Allanaki Fashion

[Lizzie]

The documentation doesn't tell them that when they successfully "craft silk into gown" it'll be a northern_make gown, that they should not try to sell to the southern Kadian shop.  There is no way of knowing that "craft silk into gown" is going to make something with a mdesc implying that it is totally inappropriate for your chosen shopkeeper, or even customer, until AFTER you have already made it. They only know that after they've successfully made it. And by then, they might have spent a couple hundred sids to discover that.

Also, veterans cannot, and should not, be expected to actually be there every time a new player is attempting to try and sell something to a shop, JUST so they can step in and ICly tell them it's a bad idea. New players and even new crafters have no way of knowing what is on that "craft silk" list, until it's already been made. They might not even realize that "analyze gown" will give them a "make-flag" that they can check, and some items are often sold to nobles in Allanak - and even specifically requested by Allanaki nobles. There is more precidence of people NOT following the documentation, than there is of people following it, and the shop code and make-flags support the exception rather than the rule.

I'm saying, that until either the shop-code or make-flag code is implemented game-wide, "be the change" is a pretty empty phrase.

[wizturbo]

Implementing some kind of northern versus southern fashion code sounds like a poor use of development time.  Read the documentation.  Buy what works.  It doesn't matter if people sell junk to the southern/northern shops, just assume those goods are shipped to the appropriate city whenever the shop's inventory resets.  The shops buy stuff for such a small fraction of what they sell it for, shipping costs must be neglible versus their profits.

[Marc]

For what it's worth and to help derail where I can I have to agree with Lizzie and here is why:

We, the players, can guess and assume what is correct and proper based off our interpretation of the game documentation, other players actions and general world 'feel'.  We cannot know until an Immortal tells us specifically.  For example:

You can make a polkadotted silk gown.  It's worth 400 sid to the shop.  You've seen them for sale there before (other pcs selling?).  The store sells them and is offering you sid for the one you offer.  From where I am standing there is no reason NOT to make them.  It is the players responsibility to play realistically.  If an npc hits you, you know it wants to kill/hurt you and you react accordingly.  If an npc is offering you coin for an item you can assume that item is in demand in that area AND that the npc thinks it is worth the cost.

NPCs are dumb, stupid animals though.  It's the players responsibility not to abuse this.  You can do that by making a variety of different items and not JUST the polkadotted silk gown or by spacing out the sale of said gowns to represent the time it takes the npc to sell the last one.  Assumptions can also be made to go the other way:  That npc is representative of many shop keepers around the city.  Him buying ten of my gowns is really me just selling to ten different merchants, right?

If the sale of an item to a specific shopkeeper is found to be unrealistic the npc should be fixed to not buy it.  Period.  If it's not something the PC should be selling some sort of coded echo needs to be included.  If none of these are good solutions, a note from an immortal explaining the problem should be sent.  Not just a "We need you to act responsibly" but some sort of concrete guidelines as to what about that play wasn't realistic and what IS expected.  Otherwise it's all interpretation and assumptions which leads to trouble :-(

Wearing said items/clothing can be handled IG through IC consequences.

Back on topic (kinda):  People make some good points about the "stock" stock of stores.  Some cycles include an overwhelming number of items that were made at an opposite branch (ie north as opposed to south or vice versa) and this doesn't help.  My suggestion is that Salarr/Kadius/Kurac sell only locally produced items from their stores ie Southern Salarr stuff in the south.  Northern Salarr stuff in the north.  They should also refuse to buy any House Salarr flagged items from any non-salarr person.  Why would salarr pay for something they make?  If they would, let a PC handle it.  Same for Kurac/Kadius.

[Sam]

Well, we could take the difficult route and make northern crafts and southern crafts a different skill for these sorts of things, e.g. Clothing, leather working, instruments

[Lizzie]

Well, we could take the difficult route and make northern crafts and southern crafts a different skill for these sorts of things, e.g. Clothing, leather working, instruments

I would have had that on my "to-do" list when it first became evident that there would even be a need, use, and available code for "make-flags" were I on staff at the time all of this was implemented. They're a pretty neat part of the game code, and they're underused and undersupported. There's a lot that can be done with them than already is.

[Armaddict]

Fantastic workload/limiting factor proposal for something little payoff, and/or something players can already enforce.

Are we going to come up with code moguls to enforce fighting styles as well?  Racism? Food availability?

[Semper]

The problem I see though is that if even a portion of the player-base don't follow the fashion, everyone else who does is playing a mini-game separate from the rest. I guess it's a similar situation as if only a few people followed the documented racism. It not only detracts from the original intent of the documents (being enforced role play in the fantasy setting) but potentially ruins the immersion of the players who -are- following the documents accurately.

Still, I guess the question remains if it's worth the added burden on players to stick to documentation, or bend it a little for playability sake.

What I see so far are two options:
1) over-haul of the code to have NPC retailers differentiate between nakki and tuluki fashions in clothing
2) prevent non-House PCs from selling to House shops, trusting instead on staff-sponsored (and staff-monitored) PCs to regulate the stock of the GMH shops

I don't think there's been a third option mentioned yet (besides not do anything and let players regulate by themselves as it's always been). However, it's apparent players self-regulating won't work all the time considering the lapses in trends IG now and then.

[added]

Are we going to come up with code moguls to enforce fighting styles as well?  Racism? Food availability?

So where do we draw the line between playability and enforcing the documentation?

[Lizzie]

The problem I see though is that if even a portion of the player-base don't follow the fashion, everyone else who does is playing a mini-game separate from the rest. I guess it's a similar situation as if only a few people followed the documented racism. It not only detracts from the original intent of the documents (being enforced role play in the fantasy setting) but potentially ruins the immersion of the players who -are- following the documents accurately.

Still, I guess the question remains if it's worth the added burden on players to stick to documentation, or bend it a little for playability sake.

What I see so far are two options:
1) over-haul of the code to have NPC retailers differentiate between nakki and tuluki fashions in clothing
2) prevent non-House PCs from selling to House shops, trusting instead on staff-sponsored (and staff-monitored) PCs to regulate the stock of the GMH shops

I don't think there's been a third option mentioned yet (besides not do anything and let players regulate by themselves as it's always been). However, it's apparent players self-regulating won't work all the time considering the lapses in trends IG now and then.

[added]

Are we going to come up with code moguls to enforce fighting styles as well?  Racism? Food availability?

So where do we draw the line between playability and enforcing the documentation?

Another option would be to simply change the docs to reflect the segue to new trends in fashion across the known, that provides more flexibility of styles between commoners and nobility, north and south. In other words, tell us "you know all this stuff that most people (except the few who actually wanted to "be the change") have been ignoring for the past four RL years? Well it's okay to ignore it now, because its obsolescence is now official."

[KankWhisperer]

If you are not supposed to sell to shops, let's just get rid of haggle and merchant class pretty much. Or you can only be merchant for a house is what everyone thinks is responsible? If you only sell to players you will likely be poor merchant. So you learned a skill, secured supplies and actually did something but getting rewarded for that is bad. Why even have the bazaar in 'nak then? Seems a big waste of time if trading is discouraged and we not supposed to be making deals and haggling or whatever, sort of ruins the atmosphere in my mind. The GMH do not want to buy something then turn around and sell it for 5 times the price? Bah. If a particular shop is a problem I say a simple fix is to make is a save room. To me that would solve the problem of selling so many pieces of silk. Sure ..every PC in the game together has sold five, but until one of those five is sold that represents the lack of demand for such a high priced item.

[Sam]

There is a lot of non-House clothing sellers in Allanak.

[HavokBlue]

I think I can count on one hand, give or take,  the number of clothing merchants in Allanak, and most of them sell much of the same thing or things beyond the common person.

[boog]

It's really not as bad to complicate things so much. You can still have PCs make money selling to merchant shops, sure. But I think it's also up to the buyers to have discretion knowing what their social class is allowed to wear, too.

[BleakOne]

I don't think the shops themselves would care who they sell their outfits to. The Templars probably wouldn't bother them about it either, since a bunch of idiot commoners walking around in silks are good marks for 'donations' and the Templarate likely have a lot of other ties and dealings with House Kadius.

As for PC sellers selling 'inappropiate' goods, it seems a bit complex a fix for something kind of trivial, so I'd go with the explaination that they ship stuff between cities, buy to choke out the market their competitors or maybe even that they buy in the hopes of some Fale or fancy Templar coming along and buying up their weird outfits.

Of course, players would do best to focus on selling south-style stuff in the south, and I'll try to do so with any of my future crafters in said city.

[Barzalene]

I should probably confess that part of my dissatisfaction with the shops is selfish. In 2004 I'd written up a great many clothes that don't seem to be in game any more. Or maybe they are and I don't see them, or you all just don't wear them (fuckers!) and it makes me all sulky!

But also true is that those who work with cloth need to make a living, and some are making that living by selling to npcs. Dying of starvation or to beetles while chopping sid might be an alternative, but I don't think it's a good one.

One solution would be to have all crafted clothing revisited. I imagine that if the staff thought that was the best use of their time they'd have done this already. I'm certainly not sure it would be what I'd like them to be doing. (After all, if they're doing that they're not paying attention to me, and I need a lot of attention.)

So, the answer, like so many, is probably gray (or grey for you people who- well you know who you are.) For instance we can make wise clothing choices. Steer newbies. And if you come across anything really egregious in crafted clothing, you could, if you were feeling energetic, write up some kind of replacement, and send the staff a suggestion to remove the bad clothing and substitute something better suited to the game world. This won't address the north south issue, but it would certainly address the really odd unsuitable issue.

[Barzalene]

P.S. while I'm throwing my little "artistic tantrum ... where's my darn furniture? Huh? Huh?

[smcdonald]

The likely reason your designs aren't seen around is because no one knows how to make them.  There are probably hundreds of recipes that have been lost because no one else figured out how to make them.  Or perhaps, the cost to make the recipe is greater than the price they can sell them for at the shops, so they don't get sold to the shops and no one sees them.

[Socko]

I think the one thing that I always noticed, historically, is that not everything translates perfectly from the documentation. Not everyone is xenophobic, not everyone is greedy and mistrustful, and not everyone fights in sandcloth and leather in Allanak. I like it like that.

The reason I like that is because we do a great job of being consistent in theme. At the end of the day, though, the player is usually going to want to dress their PCs up in stuff they think is cool. If cool is in line with the documentation, great. If it isn't, it won't break the bank.

I agree with the idea that the playerbase should control for deviation a little bit more. That may or may not be helped by more availability of appropriate clothing in stores-- more abas, djellabahs, and robes down south, more kilts, jerkins, vests, loose blousy stuff up north. It would definitely be helped IG by snooty comments and looking down one's nose at certain things.

This isn't the first time this topic has come up. I remember, way back, when Barzalene and others elaborated on the clothing culture, and made up a lot of good items. That was a step in the right direction. I'm starting to notice more of a range of appropriate stuff sold in stores now, actually.

[lepxii]

Maybe a bit of a derail regarding "read the docs" - Many of these documentation details are retconned into the game. Circa-2000 I don't recall regional fighting styles, 'nakies being all covered up, Tuluki tattoes (or subtlety, to the degree it is emphasized now), and so on. Someone writes some doc up (for better or for worse) and some of these docs are actually adhered to strictly in-game while others not so much (in terms of actual player base behavior/observance).

[boog]

The likely reason your designs aren't seen around is because no one knows how to make them.  There are probably hundreds of recipes that have been lost because no one else figured out how to make them.  Or perhaps, the cost to make the recipe is greater than the price they can sell them for at the shops, so they don't get sold to the shops and no one sees them.

God, yes. I always tried like 5 billion combinations with my crafter! I never got much done that way.

[Barzalene]

I'm sad to admit, I never made any crafting recipes, just the stuff that ended up in shops.

[Taven]

I don't understand why Kadius buys things other people make. You are Kadius. You make the best things, and you set fashion. Yet you are paying random, untrained merchants (by that I mean not Kadius-trained) for their work. You are selling those things in your shop. Why would someone go to a Kadian shop at all if the prices are higher and they don't have a guarantee that it is of Kadius make? I realize that PCs need places to sell to, but I have never understood why Kadius buys things. I think that would be the role of someone else, not the premier maker of luxury goods.

It also bothers me that you can't tell an item is Kadian-make or not unless you're holding it in your inventory, or unless it is completely unique to Kadius/has a kadius emblem on it. Why would anyone buy Kadian if nobody can tell the fine style when they are wearing it? You should hire a secret tailor and claim that it was Kadian-made and just save the coin. I think that it would make sense for a merchant to be able to tell if a garment was of Kadian make or not when someone was wearing it. If the stitch work or quality is that much better, it should be able to be told. There seems to be little point otherwise. Yes, you could argue that even if it looks the exact same Kadius has better prestige and that is where the value comes from, but again, it would be much more cost effective to simply lie about it.

/rant

[boog]

I think we're getting into this wayyyy too much. People have to make money somehow in game. Kadius has a monopoly, nearly, on all high fashion - why wouldn't they want independents to come to them, so they could sell their, well, 'common' crap? They're -still- going to make money off of it.

Anyway, it's getting way too in depth with the whole semantics and how the game should work. Code can only do so much, you have to sort of be understanding with it, that it can't cover the bases we as players should be acknowledging.

[Riya OniSenshi]

I think we're getting into this wayyyy too much.

Just because you don't care about documentation being enforced doesn't mean anyone's taking the subject too far.

I agree that the make flags (northern, southern, kadius, etc) would be excellent to use to get certain npcs to not buy or buy less of certain things where (in)appropriate.
Some gear that's got certain flags works like this already (though I don't know if I can say which it is exactly on the GDB), where the npc vendor offers you shit for it and then sells it for shit compared to the same thing made by anyone else.
However, I also agree that that would take a very large amount of work to re-flag every applicable item, and that time would better be spent flagging things for arm2.

An alternative, and possibly easier, fix might be to lower the amount the npcs buy things for - no one's going to stop spam crafting (whether they admit to it or not).
But that's still like putting a bandaid on a degloving accident, and is still quite a bit of work.

I think only one of my commoner pcs ever wore silk, and it was the silk trim/lining in a couple of pieces, and they only wore them for special events that required better dress because of their rank. As someone said, silk-trimmed pieces are really under-used.

Until we have a coded fix, it's up to us - berrate/kill people dressed incorrectly in Allanak, and... uh... Tease/kill people in Tuluk... If someone wants, they can make a PC that does nothing but monitor the clothing shops and polices people buying and selling, but I'm going to stick with assuming people that show more skin than my pc are whores and dealing with inappropriate silk however I can.  The best thing we can do is try to encourage the proper themes and outlooks in others, either through talking to "new" players/pcs, or through force (if you possess authority to do so).

[Barzalene]

I don't believe that Boog said she doesn't care about the documentation at all. I think she said that we need to balance what the code does/can do/ should do with what we can do for ourselves. At least that's how I read it.

[Socko]

I agree with Barzalene's interpretation. Honestly, why is it a big deal if Kadius resells what they can buy at a juicy markup?  What do they care?  They are the premier (and only) fashion and finery house in the Known World.  They do global trade, and though they are conscious of their local markets, they are at their own leisure to sell what they wish, distasteful or not.

As is the case with many monopolies, they have the power to survive even if people don't like aspects of their product.  If people don't like what Kadius slings, well, too bad.  There is nowhere else to go.

On an OOC level, where else are PCs going to sell things?  Unless someone's willing to write up some new NPCs and totally revamp the clothing inventory at hand, this is not a huge issue and I would rather they buy what they can.  The Playerbase can deal with the ramifications by adjusting its behavior-- or not.  The game will still exist next week.