[MUD-Dev] The grass is always greener in the other field

[J C Lawrence]

On Thu, 16 Dec 1999 14:06:43 -0800 (PST) 
Matthew Mihaly <diablo at best.com> wrote:

> This is, unfortunately, quite impossible to do in my experience
> unless your items are all very generic and exactly the same. For
> instance, aside from the shortsword that newbies get if they go
> through our newbie introduction, all armour and weapons within the
> game (well, aside from a couple of resetting quest items) are
> produced by players, and they all have individual stats attached
> to them. Aggregating the items would require them to lose their
> individuality. 

No, it would require them to lose the individuality being attached
to a *specific* object.  Look instead at the class of objects and
the distribution of "individuality".

Consider:

  You have 50 handmade short swords.  They all have individual
"unique" stats and other qualifiers.  You put them in a pile in the
corner of the room covered by a blanket, and then pull out a random
sword.

  Do you really care that that sword was #438 and that its stats etc 
are XYZ, or would you be just s happy with a shortsword which had a
generated set of stats which fit the basic distribution model?

If so, you can then decay all the swords under the balnket back to
ur-object swords and then instantiate them only as needed.

> It's the same problem with most items in Achaea actually. Most
> things decay with time (whether in your inventory or not), and
> aggregating them requires losing individual decay times.

I see little reason that a decay time need define a unique object.
It merely defines an object as a member of a class of objects with
similar decay stats.

--
J C Lawrence                              Internet: claw at kanga.nu
----------(*)                            Internet: coder at kanga.nu
...Honorary Member of Clan McFud -- Teamer's Avenging Monolith...


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