[MUD-Dev] Skill-Trees & Skill-Webs (was: Curing skill spam (was: Moving away from the level base system))

[Travis Casey]

On Tuesday, January 09, 2001, Christopher Allen wrote:

> We running into a need to have a skill-tree or skill-web in our 3rd
> game. I have a hypothetical start for how one might be written up in
> our internal XML syntax:

> <skills>
>     <skill groupname="thief" skillname="hiding" dif="0" learningspeed="1.5"
vis="true">>
>         <factors>
>             <factor skillname="size" val="-0.2"/>
>             <factor skillname="agility" val="0.2"/>
>             <factor skillname="dexterity" val="0.05"/>
>             <factor skillname="intelligence" val="0.05"/>
>             <factor skillname="thiefgeneral" val="0.1"/>
>         </factors>
>     </skill>

[snip the rest of the skills, since they all have the same attributes]

> </skills>

> Any comments on other attributes I should add to the structure?

Arg... I realized on my way home that Christopher probably meant XML
attributes rather than RPG-style "attributes".  So, here's an answer
to the question he probably intended:

You might want to have more than one "learningspeed", to represent
different ways of learning -- e.g., trial-and-error, with a trainer,
etc.

Prerequisites might be a good idea when using this for a full skill
system... i.e., you must have skill X with at least level Y before you
can learn skill Z.  It would probably be best to support AND and OR of
prerequisites.

Factors could have optional thresholds as well as values -- so that a
factor might not come into play unless it exceeds the threshold.

Skills might be marked as "exclusive" -- i.e., you can't use the skill
without training.

Some games have the concept of an "everyman" skill -- a skill that all
"normal" people in the game have some level of training in.  That
could also be a skill attribute.

That's all I can think of off-hand.

--
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