Hello. While designing my rpg, I've come up with a feature that I'd like to hear your opinions on. It is the ability to View a creature, npc or item. So far it's pretty normal. You right click on a monster and the word 'orc' comes up. But I want it to be a little more than just a word. If you view an orc, there might come up a window saying: Orcs Childhood: These vile creatures are feared by any and all civilized beings. They are ruthless, bloodthirsty and wants nothing more than blood and carnage. Since the dawn of memory have our people been plagued by orcish raids from the Marjura mountains in their search for blood and wealth. Marius' "The GreenSkin Tribes" : Orcs are the most organized of the greenskins, and can be expected to fight in a disciplined manner. Their contacts with humans mostly involves skirmishes with the Kidarii people just south of the orcs' native mountain home. Seargant Wilhelm: I've fought them green bastards for well over 15 years. They can be mighty dangerous, but if ya kill their leader, they ain't so tough anymore. Experience: They fight well, prefer large shields and crushing weapons or axes. Fear magic above almost all else. As you can see, the info is divided into what the character have been taught about the creature during his childhood, what he has read in books, heard from peoples in the know and from his own experience. The childhood part often includes either heavy bias, prejudices or pure fairy tales. What I'm mostly unsure about is the Experience part. How much should you tell the player and how much should you let him discover by himself? Is it a good idea to add "Vulnerable to fire arrows" after the first fire arrow easily killed the target, or should the player find out? [edited by - Kekko on March 17, 2004 12:09:12 PM]

Personally, I''d let the player make notes for the experience section, making it reflect their experiences rather than what the game designer thinks they should have noticed. You do risk the player failing to notice something obvious - like vulnerability to fire - but equally, the player will be able to note things that the designers didn''t think of.

If you include any online features, then the ability to share experiences could be part of that.

Oooh! Good idea!

Makes my problem with what to write disappear as well.
The obvious parts will probably be mentioned by an npc, anyway.

Maybe you could have a section dedicated to design traits, like "Vulnerable to fire attacks", and a seperate section for player notes, like "Using fire arrows does huge damage at long range."

I think that this system might inevitably turn into a gamecyclopedia, with every item and monster the player has encountered cross-referenced and categorized, so that instead of just adding new material to your "orc file", you''d actually be discovering more and more of the encyclopedia, unlocking new data through experience or conversation.

I was planning on using an idea similar to this in one game. It was a monster codex, that whenever you ecountered a new monster a new entry was added to the codex. The information in the entry was based on a combination of skills and the number of that kind of monster you had encountered. The data in the entry was fuzzy so it could be inaccurate at times.

So if you had encounted 1 unarmed orc you might get something like this:
Average Height: 7"
Average Weight: 200-300 pounds
Average Strength: 8
Average Endurance: 8
Arments: Unarmed

However having only met 1 unarmed orc this information could be exteremly inaccurate, since that might have been a very weak orc.

This could also mean the player over estimates their chances when they go charging into a nearby orc den, only to encounter some heavily armed oppostion. Since orcs real stats would be:
Average Height: 9" variation: -2/+1
Average Weight: 400 pounds variation: -200/+100
Average Strength: 12 variation: -4/+3
Average Endurance: 12 variation: -4/+3
Arments: Unarmed, glaive, flail, mace

Entries could also be copied from other monster codexs throughout the world.



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Writer, Programer, Cook, I''m a Jack of all Trades
Current Design project
Chaos Factor Design Document

Good thinking. You could go further and have that first entry list Orc HP as being "187 - 213" since that''s how much damage you inflicted on it before and after it died (You did 187, it still fought, you hit it for 26 more, it dropped). Later on it could show max, min, mode and mean for each stat, and frequency of things like weapons. I don''t know if you have a way to get exact figures for things like HP, but if so you could easily factor that more precise data into the equation.

Sub-categories might also be appropriate. A "Black Fist" orc could be identified by a tattoo or badge or hat or whatever, and their stats might be characteristically higher or lower. Knowledge of that tattoo might not be available through experience, but a little research could unlock a subcategory to your orc file, and you would start recording "Black Fist" orcs in both places, starting a new sub-database.