April 2025 (MDT)