The bookshelves preserving them thing makes sense.

(Hear that Shaddus? Start working on some salt bookshelves. -snicker-)

It does, but it still does not make sense for books to decay. Anything else that decays can be replaced, as the pattern is stored in the game itself. Books are not. Their designs are, but not the content. Content that is important enough to warrant 1-2 IG years before it can be placed in a library, that adds to the culture score of a nation, and can earn credits from Bardic competions. Books are just too unique and too important to decay, for the decay of a book is a devastating loss that cannot be replaced. Imagine if everytime a desk decayed, it's design had to be resubmitted. Or a ring, or armour, or weapons, or robes.

Are books in the real world filled with content any less important? Well darn, they shouldn't decay either!

Then we shouldn't have mages, elemental planes, cosmic planes, the Astral plane, lobstrosities, killer urns, Trill, Illithoid, Aslaran, Merian, Dracnari, Elfen, the Elder Gods, dreem leeches, Mountains of Madness, semi-sentient geometric shapes, Furrikin, etc. etc. etc.

Comparing Lusternia to the RL is an argument doomed to fail.

What reasons aside from "it will reduce lag" (which I don't believe) and "no other trade item doesn't" are you giving for books to decay? There are far, far more reasons to leave things as they are.

I was trying for deadpan there. Gotta remember to use tags from now on.

As for valid reasons?

Repeat sales, esp if a method of restoring books is provided.
The amount of bad literature that -needs- to decay.
The amount of books just taking up space that are not ever read (again, the ability to periodically restore books fixes this too, as books that aren't space-wasters are retained, those that aren't decay instead)

I can come up with more if you need more than the five reasons you've had so far. Can you come up with five reasons they shouldn't decay, other than 'Each book is a precious butterfly filled with someones individual sparkle'?

If it's important enough that it shouldn't decay then it should be important enough that you can keep a hard copy or a text file to re-paste from like any other piece of original writing.

- Books take 1-2 years to publish
- Writings are unique and cannot be redone if decayed
- Books add culture score - decaying and recreating books artificially bloats score
- Connected to bardics
- Only way to keep a record of the publication

If books are made to decay so that "bad literature" (which passed divine review, by the way) and unused books "taking up space" are removed, then the same should be done for designs in all other trades-- both are bad ideas.

I thought we covered the 'not library' exception a page or so ago...

And a written book cannot be compared to a design. However the design of that book can be compared to other designs. It's like comparing a bard's song to a design, or a painting to a design.

Books will never decay. Just forget that idea. I'm also not convinced that making books have a decay time will create repeat customers. In fact, I'm willing to bet it'll just discourage writers and make all of our Lusternian literature, that isn't locked in a library, shift to preserved letters to circumvent decay.

If you're concerned about bookbinding not having enough useful/profitable utility, then think up other methods of acquiring that. We've already begged for stationary, some sort of origami, and for scrolls to be more efficient. Origami is already slated to happen, according to the latest UStream, so there's hope yet for bookbinding gaining more toys.

But again. With literally every bookbinder arguing against decay time, and judging by administrative decisions in the past, books will not decay. Scout's honour.

People go dormant. Computers fry. Zombie apocalypses happen.

In conclusion, I would be mad if something I spent 6 hours on poofed. That happens enough to me IRL. Don't mess up my pretendy fun time game for pretendy fun time cash.

Like, seriously. There is no reason you should screw over that except to make FAKE MONEY. Which I don't find useful.

Edit: Damn you and your ninja skills, Druken.

By that reasoning, these books already decay; they will be lost when Lusternia dies (well, most of them will).

Decay, achieved. Done and done. Everyone's happy!

Why did I get a mental image of you telling kids that Santa Claus isn't real from this.

The truth is painful, I know...

Okay, I surrender my devil's advocacy in the face of your vastly superior explanation. I laughed so hard I cried when I read that.

*bows out of the subject of book decay*