Activity Duration in MMOs (was: [MUD-Dev2] [DESIGN] Spore and MMOs)

[Christopher Lloyd]

--- Michael Hartman <mlist at thresholdrpg.com> wrote:
> > What's the motivation behind being part of something big? IMO it's
> the
> > desire to be big oneself. A player that takes part in a 5 hour, 40
> > player raid can later say "I was there!"
>
>
> The sad problem with WoW is that it is more accurate to say:
>
> "What if there were so many trash mobs, it took FORTY of us to press
> the
> 1 button for 5 hours and clean it all up! Oh yeah, then I think we
> fought a boss in there somewhere between the hours of trash killing.
> Oh,
> and we have to do the exact same thing every week for 3 months so
> everyone in the group gets the item they need."

<snip>

Then I would say that your bashing system is badly designed. You need to
provide players with something a big more significant to them than just
loot.

What if defeating that master undead monster gave all those who were in
the room at the time a boost to their skills for a day or so? What if it
was a boost to their "dark magic" skill (if they had one)? Would the
positive-alignment players be competing against the evil players to get
that kill?

What if defeating all the goblins in the mine gave the local a city a
boost to its economy for a few days? Or decreased the price of ore on
the open market for crafters?

What if the guild of wizards couldn't recruit any more members until
their guildmaster had been rescued from octopuses? Does the magic
pyramid have to be fed corpses every day to keep druidic magic working?

Etc.

The problem with World of Warcraft (well, one of its problems. WoW is a
great success for its designers, judging by the amount of cash they're
raking in, but bear with me here) is the lack of global hierarchy. In
the real world, our lives are restricted. There are national and local
laws, rules for how we do our jobs and even what nightclubs and bars we
can get into. But if all those restrictions didn't exist, wouldn't it be
a rather dull Brave New World?

I think that not enough worlds impose real hierarchy upon their players.
Yes, I could declare myself the new mayor of Midgaard, but even if I had
the backing of 51% of the players in the game, I doubt anyone would take
it seriously. But code in some in-game elections for the post of mayor,
and allow the mayor to command the guards to patrol, attack other
players and defend the gates, and the whole dynamic changes. The most
popular player (and the most likely candidate for the mayor position
next time around) isn't going to the the biggest, meanest dragon-slayer
or PKer - They'll be the player who leads everyone on campaigns to areas
they haven't explored before, fight fun new enemies and (hopefully)
bring them back to Midgaard alive and with some cool stories to tell.

"Remember when Bobbo led us all to the underwayer city? I never knew
that was there! And none of us knew that you needed a magic snorkel to
last more than 20 minutes there anyway. That was SO cool!"

What if Boffo has the power to appoint deputy mayors, who can set the
shop prices and also have a degree of real power over the city guards?
But the guards are more powerful if they're fed rare beef steak...

"Well done young Biffo! You've brought ANOTHER 50 steaks for the city
guards. It must have taken you ages to grow the corn for the cows, feed
them and kill them. We'll have to see about you getting that deputy
mayor-ship one day!"

What if the mayors got a special city hall room where they regenerated
magic points quicker? Of course, Boffo can only appoint three deputies
right now, unless Midgaard had 50,000 gold in its bank account.

What about the rival city of New Delos? Do they feed their guards beef
steak too? What if there's only a finite number of cows per month, and
the two cities have to compete constantly?

Can you see where I'm going with this? 

C.