Fall Blocking Code

[nauta]

So, this'll likely be an unpopular opinion, but hear me out!  (Also I'm of two minds, so I'm just more curious what others think.)

Last year, as most know, staff did three things to prevent accidental falls in certain places in the known:

1. They put in warning echoes when you near certain cliffs.

2. They actually prevented you from going over certain cliffs (not all!) unless you type "north now".

3. You no longer follow leaders off a cliff.

So, I love the warning echoes.  I remember on my earliest character seeing this one fissure and reading the room description and misinterpreting it as 'not that bad', when it was really bad.  So, yeah.  This drives it home.

I also love (3).  Yes!  Stupid leaders.

(2) But the scripts that prevent you from going over certain cliffs I'm not such a fan of.  (And this from someone who has now been saved from almost certain death/pain three times due to them.)

Here's a few food for thought points:

1) It eliminated an economy of plundering bodies -- which generated some fun RP, be it from plundering the bodies or flaunting the loot.

2) Yes, falling sucks and dying is a random thing and it sucks, but, again, such deaths (and deaths in general) do generate more RP and plots.  Someone fell off a cliff!  Let's go rescue them/get their body before the desert elves do!

3) Perhaps at least in a storm you'd still fall off.  (Once I was in a storm and wasn't paying attention and got blocked from falling off from the code.)

4) Perhaps at least allow the fall, but have your beetle kick you over the edge.  Falling while mounted is a LOT more painful than falling while unmounted (IIRC -- warning: anecdotal, I haven't fallen enough.)

5) A skilled ranger/guide is needed to navigate these cliffs.  Elsewhere in the game, there are no blocks, and so there is some reason to 'learn the terrain' and be useful that way.

Anyway, just some food for thought.

---

Also, anecdote time: my very first character died by bleeding out after falling off the Shield Wall.  Someone had taken me to Storm (by foot) and left me.  I got bored, and tried to make it back to Allanak, but of course I missed the road, and ended up tumbling off the Shield Wall.  I passed out and was at negative hitpoints when:

Code Select Expand


[5 minutes pass]
You feel a tugging on your clothes. (Or something like this.)
ooc uh, what's going on?
Someone says ooc: I'm stealing your shit.  Stay out of the Pah.
*beep*


[Dunetrade55]

I, personally, do not think falls generate worthier plots than the ones they discontinue. Should they happen if you're not paying attention? Eh, maybe not, but you should feel like a dummy for getting blocked, but sometimes you're like, l e, and your "l" doesn't register for whatever reason, leading you to unrealisticly swan dive to your death in the middle of what was supposed to be a daring rescue mission, and, of course, leads to other fallout, that doesn't really create plots so much as dissappointingly end a bunch of them. But I get it, it's not really about the feels is it? It's more about, the fallout (pun intended).

"Oh hey, a deader, let's loot this stuff!" is hardly a plot. Most will sell what they don't want and equip/keep the rest. You call that a plot? That's just, .

Meanwhile, let's say that deader is Amos Mcbadass, 40 day warrior/outdoorsman who's central to some plots, irreplacable TO these plots, and, without Amos, they all just, go splat. The player of Amos feels like shit (for letting everyone down), the players depending on Amos to do those things for them feel like shit, and, everything, grinds to a halt. It'd be different if it weren't like a typo or something, it'd be different if it weren't lack of understanding of the upcoming room description (just how close CAN I get to skirting the cliff's edge without falling off). No, instead, all we can assume is that for some inexplicable reason Amos took one look at a cliff, with so many things going for him, kicked his beetle into a run, and charged the obviously mega-chasm up ahead screaming BAAAANZAAAAAAI on his way down. That's just, I don't know how you can justify that.

Let's put these on a scale, and consider which way it tips. Somehow I think OH BOY LOOT! seems to immediately get catapulted off the scale and onto the floor, as the the other end hits the table with a solid thunk and yanks the scale over. I fail to see the benefit.

I'm not saying make the world a happy safe place, I'm saying, there are things you really would NOT do unless you intended to do them.

[Miradus]

Not really clear what you're suggesting be done.

I'd say some room titles and flags be cleaned up some before much is done.

There's way too many rooms that say "Edge of a Cliff" but require a climb check to not fall to your death. And other rooms that say "Edge of a Cliff" which don't. It's one thing for someone who wasn't paying attention to fall to their death, but to fall to your death because there hasn't been consistency in building zones over the past 20 years is another issue altogether.

[tortall]

I didn't realize those were in place! Gotta say accidentally falling off shield wall was one of my most memorable moments. Was fully my fault and led 2 others off behind me(really glad we don't go off after leaders anymore!!). We fell and survived the fall.... Right into a pile of like 6-7 gith! I guess staff was watching us and animated several of them as we furiously fought them off. And then as we were attempting to get away and found the road... Fell into a hole in the road! Ahhhh, good times. 2 of the 3 of us survived everything.

But I don't think if you're not paying attention you shouldn't go off the wall. If you're not paying attention to your suroundings.... Then what is your PC doing? A simply look in that direction will tell you if you go n that one more time you're "in the air". The room sdesc says something like "at the edge of shield wall" or something to that effect.

In sort, I like 1 and 3, but not so much 2. Plus I think falling accidentally is a right of passage. :-D

[Dunetrade55]

I didn't realize those were in place! Gotta say accidentally falling off shield wall was one of my most memorable moments. Was fully my fault and led 2 others off behind me(really glad we don't go off after leaders anymore!!). We fell and survived the fall.... Right into a pile of like 6-7 gith! I guess staff was watching us and animated several of them as we furiously fought them off. And then as we were attempting to get away and found the road... Fell into a hole in the road! Ahhhh, good times. 2 of the 3 of us survived everything.

But I don't think if you're not paying attention you shouldn't go off the wall. If you're not paying attention to your suroundings.... Then what is your PC doing? A simply look in that direction will tell you if you go n that one more time you're "in the air". The room sdesc says something like "at the edge of shield wall" or something to that effect.

In sort, I like 1 and 3, but not so much 2. Plus I think falling accidentally is a right of passage. :-D

Heh, I once played a C-elf warrior who fell off the shield wall, spent like, god knows how long knocked out, then booked it back around the end and back to town. That was a story to tell at the Gaj. He went around boasting how tough he was and they were like, what? (still newb) but while you should be paying attention, as miradus said, theirs an inconsistencey with zones.. which is whacko... plus if a terrain feature would be blindingly obvious, why would you even pull a thelma and louise if you didn't mean to? I'm all for paying attention but I have fallen in that chasm more than once with the l e thing in haste checking my surroundings becuase sometimes my keystrokes aren't counter (I've only fallen all the way down twice, the first time I survived it, but I was playing a HG going to rescue someone trapped in there so he took a running leap at the thing while flapping his arms real fast. HEY! IT WORKEDED!)

EDIT: Fallen in exactly THREE times, the second time I managed to catch a ledge... then got accused of deserting.

[IntuitiveApathy]

Over the years, I don't think I've actually lost a character to falling off a cliff or down a hole, though I have in quite a few instances (10+?) gone off cliffs inadvertently either solo, leading others or being led.  I have also seen first-hand many characters die as a result of going off a cliff/hole by what was obviously an accident.

As a result, I feel that the changes that staff have put in to prevent the accidental falling over a cliff are warranted and have long been asked for by players.

I think it's important to distinguish between accidental mishaps of the players, and what their PC is or should be doing.  Yes, it is the responsibility of the player behind the PC to cause that PC to act in whatever manner is appropriate for that PC and the in-game situation - that's just the normal standard expected of all players here.  However, we don't actively try to penalize players who accidentally make their PCs do things.  Take the fairly common mistargeting example.  I think it's generally considered bad form to hold a player to an obvious mistargeting for most situations.  Yes, it's certainly harder to do this if there are very serious consequences for the mistarget, but in most circumstances, we either outright use OOC to make a correction, or go with the flow and RP it out IC somehow.  We don't as a player typically hold another player to ransom for their accident.

If we don't or shouldn't be holding players to player accidents, why would we also hold a player to what amounts to an accidental trip off the Shield Wall?  Did they slip and accidentally enter some command or macro on their keyboard?  Did their cat or child do that?  Such an action in game has very serious consequences that cannot be undone - I'm not sure I've ever heard of an imm granting a resurrection request in those circumstances either.  Not only that, but it was even worse when your character led a whole train of people off a cliff by accident, thus causing a whole load of people to die, all by accident of the player, and not for some legitimate in-game reason.  As has also been pointed out, I do not feel that having to recuse the player accident by having to invent some lame justification ("oh ho Sarge why are you drunk again") and trying to salvage the results of the accident and pseudo plots that result are worth characters being outright lost entirely to player accident.  I don't disagree that Zalanthas should be a harsh place, believe me.  But it being harsh because we're holding people to something which was an accident is not the right kind of harsh that I believe Armageddon should be.

Nauta, you specifically point out that you dislike the second change in your post.  In my view, #2 (the change where you still have to enter a specific command to cause your character to walk over edge of their cliff to their potential doom) is the change which specifically addresses the problem of player accident head-on.  If it actually is IC for your character to walk off that cliff, then what harm is there in requiring the double-check command to do so?  You as the player enter that command, and off you go.  I see it as a slight inconvenience which is a small price to pay to resolve the larger problem at hand.  While all of the changes are good and important, I believe #2 is specifically the most important to resolve what was a long-standing problem with the game.

[Dunetrade55]

I, too, have seen and heard about some horrible accidents. I am personally happy with the changes. If it's not hardcore enough for you, Nauta, then each time you're "cliffblocked", then go ahead and push on through and off. Not everyone has the best or most reliable keyboard, not everyone has a devilish cat that can read and press keys and cause you to fall to your demise because the human slave is not petting enough, I must eliminate the rival threat. But these things do happen, I once lived with a big, evil, intelligent cat for years, I eventually converted him into a sweet, snuggle-loving kitty who decided to wake with soft headbutts and purrs as opposed to claws all over wake up bitch.

"Sergeant Baby! What are your commands?!"

The tiny, feeble, chubby figure in a brown aba points to a huge hole in the ground, as a tendril of drool drips on his inix and says "Uguuuuuu!"

[Lutagar]

Being able to accidentally walk off cliffs is not challenging, it's difficult to play, and it's taken many years but I'm ready to begin making this distinction.

[CodeMaster]

I think the 'north now' childproofing code is actually quite old, and might've come from a time when people travelled along the North Road with large groups of newbies to get to Luir's (before said road tumbled off the shield wall).  It's not consistently applied because those rooms have been altered a great deal due to various earthquakes, etc.

Cliff edges are an interesting beast because they (should) change how you play.  If you're anywhere near a cliff, you need to slow down.  If you're prone to rattling out random garbage onto your keyboard, you should seriously consider aliasing the n e s w commands so they're harder to type by accident.  If you're leading, you should take responsibility for setting the scene with descriptive emotes and verbal warnings (and if you're unfamiliar with the area, you should slow down). 

But if a deadly cliff isn't clear from a room description (keep in mind some of them aren't meant to be at night), I'd say you should definitely 'typo' it or somehow bring it to staff's attention.