[MUD-Dev] Introductions and

[Richard Woolcock]

Matt Chatterley wrote:
> 
> On Tue, 18 Nov 1997, Mike Sellers wrote:
> 
> > At 10:05 AM 11/18/97 PST8PDT, Matt Chatterley wrote:
> > >> Hi there, thought you might be interested to know that I had a go at the
> > >> player recognition system I was talking about before I lost access.
> > >
> > >Oo..
> > >
> > >> Description is currently determined by gender and age - so you might be
> > >> 'a handsome elderly gentleman' or a 'pretty young teenage girl', etc.
> > >> However, to get around the problem of 'silly names', each player gets a
> > >> random first and surname when they connect (over 100 first names for
> > >> each gender and almost 1000 surnames means duplicates are unlikely).
> > >
> > >Now this, is a VERY interesting twist! Does the player get to choose a
> > >'connection' or 'account' name to log in under, and then have the 'game
> > >name' assigned, or is the 'game name' synonymous(sp?) with the 'account'
> > >name?
> >
> > This *is* interesting.  Given that we randomly generate character stats all
> > the time in games, I'm surprised randomly generating names isn't more
> > prevalent.  After all, how many of us got to choose our names? :)  (And I
> > suppose for a fee, you could go to city hall or whatever and register to
> > change your name if you wanted...)
> 
> Heh! Fascinating perspective - and you're quite right too. We have some
> choice in our name, as we can simply lie about it, ditto in the game. I

I don't have that coded though, although it could prove entertaining.  I
think it might also prove very confusing (Wah...you're telling me that
YOU'RE called Joe Bloggs as WELL???).

> really do like this. Richard was at one time toying with 'parentage' of
> some form - are you still thinking of this, and would you pass family
> names down?

Yes, and yes - although its on hold right now, I *am* working on dynamic
mobs, and parentage will be vital if I don't want my population dying out.

> > >> Players descriptions are also determined automatically, although players
> > >> can chose their eye/hair colour when they create their character, and
> > >> these basically sum-up the appearance.  Character descriptions are still
> > >> a long way from completion though.
> > >>
> > >> I'd be interested to hear any of your player-recognition ideas -
> > >> particularly on how you intend to generate descriptions.
> > >
> > >This is another interesting area actually, and the first point I'd keep in
> > >mind, is that if you are aiming at a very rp-centric game, fully automated
> > >descriptions are probably a bad idea (note: for the benefit of anyone in
> > >the audience, rp-centric mainly refers to Tiny-derivs, but could
> > >technically be anything. Most tiny-derivs have player-written descs, but I
> > >know at least one which does not).
> >
> > Perhaps you could let people write their own descs as a function of their
> > level/rank/score in the game?  Or, perhaps better for RPing, keep the desc
> > automatic, but include a bit more spice if the character is powerful in the
> > game, where this 'spice' accentuates the character's most powerful
> > attributes.  Frankly, if I never see another desc along the lines of
> > "flaming red hair and lips to match, ice blue eyes that at once chill your
> > soul and inflame your desire..." (ugh) that'll be fine with me! :)
> 
> Heh. This reminds me of what you might consider the 'cardinal rules' of
> descing, in all aspects (descing objects, rooms, and players). Personally
> I find the biggest rule is:
> 
> Do not tell a player what their character is feeling, doing, or
> thinking, unless you are *absolutely sure* they they will be
> feeling/doing/thinking this.
> 
> A good example is making a statement like '.. and you find her very
> attractive.'. The character who is looking at said attractive female thing
> of undescribed qualities and nature may be a gay man, or a straight woman
> (although this *does not* mean they can't find a woman attractive!), but
> may also be a member of another race who finds her race repulsive and so
> on. Such statements must either change dynamically to suit the situation,
> or not be put in at all.

Interestingly enough, I have hardcoded a 'feelings' system.  When you first
meet someone, you roll Appearance+Etiquette to see what sort of first
impression you give.  Usually there is no particular feeling either way,
although occasionally you'll take an automatic like or dislike to someone.

I am planning on expanding on this, so that you suffer penalties for 
attacking people you like (maybe a larger humanity loss).  I will also be
coding it so that as people do things you like or dislike, your reaction
to them will change.  Thus if Bob kills your true love, you'll hate his
guts (assuming you witness it or someone tells you about it).  This should
make a nice addition to the 'information trade'.

I am still not entirely convinced that this SHOULD be coded, but then there
is only one way to find out if it'll work or not.  It could certainly prove
interesting - falling in love with someone you can't stand, for example ;)
I've already had one player kill a mob, because 'he didn't like it' (I've
only had my new code up for testing a few brief times).

As far as quests go, this has some interesting possibilities.

On the mention of sexuality, I am probably going to code in a couple of
Flaw - homosexual and bisexual.  Not that I have anything against people
of those particular persuasions, but not being able to have children
(homosexual) and being able to be seduced by people of either gender
(bisexual) are what I consider disadvantages.

I still don't know how I'm going to code seduction though.  Hopefully the
emotional responce thing will help.

> > While we're talking about names, how do you propose to deal with
> > name-collision?  I've never really liked the fact that all names in typical
> > MUDs must be unique.  It seems like you could easily allow for multiple
> > name instances by keying off the combo of character name and player name
> > internally.  The only problem comes up in areas where, for example, I want
> > to talk to "Joe" or send game-mail to "Joe."  If there are a dozen Joes out
> > there, how do I know which one I want?  Even in the scheme described above,
> > you could have several "Joe Doe" characters.  I suppose you could list
> > further, publicly known information for each, such as occupation, general
> > area where they live ("Joe Doe of Tos, who is a merchant"), or in a
> > graphical environment, a picture of them -- anything to help other players
> > differentiate their Joe from all other Joes.
> 
> Hmm. Interesting. I suspect I'd answer this thusly:
> 
> Out of character communiques must go c/o the account name, which solves a
> huge problem.

This is what I am doing.

> In character communiques might function using addresses, telephone numbers
> and such, since Richard is in a fairly modern environment (aren't you?).

Yes...

> It is actually something I like the sound of - you can't just send someone
> mail and label it 'ic', because you need to actually know all their
> details.

Hmmm yes I forgot 'address'...I'll have to add that to the list of things
you can know about people.

KaVir.