[MUD-Dev] Are crafts fun?

[Michelle]

I also just joined the list.

> On Fri, 21 Dec 2001, Bobby Martin wrote:

> Is there a MUD or similar game now in which crafting is fun?
> That's an honest question, not a troll.

Well, I very much enjoyed fishing and tailoring during down time in
EQ. ("I once caught a rusty knife THIS big...")  But part of that
was, I used them as something to do during down time, which is more
boring then actually making crafts... Well, that and the fact that I
could fish while hidden...  So people would hear the splash of me
casting my line into the pond in the Blackburrow tunnels and not see
who was fishing... That amused me greatly.  But I digress.

> I have yet to see one in which crafting is more than clicking a
> button/entering a command.  Gathering materials is fun, finding
> out how to craft new items is fun, selling items is fun, building
> a reputation is fun, getting increased skill is fun,

But doing all those other things are also nothing more then clicking
a button or entering a command... The MMO community is made up of
people who think clicking buttons and entering commands is fun.
It's just that a battle or conversation involves more
clicking/entering and, in the case of graphic based games, more
movement and sound.  (Mebbe that's why I liked fishing so much, it
was the only tradeskill that made a noise...)  But if you make the
player more actively involved in trade skills my making them click
more then one button or enter more then one command, they'll
probably complain that your tradeskills are "more complicated" then
those of other games...  So what can be done?

> I want to move the not-fun part offline and leave the fun part
> online.

So if I want to make something I have to log off?  That's an
interesting idea...  It might cut down on powerleveling of skills.
Which most people do even if you implement an vaguely interesting
and profitable system with which to level your skill up.

Like the "consignments" on DAoC.  (FYI, If you don't play DAoC) The
Trade Master tells you that a certain NPC within the city wants a
certain item.  So you make the item, find the NPC (the city guards
will point you to them), and they give you money for it.

I really liked it, I pretty much know my way around the capital city
now and I'm almost to the point that I know where most of the NPCs
are.  And you'd think, with a system like that, that the city would
be crawling with people running around on consignments...  Nope.
They're mostly all huddled around the various trade implements and
merchants, powerleveling.

The "problem" is that powerleveling is boring.

Working on crafts automatically while logged out or during downtime
would help to alleviate that problem I think.  And it's a pretty
nifty idea, but I would certainly hope that the ability to craft an
item in-game wouldn't disappear entirely.  Because that is the fun
in having a Tradeskill....  You're in the city, the person contacts
you and says that they want an item made, you haggle, you obtain the
materials (either from the client or whatever), and then . . . What?
Then you have to log off?  The person who commissions an item from
you usually wants it from you simply because you are there.  (In the
case of games where crafting an item takes a relatively short time.)

- Michelle



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