i meant to say ''experience-related''

quote: Original post by Anonymous Poster
"you are obviously young "

youre right, im 29

"and never played D&D."

wrong there, picked it up when i was eleven or twelve, knew the original PHB by heart

"DM = Dungeon Master"

the term DM was not my source of confusion (if it was, my post would''ve read:

"DM" huh?

"You have also obviously never tried to set up multi-player sessions with specific people at specific times!"

wrong again. have you ever tried getting 4-6 players physically into a room to play D&D for six hours? hardly logistical nirvana. yet play they do, for some decades now, and Wizards of the Coast aint complaining. TRUE rpging has never been an instant gratification kind of affair.

"One of the major benefits of a 24x7 persistant"

-quick note, i plan on persistant worlds being easy to set up on the clients own computer so he can host his own world-

"world is that there is no social pre-interaction necessary. You can say "it''s 20 minutes until dinner... I''m going to log on for a bit". The idea is feasible... but it won''t hit mass market appeal to those that would like to game whenever they want. "

i agree totally, and im more than willing to exchange mass appeal for a loyal, hardcore customer base who come back and buy expansion packs


ps. what IS obvious is that you tend to assume too much

I quoted this just to make it clear which Anonymous poster I was responding to. I was going to respond but got delayed, and already its kinda a non-sequitter. Basically we disagree, and I''ll explain my point of view here. You think that computer RPGs can recreate the feeling of PnP rpgs, and can be as fast and fun, and more fun than MMORPGs. Innoc does have a good point about getting people together. It''s not so easy to get people together IRL for PnP (in my experience anyway) in this fast paced world. People have sudden commitemnts which come up. The good thing about the MMORPG is that you can do it anytime. The bad thing, and this is where I agree with you a little bit, is that they are not so uhm rich. I mean there is little story ususally. People who will roleplay with you are few and far behind. In the NWN system, (it''s okay, I dont think it''s a bad idea, just not better than PnP.) you''ll have to call time out while the D/GM will make you a new level if you somehow stumble into a place you shouldnt be. So, if your party gets lost or ends up somewhere they shouldnt be, you''ll have to wait till next time, or the DM will have to say "Nope, you can''t go there, invisible force." Having used some map editors, and such, I don''t think it will be THAT quick to build up quality immersive levels that our heros can go explore. Either that or use prefabs, and just add a few things, but I think most people will go ''Hey, I know this place, it''s just like the Zombie castle.''...what other questions did you have of my other post hmm...

"With a computerized version, you either remove the DM, or it takes longer for the DM to prepare stuff."

I''m not sure what about that confused you, but I will elaborate. In computerized RPGs, either the computer does the DMing, or the player does, and the player is not as adept/quick as he would be if he was handed a rulebook he knew, a pencil, a paper, and a few die. When I say the DM is removed I am talking about the computer playing DM, and really, when the computer does it, its a little bit less fun, so it''s kinda like the DM isnt there and you are just playing with a map, and rules of the universe.

"And if the player does something unexpected in the computer version, there will be some kinda barrier to him, "

Yeah, its true, computers have memory limitations, and if the player goes past them the player DM in a NWN type situation has to say ''uhhh time out'' or the players get portalled, which is not very realistic/immersive. While the PnP DM can just fling the uhm...you know a little bit and maybe make it more interesting for you to go back the other way.

As far as what''s good about massive? I believe its possible to make a MMORPG in such a way that it strongly discourages not roleplaying without it being obvious that it is. Like to construct a framework where it''s kinda difficult to not roleplay. By that I''m not saying necessarily take out all global talk functions, I''m saying make it persuasive kinda. I don''t have an exact example of how this could be done but if you''re interested, I''m sure I could come up with some good ways. Anyway, back to the point, what''s good about massive? You''ll meet many different people, and are almost guaranteed to have many different experiences, good, and bad. The more people you have, usually the more fun it is. (Until lag rears its ugly head.)

The other anon, talking about referees I think was kinda talking about DMs really.

And my comment about premade stuff, but wheres the fun in that?

Well like I said, if you have Castle Orthanon, and Castle Frelgazor, and Castle Orbamine, and they all look exactly the same, it''s not fun anymore, you know them already.

I think my main point is that MMORPGS are fun, So are NWN type scenarios as long as you can get the people together, but if you can do that you might as well try to get a real PnP group together. I''d really like to see the computer for MMORPGS just be a better DM. As it is, they''re kinda boring right now. While you might say, "Well then NWN system is perfect for you!" It isnt'', it has inherent limitations that if I preferred that style all the time I think I''d rather do IRL roleplaying. And making the computer a better DM is implemented by niceties like emotion systems. (Won''t happen for a while I''m sure) And in general, more content, better stories, etc.

-=Lohrno

i think i was all of the anons, at least i was the one talking about being DM.

of course you give up creative freedom going from the tabletop to the desktop. but you cant have your cake and eat it too (you really can''t, ink about it, if you eat it you dont have it anymore i think its worth it to give a concrete world for the players to see.

as far as prefabs, it all depends on how many you have, doesnt it? and if you have many different types, and lots of textures, you could play for a year and not see the same sets. once all the code is done for the game, all you need to worry about is pumping out new content of all kinds.

as for memory limitations, i dont know as much as i''d like on the subject, but im keeping it firmly in mind in all consideration. and the timeouts for loading new architecture or objects or scripts is not a concern with torque. everything is in game and on the fly. loading architecture on the fly should be very doable with Torque. loading new maps on the fly might be possible, but im not concerned with this. when pnp parties want to travel long distances, they often say, "ok, you made the weeks journey without event, now your in the land of X" why not do the same in a CRPG. you get to the limit of the area youre in, a dialog pops up asking if you want to travel out of the area youre in, if yes you get a map, and you choose your route. random encounters (or not so random encounters) could come into play too.

i just think why put up with all the issues of designing and maintaining a mmorpg when there are other models to explore. if you want to meet new people, bring in new players every so often, or go with a new group, or collaborate with other parties, or make smaller persistent worlds.

quote: Original post by Anonymous Poster
"you are obviously young "

youre right, im 29

"and never played D&D."

wrong there, picked it up when i was eleven or twelve, knew the original PHB by heart

Should have smilied those... sorry. I was in a rush.

quote: the term DM was not my source of confusion (if it was, my post would''ve read:

"DM" huh?

Your error in a lot of cases was only putting the "huh" or the "?"... that left a lot open as to what you were questioning.

quote: "You have also obviously never tried to set up multi-player sessions with specific people at specific times!"

wrong again. have you ever tried getting 4-6 players physically into a room to play D&D for six hours? hardly logistical nirvana. yet play they do, for some decades now, and Wizards of the Coast aint complaining. TRUE rpging has never been an instant gratification kind of affair.

Hehe... I can''t stand waiting for more than 3 minutes to get a game of Starcraft going! Your point about RPGs and instant gratification is true. Where we all (including you, it seems) had patience in the 80''s to sit through things and roll dice and look up on tables, we now expect it to be entirely automated and there should be no waiting for anything. Eventually, we will be able to say "heck, when WE were young and were playing RPGs, we didn''t have all this fancy crap you kids have today!"

quote: "One of the major benefits of a 24x7 persistant"

-quick note, i plan on persistant worlds being easy to set up on the clients own computer so he can host his own world-

Whoa. That''s not a small bite to break off!

quote: i agree totally, and im more than willing to exchange mass appeal for a loyal, hardcore customer base who come back and buy expansion packs

There''s definately the possibility for a cult following of hardcore enthusiasts. I wish you luck... this sort of thing is a valuable use of the internet!

quote: ps. what IS obvious is that you tend to assume too much

Hehe...

Dave Mark
Intrinsic Algorithm Development
"Reducing the world to mathematical equations!"

quote: Original post by Anonymous Poster
moving this to the pc, you have 1-10 players, and a referee, who takes on the task of breathing life into npcs (bots) like allies, enemies, people on the street, etc. as long as the players are only interacting with one npc at a time, the referee can breathe life into a character, bypassing the dull AI problem altogether. theres also the possibility of multiple referees, or no ref, but thats another page the ref could also change things about the adventure he didnt like on the fly, create new monsters, etc.

This sounds a lot like an idea I had a few days ago...a server prog and a small client app to connect people for playing pnp rpgs, with features geared to help players of the same game find each other and to help GMs quickly outline adventures/campaigns in a highly organized manner.

---------------------------------
"It''s groin-grabbingly transcendent!" - Mr. Gamble, my teacher, speaking of his C++ AP class

Yeah you could even spend your time creating new prefab maps. And I''m sure not saying that some of these problems arent in MMORPGs. I mean everytime you go to a dungeon it''s the same. But you know, MMORPGS are definitely where the money is at and where the people are at. Why spend all the time designing an MMORPG? It''s fun, because it really is like creating another world that people have regular lives in. In PnP and NWN type games, almost all the other people are NPCs. It''s like designing The Matrix. You make your own worlds that many real people kind of inhabit. Whereas in NWN and PnP there are many many worlds. Basically MMORPGS are fun,lucrative, and exciting. And if we can improve them, that''s even better. Simple Computer RPGs are not really like worlds, they''re a little bit more like stories. While they have their own world, you''re kinda the only person there. Also with MMORPGs, there is and always can be something different. Like it or not, I think MMORPGs are definitely the wave of the future.

-=Lohrno

quote: Original post by ThoughtBubble
1: Skills/Levels. What bothers me about so many RPGs (most notably MMORPGs) is that I have to suck at the game for such a long period of time. This is especially true in MMORPGs where I only join because a friend''s playing. Nothing worse than joining to play with your friends and being too low level/combat skill to actually play with them.

If you are in a game like EQ or DAoC where they have those restrictions, yes that is unfortunate. However, there are too many people out there who demand to play for 2 hours and then be at least average - if not better. That is what leads to the overwhelming majority of power characters out there rather than a nice normal bell curve. What you should have at any one time in the world is a smattering of newbies who are advancing fairly well and a handfull of really good characters who worked their asses off to get there. The rest should be gradually lumped toward the middle.

quote: 2: Characters who have/show emotions. Um, I guess it''s not a bad idea. How about a game where I can set my emotional state? Most games won''t even let me look scared if I wanted to be. I''d be much happer if I could control those sorts of things. Like, make a character with an expression of wide eyed wonder. Perhaps make another who looks at people suspiciously.

Because people would take advantage of it and go around looking wide-eyed or suspicious or angry or sad or idiotic full time. Therefore, it would negate most of the special meaning the rest of us would like to read into such expressions. If everyone you meet is looking suspicious (because it has the coolest animations) then how would you know that the person in the corner really WANTS to look suspicious?

quote: Though if you added things like limping when a character takes leg damage it would not only add interesting looking variations to a player''s charadter, it''d be easy to automatically handle.

This I agree with! There should be obvious signs that something is amiss with a heavily damaged character.

Dave Mark
Intrinsic Algorithm Development
"Reducing the world to mathematical equations!"

IFox, I can understand the problems in a MMORPG, I am really aiming towards a single player game, which would save a lot of resources not tracking tons of people, although at the same time, will need more resources for the larger numbers of NPCs involved.

The colors of the the people in a lot of the RPGs are pretty much the same 7 or 8 colors, maybe with variations, For example, in Arcanum (Which I personally like), the characters look like carboard cutouts, in any case. In UO, as I can remeber (I had the first version), you could set your facial features (hair wise, I mean), and you could see it in the game itself, which was nice. But instead of having to guess what red colored guy out of the bunch in the town you need to talk to, I would have something that will let the player know who who is, and who is important. Generally games will give you cues anyways, like in Fallout, people would be described as "Wasted looking junkie" but someone who looked exactly the same would be described as "Shadey looking fellow" and you knew you had to talk to them. Nothing wrong with that, so dont take it as a complaint, I am just pointing out that there are other ways of identifying characters.

In Braveheart (the movie) everyone wore browns and earth tones, but without heads they still looked pretty different. But I can see the problem. Plus, if everyone wore brown then it would be difficult to id them correctly unless they stood still all day.

Rich and colorful costumes, I don''t like. Villiages were dirty, and williagers were dirty. But I suppose that this is one of those target market things. But if there are people who tout REALISM for flight sims, wargames, and the like, is there no group that touts realism in RPG''s? I guess it''s self defeating, with elves and whatnot, but there are lots of people out there (SCA''ers, RenFair goers, etc) who might enjoy something that was more realistic in the way the middle ages were.

AS for the Newtonian effect (didnt think about it in those terms, but yes), well it is at least partially true. If you want to have more of something, then you can either run up the sys requirements, or drop something else.

Anyways, I suppose it can all be written off as feature creep.

Figure out how to do these things? Well Ill admit that a few parts I havent really thought about yet, and a few things would only work for certain designs (for example, I am going to include lots and lots of cows, because my NPC''s are 100% carboard cutouts, and dumb as rocks, but my design allows for dumb NPC''s without sacrificing *much* realism), so I am speaking of this from my perspective.

The idea of seeing weakness in charcacters is really cool. (The limping for a bad leg thing), but it would only work with legs. I dont see how you could show someone was injured at the arm. (If a character broke his arm you could probably see it IRL, swollen and whatnot), but how could you see it in a game?

quote:
If you are in a game like EQ or DAoC where they have those restrictions, yes that is unfortunate. However, there are too many people out there who demand to play for 2 hours and then be at least average - if not better. That is what leads to the overwhelming majority of power characters out there rather than a nice normal bell curve. What you should have at any one time in the world is a smattering of newbies who are advancing fairly well and a handfull of really good characters who worked their asses off to get there. The rest should be gradually lumped toward the middle.

Agreement on the whole bell curve thing. However, what I want for my two to four hours a week is to be marginally useful. You know, being able to provide some measure of assistance. Ideally, after an initial investment of time (not exceeding 12 hours playtime on one character) there are some things I''d want to see happen. Unfortunately that doesn''t happen in most MMORPGS, but getting into that is way off the topics.

As far as learning goes, wouldn''t a character/avatar/person in the game world learn better under instruction? Ie: Sure you practice fighting all day, but if you could practice, and get constructive criticism on it, it would be a better combination. Also, a more expierenced person might have made the same mistakes as a less expierenced person and could helphim out. As far as solo training goes it seems like a certian amount of introspection and awareness is necessarry to really figure out what''s happening.

Compare these prefabricated examples, made to prove my point :
"Aaargh! I hit him! Why isn''t he hurting?"

"I don''t get it. Every time I tried to attack from the left I lost all my power."

"Hey, Bob, you''re improving, but you still don''t turn your hips in your lateral attacks."
"Really? I thought I did... Guess I still need to work on that"

So perhaps a better cycle would be "practice, get expirence, observe what''s wrong (possibly with outside help), fix what''s wrong, gain skill, repeat" But I don''t know how many people in RPGs would want to have to seek out a person of higher skill to instruct them in their mistakes in movements, or wait for the extra steps.

And as far as the having AI control emotions goes I guess it''s ok, but then it''s an extention of the character, not the person controlling the character. If a guy wants to walk around looking suspicious all the time, then doesn''t that say something about them? Maybe not the obvious (instead of being suspicious, they may just be trying to look cool) but it definately communicates something. What worries me is simply in MMORPGS, the emotions attached to a character definately aren''t the emotions attached to players. While my character may be fearing for his life during an intense battle, that''s probablly one of the moments I''m going to be enjoying myself the most.

Additionally, a lot of the emotion that is dealt with in any given situation is context. When facing an overwhelming horde of enemies, one person might smile, another might cower in fear, another might survey the scene with a grim look. And how do you teach the AI about context?

And since there was a positive reation to the injury idea, I''ll expand on some more types:
Chest/rib injury: The arm on the side that''s hurt is brought across the body, croched to protect it. Any attacks utilising the protecting arm (or wide swings) are reduced in power because the injured is trying not to extend (and thus overextert) his injuries. Additionally, a little hunch over the injured side can show more of what''s going on.

Side injury: Arm that''s hurt moves a little closer, occasionally covering the part that''s hurt in idling time. Whole body leans forward and towards the injured side, lending a sort of odd swing to their walk.

Shoulder injury: Arm hangs limply at the side (so no more swinging it while walking). Any motions that use that arm (Swinging a sword) are done with more lateral motion than vertical motion, but still done very weakly.

Lower arm injury: any little flourishes or rotations of the wrist and elbow are minimized. This would mainly impact flashy fighters, taking away all the twirl out of their moves. During idle animations moves arm up and down a little.

Head injury: Character stands more bent, knees bent further, leaning forward a little. Blinks more often, and lets head hang when not doing anything. Often puts hand up to head, or shakes his head while looking around.

Upper leg injury: The injured leg drags behind the uninjured leg, typical looking limp.

Lower leg injury: The injured leg gets set down more heavily, steps forward less far, and is at a slightly outward angle.

Ankle injury: Hops on one foot.

Knee injury: The leg doesn''t straighten out while walking, instead staying bent through the whole movement. Time on this leg is minimized.

Stomach injury: Character hunches forward, brings an arm to cover his stomach when it''s not needed for anything else.

It might be possible (assuming you had access to a really motivated and talented animator) to use skeletal animations and sets of injury keyframes, and actually interpolate between the keyframes based on how injured a person is. Then interpolate between the keyframes as normal. But that''s just the crazy talking now.

Hell... my body is starting to hurt just thinking about the crap you would have to go through to model hurt bodies!

Dave Mark
Intrinsic Algorithm Development
"Reducing the world to mathematical equations!"