[MUD-Dev] Turn-based Combat

[Travis Casey]

Jon A. Lambert <jlsysinc at ix.netcom.com> wrote:

>I have been giving serious consideration to implementing a timed
>turn sequenced combat round.  I find the types of combat actions that
>interest me to be complex enough to warrant a turn based system.
>Selecting default actions and modes of attack seems easy enough as
>well as allowing a time delay for character's orders to be submitted.

[some cut to get to example.  Example indented two spaces to make
things clearer]

>  Bubba hurls a tankard at you hitting you square in the forehead.
>  Do you wish to engage Bubba? Y/N ....
>  > N
>  Ok.
>  > throw dagger at Bubba's bar stool.
>  You throw your dagger.  You miss the stool and the dagger hits
>  Bernie.
>  Do you wish to engage Bernie? Y/N
>  > Y
>  You have entered combat. You have 6 action points.
>  # draw dagger from left boot
>  You have 5 action points.
>  # charge Bernie
>  You have 3 action points.
>  # stab Bernie
>  You have 0 action points
>  # done
>  ...
>  You draw a dagger from your left boot.
>  You charge towards Bernie.
>  Bernie hurls a stool at you sending you crashing to the floor.
>
>Needs a little work eh?

Well, it depends on your audience... for an experienced paper gamer,
this would seem like a well thought out and easy to use system.  To
someone coming from a traditional mud background, this would seem
strange and hard to use.

You could make things a bit simpler by having a fairly short limit
on how long players can take to enter their commands (say, 10 seconds
or so), taking commands during that time, either discarding "extra"
commands or storing them for the next round, and having a default use
for action points that don't get used during a turn -- e.g., the
character will automatically use them for defensive actions as needed.

Of course, this would only simplify things in terms of what the players
see as they enter commands -- in other ways, it would be more complicated.
Tradeoffs, tradeoffs, tradeoffs.  :-/

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