[MUD-Dev] Focus on Hocus Pocus

[Matt Chatterley]

> From: "Corey Crawford" <myrddin at seventh.net>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Matt Chatterley" <mpchatty at hotmail.com>
> Subject: [MUD-Dev] Focus on Hocus Pocus

[Large snippage]

> I've almost completed a magic system of my own, so this thread
> interests me.  The focus is different (creating spells rather than
> how magic works in general) but it still piques my interest.

I've got various ideas on the magical fundamentals of my world - but
figured they're very theme specific, and the theme isn't firm enough
to start bantering them around yet. :)

> The first thing I thought when I read this was, "Ok, so the first
> mages who play the game for the first few months will be creating
> the spells everyone else will be using". Where do the newbies come
> in and create spells? They have already been written by older
> players!

This is one of my prime worries. As I posted just now, it'll be
possible that spells get lost (but not really *likely* - you figure
people will keep backups, or as another poster suggested, keep RL
notes or websites detailing how they made spell X).

I was considering putting a lifespan limit on a spell, but a hard
limit seemed a bad idea. So, the solution appears to be the decay
approach. Each time a spell is copied, it weakens a little -
replicative fading. Heh. The essense of the spell is contained in
the inks, words and the style of the writing used to record it,
hence, upon copying, small mistakes creep in, and eventually, you
have a useless copy.

Of course, this makes it desirable to copy from as old a version as
possible (Bob has a 10th edition fireball, but my 3rd edition one is
far more powerful, so scrolls which I create will be far more
valuable).

I'll be applying standard world 'tear & wear' rules to scrolls and
spell books (fire and water will be very, very bad for them, and
they'll gradually wear out over time), but it's tempting to also
decay spells slightly when they are *copied* (weaken the original a
little, or accelerate its decay), or used. Hmm.

Of course, the occasional new character might have an idea for
something original, or want his fireball to be green instead of red.

> My second thought was, "How are you going to label and pre-create
> all affects the players can think of?" Talk about a nightmare.

There is that. Heh. It'll be a case of getting a solid starting set
going, and then adapting it as needs be. Balance will be a bit of a
nightmare, though.

> Now other than the fact that making a pre-created list of all the
> affects will be insane, I think it could work really well if you
> did it the other way around: Let higher level mages create spells,
> not just any mage.

Nod. I'm thinking that this concept will probably not be attractive
to all players, anyway, but, certain types of mage character would
be better suited to spell research/creation (and to create powerful
spells, you'll need a relatively powerful mage).

I might bootstrap 'cantrips' which are pre-programmed onto the
system, though, so that all mages have a base set of magical
tools. Rather than being complex, magical spells, these cantrips
would be utilities and tricks - for instance "contingency" although
a powerful effect might be a "high level" cantrip, it seems less a
set of spell effects and more a way to tweak and mangle spells based
on your own abilities.

> Then focus the game play with groups of players vs other groups of
> players, possibly evil vs good, or one kingdom against the other,
> clan wars, whatever. Then, the higher mages would only give the
> new more powerful un-defendable spells to their mages, creating a
> dynamic of "who can create the unique spell that the other team
> doesn't know about and thus can't counter" when they fight. Sounds
> fun!

This would be rather cool, actually. :) Ooh. Magewars Mud. Ooh. Ooh! 
I like. :)

> Anyways, I'd be interested to know how it goes if you implement it
> :)

I'll be posting here as development starts, and I run into problems
or more ideas, I'm sure. ;)

-Matt

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