[MUD-Dev] There can be.. only ONE!

[J C Lawrence]

On Fri, 17 Apr 1998 15:36:38 PST8PDT 
Matt Chatterley<matt at mpc.dyn.ml.org> wrote:
> On Thu, 16 Apr 1998, J C Lawrence wrote:
>> On Wed, 15 Apr 1998 19:27:02 PST8PDT Matt
>> Chatterley<matt at mpc.dyn.ml.org> wrote: 

>> No.  Map changes derived from player base changes are
>> instantaneous.  There is no translation time from the old map to
>> the new (tho its probably worth putting the
>> check-population-count-and-remap check on a twenty minute pulse to
>> ensure that the game doesn't spend all its time flipping maps when
>> some twit writes a robot to log fake players on and off.
>> 
>> The result is that from a player perspective the world has a chance
>> of totally changing all about them every twenty minutes, but they
>> are guaranteed that *within* that 20 minute period the world will
>> remain relatively constant.  This effectively fracts the game into
>> segments each a multiple of 20 minutes long, each segment being
>> based on a new world map.

> Hmm, quite interesting. 

The intentions is to emphasise the ability of the players to adapt and 
quickly orient to become most rapidly combat ready.  In such a world a 
tightly coordinated *team* of such players would be a fearsome
opponent.  

Thought:  Possibility of dividing team kills among members?  Straight
division of kill count by membership poses obvious problems (I join
successful team and then go hide for the duration:  I still profit.).
Possibly divving or awarding kills among all team members within a
radius defined by the victim's score?

> The system will certainly be coordinate based, and may or may not
> use a custom client (completely undecided - the first incarnations
> will probably work with any telnet-happy thing). My next question,
> or issue to resolve relates to how to tackle placing players when
> they enter the game - from a safe room into random coordinates?

First thought: Throw the players into the game at a couple miles of
altitude.  Give them crude trajectory controls.  Have impact/landing
generally not be fatal (or if fatal, non penalising).  this gives the
new player an instant physical world context.
 
>> I'd be more tempted to do an equation ala:
>> 
>> The power of a newly popped weapon is inversely proportional to the
>> time remaining to the current world map _IF_ the map is due to
>> change next cycle, and is otherwise constant/pre-set.
>> 
>> The result would be that players in the final minutes of a world's
>> life would be toting planet busters, a few minutes before that a
>> few-dozen-megaton nukes, and etc on down.  This also gives the chap
>> who manages to find the "ultimate" weapon in the last 30 seconds of
>> the world-life the chance to kill *EVERYBODY* in one single trigger
>> pull.

> Yeah. Given a continuous world, and assuming I go with the
> 'basically human' players and weapons/equipment (as opposed to an
> idea which KaVir sparked - 'robot' players who collect 'add-ons'),
> I'm not sure how I'd approach this.

You're still going to grow/shrink the world with population changes?
Are those world growths going to be gradual or sudden?  You can
probably figure some way to still key that to the propulation change
mechanics.
 
>> Ahh, but older well established players who are members of
>> successful teams are ALSO anonymous to members of different
>> teams...

> Yup. Everyone should be anonymous to begin with, and in general. I
> quite like the 'account' separate from PC approach, although this
> causes problems with maintaing teams. Hmm.

Nahh.  Everybody is *ALWAYS* anonymous _except_ to members of their
own team.

Note: In reaction to Raph's recent UOL tales: Allow team members to
(optionally) have clearly visible (to all, not just team members) tags
as to their affiliation: arm bands, uniforms, body-types, floating
bubbles...
 
> Although theres nothing bad about them being targets, it would be
> 'bad' (from some points of view, I suppose) for them to be targets
> *to a greater extent* than anyone else. :)

That's why everyone is anonymous to all but team members.  The above
extra ID characteristics would make those teams that adopt them
definite identifiers, making them targets -- but some might like that
discinction.
  
>> Yup.  What you would supply are excellent communications and
>> tactical coordination tools to encourage group efforts.

> Yeah. This would work nicely. Give them tools, let them build their
> own teams / organisations.

<bow>

--
J C Lawrence                               Internet: claw at null.net
(Contractor)                               Internet: coder at ibm.net
---------(*)                     Internet: claw at under.engr.sgi.com
...Honourary Member of Clan McFud -- Teamer's Avenging Monolith...