Nazrix, I''m serious. When the "Anonymous Poster" website goes up, and the "Anonymous Poster" game development company takes off, you are coming to work for me. You have no choice. =)

BTW, I noticed that when you quoted me above in your other post, you changed the title to "Original Post by Landfish". I want to publicly state that I am offended by being confused with that anarchist ruffian. You, Nazrix! I Challenge you to a duel, sir! =)

No, really, I''m not landfish...

Hmmm, an elegant dueling game... what would we call it? Real Tournament?

Well Nazzlie, I haven''t quite sorted it out yet. There are a variety of non-traditional character creation systems that could apply here, but the most obvious one is to let the players choose thier social standing from a menu at character creation. If they choose a Royal position, there are only a small number of spaces, so they might get bumbed down or sent to the menu.

This ensures that there are a lot of people who *want* to be king! =) And have some of the means to get there. Meanwhile, those of us with an interest in playing "smaller" people can go straight to the bottom of the pile if we wish. First come first serve... not the system I would use myself, but I can imagine it working.

As for smart goblins, one might be tempted to give them a tribal or low tech society. I am dubious about this. If what I''ve seen in current games is any indication, players may not even notice the irony as they plow through stealing goblin land, destroying goblin settlements, and killing goblin women and children. I don''t want to willingly expose such disgusting behavior, I''d rather not give them the opportunity. I don''t feel goblins, or any non-human creatures should have a major part in day to day life, if they exist at all. They just don''t have the meaning they used to, so why bother with them at all?

The important thing to remember about intrigue with real life situations is DON''T force it! If something bad is ALWAYS happening, no one will care. Just plop one player down as "
king" and give him some NPCs/Admins to order around, and watch him give people orders. Have other in cognito admins spread the notion that the king can be displaced. Have them act as evil viziers, seeking out those who have royal blood and hatching assasination schemes with them. The King will be alerted by his "spies" and start acting paranoid. It''s perfect, and the players don''t even know you''ve planned it! Doesn''t that beat just plopping an NPC tyrant on the throne and saying "Look, tyrant! Tyrant bad! Go get ''im! Good adventurers, good boy..."

quote: Original post by Anonymous Poster

#5 Realism. Most designers think it would suck. Why? Because most designers are lazy. Think about the ACTUAL CONSEQUENCES of a realistic physical setting. Why does everyone think that players will lose motivation? We''re still offering them the chance to live out thier dreams collectively with sh!tload of other people. Realism can only add to the exhiliration of performing the impossible. Stop frightening yourself.

You mean I never get to play that powerfull mage I always wanted to be? Will I never be able to hurl fireball at my enemies, move items with pure willpower and teleport across the room? And will I never have the oppertunity to fly on the back of a dragon?

Aww, that sucks!

quote:

#6 Absolute character death. Everything i''ve heard so far leads me to believe this system is inherently balanced. The reason so many are opposed to it is FEAR. Little do they know, FEAR is what make the system work. Everything that applies to one player applies to everyone when it comes to absolute death. None of them wants to lose their character! But we digress. What do you think? Do you dare to dream the impossible dream?

You mean no epic battles between entire armies? No one acting out the role as the kings brave knight because everybody is too scared to loose their character? No one spying in the royal court? No one plotting against each other becaus they are to afraid to loose and be killed?

I agree that there must be a very real punishment for dying as to discourage people to take on hopeless fights and to encourage them into working together to beat larger enemies. Or to use stealth and cunning in a more "political" type of game spying and plotting against each other. But I think "Absolute character death" is too much.

I think the "fear" element would be too great and not only discourage mindless killing but also any other form of action.
People will then just go around doing mostly nothing. Only acting when they are absolutely sure of sucess or are forced by fear for loosing their own character.

I grant you that this type of gameplay would be very realistic but I don''t think it would be quite so fun (or even interesting) to play. We (or at least I) play computer games to get to do things I can''t do in reality: Be mighty hero on dangerous adventures play the role of a thief climbing the rooftops, a hacker in the future or just a pilot flying an airplane or a driver driving a racecar.

All those things I cannot do in reality. But the computer lets me live out those roles by removing or reducing the risk. I can still fail, but the setback is never greater than my last saved game. The saved games act as my resurrection spell and if you remove it from the game, most game will be boring and tedious.

Regards

nicba

Ahh, geez, nicba, you missed my point entirely! Environmental realism doesn''t mean you can''t play a mage! If that is what''s realistic within the rules of the setting, it can and should happen! My point is: wouldn''t being a mage be so much more fun if people reacted in TERROR every time you hurled a firebolt?

As for the death thing, it serves primarily to dicourage combat for combat''s sake. Perhaps cowardly weaklings will no loger become kings and knights, because they won''t want to take the risk, but if un-needed combat becomes scares, so will the threat of death. Follow?