[MUD-Dev] Something in the water

[rayzam]

----- Original Message -----
From: "Travis Casey" <efindel at earthlink.net>

> Sure, I'll accept that.  However, they still have to define what
> that is, which is the essential part of my point.  Just saying, "we
> want to encourage roleplaying" without defining roleplaying is only
> going to confuse things.

<SNIP>

> In any case, though, many paper RPGs have provided alternative
> means of advancement besides "shoot-and-loot" or "XP through
> roleplaying".  Some of these resemble methods that some muds use.
> (E.g., "XP for accomplishing story goals" is similar to "XP for
> completing quests".)


What about using the drives of a Sims character as a model for
RPing? In the above examples, there's a decision for a drive or
motivation. That drive is then either kept internal to the RPer or
told to the GM. If the GM rewards roleplaying with exp [as I often
do], the GM needs to know these things. That's the situation with
the start of this thread. Rewarding roleplaying, be it with RP
points or exp or whatnot.

Take the character, have the player set up motivations/drives.
Predetermine them in advance, such as the sins and virtues. Have the
player scale the character's stance on each. The player is then
telling the GM [the server] the character's motivations. Boffo is
greedy but not into sloth.

Now use The Sims model to increase/decrease these drives. Various
actions in the game can affect the various motivations. Their
effectiveness is determined by the overall drive state [what's the
point in using the toilet again when that need is already taken care
of a minute ago?].

Then score could be determined by a variety of methods. 

The twist I'm taking with this, is that gaming the system is
controlled by the game. While the game controls the level of the
need-states of each drive, it becomes harder to game.

The methods by which the game could control the need-states is
varied also.

Plus allow the player to shift the character's need-states
too. There should be some controls on this to prevent gaming of this
aspect. However, it should be open enough to allow for radical
change too. Example: Boffo can go from greedy to giving, slowly over
time. However, he could have been visited by 3 ghosts while sleeping
one nite, and change radically. So a radical change could prevent
any other gradual changes for the next X amount of time. To be more
reasonable, perhaps the only gradual change after a radical one
would be backsliding on the changed scale only. Boffo has had this
radical change from greedy to giving. But he slowly regresses,
becoming less giving [and maybe never reaches back to
greedy]. Outside of a radical change, gradual changes could be
limited by time and/or number of drives.

Over time and staff effort, more and more drives could be added,
such as wanting blueberries.

rayzam
www.retromud.org


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