[MUD-Dev] Acting casual about casual gamers

[Spin]

On Sun, Jun 25, 2000, Dan Shiovitz wrote:
<big snip>
> This all assumes character skill is much more important than what items
> they have, but we all agree with that, right?

No, if I have the Uzi and you have the omelette, I should get to tell you to
"suck eggs".

It shouldn't really be a contest between skills and possessions. The 
"dedicated" gamer should know a dozen nearby hiding places to avoid a 
ravaging pack of newbies. They may have contacts in various "protection" 
guilds who'll provide men-at-arms for a fee or a favor. They may be so far 
out in the wilderness that they are very unlikely to encounter a newbie.

  An idea that has been tumbling around in my head for a while now, which
I haven't brought to the list as I'm about two months behind the current
postings, is the following. Nearly every player is striving to be the
"hero/arch-villian" in the storybook of the mud they are playing. Given
that "heroes" are a one in a thousand find, this requires a thousand
"peasants" happy to plod along in their daily grind, to support this hero.
To put it another way, 
"You need a lot of ordinary to make the extraordinary".

  Also what makes a "hero" in many cases is simply the fact that they
have lived through what so many others haven't. These "deaths" have to 
come from somewhere, and if you can't get your PCs to die like flies,
you'll have to make sure your NPCs do (whilst most muds have the
mechanics for this, the actual events are exceedingly rare).

  Muds should strive more to give players the feeling that they are
the "cream of the crop" the moment they enter the game and that great
feats await them (be they on the battlefield, or in the market place),
ather then the current attitude of "Your 'common' til you've played x hours
or raised stat y to z".

  To tie this back into casual gamers, to a certain extent, they can't
expect to be the "main character" in the "main storyline", when they only 
appear in one or two of the chapters. However they should be able to feel
that the appearances they make are important to the whole story none the 
less, and that there are many sub-plots in which they can "play" the
lead role.

  To support these sub-plots you need lots of the ordinary, which is where
you roll out the NPCs and is a reason why I feel most muds that rely too
heavily on PCs to create the atmosphere of the mud will fail. You just
won't find a thousand people willing to play the peasant for every person
who wants to play the hero.

Cheers,
  Malcolm Valentine (rambling on).



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