[MUD-Dev] Fear of magic (was:Usability and interface)

[Derrick Jones]

On Sun, 2 Nov 1997, Jon A. Lambert wrote:

> On  2 Nov 97 at 15:15, Marian Griffith wrote:
> > On Sun 02 Nov, Sauron wrote:
> > > Marian wrote:
> > Why not simply have the
> > guards order you to surrender.  If you do so you're handcuffed and
> > brought to the police station. Or if you refuse you fight them for
> > real.  They'll still arrest you if you are unconscious rather than
> > dead at the end of the fight. Of course if theres no more guard to
> > fight you can walk away.
> 
> I would believe that submission or surrender should always be an 
> option.  Especially in dealings with "civilized" NPCs.
> The presumption of my combat system is that PCs and NPCs become
> unconscious at 0 hit points, not dead (in general).  Any automated 
> combat stops allowing the PC or NPC to make a decision on whether to 
> finish the kill, heal, or bind and imprison the fallen.

Yes, but there's a lot more to non-leathal combat than knocking someone
unconscious (and almost dead in this case).  How about a simple tackle
(grappling), or the LAPD method of swarm-and-immobilize?  I personally
think if guards rush at Bubba trying to hack him with swords, they're more
likely to kill him than arrest him.

> I'm not fond of teleport mechanisms.  I'd rather the guards parade
> the captive through the streets on the way to prison. ;)

Same here.  Gives a bit of recognition (positive and negative) to the
arrested.  Also makes for a wonderful display when a known criminal is
brougt to justice.

> > > > Why not put a criminal on the wanted list if they run off this way. Then
> > > > they must disguise themselves on return or risk being recognised and ar-
> > > > rested next time they connect?
> > 
> The key here is whether the guards can "recognize" Bubba.  
> Recognition code for PCs and NPCs seems like [a good idea] to me.

Its actually trivial if you have Universal namespaces, especially if PCs
stay within virtual memory (just a pointer to the player and save some ID
number in case of system reboots).  Things really don't start to get
interesting until you add the dimension of _not_ being able to recognize
another character.

> > > > > More realistically, just force _characters_ to remain in-game even while
> > > > > the players are away...It becomes difficult to balance on a PK mud, but
> > > > > managible if you allow players to create scripts and defences to use in
> > > > > place of human input.
> > 
> > > > That's a possibility also even though it would make it impossible for
> > > > somebody like me to play your game.
> > >
> 
> Not necessarily.  It can be done in a manner that does not resemble
> programming or scripting in the traditional sense.
> 
> > > why? seriously you either place your character in a "safe room" where
> > > they cant be attacked (if the game allows such rooms) or you leave your
> > > connection active (their are numerous programs out there that will
> > > reconnect for you if you get dumped) and it is not very hard to program
> > > a simple script that will run when attacked or respond by saying run a
> > > room, hide, when X enters, attack X, run, etc.
>  
> The PC simply becomes an NPC in the game and would return to 
> "normal" daily life.  The presumes you have game mechanisms to define 
> and handle this sort of activity.  I don't think keeping the 
> connection active is a reasonable solution.
> 
Thank you.  I'm glad someone here realizes that characters just don't
'disappear' when the connection is severed.  The problems arising from
keeping characters alive while their player is absent is what prompted the
fortress-house concept.

> > > > > Basically, I'd have to create a near-omniscient, near-omnipresent, and
> > > > > near-omnipotent police force protecting this anti-violence zone, but such
> > > > > a force would by its nature overrun and control the entire mud-world to
> > > > > impose its doctrine of non-violence everywhere.  While this could be an
> > > > > interesting twist to the mud's theme, its not what I'm looking for.
> > > >
>  
> What are you looking for?  Guaranteeing the integrity of a 
> non-violent zone?  

Yes. that was the original intention, although it changed into an
interesting discussion of the game-physics involved in teleportation in a
parallel thread.  I was attempting to design a 'safe haven' without
breaking down SOD with the typical:
	%kill Bubba
	Violence is not permitted here.
which seems to be the standard current method of approaching such a
problem.