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Re: Skills!



In message <MM.770409169.20101.yrsa@ifi.uio.no>, =?iso-8859-1?Q?Bj=F8rn_Georg_L
udvigsen?= writes:

  I'm glad we agree that in-the-field experience should result in
advancement in only related areas.

>But, to prevent this, I propose adding a new type of books to the
>game, books which give you the nessecary theory to practice the skill
>on your own. You must agree, one simply cannot learn Monster Lore
>without some theory to back it up. "book of Monster Lore".

  I like this much better.

>>  Why would anyone want to specialize in Broadsword instead of 
>>General?  Then he'll be handicapped when he finds the Long Sword of
>>Holy Avenging, which he would DEFINITELY want to use, or some weapon
>>like the Axe of Biff, or the CSUA Bat.
>
>Because General Weapon Use would be much more expensive. A skill level
>in Broadsword would (initially) cost 2 points, whereas General Weapon
>use would cost 8 points.

  Weapons skills are related.  The same muscles and experience that
allows someone to swing a sword around probably also allow him to
use other weapons effectively also.  It is easier to pick up a second
fighting skill having learned the body control necessary for one.
Therefore, even training in a specialty should also be applied in
part to training in the general skill.

  As a real life example, black-belts in any martial arts disciple often
advance *very* quickly in others.  They have built up the necessary
coordination, agility, stamina, and mental discipline which are the core
requirements of all martial arts.

  Having picked up ANY fighting skill, then, should reduce the cost
of picking up a second fighting skill by a very great deal, and the 
third should also be reduced even MORE.

  Also, my fencing is weak, but it seems to me that skill with the
Broadsword is so readily applicable to Long Sword and Short Sword that
it is unnecessary to distinguish between them.....

  So the fighting skills should be thus:  
  Sword--Ball & Chain--Polearm--Axe & Hammer--Sticks--Archery
	
>If a character finds an Artifact of any kind, he simply places it on

  No one would ever want to train in any skill other than Sword, then,
because all the coolest artifacts are swords.  Holy Avenger, Defender,
Darkblade, Demonbane, Dragonslayer, Stormbringer, Mournblade....
These are the best, and these are all swords.

>Ok, so maybe not all the way down to zero/none, BUT: as the
>information needed to learn a spell to this level (20) is only
>available in the Long Lost Tome of Abysmal Icemagic (soon to be found
>in your local branch of Gandalf's... NOT!), it should be pretty good.

  I happen to think that learning the spell of Small fireball should make
it easier to learn and be effective with Medium Fireball, and Large Fireball,
and might even help with Burning Hands, and other missile spells like
Comet, large bullet, magic bullet.  I think dividing magic skills by spell
is bad.  Dividing by path is better, but I think the whole field of channeling
mana to produce effects is so inter-related that learning in any one area
should enhance all the rest.

>> 3)  Your proposal is a lot more complicated than my 4-skill proposal.
>> A multitude of new skills would have to be added.  My proposal is
>> a good deal of work, but clerics are in the game, mages are in the
>> game, and fighting is in the game.  Thieves are NOT in the game.

>You'd have to add quite a few new skills, yes. But not really all that
>many "unknown", when you think about it. Weapon skills are easy to

Yes they ARE 'unknown'.  Right NOW all weapons are THE SAME.  The code
treats them identically.  We'd have to put in code to maintain a 
list of weapon types and interdependencies, code to handle training,
code to handle loading and unloading of these lists for players, etc.
BIIIIIG project.  HORDES of debugging.  The same goes for magic spells.
Distinctions would be put in where none were before, BY SPELL.
We're talking, lots of new code here......  I'd estimate the complexity
at seven or eight times my 4-skills proposal.

Also, there is player complexity to be considered.  4 skill areas is
enough for flavor, i think....  It distinguishes the major classes more
sharply.  A great many skills could become cumbersome for the player
much the same way that inventories are now.  A lot of work would have
to be done to provide an actual, usable interface.  Interface needed
for 4 skills areas:  1 new stat, power, 3 new levels, 3 new experience
point fields.  Easily a factor of ten in complexity here.

>I'd like there to be a possibility to learn a spell very good and
>perhaps not to be equally good at another spell.

  This is already sort of in the code.  The level dependencies on spells
address this issue.  A spell you've just learned (it's level is near yours)
is cast more weakly than you learn how to do it later when you've gained
some more experience.  And i don't see why a great mage couldn't learn
say, burning hands for the first time, smack his head, and say, 'oh, i
see, how trivial' and really blast out awesome burning hands spells right
off.  Also, rgg (Rupert) has added spell-paths, so broad areas of spells
can have different effectiveness for different players.

>In general, not making everybody know the same things equally good
>gives each character more personality.

  True, true.  But not even MUD's have this capability, I think, and
they don't have to deal with the additional complexity of having an
x-interface, etc....  Mud players introduce personality into their
characters by WHAT THEY SAY......

>That might very well be the case, indeed. But what I don't know is if
>the audience would be pleased with implementing your system and stopping
>there, or if they'd like my system on top of yours.

  A great many people have expressed support for the 4-skill proposal i made.

>Would you like to stop after implementing your system, or would you
>agree to my compromise mentioned on top of the message?

  Quite frankly, yes, I'd be happy to stop.
I can see pretty clearly everything needed to
put in the 4-skill system, and have an idea of the complexity involved.
The major weakness is the Thief area.  I cannot do everything required
to do justice to Thieves.  My bitmap art just isn't up to it.
The X-interface stuff is unknown to me, I'm hoping it won't be too hard
to deal with.

>One could of course pick any lock, including the ones on the doors
>which you now have to bash down if you don't have a key. I'd say there
>are a lot of locks out there, just waiting to be picked.
  The code support is not there yet.  You cannot say 'pick the look on
this door', and have it open yet.  The door cannot have traps in it yet.

>I agree on the traps. As for doors, what kind of doors would you like
>to add so that we may pick the locks on them? And the chests, did you
>have trapped chests in mind?

  What I'd like to do is make it so that doors are trapped at random.
Any door at all might have a trap.  This would remove the necessity
of editing all the damned maps to put in trapped doors.  Same with
chests.  Severity and level of traps would depend on the difficulty
of the dungeon.

>effect? Having traps without being able to disarm them isn't very

  Yes, that's true.
>cool, and I think it would be a rather big addition to add your entire
>system as well as traps in one batch. But adding both our systems

  Which is why I propose doing the traps/thief stuff first.

>The reason thieves had no purpose before, was that characters had no
>skills. Thieves are skill-based characters, as opposed to all other
>classes (in crossfire). 
  No, the reason thieves don't exist is because opening doors is riskless,
traps don't exist, chests are QUITE safe to open, and there are no hidden
buttons, doors for them to search and find!  You'd be amazed by how much
people will start acting like thiefs if they could die from a bomb in a
chest.



Regards,

PeterM