Perfumes

[nauta]

Inspired by the spice changes and the motivation to get more flavour props moving among the PC population -- let's do the same with perfumes!

ETA: Great ideas down below -- I've tried to pull them up here into the main post for ease of reference, but the individual points are explained below.

1. Give the perfume NPC its own spot.  A lot of people (read: me) don't realize that the NPC that sells perfumes is in a stall with another NPC vendor, so if you go in that stall and do 'list' you get the list of items from the first NPC, and only if you look carefully do you notice the second NPC, so you have to do 'list whatever-sdesc' to get a list of perfumes.

2. Perhaps slash prices on some perfumes, although they are fairly reasonable.  (Cheap perfumes like cheap spice, expensive perfumes like expensive spice.)

3. Cut the craft time down on making a perfume.  Acquiring the ingredients already takes a lot of time for the would-be perfumist.

4. Certain leaves/flowers necessary for some perfumes went virtual with the virtualization of Tuluk.  (I can supply a list in the request if staff wants.  From my reckoning, there are three, maybe four of the 24 perfumes I'm aware of whose ingredients were in plants only found inside Tuluk.)

5. Musk glands.  There are in fact two kinds of musk glands with the same sdesc, but only one of them works with perfumes.  Perhaps: have both kinds of musk glands work, thus making the materials less rare.

6. Add a help file 'perfume' that explains how to use a perfume.  (Linked from help floristry, much like 'spice' has its own help file.)  This would explain: 'use vial', the 'empty' bug, the 'sniff' command, link to help floristry.

7. Multiple uses on one vial.  Code change required.

8. Make noticing a perform easier than the 'sniff' command.  Options: (a) have the smell cleave to your 'look' output as with gith smells, (b) or show up in assess -v, (c) or a pulsed hemote, (d) or an addition to your sdesc (like holding a large bag).  Code change required.  The sniff command is, sadly, hardly ever used.

9. Have the smell cleave to you for much much longer (alternative to #7).  Code change required.

10. Improve the sniff output via a player collab. request (or the builder staff).  Just to clarify: when you sniff vial, the output is pretty minimal: this smells like pymlithe.  But when you sniff self, it's a little more verbose, but still pretty minimal with most perfumes.

[Incognito]

Just as an FYI - desert cultures with severe lack of available water - rely heavily of strong perfumes (attars).

Attars are cheap, and unlike eau de cologne or eau de parfum or even pure parfum, attars last extremely long - even days at a time, provided they are applied to the correct places (read: pulse points - neck, wrists, sometimes absorbed into cotton and worn behind the ear).

It's a way for desert folk to appear fresh and presentable when the need arises, and also to stay sane from their on BO, not to mention of course, the ace-up-the-sleeve when you're hanging out in the Harem at night!

So yeah, even though historically not many players might've patronized the use of perfumes ICLY, if the pricing was lowered to an affordable level, I could definitely see a whole new side opening up in the game.

For example, you might actually spend some sids to purchase a vial of perfume if you were going for an important interview and wanted to impress the other person. Or, you might want to just be a dandy and smell good all the time, or you might be a prostitute who uses it as an essential prop in your day to day business, or you might be a spice-head who's trying to conceal your habit from your friends. Endless RP possibilities, really!

In any case - its a super prop - that's already part of the game - it just needs to be "tweaked" like Nauta said, so that its more "usable" by more people.

[manipura]

1. I agree that it's a pain for people (not in the know) to discover this person.  It would even be helpful if the description in the room was more telling that there was a second actual merchant.

2. Considering the fact that perfume making is a bit of an art, I think the prices are just fine.  If anything I would argue that certain perfumes should be more expensive than they are.  
I don't think it's all that realistic that the perfumes made from harder to obtain flowers/leaves cost the same as easy to obtain materials.  Almost everywhere else in-game, how easy or difficult something is to get in parts of the world is reflected in costs (ex. wood in Allanak, northern hides being more valuable the further south you go)  Perfume should be the same.  The fancy, hard-to-locate flowers that make one perfume shouldn't be the same cost as the perfume you can make with some of the cheapest, easiest to find flowers.
And without delving into too much detail, considering the cost (if you buy) one main ingredient for all perfumes, I'm not sure the current price of perfumes is where it should be, considering that ingredient is only a small part of the finished product.

3. It -is- a long delay...I guess the argument is that it's a long, tedious process to make perfume and the time reflects that?  It gives a bunch of time to properly emote though!

4. Are you sure that the leaves/flowers you're thinking of actually went virtual?  Some are just really -really- hard to find.  Looking through the plant help files at all the leaves/flowers that are said to be useful in perfume making, I can say I have had/seen them all in game quite recently.  Maybe though there are some you have in mind that I'm not thinking of, not sure.

5. I would say this is one of those things where I argue that not everything has to be spelled out in a way to make things easier.  There are two, and only one works.  Looking at them you see that they are written -slightly- differently, so if one isn't working you try the other.  Trial and error.  Or you ask someone who knows and find out from them.  It's like RL...there are lots of times when I'm not going to know the difference between two really similar things.  So I either find someone who does know to explain to me the difference, or I get both and figure out which works.

6. I don't think it needs it's own help file, but it might be nice to include it somewhere because it's not quite the same as using other items that are in vials.  It can also be confusing, I imagine, to some people when they look at the perfume and see that it's 'empty'.  The mdesc implies that it's not empty, then it says that it is.  And it's a sealed vial so you assume you have to open it (like other vials).  The floristry help file is pretty...bare, in my opinion.  I think it could benefit from having a few notes about perfume making, and then it would be an ideal place to mention how to go about using those seemingly empty perfume vials that aren't really empty.

Just my thoughts.

[solera]

It is a pity that an animal gives us musk glands and we can't use them!

[Delirium]

Perfumes should be expensive, but they should also be multi-use, like soap is.

[nauta]

Perfumes should be expensive, but they should also be multi-use, like soap is.

Agreed! 

I just assumed making perfumes multi-use (and fixing the 'empty' bug) would be a more scary code change than making perfumes cheaper.  I did in fact have in mind incognito's ideas, well put, that desert tribes have used 'attars' and cheap perfumes regularly and often.

You could still have your expensive Kadian brand perfumes, but I think a big chunk of perfumes should be more easily available, and this can happen in two ways:

1. Some perfumes available with the NPC can be a little bit cheaper (but honestly, they are pretty good as is).

2. Some perfumes (unavailable with the NPC) should be made easier to make -- and the culprit here is the craft delay and how hard it is to gather materials (thankfully, no decay code on leaves).

But yeah, in an ideal world, multi-use perfumes for the win!

[manipura]

Having at least two uses per vial would be great.  Even though the vials themselves are teeny tiny, I don't imagine anyone is splashing the whole thing all over themselves.  You emote dab-dabbing a bit here and there, then use your perfume and suddenly it's gone! 
On the other hand, if I'm using a whole vial of perfume with each use, there should be a horrible room echo that floats around my PC and extends one room away, to reflect the fact that I've doused myself with a whole vial of perfume!

[Vwest]

4. Certain leaves/flowers necessary for some perfumes went virtual with the virtualization of Tuluk.

As far as I know, the Grey Forest has you covered.

The valley doubles up on some of them, too.

The real bane of perfume is no one seems to notice my character smells nice. It gets to be a pain in the ass to hemote it every time someone new comes in or otherwise close enough they would reasonably smell it, so some kind of pulsed hemote might be a nice feature.

"You notice: The leggy blonde has the scent of roses about her."

It would go a long way in giving socialites another way to fancy themselves up with meaningful impact, in that people will notice 'oh, hey, she doesn't smell like dust and sweat' without creating emote overheard. When you're at a table and having three or four conversations mud-style, plus dealing with people over the Way, keeping up with little flavor emotes gets to be a real task.

I'd also like a way to turn 'watch' off, so when there's a RPT going on and everyone is looking, hemoting, palming and such, I don't have to deal with the spam unless I want to. That might be a different thread, though.

[Bushranger]

I would like it if the perfume a person was wearing showed up in Assess -v as well so you can learn how tall, heavy, tired and how they smell in one command. Now we need to Look Person, Sniff Person and Assess -v Person to get a complete picture.

Assess -v noble
He is older than you.
He looks to be mature for his race.
He is shorter than you.
He is quite a bit heavier than you.
He has a strong floral scent to his skin.

[BadSkeelz]

PCs occasionally pulsing their scent would be a neat feature. I'd probably want a way to gag it though, for crowd scenes (more spam!) or if I play a PC who doesn't have a sense of smell again.

I'm sure there's a way to gag "You notice" messages through most any client via triggers or aliases or whatever. I'm a fan of incorporating more features in to Armageddon itself, when possible, but client-side triggers provide the most immediately available tools. Or they would, if I had any idea how to craft them.

I would like it if the perfume a person was wearing showed up in Assess -v as well so you can learn how tall, heavy, tired and how they smell in one command. Now we need to Look Person, Sniff Person and Assess -v Person to get a complete picture.

Assess -v noble
He is older than you.
He looks to be mature for his race.
He is shorter than you.
He is quite a bit heavier than you.
He has a strong floral scent to his skin.

This a great suggestion. I assess -v people a lot more than I sniff or even look at them.

[manipura]

I've always just put it in my tdesc.

Code Select Expand

Anyone in close proximity to this woman would notice there is a light floral scent about her.

The only problem I see with it being a part of assess is that I'm not always going to necessarily be close enough that I can smell the person.
I might be assessing someone from across the bar.  I can judge their age, height and weight from a distance, but I wouldn't be able to smell them. 
Including it in a tdesc lets other players decide whether they are close enough to your PC to be noticing the perfume or not.


...then again, they've used a whole vial of perfume, so maybe I can smell them all the way across the Gaj.

[BadSkeelz]

I've always just put it in my tdesc.

Code Select Expand

Anyone in close proximity to this woman would notice there is a light floral scent about her.

The only problem I see with it being a part of assess is that I'm not always going to necessarily be close enough that I can smell the person.
I might be assessing someone from across the bar.  I can judge their age, height and weight from a distance, but I wouldn't be able to smell them. 
Including it in a tdesc lets other players decide whether they are close enough to your PC to be noticing the perfume or not.


...then again, they've used a whole vial of perfume, so maybe I can smell them all the way across the Gaj.

You're not necessarily close enough to smell someone even if you can look at them, either. Echo pulses have the same problem - just because youre' in the same room as someone doesn't mean you're close enough to smell them.

However you gain the information - sniff, look+tdesc, assess -v - you have to trust other players to use the information responsibly.

[manipura]

I've always just put it in my tdesc.

Code Select Expand

Anyone in close proximity to this woman would notice there is a light floral scent about her.

The only problem I see with it being a part of assess is that I'm not always going to necessarily be close enough that I can smell the person.
I might be assessing someone from across the bar.  I can judge their age, height and weight from a distance, but I wouldn't be able to smell them. 
Including it in a tdesc lets other players decide whether they are close enough to your PC to be noticing the perfume or not.


...then again, they've used a whole vial of perfume, so maybe I can smell them all the way across the Gaj.

You're not necessarily close enough to smell someone even if you can look at them, either. Echo pulses have the same problem - just because youre' in the same room as someone doesn't mean you're close enough to smell them.

However you gain the information - sniff, look+tdesc, assess -v - you have to trust other players to use the information responsibly.

I agree. 
...That's why I said it lets the other player decide whether they are close enough to your PC to be noticing the perfume.

You're saying put it in assess and let other players decide whether they can smell it.
I'm saying, since there's no code for it, put it in tdesc and let other players decide whether they can smell it.
It's sort of the same thing.

[BadSkeelz]

Oh yeah, sure. I just would like assess -v to (Also) be an option because I can assess someone and not get blown out with their whole mdesc and equip list.

[manipura]

*nod*
That is a good point, assess does avoid the page long equipment list.

[nauta]

You can determine if a weapon or piece of clothing smells of gith through the 'look' command -- so hypothetically the code is there.  If I were to add two 'code intrusive' additions to the original suggestions:

7. Multiple uses on one vial.

8. Have the smell cleave to your 'look' output as with gith smells.

While I'm on it, it'd also be cool to have a call to improve the smell messages.  A lot of them just state the name of the perfume as the smell, which doesn't really help much!

[The Silence of the Erdlus]

I like the idea of scents being triggered by canned occasional hemotes or one or two prompts. I think perfumes should be more popular than they are--- either that or I, like everyone else, don't go out of our way to smell people.

[Vwest]

I've always just put it in my tdesc.

Tdesc is really limited.

There are so many little details that change, I never have enough room to include everything. With something like a pulsed flavor hemote, or in assess, or even having it show up below their sdesc when people do a room look (similar to how large bags are shown, or some magicks, etc) leaves more room for other things in the tdesc.

[manipura]

I never have enough room to include everything.

Fact.
Always takes me a few tries to get it worded in a way that lets me fit the most details in.

[nauta]

9. Make perfumes cleave to you for much much longer.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ittar

This might inspire some people: as incognito put it, Attars last a really long time.  So, alternative to multiple uses, you could just have the perfume last a long time too.

I've also updated the main post with the various ideas put forward in the thread!  Good ideas everyone.  Patbacks!

[Vwest]

Not strictly related, but an 'odor' command would be nice.

Something like:

change odor like blood and sweat.

Results in some kind of readout (possibly the same used for perfumes):

The buxom bimbo smells like blood and sweat.

Something like change mood, where it goes back to default when you log out. I've had characters come back from some extreme places (crawling out of a mass grave, sewers, engaged with swarms of undead, exploding insects, etc.) that would leave them reeking, but it gets to be a chore to have to always include it in every other emote.

It'd be nice to have a passive option to let interested parties know what my PC smells like at any given time and it seems like something that could have some neat synergy with things like soap (could apply the soaps scent to a PC or their equipment similar to gith stink), body oil (pc only) and or perfume (pc only), the latter two blocking manual odor changes until they wear off.

[solera]

I like your developing list, Nauta, but what is the objection to a long crafting time? As I see it, perfumes are special, and you're not trying to make a quiverful before morning.

[Vwest]

I like your developing list, Nauta, but what is the objection to a long crafting time? As I see it, perfumes are special, and you're not trying to make a quiverful before morning.

Long craft times make having way conversations annoying.

[nauta]

I like your developing list, Nauta, but what is the objection to a long crafting time? As I see it, perfumes are special, and you're not trying to make a quiverful before morning.

The motivation was to make perfumes more readily and easily available: you can make them cheaper, make the NPC more obvious, and also make them easier to make.

Right now, the would-be perfumist has to go gather the leaves for perfumes and the other ingredients (which can take time), and then suffer through a pretty long craft delay, for what is in essence a single hit of smell.

Spice, by contrast: make smoke papers spice.

I realize the realism of making a perfume would have the craft delay on the magnitude of hours or days, but for me it's really a playability thing.  If perfumes had multiple uses or lasted longer, I'd suffer through the delay, but as it stands, there's a lot more interesting things I could be doing, like waying.

[solera]

Ok. Tops for me is making them last longer, and say three uses out of a vial. One use is such a let down, every time!