[MUD-Dev] Re: MUD-Dev digest, Vol 1 #163 - 25 msgs

[Travis Casey]

Thursday, July 20, 2000, 8:18:54 PM, Tamzen Cannoy <tamzen at worldbenders.com> wrote:
> At 6:54 PM -0500 7/20/00, Raph Koster wrote:

>>Another perspective on this same issue: I ran into an interesting
>>perspective when discussing design with someone else in the computer game
>>industry recently. He disliked some ideas I suggested regarding "social
>>professions" in an MMORPG because they were means of advancement that
>>measured your actual, real-life skill at certain things that were social in
>>nature--eg, using reputation systems to propvide advancement for being good
>>at social activities like getting crowds to come to your tavern, for
>>example. The logic was that in an RPG, the point is what skills reside on
>>your character, not your "self."

> It is to laugh.

> I'm sorry, but a stupid person cannot convincingly play a genius. If 
> you don't got things like diplomacy and tact in RL, you aren't gonna 
> be a very convincing ambassador. Etc. You gotta work with what you 
> got.

Correction:  a stupid person cannot convincingly play a genius without
help.  In paper RPGs, there are several ways to let someone play a
character smarter than him/herself.  For example:

 - Give the player more time.  A slow thinker may be able to come up
   with a good plan if given time to do so; his/her character in the
   game can then be said to have come up with the plan quickly.

 - Give the player more resources -- more information, access to other
   players to help make decisions even though his/her character
   wouldn't have that access, etc.

 - The GM can help.  As a parallel example, GURPS has an
   advantage "common sense".  If a player takes that advantage for
   his/her character, the GM makes an intelligence check for the
   character whenever he/she feels that the player is doing something
   stupid.  If the check succeeds, then the GM must warn the player.
   This allows an impulsive or thoughtless player to play a character
   who is not.

 - The GM can interpolate.  For example, if a player's character is
   supposed to be a tactical genius, but the player's combat plan has
   obvious holes in it, the GM can simply think how he/she would fill
   in those holes, and assume that the character did that.

Unfortunately, due to the different nature of muds, I don't think these
would transfer well.

--
       |\      _,,,---,,_    Travis S. Casey  <efindel at earthlink.net>
 ZZzz  /,`.-'`'    -.  ;-;;,_   No one agrees with me.  Not even me.
      |,4-  ) )-,_..;\ (  `'-'
     '---''(_/--'  `-'\_)   





_______________________________________________
MUD-Dev mailing list
MUD-Dev at kanga.nu
http://www.kanga.nu/lists/listinfo/mud-dev