[MUD-Dev] more classes (Usability and interface and who the hell is suppo)

[Ola Fosheim Grøstad <olag@ifi.uio.no>]

"Jon A. Lambert" <jlsysinc at ix.netcom.com> wrote:
>Usually at a gaming convention the GM will have pre-generated 
>characters on hand and likely they are designed with the scenario 
>to be run in mind.  Muds need to be a bit more flexible in that any 
>profession or race available to players has to be playable in the 
>game.  I have noticed on certain mud-types when the implementors 
>implement a new or unusual race or class within a couple of days 
>there will be a huge quantity of such character types.  If the type 
>is unbalanced in any way you'll see either many playing the type or 
>very few.  Part of the problem is that character customization is 
>very minimal on many muds and is limited to class and race.

I don't know if this has been used in muds, but how about providing a
very limited wellknown set of classes (I'd go for just one class) when
you first log on.  After some time playing you'll probably discover
that this wasn't the right thing after all, then you get the option of
rerolling class/skills but keeping the skillpoints/xp (within reason).

In my opinion, if everybody starts with weak characters (as seems to
be the common case in muds), then everybody should start out alike, no
differences whatsoever (except for looks), and your actions would be
your destiny. If you do what vampires do, you'll eventually become a
vampire, and gradually start looking like one as well. (your teeth
grow etc)

I see the consistency in looks/actions as an important communication
aspect, even an imporant usability concept.  For instance in M59 you
would get your name written in red above your head if you were a
playerkiller.  Although there were some major disadvantages with this,
quite a few players were proud of having their names in red, in fact
it became just as much a part of their identity as their looks, armour
and weapons.  Newbies would also ask you "why is your name red" when
you tried to be nice to them, as if they tried to figure if there was
a catch to the attention you gave them, I guess you could call that a
bad charisma.  I guess you could say that the colour of your name
constituted an adaptive class system.  Although this is a simple
example I believe that this approach is desirable, and it actually
could automatically keep characters more "in character", because if
they act differently, their "class" will change.

Ola.