October 1997
- Carnage, scripting newbie guides Koster, Raph
- Carnage, scripting newbie guides Nathan Yospe
- Carnage, scripting newbie guides Chris Gray
- Carnage, scripting newbie guides ##Make Nylander
- Carnage, scripting newbie guides ##Make Nylander
- Usability and interface and who the hell is supposed to clawrenc@cup.hp.com
- 101 Spells Not Worth Memorizing clawrenc@cup.hp.com
- more classes (Usability and interface and who the Brian Price
- more classes (Usability and interface and who the Matt Chatterley
- more classes (Usability and interface and who the coder@ibm.net
- Stranger in a Strange Land (was Usability and interface and Maddy
- Tablets. Ola Fosheim Grøstad
- Stranger in a Strange Land (was Usability and interface clawrenc@cup.hp.com
- Usability and interface ... Marian Griffith
- Usability and interface ... Caliban Tiresias Darklock
- Usability and interface ... Broly
- Usability and interface ... Caliban Tiresias Darklock
On Thursday, October 09, 1997 5:16 AM, Broly
[SMTP:gunther@online1.magnus1.com] wrote:
>
> There is a fish swimming in a lake. You are hungry, so you whip out your
> Castmaster 2000 and attempt to catch the fish. Do you remain hungry? Or
> do you catch the fish? If you leave it up to the character, that fish
> doesn't stand a chance.
And what exactly does this add to the game? Aren't we all more or less in
agreement that eating and drinking and toilet habits are needless detail?
Add them if you want them (emote casts his line into the water, watching
the float intently.), leave them out if you don't want them. If you think
fishing is fun, you can fish for your own enjoyment. If you don't, you
never have to. Same with singing, musical instruments, etc.
I for one think it's fun to be really bad at something and think you're
good at it. On most MUDs, the more I go out and do something badly, the
better I get at it -- but I don't WANT to get better at it. I want to stay
bad at it, because there's just some fundamental part of the skill that my
character doesn't get. Golf is an excellent example. Don't we all know some
guy who just SUCKS at golf, and has been playing for years, but never quite
seems to *get* it? I like that. I think it's funny in games to have quirks
like that. If there's an actual skill attached to it, it's rather difficult
to maintain one. This is also entertaining to the other players...
> Simular arguments for scrollwork (can your
> character write a scroll, or will the magic in the words activate and
> crisp your character?)
No, I meant like carving scrollwork along the edges of a table for
decoration. No matter how well it's done, lots of people will think it's
ugly, and no matter how crappy it looks, someone will just love it. There's
no effective game mechanic that can represent that.
> So back to the 'singing' example...Say a character breaks out into song
in
> the middle of a battle. If the words inspire the singers allies (they
get
> bonuses on key dicerolls while the song is sung.) and strike fear into
the
> hearts of the enemy(thus causing them to rout), then there should be some
> game construct controlling the quality of the music.
That's not a function of how well you sing. Barbra Streisand and Celine
Dion both sing beautifully. Neither one is likely to be heard over the
sounds of battle, and neither one is likely to be very inspirational or
fearsome. (The vast majority of rough and ready battlemongers probably
wouldn't be caught dead listening to them anyway.)
Ozzy Osbourne isn't much of a *singer*, but he could certainly inspire the
troops and strike fear in the hearts of the enemy. Iron Maiden does some
crunching, grinding songs that just make you *want* to advance through
enemy lines and slaughter everything in your path.
They're not hard to sing or play.
They're not fantastic award winning performances.
But they just kick ass as inspirational war anthems. "War horse and war
machine/Curse the name of liberty/Marching on as if they should/Mix in the
dirt our brothers' blood". That would push me a lot harder than "This land
is your land, this land is my land/From California to the New York island".
I find the latter a much more beautiful and well written piece. But it
doesn't inspire me to battle. It doesn't piss me off and make me want to
split skulls (with the possible exception of the singer's after ten or
twelve choruses).
Even the "Battle Hymn of the Republic" doesn't have the tendency to spur me
into almost certain death the way Nine Inch Nails' "Last" would. If you
want non-electronic examples, I'd sooner march to Beethoven's ninth than to
one of Chopin's Nocturnes. If you know the difference, you can see why.
This sort of 'inspire the troops' effort is not a direct measure of musical
ability. Look at the conditioning we go through in the military. The horrid
doggerel that we use for calling cadence is vastly more inspirational than
some perfectly constructed mellifluous melody. Nobody marches to 'America
the Beautiful'. We have stupid, non-poetic, badly-written stuff like 'Mama
and papa were lying in bed/Mama rolled over to papa and said/gimme some, oh
yeah, gimme some, oh yeah'. And if anyone reading this was *in* the
military... you can hear it, can't you, in the back of your mind? Still
gets the blood pumping a little faster, doesn't it?
Why? It sucks. It's worse than "roses are red, violets are blue" ("...some
poems rhyme, this one doesn't"). It's bad poetry, bad singing, and has no
real meaning. But IT WORKS. (Unless you want a recording contract.) There's
just blatantly no effective game mechanic for it. It's too variable.
=+[caliban@darklock.com]=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=[http://www.darklock.com/]+"It must be remembered that there is nothing more difficult to plan, more
doubtful of success, nor more dangerous to manage than the creation of a
new system. For the initiator has the enmity of all who would profit by
the preservation of the old institution, and merely lukewarm defenders in
those who would gain by the new one." -- Machiavelli
=+=+=+[We are the music makers and we are the dreamers of dreams]+=+=+=+ - Usability and interface ... Derrick Jones
- Usability and interface ... coder@ibm.net
- Usability and interface ... Derrick Jones
- Usability and interface ... coder@ibm.net
- Usability and interface ... coder@ibm.net
- Usability and interface ... Caliban Tiresias Darklock
- Usability and interface ... Marian Griffith
- Turn-based Combat Jon A. Lambert
- Turn-based Combat Travis Casey
- Turn-based Combat John G.
- OT: I'm moving! coder@ibm.net
- (fwd) New mud release coder@ibm.net
- Riddles for games clawrenc@cup.hp.com
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- Riddles for games coder@ibm.net
- The Trap Collection clawrenc@cup.hp.com
- Learning through failure Jon A. Lambert
- Learning through failure Maddy
- The Trap Collection - Volume II clawrenc@cup.hp.com
- THE COMPLETE GUIDE TO UNLAWFUL CARNAL KNOWLEDGE FOR FANTASY ROLE-PLAYING GAMES clawrenc@cup.hp.com
- (fwd) New MUD software wanted? coder@ibm.net
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- multiple intelligences Brandon J. Rickman
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- multiple intelligences S001GMU@nova.wright.edu
- multiple intelligences Travis S. Casey
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- OT: Usability and interface and who the hell is suppo coder@ibm.net
- Fear of magic (was:Usability and interface) Derrick Jones
- Fear of magic (was:Usability and interface) Michael Hohensee
- Fear of magic (was:Usability and interface) coder@ibm.net
- The Official T$R Book of Adventure Suggestions coder@ibm.net
- Mud governance Koster, Raph
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- Mud governance Mike Sellers
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- Mud governance coder@ibm.net
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- Mud governance Koster, Raph
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- OT: Usability and interface and who the hell is su Jon A. Lambert
- Fear of magic (was:Usability and interface) Marian Griffith
- Fear of magic (was:Usability and interface) Derrick Jones
- Fear of magic (was:Usability and interface) coder@ibm.net
- Fear of magic (was:Usability and interface) Nathan Yospe
- Fear of magic (was:Usability and interface) Marian Griffith
- Fear of magic (was:Usability and interface) Sauron
- Fear of magic (was:Usability and interface) coder@ibm.net
- Fear of magic (was:Usability and interface) Marian Griffith
- Fear of magic (was:Usability and interface) coder@ibm.net
- Fear of magic (was:Usability and interface) Brandon J. Rickman
- Fear of magic (was:Usability and interface) Derrick Jones
- Fear of magic (was:Usability and interface) Jon A. Lambert
- Fear of magic (was:Usability and interface) Adam Wiggins
- Fear of magic (was:Usability and interface) Derrick Jones
- Fear of magic (was:Usability and interface) Derrick Jones
- Fear of magic (was:Usability and interface) Derrick Jones
- Fear of magic (was:Usability and interface) coder@ibm.net
- Fear of magic (was:Usability and interface) coder@ibm.net
- Fear of magic (was:Usability and interface) Sauron
- Fear of magic (was:Usability and interface) Marian Griffith
- Fear of magic (was:Usability and interface) Marian Griffith
- Fear of magic (was:Usability and interface) Jon A. Lambert
- Fear of magic (was:Usability and interface) coder@ibm.net
- Fear of magic (was:Usability and interface) Vadim Tkachenko
- Fear of magic (was:Usability and interface) Sauron
- Fear of magic (was:Usability and interface) Stephen Zepp
- Fear of magic (was:Usability and interface) Matt Chatterley
- Fear of magic (was:Usability and interface) Vadim Tkachenko
- Fear of magic (was:Usability and interface) Stephen Zepp
- Fear of magic (was:Usability and interface) coder@ibm.net
- Fear of magic (was:Usability and interface) Matt Chatterley
- Fear of magic (was:Usability and interface) coder@ibm.net
- Fear of magic (was:Usability and interface) Alex Oren
- Fear of magic (was:Usability and interface) Alex Oren
- Fear of magic (was:Usability and interface) Koster, Raph
- Fear of magic (was:Usability and interface) Chris Gray
- Fear of magic (was:Usability and interface) Richard Woolcock
- Fear of magic (was:Usability and interface) Stephen Zepp
- META: List burp coder@ibm.net
- To catch a mage (was fear of magic) Derrick Jones
- To catch a mage (was fear of magic) Matt Chatterley
- To catch a mage (was fear of magic) coder@ibm.net
- To catch a mage (was fear of magic) coder@ibm.net
- To catch a mage (was fear of magic) Derrick Jones
- To catch a mage (was fear of magic) coder@ibm.net
- To catch a mage (was fear of magic) Derrick Jones
- To catch a mage (was fear of magic) coder@ibm.net
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- string parsing Felix A. Croes
- string parsing Chris Gray
- string parsing Felix A. Croes
- string parsing Jon A. Lambert
- string parsing Felix A. Croes
- string parsing Chris Gray
- string parsing Felix A. Croes
- string parsing Chris Gray
- string parsing Felix A. Croes
- string parsing Chris Gray
- string parsing coder@ibm.net
- string parsing Felix A. Croes
- string parsing coder@ibm.net
- string parsing Chris Gray
- string parsing coder@ibm.net
- string parsing Chris Gray
- string parsing coder@ibm.net
- string parsing Jon A. Lambert
- string parsing Adam Wiggins
- string parsing Ola Fosheim Grøstad
- string parsing Chris Gray
- string parsing Felix A. Croes
- string parsing Nathan Yospe
- string parsing Felix A. Croes
- string parsing Nathan Yospe
- string parsing coder@ibm.net
- string parsing Chris Gray
- string parsing Nathan Yospe
- string parsing Chris Gray
- string parsing coder@ibm.net
- Idea: Hive-mind monster coder@ibm.net
- Idea: Hive-mind monster Adam Wiggins
- Idea: Hive-mind monster coder@ibm.net
- Idea: Hive-mind monster Sauron
- Idea: Hive-mind monster Derrick Jones
- Idea: Hive-mind monster Michael Hohensee
- Idea: Hive-mind monster Brandon J. Rickman
- Idea: Hive-mind monster coder@ibm.net
- Idea: Hive-mind monster Derrick Jones
- Idea: Hive-mind monster coder@ibm.net
- Idea: Hive-mind monster coder@ibm.net
- Idea: Hive-mind monster coder@ibm.net
- Skill Listing - Part II Jon A. Lambert
- Skill Listing - Part II Derrick Jones
- Skill Listing - Part I Jon A. Lambert
- Poison List - Part II Jon A. Lambert
- Poison List - Part III Jon A. Lambert
- Poison List - Part IV Jon A. Lambert
- Poison List - Part I Jon A. Lambert