Official News page 4

A WEIGHTY MATTER

by Hazed

As well as the forthcoming change to objects that will stop them vanishing at the reset, the weight of an object is now important, because there are limits on how much you can carry, and as you can probably work out, your strength is going to determine your carrying capacity.

You can carry one third of your strength, so with a strength of 35 you could carry objects that weigh up to 11 units - either 11 objects each weighing 1, or one object weighing 11. If you're a real weakling with a low, low strength of 20, you are going to be limited even further, with a carrying capacity of 6. Of course, if you can't bear the idea of being so puny, you can increase your strength by visiting the Strength Enhancement Booth on Doris and paying with slithy toves to get bigger muscles.

All objects weigh at least 1 unit, but may weigh more depending on what they are - obviously you will be able to carry fewer elephants than you can feathers! If you want to find out what happens when you try to grapple with an object you don't have the strength to hold, visit Hagar's Music Store on Earth where you will find on sale a musical instrument that weighs rather a lot. 'BUY MUSIC BOX' will get you one, provided you can pay the 100 groat price, and the only limit on how many you can hold is the weight of the thing - 10 units.

Footnote

Strictly speaking, we should talk about mass rather than weight, because you will be carrying objects into environments with different levels of gravity. An object's mass remains the same while gravity affects its weight, making it go up and down accordingly. Yes, you should be able to carry more things when in low-grav or zero-g, but it's not just about being able to lift a pile of stuff, it's also about being able to control them; it can be just as tiring to manipulate objects in zero-g as it is on Earth because they have inertia which means it takes power to start them moving in a desired direction and to stop them again!

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