[MUD-Dev] Unique items vs. item references

[Rayzam]

From: "Zach Collins (Siege)" <zcollins at seidata.com>
> On Tue, 13 Aug 2002, Damion Schubert wrote:

>> I've always liked systems that force players to make interesting
>> choices.  If the regeneration on your ring was fast enough, for
>> example, it might be perfect for a mage who needs to heal in the
>> battle while his tank soaks some damage.  But then, I always
>> favored the sick Magic cards like Lich that were considered
>> unusable by most of the player base as well. =)

> I think that an interesting item generator would have a certain
> level of "goodness" in its items, and would choose from one to ten
> "good" properties.  Each property is weighted in value, so that a
> +1 damage bonus has less value than a +5.  However, to balance the
> large amount of "goodness" on an item, random "bad" properties
> would have to be added to balance the item on its base "goodness"
> level.  Sure, you'd still have rings that regenerate while causing
> blindness, but since there's no limit to how high goodness gets
> before the item is balanced, you could have a hammer that
> instantly slays all but the nastiest enemies, but reduces its
> wielder's health to almost nothing while inflicting blindness and
> constant damage - generated by a level zero chest!

> I wonder what kind of in-game effect this would have?

We already have a system like that set up in Retromud, though not
for random items. Monster difficulty is automatically computed to
determine item 'goodness' [aka stock points]. Positive attributes on
the item takes from these stock pints. Negative attributes can
balance this out. However, we quickly realized that there had to be
a limit on the negative attributes.  Otherwise you get the great
mage items with the strength reducing effects on easy to kill
monsters. That is: there will always be some attribute, be it stat,
skill, bonus, effect, that will be meaningless to affect part of the
player population. Our rule of thumb that works pretty well is to
limit the negatives to 1/3 of the original unmodified positive
value. So a 12 stock point item can have -4 stock points in negative
effects, allowing for 16 points of positives in effect.

Then there's another tier. Really high quality items, aka Artifact
level, are required to have special negative effects that don't add
to any stock points. The Wormtooth dagger has the side effect that
it drips acid over the hilt too. Which means the wielder takes
damage unless wearing gloves. If wearing gloves, the acid damages
the gloves. It fits in theme, and is a negative special to balance
out the abilities of the Wormtooth.

In my opinion, negative effects are useful to have. At lower/mid
levels, players are willing to deal with the negatives on items. But
now you can have another set of items with the same positives but
less or no negatives.  Thus there are more items in the game, more
variety, more things you can afford, and more thing to covet! :)

    rayzam



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