[MUD-Dev] Introduction and My solution to Powergamers, Treadmills, and Content Devaluation.

[Gladimir]

Hello Ken,

I'm also new to this forum and hope our conversation is relevant.
My name is Carl Fenley, but I'm known as 'Gladimir' on just about
every message board I visit as well as usenet.

Ken Raisor:

>   Anyone can pick up that amulet; even Mobs, NPC's, Epic
>   Encounters, Other Players, ect. Especially Other Players.

Your idea of "Final Death & Inheritance" is an interesting one, but
I think it still has some problems, especially in a PvP enabled
setting.  If I get killed by another player character, there is
virtually no way I am going to get my 'token' back.  I have sunk a
substantial amount of time (and money) into Ultima Online,
EverQuest, and Dark Age of Camelot.  So, I am qualified to say that
I will NEVER be able to compete with the other players on the server
that can put in more playing time.

Also, in Ultima Online, when I was first starting out and learning
my way around the game; I was getting killed by other players about
once or twice a week.  There is no way that I would ever be able to
put in the playtime required to even begin to recover my 'token'
from these other players.

>   Final Death brings ever renewing value to your low level
>   content.

Inheritance or no, I would not be very appreciative of having to
start another character.  The powergamers and player-killers would
have their high-level characters, while the working stiffs that have
jobs and families would soon quit and walk away.

>   7: If someone takes your amulet, you can always level up, get
>   your friends together and teach him a lesson.

I have a friend, who try as he might, just couldn't put in the time
to advance his EverQuest Barbarian Warrior beyond level 31.  His
level 31 warrior would NEVER be able to take ANYTHING away from my
level 49 Shaman.  So, he needs to 'make friends'?  Let's say he does
get some high-level guild to decide to go after me.  Well, in my
day, I was 'fairly' well-known on my server and was in a guild as
well.  So, I'm sure our guilds would form up and go to war in some
good PvP fun between guilds that are probably well-known to each
other.

Yes, that would be even more spontaneous content for us high-level
players that I'm sure would be quite lost on the poor level 31
warrior.

>   3: Leveling up in NWN will be quite easy

You could be right, but I'm not so sure about this one.  If a player
character Cleric casts Raise Dead or Resurrect on a slain character,
the target character loses one complete level of experience upon
accepting the resurrection.  Only the 9th level True Resurrection
spell is penalty-free (other than expense), but the Cleric would
have to be at least level 17 to cast it.

This also speaks to encounter design.  Player characters that jump
in and begin chewing through encounters that have a Challenge Rating
(CR) equal to the party's CR are going to suffer casualties and
level loss upon resurrection.  So, if encounters are designed to
spawn a slightly lower Challenge Rating than the party's CR value,
experience rewards will be reduced.

Anyway, those were some good ideas, but imperfect depending on the
breadth of your target audience, in my opinion.

Carl Fenley (aka Gladimir)
http://www.vagabondia.net/

_______________________________________________
MUD-Dev mailing list
MUD-Dev at kanga.nu
https://www.kanga.nu/lists/listinfo/mud-dev