[MUD-Dev] weapon choices (was re: DESIGN: Why do people likeweather in MMORPGs?)

[Tom Hunter]

I snipped Travis Casey's points about weapons but I wanted to come
down on his side because he pointed out one of my biggest complaints
about game design in MUDs the near universal lack of realism
regarding weapons, armor and combat.

Lots of people get thier impression of combat from either the
movies, AD&D or thier own invention.  As far as I am aware (and
there could easily be an exception to this that I have not played)
no one designs combat by consulting with people who really do it.

If the movies showed realistic combat a lot of extras would be dead
and most movie of the people watching would not even know why.
Combat is fast, unless you know how to fight yourself you often
won't see the blows bieng struck.

Also movies are about visuals and partially clothed people are more
fun to watch than armored people.  Partially clothed people also
bleed out in seconds in real combat.  Armor is your freind from the
time of Alexander the Great to modern day Iraqu the guys with armor
beat the guys without it in battle.

People in armor are not slower than people out of armor.  Armor
makes you tired faster and this can be an issue but it does not make
your sword move slower.  The combination of shock and bloodloss from
having your un armored rapier hand lopped off by a claymore will
slow you down pretty good.  That is why there are no period
paintings of large numbers of unarmored rapier wielding soldiers on
the battlefield.

Real weapons are not clumsly and slow.  Clumsy and slow = death on
the battlefield.  Real soldiers consider this highly undesirable and
they won't use anything that is clumsy and slow.

Throughout history there is an ongoing game of rock, paper, scissors
as weapons, armor and tactics evolve.  Knights with lances beats men
on foot with sword, pikes beat knights, men on foot with swords beat
pikes.  If you want proof look at the wars between France and Spain
in the 16th century when both sides had all 3 types of soldier in
thier armies.  It happens today too, tanks beat unsupported
infantry, concealed anti tank beats tanks, infantry beats (or
flushes out) concealed anti tank.

When D&D was designed there was no Society for Creative Anachronism
(ok it existed but it was brand new and very small) no Sealed Knot
in England, no serious study of European martial arts.  PHD
historians were writing that armor wieghed so much that knights who
fell off thier horses could not get up because it wieghed so much.
(They should have been writing armor was so heavy that sedintary PHD
historians who fell down wearing it could not get up but that is
beside the point.)  When it was time to create a combat system they
made it up.  They produced a fun game but a combat system that
reflects a lack of experience, research and athletic ability.  Today
we can and should do better.
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