Bulky items

[Delirium]

Much <3 for the little change to output.

(heh, spoke too soon.  Nevermind.)

[Anonymous]

Items with enough weight will show up:

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The dark-haired man is standing here.
- he is carrying a heavy, carru-hide backpack.

Sure, it's heavy but it's not -large- enough to be obvious and noticeable.

Why not just limit it to flagged items such as furniture or bahamet shells.

[Delirium]

Items with enough weight will show up:

Code Select Expand

The dark-haired man is standing here.
- he is carrying a heavy, carru-hide backpack.

Sure, it's heavy but it's not -large- enough to be obvious and noticeable.

Why not just limit it to flagged items such as furniture or bahamet shells.

Actually I like that bulky packs show up now.

No more magickal floating pack of 98 extra stones storage space that people never emote about or pay attention to.

[Anonymous]

And another note, what about those light agafari chairs? They're big and obvious, yet...don't have enough weight to show up with the code.

[ashyom]

Feel free to typo those, if you feel the weight is too light.

As an aside, we're looking at adding a feature for objects like spears - obviously big, but not heavy.

[Flaming Ocotillo]

When the code was first introduced, you could look at yourself and see which items were appearing as "bulky" on your character. After the MUD reboot by Morgenes, it appears as though you can no longer look at yourself to find out what items appear bulky. Is this intentional?

I'm imagine a character would be aware of how bulky an item is for them, whereas the player doesn't easily know without checking the code (i.e. certain water containers are appearing bulky when filled but not bulky when less full, which is hard to judge).

[The7DeadlyVenomz]

I am in full support of this new code.

We are talking about jarring descriptors. I like the idea of using a : instead of a -, but it's really all good to me.

[Flaming Ocotillo]

While I can see Laura's point about the 'laundry list' and interrupting the flow of the feel of the game, I'm left to wonder how it is any different than your equipment list?

When you LOOK DEFILER, then you can get the shopping list of auras, the individual items he is carrying, what his feet are doing and so on..

The suggestions Laura made are apparently related to the room echos and not when you look at someone. The difference between the room echo list and the equipment list would be that the equipment list appears when you look at someone, and the laundry list of room echos appears when you glance in any given direction, or enter a room with someone (or many people). If character equipment lists were shown as room echos, then you could make a comparison, but I think Laura's suggestion right now is just an attempt at clearing the minor bullet point clutter that pulls away from the game immersion in room descriptions.

[Maybe42or54]

Well, can this be added to torches?

The hot, bisexual man is standing here, holding two lit torches.
-he has many a great pile of feathers.

[slipshod]

The problem I have with this is the extra lines it adds to the scroll, even when nothing obvious is being carried.  Sure, there are some people who intentionally wear items on every wear-location, and/or who write up main descs that take the maximum allowed lines, and for those people their gear and main descs are always going to spill enough that you need to scroll back to read it from the beginning.  But I know I personally try to always keep my gear streamlined enough that my character's appearance will fit on one screen when other people look at me.. just an ooc courtesy because it's difficult to always scroll back up to catch that missing top line or two.  Now this adds an extra 3 or 4 lines of scroll to something that was already hard to minimize.  

I like the idea of being able to see bulky items in the inventory, as is, but I strongly suggest that if what it would show is "nothing obvious", the line not appear at all.  Only have it show up when there is something obvious.  We could add a hundred extra lines for all the things people aren't doing.  I'd hope it would be possible, since it is with worn gear.  We don't look at someone and see

The man is using:
<worn on head>     nothing

[Maybe42or54]

Or possibly:

The man is at death's door.
<in his arms> Nothing obvious.

[Hymwen]

I just wish there was a way to tell if you're carrying something visible.

Unless there is? 'look me' doesn't give anything.

[Maybe42or54]

As a side note, I'd rather have something that differentiates itself from Magickering and the normal, loaded down state.

OR I'll start to thinking something like magick is just some Pc loaded down.

The little girl is here, blowing her nose.
-She is hovering above the ground.


The nightmare is here, resting.
:She has a few large weapons.

[LauraMars]

I think Laura's suggestion right now is just an attempt at clearing the minor bullet point clutter that pulls away from the game immersion in room descriptions.

Yes.  This is it exactly, thank you.

I see nothing wrong with combining all bullet points into one somehow, as was my second suggestion.

It's a little ridiculous to pinpoint each and every spell effect in the room description, each and every heavy thing carried.  Some of the lists get quite silly looking.  Efficient though they may be, immersion is sacrificed, and that is the way of it.

...Especially when so many of the magickers I've met don't roleplay out or aknowledge the myriad of auras whirling around them or the fact that they're floating or what have you.  If these things are supposed to be so obvious, so obvious as to need a bullet point, you'd think more people would incorporate them into play.  I can see the same problem affecting the heavy lifters in the future, but that is another topic entirely - one to do with the player's approach to roleplay, and not the parsing or format of effects and weight.

/my opinion

[Fnord]

As a side note, I'd rather have something that differentiates itself from Magickering and the normal, loaded down state.

OR I'll start to thinking something like magick is just some Pc loaded down.

The little girl is here, blowing her nose.
-She is hovering above the ground.


The nightmare is here, resting.
:She has a few large weapons.

Agreed.

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And from a few pages ago about Morgenes asking if we like the idea of inven story mode: Please don't make that change. Even if it's jarring to some, the playability wins out, imo, just like with equipment lists.

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Overall though, great change. You guys have really been on a roll lately.

[Cale_Knight]

As a side note, I'd rather have something that differentiates itself from Magickering and the normal, loaded down state.

OR I'll start to thinking something like magick is just some Pc loaded down.

The little girl is here, blowing her nose.
-She is hovering above the ground.


The nightmare is here, resting.
:She has a few large weapons.

I don't think I've seen a single bulky description that could be even remotely confused for magic.

[Delirium]

It's the '-' before the description of what they're carrying, CK.  We're used to associating it with magickal effects.

I nearly had a heart attack the first time I saw that mul on Caravan Way.

[Cenghiz]

Same here.. Maybe it becomes '+'? Anything else? I was about to run away from a mul slave when I first saw the change.

[Cale_Knight]

Like all code changes which are difficult to come to terms with at first, they quickly become second-nature and commonplace.

Right now, the dash simply means "something noticeable about the person."

If we start adding different characters for different things, it's going to become way more confusing in the long run.

[Delirium]

I agree.

I'd still like to see the 'bulky item' message appended to a code-generated ldesc instead.

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The tall, thin elf is here, carrying an immense obsidian table.

[Marauder Moe]

The '-' used to mean "you notice something magickal".  Now it means "you notice something magickal" OR "they're carrying something big".  The problem is, one of these things should cause most characters to react with alarm while the other is commonplace.

I think that this newly added ambiguity is more confusing than simply adding an new character marker.

[The7DeadlyVenomz]

I've been thinking ... using the & sign would do nicely, I think.

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The large man lurks in the corner with a pipe in his mouth,
& he is carrying the body of a blue-eyed man.

[Delirium]

In that case, why not just append..

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The large man lurks in the corner with a pipe in his mouth, and he is carrying the body of the blue-eyed man.

That would allow you to change your ldesc, while retaining the ability to immediately notice a bulky item.

My main beef is the same as it's been throughout this thread - the dash feels too out of place.  

I'll get used to it, but it doesn't mean I have to like it.

<shakes her fist defiantly>

[Cale_Knight]

I think that this newly added ambiguity is more confusing than simply adding an new character marker.

Meh. It's not ambiguous at all. You just need to react to the text rather than the dash.

[Morgenes]

I'd still like to see the 'bulky item' message appended to a code-generated ldesc instead.

The main reason this wasn't done is people can carry more than one bulky item, possibly several.  We didn't want to wrap the screen with:

The uber twink is skulking here, carrying a few heavy baobob chairs, a statue of a woman, a large chest, a full backpack, a few heavy iron balls, and a partridge in a pear tree.

Instead we scroll the screen vertically