[MUD-Dev] Re: DIS: Client-Server vs Peer-to-Peer

[Mik Clarke]

Caliban Tiresias Darklock wrote:
> 
> On 01:32 AM 12/19/98 -0800, I personally witnessed Marc Hernandez jumping
> up to say:
> >       Hmm.  So if I like playing games I am an average schmuck with a
> >pointless existance?  Or does being able to program makeup for that?
> 
> No. If you are an average schmuck with a pointless existence, you will
> usually like playing games. The converse does not apply and was never
> intimated. Cause and effect are not commutative.
> 
> >       I agree that games should be fun.  I agree that there is a sense
> >of accomplishment.  I was merely putting forth that games that perhaps
> >reflected a little more of life could be fun.
> 
> The need to be part of a team to achieve anything is a need that many of us
> do not feel, understand, or even recognise. If you need a team to
> accomplish something, then the team can probably accomplish it without you.
> Maybe the team needs someone else to replace you (if it takes four people
> to lift something, a team of three is just not going to lift it), but YOU
> -- meaning you personally, as a unique individual -- are not important. You
> are just a member of the team. Anyone else would have done. Even when you
> go to a class-based system. We need a cleric. Are there any clerics around
> here? ANY CLERIC WILL DO. Skills based? We need someone with lockpicking.
> Does anyone have lockpicking? ANYONE WILL DO.

Not necessarily.  There can be valid roleplay and behavioural reasons
why one cleric is prefrable to another.  I will agree that it's more a
matter of the company you keep than of who has the skills.  If you have
are going to raid the tombs of Roth, do you take the Cleric of Mithra or
the Cleric of Set?  If the Cleric of set is the only one available, do
you still go?  If the cleric of Mithra refused to help evil players,
would you still take him?  If you know cleric of Mithra was incompetent
and prone to doing silly things, would you still take him?

Strangely enough, not everyone has the discipline to be a member of a
team.  Working well in a team requires that you get to know what the
othe members can do and what they cannot.  A good team will go a lot
further than an individual, but a bad team will probably kill each other
off fairly quickly.
 
Mik
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