[MUD-Dev] RE: UO's rep system, was: CGDC

[Koster]

The title of the thread was WAY overdue for a change, so I changed it.
:)

J C Lawrence [SMTP:claw at under.engr.sgi.com] said:

> On Thu, 21 May 1998 09:39:32 -0500 
> Koster, Raph<rkoster at origin.ea.com> wrote:
> 
>> J C Lawrence [SMTP:claw at under.engr.sgi.com said:
> 
>>> Can you take the head to any guard in any city?  Why virtualise it
>>> to that extent?  Why not have the bounty tied to the city the
>>> report and bounty donation was made at, such that a grevious killer
>>> may then have multiple bounties at multiple cities (translation:
>>> localised notoriety).
>> Because we used to do it this way, and it proved difficult for
>> players to locate the proper city, afforded too much anonymity for
>> the murderers, and resulted in few bounties being claimed.
>You ran your play testing on your test shards right?

No, actually--this was with the bounty system which already previously
existed in UO (and still does, though it is currently largely disabled).
Despite the various means of rapid transport which you mention, we found
that the expected "market in heads" never materialized, and that most
people had real trouble finding the place where the head should be
turned in. (The head didn't come with a handy notation saying "Wanted in
Trinsic").

>You have Moongates and spells which are in fairly widespread use to
>link the cities, yes?  While its not being widely done now, it is
>possible to move quickly and detministically between all the cities at
>fairly high speed?

It is indeed done now. I don't know WHY it wasn't more of a factor--I
just know it wasn't. :) The bounty system was in place for months...

>Understood.  The point about the immediately above is that it doesn't
>add complexity for the normal case.  It adds complexity for only those 
>who wish to take advantage of it.  
>The normal murderer killer will knock the chap off, take his head, run 
>off to the city and trade it in for cash.  Simple, A to B, done deal.

Not simple if the city happens to be on the other side of the map, in a
place that said character cannot easily reach, though. Or figure out
which city it is in the first place, in which case the amount of
journeying required to determine it becomes onerous or just not worth
the money. (Gating and recalling across the map costs a
not-insignificant amount of money for the reagents required to cast the
spell).

>  What happens if multiple heads for a given murderer are turned in?
>Will only the first get the bounty?

Yes.

>  What is the criminal status of a killed and ressurected murderer?

He's a murderer and still subject to the loss of stats and everything
else. He has to wait the eight hours of playtime it takes for a kill
count to atrophy away.

>So __only__ pure innocents ever get the chance to report?

Correct.

>> OK, but in order to get your character up high enough to kill a
>> bunch of people, you will have to make a significant investment in
>> him. And then you'll lose said investment when you die as a
>> Murderer. So you gain money, but odds are pretty good not as much
>> money as you had to spend in order to make him a badass mage fast
>> enough to kill multiple victims.
>Run two mules, one repetitively killing the other?

Where's the bounty come from? Your own pocket. What's the point? :)

-Raph