[MUD-Dev] DGN: Rooms, Directions, etc. - any alternatives?

[Malcolm W. Tester II]

From: Skane2004 at aol.com

> I realize that just about every mud uses the direction system of
> north, south, east, west, up, down -- but are there any
> alternatives?  One of the common complaints I hear about are that
> people don't like having to memorize cardinal directions from
> recall to get places -- or new mudders have a hard time getting
> where they want to go because they don't have the directions
> memorized...  Are there any muds that don't use NSEWUD?  If so,
> how does their system work, and how do they define where a
> character's location is?  It seems more realistic to be able to
> manipulate (or at least see) what's in the rooms around you...is
> that implemented anywhere?  How does it work?  I'm just trying to
> think outside of the box here...any suggestions?

I've played a mud where they used left, right, forward, backwards,
and it stunk, to be honest.  Those directions are all from a
perspective view of the character, not global.  Very confusing.  On
most muds, you can name your exits anything you like.  People just
use NSEWUD because it's what they are familiar and comfortable with.
In my lib, you can choose whether you want exits visible or not.
(I.e. Show the "Obvious exits are: north, west, south", or not).
You can also name your exits anything you like.  Of course, the
global shortcuts don't apply for anything other than NSEWUD and
NW,SW,SE,NE.

IMO, new mudders would complain no matter how you named your
directions.  It's a new concept for them, and they need to complain.
Older mudders, well, if they complain, then ask them what they would
like to see.  Take a poll :) I would stick with NSEWUD just because
if you want to attract the existing audience, the majority is going
to be more comfortable with that.

Seeing objects in rooms around you can be done without much trouble.
Let's say I am standing in a clearing in a forest, but to the
northeast, a tower rises out of the sky.  I might have a function in
every room called query_far_description().  In the room with the
tower, this might return the string "a tower rises out of the sky.".
In every room's long description, I check each of the rooms in my
exits like this: "/path/to/room/north/east"->query_far_description()
and if that function returns a string, then I add it to my long
description as "To the "+query_exit_direction()+"
"+"/path/..."->query_far_description()+"\n".  So the end result is
"To the northeast a tower rises out of the sky."  The code is a
trifle more complicated than I am describing, but I hope you get the
point.  If not, email me offlist and I'll send you some sample code.

Another way to do it is on demand.  For example, you have a guild of
mages.  They have a spell called "gaze" or "peer".  One of them is
standing in a room with an exit of "east".  They can "gaze east"
which returns to them the long description of the room to the east,
assuming there is not a closed door there as well or something.

-Malc
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