[MUD-Dev2] Importance of emoting (Was: A rant againstVanguardreviews and rants)

[Tess Snider]

On 4/5/07, Richard A. Bartle <richard at mud.co.uk> wrote:
>         Just yesterday, someone in my WoW guild complained that they
> couldn't /gasp in guild chat.

I wish they'd at least allow free-form emotes in guild chat.  I
remember in DAOC, watching people <bracket> their text to simulate
free-form emotes in guild-chat.  This isn't about roleplaying.  Just
monkeying with your friends.  Sometimes, you do want to gasp... or
cheer, or snicker, or smirk.

> >The assumption that the player base wants better support of emotes is the
> >very point of contention here.  /train and /chicken are toys.  Current
> >players like toys.  The fact that they are triggered the same way as an
> >emote is not supportive of emotes in any way.
>         I disagree. If you give people more toys, they have more to play
> with and they can play different games.

/chicken is not a toy, anyway.  It is an important expression.
/chicken is what you do when /taunt and /beckon aren't working.  Heck,
I've even used that one in the PvP battlegrounds before.

/train, on the other hand, would be much more useful if you were
playing EQ.  Though, had EQ had such an emote, the mere sound of it
would cast fear and dread into the hearts of players everywhere.

>         My gripe with them is that they add unwanted context (if I /threaten
> someone, I want it to say "You threaten <target>", not "You threaten
> <target> with the wrath of doom").

This is an old, old issue, really.  My particular pet peeve is /grin.
I've been stuck grinning evilly since my first LP-MUD.  You'd think
after all these years, I'd have learned to /smile, when I wasn't
feeling menacing, but no.  I still /grin, and still get that little
shock of displeasure when the context is all wrong.

This is one thing that Skotos did well, actually.  They let you attach
known adverbs to your actions.  Though, their parser is generally a
fair bit more sophisticated than I'd expect in a graphical game.  That
said, I always found their lack of free-form emotes a bit stifling.
In a roleplaying world (as many of their games are), I expect to be
able to do things like:

Kalean fruitlessly reaches a hand towards her hip where a sword might
be sheathed, if she had one.

Their parser doesn't have a chance against a gesture like that.
However, it is very closely married to their coded consent system, and
free-form emotes would allow people to attempt to circumvent that
system.  I understand why they didn't allow them.  It makes sense, but
it's just not my cup of tea.

In a game like WoW, free-form emotes are no more of a liability than
free-form chat is.  It's all just text, and can be used or abused,
just the same.

Tess