May 2007

• [DESIGN] Developing and balancing a roleplaying system Calvin
• [ADMIN] Bounced Posts? Nick Koranda
• [Offtopic] Lend your ears to science! Mike Rozak
• [Design] [REPOST] Food in MMOs Lachek Butalek
• • [Design] [REPOST] Food in MMOs Jacob Cord
  • • [Design] [REPOST] Food in MMOs Steve "Bloo" Daniels
    • • [Design] [REPOST] Food in MMOs Damion Schubert
      • • [DESIGN} Who to design for? John Buehler
        • • [DESIGN} Who to design for? Damion Schubert
          • • [DESIGN} Who to design for? John Buehler
            • • [DESIGN} Who to design for? Tess Snider
              • • [DESIGN} Who to design for? Sean Howard
                • • [DESIGN} Who to design for? Raph Koster
                  • • [DESIGN} Who to design for? Sean Howard
                    • • [DESIGN} Who to design for? Raph Koster
                      • • [DESIGN} Who to design for? Sean Howard
                        • • [DESIGN} Who to design for? Caliban Darklock
                          • • [DESIGN} Who to design for? Sean Howard
                            • • [DESIGN} Who to design for? Caliban Darklock
                              • • [DESIGN} Who to design for? Sean Howard
                                • • [DESIGN} Who to design for? Caliban Darklock
                                  • [DESIGN} Who to design for? cruise
                                  • [DESIGN} Who to design for? John MacQueen
                              • "The Next Big Thing" (was [DESIGN} Who to design for?) Mike Sellers
                              • • "The Next Big Thing" (was [DESIGN} Who to design for?) Sean Howard
                                • • "The Next Big Thing" (was [DESIGN} Who to design for?) Peter Keeler
                          • [DESIGN} Who to design for? Michael Chui
                          • [DESIGN] Who to design for? Michael Hartman
                      • [DESIGN} Who to design for? Damion Schubert
                      • [DESIGN} Who to design for? Caliban Darklock
                  • [DESIGN} Who to design for? Tess Snider
                  • • [DESIGN} Who to design for? Sean Howard
            • [DESIGN} Who to design for? Sean Howard
            • • [DESIGN} Who to design for? cruise
              • • [DESIGN} Who to design for? Sean Howard
                • • [DESIGN} Who to design for? Caliban Darklock
                  • • [DESIGN} Who to design for? Sean Howard
                    • • [DESIGN} Who to design for? Caliban Darklock
                      • • [DESIGN} Who to design for? Sean Howard
                        • • [DESIGN} Who to design for? Caliban Darklock
                          • • [DESIGN} Who to design for? Sean Howard
                            • • [DESIGN} Who to design for? Dana V. Baldwin
                              • [DESIGN} Who to design for? Caliban Darklock
                              • • [DESIGN} Who to design for? Sean Howard
                                • • [DESIGN} Who to design for? Caliban Darklock
                                  • • [DESIGN} Who to design for? Sean Howard
                                    • • [DESIGN} Who to design for? Caliban Darklock
              • [DESIGN} Who to design for? Mike Sellers
            • [DESIGN} Who to design for? Tess Snider
            • • [Design] 4Cs (was Who to design for?) Mike Sellers
              • • [Design] 4Cs (was Who to design for?) Sean Howard
                • • [Design] 4Cs (was Who to design for?) Mike Sellers
                  • • [Design] 4Cs (was Who to design for?) Sean Howard
                    • • [Design] 4Cs (was Who to design for?) Michael Chui
                  • [Design] 4Cs (was Who to design for?) Peter Keeler
                  • • [Design] 4Cs (was Who to design for?) Ammon Lauritzen
                    • [Design] 4Cs (was Who to design for?) Sean Howard
                    • • [Design] 4Cs (was Who to design for?) Lachek Butalek
                      • [Design] 4Cs (was Who to design for?) Dana V. Baldwin
          • [DESIGN} Who to design for? cruise
          • [DESIGN} Who to design for? Sean Howard
          • [DESIGN} Who to design for? Caliban Darklock
        • [Design] [REPOST] Food in MMOs Steve "Bloo" Daniels
        • • [Design] [REPOST] Food in MMOs Caliban Darklock
          • • [Design] [REPOST] Food in MMOs cruise
            • [Design] [REPOST] Food in MMOs Steve "Bloo" Daniels
  • [Design] [REPOST] Food in MMOs Tess Snider
  • • [Design] [REPOST] Food in MMOs Lachek Butalek
    • • [Design] [REPOST] Food in MMOs Michael Chui
      • [Design] [REPOST] Food in MMOs Ian Hess
      • [Design] [REPOST] Food in MMOs Ian Hess
      • [Design] [REPOST] Food in MMOs Tess Snider
      • • [Design] [REPOST] Food in MMOs Lachek Butalek
        • • [Design] [REPOST] Food in MMOs Michael Hartman
          • • [Design] [REPOST] Food in MMOs Kiztent
            • [Design] [REPOST] Food in MMOs Jean, Yannick
            • • [Design] [REPOST] Food in MMOs Michael Hartman
              • • [Design] [REPOST] Food in MMOs Vincent Archer
                • • [Design] [REPOST] Food in MMOs Dave Scheffer
          • [Design] [REPOST] Food in MMOs Tess Snider
          • [Design] [REPOST] Food in MMOs Michael Chui
  • [Design] [REPOST] Food in MMOs John Buehler
  • [Design] [REPOST] Food in MMOs Morris Cox
  • • [Design] [REPOST] Food in MMOs Dana V. Baldwin
    • • [Design] [REPOST] Food in MMOs Matt Chatterley
      • • [Design] [REPOST] Food in MMOs Dana V. Baldwin
        • [Design] [REPOST] Food in MMOs Michael Chui
        • • [Design] Obstacles and Hindrances [was: Food in MMOs & Perma-death] cruise
• [DESIGN] Perma-death cruise
• • [DESIGN] Perma-death Dana V. Baldwin
  • • [DESIGN] Perma-death Steve "Bloo" Daniels
  • [DESIGN] Perma-death Nick Koranda
  • • [DESIGN] Perma-death cruise
  • [DESIGN] Perma-death Damion Schubert
  • • [DESIGN] Perma-death cruise
    • • [DESIGN] Perma-death Dana V. Baldwin
      • • [DESIGN] Perma-death Steve "Bloo" Daniels
        • • [DESIGN] Perma-death cruise
          • • [DESIGN] Perma-death Steve "Bloo" Daniels
            • [DESIGN] Perma-death Jeffrey Kesselman
  • [DESIGN] Perma-death Tess Snider
  • • [DESIGN] Perma-death Cory Cohen
    • [DESIGN] Perma-death Matt Chatterley
    • [DESIGN] Perma-death Craig Huber
    • • [JOBS] Areae hiring Raph Koster
    • [DESIGN] Perma-death Phillip Lenhardt
    • • [DESIGN] Perma-death Jeffrey Kesselman
      • [DESIGN] Perma-death Jeffrey Kesselman
      • • [DESIGN] Perma-death Tess Snider
        • • [DESIGN] Perma-death Jeffrey Kesselman
          • • [DESIGN] Perma-death Tess Snider
            • • [DESIGN] Perma-death Jeffrey Kesselman
              • • [DESIGN] Perma-death Dave Scheffer
                • • [DESIGN] Perma-death Dana V. Baldwin
                  • • [DESIGN] Perma-death Dave Scheffer
          • [DESIGN] Perma-death Matt Chatterley
          • [DESIGN] Perma-death cruise
          • • [DESIGN] Perma-death Caliban Darklock
            • • [DESIGN] Perma-death cruise
              • [DESIGN] Perma-death Dana V. Baldwin
              • • [DESIGN] Perma-death cruise
        • [DESIGN] Perma-death Caliban Darklock
        • • [DESIGN] Perma-death Dana V. Baldwin
          • • [DESIGN] Perma-death Peter Keeler
            • • [DESIGN] Perma-death Dana V. Baldwin
              • • [DESIGN] Perma-death Peter Keeler
                • • [DESIGN] Perma-death Jeffrey Kesselman
                  • • [DESIGN] Perma-death Peter Keeler
                    • [DESIGN] Perma-death Michael Chui
      • [DESIGN] Perma-death Soy weiser
      • • [DESIGN] Perma-death Ammon Lauritzen
        • [DESIGN] Perma-death Jeffrey Kesselman
  • [DESIGN] Perma-death Ammon Lauritzen
  • • [DESIGN] Perma-death Dana V. Baldwin
  • [DESIGN] Perma-death John Buehler
  • [DESIGN] Perma-death Hans Häggström
  • • [DESIGN] Perma-death cruise
• [NEWS] Sigil / Vanguard fallout ... the ex-employee interview Adam Martin
• • [NEWS] Sigil / Vanguard fallout ... the ex-employeeinterview Morgan Ramsay
  • [NEWS] Sigil / Vanguard fallout ... the ex-employee interview Sean Howard
  • • [NEWS] Sigil / Vanguard fallout ... the ex-employee interview Adam Martin
    • • [NEWS] Sigil / Vanguard fallout ... the ex-employee interview Sean Howard
      • • [NEWS] Sigil / Vanguard fallout ... the ex-employee interview Mike Sellers
        • • [NEWS] Sigil / Vanguard fallout ... the ex-employee interview Michael Zenke
          • [NEWS] Sigil / Vanguard fallout ... the ex-employee interview Sean Howard
          • [NEWS] Sigil / Vanguard fallout ... the ex-employeeinterview Mike Rozak
          • • [NEWS] Sigil / Vanguard fallout ... the ex-employeeinterview Mike Sellers
    • [NEWS] Sigil / Vanguard fallout ... the ex-employee interview Caliban Darklock
  • [NEWS] Sigil / Vanguard fallout ... the ex-employeeinterview Mike Rozak
  • • [NEWS] Sigil / Vanguard fallout ... the ex-employeeinterview Sean Howard
• Fwd: [NEWS] Sigil / Vanguard fallout ... the ex-employeeinterview Adam Martin
• [DESIGN] Mechanical support for socializer playstyles Ian Hess
  It occurred to me after reading many stories in the last six months that
  MMOs have sufficiently complex models in place for some standard
  ?negative? literary stories to occur. The razing of the rper village in
  UO, the infiltration of a large guild in Eve Online, and many smaller
  scale events (city invasions in wow), match several common book plots.
  However, when they occur in the context of an MMO, the frequent reaction
  is out of character anger, and breaking of immersion.
  
  I have been trying to describe how online player actions, character
  roles, and play experiences can fit into literary models. For this to
  work even on a small scale, I think setbacks, failures, and even
  disasters have to be mechanically encapsulated in bits of story.
  
  Death mechanics in various muds and MMOs might be a simplistic example
  of this, where there is a specific set of challenges or experience
  around returning to life. Inferno (worldofinferno.com) has a series of
  riddles to solve before your character can be revived. WOW has some
  quests that can only be done while in ghost form.
  
  I think that small scale story encapsulation of negative events makes
  for good game play and a realistic world. If resurrection is pushing a
  button, spending some mana points, and using up a component that costs a
  few coins, death is trivialized in experience and potential roleplay.
  Especially if support is desired for other Bartle types than achiever,
  then getting players right back to the hunt isn?t as important, in the
  case of death stories.
  
  Finding ways to encapsulate in story mechanics war, betrayal, plague,
  revolution, infiltration, politics, or similar potentially ?negative?
  experiences would allow more immersive worlds to be presented.
  
  Many games, especially in text, have tried to use live Gms to run real
  time story events. I served as a game master in Inferno. Our
  observation was that there was a mandatory ratio of players to
  storytellers that is very similar to live action or large tabletop rpg
  games. If you want each character to feel personally engaged each
  session, most GMs will manage to entertain four to six players. If you
  are willing to rotate the spotlight or develop the characters in small
  groups in turn, one GM to eight to twelve has seemed to be a good ratio.
  I headed a plot committee for a three hundred person live action game
  for a few years, as it grew. We found that building social layering,
  including political offices that could be contested, self-defined player
  groups, and social mechanics for basic socializer activities*, allowed
  many less game masters to players. We ended up with twelve Gms to
  roughly three hundred players, or a 1:25 ratio. The assumption was not
  that each player would be entertained, but that the social clique
  organizers would be given story seeds that applied to groups. Making
  those player leaders story gateways only solidified the contest for
  those positions.
  
  Needless to say, even a model of one gm to twenty five is not
  sustainable on the scale that exists in most MMOs. This seems
  especially true considering that as organizations of Gms grow, so does
  administrative overhead.
  
  Literary use of groups, organizations, cities or nations as characters
  is pretty common. It might be argued that most of the large scale
  stories I mentioned earlier, especially war, revolution, and city
  building, need to be mechanically supported by coding socializer support
  for groups.
  
  I am still at the stage of writing a design document, as well as
  researching and compiling notes on prior art. Nexxon?s Dark Ages had a
  pretty involved voting system for player government. Vampire the
  Masquerade had a great system of political offices with specific powers
  that players could fight over. A Tale in the Desert has a great concept
  of demi-pharoahs being elected, and having the limited ability to
  permaban other players. Many muds, Inferno included, have law
  enforcement guilds that give access at some rank to verbs that can be
  used to pacify, exile, or jail other players, often in ways that make
  socializers with few combat powers able to deal with powerful achievers
  while on the socializers home ground.
  
  I suppose I?m envisioning a socializer mini game as intricate at the
  current achiever mini games. It begs the question how much content can
  be stuffed into any one game, but that?s something I don?t have as much
  experience with.
  
  Thoughts?
  
  Ian Hess
  
  
  * By socializer support, I am referring to mechanical support for group
  definition, rulership, shunning, exiling, altering another characters
  reputation, being able to bargain social support, and enforcing
  contracts. For many applicable details to this kind of mechanic, see
  vampire the masquerade live action rules version 2 or 3.
• • [DESIGN] Mechanical support for socializer playstyles Michael Chui
  • • [DESIGN] Mechanical support for socializer playstyles Ian Hess
  • [DESIGN] Mechanical support for socializer playstyles Michael Chui
  • • [DESIGN] Mechanical support for socializer playstyles cruise
• [TECH] Creating games with Worldforge Roger D Vargas
• • [TECH] Creating games with Worldforge Alistair Riddoch
  • • [TECH] Creating games with Worldforge Roger D Vargas
  • [TECH] Creating games with Worldforge Tess Snider
  • • [TECH] Creating games with Worldforge Roger D Vargas
    • • [TECH] Creating games with Worldforge Lachek Butalek
      • [TECH] Creating games with Worldforge Tess Snider
      • • [TECH] Creating games with Worldforge Roger D Vargas
        • • [TECH] Creating games with Worldforge Tess Snider
• The Merits of Text Chat (Was: Importance of emoting) Michael Hartman
• • The Merits of Text Chat (Was: Importance of emoting) Matt Chatterley
• [Design] Alternatives To Advancement Systems (was Food in MMOs) Caliban Darklock
• [DESIGN] Essence of a MMO (was 4Cs) Dana V. Baldwin
• • [DESIGN] Essence of a MMO (was 4Cs) Caliban Darklock
  • [DESIGN] Essence of a MMO (was 4Cs) Sean Howard
  • • [DESIGN] Essence of a MMO (was 4Cs) Dana V. Baldwin
• [TECH] Server Side Scripting Roger D Vargas
• • [TECH] Server Side Scripting Caliban Darklock
  • [TECH] Server Side Scripting Richard Tew
  • [TECH] Server Side Scripting Ammon Lauritzen
  • [TECH] Server Side Scripting Jeffrey Kesselman