Being a once-avid MUDer.. I can say I get most of my complaints about UO from the lack of gameplay which most MUDs had! It seems like a major company could afford to look at those models and see why they work! I agree with you though, too many people complain about the MMORPG world and never do much to fix it. Although, i''m working on one of my own which hopefully will fix a lot of the quirks.
Agreed on the UO housing point as well.. far too many people, far too little area. but then again, the map is nowhere near to scale

As for pleasing everyone all the time.. I never planned on it. In NWN I was an active guild member and know the quality of player-run guilds, and its ability to increase roleplay and enjoyment. I actively support that in my game in several ways.. from allowing custom player-guild banners and so forth down to allowing them an easy way for active recruitment of people I''m even planning on providing methods of keeping track of who''s in what guild by those who run the guild via a website. That way they don''t have to try to manage lists and whatnot I''m quite aware of the problems with keeping a player guild running, and have adapted to allow ease of use in that respect.
World simulation is fun, yes.. but the breakdown of the world is important. Something I''m trying to learn is how to break the world into several servers and still have them all tied in via a main server. The main one would do mostly the routing and such.. hold the world together so to speak. The others would be running the individual parts of the world, be it by country, or state. This would allow for things like "did the dragon go and slaughter all the deer?" and so forth. But I, as programmer and designer, plan to play an active role in the enemies troop movements. Almost like playing chess against your own populous Admit it, it sounds fun Nothing too harsh though.. lol!
My girlfriend and I both agree on the idealism part. Real life sucks enough already, a game.. and ALTERNATE reality, should be just that. That''s why we have plans for a reality sim based on the medieval ages. I want people to ENJOY the game first and foremost, but I want it to be believable. No stupid monster spawn points, etc. It all has to be done in a coordinated way! I think too many designers write the game and then leave it, failing to go back and attempt to actually make the world realistic by having events happen.

Your ideas for the skill mastery are very very well thought out. I''d never considered it that way, but I certainly like the way you''ve explained it! It actually works well with a lifelike situation, where you never really forget the tricks of the trade, but you lose your mastery of them after a while I''ll deffinately consider that for some system later!

Your cross between level and skill based systems is very interesting.. I''m a natural skeptic and my mind is fizzled, so I can''t think too hard on it now, but I will later!

What do you define to be unrealistic expectations, exactly? what are some unrealistic expectations and what are some that are realistic? What would you do to fix the problems, or does the system need to change because the problem isn''t solvable? Thanks

J

Very cool idea, and i believe it would work out if you put your mind to it it''d be different and neat, that''s for sure. I''ve always wondered about exactly what to do with characters not logged in.. and still have them lead lives I think a system like that could work, but i also think people would enjoy being a blacksmith, otherwise they wouldn''t become one I''ve thought about this with my girlfriend and we''ve come up with a good system for handling things like that in game Well.. got to run, gonna go see gladiator that should give me ideas about an old-roman style game.. muhahahaha!

J

Two things what I really miss are wars between kingdoms and having own army. In war all bashers are gathered to same point to kick each others ass with priests, mages and warmachines meanwhile civils run all over the place thieving and robbing items... Or basher X who is the best fighter all over the XXXworld could found an organization and teach his skills to other fighters for fighting in his army as payment. This could be good place for newbies and stuff... Well these are partly done already, anyway.

Time comes, time goes and I only am.

A lot of people do actually like playing blacksmiths etc. But quite often the game designers don''t really put enough work into fleshing out the profession. Think about it: do you think UO has a ''mining system'' as complex as the ''combat system''?

You''d want to encourage people to mine in different places (like they level in different places), to buy new and improved mining equipment (better weaponry), some sort of competition between miners (like comparing the level of 2 warriors) etc. It just needs a little more thought than "let''s allow mining."

I have to agree with "saint" Kylotan cute title.. hehe

The mining system is nowhere near true to life.. and he''s hit on a big point. If you read the other thread I have started, then you can apply some of it here I think that all the systems should be fully worked out, if not.. well, there''s no point. I deffinately agree with you, that they need more work. This is the reason I have guilds in my game as well.. a dedicated game master and assitants will be devoted to making that profession the best profession to be a part of! This will cause some friendly competition among the staff, to help keep the game balanced. I suppose you could say it''s like having many gods, all of them campaining for your personage to join them It''s a very good theory, and worked well in DragonRealms, until they fired most of the original staff. After that, it pretty much sucked because only the war mages had a real programmer who knew what he was doing, and therefore they became the best to be. After that, the game went downhill and hasn''t stopped since, I believe. They were fired because the head butt-nugget had to have her way. She wouldn''t allow creativity of the GM''s to flourish, she halted it. And she was so busy she never had time to look at the GM''s designs for the guilds, so half of them ended up quitting due to frustration. This is where management ruins the game environment. I hope not to do this! hehe.

Landfish, yes.. it''s possible, but it''d have a LARGE overhead. An AI script for each player. Eventually they''d become semi-intelligent. You need to read the AI board and the post about the neural nets and how they could advance intelligent computers, but it would take forever for it to learn.. hehe But it would be interesting to see.. although it couldn''t reflect moods well!

J

LOL.. I get what ya mean, but i don''t think it''d work well in a reality system.. i think the system would need to be designed around the fact that the player wouldn''t be doing certain things while they''re actually playing, since the character would do those themselves. But.. there''s also a pride factor involved. Blacksmiths who make awesome weapons will want to make them while logged in, because they can boast about it. You have to make benefits for doing things, like making a super-good weapon by accident.. hehe It could happen!
Anyways.. I''ve enjoyed the friendly discussion, but prolly won''t be in on it much for a week to three weeks. I''ll check back in when i get time, but i''ll be at my girlfriend''s parent''s house in NY.. so i''m sure we''ll be doing more.. interesting things Have a good one, and keep the discussion going!

J