[MUD-Dev] (no subject)

[John Buehler]

>From: Marian Griffith <gryphon at iaehv.nl>
>Date: Fri, 17 Nov 2000 22:52:03 +0000 (GMT)

>You would put restrictions  on what a character can do  if it is  either
>physically impossible for them (obviously) or if you, as a world-builder
>want to keep the players  true-to-type.  Paladins are supposed to be the
>champions  of their god,  and will have no desire  to do something wrong
>(ideally, that is). While some players will see the challenge in playing
>the paladin in character,  others will merely see a "cool" set of abili-
>ties.  To prevent dilution of the meaning of the term paladin  you might
>want to restrict the abilities of that class, if that matters to you, as
>a game designer.  There are of course other ways to achieve the same end
>result, but all take away freedom of the players one way or another,

  I once postulated a system where faction/opinion/liking/regard was a very
significant factor in the world's operation.  Whenever any character does
anything, all characters that can perceive that action make a judgement call
about that action.  Most actions would be inconsequential, but some actions
would cause characters to form a positive or negative opinion of the
character performing the action in question.

  Now couple opinion with possible favors.  If the baker likes you, he might
be willing to part with some ingredients that are a little tougher to find.
Or a recipe that he only hands out to buddies.  Build up good faction with
the captain of the guard and he might be willing to talk about security
measures being taken to protect somebody - or even just mention that an
important 'somebody' is coming to town soon.  And so on.  NPCs that like you
will grant you various favors that you have earned.  If NPCs actually
provide favors that enhance the success or enjoyment of players, that means
that what they like and dislike is significant.  That, in turn, means that
the players will have to be watching their P's and Q's in one town and how
they dot their I's in another - because the townsfolk are touchy about those
topics in their respective towns.

  This means that NPCs will like or dislike you as they see fit according to
your actions.  Obviously, this is good stuff for the NPC behavior code.  An
orc sees a human and immediately forms an intense dislike of him.  Change
things around so that the human appears as an orc and it might not be as
belligerent.  Change things around so that the orc doesn't see the human -
or can't tell if it's a human and you get yet another new behavior.  This is
the value of a good character perception model.

  What does this all have to do with paladins, you ask.  The gods are more
NPCs (whether they manifest themselves in the world or not).  And their
perceptions can be as perfect as you like.  And they judge the player
character actions, resulting in some faction rating with each god.  This is
true of ALL characters, not just paladins, priests and the like.  Those who
do things that are in line with the likes of a given god will work up
faction, and that means that favors can be requested of the god.  And the
favors from gods can be pretty significant.  So a paladin is simply a
fighter that fights in line with the likings of a given god.  A priest is
somebody who devotes even more time to focusing on the likings of a given
god.  This is in an attempt to accumulate such high faction that great deeds
can be done almost exclusively through godly favors.

  All of the above means that if you want to be a good paladin, you do
whatever is in line with your god.  If you want to change sides, knock
yourself out and do what a different god likes.  But you're going to have to
slowly switch factions and while you're half-and-half, you only get pansy
favors from two different gods.  Or none at all.  Don't want to be a fighter
anymore and prefer just doing things in line with your god?  Dump your armor
and sword and go off and pray, meditate and praise your god's name, boosting
your faction ever higher, permitting you to do good works (well, aligned
with your god, whatever that means).

  The biggest problem here is figuring out what the player character is
actually doing at anything more than an atomic level.  Oh look - he's
walking.  Big deal.  Is he stepping on the bodies of vanquished enemies?  Is
he stepping on wounded civilians?  Context could be rather significant.
Intent is not significant to this because everything relates to the godly
perception of what the character is doing.  I don't claim that such a system
is anywhere near perfect because a god figure could never really look at
extenuating circumstances very much.  The code would just be too difficult
using current techniques.  But the nice thing about gods is that they are
usually pretty fickle and unfeeling.  And that works well with computers and
straightforward algorithms.

JB


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