[MUD-Dev] Re: Issues from the digests and Wout's list

[clawrenc at cup.hp.com]

In <Pine.GSO.3.95q.970419122247.29623C-100000 at uhunix2>, on 04/23/97 
   at 10:39 PM, Nathan Yospe <yospe at hawaii.edu> said:

>On Thu, 17 Apr 1997 clawrenc at cup.hp.com wrote:

>:In <199704170238.CAA492348 at out1.ibm.net>, on 04/16/97 
>:   at 10:51 AM, "Shawn Halpenny" <rsh at dos.nortel.com> said:

>:>On Apr 10,  6:57pm, clawrenc at cup.hp.com wrote:

>:This gets really messy when the player is controlling multiple bodies
>:simultaneously as you can get multiple stacked prompts for multiple
>:bodies.

>(for the purposes of discussion: I am controlling two characters,
>FireBrand and Lissajous. FireBrand is in a secondary interface,
>Lissajous is primary. I also have a piece of mmail I am doing in my
>shell.)
>
>   > :fire >tell lissa Testing, testing...
>  {FireBrand} You mutter into your comm. {/F} Your comm chirps, and
>   FireBrand's voice says, "Testing, testing..."
>  > tell fire Testing.
>  You mutter into your comm. {FireBrand} Your comm chirps, and
>  Lissajous' voice says, "Testing." {/F}
>  > :messaging fire off
>  {shell} Messages directed to FireBrand will no longer be broadcasted
>  via shell. {/s}

My current handling (from memory):

  Bubba> whoami
    (Bubba) Account: tester
      Active characters: Bernie, Boffo, Bubba.
      Bernie has one body: Bernie  // Bodies default to char. names
      Boffo has three bodies:  Marsh, Slug, Thwacker
      Bubba has one body: Bruce    // But don't have to
  Bubba> who
    (Bubba) Active accounts:
      Aulder
      Charliehorse
      Klepto
      Tester
      Thisnthat
  Bubba> l
    (Bruce) You see a long description
      of some place wherever.
  Bubba> switch to boffo
  Boffo> l
    (Marsh) You see a long description
      of some place wherever.
    (Slug) You see a long description
      of some place wherever.
    (Thwacker) You see a long description
      of some place wherever.
  Bubba> bernie < l
    (Bernie) You see a long description
      of some place wherever.  
  Bubba> bernie < get bag
    (Twacker) The troll smashes you over the head with his 
      club!  Ouch!
    (Bernie) Do you want the:
      1) Red bag
      2) Tattered paper bag
      3) Mouldy sack
      0) Cancel command
  Bernie>>                       // Auto prints the non current prompt
  Bubba> thwacker < fight troll  // because there's a filter there
    (Thwacker)  ...combat script stuff...
  Bernie>>
  Bubba> bernie < 2
    (Bernie) You take the paper bag.
  Bubba> cd thwacker              // Also works
  Thwacker> (do something nasty to troll)
    (Thwacker)...etc.

<<Been a long time since I've even looked at this stuff, I know I
forgot something, but I'm at work and the code is at home.  I'm reptty
sure I changed the "BodyID < Command" syntax to something else, but I
don't remember what.>>

I don't encourage players to play multiple characters with multiple
bodies simultaneously due to the playability aspects and IO overhead,
but it can happen.  More typically I'd expect to see players playing a
single character with perhaps two or three bodies.  Most smart players
will always have at least two bodies per characters as death is
permanent and only occurs when all of a character's bodies die.

Note: This is also a big reason to play swarm/hive-type bodies.  They
are damned near immortal.

>:The only solution there is to bind "drink" et all to the player
>:objects (or something that all players always carry).  Drink then
>:resolves on the player, and the verb then goies out looking for an
>:object to satisfy.
>:
>:It can make for an expensive parser.

>I have to admit, my parser can get pretty expensive, though
>hardcoding helps a lot.

The real expense that I see is having the verb attempt to resolve its
own subjects and objects rather than having the up-front parsing do it
for you.

>:>>>6) Global mob AI.
>:>>
>:>> Ouch.  Like it.  Don't have an elegant solution yet.
>:
>:><gurgle><spastic-twitching>
>:
>:I thought we warned you against playing with ducttape?  You really
>:shouldn't get so wrapped up in your work.

>*grin* He wasn't... he accidentaly cut the _red_ wire.

I thought we told him the green wire controlled the power shunt to the
ECT machine?

--
J C Lawrence                           Internet: claw at null.net
(Contractor)                           Internet: coder at ibm.net
---------------(*)               Internet: clawrenc at cup.hp.com
...Honorary Member Clan McFUD -- Teamer's Avenging Monolith...