Reboots more than once a week?

[Someone]

Back in the day the game used to crash a lot more. Now, it hardly ever crashes. I think it would help spur a lot more RP and commerce if the game was rebooted at least twice a week - once on the regular time, and once about halfway through the week, maybe Wednesday.

[creeper386]

Just so people can rush to the stores and sell this items twice a week instead of just once?


Great idea!

Sure not everyone does this. But enough people do that it is a pain for those that don't. No need to let the people that do this even more of a chance to get rich.


Creeper

[Bestatte]

How about - once on Saturday the usual bootup time, and another day during the week in the middle of the day?

That would give OTHER people a chance to make the mad dash, instead of it always being the same people who all happen to be available 30 seconds after saturday bootup.

[Agent_137]

Yea, make it just a reboot, not downtime.

Honestly, while there are some items that are a mad dash, other ones do well with two reboots.

[moab]

Or - all items that NPC merchants purchase can remain on the merchant after rebooting - allowing some one to sell something to the NPC on Saturday AM and someone else buying it on Sunday.

As for merchants "filling up" we simply need to have them slowly change their items in inventory to account for VNPC population purchases and other losses (crafting, warehousing....whatever).  

This would go a long way in helping develop the virtual economy.

Having NPC merchants loose their inventory over a reboot is a serious blow to realistic economy and sets up a situation that is ripe for "merchant abuse" if we want to use such a strong word.

[Halaster]

I think it would help spur a lot more RP and commerce ...

How would it spur a lot more Roleplaying?

[Cenghiz]

I did not understand what the aim is going to be.. When someone can sell only five planks/hides/chitin/women to a NPC merchant, he is forced to find a PC merchant instead. That causes interaction.. Why is the interaction increasing when we raise the number to 10?
I'm an off-peak player. I can't sell anything but something rare to a NPC merchant because the quatas are nearly always filled before I can log in in Sunday morning. This forces me to interact with other players and sell to them instead to earn. This forces me to feel IC fury against other rich folks with the same skills and plan their death to become a monopoly. But this does not force me to interact less to other folks.
If the game's reset for a second time, I'm nearly sure nothing will change for me. Just some peak players will have the chance for a second rush. And they won't interact to do this second rush.. It's going to be something like 'enter xxx;offer yyy;barter;offer yyy;barter;offer yyy;barter.....'
So what?

[Sanvean]

Given that reboots disrupt play, I'd rather keep them to a minimum.  So far I haven't seen any concrete, specific reasons why this approach should be rethought.  If anything, they end up detracting from roleplay by doing things like resetting drop descriptions back to their default.

[deinol]

Rebooting to fix economic issues is like cutting off your foot to cure athletes foot. Ok, not quite, but it has a lot more effect than simply reseting the shops.

Maybe I'm in the wrong economic bracket, but the shops that buy the stuff I'm selling were still empty midweek.

I do think that PC's should have a fighting chance to survive based purely on code. On the other hand, it's a lot easier to do this than it used to be. If your a poor character, don't be proud, do what it takes to survive.

The economy of the MUD shouldn't have to rely on reboots to work. I sort of like the idea that stuff should be randomly purchased from shops. Perhaps an average of 1 item per RL day per shop.

And those of you that aren't poor, be willing to hire someone for random stuff. Everytime I've asked about jobs, the only offers I seem to hear are for soldiers. Find stupid stuff for them to do, like running errands, or just carrying stuff. Be creative.

Anyway, while I'd like to see some improvements to the economy, I think if anything should be done it should be done more elegantly than a hard reboot.

[fearwig]

As for merchants "filling up" we simply need to have them slowly change their items in inventory to account for VNPC population purchases and other losses (crafting, warehousing....whatever).  

This would go a long way in helping develop the virtual economy.

Having NPC merchants loose their inventory over a reboot is a serious blow to realistic economy and sets up a situation that is ripe for "merchant abuse" if we want to use such a strong word.

Bingo! If you want to end merchant abuse, let's make merchants work! Everyone -should- be selling every useful item they own in market. If you think that's overpowered, make those items worth less (scrab legs, for instance). But make sure they don't go in the trash heap. That is NOT Zalanthan.

PC interaction should not always be the goal for every single thing in the game. When it happens, great--when you have to regard PCs as absolutely different from NPCs because of it, that is detracting greatly from the experience and atmosphere of the game. PCs don't always have the same needs for the same items that NPCs do, because NPCs deal to VNPCs, et cetera. Or they damn well should.

Trying to sell a lot of items that are popular in the NPC markets will get you laaaaughed at if you sit in a tavern trying to sell them. "Hey, anybody want to buy twenty scrab mandibles? No?"

PC interaction is a great part of the game, but making gameplay dependent upon it really hurts that gameplay. A character should be able to survive (survive, not thrive) self-reliantly on the NPC market in a realistic way. Not a way where NPCs buy 10 scrab pincers and no more and never, ever sell them until one time of the month when ZAP they all disappear! It's just silly. I think a fix to this kind of problem should be first priority.

[Someone again]

There are a lot of things that reboots open up: hunting, burglary, pickpocketing opportunities for newbies to start out and survive with, poisons, plantlife, and, of course, NPC merchants to sell things too.

I read that Tuluki thieves thread and it does seem like its asking too much to force people to develop their burgling skills once per RL week. That just discourages people playing the game. What's more, those opportunities are certainly limited to the people who get there first. *shrugs*

I know, some people will call me a twink, but on Armageddon, skills do matter. And the satisfaction that you get from knowing that your skills are increasing can keep you going when the game is getting boring. Most of the action and RP that thieves and hunters get revolves around using their skills at least somewhat.

(The much lauded "pure RP" role in which an interesting character is developed for its own literary sake is very rarely seen on Armageddon, in my experience. That's because it is, quite frankly, not very workable or rewarded by the game mechanics and game environment. Instead I just see a lot of powergaming - whether it's social in-game, out-of-game, codewise, or whatever else. The Will to Power is the fundamental drive of all living things, after all. This is just a little pre-rebuttal to cries of twinkishness.)

[Larrath]

I had a lot of fun playing an aide once, and he lived around three months or so, I think.  The two skills he ever really used were Listen and Cooking.
Most aides and bards and merchants and noble (not crafters) that I know of rely on 'pure roleplay' instead of skills.  I think that this is a nice amount of people.

Having a second reboot -will- help sell more junk every week, but it will also promote more spam-hunting and spam-crafting/selling.  Most objects and NPCs on Arm are finite because the world is finite, and it serves as a reminder.
Also, I'm pretty certain that the item-duplicate limits on the NPC merchants are there for a reason.

[moab]

I think it would help spur a lot more RP and commerce ...

How would it spur a lot more Roleplaying?

It will generate rp because people wont have the OOC urge to rush to the store and fill up the merchants to make this week's coin.  It will encourage people to play their characters more realistically.  Collect a few plants, (for example) sell a few plants, go do some other stuff for awhile.

There is no need to make sure you have a ton of stuff to sell on Saturday night because you'll be able to sell some of it most any time.

This frees people up to focus on other things - like role-play.

Edit to add:

But maybe this is an imaginary problem.  I don't seem to have problems selling things - though once in awhile a merchant is out of coin.  Eh. Realistic enough.

[Forest Junkie]

It will generate rp because people wont have the OOC urge to rush to the store and fill up the merchants to make this week's coin.  It will encourage people to play their characters more realistically.  Collect a few plants, (for example) sell a few plants, go do some other stuff for awhile.

I disagree. It's quite possible that people will have even -more- of an OOC urge to rush to the store as soon as a second reboot occurs, so they can make double what they normally would per RL week.

I know of specific items in this game that can give over one hundred 'sid per item. I feel that the same players are going back to the spawn points each week, snatching these special items and selling them for the sole purpose of racking up an unrealistic amount of coins to gain that "phat lo0t". If a second reboot was added to the weekly one currently in progress, I could almost guarantee these players would take unfair advantage of the special privelege by snatching these things as soon as the game reboots that second time.

I would be more in favor of a system where shops randomly "sold" a certain amount of items to clear up space for more things to be sold. This would be a fair deal, in my opinion.

Two weekly reboots: The twinks will rule this game even more.

A weekly randomization of items disappearing in "sell lists": Would promote more trade and action.

With that said, I could live without the second idea. The first one is just not going to work though, because some people don't know how to use their common sense.

[Ghost]

I would be more in favor of a system where shops randomly "sold" a certain amount of items to clear up space for more things to be sold. This would be a fair deal, in my opinion.

A weekly randomization of items disappearing in "sell lists": Would promote more trade and action.

[moab]

Forest Junkie>


Just to make it clear, I'm not advocating for multiple reboots.  That's not going to fix the problem.

The problem which is how do we simulate the economy more realistically and thus increase RP would be changing how the merchants hadnle their inventory.

[Bestatte]

I know this has been addressed in the past. I don't want to try a search though - someone else can do it if they're in the mood. It might be so old that it's not even on the search radar.

Anyway..here's the idea some of us were trying to flesh out then:

Issues:

1) The mad dash after reboot to sell off 5 of everything because that's all the merchant will buy.
2) The frustration of everyone else who has those items to sell, because none of the NPCs have any room left to buy more all week long.
3) Trying to sell animal guts to PCs is difficult, at best. Impossible, at worst.
4) Most people who buy jewelry don't WANT a granite ring, but if that's all you know how to make, the only way you can earn sids from it is to sell it to an NPC. That NPC is usually filled with 5 of them within an hour or two after Saturday bootup.
5) The desire to encourage PC-to-PC trade rather than rely on NPC trade doesn't currently outweigh the need for crafters and foragers and skinners to earn enough sids to eat and drink.

Possible solution:

Rewrite the list code in the shops. Allow it so that ALL PCs can sell 2 of whatever, to whoever, every week or between game bootup (if the game crashes for example). Get rid of the max capacity per item on the NPCs altogether..they can buy up to 2 of each from every PC in the game, per week. If that seems like too much, then make it 1 of each.

What this solves:

1) It gives crafters and foragers and skinners the opportunity to unload some of their stuff to NPCs.
2) It DIScourages overhunting/foraging/skinning/crafting among people who rely on NPCs for their sids.
3) It ENcourages RP between other PCs, because sure - you can sell one to each of 4 different shops, but if you have six or seven, you need to find something to do with the leftovers.
4) It ENcourages potential buyers to rely more on PC sellers than the NPC merchants.
5) It completely removes the mad dash after reboot from the equation.
6) It's more realistic to have an NPC say "You've sold me your quota for the week - I know I can get a kajillion more from other people, so I'm gonna do exactly that. Now shoo before you start to annoy me." than it is for the NPC to say "I have exactly five, I know I won't need more than that all week long, no matter what anyone else has to say about it. Go away now."

This must be implemented along with random removal of things from the NPC's list throughout the week. Maybe those granite rings are no longer available for sale at the shop until next bootup - so on the offchance that a PC actually wants to buy it, he has no choice but to look for another PC.

ICly you can assume that the NPC merchant just had a huge order from some unnamed tribe for granite rings, or House Fale wants to give away door prizes for their latest orgy. Whatever - you can make up a million explanations that make perfect sense, if you need to.

[Larrath]

I'm not completely in favor of this idea.  I think it will result with people asking other people to sell their goods for them in trade of a tiny portion, which will result in myself going berserk and killing somebody.

[Bestatte]

Well..think about that for a sec..

How many people do you know, who would give up their quota to someone else, in exchange for less than the shop would give them if they were selling their own stuff?

Okay - you've got a number in mind..

Now of those people, how many people do you know, who your character would have a chance to interact with?

Okay - we're narrowing it down.

Now of those people, how many do you know, whose character would agree to do this specifically for YOUR character?

And of THOSE people, how many would your character WANT to interact with, if given the chance?

Now turn that into a really neato plotline to promote roleplay between all "people who would give up their quotas" and "people who need people to give up their quotas".

See, even that problem can be turned into some fun RP.

[Anonymous]

Bestatte is cool, except for

6) It's more realistic to have an NPC say "You've sold me your quota for the week - I know I can get a kajillion more from other people, so I'm gonna do exactly that. Now shoo before you start to annoy me." than it is for the NPC to say "I have exactly five, I know I won't need more than that all week long, no matter what anyone else has to say about it. Go away now."

I don't see where it's realistic. Merchant knows how many of certain goods he needs and should not bother with quotas nor care if a single person or group provides those numbers. Let's say it's just more playable instead of realistic, which is cool too.

As for a whole mechanic of making NPC trade more playable, well, I'd suggest to keep everything the way it is, except for implementation of scrip that will deduct something from a counter of already sold goods. I'd say -1 for every 6 RL hours, so everyone would have a chance to sell something, even losers who don't play during those golden hours after bootup. That should be easier than keeping track of all goods sold by all PCs in all shops.

[Angela Christine]

Forget commerce, a mid-week or late-week second boot would clear up those almost-buggy blinding sandstorms that seem to get to a certain point of awfulness and then linger in a place for days.  A reboot doesn't guarentee Good weather, but it does reduce the impossible weather for a little while and that allows groups of legitimate buisnessmen to get out and about.  That stoneworker can get out and find the last five stones he needs to fill an order for a complete set of izdari pieces, those Salaar hunters can go look for an anakore so that their boss can fill an order for anakore-clawed gloves, those world weary smugglers can finally see well enough to smuggle spice between Red Storm  and 'nak, adventuresome or addicted 'Nakkies can go to Red Storm or Luir's to get wasted, the Byn can finally see well enough to escort their client half way accross the known world without falling off the shieldwall, and when that client gets halfway accross the known world (under the guise of a simple traveling merchant or bard) she can report the results of her spying to Templar X and hand over the proof that she has actually been in the Happybottom Estate (the Way is nice, but for an in-depth debriefing and producing evidence you need a face-to-face meeting).  

Some bad weather is good, it emphasizes the Harshness of the world, it forces relentless spam hunters and spam foragers to occasionally take a break, and it encourages people to huddle together out of the storm.  But too much bad weather is just discouraging.  If the weather has gotten to the point that it is blinding durring the day, you know OOCly that it probably won't clear up to tollerable levels for weeks ICly, so your obvious choices are to roleplay sitting in a tavern complaining about the weather for hour after hour, or go play counterstrike and check in tomorrorw to see if the weather has gotten any better.

I think an unschedualed reboot on Wednesday or Thrusdays (only in weeks where there hasn't been a crash) could be a good thing.  Six and a half days between reboots seems long to me.

[Cenghiz]

Just an idea...

If we really do want to get rid of spam-sellersü let the merchants keep their inventory. Let a random item get lost every day. SO;

1. More people will be looking for Salarr, Kadius and freelance crafters because the table/sword/wagon/concubine is no longer for sale. It simply disappeared and you now know it won't come back.. Off-peak players won't be hurt badly because usually every crafter makes a good amount of items and some will be sold back.

2. Spam-sellers will still exist, they always do, but they won't bother rushing to the shops after every reboot. They will be forced to do something else after they're VERY HEAVY.

3. Crafting will be valued again. Merchants should be a little bit more valuable after they became the only masterworkers who can craft something special. Let every crafter be more valuable for his-her organization because they can craft. (Still, this may overbalance the game.. I don't know.. I wouldn't like to see 12 warrior/armorcrafter chars in Gaj)

Thanks to the one who mentioned this idea. I was too lazy to scroll back and quote from you. Sorry.

[Praetorian]

Oddly enough, I agree with Angela.  The shop issue I don't think is that big of a deal - more frequent reboots just so people can sell things makes the rich richer, and still screws those that happen to not be able to be on -right- when the reboot hits.  In other words, the fanatical players profit unrealistically and the not-so-fanatical wouldn't notice much difference.

However, the weather issue bothers me.
Don't get me wrong, I love the wind...but when I find myself stumbling around for 20 minutes because I can't reach the north road, which I can see south of me in the room description, then thats leaning more toward annoyability than playability.  The times I would most often want to go out and frolic, I get a short ways and discover that ooops, the winds are too strong...sands are up, I can't go anywhere, and turn back around.  If anyone says, 'oh well take a ranger with you', you need to understand that not everyone is able to muster a ranger to serve as a tour guide at all times.
As a personal opinion I feel the weather issue has hampered playability more than it has enhanced realism.  To reflect this, someone should do a statistical study of the who list, compare players in game at the same time of the week when its windy, or rather -stormy- and when it isn't.  I suspect you will find a significant percentage drop due to players that would rather not be forced to just sit around, and go do something else outside of the game with their time.
Alternatively, perhaps enable certain in-game means to at least -help- those players that navigate strong winds with blowing sand.  Perhaps sunslits which shield the eyes, would reduce chances of getting 'lost', or perhaps certain spells could achieve that (for the magickerly type), or ...
something like that.  *edited to protect the innocent*

[fearwig]

I see the point of the administration, here, and I think it's a seriously flawed way to look at the game. I'm not trying to be difficult, that's just all I can infer from this situation.

The concept of "spam selling" is *derived* from the fact that there is an item limit. If you think those items are useful, make them useful. What you're doing here is turning something that would never, EVER be tossed into a trash heap in real Zalanthas into something that has to be, because there's no worth in it unless you arrive at the NPC at an OOCly determined point.

If these things aren't that valuable ICly, make them worth less. Or make the NPC buy each one for successively less, but without a limit until they become near-worthless. You shouldn't have a 10-20sid item lying in a trash heap, or getting junked, when 10-20 sids can be life or death to a character. That's just bad design.

The sale system is screwy, at the moment, I think that should be pretty clear. Having to rely on OOC events to pursue your IC character's goals is foolish. Either set up a VNPC "sale" system, where the merchant will lose some of the items over the course of the week, or figure something else out. If you think it's fixed the way it is, I can't see how you're thinking it through. There should not be anything produced by hunters that goes to waste in Zalanthas, if things are as rough as they seem to be. If the item has practical use ICly, give it practical use according to code. If the item doesn't, well hell, don't make it worth anything to a merchant to begin with. But don't enforce arbitrary limits, that just ruins the atmosphere and fluidity of the game.

I don't mind that this stuff simply hasn't been coded fully or finished yet. If that's the case, great. But I can't see how someone could look at the merchant system and say "That works just fine." at the moment. If you have something to sell on Zalanthas, you damn well sell it--you don't keep it lying around. There's nothing "spammy" about selling what you collect for a living.


More reboots is obviously not the answer, but leaving it be isn't really the answer either, is it?

[Forest Junkie]

If these things aren't that valuable ICly, make them worth less. Or make the NPC buy each one for successively less, but without a limit until they become near-worthless.

Neat idea.

You shouldn't have a 10-20sid item lying in a trash heap, or getting junked, when 10-20 sids can be life or death to a character. That's just bad design.

I agree you shouldn't have things like that junked. I disagree with your assessment that this problem is due to bad design though. I think it was designed to allow players to use their discretion when selling items. It has become apparent that we as players are not.

There's nothing "spammy" about selling what you collect for a living.

The hell there isn't. If your pc goes to the traders directly after reboot and sells exactly FIVE of everything in their inventory, you are being disrespectful to the other players on this mud who are trying to make a living. Granted, it can be hard to survive if you don't sell your items, but please try to use discretion when selling items to the merchants in the cities. I myself have been guilty of this in the past, and try my best to remedy such actions to allow a more fair playing field for everyone else.

[fearwig]

The hell there isn't. If your pc goes to the traders directly after reboot and sells exactly FIVE of everything in their inventory, you are being disrespectful to the other players on this mud who are trying to make a living. Granted, it can be hard to survive if you don't sell your items, but please try to use discretion when selling items to the merchants in the cities. I myself have been guilty of this in the past, and try my best to remedy such actions to allow a more fair playing field for everyone else.

Dude. You totally missed my point. First: that is an OOC restriction, and I agree that it is absolutely good OOC courtesy to respect that restriction and to allow others the chance to make the money as well. My point is that in an ideal setting, there would NOT be anything spammy about it, because the act of selling your goods in itself, even all your goods, is absolutely not twinkish, spammy, or anything else negative.

If these items are going to be saleable, useful items ICly, there should be an ability to sell them, essentially no matter what. The fact that merchants can only carry 5 of each indicates that these merchants are just randomly buying them, knowing they'll sit around forever--if they're valuable sale items, ICly they'd want to buy as many as they can get their hands on, if the price is right.

The way things are, you've got a big fat OOC condition sticking in the middle of an IC game. And that's never good. On Arm it's even more detrimental, considering how great the game is about being IC otherwise.


As for "using our discretion"--that's OOC discretion! There is NOTHING IC about limiting how much of your goods you turn into useful material (sid). That is in every way a totally ridiculous statement, I'm sorry.  I can deal with this issue, as a player--it doesn't really bug me that much, and wouldn't even if I were playing a hunting character at present. The problem is that it's absolutely unrealistic, and there's no real reason to it at all. And it reinforces the stupidity of the reboot-camping system, which we can all agree caters to a spammy, OOC mentality.

As a player, I'm a reasonable, nice guy, and I want to be courteous to other players. As a character, I may be a greedy feck--in fact, I'm very likely to be. And I'm going to turn everything I can that's useless to me into sid. As it is, I tend toward being a nice player, at least where this issue comes up. That's not good, and I feel it hurts the game when I have to be a nice player, rather than a realistic character. If you disagree, I think we have some serious disagreements as to what is and is not an IC MUD.

[Forest Junkie]

My point is that in an ideal setting, there would NOT be anything spammy about it, because the act of selling your goods in itself, even all your goods, is absolutely not twinkish, spammy, or anything else negative.

It's twinkish when you absolutely destroy the environment and economy around you by running a damn monoply on the amount of GUTS and teeth from animals being sold. Give me a break. It's twinkish, powergaming, and spammy. These acts are having a negative impact on ArmageddonMUD currently.

If they're valuable sale items, ICly they'd want to buy as many as they can get their hands on, if the price is right.

I agree. But still, there should be a limit. Perhaps a higher bar. Or, one of the ideas listed above by several people.

As for "using our discretion"--that's OOC discretion! There is NOTHING IC about limiting how much of your goods you turn into useful material (sid). That is in every way a totally ridiculous statement, I'm sorry.

Call it what you want. I didn't think it was incredibly OOC for my character to give a damn about how they may actually be hurting the environment when they kill a disgusting amount of animals "just cause they are the shit in combat". OOC discretion is when you use your common sense and play the game fairly. If you are selling five items per week to the same merchant, maybe, just maybe your pc needs to tone down how much of this particular item they retrieve each reboot. Just a thought. My discretion may be rediculous, but at least I'm trying to not screw everyone over with my pack full of ritikki guts. Please guy, give all the other players a shot who hunt and gather too.

If you disagree, I think we have some serious disagreements as to what is and is not an IC MUD.

I disagree on principles, friend. You can't justify selling vast, unrealistic amounts of raw goods. I may not be IC in trying to be courteous to other players, but I won't stop until an immortal says it's a no-no. Until the code changes, or players learn to practice taking in only what they need as food and crafting materials, I think that's the way I'm going to have to play.

[SewerRat_inTheOpen]

A midweek reboot to clear up those dastardly RL whole week-ongoing storms sounds good, keeps us from choking in the sandy winds.

I agree with fearwig that there is nothing wrong IG to sell everything you have, but I think OOC wise, players should be nice to others and not spam collect and sell, thus blocking off all revenue for others.

Even if you are just a specialised kank killer, you do not have to kill 5 kanks and get their antennaes to sell, instead maybe take time to hunt something else after you bagged your first kank for the IG month. Or forage. Otherwise if you bagged two in early month, try to sell one skinned kank fur to the players/merchant houses. They do like to have crafting materials. Talk to their aides-->refer to their lords--->maybe a side contract of supplying them with kank fur every month.

I am rather neutral on this, since I  try to find ways about the problem IG. Like maybe... find a merchant and make friends. Or hunt less of whatever people are hunting all the time.

[fearwig]

"Spam-selling" has nothing to do with "spam-killing". You can get the max number of scrab legs and pincers off a single scrab for a single merchant. Don't give me that "It's IC over-hunting" crap. And only the most sensitive, intelligent community would really have much of a care for what gets killed where or who skins it. There are lots of people IC who wouldn't give a damn, a majority, even, whatever the helpfiles say.

I dunno, people are looking at this OOC code and reading a lot into it IC when I don't think there's anything IC to it at all. If you have six legs and six pincers in game, you are damn well going to try to sell them. Now, if you are a nice player, maybe you will IGNORE THAT ROLEPLAY FACT and not sell them, and junk them or throw them off somewhere instead, despite the fact that they are obviously saleable items, and even valuable. And that's fine enough. But! Remember what's happening. It's a break of roleplay, and players shouldn't be forced to work this way to suit the MUD. Because while you're making the MUD work better through player etiquette, you're overstepping roleplay entirely.

If you can't follow that, and want to pick it out for things to bitch about, and to claim I'm supporting spamming and all that bullshit, go ahead. But if you actually want to read it and think about it with a detatched mindset, you might realize there's something wrong with the way it's set up. That's all I have to say on that topic, I think


I agree that you should be a nice player. Play it how it has to be played, for now. But I implore the coders to look at this and fix it so we can have a continuous roleplay environment, not ruined by little OOC facets like this one. That's what this MUD is about. Roleplay first, balance second. Figure out the balance ICly, don't impose it through OOC ceilings.

[Cuusardo]

It sounds to me like the reason people who are in favor of additional reboots, are in favor because it would be a way to make people's IC lives easier.  (An OOC way to make IC life easier, it is.)  This is Zalanthas, it's supposed to be difficult!  The weather is supposed to suck, and merchants are supposed to be greedy bastards.  The poor stay poor while the rich get richer.

[Delirium]

The poor stay poor while the rich get richer.

While I agree as a general statement, this shouldn't happen because of spawn-point abuse and filling up the merchant's shelves with five of everything before anyone else can. As it is now, it does.

My suggestion is to have 1-2 random items disappear off the shelf once an IC day. If the item is a continually restocked item, it gets bypassed by the code in favor of a PC stocked item.

[creeper386]

The much lauded "pure RP" role in which an interesting character is developed for its own literary sake is very rarely seen on Armageddon, in my experience. That's because it is, quite frankly, not very workable or rewarded by the game mechanics and game environment.

Well, I'm sure someone has probably already covered this, but I'd just like to say ... The richest character I ever had. Didn't use any coded skills to earn his 'sid. I didn't get it because of any OOC friends or anything. I acctually started making it within the first day playing time.

Not always the fact. But I've seen the opposite as the quote, I've seen MUCH more rewarded through RP then through the code.


Creeper

[Praetorian]

Here is a way to look at the 'spawn selling' issue in a different light - might provide a means to a solution.

Economic laws of supply and demand work such that as supply increases, if demand remains constant, then price drops to increase demand to match the supply.  If demand increases, and supply remains constant, then prices increase until demand finds equilibrium with supply.  Now, before someone hows that real world economics isn't applicable to Armageddon let me just state that that isn't what I'm suggesting.  What I -am- suggesting, is the price adjustments that reflect some of these same principles in game.

Suppose you have 10 curved obsidian swords.
sell sword - get 40 sid     "I'll give you 40 obsidian coins for that."
sell sword - get 40 sid     "I'll give you 40 obsidian coins for that."
sell sword - get 40 sid     "I'll give you 40 obsidian coins for that."
sell sword - get 35 sid     "We have a decent stock, I'll give you 35 sid"
sell sword - get 33 sid     "We are presently overstocked, how about 33 sid"
sell sword - get 30 sid     "We are quite overstocked, how about 30 sid."
sell sword - get 25 sid     "Look, we have a large stock, best I can do is 25"
sell sword - get 18 sid     "I am swamped with those, 18 is my best offer."
sell sword - get 12 sid     "-Another- one?  12 sid is the best I can do."
sell sword - get 10 sid     "I don't really need it, but can take it for 10 sid."
(continues at this rate)

As merchant quantity goes up, price decreases.  Salarr is going to pretty much buy a sword for dirt, dirt cheap if it can, since it has the storehouses available to profit on the sale at a later date - and there are always armies to outfit.  This eliminates the whole 'not wanting to buy it' angle, the difference is the diminishing returns.  A crafter could still sell goods, but without travelling and finding other buyers his profitability is going to decrease rapidly.  However, it still enables someone carrying around 5 duskhorn horns to sell them, perhaps at a bad price, but still sell them if they miss the 'respawn' rush.  It still lets the hunter fill his hide with water and go back out.
In a nutshell, the diminishing returns would inject 'slightly' more money into the game for some, but would also remove the whole, 'oops shopkeeper is full, guess I'll have to carry this bag of hides around until next weekend (an IC month) - selling would always be possible, you just might have to settle for a bare minimum price.

[creeper386]

I think a combination of what Praetorian posted would be a great addition. Also if you make the buy back price go down to reflect the merchant has alot of the item. BUT still set a limit to how many items can be bought. Just make it broader. Maybe rich merchants won't buy many, if any cheap items. And poorer merchants would buy less expensive stuff. But over all the mid-range stuff would be bought most as it's not TOO expensive and of average quality. The whole removing items randomly(Preferably at least one or two an IC day as one an OOC wouldn't help much, perhaps even make this a randomized on when it happens and have the chance set up to only do one or two so often.) would ALSO be a great addition. Specially if this was combined with base item cost against acctual cost, and THEN an addition that merchant lists aren't so changing. That reboots/crashes/shutdowns don't wipe the list clean.

It'd be a resource hog possibly, but if done right it could keep everything even resource wise, create a more stable economy and make everything work more realistically.

Summary:
*Price goes down as quantity goes up(Even make the selling price go down. Keeping the NPC making profit of course.)
*Still make some sort of set limit on how much the NPC buys.
*Random removing of items from the list.
*Item list lasts through reboots.

I personally think over all they'd be most effective as all together. Although it'd be a huge project and a resource hog ... but with some tweaking could probably end up being rewarded for a great coded economy.

Creeper thinks it'd still be easier to make money from rich PCs though!

[fearwig]

Huge project? Resource hog? Bah.

This is a bit of a project, I suppose, at least certain aspects of it would be take one or two saturdays to get right. Some these concepts are implemented in even the simplest muds. A randomization effect that occurs once a day, even affecting every single shopkeeper, would have absolutely negligible impact on the performance of the mud, though. Compare to say, combat code, which is ongoing sometimes ten characters at a time. That's something more of a drain, and it still has no impact on performance.

I am happy to see the thread falling in behind my recommendations, though. Ahem.

[fearwig]

It sounds to me like the reason people who are in favor of additional reboots, are in favor because it would be a way to make people's IC lives easier.  (An OOC way to make IC life easier, it is.)  This is Zalanthas, it's supposed to be difficult!  The weather is supposed to suck, and merchants are supposed to be greedy bastards.  The poor stay poor while the rich get richer.

It sounds to me like you didn't read the thread--or if you did, you didn't choose to think about any of it.

If you can explain to me why on earth a merchant would buy precisely five items, all at the same price, and then refuse to buy any more for exactly one half of one month at which point he would have magically sold all those items (and yet would have no spare sid), you can have a big fuckin' cookie. Chocolate chip. And you'll also have the right to say we're trying to avoid IC difficulty with OOC changes. Thanks for playing, have a nice day.

[creeper386]

Well, reworking of the shop code to institute the four things I have there would be a big project. Maybe not the initial code, but the tweaking and changing of things so it's not abusing players and players aren't abusing it. It'd be alot of time for whoever did it. Even if it's not difficult.

The resource hog. I'm talking mostly about saving shop lists here. Also, saving shop lists. That'd take resources. They'd have to at least save before shut downs, which could quite possibly make shut down longer. We have lots of NPC shop keepers. Also, saves in between for crashes could possibly slow things down. Mostly, that's alot of information to save, and it'd take up memory space.

Sure, some extra code in the shopkeepers here and there wouldn't maybe hurt too much. But if you add up EVERY shopkeeper in the game, in addition to the resources the game takes up now ... It could very well make a difference.


Creeper

[fearwig]

Fair enough. Might tack on five seconds, as an outside estimate. But only if the lists were really that much larger. You should consider that not all shopkeepers actually have items that would be sold to them for profit. Only a small minority, really.

[Cuusardo]

If you can explain to me why on earth a merchant would buy precisely five items, all at the same price, and then refuse to buy any more for exactly one half of one month at which point he would have magically sold all those items (and yet would have no spare sid), you can have a big fuckin' cookie. Chocolate chip. And you'll also have the right to say we're trying to avoid IC difficulty with OOC changes. Thanks for playing, have a nice day.

Zalanthas is not earth.  IMO, this limit imposed by shopkeepers is a means to maintain the struggle for survival.

[fearwig]

And you wouldn't say that's artificial? You wouldn't say there's a better way to do it? Because what it does now is it makes IC perfectly valuable items junkworthy if they're not also valuable to a PC. If anything that injures the "harshness" of Zalanthas. Waste is not something you find in a harsh environment. Things you find on the ground should be worthless to all (hence their being on the ground), not useful hides, claws, and other potentially valuable parts.

Make the items worth less, or worth successively less. The total value can be as much or less than it currently is. Just make them able to be sold, that's my point. It's an awfully cocky thing to just assume that someone making a suggestion for a change to the game is doing so to benefit themselves or to make things necessarily easier on players.

You want Zalanthas to be a hard, *IC* world. A hard, but realistic place to live. What you're suggesting is that you just want it to be a hard game with OOC limitations, which isn't entirely the point (though it would sometimes be a result of making the world itself harsh).


The best way to fix this would be with a system that produced a uniform VNPC "sale" of the items (randomized daily perhaps) that would reduce the quantity held by the shopkeeper, in addition to a system of mathematically gradiated worth according to quantity. Lots of DIKU muds have implemented the latter. It's pretty easy. If there's a super-abundance of the item, from PCs selling it all the time, then it will be cheaper to buy and sell. What's that? That's economics! Oh noes!

[spawnloser]

I don't think there's anything artificial to having a max of five items.  It'd be better if the IMMs could set how many the shopkeeper will buy instead of it be a broad limit of five across the board.  Yes, Praet's idea is better, but this is not unrealistic.

"I'll pay 40 sid for that."
"I'll pay 40 sid for that."
"I'll pay 40 sid for that."
"I'll pay 40 sid for that."
"I'll pay 40 sid for that."
"Screw you!  I've already got five of these things from you and haven't sold them.  Come back when I've unloaded these.  Fuck!"

Sounds good enough to me.  Not perfect, but good enough.

[Maybe42or54]

But.. preatorian..

I would love your idea until I die as long.. as..
The highest the NPC buys your wares is less than the lowest they will sell it for.

[fearwig]

That'd be pretty easy, and pretty reasonable.

The shopkeeper sells (to players), depending on the amount of his stock, on a gradient between the price at which he would pay the most (base value--the amount you see now when you sell to a shopkeeper, or some adjusted value similar to that) and the price he sells at now (or some adjusted value based on that price). So it's like, if it sells now at 100sid, and he buys now at 50 sid, the range of his selling would be 50-100, with 100 being his sale price if he has one of the item, 50 being his sale price if he has [max value, maybe based on merchant's ability to store stuff, varying from bazaar hawker to Kadian in range].

The other way would be, as I hinted, to adjust those max and min values to reflect the current prices as the *average* price (both buy and sell), such that it extends to a level lower and higher, equally. It's all pretty simple math, once you think it out and start putting it into code, it just sounds awfully complicated when you try and prose-ify it.

All in all, I think it's a good idea. It will estimate pretty accurately the way a shopkeeper -would- try and operate, despite the fact that it sounds somewhat mathematically complicated. And better yet it would help make "spam-selling" less viable--you could sell 10 scrab legs, but you won't get as much for them as if you diversify and kill other things too. Best yet it puts more factors into the mix. It's so dull and pre-ordained that you'll be able to sell the scrab mandible for 10 sid, et cetera. And it makes total sense that a vendor would accept your item, just at a piss-poor price if he thinks they're not selling well. He knows that the items will sell, they just won't sell for a lot, et cetera. And then you've got the whole VNPC sales issue to consider, which absolutely needs attention.

This may bore some people to tears, but I'm sure someone shares my interest in seeing Zalanthas with an economy.

[creeper386]

What can be done, with modifications for different merchants. Is something like ...

A merchant sells an item for 50 'sid. If he has one. Buys one for 25 if he has none. If he's buying a second on, it might go down to 23 and the selling price would go down to 49. He sells one of them and the price goes back to 50 'sid. Basically making it better to buy when the merchant has more of the item. Realistic I say. BUT, if abunch of items of the same time are sold to him, he won't buy anymore if the sell price is say ... less then thirty. So he can still make a decent profit.

This would have to depend on the cost of the item. More expensive items aren't bought in large quantities. And cheap items aren't bought in mass quantities for the opposite reason, not as useful or worth a profit.

We already have merchants that have a certain spending limit from what I understand. That can be worked on even more. And I don't think it'd be really that DIFFICULT to code in a better working system then what we have now, to both help support everyone and not the people that rush after boots and crashes. As well as create a much better economy on the small scale. We got a beautiful one in the works, but the shopkeeper interaction is still quite basic.

Only problem is people could still rush in and sell abunch of stuff. That could be solved by having each CHARACTER only able to sell so much. And this would be more of an OOC limitation to help keep players in line. Because we all know too many people do a made rush after reboots. It may not be right away. It may even wait untill sunday morning but ussually less then twenty four hours and things tend to be filled up.

Creeper

[Bestatte]

I like the combination of ideas. NPCs offering less to buy things, and charging accordingly as their inventory supercedes the demand. Plus imposing a maximum quota on how much each character is allowed to sell to the shop per game reset. Plus random inventory removals throughout the week.

That way, it works a lot more like pawn shops do. And there are some specialized pawnshops in the real world..consignment stores for clothing, musical pawn shops (where I got my guitar for example), jewelry pawnshops, odds and ends pawnshops -

In most stores in real life, you can't SELL stuff to them right? You can only buy. So this makes it work more "realistically" in a sense, while also providing more playability.

[fearwig]

(re: creeper's post, not bestatte's)

Right.

So save merchant item lists at reboot.

It seems to me the reboots are the real problem, here. If it weren't for the fact that merchants suddenly are willing to buy anything and everything on sundays, you wouldn't even have such a phrase as 'spam-selling'.

Items that have a great demand from PCs (i.e. not scrab legs) would probably need to be removed from the market less often. Those that have primarily VNPC sale value could be removed at a fairly regular rate, maybe 2 per IC day. If the merchant wants your items ICly, you should be able to sell to him, I say. And we can fix anything that gets in the way of that, reboot wipes included.

I just don't like the feel I get off the whole idea of an item sell limit per player. It just feels so artificial. If you think those items should be harder to get, make them harder to get! Make them harder to skin, maybe, or what have you. That's the way this kind of thing needs to be approached. Because if you give people reason to junk stuff, rather than get rid of it in market, you're changing the feel of the game, generally in a really OOC direction. More into the "Game" and less toward the "World", that is to say. Personally, I much prefer to think of Zalanthas as a world.

[spawnloser]

So...instead of relying completely on shops and find a PC to sell stuff to?

Why 'fix' this when it's not truly broken?

What's broken is that people rush out to do their selling on Saturday night.  Fix the problem, not the symptom.

Oh, yeah, and reboots aren't the problem either...and no matter how many arguments you come up with for why we shouldn't have Saturday down time, it'll still happen.

[creeper386]

One, noone has come close to suggesting getting rid of Saturday downtime Spawn. Don't know where you got that from. But I haven't seen the slightest hint of that ANYWHERE. I know I like it personally.

Two, it may not be broken, but lots of things in the MUD aren't broken and they are still tweaked and improved upon. The actions of desert wild life weren't broken, someone still spent much time improving it to make the desert more alive. Why can't we do the same in the markets?

Three, again not broken, but it's still a very basic shop code. The MUD in my opinion just from an OOC stand point would look better with a more advanced economy system, and a more advanced shopkeeper interaction would be a way to get that going on the right track. We already have items that cost more/less depending on location and availability of items in that location and so on and so forth, why keep a horribly bland and unrealistic shopkeeper interaction with it?

Four, aiming at Fearwig here. Yes, it might change some things because of OOC to impose a limit per character. BUT if you don't, have something similar, changing the code won't do any good. And you'll still have people selling just TONS of items when the shopkeeper list clears out. It'll happen, and it's not alot of people doing it most the time. Some of them aren't even bad RPs they've just developed the habit as almost a neccessity to try and stay alive. It's not as bad as it used to be, but this sort of reality still exists.

And it's STILL not horribly unrealistic, for a merchant to not buy alot of stuff from one person. They only have so much coin. Maybe they want to hold out for that nice duskhorn skin instead of buying all your fifty seven dirty 'rinthi rat skins. Maybe there is a chance someone might bring in BETTER quality dirty 'rinthi rat skins then your character. So they want to hold out. OR just maybe they want to see ... IF THEY CAN SELL SO MANY DIRTY 'RINTHI RAT SKINS??? I mean ... I know a merchant doesn't want to buy even a few of something, let alone a ton of something, if he's not sure if he can move it.

Creeper

[Delirium]

So...instead of relying completely on shops and find a PC to sell stuff to?
*snip*
What's broken is that people rush out to do their selling on Saturday night.  Fix the problem, not the symptom.

Both issues have been addressed repeatedly in this thread. The suggestions put forth are meant to fix the problem of people rushing out to do their selling on Saturday night, and to encourage PC-PC selling while allowing objects that the vast majority of PCs will not be interested in (scrab legs, anyone?) to be sold - for absolute bottom-level prices perhaps, but still sold - instead of being junked or laying about wasted.

In a brutal desert world, something being wasted seems to go directly against the grain of what "should be". If the original hunter did not want them, scavengers desperate for enough obsidian to get a skin full of water would want them, only to find that there is absolutely nowhere to sell something that DOES in fact retain value - it is simply impossible to sell them because of an OOC limitation. That is what the suggestions put forth are intended to fix.

[Forest Junkie]

What's broken is that people rush out to do their selling on Saturday night.  Fix the problem, not the symptom.

Finally, a voice of reason!

The ideas put forth are reasonable, and could be implemented. The question is, should they have to be coded? Can't this simple problem be fixed by people just hunting/crafting/jacking all the spawn-items less?

[creeper386]

What's broken is that people rush out to do their selling on Saturday night.  Fix the problem, not the symptom.

Finally, a voice of reason!

The ideas put forth are reasonable, and could be implemented. The question is, should they have to be coded? Can't this simple problem be fixed by people just hunting/crafting/jacking all the spawn-items less?

Well, that'd fix the problem of people selling everything saturday's and what not, and would be an improvement, but it's most likely going to take more staff time just to support something like that then to code something else.

Also, improvements to the code are good. Yes, RP is alot of things. But we still have code. We should have the best of code to go with the best of RP.

Otherwise, why make any code changes at all? Lets just go back to stock diku, because that wasn't really broken, so why did they fix it in the first place?

Want more players ... Having articles written about the MUD helps that. If you have some outstanding code, you can get into online mags as well as other ones. With little effort beyond okaying it from the staff. All they have to do is make an awesome MUD alittle better.

Creeper

[Praetorian]

Heres a wild and wacky idea... leave the 5 object limit in shops just like it is.  However, tweak it so that merchant class pc's are able to sell beyond that limit.  If you are a hunter and want to sell those two extra duskhorn pelts then find a merchant, and sell them to them.  The merchant, knowing that he will be able to 'talk the other trader into doing business' so to speak will likely give you a somewhat fair price because they -know- they will be able to sell it.
This gives everyone a reason to go find merchant PCs to buy their goods when necessary, and gives merchant players a WHOLE new realm of importance in the game - as it should be.

[Maybe42or54]

I like, also expand the past five limit to Con artists, not just merchants alone.

[Anonymous]

Wild and wacky is right on the ball with describing that idea.

I'm against it. Merchants already can make alot more money then anyone else with bargaining. Merchants tend to be the ones that sell the craftable stuff the the stores anyways, so they would make even more money there.

If a hunter or some one is smart, they would probably find someplace or someone to sell their stuff to as it is. Instead of they themselves selling it. I know a merchant could ussually make the hunter a few extra coins and still make a profit himself.

I personal am more for improving the code, not just fixing the problem of people selling items in mass. Good code that is more realistic and less basic stock sell code would be nice, and make things look alot prettier from an OOC stand point.

Creeper

[creeper386]

Just so everyone knows. That really was me.


Creeper

[fearwig]

So...instead of relying completely on shops and find a PC to sell stuff to?

Why 'fix' this when it's not truly broken?

What's broken is that people rush out to do their selling on Saturday night.  Fix the problem, not the symptom.

Oh, yeah, and reboots aren't the problem either...and no matter how many arguments you come up with for why we shouldn't have Saturday down time, it'll still happen.

Is this post produced by some kind of drug-fueled frenzy? Because I'm having a lot of trouble following your little half-baked rants, here.

You say "Fix the problem, not the symptom!"  The -symptom- is that people mass-sell on saturday nights, yes? We agree, then. The problem is the merchant lists evaporate with reboots. What you are actually saying is, "Fix the symptom, not the problem!". You know what the word "symptom" means, yes?

As for wanting to get rid of Saturday downtimes, I think you may very well be in your own little world here, because NO ONE IN THIS THREAD has actually mentioned that. *shakes his head* I'm baffled, really.

I should probably just have ignored this post, being that it is really just self-contradictory, but I don't like to see a good thread get derailed by this kind of crap.


As for the rest of the thread, I've got to agree with Creeper. Suggesting different item sale limits is really just a band-aid on a flesh wound. The suggested fixes were good, no need to make it even more stupid and artificial. Derailment is bad. Bad!

[fearwig]

And it's STILL not horribly unrealistic, for a merchant to not buy alot of stuff from one person. They only have so much coin. Maybe they want to hold out for that nice duskhorn skin instead of buying all your fifty seven dirty 'rinthi rat skins. Maybe there is a chance someone might bring in BETTER quality dirty 'rinthi rat skins then your character. So they want to hold out. OR just maybe they want to see ... IF THEY CAN SELL SO MANY DIRTY 'RINTHI RAT SKINS??? I mean ... I know a merchant doesn't want to buy even a few of something, let alone a ton of something, if he's not sure if he can move it.

Creeper

Woah, okay, following you up to here, going good. Let's talk about this though.

Generally, a merchant knows whether he can unload the goods he buys. Sometimes it takes longer, sometimes it doesn't. Generally, if he's getting a fantastic price, however, he doesn't mind the wait. That's essentially how sales works.

Now, a max item limit could be produced based on that item's worth! In fact, that's basically what I've already suggested. But you've also got the simple fact that those rat skins are dirt cheap, and sell, in time. Zalanthas is a low-end-based economic world... people want cheap and effective. Players don't always represent that, of course (and nor does the code, always).

I pefer the absolute, basic system that doesn't take that into account though. The merchant will buy more, sure, just not for nearly as much. In effect, he'll buy one skin for 20 sid, or all ten for 100, based on his progressively lowering offers. It's a good system, I say. Eventually, sure, a merchant will have too many and he'll be offering 1 or 2 sid per skin, or maybe code will determine he doesn't want to waste any more storage with that item. Either way, that's when you stop selling, you old feck! You're not getting anything from it.

[Forest Junkie]

Hey homie. Calm down.

[fearwig]

I will cut you! *brandishes a spoon*

[Trenidor]

Ok and while we're at it, let's make a channel where people can talk ooc to everyone in the whole world, that way we can be like:

"Hey, I need someone to take this mek down anyone online want to do it?"

and we'll all benifit because we're doing an ooc thing to RP more.

And then we can show our percentage levels and exp of skills.
And add in those pink bunnies and a start up field so we all practice our skills before we get to play

And then, we can make another channel for merchants only:

"Hey, I'm auctioning this kank shit in mint condition, lets start the bids at 10 sid a clump"

That would help to get rid of those items we can't sell to NPCs

/sarcasm

[spawnloser]

The fact that merchant lists dissappear is realistic in that merchants will sell things to other people.  There will be a demand for something even if there is no PC demand.  Forcing only PC to PC sales, which any suggestion here would eventually do for some things would make some things which are already fairly difficult even moreso.

From what I understand, when there is a reboot, the shops will reset.  That's just the way it is.  It would probably take a fair amount of work to fix the hundreds of shops in the game to fix this, including making every room that contains a shop to be changed to a different zone so that it can be a save room, so that the merchants will save with their current inventories (and thus items available for sale).

If the idea for reducing price as the market floods, eventually there would be no purpose to selling things...and noone'd be buying any of the item for it to be storing up so many, so eventually there would be no purpose to selling these things...etc.

[fearwig]

Look, man, if you're going to reply, read the thread.

First, no, it's not impossible to save merchant lists. That's just the way it's coded. MUDs make a lot of allowances where code is concerned because it's simple and it's text-based. Saving the merchant lists when rebooting is not hard.

Second, the whole problem with 'spam selling' comes from this reboot clearing. It's unrealistic because it happens all at once, on a given day, and everyone rushes to sell their things on that day of the RL week.

This can be fixed by having the merchant lists save and then having them "sell" things on an IC day-to-day basis to VNPCs.
Then you combine that with the other suggestions we've made as to how to gradiate the pricing system. All in all they are pretty simple changes, though a little time-consuming. But I think they're more than worthwhile.


And the results? No spam-selling (which is a stupid concept to begin with that shouldn't have to exist), a market that's realistic and more useful, and reboots that don't harm the game in this way and aren't relied upon. You would still -have- the reboots and downtimes, they just wouldn't have an IC impact, as they shouldn't.

[Cuusardo]

It's highly doubtful that this is going to change anyway, so I really don't see what the point of beating the dead horse is.

[Ix Machina]

Fearwig,

As far as the way the code works: unless you somehow have access to the codebase, it's probably unwise to assume what the code can or cannot do as compared to other muds. Without going into detail, Spawnloser's comment on what it would take to ensure saving lists is correct.

Secondly, is there any way you could tone down the borderline flaming/obnoxiousness of your replies? No one is attacking you or calling you an idiot, they are merely stating why they don't agree with you. It'd be nice if you could show the same level of respect to the posters who disagree with you.

[fearwig]

I'm not asking anyone to take me seriously--in fact I wouldn't recommend it. But if they'd like to, I suppose it's their prerogative to be offended. Beyond that, well, you can be angry about it, but I'm not going to worry myself over "borderline flaming", with all due respect. We're adults, here, aren't we? Or at least competent minors. If you think I've been rude, point it out to me--I don't think I've made any particularly rude comments, save maybe for some that were facetious.

I am somewhat familiar with mud code, and I'd love to be able to speak with more surety on the ability for this idea to work with this mud in particular. I was mostly speaking hypotheticals. I enjoy discussing these sorts of things--I would assume that anyone who bothers to reply does too.

On a similar note, if there's any way you might suggest that one could get into the process of coding or helping to code for Arm without imm status, I'd be more than happy to help. I have looked, but haven't found much on the subject.

It's highly doubtful that this is going to change anyway, so I really don't see what the point of beating the dead horse is.

That's how you get the juice out. Dead horses are where all the action is.

Really, I don't think forums are always meant to actually invoke change, with a few exceptions (usually pointing out oversights, et cetera). If people really didn't want to discuss it, I imagine there wouldn't be replies, and there wouldn't be anything for me to get excited over.

[Adhira]

I think this discussion has been all debated out, and so no one has to worry over borderline flaming, thread locked.