[MUD-Dev] Maintaining fiction.

[Matt Mihaly]

On Thu, 21 Jun 2001, Freeman, Jeff wrote:
>> From: Matt Mihaly [mailto:the_logos at achaea.com]
>> On Sun, 17 Jun 2001, Jon Lambert wrote:
 
>>>   Permadeath occurs when the player decides that the character
>>>   they have been playing is dead.
 
>> Yep, that's the definition of permadeath I've been pushing. It
>> recognizes that a MUD has no control over when a character dies.

> So, Matt, when someone says a MUD has resurrection, do you tell
> them there's no such thing?  What about just plain ol' "death"?
> Don't we have some vague notion of what they mean by that even
> though MUDs have no control over that sort of thing?  Would you
> completely derail a conversation about some particular
> implementation of resurrection just to make the point that there's
> no such thing?

Resurrection and 'death' in a MUD are very possible
concepts. They're entirely in-role. Permadeath, on the other hand,
makes a meta-statement about the MUD which isn't possible to validly
make due to the inherent lack of control a MUD has over a character.

As to whether I would "derail" a discussion based on a faulty
premise because of the faulty premise is a given as far as I'm
concerned. One of Mud-dev's mandates is to foster a higher level of
discussion, and surely questioning some of the basic premises we're
trying to build systems of thought on falls within that purview of
the mandate. I'm sorry if you're not happy with it, but you could
just ignore my posts on the subject, or ignore all my posts. I'm
quite enjoying the discussion personally.

 
> The definition of permadeath you're pushing isn't useful for
> anything.  So why use it?  Why prompt people to come up with a
> whole new phrase that means the exact same thing that the old
> phrase used to mean?

Because I find more value in your "useless" knowledge than I do in
practical knowledge. Practical knowledge derives from higher-level
concepts systematically applied. Frankly, I find this list
interesting for things of practical value only about 5% of the
time. I get far far more pleasure and intellectual satisfaction out
of the more abstract discussions. I mainly do not care how mud X
implemented its fireball spell.


> Just seems like a pretty fruitless exercise to me.  Particularly
> since all the MUDs advertising permadeath aren't exactly leaping
> on the bandwagon to erase the word from their vocabularies.
> Permadeath still means exactly what it used to mean before this
> big "It don't mean nuttin'" side-track.  Did we just spend a month
> on MUD-Dev to come to the realization that death on MUDs isn't
> real?

Tilting against windmills has never bothered me. I think the idea of
MUD-mandated permadeath is just bullshit as currently understood,
and I've presented my reasons a number of times. If you disagree,
please tell me why you disagree. Any other argument has no place in
an intellectual discussion, in my opinion.


> This is just going to hinder conversation.  Now every time
> permadeath is mentioned in any sort of context, we'll have a big
> debate about what it doesn't mean and how there's no such thing -
> even though we all have a pretty good idea of exactly what is
> meant by it - instead of discussing the actual post.  Until
> someone finally says, "Oh, you're talking about what I like to
> call 'Full Flava Death', not 'permadeath' - of which there's no
> such thing!"

So, what you're saying is that you don't seem to have any logical
objection to my objection. You just think it's inconvenient and want
to gloss over it? Why? Why not just accept it if you can't defend
the actual idea rather attacking the consequences of the idea? A
stronger understanding of the basic concepts we're dealing allows us
to construct a more precise vocabulary to structure our thoughts
around, and to communicate to other people with.

I'm really not just trying to be difficult. I think I have a very
valid point, and I'm perfectly willing to be convinced by a good,
solid chain of reasoning.
 
> Yeah, MUDs don't REALLY have any control over when a character
> dies.  So?  Would could knee-cap every discussion on any topic
> ranging from PKing to resurrection with that.  I don't think that
> would be particularly useful.

No, MUDs can control when an avatar dies, but it's purely an in-game
death. That's fine. Permadeath is, by its nature, trying to describe
a situation that has a meta context to it, and it's just not
possible.

--matt

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