[MUD-Dev] Life

[Adam Wiggins]

[Marian:]
> What hurts is not especially the fact that the character died, but the
> fact that somebody else decided she should die.  Without any regard or
> respect for my feelings.

Ah - okay, what I'm getting out of this is that the *computer* can decide
that you are going to die, without respect for your feelings (of course),
and you don't take it too hard, but if a *human being* decides this, by
virtue of the fact that they are a human being and can consider such things,
then you take it personally?
This makes sense, but unfortunately would fit in nowhere with my game,
since we treat NPCs and PCs as being 100% identical.  I find it hard to
have a really immersive world without this.

> Like you say further on,  if you RP you have
> to be aware that your characters do dangerous things  and may die as a
> consequence. This is true for AD&D style quest/campaigns. Should this,
> however, allow other players intrude on your RP  without your consent?

I guess I don't understand where one draws the line about 'intrusion'.
Where do you decide that somewhat is just interacting with your story,
and that someone is actually intruding?  I certainly can't be practical
to ask the other player(s) involved whether anything you do is going to
be considered acceptable, but I can't think of any other way to know.

> To further complicate things,  this is not necessarily true for story-
> telling RP that are much more cooperative efforts  and are much closer
> to the book examply I snipped above.  There a character is part of the
> story told by several people and killing her does cut off a story that
> is unfinished.

Yeah, I didn't realize that there was quite such a strong line drawn
between story-telling RP and character RP.  My time spent on RP muds
and play P&P RPGs has all been the second type.

> > When the admin decides it's complete?  I think the answer to this
> > question probably will tell you a lot about the kind of game you want
> > to play - there's certainly no 'right' answer.
> 
> Indeed.  And if we all keep this firmly in mind we might be able to
> cut down the bitterness that seems to have crept up on this thread.

*shrug* I've learned quite a bit from this thread, and that's all I really
ask.  I have trouble being bitter about anything so abstract as what we
are discussing, I think others are speaking from more personal bad
experiences and thus some less-than-pristine emotion has bubbled up in
places.

> > I've sent more than one character to certain death, both because I found
> > it a lot more fun to charge in on the dragon to give my friends time to
> > escape, and because it was in character.
> 
> The trick here  is that you decided to do this.  It may have been in-
> evitable, but you still agreed to it.

Hmmm, true. <ponders>  I actually really deeply enjoy that terrible moment
of decision - you know your character is a gonner either way, so you might
as well make their death worthwhile.

> If a player you don't even know
> came in, mindcontrolled your character and sent him charging the dra-
> gon barehanded would you still consider it equally fun? Maybe but I do

Yes, I've had this happen to me.  I less thought it was fun from
the standpoint of the character, but I found it incredibly intruging that
you *could* do such a thing (being somewhat new to muds at the time).
Eventually I learned how to do it myself, and was more prepared the next
time somewhat tried it on me.
I guess the only kind of death I find meaningless is one I don't learn
from.

> decide for themselves. If the master swordman decides he doesn't like your
> face when you enter the bar and in a single swift stroke beheads your lit-
> tle thief there is no RP involved.

How so?  It seems to me that the general consensus is that if you are
playing a 'powerful' character, it is impossible to role-play.  If you're
role-playing a quick-tempered swordsman who has an inherent distrust
of greasey little goblins, and you walked into the bar, it would be
breaking the role for him to NOT react in some way.  Taking your head
off immediately seems a bit extreme in most cases, but I don't think we
can rule it out.  Chances are, though, someone playing a quick-tempered
swordsman isn't going to live all the long, because sooner or later they
are going to come up against something they can't handle.  At the very
least they'll become disliked in any town they go to and will find themselves
banned from entering any town.  (Now the role changes - you become a wandering
hermit?)

> This kind of act is commonly termed PK
> in the roleplaying community (a misnomer  and the source of much confusion
> and occasionally bitter arguments  even on this list).  Disruptive playing

If you kill someone just because they are there, that's not really
role-playing, I can agree.  From the standpoint of those in the world, that
player is a crazed psycopath, and chances are they won't last very long.

> Maybe we should, for the sake of clarity, entirely drop the term PK. It is
> too loaded with conflicting meanings for the people on this list.  Instead
> we could opt for the terms that I've read somewhere:  constructive playing
> (which still allows combat, murder and mayhem) and destructive playing.
> Or maybe we should drop the entire discussion as Chris suggested and let
> things cool off a bit.

As I said, I've found it very enlightening, even if my views are mostly
unchanged.  Possibly we've beat it into the ground, however - it can
go into the Retired Thread Bin along with Multithreading, Global Namespace,
and that short but highly amusing thread involving Chris Lawrence, a
saddle, and a greased pig.  What WAS that all about, anyways? :)

Besides, we all know - like a good character, a good thread is eventually
exhausted of its possibilities, and must die...

The dragon *L*I*Q*U*I*F*I*E*S* the thread with its bite!
The thread is dead! R.I.P.
You gain your share of knowledge.