[MUD-Dev2] [DESIGN/OPERATION] A rant about NPC ops

[Jeffrey Kesselman]

On 4/13/07, cruise <cruise at casual-tempest.net> wrote:
>
> In Paragon, or the Rogue Isles? If actually in Paragon City (for those
> who don't play, that's the hero area, and Ghost Widow is a signature
> villain) then yes, that's just stupid - she should have been attacked by
> heroes and a tonne of NPC's on sight. Again, it's immersion breaking.

In Paragon.

> > (III) I think it encourages "cult of personality" to develop around
> > the ops.  Further feeding their egos at the expense of those more
> > deserving and the RP environment.  Some segment of the players
> > automatically responds by brown nosing.  The op, only being human,
> > enjoys the attention and responds by bestowing social advantage on the
> > brown nosers both through more attention and little op "favors" like
> > the aforementioned special titles,  and the whole thing quickly snow
> > balls into a clique centering on the op.  This is natural, human, and
> > *highly* destructive to the game as a whole.  In the worst cases, the
> > game becomes about social engineering the ops, not about playing the
> > game.
>
> I don't actually have a problem with socialising like this - these
> titles affect nothing in game, they only last a limited time, and many
> players don't care or wouldn't notice - they're a perfect reward for a
> socialiser for good socialising.
>

My problem is that its an ego-toy.  And its an ego-toy you get by
sucking up to the op.  So it encourages all the OOC behavior that much
more.

Again it comes down IMO to what you said above... about the ops having
special powers breaking the RP immersion.


JK