[MUD-Dev] Re: UBE/high: Re: FW: UBE/high: Re: W IRED: Kilers

[Adam Wiggins]

On Fri, 21 Aug 1998, Brandon J. Rickman wrote:
> On Wed, 19 Aug 1998, Marian Griffith wrote:
> > I actually was more concerned with  how to prevent the fighter spoiling
> > the fun of the tailor without forcing the tailor to become a fighter in
> > the process.
> 
> I have been avoiding this topic [for months] because there seems to be
> little prospect of progress for what is now the pro-tailor/anti-fighter
> camp.

That's a pretty odd way to view it.  I don't think that Marian desires to
prevent others from playing characters who have violence as part of their
profession, just that she wants to be able to be reasonably safe from
mauraders.  I also don't thinks she cares what profession said maurader
is.

> Well, time to throw my hat in the ring (as opposed to throwing down
> my glove, a decidedly aggressive gesture).  There are too many wanna-be
> computer science majors raised on "traditional" role-playing games trying
> to develop muds, leading to an overwhelming emphasis on aggression and
> combat as _fundamental_ elements for muds.

I might point out that it's also a fundamental element of the planet we
live on.  However, this does not necessary make any case for inclusion in
a purely fantasy game.

> When games are geared so that
> it is easy and profitable to be a fighter there should be no surprise when
> that particular activity is dominant.

I doubt anyone disagrees with this, just that they don't give it the
importance it deserves.  It's human nature, and indeed nature in general,
to follow the path of least resistence (aka "the most gain for the least
work").  Combat also tends to have a lot of opportunities to be
spectacular and exciting, which is why it is so much more often the
content of our entertainment than is sewing or fishing.  It's also
something people experience less in their day-to-day lives; most people
have probably sewn or fished in their lives, but in these days a
middle-class person can expect to see little combat outside of jujitsu
class.  This makes it that much more appealing as subject matter for
entertainment, IMO.

> Even though there is no need to defend the "fun of being a fighter",

Maybe you don't think so, but a lot of folks here seem to.  It's usually
with great appology that someone states they are making a diku-style
server, as if combat-based games are somehow a more base form of
entertainment than puzzle-solving, social interaction, or anything else
that finds its way into our entertainment.  And hey, maybe it is - but the
players don't care.

> fighter activity is constantly being
> defended in this thread with no explicit justification.  Solutions that
> make the game less fun [for fighters] or make the game less realistic [for
> fighters] are rejected out of hand. 

I guess I've been reading a different thread.  First of all, I don't think
there's such a thing as making a game more realistic only for a certain
class of character.  Most of the examples I've seen have focused around
gravity as a basic gameworld element.  This makes the game more realistic
for everybody, although naturally it's a feature that would probably be
most interesting to the character types of juggler, weightlifter, and
physicist.  By the same token, adding something like poison would be most
interesting first to herbalists, second to thieves, and the evenly to
everyone else.  But it still enhances the "realism", or better yet
"complexity and consistency of the game world", for everyone.

> Let us do away with market research for the moment.  Someone will
> invariably comment that it is all the little boys with cash in hand who
> drive the computer game market.

This is a) not true and b) irrelevant, at least to the hobbyists here.

> While that is a valid commercial reason
> for violent games it doesn't particularly satisfy cultural or social
> demands.
> 
> I will propose some priorities for how to develop a combat-unfriendly mud
> environment:

"Combat-unfriendly" is a pretty terrible way to describe the aims of your
game.  Personally I find it better to describe a project based on what it
*will* do, not on what it *won't*.

> 1) Minimize the ability of players to critically disable (i.e. maim,
> cripple, or kill) other players.
>
> 2) Maximize the difficulty for player actions that directly harm other
> players. 
> 
> 3) Eliminate the rewards for pro-active violence against all creatures.

So what you're saying is, if you don't want a feature in your game, don't
put it in?

> [snip rest of post]

It seems to me that you're trying to walk a line which will be equally
unsatisfying to everyone.  ("You can't please everyone all of the time..")
You want to make a game where the only people that will bother to become
good fighters are hard-core harassers, who will first become
super-powerful and then go on a gleeful killing spree, confident that they
can't be touched since no one else would take the time to built themselves
up as high.

I think the aim of the discussion was to determine how someone could be a
peaceful tailor in a typical fantasy world.  Such worlds include violence,
and many people whose professions give them great power over others.
Elliminating these people altogether may elliminate PK, but it also makes
it no longer heroic fantasy (since there are no heros).  Instead it's a
santized medieval world.  I don't get the feeling that's what anyone is
after.

Finally, critisizing someone for writing the game that they want to write
is an excercise in futility.  Useful suggestions are those which suggest
how professions like tailor could be fit into a heroic fantasy world.
Telling someone that they are stuck up "computer sciene wannabes" that
don't have any idea how to write a game just because they plan on
implementing combat is *not* useful, and is not going to convince anyone.