[MUD-Dev] Maintaining fiction.

[Ian Collyer]

Travis Nixon wrote:
> From: "Caliban Tiresias Darklock" <caliban at darklock.com>
>> On Wed, 20 Jun 2001 16:45:41 +0000 (GMT), Matt Mihaly

>>> Yep, that's the definition of permadeath I've been pushing. It
>>> recognizes that a MUD has no control over when a character dies.

>> Shouldn't that be "a MUD has no control over when a character
>> *lives*"?

>> The MUD can certainly tell the player "your character is dead and
>> you can't play it anymore", but it can't very well say "you must
>> log in and play your character".

> No, and I think this is the point Matt's trying to make:

> You can't, in fact, tell the player "your character is dead and
> you can't play it anymore", because all they have to do is create
> another character with the same name, the same skills, and the
> same behavior, and for all practical intents and purposes, their
> character is NOT dead, and they can play it any time they want.

True, but you can tell the player "this MUD now considers your
character dead and any
skills/spells/property/wealth/marriages/etc. it may have had are now
null and void or left on the ground for others to loot".

> Even if you don't allow them the same name, they can still play
> the same character.  They just have to play that the character
> chose to change its name.  They might also have to come up with
> some backstory about why they're not as good at swordfighting as
> they used to be (I nearly lost my life in that last battle, in
> fact, everybody thought I was dead, yada, yada, yada,
> rehabilitation from those nasty injuries, etc etc), and they might
> have to come up with some backstory about what happened to all
> their posessions (When everybody thought I was dead, my Evil Uncle
> Bubba plundered me for all I was worth and then ran off around the
> riverbend, yada, yada, yada).

Indeed a player can claim anything they like on behalf of their
character and if they can convince enough other players then it may
as well be fact.

We provide a playing field, but we cannot control the games that
players choose to play upon it.

But the MUD's natural laws, the definition of such terms as
permadeath, do serve a purpose. They provide common ground and a
shared understanding of the world in which the characters exist.

Without a clear definition of such fundamental terms you would end
up with players attempting to play the RPG equivalent of football,
soccer and golf on the same playing field and arguing over whether
the ball is round or oval, large or small, whether it should be
thrown, kicked or hit with a club.

Sure players can bend the laws of the MUD, but only with the consent
of those others they interact with.

In MUDs perception is reality, but yours is not the only perception
you must change, unless you play them like single player games.

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