MMO Communities (was RE: [MUD-Dev] MMORPG Cancellations:Theskyisfalling?)

[John Arras]

On Fri, 30 Jul 2004, Douglas Goodall wrote:

> This is almost the opposite of real life... Societies with extra
> food generally have extra food only because they've found a way to
> keep the rats/bugs/mold out.

It depends on how you look at it. I assume that rats are attracted
to food and will try to eat it, and you assume that there won't be
food unless the rats are taken care of. It's a matter of which is
cause and effect, but i don't think it matters which one is which
too much. I think similar events for the players could be produced
looking at things in both ways.

> Also, giving out rats for extra food is a punishment for success
> (at least if players are involved in the running of the town). I
> think it would be better to punish players for... hm... how about
> Sloth?  Rats appear when players don't take steps to keep the town
> clean. That's more realistic. Unfortunately, it's not any more
> fun... At the worst, it would force players to do menial tasks
> (picking up trash, etc), and I'm looking for a game that does
> anything but that.

Sure. I was trying to show how a way in which "rat" quests could be
automated. This isn't the most interesting quest in the world but it
was the example given in the parent post to mine. And, I think that
having "menial" things for players to do will be a part of any game
that involves letting large numbers of players alter the world since
there aren't enough grand things for all of the players to do.

> Once upon a time, I tried to do something similar to your
> "society" idea, though there was a single controller for the whole
> world. I even researched and coded biomathematical models for
> various monster

That's one thing that I think people should be careful about when
trying to create ecologies and such for virtual worlds. The "real
world" formulas and rules won't always apply because the real world
doesn't have "superpredators" like players who break and kill
everything in sight.  I also don't worry about modifying "correct"
systems if they give bad results, since the issue isn't to be right,
but to make something interesting.

<snip dynamic world description>

> On the other hand, maybe I just didn't do it right. I think
> dynamic content has alot of potential. I also think no one's
> figured out a good way to include it.

And that's EXACTLY why I post onto this list every once in a
while. Who cares if nobody's gotten this right? If you find it
interesting (as I do) then try things. Try to come up with ideas
about how to implement. Write code. Test. Make mistakes. Instead of
thinking that you "just didn't do it right", think of it as "you
just didn't do it right, yet". I don't see this dynamic world
problem being solved by a magic bullet that comes in and makes
everything simple all at once. It will probably take a long time
with lots of mistakes, but I think it's work working on it and
trying to make something work even if it's not perfect. Also, if you
have the code available and don't mind, I would like to look at it.

I've gotten someplace with code for some these ideas, but it's never
been tested with real players. I think it's neat to sit and watch it
and to wander around and follow monsters and watch them doing
stuff. That's enough of a start for me, since if it's interesting to
watch, it might get to the point that it's interesting to play
someday. And, I don't look at what I've done as the solution. I look
at it as the best I've been able to do so far, and I hope that it
will continue to get better with time.

John
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