[MUD-Dev] Re: Leaving characters in play

[Travis S. Casey]

On Saturday, 16 May 98, John Bertoglio <alexb at internetcds.com> wrote:
> From: J C Lawrence <claw at under.engr.sgi.com>

>>I don't have a good design.  The best I can think of so far is:
>>
>>  -- No first blows are fatal.

> Why? You hit a bunny with a halbred and you either miss or have a binary
> bunny.

Yes, but that doesn't mean the bunny is necessarily dead -- it could
be missing an ear, a limb, or a large piece of skin, but still be
alive.

However, I think it most likely that JC meant that "no first blows
against PCs should be fatal" or that "no first blows against any
significant opponent should be fatal."  In either case, bunnies and
similar small creatures would be left out.

> Now when our system is finished, I guarantee that no player will score a
> one hit kill on another player...but that is a different story.

Never?  Why not?  It certainly isn't realistic not to allow one-hit
kills under any circumstances, and the more powerful the weapons in
your game become, the less realistic it becomes.  If, for example,
your game includes shotguns, grenades, and other such weapons, such a
rule starts to look silly.  If you go on into the kinds of
superweapons available in some SF, it becomes downright ridiculous.

Of course, you may be restricting your mud to just medieval weapons,
but I personally prefer to design systems that I can use for a wide
variety of possible muds.

> (I have a huge, somewhat incoherent post on a combat system started on my
> workstation at work. I should be able to poach enough time to post it next
> week sometime. It could even be coherent by then...It references a lot of
> past posts and might even be interesting.)

Please do post it when you have it ready!

--
       |\      _,,,---,,_        Travis S. Casey  <efindel at io.com>
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MUD-Dev: Advancing an unrealised future.