[MUD-Dev] Respecting NPCs

[lazarus at ourplace.org]

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Original message: http://www.kanga.nu/archives/MUD-Dev-L/2001Q4/msg00372.php

On Thu, 25 Oct 2001 13:39:23 -0700 (PDT)
"Sami Kosonen" <sami.k.kosonen at welho.com> wrote:
 
> Has anyone tryed to use chatbots to give more humanlike speaking
> experience when dealing with NPCs? I'm not sure, but you could
> maybe do different kinds of personalities by modifying what words
> they use, how they response (agressive, passive, nervous etc.),
> how broad their voculabulary is and so on.

Been there, done that.  Not sure if your players are different than
mine, but mine didn't appreciate it.  People get tired of talking to
eliza over and over and having all mobs behave the same gets silly
fast.  Having a different chatterbot script for every mob would be
significant work and you have to decide if you want to add that work
to each NPC you develop.

I thought of having a different script for every mob race (thus
insects would not bother to talk and elves could hate dwarves) but
abandoned the idea when I realized that walking through an elven
town with all the citizens behaving exactly the same was little
improvement.  Like I said.  Maybe your players are different than
mine.  Mine said that having all mob in the game shrug 25% of the
time, grumble 25% of the time ... when you poke them added very
little to the game over just having them ignore you.
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