[MUD-Dev] Death

[Adam Wiggins]

[JK, on his style of RP:]
> Best thing i can tell you is its like dating.  You take a little step, test

Heh, if I ever play a mud that's half as stressfull as dating I think
I'd probably yank my phone cord out of the wall, and possibly take
a hammer to my modem to make sure I never try THAT again. :)

> the waters, take another little step...   thsi is on anything "dangerous".

Okay, I see, and I can also see why I wouldn't like this.
I spend all day long behaving like this.  I have to be careful about
what I say to friends, co-workers, investors, creditors, and family
members.  I have to consider my actions carefully, trying to figure
out all possible consequences in my head before going ahead - and even
then I might still hold back if I know it might cause a potential problem.
So, when I come home and want to relax on a mud for a bit, I *love* to
be able to play characters that can act in a bold and descisve manner,
100% of the time.  Partially they can do this because they have a
well-defined role, so it's easy for me to instantly come up with their
response to any situation.  Even if I know this is not the _best_
response for them as far as what is 'good' for the character, I know that's
the response they would have, regardless.  Secondly, I can go ahead and
enact this response without (much) fear, because it's a game.  Unlike
real life, things like getting in trouble with creditors is usually a whole
lot of fun in a game.  And at worst, if things take a really bad turn, I
can always play a different character, go play a different mud, or
just turn off the computer and go do something else, with nothing lost
except some time.

> We all knwo what the "dnagerous" thinsg are, they are the things that have
> a lasting impact on the other character.  Killing the other character, ina
> real-death world, would be an obvious BIGGIE.  So big that we basicly don't
> do it.  We may coem to blows, but the killing blow is never landed.

Yes, we agree on this.  Fundamental difference seems to be that I say
'Discourage such acts via game mechanics and setting' and you say 'Restrict
the acts altogether.'
I'm thinking more of non-PK action, though, since (for one) I think
we've pretty much gone over all the ground about PK, and secondly, since
I find the more subtle things more interesting.  Your description of
the story-conscious role-player seems to go far beyond just the implications
of PK, and that's what I'd like to delve into.

> >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.
> 
> Um... if you're not concerend about story, then I have to ask "why"?

Why did you ever get the idea I wasn't concerned with story?
There are only two points that I've been trying to make, so let me
see if I can sum it up:

1) You can roleplay without any knowledge or desire for knowledge about the
story.
2) PK is frequently a part of role-play.  This is not a bad thing.

The first point is the more interesting one, I think.
Let me see if an analogy will help.
Consider your brain.  Assuming you believe modern science, it's made
up of an innumerable number of neurons, each of which has a simple function -
to fire when enough electric charge builds up as to cross its synapse.
This is all that is required to be a neuron.  The neuron itself requires
no knowledge of the overall workings of the brain in order to function,
only that it satisfy the basic requirement outlined above.
Yet, somehow, cognition emerges from the bajillions of neurons setting
in your brainpan.  How?  The answer, of course, is that your brain is
an emergent system.  The 'cognition' which is the function of your brain
is in fact completely seperate from the matter which makes up your brain.
The neurons are only the medium across which the system - cognition - can
travel.  (If you're not a believer in brain functionality this way,
you can use the same exact example with a modern computer CPU as the
'brain' and transistors as the 'neurons'.)

Now map this to RP.  Characters are the neurons - the individual elements
which are the *medium* for the system, without *being* the system.
The system being carried, of course, is the story.  Each character has
no need of any knowledge of the 'story' (which, in itself, doesn't
exist, and can be perceived in an infinite number of ways) in order
to effectively roleplay.  I could probably sit here and feed you
imaginary situations and then let you come up with responses from some
of your favorite characters without me having to explain an overall story
(although certainly knowledge of the surrounding facts etc is pretty handy).

In addition, some of my best role-playing has been done in completely
ignorance of the 'real' story.  I *thought* I knew the story, but I didn't -
there was actually much more going on without my knowledge.  When I did
find out the real story, I'm generally very surprised and delighted.
Did this make my RP worse, however?  No - in fact, I'd argue it made it
better.  Since *I* was in ignorance, as well as my character, that made
my role-playing that much better, since I wasn't trying to fake not having
knowledge that I actually did.

Lastly, how do you _ever_ know when you know the 'whole' story?  On
any kind of descent sized mud, there's always a ton of people fading
in and out of your 'story'.  Characters are affected by motivations,
plot twists, and other influences which you will never know.  Nor do
you need to know them; this is where role-playing differs from writing
a novel.

Note I've never said that role-playing unequivicoly means that there
is no story knowledge, or that you wouldn't want to know the story while
role-playing, or that there's no place for role-playing where every
character knows everything about the story.  I'm just trying to
illustrate how they *can* be seperate, which allows one too consider
how seperate one should want them to be when designing a game.

> I know why I want it to be woirthwhile, but I wonder how it fits in to how
> you play?

There are two things which determine what I do when I play: what I think
is fun, and what is in-character for the character I am playing.  (Not
necessarily in that order, but usually.)  A story will emerge, regardless,
although it may be a thoroughly boring story.  Other times the story
that emerges is incredibly interesting.  Obviously the second type
is more interesting to me, but it's only one of many concerns.  I won't
break character by any major amount just because I think it would make
the story more interesting (ie, having my mage cast 'fireball' during
a particularly boring meeting of the Council).  I am, however, perfectly
willing to bend the story to make things more interesting.  Note that
'more interesting' for me at least, usually translates to 'hairier.'
Thus, if I'm being chased by someone, and the chase has been fun so far,
I may lag behind just a bit to make sure things stay hot-and-heavy,
even though my character would probably have taken the first oportunity
possible to get away scott-free.

One more story comment.  I love a good story, but generally I don't
think too hard about what the story is, exactly, until after it's all said
and done.  Yes, this works - just the same as it works in real life.
Characters be themselves, and a story emerges.  The difference is,
the characters are usually a lot more interesting, varied, and likely
to make bold maneuvers; and the world itself is more perilous and likely
to host non-mundane situations.

Ie, most of my good mudding stories start like this:

"My buddy had learned this little trick from some wandering mage that let
him give a magical glow to any object.  So, I had him cast it on a junk ring
I had.  Feeling pretty tricky, I pawned it off on some poor sap who had
just come into town and didn't know any better.  Little did I know the 'poor
sap' was actually Grooble Furfoot, captain of a small legion of mercenaries,
whom he was waiting to meet in that very town.  The ring, although not
magical at all, was actually an ancient signet used by the now defunct
Bludrust clan, and it was for that reason that Grooble bought it from me,
not the magical glow.  Of course, I didn't know that.  Then things started
to get interesting when a passerby who had witnessed our transaction
reported the event to the local authorities.  Fearing that the hated Bludrust
clan had returned and was rebuilding itself in secret, they sent..."

Here, I (neither myself as a player, nor my character) knew anything about
what I was doing.  Grooble, neither the character and (probably) not the
player, knew that the magical glow was just a cheap cantrip.  We weren't
aware of the 'story', as it were - yet we still managed to role-play.

> >I guess the only kind of death I find meaningless is one I don't learn
> >from.
> 
> Ah, I see. NM my last question. I'ld say though it seems to me you are not
> immersing as far as I am.  To me each hcaracter is an individual with a
> life, hisotry and death.  That I leanr something for my next character to
> know is irellevent to me because it is irellevent to the character.

Okay, well this is again just a difference in style of play.  I treat
my characters like characters in a novel.  I may become more or less
attached to them, depending upon what happens in their story; but I am
not them (obvisouly).  Thus I keep a certain aloofness, I suppose, that
keeps me from ripping my heart out when something bad happens to them.
This also allows me to play characters which behave nothing like myself;
in some cases I might not even condone anything that they do, although
this sort of character takes rather a lot of effort to play.

> My turn to say "this seems very OOC..."  ;)

Indeed.  I'm a player, and I'm not my character.  I carry knowledge between
characters; I can't not do this, really, other than to 'fake' it (but
regardless, I as a player still make decisions based on all availible
knowledge, regardless of whatever I might try to force myself to 'forget').

In this area, though, I see it (once again) the same as RL.  I don't
mind mistakes at all, if I learn from them.  Making a mistake that I
have made before and I know I should have been able to avoid is the only
kind of mistake I find frustrating.  Bad things which happen to my character
only qualify as mistakes, to me.  Even death.  Thus, I may not be very
happy that I made the mistake, especially given the punishment for failure,
but if I take something away from it - knowledge, experience, even a brief
thrill - then I don't find it frustrating or highly upsetting.  Advantage
to aloofness, I suppose?  Not to say playing isn't an emotional experience
for me, it's just that a character is like a character in a book to me.
There there for as long as they are there, and then they are gone.
Sometimes I wish they'd have stuck around longer and other times I wish
they'd go away sooner, but it's how it is and I think I've already
explained that if things went exactly how I 'wanted' them to go 100% of
the time, I'd be bored out of my skull.

> >> 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.  
> 
> Nope, quite the opposite. With power comes responsability. Yo ucan tell
> someone with TRUE power by what they DON'T do.

Heh, well this is true, and why I find power competely unattractive
in RL.  I enjoy striving to be the best at what I do, even if I never
come close to 'the best'; sometimes this translates to power in a game,
but power in and of itself is pretty worthless and boring to me.

> I'ld suggest you consider your own behavior as a MUD wizard.  How
> capricious are you with those power?

Hum, a good question.  It's pretty much what I said above - I want to
create, not manage at the player-level.  Basically, players never see me.
If they can't resolve it in-game, then there is a flaw in the game (which
they can report to me via in-game commands or the message boards, and
in which case my time is better spent fixing the flaw than doing something
with my wizard's 'power') or they just aren't understanding/playing
the game to its full capacity, in which case I leave it to them to figure
out.

> a alck of fear.  A lack of fear brings a lack of hate. (We can get into
> THAT side discussion if you want.)  A truely powerful character has little
> to no "hates"..  but he ofetn WIll have a big fear of hismelf and what he
> can do.

Uh huh.  But as I said, I would not want to play a mud, nor do I want
to create a mud, where any player ever feels that they need not fear
anything.  The best swordsman in the world still 'fears' (in an abstract
way) being thrown in jail for breaking laws (what good is his sword there?)
or being banned from every habitated area within 200 miles.  He also fears
six gang members armed with enough crossbows, spells, and tricks
to make sure that his sword-arm won't do him a damn bit of good.

> them. What they play instead are ineffectual people witha  sudden dose of
> pwoer who have to go around proving it.  (A TRUE psychotic maniac might be

*shrug*, well, humans being humans, this happens.  In my game world
they'd probably get themselves either killed, thrown in jail, or very
badly hurt within no time, regardless of how good they were.
I won't tell them not to do it, though.  Much more effective for them
to learn that it's a bad idea on their own.
And again, this is balancing powerlevels.  If someone can just kill things
for a while and then be in a position to, without fear, slaughter whole
villages wholesale, I'd say there's a problem.