[DGD] Object house-keeping and persistance

[Stephen Schmidt]

On Thu, 19 Aug 2004, Jas wrote:
> [A]ll of the physical resources (versus objects) that will
> EVER exist in the game should exist in the game from the beginning of
> time, in the form of natural resources to be harvested, refined or
> processed, or utilized in the creation of player-manufactured
> objects.... OR, and here's where things get fairly complicated, consumed
> as fuel to create energy.
> "Matter and energy is neither created nor destroyed."

Hm. But the second law of thermodynamics? Should one allow
for entropy, that is, the quantity of -usable- energy in
the game universe to decrease?

Of course, that could be problematic from a player standpoint.
"Welcome to Heat-Death MUD! See if you can make level 20 before
the universe achieves a uniform distribution of energy!"

:)

> There's nothing written anywhere I can find that says a game
> administrator can't stockpile some of the universe's matter and/or
> energy for their own purposes (to use to maintain the peace or rule with
> an iron fist, your choice of course ).  World leaders have been doing
> that for thousands of years, and it seems to work quite well!

True, although for testing purposes (which is what I think
the original question was about) you might need to have a
separate stash. Otherwise you would have to do warning
messages like:

** All Players: The Wizard Oppenheimer is about to test his new
** object, "Nuclear Pile". He is requisitioning 74% of the world's
** available energy to test this object. Please lie down and don't
** move until the test is complete.

That is, things which are happening outside the game world
(ie, in the wizard's workroom) should not use the game world's
matter and energy; either they should bypass the matter/energy
rules or they should have an independent source (which can
be increased as needed).

Also, one probably needs to have some ability to increase the
world's supply of matter/energy as the player database grows;
that violates the persistance idea to some extent too, but
if one doesn't allow new players to join, what's the point?
Eventually the player base would probably reach a steady
state, solving the problem, but in the growth phase prior
to that steady state, adjustments would be needed.

Steve



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