[MUD-Dev] Usability and interface ...

[Derrick Jones]

On Thu, 9 Oct 1997, Caliban Tiresias Darklock wrote:

> On Thursday, October 09, 1997 5:16 AM, Broly 
> [SMTP:gunther at online1.magnus1.com] wrote:
> >
> > There is a fish swimming in a lake.  You are hungry, so you whip out your
> > Castmaster 2000 and attempt to catch the fish.  Do you remain hungry? Or
> > do you catch the fish?  If you leave it up to the character, that fish
> > doesn't stand a chance.
> 
> And what exactly does this add to the game? Aren't we all more or less in 
> agreement that eating and drinking and toilet habits are needless detail? 

As far as toilet habits are concerned, I suppose we are, but I won't
pretend to speak for the rest of the list.  I for one think eating and
drinking are details that aren't needless (at least for the world I'm
designing).  In a world where food and water are scarce (i.e. a desesrt
world), scavaging for food can be a great motivational push.  Players
won't hang around in a few selectd areas because (for one reason) that
area will run out of food/water, and the characters will soon follow.

The problem I have with food code is that it is treated as follows:
	You are hungry.
	>buy 10 bread
	The grocer tells you 'That will be 30 coins.'
	You now have 10 breads.
	>eat bread
	You eat the bread.
	>eat bread
	You eat the bread.
	You are full.
Now this adds nothing to your mud.  Characters having full access to a
constant and unlimited food supply is the problem.  It can, however, add a
whole new dimension to play if players have to actually _work_ to eat.
A forest where characters harvest nuts, berries, animals is worth
protecting from a horde of orcs, unlike a generic and generally useless
copse of trees.  Also, the rampaging orcs have a reason to invade the
forest.
I also have a plan on the back burner to put in a nutrition system.  This
will also increase the range of character travels/interactions.  Salmon is
brainfood, red meats are best for muscle building, but they're high in
fats...Its going to be tricky to do it right, but once its in, (smart)
players will watch what they eat, set up trading guilds, and be
ever-mindful of their food supply.
So, yes, it does add to the game to have that character spend some time
fishing beside a small mountain stream.  The character can then eat that
fish (cooking is in my mind a mindless detail), sell it, or trade it.

> I for one think it's fun to be really bad at something and think you're 
> good at it. On most MUDs, the more I go out and do something badly, the 
> better I get at it -- but I don't WANT to get better at it. I want to stay 
> bad at it, because there's just some fundamental part of the skill that my 
> character doesn't get. Golf is an excellent example. Don't we all know some 
> guy who just SUCKS at golf, and has been playing for years, but never quite 
> seems to *get* it? I like that. I think it's funny in games to have quirks 
> like that. If there's an actual skill attached to it, it's rather difficult 
> to maintain one. This is also entertaining to the other players...

Not all skills have to advance/decay at the same rate.  Or even at all.
For the golf example, each character would have a personal maximum based
on character stats, so that poor dolt would never really become good at
the game, but after many, many years he wouldn't be quite so bad.  If you
really don't like the idea of basing maximums and advance/decay rates on
player stats, determine them at the time of character creation (either
random or chosen).

> > Simular arguments for scrollwork (can your
> > character write a scroll, or will the magic in the words activate and
> > crisp your character?)
> 
> No, I meant like carving scrollwork along the edges of a table for 
> decoration. No matter how well it's done, lots of people will think it's 
> ugly, and no matter how crappy it looks, someone will just love it. There's 
> no effective game mechanic that can represent that.

Ahh...But what if the player decides to sell the table in an NPC shop?
what value has the scrollwork added/detracted from the value of the table?
Yes, the actual description of the scrollwork could be written by the
player whose character did the work, but if you intend on actually
changing anything about the table that affects other objects, you need a
game mechanic to handle the change.
If you intend on leaving the change limited to a cosmetic one, then I
would tend to agree with you that it doesn't need a scrollwork skill, but
I personally would add an objective value (as in sell cost) to a table
that has a masterful piece of scrollwork done to it.

> > So back to the 'singing' example...Say a character breaks out into song 
> in
> > the middle of a battle.  If the words inspire the singers allies (they 
> get
> > bonuses on key dicerolls while the song is sung.) and strike fear into 
> the
> > hearts of the enemy(thus causing them to rout), then there should be some
> > game construct controlling the quality of the music.
> 
> That's not a function of how well you sing.
> Ozzy Osbourne isn't much of a *singer*, but he could certainly inspire the 
> troops and strike fear in the hearts of the enemy. Iron Maiden does some 
> crunching, grinding songs that just make you *want* to advance through 
> enemy lines and slaughter everything in your path.
> They're not hard to sing or play.
> They're not fantastic award winning performances.
> 
> This sort of 'inspire the troops' effort is not a direct measure of musical 
> ability.

Okay...I see your point.   I was thinking along the lines of a Bard-style
skill 'inspirational music' where, in the heat of battle, the player
controlling the bard would type 'inspire' and the game then effecively
composes short little snippets for display purposes, and gives benifits
according to how good the character is at inspiring people in battle.

Of course the following still works:
	>sing Row row row your boat.
	You sing 'Row row row your boat.'.
Or your could even add an adjetive list:
	>sing @clear 'Row row row your boat.'
	You sing 'Row row row your boat.' in a clear voice.
with the '@' added to distinguish between
	You sing 'Row row' in a clear voice. and
	You sing 'clear Row row'.
You could elininate the '@' by requiring the singing to state a voice
tone, but many players just want to sing, and don't care how.

Gunther