Praetorian Clockwork Dialogue

[KalSpiro]

I've been trying to track down a document for learning the speech patterns of Clockwork, but the only one I could find pointed to NCSoft and is defunct.  Does anyone have anything worthwhile?

[Crasical]

Cleaner: If PPL.ATK.PRA then PPL = RES?
Cleaner: PPL = RES. ATK

Cleaner: TSK = DEF
Cleaner: LAB.SFE = False. ATK = True
Mender: CRM.HLT!
 

A random sampling from Paragonwiki. 
Abbreviate certain concepts to 3 letter acronyms, use faux programming language. 

[Gulver]

On 11/17/2019 at 6:56 PM, Crasical said:

Cleaner: If PPL.ATK.PRA then PPL = RES?
Cleaner: PPL = RES. ATK

Cleaner: TSK = DEF
Cleaner: LAB.SFE = False. ATK = True
Mender: CRM.HLT!
 

If people attack Praetoria, then people are Resistance, correct?

If the people are resistance, then attack.

My task is to defend.

This lab is not safe.  I am now attacking.

Halt, criminal (scum)!

[MetaVileTerror]

Excellent work, Gulver!  Thanks.

[Gulver]

It's a really rough translation.  They're giving me the impression that their dialogue is extremely simple-sounding.  Most likely their AI can't handle complex instructions due to Neuron not taking the time to properly code them with his ADD combined with superspeed.

[NotRandomEnough]

I'm working on it myself as part of a Clockwork roleplay.

Some in-world examples led me to write up a rudimentary file in the past couple of days.

 

(I hope this is not seen as necroing a thread for no reason; it's one of the first results when looking for Praetorian Clockwork speech and adding this file might help someone work on a more detailed example in the future.)

 

Find the new version of this file further down the thread.

Edited January 10 by NotRandomEnough
Removed bugged-out file, new version of the file is in a new comment.

[chase]

the text attachment isn't available for me, though I'd love to check it out.

I'd always imagined that, if roleplaying a clockwork with such a limited element of expression, I'd accompany it with a lot of emotes, as if to emphasize that they're trying hard to express past the limit of their dialogue... a kind of struggling to express what feels almost trapped inside.
 

[NotRandomEnough]

4 hours ago, chase said:

the text attachment isn't available for me, though I'd love to check it out.

I'd always imagined that, if roleplaying a clockwork with such a limited element of expression, I'd accompany it with a lot of emotes, as if to emphasize that they're trying hard to express past the limit of their dialogue... a kind of struggling to express what feels almost trapped inside.
 

I'm not sure why the text attachment shouldn't be available for you? I've updated it to include a wellspring of new information I came across just now. See if it works now?

 

On the note of expressing emotion, I thought a malfunctioning unit said it best; !!CWK.FIX; CWK == SAF; !!CWK.ALV

I read that as "PLEASE Fix Clockwork! Clockwork is safe! Clockwork is alive!".

No emotes, but a lot of emotion nonetheless.

Edited January 7 by NotRandomEnough
s/emoticons/emotes/

[lemming]

It downloaded fine for me.    You might want to check your browser settings, you may need to right click and Save Link as instead of just clicking on it for autodownload

[NotRandomEnough]

I've been adding to the file all day, trying to extrapolate what I didn't get yet from the NPCs roaming in Praetoria. (Who needs to level up when you can do research?)

 

I should have most statements from the examples at the bottom of the document added to the dictionary up top. I've decided to go for a tabbed 4-column because that fits the whole dictionary on one screen rather than requiring endless scrolling. YMMV.

 

Some of the use of operands is awkward. Notably the OuroDev site linked in the file mentioned that the early iterations of Praetorian Clockwork Missions did not follow the guidelines set later. This could also be explained ICly as Clockworks having multiple versions of their OS and the different syntax being used interchangeably for roleplay purposes shouldn't be an issue.

 

Find the new version in the next post;

 

Edited January 10 by NotRandomEnough
New version of file, removed old file.

[chase]

20 hours ago, NotRandomEnough said:

I've been adding to the file all day, trying to extrapolate what I didn't get yet from the NPCs roaming in Praetoria. (Who needs to level up when you can do research?)

 

I should have most statements from the examples at the bottom of the document added to the dictionary up top. I've decided to go for a tabbed 4-column because that fits the whole dictionary on one screen rather than requiring endless scrolling. YMMV.

 

Some of the use of operands is awkward. Notably the OuroDev site linked in the file mentioned that the early iterations of Praetorian Clockwork Missions did not follow the guidelines set later. This could also be explained ICly as Clockworks having multiple versions of their OS and the different syntax being used interchangeably for roleplay purposes shouldn't be an issue.

CoH Praetorian Clockwork Dictionary.txt 6.63 kB · 2 downloads

this attachment worked. thank you. 
The original attachment in this thread still errors out.

[NotRandomEnough]

And we're up to V0.3.

I'm roaming farther from the beginning zone and am coming across some interesting new expressions.

As the OuroDev link mentioned there are some discrepancies between Clockwork expressions in the missions compared to when they roam outside. There's also a difference between what they say in Nova Praetoria or Imperial City.

I'll continue to mark them.

 

First RP using the strings was a success. Find me in-game if you want to test my knowledge. :)

CoH Praetorian Clockwork Dictionary.txt

[NotRandomEnough]

Who knew writing a style guide is this tricky?

Anyway, some new additions since my last post. Have fun with it.

 

CoH Praetorian Clockwork Dictionary.txt

[KalSpiro]

I just wanted to say it's really cool that you're doing this project.  Even though I started this post 4 years ago and pretty much abandoned it, it's cool to see it's making some progress now.

[NotRandomEnough]

On 1/23/2024 at 2:47 PM, KalSpiro said:

I just wanted to say it's really cool that you're doing this project.  Even though I started this post 4 years ago and pretty much abandoned it, it's cool to see it's making some progress now.

Thank you for the kind words.

This thread was pretty much the only result that had any life left in it, especially now the servers are more populated again.

I'm hoping that my attempt to collate the data leads to someone else having fun with it.

 

I noted a few errors in the last upload. I'm trying to solve those and work on a more descriptive style guide section for the next upload.

There's a need to find a balance between the hardcore Clockwork code language and something more readable for roleplay partners.

I've been running various Clockwork characters on server, trying to make a mental distinction between the ones in Nova Praetoria & Imperial City, Neutropolis, and the Keyes Reactor respectively. (Not to forget the Malfunctioning Units and those reprogrammed by the Resistance.)

There are definitive differences between them and they should be respected as such. I'm going to try to put each group in their own section at some point, but that does mess up the plaintext file format I've been using so far.

Big rewrite takes time.

[NotRandomEnough]

Fully rewriting the style guide as I made some egregious errors (see next post). Re-adding it next update.

 

 

 

 

 

CoH Praetorian Clockwork Dictionary - Wiki.txt

Edited January 31 by NotRandomEnough
Updated the file to v0.9.

[NotRandomEnough]

I'll do a rewrite on the style guide given information from the wiki, and especially these links below, and work on adding links and in-game dialogue examples for the next version.

https://homecoming.wiki/wiki/Praetorian_Clockwork

https://homecoming.wiki/wiki/Resistance_Clockwork

https://homecoming.wiki/wiki/Neuron's_Clockwork

https://homecoming.wiki/wiki/Anti-Matter's_Clockwork

Edited January 31 by NotRandomEnough

[Lockely]

I'm really excited to see a more formatted version of this. I have an upcoming AE mission in Praetoria and I'm going to have to write some Clockwork dialogue.

Keep up the good work!

[NotRandomEnough]

I'm working on adding these to the list as well.

Hero mission - Investigate the Clockwork Menace:
------------------------------------------------
[NPC] Mender: CWK.TSK = ATK.HRO (Clockwork.Task = Attack.Hero)
[NPC] Sweeper: CWK.TSK.DEF.PRA > PML.SAF (Clockwork.Task.Defend.Praetoria > Primal Earth.Safe)
[NPC] Dismantler: HRO.ALV + HRO.OBS.CWK = !PRA.SAF (Hero.Alive + Hero.?.CWK = !Praetoria.Safe)
[NPC] Dismantler: PRI.PPL.OBS.CWK = !PPL.ALV (?.People.?.Clockwork = !People.Alive)
[NPC] Cleaner: While HRO.ALV; CWK.TSK.ATK (While Hero.Alive; Clockwork.Task.Attack)

Hero mission - Use Manticore's Database for Research:
-----------------------------------------------------
[NPC] Cleaner: ATK.SHN.STR.HRO (Attack.?.?.HRO)
[NPC] Sweeper: PML.HRO.ALV (Primal Earth.Hero.Alive)
[NPC] Sweeper: While PML.HRO.ALV; !PRA.SAF (While Primal Earth.Hero.Alive; !Praetoria.Safe)
[NPC] Sweeper: TGT.ACQ (Target.Acquired)
[NPC] Dismantler: TGT.ACQ; TSK.ATK.TGT (Target.Acquired; Task.Attack.Target)
[NPC] Sweeper: TSK.ATK.PML.HRO (Task.Attack.Primal Earth.Hero)

[Lockely]

1 hour ago, NotRandomEnough said:

[NPC] Dismantler: HRO.ALV + HRO.OBS.CWK = !PRA.SAF (Hero.Alive + Hero.?.CWK = !Praetoria.Safe)

Hero.Alive + Hero.Observed.Clockwork = !Praetoria.Safe            (Praetoria isn't safe if a hero has observed us and is alive)

 

1 hour ago, NotRandomEnough said:

[NPC] Dismantler: PRI.PPL.OBS.CWK = !PPL.ALV (?.People.?.Clockwork = !People.Alive)

 

Primal.People.Observed.Clockwork = !People.Alive            (No witnesses.)

[NotRandomEnough]

Sorry for being a bit slow this week. Trying to wrap my head around wikicode so I can make an actual wiki page for this.

[NotRandomEnough]

Altitis has got me in a vice grip and I haven't been able to work on this since my last post.

[chase]

Fully understandable.  RL work has me hammered.

Although I won't lie, this thread did inspire me to start re-imagining a Praetorian clockwork Mk-IV victoria-series fanmodded with catgirl accessories by one of Tabby's stalkers that utilizes this clockwork speech.   Codename [TAB]-E