Salt Flats/Custom Forage Seeder/SimDesert Object discussion

[Rokal]

I just have to say a bit on testing the SimDesert Object, because it was entertaining and well, doesn't hurt anyone.  So we made a tumbleweed object (someday may come to an area near you!) and this thing can move, and moves around based on all sorts of variable conditions, it's AWESOME.  So Nergal and I were chatting, he was testing the script... I wonder what happens if we put a 1000 tumbleweed or high numbers, I wonder what it would do.  Nergal is like, Oh... it seems to work great!  As thousands of tumbleweed are blowing all over the grasslands as he tests it out.  Ginka 2.0 took that shit like a champ!  (Of course, this was not done on the same instance you all play on.)

Neat little story that I thought to share with you.  The possibilities of these new scripts are endless.

That sounds awesome.

[th3kaiser]

Can we maybe get a much longer delay added to getting salt from the patches? As it is, it's lots easier and faster to salt now.

[Clavis]

I just have to say a bit on testing the SimDesert Object, because it was entertaining and well, doesn't hurt anyone.  So we made a tumbleweed object (someday may come to an area near you!) and this thing can move, and moves around based on all sorts of variable conditions, it's AWESOME.  So Nergal and I were chatting, he was testing the script... I wonder what happens if we put a 1000 tumbleweed or high numbers, I wonder what it would do.  Nergal is like, Oh... it seems to work great!  As thousands of tumbleweed are blowing all over the grasslands as he tests it out.  Ginka 2.0 took that shit like a champ!  (Of course, this was not done on the same instance you all play on.)

Neat little story that I thought to share with you.  The possibilities of these new scripts are endless.

That sounds awesome.

second the awesomeness. now do this ig! so i can chase the tumbeweed!

seriously though stuff like this makes the game come alive for me. Even the randomness some people do like. Drop flute a something or other is here playing the flute blah blah. not a skin flute. well until someone comes and steals the poor whatevers flute....

[Majikal]

I'm already dreaming of staring down a fellow salter over a good crystal deposit, everything gets tense and then.

A tumble weed blows in the east.
a tumble weed leaves west.

Showdown time.

[Ath]

Can we maybe get a much longer delay added to getting salt from the patches? As it is, it's lots easier and faster to salt now.

Could you toss up a request on this?  If you have feedback, or something doesn't seem right, it would be preferred there so we can discuss with you and on our end if needed.  Thank you for this though, we appreciate the feedback.

[Kankman]

You guys are totally using a modified poop script for the salt deposits, aren't you?

[Ath]

You guys are totally using a modified poop script for the salt deposits, aren't you?

It's actually entirely new and does a lot of different things that we can utilize.  We've thought of a bunch of neat ideas for it, but I'm sure there are ways we haven't even thought of yet.

[Clavis]

I'm already dreaming of staring down a fellow salter over a good crystal deposit, everything gets tense and then.

A tumble weed blows in the east.
a tumble weed leaves west.

Showdown time.

'well I'm your huckleberry.' the small, wax stached man says in southern accented sirihish.

[Iiyola]

I just have to say a bit on testing the SimDesert Object, because it was entertaining and well, doesn't hurt anyone.  So we made a tumbleweed object (someday may come to an area near you!) and this thing can move, and moves around based on all sorts of variable conditions, it's AWESOME.  So Nergal and I were chatting, he was testing the script... I wonder what happens if we put a 1000 tumbleweed or high numbers, I wonder what it would do.  Nergal is like, Oh... it seems to work great!  As thousands of tumbleweed are blowing all over the grasslands as he tests it out.  Ginka 2.0 took that shit like a champ!  (Of course, this was not done on the same instance you all play on.)

Neat little story that I thought to share with you.  The possibilities of these new scripts are endless.

Meanwhile in the grasslands:
https://i.imgur.com/62YOzvs.gifv

[Dar]

Well. Time to steal an ant queen and lay a trail of pheromonones to Allanak. 1000 randomly (probably affected by wind), moving tumbleweeds? That's nice. Now ... replace it with ants!

[Nergal]

Affected by wind, yes. That's one of the movement types we have available for objects.

[Desertman]

Affected by wind, yes. That's one of the movement types we have available for objects.

Let me fly my kite item now.

k thx bai

[frankjacoby]

Can we maybe NOT get a much longer delay added to getting salt from the patches? As it is, it's lots easier and faster to salt now with Meks wandering right nearby to me and I am command-delay locked from my new pound-me-with-a-Mek shot.

[Delirium]

Suggestion: any delay should be pre-delay. Post delays cause death traps that end up feeling pretty cheesy.

[Desertman]

Suggestion: any delay should be pre-delay. Post delays cause death traps that end up feeling pretty cheesy.

Died to a bahamet on a forage delay once. Can confirm. Pretty retarded. I typed flee at least ten times and was unable to do so because my character was more worried about digging pot shards than running from that bahamet.

Flee should in my opinion cancel MOST delays related to MOST skills. (Probably not combat skills, since those should be calculated.)

[Norcal]

Maybe replace -some- of the meks with less dangerous animals that are not an insta kill?

[Armaddict]

Maybe replace -some- of the meks with less dangerous animals that are not an insta kill?

That would kind of defeat the purpose of making it more dangerous, yes?

[Delirium]

I think there can be a happy medium found between "little to no chance of real danger" and "nearly instantaneous death."

[Jingo]

Big critters like meks are kind of ridiculous because they rely on reaction time and good ping to survive. If they catch you, you're dead. So you just need to ride away as quickly as possible. And if they've somehow flipped into run mode, God help you.

A bad lag spike or a few typos can really ruin your day.

I personally find Dujat to be a much more interesting design of creature. Sure they're dangerous. But they won't kill in the first round of combat. If you can't fight them, they'll try to track you. This forces a much more interesting counter play that relies on finding a safe place they can't traverse.

I don't know how this could be done ins the salt flats though, where there just isn't much variation in terrain.

[Yam]

the ability to l ne

[Yam]

Or potentially a script that makes the ground rumble whenever a mekillot or bahamet has a path of two rooms to you. So that would work if they are diagonal from you or if they are two rooms in a cardinal direction.

Not sure how difficult either of these would be to code but it would certainly solve the problem of mekillots stealthing up on you.

[Delirium]

On the topic of terrain variation:

Bring back the area that was delinked from the salt flats, but open it up as a desolate ruin... just one that big critters like worms and mekillots don't fit into.

That way you have at least somewhere to run and hide if you're being chased (and somewhere for raiders to lurk and wait for desperate, wounded salters).

[Morrolan]

Or potentially a script that makes the ground rumble whenever a mekillot or bahamet has a path of two rooms to you. So that would work if they are diagonal from you or if they are two rooms in a cardinal direction.

Not sure how difficult either of these would be to code but it would certainly solve the problem of mekillots stealthing up on you.

+1

Code Select Expand

>The ground shakes to the northeast.
>The ground shakes to the east.
>The ground shakes to the southeast.

[solera]

Just
you feel the ground shake ?

And run. Some way 

[Armaddict]

I think there can be a happy medium found between "little to no chance of real danger" and "nearly instantaneous death."

I think nearly every death in Armageddon is 'nearly instantaneous', at least in so far as it turning from handleable into death-driving; once I know death is going to happen, it doesn't matter whether it happens in two hits or from a slow-working poison.  It happening with a reel instead of drawn out hunt after you is not such a concern to me.  The danger of the salt flats -is- meks, aside from the classic new mistakes of not bringing water and running your mount to exhaustion.

If we just made everything more middling and removed that danger of death in such ways, the idea of promoting more danger for the reward is kind of a moot point, because we'd be countering it immediately by making it easier.

The 'compromise' I see is that these deposits are actually still surprisingly low risk for high reward.  I'd like to see a new creature that is anakore-like that burrows in salt deposits and works like an ant lion, occasionally grabbing at prey wandering too close, and varying in degree of difficulty wildly, from chalton-like difficulty to tembo-like difficulty.  Make them not visible with scan, but part of the deposit object in some way.  Not present in all of them, but in some of them. Make salting alone just as risky as hunting abroad alone, and salt operations more of a thing.

Meks should remain a very real and present danger at all times on the flats.  Not something that is just bad luck.  The edge is safe, but low reward.  That was the purpose of the entire thing, from what I read out of the post.