Googly-eyed people

[Barzalene]

i used to be really really careful about not looking at people unless my pc had a reason to check them out. Lately, not so much.  I mean I could adjust my behavior to preserve your rp experience taking into account that you (you being the general you, not to op) have a thing about being looked at and not look. But I find that I'm doing so at the expense of my own rp experience. You miss a lot not looking at people. I'm not memorizing your ldescs. I'm just taking in the main stuff.

So, I can adjust my behavior and not know if I'm standing next to a six eyed four eared mutant with a cleaver, or you (general you again) can get past it and stop imagining that I've climbed up on your feet to stare into your eyes.

[jhunter]

Ever since I failed to notice someone was walking around naked in a public place simply because I didn't look at them I've become a looking fool. There are things that you would -certainly- notice about others around you that you can only find out with the look command so that you can respond appropriately.

"look", used responsibly, is your friend.

People have had a habit of reacting negatively to being looked at. When you find yourself starting to do this remember something...the echo does -not- say: "So and so STARES at you." People look at each other in RL all the time, get over it.

[LauraMars]

Maybe what the person is wearing "around body" if anything, could be added to assess too.

They are older, fatter, and taller than you.
They are armed.
A red super-clan superman cape is worn about their body.

Maybe worthless clutter, maybe it could help a person out.  I'm just throwing down.  Ideas.  

If not, let's add a 'naked' descriptor to assess!

[marko]

There's really nothing wrong with looking at people or npcs.  

Does look imply staring?  No, it means that someone is looking in your direction and taking in some of the details.  For a real life understanding of "looking" at someone - while walking down the street you are approaching someone and well you see them.  You take in their general appearance, what they are wearing, and what they are doing.  

Does that mean you are staring at them?  No.  It just means you've noticed them on the street.  When you pass one another you may continue to look, smile, and say, "hello" or you might avert your gaze and move on quietly - the choice is yours.  But, you have already looked and taken in the broad strokes of what the person looks like.

Hoods don't grant anonymity - although I would love to see code that begins to scramble someone's description based on "concealing" objects (hood, masks, etc) that they are wearing.

If you really don't want people to be noticing your character at all then hide.  

[spawnloser]

Winged one, you have to learn to have some amount of trust in your fellow players.  The staff does.  That is all I will say.

[Anonymous]

Trust is earned, and you've earned shit.

I find the 'look' command simply jarring. I can easily look at someone, even stare, without them noticing it in real life. Well... why the fuck can I -not- do that on Zalanthas. It should be added to one of the commands that  'watch' picks up, not something that's obvious instantaneously.

Semper Pax,

Dirr

[LoD]

Trust is earned, and you've earned shit.

While I don't have the elegant tongue of my peers, I do agree that the "look" command is most often used as an OOC tool for we (the player) to view the other characters in the game so we can help make decisions on how to interpret what we might hear, smell, feel, or see.

We may not have our character react to your presence at all, deciding that you aren't visible to them, or not interesting enough to remember out of a small crowd.  Proximity in the game is a touchy subject, and while my character might not be able to glean personal details of your hooded character across the street, I might catch an angle if we were passing on the road side-by-side, or moved through a doorway at the same time.

Trying to code each of those particular situations simply to cater to the needs of a few distrusting players seems unnecessary.  The sneak and hide command are available for those people who would be truly adept at keeping out of sight, but I think most folks should just calm down when people "look" at their character and go about life as usual.

I enjoy look echoes because it tells me who is paying attention to my character, and I've not had near the amount of trouble others seem to have had when "every single person" looks at them.

-LoD

[EonBlueApocalypse]

After reading this, I feel more comfortable using look in the means that we have it, now.  Its impossible to roleplay (err, do it right, rather) without absorbing your environment, in whatever forms it takes.  I would still love look to be altered, but as long as its understood as an OOC tool, I won't mind using it so often at all.

[Medena]

It not a big deal when only one or two PCs do it. But it gets annoying when every single PC your character happens upon does it.

You've got to share your secret! Hardly anyone ever looks at my PC and she has on a brand new outfit to show off, too.

[Cegar]

Are you seriously complaining about people looking at you? What the hell do you think people do? Stare at the ground when they walk along?

[Gimfalisette]

Whether my character is looked at depends on the familiarity of other characters with mine; going into that same old tavern and seeing the same old faces, there's little to no look spam.

If there are new characters around, I expect to get look spammed. No biggie. Let them look, because indeed they may need to glean important info about my character.

Then there are other characters who use look a lot, even though they are quite familiar with my character. In those situations, I will sometimes RP that as, "What are you looking at?" in a friendly or curious way. "Do I have something on my nose?" Look can be an RP tool too, is what I'm saying--it's not always just OOC. Between familiar characters, it can actually be quite an intimate thing. (No, I didn't mean sexual, I meant intimate.)

Also, my character may have changed clothes. And I'm not always greatly adept at indicating this. (Point to work on.) So it's cool for other characters to look so they can find out if my character is currently in armor, or is dressed for a tea party.

Or if I'm hooded where I shouldn't be--I expect to get looked at. Those who stick out will draw more attention to themselves, rightly so.

I myself try not to always look at a new/unfamiliar character right away. And when I do look, I try to incorporate it into RP somehow. ("look newb (as ^me gaze passes over the room)") and when my character actually has a reason to look. Probably I shouldn't always be so hesitant about looking and should just go ahead and do it, because look gives a ton of important info, potentially.

[Angela Christine]

You have to look at a character to find out if they are worth looking at.  Isn't it ironic?


I ignore a single look per person, per day.  That is just part of a normal day.  Tagging on an emote to indicate that is just a glance is unnecessary, I assume that a single look is merely the normal glance that you give everyone in a crowd as you move through.  Looking is normal, most emotes would be invisible if people really avoided looking at eachother.  How can they see that I am smiling and nodding like a bobble head if they never look at me?  

If a person looks at me repeatedly in a single scene, then I assume that they are watching me or staring.  Perhaps I have spinach in my teeth, or they are trying to get my attention.

[Rhyden]

When I'm walking down a city street, I'll usually look at most people, it's a common habbit people have. No difference in Armageddon except it's a little more obvious most of the time.

Tuff.

[LoD]

I ignore a single look per person, per day.  That is just part of a normal day.  Tagging on an emote to indicate that is just a glance is unnecessary, I assume that a single look is merely the normal glance that you give everyone in a crowd as you move through.

I try to exercise a difference between an OOC look and an IC glance.  If someone tags on an emote, it's telling me that the character is actually taking notice of me.  If I just see the look command, then I'll more readily lump them into the "OOC glance" category.  I know that I'll actually use an emote with look if my character could be seen physically looking at them.

The tall, dusty half-elf has arrived from above.

>look elf with a passing glance

As compared to:

>north
The tall, red-bearded templar is standing here.
The human soldier is standing here.
The human soldier is standing here.
The hunnched, one-eyed templar is standing here.
The human soldier is standing here.
The human soldier is standing here.
The corpse of the unfortunate, poor soul is here.

>look templar

>look 2.templar

My character isn't standing there gawking at the two templars, I'm just trying to assess the situation dependant upon the scene before me.  Are the templars armed, hurt, holding an eyeball, black robes, red robes, blue robes, glowing, humming, sparkling?

I'm not saying that's the way everyone should approach it, but that's how I generally approach the difference between OOC and IC looks.

-LoD

[The7DeadlyVenomz]

I have no problem with the look echo. It disturbs me not at all. If someone looks at me and my character should notice, then they do, and if not, then they don't.

I don't believe there's anything such as an OOC look.

[Forty Winks]

Hmm. While look as it is currently is fine IMO, I would still like to see an option to players to glance people over, and see just the equipment. It won't be a coded decision by the person being looked at, but rather a decision on the part of the looker to only see what his/her character would notice, the visible garments, without looking in detail at the underlying physical traits.

This would be different from peek, as it seems some people implied would be the same, since it wouldn't show the inventory of the person. Peek is used for a more specific visual reason.

As it is an option, players could still use look as much as they like, but in situations where the player might think his/her character would only glance a person over, the brief look-over might be better there.

I guess a similar RP tool such as assess (assess verbose), in terms of game-related, it would allow players to selectively choose what they are focusing upon, without having to filter through things their character would or would not notice.

Personally, even just glancing over a person's ldesc, I can retain alot of what I glance over, to be able to pick that person out in the future with look, without intentionally marking that person as someone I have met. I would like the option to choose how much information I as the player recieve.

[edited to add] This is coming from the perspective from the looker...so I guess abit off-topic. In any case, there's no need to be negative about a player's views. There's some unneccesary flaming of this OP's view that should stick to OOC if anything.

[bloodfromstone]

I honestly think people should chill about this sort of thing. These discussions have cropped up a few times, but I'll go ahead and say my piece on this one, too.

NPCs are static. They do not move, nor interact in any meaningful way, unless imm animated. I will not look up at the barkeep every time I walk into the bar because I already know his/her deal.
Personally, I want to picture the scene, focusing on the important players (that's our characters, btw). If a red-haired woman PC walks through the crowds, then it is a part of the scene. Yes, she's milling through a bunch of faceless, nameless vNPCs, but I don't care about them. They're the background. Thing of it as cinematic. The camera shifts to her, pans after her a bit. She tosses her hair over her shoulder and then vanishes. Does my PC sitting at the bar REALLY take note of her? Probably not. But I, as a view, see her. If she becomes a major player in my PC's story later, I can say "I remember her from earlier!"

The 'look' echo is an OOC construct, imo. If it IS important and prominent, your fellow players will add on an emote to it. Generally, I do something like this:

l woman (as he takes a brief glance over his shoulder, skimming the crowds)

The bolded text is my way of saying "I am looking at a bunch of vNPCs, NPCs, AND you.

If I'm honing in on you for whatever reason, it will be more like this:

l woman (with a scan of the crowds, eyes landing squarely on !woman)

I would try not to worry about it too much. Most everyone knows that vNPCs are there, and most everyone RPs it properly. We just also want to know what you look like so we can picture it properly.

[Malifaxis]

I'm frankly flabberghasted that there is someone who has a complaint about the fucking look command.

I have no other comment on this subject.

[Forty Winks]

Regarding bloodfromstone's post:

While a player might be using look in different 'levels', he would still recieve the same amount of information. And in either case of the examples, there were two kinds of looks, the once-over, looking at the visible, clearly-seen stuff, and the detailed look. If a character wanted to inspect someone's face to recognize the person, he'd use look. If the character was interested in what the person was wearing, he'd use glance, or some similar feature, without having to pick through the mdesc.

In instances with cloaked figures, looking at someone would be closely inspecting the figure, while glancing would be noting the visible garments and accessories.

While fighting, glancing to see if the opponent is wielding a Steel Weapon of Doom would use the brief look, without having the spam of the mdesc  to clutter the already hectic screen up.

These are just instances I would use the seperate features in, if ever possible. There would still be the option for people to LOOK at everyone, and pick out themselves whether they notice someone's hair color or not.

[bloodfromstone]

Well, I certainly have no objective to a command that seperates out what information you can obtain, so long as we still have the standard 'look'. More options = more better, as far as I'm concerned. But even if my char is glancing over PC as a random face in the crowd, -I- want to know what they look like and how to visualize them. So even if there was a 'glance' command of some sort, I would still flat out look at every PC I came across.

[Anonymous]

So even if there was a 'glance' command of some sort, I would still flat out look at every PC I came across.

Including the hooded ones that happen to be passing you on the street? If so, how do you justify doing so, given that many of the features are hidden to all but he who goes out of his way to get in front and close to that person?

Also, people have stressed that they should be able to notice prominent features such as someone wearing a particular cloak or waving a gruesome head around. This seems reasonable, but at the same time someone who is walking about without hood up receives a lot fewer looks than someone who has the hood up, even though they are both candidates for waving a gruesome head around.

I'd like to see characters be able to indicate prominent features so they stand out the way heavy objects stand out in inventories. Something like 'show es on' leading to people just looking at the room seeing:

>l
This is a generic room. It has no distinguishing features whatever.

The cowled figure stands here. Don't you hate her hood?
-- She is carrying an amphora.
-- She is holding a gruesome dwarf head!
>

That way they can be noticed instantly, as one would expect to be the case.

Another point: the argument to trust others' roleplay doesn't carry much weight when so often new ideas are smacked down by the argument that they're too open to abuse.

[Quirk]

A small bone to pick, LoD...

I enjoy look echoes because it tells me who is paying attention to my character

You earlier said:

We may not have our character react to your presence at all, deciding that you aren't visible to them, or not interesting enough to remember out of a small crowd.

We have a clear problem here. To the person being looked at, look shows that attention is being paid to his character (and I'm not disputing that, I treat look the same way). However, to the person looking, it's an OOC tool to decide whether or not they're going to pay any attention to the character or not.

If I step onto a bus full of people, I can pick out the guy dressed in bright red with one scan across the seats. In an equivalent situation on Arm, I have to look at twenty people individually - and echo to all of them with every look - before I can say who's wearing bright red. If all of them think I'm paying special attention to them, then we have the distinction between (from my perspective) walking up the bus aisle without paying particular attention to anyone and (from their perspective) staring at each of them with enough intensity I'll be able to remember their faces later.

and I've not had near the amount of trouble others seem to have had when "every single person" looks at them.

Try putting your hood up when walking the city streets with sand blowing heavily. It seems unlikely that this is unusual from a VNPC perspective, and I'd expect the streets to be full of hooded figures hurrying from one place to another. However, if you're not speed-walking, plenty of people will stop to take a look - and many of them are not looking just because you might be carrying something memorable they should react to, because they don't do this as frequently when they can see your sdesc, but to satisfy OOC curiosity as to who it is they've passed. This becomes even more noticeable if someone steps into a bar and takes their hood down - in that short space after coming through the door, most of the bar seems to decide it has a right to know the mdesc and jewellery of the hooded person in their peripheral vision, despite all the information their characters are likely to notice - comparative height, weight, race, most visible item of clothing and whether or not they're armed or naked - being accessible without look.

People just don't look at hooded people realistically. If someone loiters round a tavern with their hood up, sure, take a gander, but the number of hooded VNPCs coming through the door out of the screaming sands and unhooding and cleaning themselves off is likely to be large. And the only reason to look at someone you pass on the street is to take in their most obvious, salient features - which you already have, passing a hooded person.

Ideally, we'd have commands that gave us more control over seeing what people wore around their bodies, or failing that, on their torso, so you could see them with the hood down, and, even better:

Code Select Expand

look room red
The mangy-bearded half-giant is wearing a red, hooded cloak.
The one-legged, one-armed elf is wearing a bright red shirt.

look room kurac // catches clan-specific items in certain wear locations
The spindly, noseless woman is wearing a dun-colored hooded cloak.

look room clanned
The spindly, noseless woman is wearing a dun-colored hooded cloak.
The sturdy, bearded man is wearing a black cloak with a jade cross.

Extend that to hats, armbands, and maybe magicker gems, and we'd have a great resource for being aware of our surroundings without studying every PC and NPC in our presence intently.

[LoD]

A small bone to pick, LoD...

I enjoy look echoes because it tells me who is paying attention to my character

You earlier said:

We may not have our character react to your presence at all, deciding that you aren't visible to them, or not interesting enough to remember out of a small crowd.

We have a clear problem here. To the person being looked at, look shows that attention is being paid to his character (and I'm not disputing that, I treat look the same way). However, to the person looking, it's an OOC tool to decide whether or not they're going to pay any attention to the character or not.

I also said:

I try to exercise a difference between an OOC look and an IC glance.  If someone tags on an emote, it's telling me that the character is actually taking notice of me.  If I just see the look command, then I'll more readily lump them into the "OOC glance" category.  I know that I'll actually use an emote with look if my character could be seen physically looking at them.

...and many of them are not looking just because you might be carrying something memorable they should react to, because they don't do this as frequently when they can see your sdesc, but to satisfy OOC curiosity as to who it is they've passed. This becomes even more noticeable if someone steps into a bar and takes their hood down - in that short space after coming through the door, most of the bar seems to decide it has a right to know the mdesc and jewellery of the hooded person in their peripheral vision...

At least, that's what you assume "most of the bar" seems to decide rather than looking as the player and working those perceptions into the actions of their character.  I agree with you that it's not a perfect system and that some people find it jarring.  I guess that I've just gotten used to it over the many years it's been this way and adapted to the situation.  I've played thieves and sneaky types that don't want to be known just fine without people identifying my character.  Know why?  Because I don't act suspicious by walking around with my hood up or, if so, I don't draw attention to myself when I'm going to do something "sneaky".

I understand other people have an issue with this, and that's fine.  I'm certainly not against a better developed system of viewing character information, but I'm also an optimist and like to give people the benefit of the doubt regardless of the times I've been burned.  That's just who I am.

-LoD

[The7DeadlyVenomz]

Code Select Expand

look room red
The mangy-bearded half-giant is wearing a red, hooded cloak.
The one-legged, one-armed elf is wearing a bright red shirt.

look room kurac // catches clan-specific items in certain wear locations
The spindly, noseless woman is wearing a dun-colored hooded cloak.

look room clanned
The spindly, noseless woman is wearing a dun-colored hooded cloak.
The sturdy, bearded man is wearing a black cloak with a jade cross.

Extend that to hats, armbands, and maybe magicker gems, and we'd have a great resource for being aware of our surroundings without studying every PC and NPC in our presence intently.

Now that, I could dig.

[bloodfromstone]

Including the hooded ones that happen to be passing you on the street? If so, how do you justify doing so, given that many of the features are hidden to all but he who goes out of his way to get in front and close to that person?

You're only reading part of my post, from the sounds of things. As I said, I do this for MY (not my PC's) benefit and personal visualization of the scene. It is entirely possible that I will look at you, hooded and undistinguished, on the street, read every line of your desc, visualize your character, and have my PC react to absolutely none of it. He glanced over the random figure on the road and kept walking. He wouldn't recognize you later. He wouldn't give you a second thought. But I, as a viewer, see you. I do not think this needs to be justified.

EDIT: to add....

I do not understand what the problem is with being looked at. Personally, I like people to look at my PC, read my desc, look at my shiny and characteristic items and take a moment to soak it all in. I would prefer not to have everyone just sort of imagining everyone else as random congloberations of sapphire eyes, ponytails, slenderness, and eyepatches because all they read is each other's sdesc.

If your character doesn't have anything to hide, then appreciate the fact that people are looking at you and, hopefully, visualizing your character.

If your character DOES have something to hide, then, well, being looked at and noticed is part of going into places where people are. Hide, sneak, stay out of public eye, or whatever, if it's for IC reasons. If it's for OOC reasons, I say forget it, chill a bit, gag the lines on your mud client if they really drive you batshit, but don't encourage people not to imagine their surroundings. That, in my opinion, is what limiting and avoiding the look command would accomplish.