[MUD-Dev] PvP Systems

[Jon Lambert]

Federico Di Gregorio wrote:
> Scavenging the mail folder uncovered John Buehler's letter:
 
>> ... Most people simply don't have the energy or skill to be actors.
>> Roleplaying is supported, but hardly compulsory.

Certainly that is true.  Most people that do enjoy that style of game
will simply gravitate towards another game.  In fact they tend to
bunch up on them.

> with role-play i don't mean that everybody should be an actor. just
> the fact that you're not playing risk or any other tabletop game. by
> "role" i mean that every player has a role and when make a decision
> playing a role, she will have to pay for what she did. if players
> are allowed to randomly kill other people just for fun, then you're
> running nothing more than a sophisticated wargame. what you propose
> is very important in that kind of game and i agree with you.
 
I think this has been entered into the FAQ glossary as functional
role-playing.  I've been calling it immersive role-playing.  Anyhow
the concept is the same.  What some of us mean by role-playing is
consentual or cooperative role-play.  So John is right that his system
for PvP actions isn't necessarily appropriate for those games.  On the
other hand, it bears a strong similarity to the more informal PvP
negotiation methods we have been using over OOC channels.

> > For what it's worth, roleplaying will be far more common when the
> > NPCs outnumber players 10 to 1 and are far more intelligent and
> > interactive than they are today.  That will establish a framework in
> > which players will be encouraged to act 'in genre'.

Like I said above this is an entirely different animal.  
When RPing players outnumber GOPing players 10-1, then you a have
framework for RP.  The number of NPCs is irrelavent, because NPCs
can't role-play, unless of course a player or GM is running them.  ;-)
 
> ok. me and stefania are sitting in a bar. stefania has PvP all yes.  I
> have all PvP set to off. then a guy enters, and makes some harsh
> comments to her. she punches him. a friend of the guy start kicking
> her. i want to help in this fight, even if i don't usually like to get
> into PvP fights. but I can't. i need to:
>

"harsh comments" <-- a perfect example of a PvP communication attack.

It's nearly impossible to police without being overly intrusive.
Even though some of us do have these arbitrary, ambiguous and ill-defined 
game rules against harrassment.  The definitions and enforcment vary wildly
between muds and even among the admins within a mud. 

Now it shouldn't be suprising that the killer's primary mode of attack 
is the mouth.  That's been documented by Dr. Bartle way back when. :-)

> yes but.. after having his character justiced or jailed and having the
> player re-create it once or twice the malicious guy will leave...
> guaranteed. 

Hehe.  You would think so.  In practice there does exists a player 
type we've various called a crusader or stalker.  In the past I would 
have thought such player types were rare.  However in the the past 8 
months, I've personally encountered 2 of these odd birds.  Their 
primary goal is to harass and disrupt a particular mud they've been 
banned from. 
 
--
--* Jon A. Lambert - TychoMUD        Email:jlsysinc at ix.netcom.com *--
--* Mud Server Developer's Page <http://tychomud.home.netcom.com> *--
--* If I had known it was harmless, I would have killed it myself.*--

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