The Importance of Teaching

[Chettaman]

Having not read much but the first post I'll describe how I use the teach command:

It always helps to know some actual knowledge about what you're ''teaching''. For instance how cotton bandages are a terrible idea because the little pieces of cotton will get stuck in the wound and the body will heal over those little pieces and cause infection.
You tell someone something like that as you use a cotton on your bandage and explain how cotton will absorb more blood and the bandage will keep the cotton from touching the wound.
Boom >teach dood bandage

or in combat, since combat is something really difficult for some people to understand and yes it is a lengthy thing to cover with words and such. So I just emote it mostly.

>emote using the same weapon as ~guy, @me describes, names, and demonstrates several moves. He demonstrates the moves once more describing their use, misuse, and how to counter them.

--- and then I usually wait and hopefully the other person emotes that they do indeed practice or they roleplay not getting it and I roleplay helping them understand.
I usually end the emote-teach session with some words like, "So that's this and that and now ou have to practice practice practice.
>teach guy shield use;teach guy slashing weapons

I try not to do it everyday, but there's no reason not to if you roleplay correctly.

[Riev]

But a successful teach is equivalent to a guaranteed gain, correct? Also, reading the helpfile seems to suggest that having a teacher of a much higher skill level will impart a larger chunk towards the teachee's skill. Is that correct?

This command allows your character to instruct another in the use of a skill or spell. The amount of knowledge imparted depends on the knowledge level of the student and the difference between the teacher's and the student's ability. The student must spend some time absorbing the new information before he or she can learn more.

Teaching is most effective to impart the 'basics' of a skill to someone; if they have already mastered the basics, then the effectiveness of the lessons are reduced.

This is what I meant by it being a bit arcane. Does being taught by a master mean you get TWO points learned in a skill? Does being successfully taught mean you get AT LEAST a point/successful skillup? What is meant by "basics"? Does this mean any teaching above "Apprentice" is reduced? Does that reduction mean a potential "failure" to skill up?

All that is pertinent information when determining whether a session is better run as an RP Teach session, or a coded combat session, especially when hidden values/skills exist that are not affected by the Teach code.

[Delirium]

Or you can do both and not worry so much about it?

[Chettaman]

Yeah. I do both. I'll RP teach, codedly use teach and then say, "Strap yoself, fool!" and offer to combat them with their "new" knowledge.

Of course I'm going to best them, but after a while of doing it. You see improvement and they get to a level where they can actually make you afraid to lose and you just want to cry a little. From pride.

-- or even reverse. I'll do combat and do some flashy moves and then explain my flashy moves and then codedly teach.

[Miradus]

-- or even reverse. I'll do combat and do some flashy moves and then explain my flashy moves and then codedly teach.

Didn't we learn in this thread that the reverse does nothing?

They swing at your superior booty a few times with their sword and miss, get the hidden tick up in skill, and then you say, "Let me show you how to use that sword."

And you teach, but it's not going to do anything because the regular skill timer has been triggered?

Seems to me you either teach before you show or you don't bother. The roleplay is immaterial to the code. You can do the roleplay either before, after, or however you want. But if you are going to teach a skill, they need to have not just failed the skill or you might as well not bother.

[Riev]

Miradus hits on what I'm talking about here. While I understand what Delerium means, and often I'm of the same mindset, we have the topic open so I'm putting my thoughts at face value.

If Teach, when the teach-ed person gets a successful message, means they got a tick up in their skill, further training in that skill is absolutely meaningless, and when it comes to combat skills, only becomes useful for those hidden skill factors.

If I'm teaching someone how to make bone swords, and I give them an amazing RP lesson, they don't need to try those techniques CODEDLY because a failure will do nothing for them. At this point, I don't feel its twinky at all to want to know how teach works AT LEAST enough to determine whether you're going to need that failure, or not. And if a master sword crafter is teaching someone at Journeyman, do they get the same "size" bump from teach as an apprentice would? Does that mean novices may even get +2, or +3?

[gotdamnmiracle]

She's saying that if one fails to do what you want, then hopefully the other will complete it for you. Honestly, I agree with this. In the case of combat, you accomplish training like five fifferent things with a successful bout. If I teach you how to stab with a spear or swing a blade, that doesn't necessarily mean your footwork isn't going to be garbage.

If you wanted to get the most bang for your buck I'd suggest teaching the skill from a defensive perspective. Like, telling them to grab a club and shield and YOU take up a spear and explain to them how a spear is best used, and how to counteract it. That's a ton accomplished all at once, even if it takes a bit of a liberal approach to teach, I think it still sufficiently hits the wickets.

[Chettaman]

Didn't we learn in this thread that the reverse does nothing?

I got to roleplay being the badass teacher.
If anyone gets upset that I didn't do it the right way they may submit a player complaint to staff or to me. 

But I am understanding your point of  how useless it is.
And then I get distracted and wonder why we do so many things in life and contemplate the word "useless".
Then I think of the people I've used "teach on" and see how far they've progressed and it brings a tear to my eye to know that they don't daddy anymore.

So. Whatever the case my be... I do it forwards and reverse and enjoy roleplaying caring only about whether or not the players I'm with enjoy what's happening. lol Even if it means giving them the false truth of me using "teach" on them.

[Miradus]

*SIGH*

You would still have been a badass teacher in roleplay. Nobody is going to take that away from you.

But if you had thrown out the teach command before they did the thing, then you would have been a badass teacher in roleplay AND they would have gotten a bigger benefit out of it codedly, thus allowing your badass teacher to exist both in the digital code AND your head canon.

[WanderingOoze]

Your fun is wrong!

[Miradus]

You know, I appreciate the hell out of a good roleplayer and I'm going to be pleased to see someone being the teacher.

But the reality is now, in the light of the code reveal, if your goal is to improve my skills codedly and you teach me after I already failed and activated my timer ... you didn't do shit.

That's completely separate from having the fun with the roleplay. And since you're GOING to a coded command to try to improve the skill, then I have to assume that if you throw out a teach command you WANT to do it properly so there's a benefit.

So to hell with all this "I'm a better roleplayer because I don't care about code" nonsense. If that was true then a player wouldn't be using the coded command in the first place. It's like saying, "I roleplay putting bandages on people instead of actually doing it." Well, that's awesome that you roleplay that but you're not really codedly doing anything.

Damn virtue signaling in roleplay. This is ridiculous. My thanks to the imm who explained how the code works and I'm happy to use it now as it apparently was codedly intended to be used.

ETA: That sounds harsher than I meant it to be. All I'm trying to say is the roleplay is cool and all, but we are talking about an actual coded function here.

[nessalin]

Hmmm, I'd always hold back a reserve of skepticism on what code was intended to do.    Like many features, the teach command is old as dirt and its original purpose, which may be separate from developer intent, has been buried under layers of how it has been incorporated into player culture (which we're seeing discussed in this thread) and staff desire (same, to a lesser degree).

While we've always sort of known that teach/skillgain use the same timer, and as a result cancel each other out in an individual session, it hasn't been a huge deal worth doing a re-write over.

Certainly the help file should be updated in light of the demonstrated delta between reality & player perception (no slight, there, it's an opaque feature).  Possibly code should be updated, too.

Some of the logic on % imparted on teach and how the differences in pupil / teacher skill values come into play was pulled from the Runequest game system, where teaching between campaigns could be used as a way to up skills without experience.  It was also heavily tilted towards knowledge based skills which weren't going to go up by staring at a book all day.

[Riev]

While ideally, teach and skillgain would work off separate timers, I think just updating the file on teach with expectations on RP from staff and a notation that if you successfully teach someone a skill, it will count towards learning that skill and repeated failures afterwards are codedly unnecessary.

I'm actually ALL for people teaching me like... slashing weapons without being in more than  a couple sparring sessions, for REASONS, but I feel like if someone is teaching a workshop on how to ... I don't know. Ride properly? The ride teach is all you need, they don't then need to go running around the city for 10-15 minutes for a failure, its just a waste of time.

[nessalin]

While ideally, teach and skillgain would work off separate timers, I think just updating the file on teach with expectations on RP from staff and a notation that if you successfully teach someone a skill, it will count towards learning that skill and repeated failures afterwards are codedly unnecessary.

I'm actually ALL for people teaching me like... slashing weapons without being in more than  a couple sparring sessions, for REASONS, but I feel like if someone is teaching a workshop on how to ... I don't know. Ride properly? The ride teach is all you need, they don't then need to go running around the city for 10-15 minutes for a failure, its just a waste of time.

Yeah.

Or the teach command will make your next skillgain in that skill be a larger than normal boost.

Using it before sparring, get a nicer boost off sparing right away.  RP it as they just showed you something useful.

Using after sparring - no harm - you'll still get your boost NEXT time, after thinking for a while on what your instructor taught you.  RP it as they explained what you did wrong, and you need to do better next time.

[Riev]

That'd be an interesting tweak. Like a lingering status effect that the next gain on a that particular skill is doubled (assuming 1pt increases each time). That way its not "I just taught you how to parry, you should know how" but more "the next time to don't parry, you'll remember this lesson and try harder".

I'd be for the idea. Though I often avoid asking for code changes when transparency will do. But of course, the idea is a better one than simply 'laying out how it works currently'.

[FantasyWriter]

Yeah.

Or the teach command will make your next skillgain in that skill be a larger than normal boost.

Using it before sparring, get a nicer boost off sparing right away.  RP it as they just showed you something useful.

Using after sparring - no harm - you'll still get your boost NEXT time, after thinking for a while on what your instructor taught you.  RP it as they explained what you did wrong, and you need to do better next time.

I think those ideas seem much more realistic compared to RL learning than the current +X bump when user A uses the Teach command on user B. Awesome idea!