Playing Multiple Characters

[RogueGunslinger]

I was reading across another RPI mud's FAQ and noticed this:

Can I have more than one character?

Yes, please do. We invite you to create as many personalities as you would like so that you can experience and enjoy all aspects of [other RPI's name redacted].

It made me wonder... Why not allow players with sufficient karma to play more than one character at a time? Obviously there would be a limit to having multiple characters, I think 2 at once is enough. In any case I don't believe it would be that hard to play multiple characters realistically, without letting them interact in any way, and might allow for someone who isn't enjoying their role to step out for a moment, and into another.

Discuss.

[AmandaGreathouse]

I would really enjoy this.

I get bored/fed up/frustrated with some of the things that happen once the PC I love the concept of so much steps from VNPC land into the land of dynamic change also known as being a PC.

I think my characters would tend to live longer because I wouldn't become so frustrated that the concept I loved so much turned out to be a hermit and I WANT some RP, or that my originally cheery bard who's become depressed since 20 people they know have died in a month is depressed.

[Malken]

No.

[Rhyden]

No.

As much as I want to play a 2nd character sometimes, there's just too much room for abuse.

[mattrious]

No.

[number13]

Why not?  In a limited fashion, like the old gladiator system.

[Kalai]

Aside from abuse, there are far too many situations in which it would make much too much sense for 2 of your characters to interact. Unless you're strictly citybound in different cities, which seems to rather narrow your concepts.

So yeah, it'd need limits if at all.

[Sinna]

We used to be able to do this long ago.
It was horribly abused.

It's bad enough now how much IC info gets sent around OOC channels, but with two characters (or more) it would be that much worse.

I'm even thankful that there is a bit of delay during application to prevent some folks from rushing out with their new character and snagging all their old character's gear (some of which would also happen in the 2 character days - I remember some player admitting it).

Got a successful merchant?  Want to start that Sorc off with an advantage - drop off 10k coins and gear, log in with new character, pick it up - done.  

[Little_Cacophony]

I would like the idea more if the two or more PCs do not exist in the same time frame.

Such as, in order to soft store your pc to play another pc, you need to have at least 10000 playing days, and you can only return to your old pc after 1 irl month has past or the pc dies. Or some limitation.

It would be welcome to some people who have long lived pcs.

[IAmJacksOpinion]

I'm gonna go with a no...

As it was said, it's too abusable. And honestly, this type of thing has gone on in Arm, hence this post.

I've played an RPI before that allowed for this kind of thing. (Don't remember which one, honestly.) They limited it so that you could only switch characters once every RL day or week or something.

It would be welcome to some people who have long lived pcs.

Yeah, sounds awesome. I join up clan X because it's got a solid, long-lived, well-connected leader.... only to find out that he's not around because he's running around mudsexxing on another account.  Sometimes OOC boredom is a good motivator to start a plotline, or a series of fun/interesting events.

Why not?  In a limited fashion, like the old gladiator system.

This I would like to see more of. Slaves, clan muls, and gladiators have been ridiculed for being notoriously boring/ unrewarding for the PC involved to the point that they were shut down. It's always been unfortunate (in my mind) that the Allanaki arena sits empty 99% of the time, until some dumb elf / northerner shoots his mouth off to a templar. In a city like Allanak, I personally envision the arena being used for idle entertainment and execution on a near daily basis. (Even if the gladiators just spar in it, and don't actually kill anything that day.)

I think more gladiators would be a practical solution for both: A) a currently lame arena situation, and B) Bored long-lived peoplez.

I think it would be easier to stay locked in long-lived roles if every week or so you got to swagger into the sands with your gladiator (Thropper the Skull-Cropper) and have a little fun maiming shit, and putting on a show. Personally, I can hardly stand to play a fully social role for more than a month, before I get bored and start taking risks for fun. (Which is sad, because I do enjoy them from time to time, but at the end of the day I'm here to play a game, not chit-chat. I got AIM for that.)

[RogueGunslinger]

It would be welcome to some people who have long lived pcs.

Yeah, sounds awesome. I join up clan X because it's got a solid, long-lived, well-connected leader.... only to find out that he's not around because he's running around mudsexxing on another account.  Sometimes OOC boredom is a good motivator to start a plotline, or a series of fun/interesting events.

Seriously? I'd rather him/her still be playing the game then simply not logging in because they're bored.

[IAmJacksOpinion]

Quote from: IAmJacksOpinion on Today at 03:12:05 PM


Quote
It would be welcome to some people who have long lived pcs.
Yeah, sounds awesome. I join up clan X because it's got a solid, long-lived, well-connected leader.... only to find out that he's not around because he's running around mudsexxing on another account.  Sometimes OOC boredom is a good motivator to start a plotline, or a series of fun/interesting events.

Seriously? I'd rather him/her still be playing the game then simply not logging in because they're bored.

His choices are:
A) Not play Armageddon, because he's stuck in a role he's no longer having fun with, and go do other non-Arm things.
OR
B) Chose between his boring old character, or his exciting new character.

Honestly, I think old Sargeant Who-ever is gonna get about the same amount of play time either way. (Which is to say, very little at all.)

Why log on at peak and be bored, when you can log on at peak and work on the advancement of a fresh, exciting character??

---- -

I would hate to see this simply because there are people who play this game and do nothing BUT socially network. - Build connections, make friends, fuck people in power. I'm really less worried about someone who has a 20 day Byn Warrior, and a 20 day maxed Skullfuck Elementalist, than I am about someone who is a Templar's Aide in the South, and everyone's favorite piece of ass up in Tuluk. --Nothing would escape you, and many things would come up.

-One PC might be entrusted with details about an assassination plot against their other PC
-One PC might be close friends with Malik and know his ins and outs, strengths and weaknesses, while the other is Malik's sworn enemy.
-One Lirathan PC might secretly know Sargeant Joe is really a Nilazi from their days spent in Undertuluk with their assassin PC.

Info overlap, and interaction is inevitable. Making decisions, or showing mercy based on forces of OOC persuasion is inevitable no matter how good the player, or how closely the staff regulation.

Two accounts - NO
Limited and regulated gladiator accounts - FUCK YES.

[Pantoufle]

It would be nice to hear an argument against allowing multiple characters besides "it can be abused". I can abuse the cooking skill too for that matter.

The only argument I can think of is that it might risk diluting the population of the playerbase further. But then again, it might not.

[RogueGunslinger]

The problem iamjacksopinion. Is that with your option the player is bored and not playing no matter what. With mine at least he's playing someone else to interact with. As it stands your argument is "If people play more characters we'd see less long lived characters"

But he's already not playing and around because he's bored of his role, so i'd rather interact with a fresh new character than interact with no character at all.

[RogueGunslinger]

And.. with a limit on how often you can switch between players I'm thinking abuse would be pretty limited. And met with obvious swift and brutal punishment when found.

[Synthesis]

It would be nice to hear an argument against allowing multiple characters besides "it can be abused". I can abuse the cooking skill too for that matter.

The only argument I can think of is that it might risk diluting the population of the playerbase further. But then again, it might not.

There's a huge difference between say, spam-crafting a thousand steaks and using one character to figure out the secret plot to ambush the 'nakki gemmers on their top secret mission, and using your 'nakki gemmer to thwart said ambush.

[RogueGunslinger]

I think his point though, was that 'it can be abused' is an obscure blanket statement used by people who want to be negative, but can only manage to repeat what five people already said.

Wait... Wait no. That's my point.


In any case, I think it's the idea that plotlines could to easily be ruined by people unable to control themselves; Such that limitations on keeping you character in the same city, ability to log back and forth between the characters too easilly , and other such things would become too much of a hassle for the staff to put in . On top of that, now keeping track of if the characters interactions would probably incite a good deal more scrutiny than the staff probably should be bothered with. Also, it would foster people to be more paranoid when things do go wrong with their plotlines, people would blame the ability to make multiple characters because of the nature of it. Not to mention the nature of the people on these forums to see and assume the absolute worst in/about each other. (yeah, you guys totally do this)

All in all it's a lot of work for something that could be avoided by just storing with a request to un-store later.


There's a frackin' argument, guys. Try harder next time, please.

[Synthesis]

When someone says, "It can be abused," it generally means "it can be abused in a way that would seriously detract from the quality of the game."

Thus, when someone says "Oh, I can abuse dropdescs, so 'it can be abused' is not a valid argument," they are committing a fallacy of equivocation, or the dreaded "straw man...." I.e. they're attempting to refute a position that probably nobody is committed to.

The implied position is "I don't believe any code should be implemented that can be used in any other way than that for which it was intended."  This is the strict interpretation of: "if x can be abused, then x should not be implemented."  Of course, nobody is holding this position.

"It can be abused" is merely short-hand.  Is it a little lazy? Yes.  But this is a post on the internet, not a thesis.

[Jdr]

I approve of this. This way you might have more special apps sticking around. I think if they go play something else, they'll be able to come back to their special role with a refreshed aplomb.

[Akaramu]

It could create difficult situations even for players who don't mean to abuse it. What if character A was paid for an assassination contract on character B? Or if the two characters had to communicate IC to solve some sort of political issue? They would never even be online at the same time.

I would totally support strictly limited arena gladiator roles as secondary characters, though.

[Cutthroat]

My concern with playing multiple characters is that clashing plots will be inevitable. Eventually, someone with two characters will experience a point where character 1 can benefit from 2's detriment, or character 1 can benefit from 2's information. Don't think of this as "abuse" so much as a consequence of what happens when a player (not a PC) knows something. I think that if we were allowed to have two characters, I would like to see it best implemented as this:

Character 1 is the player's Main character. This is the kind of character we have now for the most part.

Character 2 is strictly
- A gladiator, perpetually stuck in the Arena and training areas.
- An animal, perhaps. You wouldn't get a unique desc (as in, if you want to be a gortok, you have to pick a gortok NPC's description).
And there would be a limit to how many of these you can make, by nature of the fact that accounts can't have 2 characters unless they're set up that way, so each app would be special (but not necessarily a special application).

And both characters can never possibly be in contact with the other. If Character 1 is one of those travels-around-the-world types... they might not have a Character 2. If Character 1 is bound to Allanak for some reason, they can't play a scrab, but they could play a tregil. If you screw up and take your scrab on a trip to the Grey Forest... no more Character 2 for you. Abuse is easily fixed.

[Qzzrbl]

Even animal characters could be abused....

Say you're big bad scrab, and you're scuttling around.... You happen to find Spicy McAsshole out in the wastes, that guy who always hassles your main character at the Gaj....

Oh my! He's injured too....

You see where I'm going.... And that's just an example of things that could happen. Sure, you could say it probably would have happened even if the scrab were an NPC, but you know what I'm getting at.

What would be the point of playing an animal anyhow? Other than trying to kill other PC's that is?

[Malken]

Also, the problem with Armageddon is that it is way too small to say that we could only allow people to play another character in a different 'zone'.

It would become a nightmare for Staff to monitor who plays where and make sure that they truly stick to that zone.

I could see something like this working on a RPI mud like Shadows of Isildur where you have very defined areas of play, like, say, Mordor and Minas Tirith, and you can be assured that 99% of the time, no one from Mordor would end up in MT and vice versa, but like I said, you can't count on these type of boundaries with Armageddon, where cities are only a few minutes apart.

Otherwise, let's say you play an assassin, and you have a mate, and only your mate knows what you do.. Then your mate's player also plays another character, and you end up with a contract on her head.. Oops?

So your plan is to seduce that character and lead her to a private area.. But that character knows that your character is an assassin.. Bah, I won't even go further with that example, you can easily see how much of a huge mess it would create in the end!

[Qzzrbl]

I could dig gladiator roles though.

[Delstro]

Abuse far out weighs the potential for benefit.

Abuse as a blanket statement? Maybe, but... If this happens once, it could directly affect 10+ pcs. If you abuse the cooking skill, it only affects you.

I am supportive of the gladiator as a second role though. The gladiators have always been neccessary to reinforce the true Allanaki spirit.

[jhunter]

Two pcs per account I don't think will work. Too much OOC knowledge of different characters will bleed through even if unintended.

Alternate "gladiator" pcs I would love. You log in, restricted to the slave pens and the arena and once a RL week games are held that you can participate if you are able to log into your gladiator and play during those times.

[Sinna]

They used to do this - I wonder what happened?
PS: I remember back in the day I totally abused my gladiator PC - but I was young and childish back then!

[Salt Merchant]

No thanks.

I was around back when this was permitted and it was no good, except that you could have a character in reserve to play with during a time when character applications could takes weeks.

Even for those who tried to play responsibly:

It made you be less attached to (and therefore involved with) a given character.
It gave too much knowledge of what was going on in the world, ripping away some of the important veil of mystery.
It made individual characters appear less consistently (one day you play one, the next day another).

[musashi]

I vote no. For reasons already expressed by other folk.

[IAmJacksOpinion]

First off, I'm sorry that a combined 545 words in 2 long posts came across as a 'blanket statement.' I hear hooked on phonics is good for that sort of thing.

Starting a thread campaigning for something you knew wasn't going to happen - ever - and then turning on yourself with a very concise argument.... I really don't fucking get you man, but to each their own.

Anyways,

I would like to hear some kind of explanation as to why the gladiator thing had been taken out. I don't envision even the gladiator account getting added except on special occasions (like last year when they called for 5 or 6 glads), but I'm kinda curious.

[stark]

I'm against it, totally.
I think the more interesting thing is that so many people talk about being bored with their characters. Chances are, someone is bored with your character just as much as you are, so why not work something out with the admin for a spectacular death or something? Why make a noble/agent/templar/whatever and then not bother being around to interact with people? You don't need to make a new character if you get bored or want to do something else, you don't need to suicide, you can just try to involve some other people in your death and end it all, and then move on. Seriously people. It's no fun trying to work with someone who is so bored of their character they can't bother showing up thereby limiting other peoples' play. 

[Jdr]

I'd love to see plots shaped by people who are easily bored and seek a fantastic death within the higher echelons, where they're supposed to be movers-and-shakers.

Better that the bored individual just takes a break and comes back refreshed then having some newcomer show up to the clan every month or two.

[RogueGunslinger]

sent in pm

[ianmartin]

Let's give Karma players unlimited coins, defilers and 100 day old warrior skills, ALL in one character.

[EvilRoeSlade]

With my current character, I just learned that my last character's mudsex partner was a [defiler/demon/templar/spy].  Now imagine if I were playing both of these characters simultaneously.  Let's not go here.

[Kryos]

I already want to choke players who take minutes to respond from playing multiple games at once, multiple characters in the same?  No.

[deviant storm]

More than one character? No thanks. I barely have time for the character I have now, and it's just the one. I couldn't imagine immersing myself well with two characters. Too much worry about whether I'm giving the first enough time as I play the second, what about the people depending on me to rp with, etc, ect.

[solera]

I already want to choke players who take minutes to respond from playing multiple games at once, multiple characters in the same?  No.

How do you know?

[RogueGunslinger]

What makes you think they could ever play them both at the same time?

[brytta.leofa]

Multiplaying would benefit the game in some cases.  We have lots of outstanding players, and surely all of us get burned out with a long-running character from time to time.

But the potential for abuse (even unintentional) is so extreme that it probably ain't worth it.

[Bogre]

Plan for gladiator PC's:

Allow people to apply for them who have mostly sedentary PC's, in the opposite city state. So northern players could apply for southern gladiators and vice versa. I imagine you might be able to work in travelers or tribals as well.

To stop the problem of playing only the gladiator PC, only allow them to be played during set up RPT's or specific trainings, etc. You could give slight skill boosts each fight the gladiator wins or participates in, thus eliminating the need for people to constantly train their gladiator.

[Agent_137]

I often experience the long-lived char burnout. I never wanted to play two characters at once, but i'd love to have a way to send my current character on a long ass sabbatical. Pick him back up when my next character dies.

I mean, I do this anyway, but instead of playing arma as another char, I just don't play at all for 6 months. And I constantly wrestle with retiring my character to pursue my latest greatest idea.

[Cavaticus]

I feel like I'm stalking you on the forums, Agent.

You can always bring up the possibility, with your staff, of storing your current character with the option of coming back at a later date. We don't do this often, but the possibility exists - especially if you have a compelling reason for it.

[Agent_137]

Good point Cavaticus. I'll give it a try.

unhitch all

[jmordetsky]

No.

As much as I want to play a 2nd character sometimes, there's just too much room for abuse.

+1

I often experience the long-lived char burnout. I never wanted to play two characters at once, but i'd love to have a way to send my current character on a long ass sabbatical. Pick him back up when my next character dies.

I mean, I do this anyway, but instead of playing arma as another char, I just don't play at all for 6 months. And I constantly wrestle with retiring my character to pursue my latest greatest idea.

+1

[Lithium]

Alternate "gladiator" pcs I would love. You log in, restricted to the slave pens and the arena and once a RL week games are held that you can participate if you are able to log into your gladiator and play during those times.

I wouldn't mind this, or anything encouraging use of the arena. A script to set npc gladiators spawning at random times to battle each other would be wicked, but if there were pc gladiators, they would have to be stuck in the arena.

[janeshephard]

A gladiator role or a throwaway NPC roll you can jump into every now and then would be fun.

Sure make it karma restricted to avoid abuse.

[jmordetsky]

My throw away pc is 30 days old. *shrug*

Gladiators hmm maybe.

[Saellyn]

I once had a..

No I didn't. Anyways, if you allow people to play multiple characters, players can and -will- abuse it. It's a fact of MUDding that when a player has a chance to spawn with fresh cash - let's say he spawns with a merchant and drops that starting coin on his warrior, eh? That guy's going to be loaded. Let's say that warrior is also an amazing grebber of whatever. He just got a major boost to his income, which completely screws everything up for everybody else out there.

It's not fair. If I'm player A, and Other Player A wants to kill me, but his Player B is friends with my char, what are the chances that he's going to use Player B to kill me? Probably pretty good. And I'm going to be left sitting here going 'Wow... so he was never my friend after all!' not realizing that that was his Player B that just ganked me.

See where I'm going? It's a system that allows for abuse on many levels, not just sharing plotlines and learning plotlines. People are going to DIE if this gets implemented.

[Agent_137]

saellyn, and everyone else who said basically the same thing:
the thread has moved on. No one is suggesting unrestricted and unmitigated multi-play. It will not ever happen due to the reasons you describe.

What has happened before are gladiators. What i think would be helpful would be non-permanent retirements. Both would increase administrative workload, but be useful to the playerbase. What do you think of those options?

[Akaramu]

Two thumbs up on non-permanent retirements as long as some sort of restriction was placed on them. It shouldn't be possible to temp store every new PC just to 'try something new for fun'. The option should be reserved for players of long lived characters, or very special circumstances.

[Agent_137]

Two thumbs up on non-permanent retirements as long as some sort of restriction was placed on them. It shouldn't be possible to temp store every new PC just to 'try something new for fun'. The option should be reserved for players of long lived characters, or very special circumstances.

Well, by your definition, that already exists on a case by case basis, as cavaticus said:

You can always bring up the possibility, with your staff, of storing your current character with the option of coming back at a later date. We don't do this often, but the possibility exists - especially if you have a compelling reason for it.

my imagination holds some sort of automated system of not permanent retirements that the immortals could just oversee instead of manage each case. however it's not fully formed yet.

[Akaramu]

Well, by your definition, that already exists on a case by case basis, as cavaticus said:

You can always bring up the possibility, with your staff, of storing your current character with the option of coming back at a later date. We don't do this often, but the possibility exists - especially if you have a compelling reason for it.

my imagination holds some sort of automated system of not permanent retirements that the immortals could just oversee instead of manage each case. however it's not fully formed yet.

From what I understand, this is done rarely. It could be done more often, and an automated system sounds great to me.

[Agent_137]

Well let's discuss a reasonable set of rules (reasonable to us). Then the immortals can go "NOWAI" or "hmmaybe"

Ideal use case is this:
you've played your character awhile but you're tired of it for whatever reason. You submit him for temporary storage with your reasons via the request tool (a new option would be added next to Retire for Temporary Storage.). The immortals grant your request, and you are given the new player screen on next login. You make your new character and play for awhile and die. While staring at the mantis head you realize the min storage time is up you can go back to your stored character. So you submit a request using the same option as before. Once the immortals grant it, your character is alive again on  your next login. You play him for awhile, get bored again, and submit a request for temporary storage. The immortals deny it seeing as your reason is shit and you obviously don't enjoy your character but you don't want to give up the l33t gear. They tell you to keep playing or just retire the character already.

Optional use case:
Same as above, but you retire your character instead of dying once the 6 months is up. Or maybe you just want to switch them out, put the newer one into temp storage and take the old one out again.

Potential for abuse in all cases:
Temp Store character. Create a new burglar. Join opposing clan. Spy your little butt off, writing it all in excel, until you're caught and killed. Unstore original character and use the information gained with your spy character to wipe out enemy clan. (the reverse of this can already be done. Create a spy, spy, die, create a character and join opposing clan.)

Rules to mitigate potential abuse:
A temporary storage minimum duration of at least 6 months should make it still a serious retirement and make any information gained during the bulk of the new character's life less useful as most of it will be out of date. Putting min duration at a year would mitigate the abuse even further but probably make coming out of retirement more awkward.

Rules to mitigate willy-nilly storing of characters and extra work for admins:
The min duration will help with this too, but also you should only be able to have 1 character in temp storage at a time, and 1 alive at a time. The rest have to be retired permanently or dead.

Keep in mind anytime you make a new character you have new OOC information from your previous that you can use against your new enemies. There must already be eyes in place to mitigate this sort of abuse. A well documented system like i've described would actually be easier to watch for this abuse than all the new characters created every day that go off and promptly join a clan.

thoughts? Other abuses you could think of? I'm assuming that abuse is the reason this isn't already allowed more often. Could that not be the case? Maybe no one is ever asking for temporary storage so it rarely gets granted. That's a player awareness problem. Or maybe it's just not worth the hassle and time spent by admins. That's a tool problem. both are more easily fixable than a severe potential for abuse problem.

[valeria]

Keep in mind anytime you make a new character you have new OOC information from your previous that you can use against your new enemies.

Also, this is true in any situation where you are starting a new character.  It wouldn't just be in situations of temporary storage.

[Agent_137]

Keep in mind anytime you make a new character you have new OOC information from your previous that you can use against your new enemies.

Also, this is true in any situation where you are starting a new character.  It wouldn't just be in situations of temporary storage.

yep. that's the point i was making: temporary storage wouldn't introduce any new potential abuses.

[spawnloser]

I prefer that if you store a character you're done, and not because there is potential for abuse but because you are discarding the character.  If you want it back, you need staff approval, period.  I like that.

[Agent_137]

you always get on other people for having just negative opinions against your ideas and no arguments. Try to give other people's ideas the same due.

[Thunkkin]

I agree completely with Spawnloser.

Disappearing should have consequences.  When minor minions do it, it's annoying, but meh.  But I really don't want to see this game move toward an expectation that people will be here for a few months, then mysteriously gone, then back, demanding or expecting all their old perks back, then gone again.  People do that enough as it is.

"I'm sorry your order of spice hasn't arrived.  Slacker-Da is on his sabbatical again and may be back in three years.  He does this like clockwork.  Three years here.  Three years gone."

Ugh.  This happens way too much with people who just vanish but don't retire.  No need to encourage it.  If you don't like your character, you should store and move on.  If you're bored and you don't want to store, make your character's life more interesting.  If you can't do the latter, it's probably time for the former.

[Agent_137]

1 temp storage per character would prevent that completely. if you take 6-12 months off your character, come back and still want to do that again then yea, you should just retire and get it over with.

[Akaramu]

I'd suggest not only per character, but an over time limit as well. Maybe once per year or something.

[RogueGunslinger]

One storage/return a year?

You guys seriously play this game thinking about the long term don't you? In a year from now I'll probably have quit this game five times, and changed my RL career choice about twenty.

[Agent_137]

i've played this game since early 2004 and have had less than 10 characters. so yea.

April 2004 byn initiation:

The severe, tattooed half-elf says, in sirihish:

     "And Rame, it is Vanir or sir, not 'guys'.  Grab a pallet and get some sleep."




The burly, bearded young man exclaims, in sirihish:

     "Yes sir!"

[Synthesis]

If we're going to allow temporary storages and such, I think the goal should be to be as accommodating as possible.

Personally, I don't see that there'd be a problem if someone had something like 5 maxed-out PCs that were switched between on a regular basis.

You could have a crusty old Bynner who only logs in during Byn RPTs (which would be a huge boost for the Byn n00bs, because 99.9% of the time n00bs die because there aren't enough vets on during the RPT to save their asses).

You could have a Tuluki bard who only shows up for major bardic competitions and for various parties.

And then you could have a primary character that you can enjoy on a regular basis, whether it's a 'rinth-rat, a soldier in one of the city-states, or a d-elf tribal.

I think the only reasonable requirement is that you shoot the staff an e-mail about your intent.  E.g.  "I'm playing Trooper Amos again for this HRPT."

I really don't see the logic in forcing someone either not to play (because they'd rather be doing something else), or be bored, simply to reach the end goal of participating in Byn RPTs, etc.

Sure, abuse, whatever.  Look how old the playerbase of this MUD is becoming.  A good half of us are responsible adults, and you know...I'm starting to feel like I want to be treated like a responsible adult, not like a child.

[Akaramu]

One storage/return a year?

You guys seriously play this game thinking about the long term don't you? In a year from now I'll probably have quit this game five times, and changed my RL career choice about twenty.

Well, I think storage / return should only be allowed for long-lived characters. Not a PC that was played for three weeks. Those should just be stored permanently.

[Synthesis]

Why should the length of time the character's been played have anything to do with it?

[Akaramu]

Because for me, the idea is to let players who are worn out by their long-time role to freshen up their game experience. So they can later return to that beloved 80 day character with fresh motivation, after already having tried everything to make the role more exciting again. People who stop playing Armageddon because they're bored, but don't want to store their beloved old PC.

I don't think people should just hop between characters at random. Already now, it is frustrating enough to try and catch that PC you -really- need to advance your plot when they only log in 5 hours a week. If random character hopping was allowed? I'd be gone.

[Synthesis]

 

Newsflash:  most people do not play Armageddon to entertain you.

[Akaramu]

Take a chill pill? No even hinted at such a thing. But ongoing, consistent storylines are one of the core strengths of the MUD. Probably one of the main reasons why many of us play. And for those, you need people.

Newsflash: This is not a single player game.

[flurry]

It's an intriguing idea, but the potential for abuse might be too great.

One problem I see is that it could be used as a way to escape consequences. The heat becomes to great for your character, and you store while your character's enemies die off. This makes it too easy to monitor the political climate for your stored character, and then have that character resurface when it becomes convenient.

The other issue I see is conflict of interest. It seems almost inevitable that the motives and actions of your new character(s) would be clouded somewhat by the interests of the stored one.

[Synthesis]

Allowing people to temp-store at will on a very short-term basis wouldn't detract from long-term plots, because as soon as <whatever event> was over, they'd probably go back to playing their regularly scheduled character.

Allowing people to temp-store could actually further your plots, because then instead of permanently storing or suciding (which would stop the plot entirely in its tracks), the character in question would still be alive and available at a later date.

And as much as it might suck for your plots, it also opens up plots for other people.  It's not like the player stops playing...they simply start playing where they'd rather be playing at that particular time.  And while we're talking about plots, I think scheduling things would be easy enough to facilitate important interactions.  E.g. send a PM on the GDB or a message via staff:  "Hey, could you log in with Amos on June 2 at 6:00 CST? Got a major hunt scheduled and could use the help."  It's essentially like Amos is now an NPC that you don't need to harangue the staff to animate.

I'm not suggesting people be able to switch entirely willy-nilly, playing three different characters in a single day on a regular basis.  I do think there is some reasonable middle ground where we can accommodate people who would like to play a different character for a while, without forfeiting all the time and effort they put into their current character.  I don't think it has to be based on length of time put into the character.

Edit:  Snipped the new idea and moved to a new topic.

[netflix]

It's an intriguing idea, but the potential for abuse might be too great.

Exactly. And not even intentional abuse, as I mentioned in the branch off thread. But all those seemingly small, nothing decisions of one character, that good possibly benefit the other character. The human mind is great in situations like this in making itself think "Well, I woulda made this decision with this character anyway, despite the fact that it gives gain to my other character. It was the IC thing to do and all."

But between that and intentional abuse, you'd need to double the staff size, with a whole section of staff devoted to nothing but monitoring the possible connections between a players multiple characters. Talk about an administrative nightmare.

[Agent_137]

topic-splitting fail.

here is the link to syn's new thread:
http://www.zalanthas.org/gdb/index.php/topic,38793.0.html