Author Topic: Immortals, try not to take this personally :)  (Read 21447 times)

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Offline Jaros

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Immortals, try not to take this personally :)
« on: September 13, 2011, 09:46:28 pm »
Immortals are great and totally necessary but in an ideal world the game would run itself and we wouldn't need them.  To that end, I think we should open up more things to in-game manipulation.

One reward worth earning that doesn't make anyone physically stronger would be the ability to pay for and build things in the game.  Things like houses, clan-halls and perzes could all be coded such that players can expand and customize them on their own.  The fact that we can do this at all is a massive strength of text-based gaming, so why not make it easier?  Why not lower the cost of things like plain rooms and mobs and stat-less objects, none of which imbalance the game but all of which could add character to the world and get more players involved.

Make it possible to add scripts to certain things in game, for a price, once you've earned the right, whatever.  We could be collaborating on in game 'sandbox' zones, adding ever more interesting dialogue to certain mobs, things like that.  It could be great.

Offline Xeriuth

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Re: Immortals, try not to take this personally :)
« Reply #1 on: September 13, 2011, 10:47:20 pm »
I suggested on an earlier thread on a item restring machine. You bring the item, any item, and you can restring the item by doing a special command phrase like... restring gauntlet some bloody knuckles

That would string your gauntlet item to look like some bloody knuckles.

This would give the players the ability to restring any item, even non perzables, and have a completely unique set of eq to fit their RP. Don't have to see every melee person out there with an Achilles' Heel anymore because it's non perzable. You see them with socks, or shoes, or boots, or mittens on their feet.

This of course would also make the imms jobs a lot easier because they wouldnt have to always have to do stuff for the players, they may be needed for perzes themselves, scripts and rooms for now, but restrings, could be a thing of the past for them.

Thoughts?
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Offline Virisin

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Re: Immortals, try not to take this personally :)
« Reply #2 on: September 13, 2011, 11:19:39 pm »
Minecraft is popular because it is possible to alter the game itself.

4d should also create a 'dreaming' feature, (Once will know what I'm talking about) and allow players to code mini-zones that pop in and out of existence.

Offline Jaros

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Re: Immortals, try not to take this personally :)
« Reply #3 on: September 13, 2011, 11:39:32 pm »
Minecraft is popular because it is possible to alter the game itself.

Exactly.  Minecraft pretty much has lego graphics and all you do is run around building whatever you want.  It's massively popular.

I suggested on an earlier thread on a item restring machine.

I like it.  :D

Offline Molly

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Re: Immortals, try not to take this personally :)
« Reply #4 on: September 14, 2011, 12:53:56 am »
The difference between Minecraft and a text mud is that Minecraft does have lego graphics.
A text Mud hasn't, and until now 4D has always taken pride in zones that are well built and relatively free from typos.

Allowing anyone to add extra rooms and objects to the gameport means that we'd be dependant of the writing skills of those who design these things.

And after over ten years if seeing what horrible pieces of 'building' some people produce in the Buildport, I am very reluctant to let this loose in the Gameport, in plain view of everybody. And I am not just talking of things like obscenities and garish colours now, but of bad English, typos, lack of grammar, and usually lack of punctuation too. You have to see it to believe it.

Sure, if anyone can code the text equivalent to the lego blocks that Minecraft has, I'm all for letting people play with them. But I very much doubt that will be possible, plus that it would hamper the creativity you are aiming for.

It's a nice idea, but it just won't work. Believe me, building is not as easy as many seem to think. It's also very time consuming. There is a reason why so many of the zones in the buildport never get finished.
« Last Edit: September 14, 2011, 12:56:29 am by Molly »

Offline Jaros

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Re: Immortals, try not to take this personally :)
« Reply #5 on: September 14, 2011, 01:18:24 am »
So what about small steps?  Things like Xeriuth's restring machine?  Restricted sandbox areas that we can build in / customize?

There is obviously value in our amazingly built world, no one's trying to risk that.

There's also value in amateur, social things.  If it's obviously a sandbox, no one will care if there are mistakes all through it.  There will be people though who appreciate the ideas and the character it develops and the chance to get involved without having to commit to 100 complete, well-written rooms, because you're right, that is a massive undertaking.

So, restricted spaces for this kind of thing?  Restring machines?  Perz machines?

Offline Jaros

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Re: Immortals, try not to take this personally :)
« Reply #6 on: September 14, 2011, 01:29:58 am »
To be honest the spaces are already there: houses.  Surely it would be possible to grant restricted OLC to those on a house-list that only functions Between Time & Space?

Offline Jason Orsini

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Re: Immortals, try not to take this personally :)
« Reply #7 on: September 14, 2011, 01:31:58 am »
damn not sure i can buuuu this....  >:(

Offline Virisin

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Re: Immortals, try not to take this personally :)
« Reply #8 on: September 14, 2011, 01:44:50 am »
Yeah making it a dream feature would require endorsing the building as a mud which we couldn't do.

But as a sandbox it could be quite fun if it was clearly SIGNED: "You are now entering seriously warped space time, you are losing contact with 4dimensions - any further venturing could prove harmful in more ways than on."

I actually love the idea of building block pieces for zones:

Imagine if there was a type 'forest', 'ocean', 'plain', 'scary room', 'plain room', or some shit like that that were just pre-constructed 1 room pieces of zone that it was possible for players to adjust the links for, essentially making mini- 'create-your-own' mazes of say 10 or 20 rooms that they didn't actually build, just put together. Not sure exactly what we'd get out of it but I'm sure we could make it fun.  :P

 

Offline Molly

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Re: Immortals, try not to take this personally :)
« Reply #9 on: September 14, 2011, 09:31:46 am »
To be honest the spaces are already there: houses.  Surely it would be possible to grant restricted OLC to those on a house-list that only functions Between Time & Space?

I guess I could live with restricted OLC access to add new rooms inside a private house, i.e. rooms that couldn't be accessed without special invitation.

I could live with rooms and possibly mobs being added in a 'sandbox' too, as long as it was set as !teleport and had a warning sign at the entrance about desc quality.

But objects is a totally different matter, unless someone could code in a restriction against them being taken anywhere in the mud. I wouldn't like 4D turning into something that looks as a DragonballZ mud. And I'm even a bit reluctant about mobs, because I know that at least some players would abuse this liberty by making easy-to-kill mobs and then use these for fast levelling. It has happened in the past, and that's not what the game is supposed to be about.

The sandbox idea has merits, even though I think the players would tire of it very fast, because building is really rather tedious work. However, at the time when I was still hoping that Crafting skills would be implemented, the top skill for Woodworkers was Shipbuilder - i.e. to build vehicles. And for Stoneworker the top skill was Constructor, which would give them restricted access to OLC, so that they could build player Houses in a walled in zone with building plots that we would provide. These houses would not be crashproof, but there would be a skill called Cabinetmaker, where players could make the equivalent to our crashproof lockers.

And it would also be quite possible to let players build their own mini dungeons or arenas in the sandbox area, without needing to write any descs at all, unless they chose to. Because we actually have the equivalent of the Minecraft lego blocks in our Wilderness code. A room that is set with a Wilderness flag gets an auto-generated description, based on the sector of the room. And until you exchange that default desc for something new, that is what everyone entering the room will see. So, repetitive descs, and just two lines, (but at least two lines without typo, grammar and punctuation errors). And it allows for quick building.

Also, with the help of KaVir's new client app, (which is still under development), we now also have access to graphic sidebar maps, which look pretty nice, and make orienting in the game a lot easier, which is good both for exploring amd Pkilling.

The enclosed screenshot shows a part of the Ancient Greece map in the right side window, while using KaVir's GUI in my own MUSHclient. The circle indicates my own position on the map, and each square on the map represents one room, i.e. one map tile or lego block.
The in-game equivalent map is displayed on the Game screen, for comparison.
At least for me this is an enormous improvement, because you always have the map at the side to help with the orientation, and you can use the arrows on the number pad to move around easily.

(In case someone wonders, the small icons under the Avatar to the left indicate that I have a spell cast on me, and the digits on the icons show the remaining duration time, which slowly ticks down until effect ends and the icons disappear. There are of course lots of other features you can add to the client, but for this subject the maps are what counts. I'll post more info about the client app and how to download it in another post, just thought I'd mention it here).

http://img215.imageshack.us/img215/1695/maplaconia.jpg



« Last Edit: September 14, 2011, 10:33:05 am by Molly »

Offline Xeriuth

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Re: Immortals, try not to take this personally :)
« Reply #10 on: September 14, 2011, 09:46:50 am »
Does no one like my idea for a restring machine?
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Offline Tor

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Re: Immortals, try not to take this personally :)
« Reply #11 on: September 14, 2011, 09:54:18 am »
Xeriuth's idea of a restring machine sounds interesting to me.

Offline Riley

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Re: Immortals, try not to take this personally :)
« Reply #12 on: September 14, 2011, 10:10:37 am »
I agree with Xeriuth's idea for restring.  Just cause I'm a girl... doesn't mean I want to look like all the other girls.... or caster guys... that doesn't have gender restrictions on the gear.  And you guys want to promote RPing with allowing us to buy statless gear?  Not many people really want to run around in statless gear to RP especially if they are PK.  It's like for an example that will never happen... Jason is running around in his RP gear with his other gear still on him, gets axed, and has to start all over.  Why can't he just be wearing his super awesome equipment and deal with the PK punkass right than and kill him while still in his RP gear.

I know it's something that will have to be monitored so people aren't running around with like somone's V... on their face but think it's safe to say that on the mortal side that the code can block some words from being used in the restrings short name.  You will just have to compile a blacklist for unusable words, which wouldn't really be that long of a list imho. Swear words, some anatomy parts, and perhaps a few words if used together/back to back.

But over all would really help out Role-playing and character uniqueness, which above all is drastically lacking in most games.

Offline Xeriuth

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Re: Immortals, try not to take this personally :)
« Reply #13 on: September 14, 2011, 10:18:22 am »
If people are worried about abuse. Then simply can add a lock to it, a way for hero's or imms to blacklist people who abuse the machine. Just have a list of set rules of do's and don'ts and if people want to overstep their bounds the their loss. Also can make it so it's only available after 1st Remort. So people don't just make level 1 alts to use it.
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Offline Prometheus

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Re: Immortals, try not to take this personally :)
« Reply #14 on: September 14, 2011, 11:45:04 am »
If a builder could answer this it would be helpful. Aren't perzs and some restrings done using other vnums than the object that is changed? Or am I missing something? (coder here not builder lol)

The restring machine isn't too bad of an idea but we would need controls and Xeriuth suggested Hero / Immortal overview could work. And depending on how restrings / Perzs work in 4d.

Prometheus