[MUD-Dev] Re: WIRED: Kilers have more fun

[Maddy]

On Mon, 29 Jun 1998, Koster, Raph wrote:

> 
> 
> > -----Original Message-----
> > From:	Maddy [SMTP:maddy at fysh.org]
> > Sent:	Monday, June 29, 1998 7:00 AM
> > To:	mud-dev at kanga.nu
> > Subject:	[MUD-Dev] Re: WIRED: Kilers have more fun
> > 
> > On Fri, 26 Jun 1998, Koster, Raph wrote:
> > > Very nice analysis. Of course, the alternative is for the game to
> > play
> > > the cop, which is actually rather hard to pull off.
> > 
> > Not really - a NPC sees two people fighting.  They wander over and
> > break up
> > the fight, maybe even arrest them and put them in a jail.  The idea
> > that a
> > cityguard would imediately try and kill someone just for starting a
> > fight
> > seems a bit hypercritical(sp?).
> > 
> Either way, the game is playing cop. Whether it uses deadly force is
> really a side issue. Deadly force is of course a LOT easier to code. :)

Well the game is only playing cop where the players don't want to.  You're
right about deadly force being easier I guess, but that doesn't make it
right.  Non-deadly force makes far more sense, you end up with less bodies
lying about the place, and you provide roleplaying events, such as 'jail
breaks'.

> However, let's analyze the basic scenario you described, with typical
> problems we ran into:
> 
> "An NPC sees two people fighting."
> 
> How? Line of sight? What if the players block the view? Do we allow the
> use of NPC witnesses? Can the guard be called to the location? Who can
> do the calling? Who GETS the call, what is the itnerface? Do you need to
> call guards to empty air, and thus monitor the guarded space for all
> speech, place the monitoring code on the players, or have NPCs hear the
> call and thus permit "deserted alley" fighting without guards showing
> up?
> 
> "They wander over"
> 
> Pathfinding? How expensive is it? What if the fight is on the roof? What
> if the door is locked? What if other people or objects block the way?
> What if the combatants (or specifically, the aggressor) runs away, can
> the guard catch them?
> 
> "and break up the fight"
> 
> How? Remove any combat pointers between the two combatants? What if they
> re-initiate? How long does the guard monitor them? Do we physically
> separate them? How? Do we do searches of the area to determine open
> space to which to move the two characters? (And do we feel comfortable
> with the idea of taking control of a player's character this way?) If we
> do move them, do we have any sort of movement prediction queue which
> will be messed up by this?


> You get the idea. FWIW, in UO we used to have guards who were called by
> players, said call heard by an NPC, were created offscreen, walked to
> the point of the incident, announced their intention to stop the fight,
> and attacked the two players if the fight didn't go away immediately.
> And players ran LOOPS around 'em. So now they teleport to the guy and
> slay 'em in one blow.

Thats essentially how I'd like NPCs guards to work - most NPCs will be
created "off screen" as and when they're needed.  It seems that rather than
trying to fix the "bug" that let players have an unfair advantage in combat,
you reversed the imbalance by making the guards superpowerful.

> > Hmm.  What I meant was, why does the average player have to be the one
> > to
> > stop killers running through the streets killing innocent people?  I
> > think
> > Marian (not Mike - left his attribution string in by accident)
> > actually
> > meant that normal players would have to stoop down to the killers
> > level,
> > rather than killers being the one to take on the killers.
> > 
> It doesn't have to be the "average player." It could be particular
> players. It could be NPCs with parameters set by players. And of course,
> in the classic mud model, it could be the code or the admins. But that
> is sort of limiting to player governments, and what I try to evolve away
> from.

See - a clear example of me not explaining myself properly.  *8(
Sure it could be particular players, thats the whole idea - players who want
to be guards should be guards.  Buffy the tailor shouldn't have to turn into
a pyschotic killing machine to protect her shop.  If no-one wants to be a
guard, the game should make up the numbers.

> > Well I wasn't just talking about players - they're the minority in
> > most
> > muds.  I'd imagine that there are loads of NPCs that would want to be
> > watchmen & bodyguards to make up for the lack of numbers *8).  As for
> > the
> > corpses, you probably want streetcleaners too?
> > 
> Sure, but then the standards are set by the coders, in the areas defined
> by the coders, and players have no power. (Nor responsibility).

No, the standards are set by the rulers of the city/kingdom/whatever.  This
maybe an NPC, or it maybe a player who managed to get elected.  Indirectly
the admin/coders have provided a set of rules by which the NPCs "think", but
I'm planning on making NPCs use a subset of these to make them not all
alike.

> > You can leave the day-to-day boring parts of being a guard, such as
> > walking
> > about the town doing sod all to the NPCs as they'll just be following
> > their
> > programming.
> > 
> Which puts us back where we started.
> 
> > > In the player-run cities of UO, we've recapitulated many of the
> > classic
> > > problems: player-run cities having problems with absent guards,
> > guards who
> > > turn out to be in the pocket of the gangs, guards who quit, guards
> > who
> > > would rather go on vigilate sprees of their own...
> > To me, these kinds of things aren't a problem and are perfectly
> > natural
> > things to find in a roleplaying environment.  In fact none of these
> > things
> > in themselves affect anyone else enjoyment.
> > 
> They do if that guard you expected to be there isn't, and a roving
> warband comes in and ruins your carefully constructed roleplay event.

No.  That just means when you planned the event you didn't take into account
all the possible outcomes.  There are (in my experence) two types of
table-top GM - those that follow the game out of the book, and those that
make it up as they go along.  The former will consider a warband ravaging an
event a bad thing - the latter will have either made sure the warband
found something better to do, or fit the warband into the event.

The easiest solution to prevent the warband doing any lasting damage is to
actually give the NPCs some intelligence.  Your average NPC on a mud today,
will quite happily stand there whilst gangs of thugs wander past and not
blink an eyelid.  Surely they would run away at the sight of an armed gang
- I know I would.

Add to this the idea that the local rulers _could_ make laws preventing people
openly carrying weapons, or even not allowed any weapons at all.  Guards can
then arrest people for breaking such laws, thus preventing fights before
they happen.

> I suspect we are speaking at cross-purposes here. I was talking about an
> environment where players are building governments, setting their own
> laws, and there is a considerable amount of freedom. You seem to be
> assuming a fairly high level of admin/code governance...

Actually I'm not.  I can't remember how much I've stated about what kind of
game I'm aiming for (mostly cos I've not been "around" much lately) but what
I'm aiming for is a game where players _or NPCs_ are building governments,
setting their own laws etc.  The admin, namely myself and er...well it's
just me, won't need to get in and prod NPCs to do things.  I want to create
a game where NPCs do more than just get killed and actually create a fun
environment that players can join.

Maddy