[MUD-Dev] Re: Introductions and descriptions

[Matt Chatterley]

On Wed, 19 Nov 1997, Richard Woolcock wrote:

> This message is getting huge, so i'm going to give it a trim.

<AOL> Me too! </AOL>
 
> Matt Chatterley wrote:
> [snip]
> > > The name is purely random, and is seperate from their 'login name'.  I am
> > > using the login name as the person's 'Soul name', which is permanent, and[snip]
> > This is a very interesting way to tie things in, although I'm not sure I'd
> > choose to do this (given your *theme* however, it seems very appropriate -
> > will you tie in the 'special' character types to these soul points,
> > somehow? Or will all your players be special, rather than mortal?)
> 
> All players will have soul points.  Its really just a way of getting around
> the problem of perm-death.  Basically, its like saying "Okay, so you died
> and that sucks...BUT your next character doesn't have to start completely
> from scratch".

Sort of reinforcing for the player that death is really a new beginning,
rather than the end. ;) As a point of interest, how will you cope with the
differnet types of character present in the WoD theme-base?
 
[Snip names]

> > > > This is good too - its starting to pull the concept of 'introductions'
> > > > away from the very static thing that it tends to be, into something far
> > > > more dynamic and more involved in the game. How are you coping with 'out
> > > > of character' communications and such? Eg: Who lists, tells, and such?
> > >
> > > The 'who' list and 'tells' show your login name (or 'soul name').
> > 
> > Makes sense to me. Presumably all other 'out of character information'
> > dealing commands will also relate to this, muchly like they might in a
> > unix environment - finger, and suchlike.
> 
> Yes the finger command works the same (as it checks the parameter against
> the pfile name).  I've still got a fair bit of tidying up to do with this.

Right. I'm not entirely sure where to go with this, since we notionally
have accounts (as yet the code is incomplete), to simplify
multiple-characters and such from a user point of view, but also use a
separate file per PC. We don't really care for enforcing anonymity between
player/character (while it is to be a quite 'intense' environment from our
perspective, we are also taking a light hearted look at some things, and
do not object to small breaches in our consistancy).

[Snip automation / player input for descs]

> Interesting way of looking at it.  At the moment my descriptions are 100%
> automated, but it would certainly be interesting if players could psudo-
> generate descriptions.  My main worry then would be that they might leave
> something important out because they didn't think it would look good in
> the description ("Hey, I didn't know you had glowing eyes!").

Yes. The main problems in my experience are important things omitted by
accident, by choice as you list, or maliciously (yes, you can maliciously
not include something in a desc!), and the same three apply to adding
untrue information without a just cause, although the second option only
notionally.

Good examples:

Players omitting striking features by accident (simply forgetting -
writing descs can be very confusing!), deciding it would look bad, or
being unable to phrase it well, or of course, leaving it out because it
would draw attention that they do not want, but without disguising it
appropriately in character (eg: Not saying they have black hair, rather
than going to IC extents to bleach it).

In terms of adding information, a player may accidentally add something
untrue (for instance, that they are wearing a prominent piece of jewellery
that was stolen a short while ago, but which they forgot to remove from
the desc), or simply make something up because they do *not* have the
right to do so with IC basis (for instance, describing oneself as a
were-creature, when one is not a were-creature, but infact, something
rather harmless in comparison).

> [snip]
> > > I do have eye/hair colour, as well as hair length and a choice of verb for
> > > both hair and eyes - however this is only used in the 'look at' description.
> > > I was considering working on some form of 'priority' to pull out features in
> > > order to create a short description.  I mean, you don't want to see:
> > 
> > I overlooked hair length. :)
> 
> I only have 'short', 'average', 'shoulder length', 'half way down back' and
> 'down to waist'.  Hair doesn't grow yet either.

There are *so* many verbs/adverbs that could apply to hair..
 
> > > A tall, ugly fat man with a bushy black beard, bald head, piercing blue eyes,
> > > heavily tanned skin dressed in expensive clothes says 'hello'.
> > 
> > Right, this is simply too verbose for most players. I personally am
> > capable (no boast, just a fact) of reading a screen of text in a few
> > seconds, and retaining most of the content - many, many, many people read
> > FAR slower than me, something of which I have to be repeatedly reminded,
> > because my messages for various minor game events tend to stray on the
> > verbose side of things. It also gives you far too much information, unless
> > your character is penomenally informative.
> 
> Hmmm so you're suggesting perhaps YOU the player could chose how much information
> you want to see about other people?  Now that would be very interesting...

Yes, either by concious choice (this would certainly be interesting), or
based on a stat. The former seems very intruiging, really.
 
> > > However it would be nice if it picked for example 'fat' and 'piercing blue eyes'
> > > (your characters most outstanding two features) and displayed:
> > >
> > > A fat man with piercing blue eyes says 'hello'.
> > 
> > This is good - certainly do it this way with prioritising, so that not
> > everyone is "A [size] [gender] with [colour] eyes."
> 
> The trouble is working out priorities - surely they are a personal thing?
> If I like slender women with long dark hair and dark eyes (read "I do" ;),
> then I might see something like:

You too? :P
 
>    A slender woman with long dark hair and dark eyes stands here.
> 
> Whilst if Bob likes chubby women with short hair and long legs, he might see:
> 
>    A skinny women with uncut dark hair and lovely long legs stands here.
> 
> I suppose I could churn up a 'favored description' whenever you first see
> someone, which it would give you (until you found out their name).

Yeah. Perhaps have the player select a few things from a menu (or enter
keywords) to determine how they view other people (the character), and so
forth, and then use this to construct these pro-tem descs.

[Snip rest, with a chuckle at Richard's comment that there are several WoD
based MUSH games]

Regards,
	-Matt Chatterley
"I shall never believe that God plays dice with the world." -Einstein