The idea
When writing a custom design for cyberware, chiral body parts such as eyes, arms, and legs, can have their designs "merge" into one @naked when someone looks at you, so if you have a matching set everybody else isn't forced to read the exact same thing twice. Of course, it's pretty unlikely you or anyone else will always have the whole set, so you still need these designs to function for the individual implant. To achieve this, you can use substitution tags, much like with tailoring. A few examples are things like %hand, %eye, %thigh, and %foot. For example, if you have a left leg implant, %thigh will resolve to 'left thigh'. If you have a left and right leg implant, with matching designs, it will currently resolve to 'left and right thigh'.
Now, after that painfully long introduction, this is my first suggestion. Rather than having paired tags resolve to 'left and right [thing]', why not just have it resolve to the plural form? The current way it resolves feels rather clunky. For example, have %thigh in a paired set resolve to 'thighs' rather than 'left and right thigh', or %hand resolve to 'hands' instead of 'left and right hand'.
Of course, doing this raises new problems of its own that would need resolving. You can't, for example, write '%p %thigh is made of...' in a design, as if it's then part of a paired design, it'll display as 'his thighs is made of'. To get around this, I'd suggest some kind of substitution tag for "is" and "are", respectively. If it's a single implant, it'd use 'is'. If it's a paired set, it'd use 'are'. A similar tag for "it" and "them" would also help. I think that about covers it, but if there's any other words that'd need to be swapped out for a singular or paired set, please let me know.
Expanding on this, the currently-existing %count tag could use some tweaking. For a single implant, it resolves to 'A'. Always uppercase, all the time, even if it's in the middle of a sentence. I think having a %count tag for a lowercase 'a' and a %Count tag for an uppercase 'A' would make the most sense. When part of a set, it resolves to 'two', and I feel the same applies for that. 'Two' for %Count, 'two' for %count.
Currently, %bias will break paired designs entirely, as it always resolves to "left" or "right" only. The only thing I would suggest for this is to have it resolve to "left and right" in a paired set.
And, finally, there are no %arm or %shin tags. For %arm, you can just use %part anyway, as the 'arm' is the overarching body part anyway, but it may help people feel less confused when designing cyberware to add an %arm tag. Similarly, there is no %shin tag despite leg cybernetics covering the shin area. I think there should be one.
I also feel that the substitution tags for cyberware and their possible values should be better documented, perhaps in a helpfile, as you can't re-design cyberware and this isn't really a "FOIC" kind of thing. There already exists a file for tags like %p and %o, so why not these?
Why it helps
It would make designing custom cyberware much easier, as currently it is quite difficult to write a design that reads well both as a singular and a plural.
Will this idea increase RP?
This isn't really an RP-related suggestion in the typical sense.
Other considerations (optional)
If these changes are implemented, it would be nice if they could be retroactively applied to existing implants. I can't see how they'd break existing designs, but if anyone sees a way they could, having it only apply to new designs should be fine.
When writing a custom design for cyberware, chiral body parts such as eyes, arms, and legs, can have their designs "merge" into one @naked when someone looks at you, so if you have a matching set everybody else isn't forced to read the exact same thing twice. Of course, it's pretty unlikely you or anyone else will always have the whole set, so you still need these designs to function for the individual implant. To achieve this, you can use substitution tags, much like with tailoring. A few examples are things like %hand, %eye, %thigh, and %foot. For example, if you have a left leg implant, %thigh will resolve to 'left thigh'. If you have a left and right leg implant, with matching designs, it will currently resolve to 'left and right thigh'.
Now, after that painfully long introduction, this is my first suggestion. Rather than having paired tags resolve to 'left and right [thing]', why not just have it resolve to the plural form? The current way it resolves feels rather clunky. For example, have %thigh in a paired set resolve to 'thighs' rather than 'left and right thigh', or %hand resolve to 'hands' instead of 'left and right hand'.
Of course, doing this raises new problems of its own that would need resolving. You can't, for example, write '%p %thigh is made of...' in a design, as if it's then part of a paired design, it'll display as 'his thighs is made of'. To get around this, I'd suggest some kind of substitution tag for "is" and "are", respectively. If it's a single implant, it'd use 'is'. If it's a paired set, it'd use 'are'. A similar tag for "it" and "them" would also help. I think that about covers it, but if there's any other words that'd need to be swapped out for a singular or paired set, please let me know.
Expanding on this, the currently-existing %count tag could use some tweaking. For a single implant, it resolves to 'A'. Always uppercase, all the time, even if it's in the middle of a sentence. I think having a %count tag for a lowercase 'a' and a %Count tag for an uppercase 'A' would make the most sense. When part of a set, it resolves to 'two', and I feel the same applies for that. 'Two' for %Count, 'two' for %count.
Currently, %bias will break paired designs entirely, as it always resolves to "left" or "right" only. The only thing I would suggest for this is to have it resolve to "left and right" in a paired set.
And, finally, there are no %arm or %shin tags. For %arm, you can just use %part anyway, as the 'arm' is the overarching body part anyway, but it may help people feel less confused when designing cyberware to add an %arm tag. Similarly, there is no %shin tag despite leg cybernetics covering the shin area. I think there should be one.
I also feel that the substitution tags for cyberware and their possible values should be better documented, perhaps in a helpfile, as you can't re-design cyberware and this isn't really a "FOIC" kind of thing. There already exists a file for tags like %p and %o, so why not these?
Why it helps
It would make designing custom cyberware much easier, as currently it is quite difficult to write a design that reads well both as a singular and a plural.
Will this idea increase RP?
This isn't really an RP-related suggestion in the typical sense.
Other considerations (optional)
If these changes are implemented, it would be nice if they could be retroactively applied to existing implants. I can't see how they'd break existing designs, but if anyone sees a way they could, having it only apply to new designs should be fine.
ACE KOOL