[MUD-Dev] Rooms, 3D arrays, etc.

[Michael Hohensee]

On Wed, 28 May 1997 clawrenc at cup.hp.com wrote:

> >On Sun, 25 May 1997 coder at ibm.net wrote:
> Very space wasteful -- most of those pointers will be NULL.  Why not
> have a simple array of unsigned chars for the terrain, using the 255
> value as a flag.  If the value is 255, instead use those coordinates
> as an offset into a sparse array to get the pointer value, if its not
> 255 the char value is the terrain type.
> 
> Additionally this allows you to compress the terrain array as above.
> 

Heh, you know, I actually had just this idea driving home from school 
yesterday.  Except I'd planned on zero being the starting number. :)

> >> The problem here is preserving state changes at the various "time
> >> levels".  Consider the cimple form of two players crossing the same
> >> ocean.  Bubba  crossed two hours ago IRL, and Boffo is crossing right
> >> now.  If you go for the 4'th D == time, then you should be able to
> >> move some distance in the 4th D and find Bubba still crossing the
> >> ocean (even if you can't interact with him for obvious reasons).  
> 
> >Well, you could always come up with some arbitrary rule which
> >prevents  this.  Say that due to the laws of physics/magic, you can
> >only travel in  time in 100 year intervals.  And each universe is
> >moving forward in time  at the same rate.  So in the year 101, you
> >could go back to the year 1,  but in the year 102 you could only go
> >back to year 2.
> 
> So, after sufficient time has passed in the game, shouldn't you be
> able to see Bubba passing there 100 years ago?  There are other forms
> of this question you'll also need to account for.

Heh, okie, increase the time differential.  Say about 1,000,000 years. :)

> 
> >It would take a rather determined player to prove your universe 
> >inconsistent. :)
> 
> You'd be surprised.
> 

If anybody sat down after one million years of game-time and complains 
that he didn't see his friend Bubba go by, I might just swear him to 
silence and give him an immort.  (Such a dedicated player. ;)

Michael Hohensee

> -- 
> 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...
> 
>