| A few suggestions | 
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| A few suggestions |
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Posted by Tamburlaine the Great on June 12, 1999 at 05:32:00:
Just a few suggestions, in no particular order. Please comment and elaberate on them.
1)The elizabethan London Bridge was a toll bridge...
2)How about some plays to be performed at the Globe?
- Perhaps a quest involving one: must buy or get printed a script at the printers; have to speak lines at right time.
- Also someone might be interested in organise plays for role playing, say a once a (real life) week performance. The Scooby-Doo ending to Hamlet might not be a bad start (its posted on the message board in London). Such role playing should be open to every one who wants to participat and widely advertised.
3)How about appropriate currency to each region and time zone? Most coins would be useable in various time-space localities, but paper cash can only be used in industrial areas. Industrial areas where there is a nation-state would only accept their own money. The British pound would be
accepted throughout the empire.
4)New Region: Imperial Rome of the Julio-Claudian Dynasty. This would be the new toughest section of the ancient world, as its fighters have the best arm's, armour (that is, ones made from steal) and training.
- Rome should be a true urban jungle, with preditors as well as prey. That is, there should be NPCs (Non Player Characters, ie monsters) that attack first: like the emperor's German bodyguard's; theives who backstab; prostitutes with poisoned knives, who try to mug players after getting them to undress and disarm (to have sex); roving slavers who try to capture the unwary for the slave blocks; gladiators attack those foolish enough to wander into the Circus; the Preatorian Guard; vilianous slaves; and many others...
- There should be lots of political intreague quests: assasinations; stealing stuff to provoke a scandal and disgrace someone; spying on people for the imperial secret police and testifying before the emperor if they speak treasonable utterences (such individuals were known as "delatores" or sewers. A delatore got a portion of the wealth that was confiscated when a person was convicted of treason); acting as agent provocure on behalf of one faction to get members of another faction to speak treason, although if things go wrong the player could end up being tortured for information or even crucified; incinerating the graineries (grain dust can be explosive) causing riots, and perhaps leading to the overthrow of the emperor.
- The Forum Romanum is the bigest market on non-magical items in them ancient world. It has every natural (as opposed to supernatural) artifact and commodity available in the ancient world. The only problem is surviving the experience.
- There is the 'Subura', the main slum of Rome. It is where all the poor immigrant workers live, and is a hive of small alleys and 'insulea' (literally 'islands' but refers to apartment blocks. There is a great deal of organised crime here, run by the collegues of the crossroads (which by this time where simply drinking clubs). An area the 'urban cohort' (or police) were afraid to enter.
- There is the Port of Rome ('Portus') on the Tiber river, leading down to the port of Ostia, and the Mere Romanum (the 'Roman Sea', their name for the mediteranian).
- There are the various 'forum': the Forum Boarium (meat markets); the Forum Frumentarium (grain market); the Forum Holitorium (vegitable markets); the Forum Piscinum (fish market); and the Forum Romanum, centre of all political and legal activity as well as the sight of many of
the major temples.
- There is the imperial palace, centre of much intreague, ploting and sex.
- Much of Imperial Rome's coding could be recycled for a reneiscience christian rome.
4) New Region: Roman Alexandria of the Adoptive Dynasty. This is a great community of learning and magic at the Museum (the biggest liberary prior to the 20th centurary). The city has egyptian priests, greek philosophers and scientist, zorastian magi, jewish quabalists, gnostic mystics and primative christian mystics. All of them teach and fight with magic, making them very tough (but it not as dangerous as rome 'cause they not as aggressive). Very powerful equipment and quest objects available here. This city would well compliment cities of Agraba and the city on the upper nile (i forget the name).
5) One item of furniture that should be available for players houses is slaves, who can be ordered to protect the house, or serve the inhabitants.
6)New Skill: Sea Farring and SeaFighting. Start game able to use simple boats, SeaFarring allows use of ships, SeaFighting allows use of ships' offensive capacities.
- BOATS: exhorst movement points twice as fast as walking; carry only one player and no horses; can be carried on land;
- SHIPS: take as much movement points as walking; can carry horses, boats and more than one player; can only cross isthmases of land; When player leaves ship the crew remain to guard it (player is only the owner-captain); The player carries the deed (like Ultima 7) around with
her/himself, it is this that is saved and costs the player when renting. It also ensures that the ship remains where the player left it. A ship is effectivly saved when it is docked or anchored; Ships can carry things in the hold, independantly of characters. These things will be saved there when the player leaves the ship, making the ship, effectivly like a mobile house.
Ships are useable for fighting, at sea or in shore rooms, against NPCs and PKs. Different ships add to fighting capabilities differently: triream (ancient world) can ram; galleases (medieval) have cannon; and gunboats (industrial) have Big Fucking Guns. If ship uses them player must
replace gun powder, ammo, and fuel. This can only be done in habour (when on board ship) as such munnitions are too heavy for players to carry. Can buy greek fire (basicly ancient napalm) for trireams.
Ships can be sunk at sea, so it is advisable for players to carry a boat on board to prevent drowning. Ships have an equivillant to Hit Points (HP). After some damage a ship will start to take on water, but player can order crew to start bailing. Player can also order crew to repair ship
(the equivilant of a character sleeping), but it must be anchored near the shore. After a certain number of HP have been lost, the ship will start to sink, the speed of which depends on damage and cargo (so its possible to sail to port in a sinking ship).
The SeaFighting skill allows three new commands RAM, BROADSIDE and BOARD. The ram command is for trireames, and is like a amalgam of the DASH and SNIPE commands. Essentially the player must be in a room next to the target, s/he then enters the command and the triream dashes into the next room to ram the target. The broadside command is for galleases, gunboats and trireames equiped with greek fire. It is basicly the same as fireing a missle weapon, except it involve ordering the crew to do it, leaving the player to do what s/he would. However when fight from ship top, melee weapons can not be used, for obviuos reasons.
Hence when fighting at sea, players can use the BOARD command. This command means the player boards the enemy ship and starts attacking the crew instead of just the ship (although attacking the ship still damages the crew, just not as much). If the crew of the enemy ship are killed then the player has captured the ship.
NPC ships can be captured in victory, but i am not sure if players should be able to capture other PK's ships, or just board and kill the owner. The major problem with being able to capture ships is how many can a player control? Vast fleets of ships would decrease the playability of the game for those without them, but it would make the game more realistic. At any rate, if ships can be captured then they will follow the player around (presumably using the 'follow' coding). Nor am i sure if players will be able to use multiple ships in combat, again it is the realism vs
playablity dilema.
- IN RE: the sugestions for Rome. A number of the emperors held mock sea battles using gladiators, sometimes using artificial lakes. Ofcourse the word 'mock' is used lighly as these battles were to the death. But it would be another of the entertainments of Rome.
- There needs to be timetravel quests at sea, to allow ships to time travel.
7) New Rules for Riding: can buy horses / camels / donkeys / mules / lama / alpaca / elephant / etc... at start of game to use as pack animals. That is they can be bought and used without learning any skills. Pack animals have their own weight limit, independant of character's. Pack animals do not lessen movement point attrition, they just carry stuff for the player. Animal and pack conents are counted when renting.
- The RIDING skill allows characters to ride, as per status quo.
- The new skill of CAVALIERING allows players to fight mounted, with all the attendant bonuses. Skill only available to those who (can?)finish the ritter quest. Cavaliering allows CHARGE command: player must have a lance equiped; and be in room next to target; command very similar to that of RAM.
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Without techne there is no humanity -- But
no techne is worth more than my humanity.
- Hakin Bey. Association for Ontological
Anarchy, Communique 7.
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