[MUD-Dev] Guilds & Politics [was Affecting the World]

[Matt Chatterley]

On Thu, 11 Dec 1997 coder at ibm.net wrote:

> On 09/12/97 at 01:42 AM, Derrick Jones <gunther at online1.magnus1.com> said:
> >On Mon, 8 Dec 1997, Vadim Tkachenko wrote:
> 
> >> I believe that if you wouldn't know WHAT exactly has killed you, it
> >> would be much easier to go with. In other words, you just can't
> >> differentiate the monster/NPC from the different player, nothing
> >> personal will be left.
> 
> >This is no small task.  
> 
> Actually it happens as a side effect for me.

Yeah. It really depends on how you approach these things. Obviously if
people can pick player names off the 'who' list, or the game screams 'You
were PKED!!!!!!!!!!' at you after you die, its going to be obvious (unless
in the former case, the who list is huge).

I would like an environment where players care that they were
assassinated (or died), not if it was a PC or NPC that wrought their death
(Perhaps I will try to dissociate Player-Killing from being killed by a PC
- its all character killing?).
 
> >Especially in most designs where all of the
> >players are humanoids, and the vast majority of target creatures are not.
> >Players quickly learn the 'normal' NPCs in each area, and characters
> >typically stand out as they wander much more than any normal mobile
> >should.  Imagine a hack-N-slash mud where all the mobiles ran around
> >speedwalking and killing a buch of stuff, then recalling before repeating
> >the process somewhere else.  Imagine the sheer spam in town when every
> >creature decides to recall.  Roleplay muds would be virtually impossible,
> >unless you manage to pass the Turing test for mob AI.
> 
> Well, after a short while of play there are no more "normal" NPC
> populations for me.  For one there is zero difference between an NPC body
> and a player character body -- especially seeing as all player bodies
> (other than the default lumpy clay ones) were once NPC bodies.  Next,
> player pick up bodies and then move them about to do whatever they want,
> with the result that the population is constantly stirred, with body types
> (often freed from player control) now long seperated from their original
> locations.

This is *very* interesting.

[Snip example]

Regards,
	-Matt Chatterley
	ICQ: 5580107
"I shall never believe that God plays dice with the world." -Einstein