[MUD-Dev] Git out the boar spear, Martha!

[Jon A. Lambert]

> From: clawrenc at cup.hp.com
> Subject: [MUD-Dev]  Git out the boar spear, Martha!
>    at 12:56 PM, Matt Chatterley <root at mpc.dyn.ml.org> said:
> 
> >The thread(s) upon hunger/food/nutrition a short while ago were very
> >popular and quite highly contested - I'd like to raise another issue
> >of that - the gathering of food, and specifically, implementation of
> >some way to hunt.
> 
> For this area I fall into the grunt player camp.  I expect my
> cahracter, outside of unsusual circumsatances (forced march across a
> desert etc), to take care of his own nutrition without requiring my
> attention or direct involvement as player.  Possibly this is because I
> try and handle feeding my own body in much the same manner -- utterly
> ignorable automaticities.  Eating is a bother and an unfortunately
> necessary waste of time.  (Conveniently ignoring my own gourmand
> tendencies which I see as entirely seperate -- eating for pleasure as
> vs nutrition which I can't see translating into a text MUD well at
> all)

I think this may well fall into theme.  It may be convenient to
assume ALL characters can hunt if your game world is primitive/historic.  
If you do a modern/future theme, this skill may be more unusual and 
having it as a survival skill might make a game difference.

Hunting down parts for the food replicator...hmm

> 
> >I intend to allow the eating of corpses (of courpse, most players
> >will have to cut them up into suitable food pieces and/or cook them
> >first.. only trolls and orcs will be able to chow down on a freshly
> >dead body with no chance of being ill). 
> 
> That "chance of being ill" piece is interesting.  Why should a
> character get ill from eating a freshly killed carcass?  Parasites? 
> There are amazingly few that can survive a human digestional system
> long enough to be real bother.
>

I not sure.  Maybe I'm misinformed.  I thought there was good reason
to drain the blood from that boar before eating.  I also remember 
something about people having digestive reactions to horse blood.
Perhaps certain creatures require special preparation, like Fugoo.
 
> There is considerable evidence (I find supportable) that Homo Sapiens
> is by nature a cursorial hunter.  What is a cursorial hunter I hear
> you cry in bewilderment?  Very simple:  A cursorial hunter is a hunter
> which hunts its prey by running (jogging actually) it into the ground. 
 
I spend much of my time hunting down my cursor. :)

> 
> Several "primitive" tribes continue to hunt this way to this day.  
>
 
There may be some modern anecdotal evidence to support this.  
Did you ever see a pack of children hunt down an ice-cream truck?


JL