[MUD-Dev] Interesting EQ rant (very long quote)

[Chris Lloyd]

> -----Original Message-----
> From: mud-dev-admin at kanga.nu [mailto:mud-dev-admin at kanga.nu]On Behalf Of
> msew
> Sent: Monday, February 26, 2001 00:06
> To: mud-dev at kanga.nu; mud-dev at kanga.nu
> Subject: RE: [MUD-Dev] Interesting EQ rant (very long quote)

> ie: A mean troll stole my axe.  vs A mean troll stole my axe.  The
> axe that my great grandfather once found whilst gathering
> blueberries in the haunted forest of elderath.  He took that axe to
> the great wizard zanzabar, wherein blah blah blah.  (ie little timmy
> SHOULD know about everything he mentioned with a decent amount of
> detail)

Ah, so the your Grandfather's axe is exactly the same as any axe you
can find lying around? If you kept it in the first place I'd expect it
to have some unique property or such that you'd want to keep, rather
than get another, slightly worse axe.

> The ONLY thing in EQ's background story that was of ANY use was the
> story about Miragul the arch lich and how he went North beneath the
> ice.  We spent many hours looking for him during beta, then during
> the first month of retail.  Not there (not implemented).  Then along
> comes a patch and boom there he is, but once he was in the game his
> background story didn't matter one bit.  Just another quest mob to
> be smacked down, mob location noted, mob items noted, weaknesses
> noted, strategy to kill him noted.  His background story and who he
> is doesn't matter one bit in the game.  Only the items he has.

Thats a good example of bad implementation. What they should have done
with the patch is to allow the potential that someone will stumble on
his lair at a later date, and then waited to see which lucky
adventurer discovered him first. Of course, after that it doesn't
matter, everyone could go there, but I bet you wish you'd found him
when you went looking.

>> If these two quests equally easily, and it takes the same amount of
>> time and effort. If I want to be a 'bad guy', I'll do quest B. If I
>> want to be a 'good guy', I'll do quest A. As far as the loot is
>> concerned, it doesn't matter, but it matters to _me_.

> Those quests are most definitely NOT the same.  Game state of
> Princess Buffy was altered; she was killed!!!  That should be a HUGE
> deal.  If choosing between killing a specific named mob is not a big
> deal, then being the "good guy or "bad guy" is 100% based on how
> _you_ view things.  

I'm assuming that Princess Buffy either repops 20 minutes later, gets
captured 20 minutes later or is some other generic NPC.

> killing Buffy could be a "good" thing to your persona or it could be
> a "bad" thing.

> The generated minutia is NOT determining how you feel; _you_ are.
> And more over there are no consequences to this quest at all, all of
> the actions you take don't affect your character in the game world
> at all.  And because of that, the minutia is irrelevant.  All the
> quest was: character gets magic thingie did some stuff that didn't
> matter in the game world.

> Flip a coin!  heads or tails?  heads I kill her tails I don't.
> Doesn't affect me at all in the game world.  Next quest please!
> *flips coin*

> If you do not affect people in the game world then you get the
> epidemic that exists in online games: the paladin grouping with
> CLEARLY not paladin ideal-esque people and the age old excuse: "I am
> converting them to be good."  or "I need to be with them so I can
> make certain they don't do something REALLY evil."

> LOL!  Go look at EQ :-) Lots of the players there are utterly
> clueless on the EQ background and heck even in game "rulers",
> important mobs in a zone, zones themselves, which zones are
> connected to each other, the world map, etc etc etc.  Look at a lot
> of the muds out there too, it is the same thing.

OK, you got me here. There isn't much I say except that there IS a
small portion of EQ players who do try to RP a bit. And there are many
MUDs where roleplay is common, if not practised to a high standard.

> The more important question is: does it really matter?  Does that
> information affect you in the game?

> Certainly, it might help some people "get into the game", but one
> can argue those people just lack imagination and need someone else
> to tell them how to RP (which never works and they just end up
> speaking 18th century english and think they are RPing).

> If it does not help you in the game, then why bother with it?  Make
> up your own religion, get your own followers, spread your own
> likeliness across the world!  Leave a mark on the world BY YOUR
> CHARACTER and your character's ideals, philosophies.  And your
> character and his followers can ACTIVELY affect the game world,
> unlike little Timmy or little Timmy's grandfather.

It might not help you get more loot, but it might impress and please
people of the 'persona' type (going back to Tess Lowe's immersion
model) where people care about the game world, and are attached to,
and linked to, the world's history and NPCs. People who do RP a bit
will want to know who Timmy was, and may file that bit of information
away for later reference. If you don't want roleplayers in your world,
fine. But even the slightly curious player will wonder "Who is this
<insert powerful or well-known mob> guy, anyway?".

> Question: which is more valuable for the game's livelihood?
> Consistent created quest backgrounds that are all interwoven OR
> Allowing your player base to create their own quests, own stories,
> and generate content in the game?  (which is going to scale?)

Whilst I agree in principle that having players make quests is a good
thing, I have fairly strict ideas about the geography and design of my
game world, so I want to be the person (along with the other admins)
who decides that sort of thing. I don't mind input, but it has to fit
exactly into our pre-visualised environment.

C.

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