"contact white" from Ask the Staff

[Halaster]

See this thread here:

http://www.zalanthas.org/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=11988

Please discuss, I'd like to know what everyone thinks, staff included.

[Anonymous]

This is the case because, for whatever reason though I've always assumed it's intentional, the documentation on the Way is very ambiguous.

I'm sort of undecided, though, but I lean towards it not being cool.  I know that I'll have my PC contact people without knowing their name but having seen them before.  I'll also have my PC contact people by name without having met.  Having neither met/seen them in person nor knowing their name a blanket 'contact defiler ; contact 2.defiler ; contact 3.defiler, etc' seems a little cheesy considering the immense numbers of psionic minds out there.

Those are the two guidelines I try to keep to with all things of this sort of nature, though.  I can't recall any exceptions in my own play, at least not recently.

Edit: I'd love to see some sort of documentation update on the Way to address this and include that the Psi'ing of a mental image is acceptable, which is what I believe I read here on the board from the staff perspective.

psi *A hazy image of a hand giving the thumbs-up symbol.*

[Rhyden]

I think it's absolutely fine. Here's why:

-You're trying to imagine the person's image to contact them but you accidentally screw up slightly and contact somebody else.

-You focus on one aspect (white for example) and find somebody's mind who clearly has that physicalization

Really the way is like built in phones without numbers and you have to use your head not mouth. You can dial any number you like to see who you get and sometimes you can dial the wrong number and get somebody unexpectedly.

[Armaddict]

I agree somewhat with Rhyden.  Where I have a problem is when you being spamming 'contact 2.white' 'contact 3.white'.

There are going to be -so- many people with that same feature that aren't represented or contactable...it would be like searching for a needle in a haystack.

I'd like to see the removal of the ability to do '2.keyword', and instead change it so that you can include multiple keywords.  'contact dark-skinned red-eyed'  'contact amos black-haired'  and so on.

[Anonymous]

I'd like to see the removal of the ability to do '2.keyword', and instead change it so that you can include multiple keywords.  'contact dark-skinned red-eyed'  'contact amos black-haired'  and so on.

The problem I have with that is when you've actually seen the person you are trying to contact, maybe they just left the room you are in, but can't for whatever reason and end up contacting another PC all the way around the world and would have no recourse.  That's where contact 2.man helps.

[Marauder Moe]

I think its fine to contact people using names, aliases (keyworded, of course), or keywords from sdesc.

From an IC point of view, the Way seems to be as intuitive as it is chaotic.  Minds respond (form a psionic connection) to any name that the person would answer to or to the person's image.  Of course, images are often harder to think about than words, so you're more likely to find the right person's mind with a name than a description.

[Please don't pummel me with rocks, I'm not a mindbender and I've never played on in Armageddon, and even if I did I wouldn't spoil any secrets.]

EDIT:

I'd like to see the removal of the ability to do '2.keyword', and instead change it so that you can include multiple keywords. 'contact dark-skinned red-eyed' 'contact amos black-haired' and so on.

Yes, I would also like to see compound keyword matching, and not just for Waying.  As a suppliment to the #.keyword syntax, though, not a replacement.  Alas, I suspect it would be rather difficult to code.

[Ghost]

I see no code abuse, nor bad roleplay by just attempting "contact white" "contact defiler" "contact templar", here is why:

1) As Rhyden said, you are focusing your mind over one aspect.  It is "white".  Your mind will go through many mental images and will pick up one it meets.  So you will get a mind that is related to "white".

2) It has NO guarantee that is the person you are looking for.  It can be any other NPC/PC who has a a similar mental image.

I do believe, psionics work with a "mental image".  And those mental images contain information about the person itself.  If someone is known to be Amos, say around the commoners of Allanak, and when you try to contact to Amos, your mind is calling for it.  And Amos's mind, unconciously replies for your call and that is how you two are contacted.
This is how you can contact someone using his name.  
Or if you know someone with piercing azure eyes, you focus your mind to see a mental image that contains information about "azure eyes".  Your mind searches through countless minds and picks up a mental image that is fit to what you have focused.  And this is how you contact someone using his keywords.


By talking via the Way repeatedly, you get to recognize the mental image of someone.

In my opinion:
How it COULD lead to bad Roleplay:  You contact to the weathered, cool looking guy, and you immediately assume (without any previous IC knowledge, or previous encounter with the character) you know this "weathered cool looking guy".

EDIT: Not that it is directly related to the subject but:  
See http://www.zalanthas.org/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?p=89427#89427.
I think Bestatte's post is pretty helpful in what kind of mental image one might assume to be getting at first contacts.

[Delirium]

If you don't want to be contacted, everybody gets the 'barrier' skill.

My viewpoint is mostly the same as CRW's. If I have a name and a decent description or have met them at least once, I think it's fine.

If you haven't ever seen the person, have no description, and only have a nickname, "purple jozhal" for example, then I think it's somewhat cheesy. I personally wouldn't try to find them, but I wouldn't have too much of a fit if anyone else did, simply because there's no hard rule not to - and I could see an argument for it, where the raider starts identifying himself with the name 'purple jozhal', and therefore it becomes possible to find his mind by focusing on that. It's a tiny bit of a stretch, but.. like I said - barrier. We have the skill for a reason.

[Ktavialt]

I think this should kinda stem from the staff and what the nature of the
Way is. I think that I could see it going both ways, but it really depends
on how the Way works.

Here's what I think the realistic (for as much as arm can be =))
possibilities are, or any combination of the below:

Spiritual Method:
Searching for someone via the Way requires some sort of link. Either
you have met them before, have an article of their clothing with you or
something close to them, have met with people trying to describe this
character to you that knew him/her in some manner. Possibly even
notoriety of the individual could suffice if that person is sufficiently known
(contact tektolnes, anyone? ) This is sorta like a spiritual searching
method. In this case, if the purple jozhal was either notorious enough, or
you have met someone who met him that described him in decent detail,
or you had met him (and recognized him) before, then you could find his
mind. Otherwise, no.

Physical Method:
Searching for someone via the Way requires simply physical appearance
for you to contact him. This is sorta like a roving brain scan method. Your
mind is searching the lands far and wide for someone who looks like what
you're aiming for. This would mean only a decent description, whether
through your own eyes or from another person telling you, should suffice.
With this method, using names to find someone would be a serious no-no
unless you have met them before. Names would simply be an OOC way
to make things easier on yourself, but should only be used to find a person
if you have contacted him before or had seen him enough. In this case, if
purple jozhal has never been seen or described to you decently, then you
shouldn't be able to contact him. Additionally, the idea as to how many
minds you can scan may be taken consideration, because although you
know that the guy you're looking for is a tall, muscular man, picking up on
his mental signature via characteristics would be nearly impossible with
this method unless you've personally seen them. This method makes
it so more nondescript characters without neato, discerning features and
keywords such as the jozhal-tattooed have a big advantage.

Familiarity Method:
Searching for someone requires you to be familiar with them. Your mind
finds others because you've seen them before and subconsciously you
picked up on their mental signal. Even if you didn't have a good view of
them when you saw them, such as if they were wearing a mask, veil, or
cloak, it doesn't matter, their presence was near you and that was good
enough. Of course, this also means that if you saw a figure in a jakhal-
braided aba come up to you and attack you, but you never got a good
look at them before you ran, later on since you were near them you could
later do "contact jakhal-braided" to figure out who they are. If they were
invisible or unseen near you, such as if an invisible magicker is near you,
taunting you, then you probably shouldnt' be able to use that as an excuse
to show that they were next to you and you picked up their mental signal,
for code reasons.

I can't think of any other good ways to justify how the Way works. It
could be one or a combination of the above means, or all of them. Each
of them will make different things legitimate and other things twinky.

- Ktavialt (Trying his best to live up to an AC post - minus the posting and
analyzing of various websites related to psychics as well as books and
movies then putting them in a comparative, easy to read format on a
single post)

[Spoon]

I guess psychic communication is bloody complicated. If you have any clue what-so-ever about a personality, physically or mentally, then I don't see why you couldn't contact them. That is, however, how I see it in my feeble earthling mind. It's going to be a lot harder though if you only know one word. You might end up contacting anyone a little similar. Or anything.

I can see how randomly typing keywords to contact for-a-laugh could be frowned upon, though, if that is what the origional poster is on about.

[SewerRat_inTheOpen]

I don't think it's bad roleplay nor code abuse.

It's like rhyden said, just using a phone, except it's more complicated and just calling for 'purple' is going to get one more than he can bargain for. Like a decoder, you give it a keyword, it's going to search through everything, till it gets the right password.

Typing alien on the net to look for the ET, much more searches and others are going to come up. Then should we be more specific then?

I can't say it's wrong to way another that I have not seen or met, not too sure if it's alright to get to the defilers/magickers like this. I mean, the way is a internet kinda thing, doesn't seem wrong to use it to track down inidviduals that I have not met even. But then, I don't understand much of the way, images or words?

[Jacques]

Unlike most of the other posters, I'm not going to try to explain how the Way works and why the current syntax makes sense - to be honest, I have NO IDEA how the Way works. I just know it does.  :wink:

Instead, I'm going to talk a bit about playability. Several of my characters have been ranking members in one House or another, and people have really needed to get in touch with them (for special orders, recruitment, or the usual RP things). Being able to "contact idiot" has helped out immensely.

Regarding the original posting, I would recommend that if you want to be known as "the purple vestric" (or whatever it was) then you NOT add "purple" to your list of keywords. Why? Because of what you just said. Instead, I'd suggest that you get an item that will modify your sdesc to include the word "purple". Hooded cloaks, facewraps, masks... a lot of things will do this. THEN, if someone is in the room with you, they can still "tell purple (quivering in fear) Please, Purple Vestric, take all my money and my wives, but don't kill me!" This would prevent unwanted people from finding your mind until you found theirs first. Once you had found them, they should have enough of a feel for what your mind is like (a suitably-contactable sdesc) to way you back.

Hmm... I now have the urge to make a rapier-wielding bandit known as "The Purple Vestric"... weird.

[Ender]

Not to just argue that since the code allows it, it is correct RP, but I think there is a valid explanation as to why you can contact people you've never heard of.

I've always imagined the way like the oversoul or a collective unconsciousness.

The world consists of a vast sea of minds, thousands, millions all jumbled in in a huge churning ocean of psychic energy.  In Zalanthas demi-humans have developed the ability to traverse this sea to a certain limited extent and just on the surface.  

Mindbenders however can dive deep into the psychic sea, and make more sense of the cacophony of thoughts constantly being bombarded through it.

The way I invision contact literally working is that the user focuses on either an image of the person, a defining feature, or a person's name.  Their, for lack of a better word, psychic subconscious then projects psychic energy throughout the sea of minds looking for a match.  The psychic subconscious in this instant works literally like a machine with an order.  

The only thing the psyhcic subconscious can use to identify people are how these people identify themselves.  In other words brains of Zalanthans have a distinct self image (similiar to the residual self image in the matrix).  

These self images include names, because in the world of the mind there is no differentiation between senses, the idea of a name is just as potent a self image as the actual physical appearance.

Once the psychic subconscious finds a suitable match, contact is established.  This  explains how someone could contact someone they never have met or even heard of.

If someone contacts an unintended target, they can break off the link, and focus harder on a different aspect or more distinctly (2.blah) on that similiar feature be it a name or a defining feature.

This idea of residual self image goes on to explain why you see an image of the person in your mind.

A rough theory, but I've always liked it.

[Savak]

As with most things Zalanthan, it's not what you type, but why you type it.

Did you just hear from a friend of yours OOC'ly that some chick with fuschia hair was wandering around, and you just want to see if she's online?  Are you just letting your mind wander, and it drifts towards the uniqueness of fuschia?  Wait, are you a mindbender, whose mind can step out of its body to look around like that?  Or did you really focus on fuschia to begin with, for its..uh..relaxing qualities?  What?

In most cases, I don't think focusing on adjectives is an appropriate way to "contact" someone.  It's descriptive and superficial, and changed as easily as getting sunburned.  Using a keyword to contact someone you know or has been identified to you in some nominal fashion (they calls him Ebon'n'Ivory) is merely a simulation of what the mind is actually accomplishing -- thus in those cases, it's passable.

-Savak

[path]

from what i understand in my various studies of psychic communication, edgar cayce for example was very well documented, you should have a sort of a "feel" for the person. However, he "contacted" people he'd never met in cities far removed and apparently posessed the ability to diagnose illnesses from any distance as well as proscribe cures.

that's a little off topic, but a slice of real life.

i personally would prefer that psionic contact was limited to actually knowing a character's name. it seems like one's mind is a very private thing and i'd like to see the fear of defilers built up into names being more intimate, as i believe mental contact should be.

(i've always been fond of the ursula k. leguin wizard of earthsea books.)

it is, after all, another "voice" in your head. i think the nobles of the south have the right idea theoretically in keeping servants just for those sort of communications.

[Cavus]

I am lazy now, so I will make it short. "contact white" is a code abuse, and you cannot contact to a person only becase he has white veil, or something. There are keywords for chars that you choose at char creation. Niicknames, sdesc and name are those keywords, and anything other than those is bad. I had a char that I wanted to hide who he is, but some folk that I dealt with simply contacted my mind by using color of my veil on my face, and probably wrote to their notepads. It was kind of aggressive, and sometimes raider char, so it caused problems to me.

But in original post, poster is talking about a nickname, so this man should have an image on many folk in the world with his nickname. So, you can use thatnickname for the Way. If that man did not ask staff to add this name to his keyword list, there is an abuse caused by that man. If he has white nick name, and white cloak, but he did not add that word to keyword list, then he is not clever abuser  :wink:

[Halaster]

I am lazy now, so I will make it short. "contact white" is a code abuse, and you cannot contact to a person only becase he has white veil, or something.

I'd agree with this except the situation where...  you're in a room with a guy in a white veil.  He's standing RIGHT IN FRONT OF YOU, but you have no idea any of his keywords, so.. you go with contact white.  That'd be ok, since you're staring at the guy, heh.

[Xamminy]

I am lazy now, so I will make it short. "contact white" is a code abuse, and you cannot contact to a person only becase he has white veil, or something.

I'd agree with this except the situation where...  you're in a room with a guy in a white veil.  He's standing RIGHT IN FRONT OF YOU, but you have no idea any of his keywords, so.. you go with contact white.  That'd be ok, since you're staring at the guy, heh.

I was just going to say something about this before getting to this page...but because of something someone else said.

Contacting someone standing right in front of you should be no more difficult than contacting your grandmother that you've known all your life.  You can see the person to establish that contact.  For that reason, 'contact (adjective)' should not be disabled.  Then there are people that don't give out their real names.  I for example am currently playing a character who has never had its name typed into the mud except perhaps by an immortal (since they can see the real name easily).  Noone could contact me, even though I have a few aliases, if you could only contact by name.  That restricts roleplay in that everyone you wanted to deal with over the Way, like your spy across the world, would HAVE to know your real name which could get you in lots of trouble when your real name starts getting spread around.

No, I don't want to see this changing.

Still, 'contact (unique keyword)' because you know of a character with that keyword...sometimes unavoidable.  Someone contacts you and says something requiring a response...well, you don't know the person's name, so you have to start hunting the person down by contacting keywords...and for the dark-haired man (which I have seen three of in game :shock:), this could get REALLY annoying.  This shouldn't be too difficult, to simply contact the person back, but you have to start going through the pain of, 'contact dark...contact 2.dark...contact 3.dark...'  Oh yes, I'd get that person's name faster than a skinny on 'sid, but how else should you go about this situation before having it?

[Cavus]

For that reason, 'contact (adjective)' should not be disabled.  Then there are people that don't give out their real names.

This includes what I mean with keywords. You know adjectives are in sdesc, so safe to use. But I am using my veil, and a deep hood. But, the one I am robbing will use the color of my veil to detect my sdesc, and post it to board as a rumor of raider?
No, I don't like this. He hs main desc when he look at me. If he wants to descrşbe me to head hunters, he can use all of my main desc after deleting everything cncealed by veil and hood. Besides, he can use my items to report me. But, not my sdesc, or my body parts that is concealed carefully and intentionally.

[Xamminy]

So the problem you have, Cavus, is not with 'contact (adjective)' but with the fact that your sdesc shows to the person contacting you.

I understand your frustration, but anyone ready to do something so twinky while you're threatening to brain him/her deserves what's coming next.  I suggest using bludgeoning weapons, as you'll knock them out pretty quick if you're helping them along by using the Way.   :wink: Plus, this way you can play a raider that leaves survivors.  Survivors are good for repeat business.

[facehugger]

Myself, I've always viewed the Way as a giant Zalanthan switchboard...

I refrain from making contact with someone if I just know their name. Pull out a phonebook and look for Bob, see how well it works.

But, there are times when I -do- feel fine in contacting someone I've never met. If I know their name, if I have an idea of their overall physical characteristics, if I know what they do, where they are, what sort of personality they have... if I feel I have enough characteristics to separate one Bob from all the others, then I'll go for a contact. But, I will have my pc sit there for several minutes, going over in his head all the things that he knows about the stranger he's trying to contact, before actually doing so.

Or, a possibly easier way, if I know a person who has Wayed the person I'm trying to Way, I get them to help. I figure, each person who taps into your mind for a conversation is going to leave a fairly distinct "psionic impression". So I'll get the person I know to contact me and share this psionic impression, so I've got a better idea of what sorta mind to look for.

[Bogre]

I think it's absolutely fine. Here's why:

-You're trying to imagine the person's image to contact them but you accidentally screw up slightly and contact somebody else.

-You focus on one aspect (white for example) and find somebody's mind who clearly has that physicalization

Really the way is like built in phones without numbers and you have to use your head not mouth. You can dial any number you like to see who you get and sometimes you can dial the wrong number and get somebody unexpectedly.

But you have to think about how much control non-psionics have over the Way. To use it you have to search for someone's mind, correct? If you didn't know what to look for you can't find them. And if you don't have an accurate description, then you might find the wrong one. I don't see the ability to use the Way as just a phone, it's a conscious effort to seek out someone elses presence and send them a message. And they are dissimilar in another way: while you can dial any phone number you want, you should not be able to search out someone with the keyword 'voluptous' and hope they are a nakki whore and not a northern chosen.

[JollyGreenGiant]

Myself, I've always viewed the Way as a giant Zalanthan switchboard...

No no.  It's a best effort network in which every single mind acts as a router.  Can't contact someone?  SYN packet got dropped along the way, psi port wasn't open, or you couldn't find a route.

I'm joking, but only a little.  I really do see the Way working somewhat like the Internet.  I can type in www.doesthisaddresswork.com and pull something up if something is out there to pull up.  Think of keywords as Network Address Translation with non-unique entries in the NAT tables.  Unique names would be the equivalent of an IP address - you'd know exactly what you were zeroing in on.  And then mindbenders?  Nothing but cerebral hackers.

The analogy doesn't have to work for you, but I like it.  Anyway, all that's to say I don't have a problem with someone contacting me out of the blue, whether by accident or on purpose.