RTW Derail: -armed tag on people with weapons

[Malifaxis]

I dig the concept of Thunkkin's idea, but I think it needs some modification.  It needs to react appropriately to crow situations.  The more people in a room, the more likely it is that someone can hide a weapon. 

Perhaps when you use the 'armed' command, the first person in the room has a 0 modifier, the second gets a -5, the third a -10, the fourth a -15, the fifth a -20, etc.  The negatives are a great impact, sure, but this is also a way to count vnpcs into the math.  Realistically if you did this in the Firestorm during prime time, there should be maybe 50 to 100 people in there, and you're going to try to scope all of them.  Since at any given moment there probably won't be more than 6-10 people in the bar, by giving them larger negatives, you take into account those extra non-people.

Perhaps even throw in some messages about vnpcs...  shrug.

Fuck it.  I can't brain today.  I hope this made sense.

[Kiara]

Take into account the size of the room as well and I think we've got something good here.

[Reiteration]

General percentage as to people armed or have large noticeable weapons?

>scan armed
>About 60% of the visible people have clearly distinguishable weapons.

[Kiara]

That doesn't tell you who is armed though, which is what I'd like to see taken into account.

[Lizzie]

I'm not caring about how many people are armed. I will assume, when I walk into a room where the mdesc says there are tons of soldiers hanging around, that all those VNPCs are armed.

My concern, is that I can see clearly when someone is carrying something heavy, that is not being "held" or "wielded." And yet, as soon as they "hold" or "wield" it, I can no longer see it clearly unless I make a point of looking at them, which returns an echo for everyone to see.

So, a guy carrying a large bag in his inventory, I can see the bag when I walk into that room. I don't know WHY I'd want to see it, I don't know why it's so noticeable, ICly. ICly, it shouldn't be noticeable. It's just a bag. I can't see the 20 cylops larvae inside it all wriggling to break free. I can't see the 60,000 obsidian coins that were stuffed into it. I can't see what it is, about that bag, that is so significant that when I walk into the room, I see it in this guy's inventory.

HOWEVER - a dwarf e-twoing a massive obsdiian-bladed bone broadsword, that is a full 2 cords taller than he is, I can't see upon walking into the room.

It just doesn't make any sense at all that I can see one guy's large bag, just by being in the same room as him, but I can't see the HUGE BIG REALLY LARGE FUCKING DEADLY RIDICULOUSLY TALL BLADE in a little stump's arms, without making a point of looking at him.

[spawnloser]

How about adding something to the code that does what it does for large items in inventory to large items in equipment as well?  Then you don't get any information on the people with knives, just the people carrying things that are of a certain weight/size relative to their strength.

( edit for grammatical clarity )

[Lizzie]

I just figured instead of all these "if then" possible scenarios that might require different code criteria, it'd be easier to simply add the word "armed" after the article "The" when a person walks into the room, and becomes a part of the room's description.

The armed, red-haired man is sitting here at the bar.
The armed, blue-eyed soldier stands in a corner.
The armed, maimed and scarred youth is here, bleeding profusely.

If you want to know WHAT he's weilding/holding, you'd STILL need to look at him, you'd STILL need to echo to the room that you looked. Or you could take your chances with the peek skill...and it could be that he's armed with a little rounded green marble. You wouldn't know what he's armed with, until you look at him, which you have to do now anyway. So that wouldn't change at all. The only thing that'd change, is that you know upon his entrance that he does, indeed, have something held in his hand(s).

I think it'd just provide people with a more useful set of options.

[RogueGunslinger]

Still against the ideas that involve you magically knowing that someone is armed without looking at them.

How can you know someone is armed without knowing what they're armed with?

[Kiara]

Peripheral vision.

[spawnloser]

Peripheral vision won't get an entire room, at least not reliably.

[Kiara]

Peripheral vision won't get an entire room, at least not reliably.

Malifaxis proposed negatives depending on the amount of people in the room. This would make things more balanced, right?

[Qzzrbl]

I'm still having trouble seeing why it's so damn inconvenient to just use assess or look....

[Thunkkin]

I'm still having trouble seeing why it's so damn inconvenient to just use assess or look....

Because it takes much longer to type "look keyword" and then examine someone's gear list and then move on to the ten other people in the room than it does in real life.  By about a factor of 10.  Or maybe 50.  Do you disagree, Qrzzbl? 

However, if look didn't echo, I'd look at every person in the room all the time.  As it is, I hate look spam and so I quite often don't look at people because nothing is more annoying than having one person come into the tavern ... and look at everyone ... and then another person enter ... and look at everyone ... and everyone else all looks back ... and then someone else enters ... and everyone all looks ... and I want to stab my eyes out.

[Kiara]

I'm still having trouble seeing why it's so damn inconvenient to just use assess or look....

I'm having trouble seeing how your comment contributes positively to the discussion in any shape or form.

What Thunkkin said.

[X-D]

Takes me about 4 seconds per PC to look and determine if they are armed, less if I use assess.

Takes much longer in real life...well, unless I happen to find a bar where everybody is lined up facing me with hands on heads...Which is rather easy, I just have to follow sheriff Joe around.

[AmandaGreathouse]

I'm still having trouble seeing why it's so damn inconvenient to just use assess or look....

I'm having trouble seeing how your comment contributes positively to the discussion in any shape or form.

What Thunkkin said.

I kind of feel like it does contribute to the discussion. People get way too up in arms about people using the 'look' command. Inside and outside certain situations. I think that suggesting that it's a viable option to see that someone's armed is a good point. People SHOULD look at other people to tell if they're armed. Taking into account things like the arrangement of seating regarding exits, terrain in outdoors rooms, and more, it seems perfectly realistic to need to look at a person to tell it. While what Qzzrbl said certainly wasn't long-winded or overly verbose, it also wasn't snarky, and made, I feel, a valid point.

[Lizzie]

If look didn't echo I don't think this topic would even exist. The whole reason it exists is because of the echo and the spam created by it.
As Thunkin said, he sometimes omits looking at all, just to avoid the spam. ICly, his character WOULD look. But because of the OOC imposed coded spam created by that one command, used on everyone in the room by everyone who walks in..it's one of those things people are more likely to avoid using.

I don't care what anyone thinks of me, the player, when my character looks at them. Really. What I care about, is this:

The tall guy looks at you.
The tall guy looks at the other tall guy
The tall buy looks at the dwarf.
The other tall guy looks at the first tall guy.
The dwarf looks at you.
The big guy walks in.
You look at the big guy.
The dwarf looks at the big guy.
The tall guy looks at the big guy.
The other tall guy looks at the big guy.
The big guy looks at you.
The big guy looks at the dwarf.
The big guy looks at the tall guy.
The big guy looks at the other tall guy.

Now add in all those pretty emotes to break it up so one guy is looking with a curious gaze, another is flitting his golden orbs down the bar, another is twisting in his seat to watch the entry, another is rubbing one off and leering..

And really all you have is decorative spam.

If we could just get rid of that echo, a whole lot of frustration, and several threads suggesting improvements for situations related to the look echo, would no longer be an issue.

[AmandaGreathouse]

If we could just get rid of that echo, a whole lot of frustration, and several threads suggesting improvements for situations related to the look echo, would no longer be an issue.

I do agree with your point here, Lizzie.

I've always been in the 'look with no echo' camp.

[a strange shadow]

I'm in the look with no echo but a chance to notice via watch camp.

[Thunkkin]

If look did not echo and masks hid mdescs, it would solve ... a lot.

[AmandaGreathouse]

I disagree with masks hiding mdescs. Highly.
There are too many other variable things to account for on a person other than the face for an item which, by definition, covers only the face, to be able to completely obscure all details of what a person looks like.
I'm glad that the mdesc masks are gone.

[Thunkkin]

Er, sorry, shouldn't have mentioned masks, since that's its own beaten to death horse.  Mea culpa.

The main argument against look not echoing is raiding, however.  If look didn't echo, there'd just be an equal amount of crying about how muggers/raiders/etc. just kill everyone since they assume 100% that every detail of their appearance will be reported shortly to the nearest templars who will raise several units of militia to go hunt them down.

So, removing the look echo without some reliable form of making yourself anonymous wouldn't cut down on this type of thread.

[Lizzie]

I'm in the look with no echo but a chance to notice via watch camp.

But then people who are watching, who have max skill, would be stuck dealing with the spam just because they're hoping to catch someone planting something on someone, or peeking into someone's pack, or palming something, or semoting...

Look allows you to include emotes with it. I think that's sufficient. If I -want- my look to be noticeable, I'll include an emote with it. I can trust my fellow players enough that if -they- wanted their looks to be noticeable, they'd add emotes to them.

Maybe, I'll "look" at everyone, and then realize there's someone who has something that stands out. And THEN I'll look again, but include an emote. Or maybe I'll just emote, and not have to look again.

Hard to "look in awe" at someone over something they're wearing, if you don't know what that awesome thing is, until AFTER you've already looked. So now you have two things: The look..curiously maybe. A curious look. You look curiously at the guy. And after looking at him, you realize he has something awesome. So now you have to add an emote to indicate that you have noticed something awesome about him.

Instead of the nice neat tidy look guy (returning no echo at all) followed by...

emote gazes in awe at the awesome thing the guy has.

Which makes sense, since I'm not really looking at him. If he's got something awesome that I'm gazing at, I probably wouldn't be able to tell you what color eyes he has. Since I'm too busy gazing at his awesome thing. Unless of course it's his eyes that are awesome. Maybe they're sparkling purple with flickering flames shooting out of them. In which case, don't bother asking me what he's wearing, or even if he's wearing anything at all. I am not paying any attention to his wardrobe. I'm gazing in awe at his awesome, awful eyes.

But that look echo indicates clearly to everyone present, that I, the player, just saw a screen capture of this guy's entire mdesc and everything he's wearing that's visible. Which sucks, because that makes it difficult for me to RP only noticing one part and ignoring the rest.

And it's all because of an echo.

[Qzzrbl]

If look didn't echo I don't think this topic would even exist. The whole reason it exists is because of the echo and the spam created by it.
As Thunkin said, he sometimes omits looking at all, just to avoid the spam. ICly, his character WOULD look. But because of the OOC imposed coded spam created by that one command, used on everyone in the room by everyone who walks in..it's one of those things people are more likely to avoid using.

I don't care what anyone thinks of me, the player, when my character looks at them. Really. What I care about, is this:

The tall guy looks at you.
The tall guy looks at the other tall guy
The tall buy looks at the dwarf.
The other tall guy looks at the first tall guy.
The dwarf looks at you.
The big guy walks in.
You look at the big guy.
The dwarf looks at the big guy.
The tall guy looks at the big guy.
The other tall guy looks at the big guy.
The big guy looks at you.
The big guy looks at the dwarf.
The big guy looks at the tall guy.
The big guy looks at the other tall guy.

Now add in all those pretty emotes to break it up so one guy is looking with a curious gaze, another is flitting his golden orbs down the bar, another is twisting in his seat to watch the entry, another is rubbing one off and leering..

And really all you have is decorative spam.

If we could just get rid of that echo, a whole lot of frustration, and several threads suggesting improvements for situations related to the look echo, would no longer be an issue.

But assess doesn't echo like that....

ass <keyword>

That took me less than two seconds to type that.

And if you're on that whole, "Well what if I run up on a huge group of people in the dezertz! I NEED TO KNOW IF THEY'RE ARMED!" boat....

I mean.... Really?

Is it -so- hard to just assume everyone around you is armed?

Everyone pretty much is, all they have to do is type, "Draw sword".

And bam, they're armed.

There's no real advantage or disadvantage to knowing if someone's armed from the get-go whatsoever.

Prove me wrong, put up a situation where knowing if someone else was armed is all that damn important, that can't be combated with use of the "assess" command.

And before any one says, "Six PCs come in from the west in the middle of the desert...."

Seriously? If you type -that- slow, just "assess" one or two of them.... If those two are armed, they're all armed.

You're in the middle of the desert, why wouldn't anyone not trying to suicide their PC not be armed?

::Edited to add::

tl;dr: Everybody and their mother is armed on Zalanthas.... Be on your way.

[Kiara]

>assess <keyword> echoes

assess -v does not, I think.