Real-world skills Was: Re: [MUD-Dev] strong encryption for authentication

[Hans-Henrik Staerfeldt]

On Wed, 18 Jul 2001, Travis Nixon wrote:

>> It also encourages people who want an advantage in-game to
>> *develop* real world skills. When real world skills become
>> useless, your game will appeal primarily to those who don't have
>> them. My military and martial arts training were exceptionally
>> helpful when playing Quake. That was a real world skill giving me
>> an advantage. Frame rate and bandwidth were also important; a
>> fast graphics card and a fat pipe gave me an advantage,
>> too. Writing good aliases was an advantage, and as a programmer I
>> could do that pretty well. So that was my own real-world skills
>> making me a better Quake player. Why is that wrong? Real-world
>> skills DO make you a better player. Which real world skills those
>> are is dependent on the game.

> Have to throw in the compulsory "hear, hear" here.  All games
> involve real-world skills.  Period.
 
> Some, like Quake, invovle reflexes and timing (can I hit that guy
> with the railgun).  Some, like Starcraft, rely on knowledge and
> tactics (can hydras beat marines, and if so, how many does it take
> and how should they attack).  And then some, like EQ, involve the
> real-world skill of patience (how long til the next spawn again?).
> Supreme patience.
 
> :)
 
> The long version: every online activity requires real-world
> skills.  You can (sometimes) choose which skills are relevant, but
> there will always be real-world skills involved.

Perhaps more important, in the design, one should consider which
effect the players real-world skill has on the characters skills.  A
skill such as 'problem solving' for instance would be hard to
forcefully translate to a character, since a genius player could
play an idiot character and choose not to roleplay that particular
skill.

Therefore when you implement different skills in a game, you should
carefully consider how they are affected by the players real-world
skills, and how/if they can be enforced ... Just a thought.


Hans Henrik Stærfeldt   |    bombman at diku.dk    | work:  hhs at cbs.dtu.dk      |
Address:                |___  +45 40383492    __|__       +45 45252425     __|
DTU, Kemitorvet,        | Scientific programmer at Center for Biological     |
bygn 208, CBS.          |  Sequence Analysis, Technical University of Denmark|

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