I have been reading the threads here in the past few days, regarding
pkill, medevia, and the discussion on the upcoming new OOC, and I
want to collect all of my thoughts on each of them here.
1. On Legend being compared to Medevia.
I'm not sure that I like comparing things that happen on one mud
to things that happen on another. I mean, some good ideas have
been given, don't get me wrong. But the main thing that runs
through my mind is, we're not Medevia. The problem, I find,
with the npk cpk, or whatever they were(I don't recall, sorry),
is that I think that would cater to the gamer type pkiller, and
leave the others out in the cold. Yes, they could easily use
these 'zones', but just as easily, the gamer type could use
the entire mud. I wonder, why all of these people have come
to the staff in order to change pkill. From my point of view
there's nothing wrong with pkill on this mud. There IS something
wrong with the pkillers(now don't get mad until you read the rest).
I see, daily, people saying 'Oh I have no one to kill, pkill is so
boring!'. The funny part is, I see three or four saying this at
once, all being in the same range, in clans that hate each other,
and all sitting ooc saying it. The first thought to my mind is:
HELLO! I don't believe that there is much that we, as the staff,
can do about that. And I do believe that that is the biggest
problem with pkill lately. Instead of saying that pkill is boring
here, do something to change it. This is where the pkillers
need to get off their asses(so to speak), and do something
for themselves. No amount of code will change what goes on
currently.
2. On the OOC changes that PR is working on.
While some don't use OOC much, or at all, others do. For this reason
I think that we should stop thinking of ourselves as the only
person on the mud, and realize that there are others. So, if you
have no ideas on the specific topic there, just leave it at that.
The PR department has a HUGE task here with the OOC, and they
want to make it fun for those that use it, and perhaps get
others interested as well. Don't make it difficult for them.
3. On retiring from pkill.
These are some good ideas in general. Though I still have my doubts
on seperating the enabled from the unenabled any more than now, I
do like some of the ideas. But, I am less inclined to do much
about them currently, and I'll explain why.(You can also re-read
my first point above)
I am increasingly tired of pkenabled people thinking that they
are better than the rest of the mud. Now, this may or may not
apply to you, but even if it doesn't, read on.
The attitude of the pkillers makes me sick, most of the time. This
mud is not a pk mud. Pkill is a feature, and one that is becoming
more of a problem than its worth, when those that use this feature
are becoming more and more like the spoiled brats that we would
all love to throttle. If pkillers want new things, my suggestion
to them(and this does apply to everyone) is to change the way
your part of the community behaves. Its a big task. But no
bigger than what is being demanded by us, and one that is more
important, imo. I would like to see people acting maturely, before
I even consider changing things, including retirement. Hell, I'll
even work on the code for it, if we can get something balanced out
of the ideas if I have to. But I want the above to happen first.
I'm tired of the 'gimme' from others, now I'm going to say 'gimme'
to you.
These are the things -I- want to see, lets see if I get them.
-Sandra
From: Adolfus
Tuesday, January 12, 09:41AM
wow, I want to commend rufus again on how he responded to our
posts, cuz heres a post I almost totally disagree with.
Except for point number 2.
First I think it shows a certain attitude of wanting to
dismiss the ideas offhand, trouble even citing examples.
Specifically The i don't recall sorry part. Secondly I think
they show a certain naivete about the situation, and the
sort of ingrained thoughts we definately don't need in an imm.
Mostly because they are just wrong and secondly because they
are detrimental.
First Im not sure exactly what was meant by the zones catering
to gamers statement, this needs clarifying. Having zones is in
use now, having a single saferoom, is having one small little
zone of no pk. Secondly, oft times have I heard complaints
about how pkill was causing trouble and how the imms might
just rip it out. Well I got news for you Sandra, your dead
wrong about the players being the problem. It is the system
that is the problem, you only have to look at other muds
to see this is true. Muds that make no limits on pkill are
madhouses, like duris was, there were no level limits and only
a racewar theme, evil against good, but once you left justice
areas you could kill anyone. Ie if you were good you could
kill other good align races, and guess what, it was rampant.
A hundred times more brutal than here, and each death you lost
everything unless the person felt your stuff wasnt worth taking
which was very rare. Other muds which have different pkill
systems are much more tame, and its the system that restricts it.
You need to read that article on pkill. Not all people that pkill
on legend are idiots, but there are some, but its not the people
that are the problem. Pkill has to be regulated, just wait till
you do get this mud out of beta and you have a few hundred players
and you will see what happens. Ppl will do what the system allows.
Its not my job to regulate pkill, I take care of myself only.
I haven't done anything stupid your suggesting, causing pkill
to be wrong somehow, but yet you condemn us all. I suppose you
feel I/we should talk other players into behaving, how naive.
Also whether you realize it or not, uh legend is a pkill mud.
And will remain one untill you remove pkill. I don't think
that is hard to understand, and yet you complain how the
players are causing so much trouble. Fix the system and it will
take care of that. Your wanting to bury your head in the sand
and say the problem is with the players.
We want the system changed because there is something wrong with
it and its not lack of activity, thats just a by product.
I agree I don't see much you can do about anything with the attitude
that all of the problems are with the players.
This is the perfect example of closemindedness and failure to look
at ideas and naysaying that is just sickening
As for the last paragraph, geez. Its the same thing all over again,
I can't believe you have the gall to say the problem is with the
players, yes there may be pkillers with just the attitude you
describe, but dont allow them to shape what goes on with pkill
this way. These arent the only ppl involved, theres also the
normal ppl and the ppl who have yet to play legend. Here you
are withholding changing things till pkillers act in a way that
satisfies you Sandra. Big mistake. I can't control how others act
and thats not my job, that you would even presume to withhold
changes till someone pleases you is, well I dont know what to call
it. Reprehensible?
You know something, im not saying gimme at all, im spending all
my time on medievia, im making honest suggestions about what I
think would improve this mud, Rufus looked at them honestly
and appeared to think them over.
I think you need to adjust your attitude, or resign.
From: T-Bone
Tuesday, January 12, 09:57AM
Sorry but leaving it up to the players to create games
within a game is pretty sad. Pkill needs fixing.
From: Mugwump
Tuesday, January 12, 10:34AM
umm, you are wrong adolphus. you say "Having zones is in
use now, having a single saferoom, is having one small little
zone of no pk." But there isn't any zone on Ledgend that a nonpk
cannot enter. If you have pk zones, then only the enabled can use
them, or am i misunderstanding the system?
I read the article you on pkill you posted, and the only specific
suggestion i saw there was being able to enable by choice.
Not exactly revolutionary. That and the idea of making an area
dangerous to pkill in, which sounds to me like it would just limit pkill
to higher level characters who would have less need to be concerned
about such an area.
I have a pkill alt who is still new to pkill, but I think a lot of what S
Sandra said is true. If you are a newbie to the mud, people will be
all kinds of helpful to you. In pkill, forget it. You will learn by expe
time
experience only, and I am not talking just about how to fight
effectively, I mean what other players will see as fair and what will
make them mad enough to hunt you repeatedly. There is more
crossplay and less roleplay in pkill, and really it should be the
other way around. Most of what is wrong with pkill that i have seen
comes from the players. Of course it is true, that you have to
go along with the status quo somewhat to survive. But by and large
it will take an effort on the part of the players to change anything.
I hope this doesn't come across as saying that pkill is
all bad. It is tons of fun, and most of the time people are really
civil considering that they are killing each other. My biggest
complaint is probably also the inactivity (finding a duel when
noone knows who you are seems harder than it ought to be)
and the lack of roleplaying.
From: Adolfus
Tuesday, January 12, 11:23AM
Well mugwump, it would be really open to how the imms wanted to do it,
but no i didn't mean that non pkill players couldn't use a zone.
If everyone was made to be pkill enabled, then when they entered
these areas they would be open to pkill. If it remained how it
is now, where you choose to enable then nonpkillers would be able to
enter the pkill zones too. If you look at other muds closely you
soon realize that the way pkill is, is determined by what kind of system
is in place.
Here on legend, the imms talk about wanting to keep pkill separate
that its not the main focus of the mud etc, but they keep it so t
that you can pkill anywhere, other than the few saferooms, and not
only can you pkill but you can loot and multi etc. They want players
to regulate themselves. Other muds realize thats silly and put some
safeguards on the system. The system here is ruthless, and its only
chant vina gam dyn ex of reprisals keeping most ppl in line. But guess wha
but guess what, as soon as someone decides they dont care about
reprisals they can multi someone and loot and do other nasty things.
And the only recourse is for the players to take it upon themselves
to retaliate or punish the player. In the most extreme circumstance
were someone decides and succeeds in permakilling another char,
if the pkill community responds and permakills this char. There
isn't even a way to track who this person was. They can try to join
any other clan and cant even be asked who they were in the past.
The imms are big into players self regulating themselves and
they want everyone to rp. I guess this is a lot less work, and
if only rp people played here and everyone behaved it would be dandy.
But it just isnt the case.
From: LadyAce
Tuesday, January 12, 12:17PM
While I agree that there are things that immortals can do to fix
whatever is wrong, I think you are selling yourself short if you
don't recognize the power that players have in the way this place
operates.
What makes a MUD different than a video game you pick up at the
store? It's not just the player to player interaction -- they've
got games that do that too. The main difference, as I see it, is
the flexibility that this place allows. Your ideas shape its
development, and your choices shape the environment.
I'm sort of surprised that players who seem to direct a great deal
of thought into this place, consider only the immortals to be agents
of change. Sure, we build the mobs and the code. But you help and don't
help each other, you jump or don't jump, you help re-eq, multi, level,
do quests. You need us, but we need you. We've given you a huge set
of paints in all kinds of colors, and set up the canvas on an easel
with some pre-defined edges. We can add or remove colors, but the
ultimate creation is largely up to you.
In the end, the ultimate balance of the code and the areas is on our
shoulders. But the balance of the MUD as a whole is shared between players
and immortals.
From: Davien
Tuesday, January 12, 06:29PM
I think Sandras post made a whole lot more sense than did Adolfus's
The bulk of pkillers here think they are a cut above all other characters
simply because they chose to take advantage of the pkill feature. This
is not true of all of them I know, but you only have to listen to caht
for a while to see it. Constant calls of 'if you were enabled I would
kill you for that' or 'You're not even brave enough to enable and
defend your point of view' make a pretty compelling case of contempt from
these wonderful pkill people. Whats more, in many cases I know the
people making the claims HAVE pk enabled alts, some of them being quite
sucessful in the pk arena. Often it just makes me laugh when people
say 'enable and I will kill you', and I have never understood why
the pkers point of view is more valid than the non-pk point of view.
For those of you who are wondering, I do have a pk alt stashed
somewhere. That alt does not get out much. I enjoy fighting duels
against other people I know, because people tend to do some evil things
that I am VERY glad mobs don't. That side of pkill is great fun and I
enjoy it a lot. The reason that alt is not around much though, is that
I do not enjoy being jumped overly much. Most pkillers who jump people
cannot seem to understand that there are people around who do not want
to fight all the time. There are people here who are helping out
friends, people who are late for work, on the phone, and all sorts
of other things might make them not want to engage in pk. I find
people who intrude on such other people simply because 'they enabled, so
I can kill em!' remarkable small-minded. If you want to jump me, then
make sure you have a darn good RP reason - clanwar, personal grievance
or something more substantial than 'I was bored'. I know many of those
pk people will immeadiatly read that and say 'Hey, you knew the risks
when you signed on and should take care that these things don't happen'
but thats where Sandra's comment regarding pkiller attitude comes
in, as I can see it. If you can't drop someone a mudmail saying 'If
I see you, I will kill you on sight' just so they know what the score
is, then I would suggest you aren't really promoting anything.
Ohhh regarding the comment, 'I can't do anything about what other
people think and how they behave', well thats fairly close-minded as
well. We all have an influence here, even if its refusing to help
people get those 'hard' items that they need or refusing to praise
someone who harasses other players. I'm not suggesting we cross-play
or carry our grudges between characters, but we do have a say.
Davien Holyoake.
From: Adolfus
Tuesday, January 12, 07:34PM
I agree with everything you say Davien, and personally I do
try to keep ppl from acting like idiots in pkill, I have ever
since I started playing here, but my point is that its had
little affect on the situation. Even if a small little change
were made so that 90 percent of the mud areas where no pkill
and the rest pkill, less would give everyone a choice about
whether they want to be jumped or not. Not that anyone couldn't
go in these areas, but these areas would be the only places
you could be jumped, then droves and droves of people could
enable without having to hide all the time.
Didn't want to restate everything I said earlier just wanted
to say I agreed with you.
From: T-Bone
Wednesday, January 13, 03:02AM
Ha, you call us small minded, inconsiderate etc. If you
don't want to be jumped while helping friends or the other
things mentioned, play your non-clanned and it won't happen.
You really expect me to ask first after waiting 10 hours or
so for some action? If you want to be left alone playing
your clanned for a specific task, YOU ask!
From: Harun
Wednesday, January 13, 05:28AM
I agree in principle with everything Dandra says,
especially the attitude of some pkenabled considering
themselves to be superior to the rest of us.
It may be a minority of the pkenabled community, but it
surely is a very -loud- minority.
However some ground for that attitude -might- have been
laid by immortals in too high a degree allowing pkill
to dictate decisions that even affect unclanned, often
without enough reasons.
Now I am not claiming that is always done,
or even frequently, but it certainly happens.
I can take glowing roots as an example. Increasing
of their food value has seriously inconvenienced
unclanned create mages solely because of pkiller
whining. You can't eat while fighting, roots can't
be preserved, they disappear rather quckly, so
surely it wasn't as much of a problem that a more
moderate increase of their food value wouldn't
be enough?
Finally, I would like to say that telling
Sandra to resign, just because she states her
views, is - to put it very, very mildly - amazing.
Harun-ar-Rashid
From: Harun
Wednesday, January 13, 05:45AM
Oh, and of course I meant Sandra, not Dandra :)
Sorry.
From: Fairfax
Wednesday, January 13, 06:51AM
Um.. something I was curious about. If we had this CPK and NPK
zones.. how will it be handled in terms of mobs/eq? I don't really
want to wander into a CPK area if a certain item or quest I want is
in that area. However, remove those possiblities, and CPK areas
might become really dull. If SL became CPK, for example, most
unclanned will stay away from it, expecially those who are not too
good at fighting, and the eq price from those areas would soar. Take
away the eq from that area, though, and you kill it. How did the
other Muds resolve the problem? Just hire pkillers to fetch eq?
Curious
Fairfax
M.B.B.S. (Madras)
From: Adolfus
Wednesday, January 13, 01:33PM
Fairfax, thered be a number of ways to do it, if everyone became
pkill enabled then everyone would be vulnerable to cpk when they
entered these areas, the eq would be worth more then possibly, but
it would only be a few areas hopefully, and it would be a risk/reward
type thing.
Now the more likely scenario would be though that this cpk npk wouldn't
affect everyone only those that chose to enable, so unclanned
could go into any area still without worrying about being pked.
