[MUD-Dev] Re: DGN: Emergent Behaviors

[cruise]

Michael Sellers spake thusly...

> So is this worth it, as opposed to just having randomly spawning
> newbie and uber-monsters?  I think it might be: it would give the
> power players a new and meaningful pattern to detect, would give
> them a reason to interact with new players, and overall would
> reduce the typical impression that the world is a series pop-up
> encounters with no meaningful connection between them.

> There are many other examples like this that make a nod toward a
> type of monster ecology without trapping the game into full-blown
> ecologies where there's disaster if you kill off all the sheep (or
> wolves or dragons etc).  The key isn't in the ecology, but in
> creating meaningful but non-obvious connections for the players --
> as a whole -- to understand and use.

One hint that it might be was the player reaction to the
introduction fo zone events in CoH. Players spent months trying to
figure out how to "trigger" the events until the devs officially
posted that they were just random.

I think this is a missed opportunity - yes, you don't want to get to
a situation where the "events" are constantly being triggered by
players - but since the reward for the events is pretty much a badge
(rather than masses of xp and uber loot), I don't see the abuse
possibilites are too great.

I think it's an excellent idea to link low-level players into such
high-level events. It would, as you say, promote interaction across
levels to a much greater degree.

While, yes, once the connection is figured out it will be on
websites everywhere, there should be still fun in triggering the
event, and the first player to discover the connection can be
written down in game lore somewhere.

--
[ cruise / casual-tempest.net / transference.org ]
   "quantam sufficit"
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