[MUD-Dev] A flamewar startingpoint.

[Derrick Jones]

On Thu, 13 Nov 1997, Miroslav Silovic wrote:

> 
> Adam Wiggins <nightfall at user2.inficad.com> writes:
> 
> > I like slower timescales.  They take care of this problem pretty
> > nicely; 24 mud hours for us is about 2.5 RL hours.  Since I can go
> > pretty easily for 24 hours after eating a big meal, I figure people
> > that don't want to worry much about food can fill up and not have to
> > worry about it for several hours of play.  Of course, this still doesn't
> > solve the basic problem, which is that diku/lp-style food is pretty
> > boring no matter how little you have to do it, and as I always
> > say I don't see much point to putting something in the game that doesn't
> > add anything in particular.
> 
> Or you can have both. For example, make it happen, but
> off-camera. I.e.  allow players to set up camps. With a single
> command, player would unpack, eat, rest, pack, and they'd be able to
> continue. Perhaps they might also be bothered while camping (that
> could be checked) - but if no encounter occurs, there should be
> no message and no delays.

You then have problems keeping characters in the same time-frame.  Say,
for example Party_A camps for the night with no problems, and Party_B must
actively control the nights events.  Party_A sets out once again the next
morning and passes the sight of Party_B's camp long before Party_B is
finished with the prior nights activities.  You then have Party_A
observing a scene that hasn't been defined.  With a 2.5 hour day, an
8-hour night would take 50 minutes, during which time the characters are
unconscious and therefore the players would be forced to sit and wait
until they regained control of their characters.

There might be a way to resolve this problem by create non-linear
time-scales(such as allowing the night to pass more quickly if there is
nothing within range to affect the area where camp is made), but
implimenting such a thing would prove quite difficult.

Gunther