Things in Your Inventory Slowing You Down

[Night Queen]

And if a giant can't carry a crate easily that holds less then a quarter is weight. Then I want to make sure that small chests or boxes just devastate humans.

They already do, because of the weight - the issue is it just doesn't work to go by weight to work out what can be reasonably held when one item can be an actual chest of drawers with no handles, held with invisible hands while also fighting

A good rule of thumb when you see something you think is bad RP, handle it IC first.  Don't try to take other people's options/playability crutches away just becauseyou, the player are incapable of ignoring something that bothers you on an OOC level

Sure, anyone can ignore stuff like this, easy, if we just give up caring. But:

1. It gives new people a terrible impression of karma players that should be setting a good example.

2. When there are consistently low standards on behavior in some ways like this, it's hard to encourage everyone else to be better, it's the effect of "Well, they're getting away with that, why can't I do <stupid-borderline-thing here>?"

3. Stuff like this detracts from the atmosphere for everyone else, and makes it harder to argue to potential new players from other forms of RP (which is the best way to invite new people) that it's not "just another MUD". Other games in similar situations went down the drain because of becoming increasingly focused on mechanics, and it doesn't kill the game, people can ignore it, sure... But keep ignoring stuff and you end up with the people that run around mindlessly hitting stuff being the only ones that are left.

Edited by Hestia: added the rest of the sentence for context, removed a line implying the other poster had an agenda/negative motive

[creeper386]

That chest of drawers ... That is a small box to a giant, could be virtual nets or any number of thing tied to a backpack or something, but it's not something that the code supports.


What items are available to further this sort of roleplay is incredibly limited.

But the problem is, you are trying to solve it by ONLY weight. That 30 stone object could be a hunk of rock or a big dresser. Nothing about weight indicated anything about it's volume or ability to be carried.

What fi it's a 30 stone box that Does have straps and handles, but doesn't have wear locations. Should it just be unusable until a bug fix comes through.


If this fix  that's been proposed was scaled at all based on character sizes, it'd make just about anything not carriable.

[creeper386]

Edited by Hestia: removed because it was a criticism of a removed line from another post

[dumbstruck]

I don't play half-giants, I don't have a personal horse in that race. But, for the people who this is so upsetting to, would it satisfy you to see it being put in a line in their tdesc or something about having the thing strapped to a hip like a saddlebag? I feel like realistically, if we want to argue about realism, in this instance, there should absolutely be larger container items that half-giants can wear and use that have a lot more space in/on them than when a human does.

Wanna bet that the 3 stones that the pockets of those pants hold when a dwarf wears them don't scale up to 30 with size though. Realism, am I right? If we want to argue for that, you should make chests and crates wearable on belt and see if we don't see HGs start doing that. I am willing to bet at least a couple would. And a belt sized for a half-giant? Probably gonna need to be stout enough to hold 'em up, too. Or maybe we make pouched belts that are sized for half giants where they can fit the same amount as a crate? How do we do that with code?

[creeper386]

Last post.


This sort of change would make inventory management a nightmare.

It's pretty easy to forget to repack a box or a bag, especially when it doesn't even impact your encumbrace, but this sort of change would cause massive penalties or say dropping an object.

It's then easy to miss that the object was dropped especially in the spam of combat. And now you don't have an impact on your encumbrance. It hasn't gotten lighter. You start leaving chests and boxes and bags all over the known. It's an nightmare.


I say either go to the two hand only inventory after ramping up all sorts of neat ways to carry stuff. Or realize it's a game, and that the crates in game, when full up, not impacting encumbrace, isn't actually causing any issues, and give other players the benefit of the doubt that something reasonable is happening.

[Tranquil]

At the moment, there are alot of things that are meant to be a thing in game, but aren't, because people have found ways to abuse and go around the implemented penalty via code.

Low agility is supposed to give you a small inventory to clumsily hold a few things at best, if your character hasn't gotten access to the many wearable containers in-game, or simply put it on their mount. This is gone around by carrying a few massive chests in your hands.

Side-note: Your mount doesn't receive any encumbrance penalties from whatever size or weight the rider is, only from the things that are strapped to the mount itself.

Low agility is supposed to make you slow in combat, and generally, make it hard to hit things. This is gone around by simply raising two-hand, and even better, raising ride + charge.

Low agility is supposed to make you very easy to hit, via ranged or in melee. This is true for the first month or so, but then the defense score rises high enough (due to getting hit so much) that, ironically, a giant is harder to hit with an arrow/blowdart then the average trained human.

I think there should be efforts made to start balancing things to the way they should be, and this thread could perhaps drive such an effort to fix atleast one thing.

This sort of change would make inventory management a nightmare.

It's pretty easy to forget to repack a box or a bag, especially when it doesn't even impact your encumbrace, but this sort of change would cause massive penalties or say dropping an object.

It's then easy to miss that the object was dropped especially in the spam of combat. And now you don't have an impact on your encumbrance. It hasn't gotten lighter. You start leaving chests and boxes and bags all over the known. It's an nightmare.

I don't see this as a bad thing. It makes such encounters more complex, and the fall-outs more interesting, in contrast to the path of simply 'winning' and keeping everything on you. Someone could find all these crates and chests all over the Known, loot them, tell stories about them, etc. Armageddon is a game, but it's a game that focuses on conflict, and scenarios that arise from conflict. Why not make the conflict richer and more interesting, not only with RP, but with code to help push along appropriate RP?

Inventory management is supposed to be a nightmare for a race that is too clumsy to hold on to more then a few things unless they're strapped onto them. Not to mention, half-giants are meant to be forgetful. Especially if the things they're holding are.. not able to be even felt by them, by your claim.

[creeper386]

Side-note: Your mount doesn't receive any encumbrance penalties from whatever size or weight the rider is, only from the things that are strapped to the mount itself.

Almost 100% sure this is very wrong. Mounts without riders lose encumbrance way slower.

[Agent_137]

 I was never bothered by half giants carrying around chests.  Seemed like a must because  sizing a backpack for a half giant doesn't increase it's carrying capacity.  Making code changes to nerf this behavior seems like an unfun solution. What should be done is give HGs more reasonable ways to carry all their crap.

[dumbstruck]

I was never bothered by half giants carrying around chests.  Seemed like a must because  sizing a backpack for a half giant doesn't increase it's carrying capacity.  Making code changes to nerf this behavior seems like an unfun solution. What should be done is give HGs more reasonable ways to carry all their crap.

This was kind of exactly my thing with it, like a crate/chest is probably equivalent to a backpack that's properly sized for a HG but because we don't have those, everything is nanners, and you just know that if we did and they were still somehow wearable by smaller people (which they probably would be, unless there is like a race_only flag) because container items don't hold a 'size' the way that normal items do, this seems like a perfectly logical workaround, though it would be rad to see something just absolutely stupid like a crate and ropes you could craft together into a wearable crate that you could wear on your back. bet hgs would wear 'em and humans wouldn't, because crates are so heavy, without even putting anything into them.

[betweenford]

Several clans have gigantic/giant-intended-use backpacks that themselves are about the size of a trunk or a crate. Most giants do not know about or use these items.

It really is just kind of ridiculous to see giants manipulating 3-4 filled chests/crates while also wielding a megasword.

[FantasyWriter]

1. It gives new people a terrible impression of karma players that should be setting a good example.

2. When there are consistently low standards on behavior in some ways like this, it's hard to encourage everyone else to be better, it's the effect of "Well, they're getting away with that, why can't I do <stupid-borderline-thing here>?"

3. Stuff like this detracts from the atmosphere for everyone else, and makes it harder to argue to potential new players from other forms of RP (which is the best way to invite new people) that it's not "just another MUD". Other games in similar situations went down the drain because of becoming increasingly focused on mechanics, and it doesn't kill the game, people can ignore it, sure... But keep ignoring stuff and you end up with the people that run around mindlessly hitting stuff being the only ones that are left.

A. I just suggested talking to the players IG about it to resolve the issue there.

1. There you are again saying that if people don't play like you want them to, they are bad roleplayers and undeserving of high-karma roles.

2. Again, you are saying that this is BAD behavior without addressing it in game

3. "Stuff like this distracts from the atmosphere" that is why specifically  I said "incapable of ignoring things you don't like OOC"  I see people do stupid shit all the time, my personal [least] favorite is sparring roleplay. Things like master fighers not being able to hold back 50% of their offensive skill so they can actually swing at a friendly with a blunted weapon without taking their head of.  I just roll with it.

For the record I don't think anyone should ever be carrying around two chests either, I wonder if making more high-capacity backpacks more available in game would alleviate this problem. The bags... meh, I have brought in 10+ grocery bags before and still managed to unlock the door and turn the handle.

Edited by Hestia: removed references to previously deleted lines in a post

[Hestia]

I'm gonna remind everyone here to please re-read https://gdb.armageddon.org/index.php/topic,51856.0.html - our forum rules.

If you're not a moderator, don't try to police this forum yourself. If you feel a post is against our rules, then report it to the moderator. If it isn't against our rules, then they have the right to their opinion. If you're unsure, report to moderator.

Don't criticize other people or accuse them of doing so to others. You can criticize the content of their post - but not the poster.  We /try/ to be civil here.  That is not a request, it's an expectation. Thanks.

[LXXXVIII]

Agreed that making mechanics changes would make the game miserable, but also that walking in on a character loaded down like an inix is immersion breaking.

My two cents, stop blaming groups of players because I've seen every sort of concept guilty of the behavior described, and examples of good roleplay among the most despised/blamed concept in this thread, half-giants. Not to toot my own horn, but my most recent half-giant was so stupid she would leave crates all over the place, including non save rooms, because I also found the idea of fighting while loaded down immersion breaking. Do I get a prize for roleplaying in a believably stupid and clumsy way? Well, I guess I got a couple of kudoses... including for a time I let an elf completely rip off my HG by letting the elf pick "anything" she wanted out of my HG's crate--thousands of sids worth of goods--in exchange for an elven craft worth about 200 coins. Because shockingly, some players of HGs can roleplay.

Solution: critique bad roleplayers with sick burns in game or targeted complaints rather than vaguebooking about how certain roleplayers or character concepts are bad and punishing everyone with mechanics.

Encumbrance code updates, including showing heavy items carried in ldescs, already empowers you to be the change! Is someone breaking immersion? Point it out and they might change!

The Aide to a Noble Lady carrying 5 bags of master crafted equipment (some immersion breaking shit I've seen in game): Great Lady! Are you fond of developing your muscles through labor or might I lighten your burden for you? Perhaps I can fetch another servant to help carry all of your, uhm, large bags?

The Red Stormer to a mul starting a bar fight while carrying 3 chests: Oi! Wot're ye doing swinging at me with three feckin' chests t'ye chest? Did'ye escape slavery t'become a feckin' pack animal?!

The Byn Recruit to a Half-Giant Trooper jogging with 4 humongous crates on them: I wish I 'ad massive rolls of lard to tuck crates under whilst we run around, seems handy!

If anyone thinks in-game critiques are immersion breaking themselves, then you are also at liberty to complain via private OOC mechanisms. And if you see a half-giant like one of my characters who is leaving shit all over the place and not quitting out with shelves and bags stacked on them like a dragon's hoard, maybe kudos them, they'll appreciate it

[Night Queen]

Accusing people of being "incapable of ignoring" is pretty rude, when the reply saying it's insulting gets edited but not the insult in the first place, it doesn't seem right.


Isn't it not for players to argue with or give criticism to other players for the behaviour of specific characters ingame, I would've thought that'd probably be considered an abuse of OOC? It'd seem obnoxious if someone started saying stuff like that OOC.

And passive-aggressive IC comments about it would be even worse. Responding IC to something that should obviously be impossible is a terrible idea because it just legitimises what happened as if it is real, and godmodes other people into replying to your words/actions that are referring to something that should be impossible.

My reply wasn't about any particular character, and I don't appreciate the vague accusation that it was vaguebooking. Discussing this kind of stuff in general is the whole point of threads like these, it's something that a few people noticed happens over many different characters.

[LXXXVIII]

Alright, sure, apologies. I didn't see the original content before staff edited it. I just saw from notes that people were being mean and assumed it was that.

To emphasize in terms you might find less objectionable: we probably don't need game breaking mechanics, can chill, and if someone is doing something stupid in game you can say it's stupid.

Case in point, this guy: https://youtu.be/Y3i2xbaxcRE

This man practically IS the Armageddon trope. How many times have you seen Amos carrying a couch and running around like it's nothing? How many times have you seen that and thought, "That breaks my immersion?" Well, great news is (1) Armageddon physics / biomechanics are fairly realistic and (2) when people do such things such as the man in the posted video, people make fun of them. And you can do the same thing in game, it's realistic! Be the change.

Last note is I think a lot of people complaining aren't used to encountering very strong people IRL. My girlfriend has myostatin related muscle hypertrophy (or at least all the symptoms of it including the bad ones) and I once saw her carrying 10 heavy shopping bags with one hand. It looked insane because it was indeed superhuman but normal to her. You might just need more exposure to conceptualize that some behaviors IG are actually realistic so far as these fantasy "races" are conceptualized.

[Night Queen]

No one has been talking about strength though, we already know it's possible to carry heavy things in one hand, the issue is like some slide puzzle thing where if you move the hand to hold one thing, you can't also be holding other things at the same time, due to the shape and size. With the sheer hugeness of stuff, even if it was stuck into pockets it'd make moving impossible, let alone holding other things, no matter how strong, because of everything being so big and bumping and blocking. This is sometimes about two hundred things per crate, some of them bigger than any human-shaped thing's head.

The game breaking mechanics are already there, it's the thing that allows this to happen, and no matter how it's become normalised for some, newer people seeing that happen are just going to be wondering why they are allowed to do this obviously unrealistic thing, so it drags everyone else down and makes it hard to encourage people that it's not just a hack and slash, and people do in fact care about trying to make it seem believable

[creeper386]

This this would require a whole overall of how items work and editing all items in the game. Because if it's not strength related, weight has nothing to do with it.

But also, inventory still doesn't mean in arms or in hands. I don't think it ever has. That whole mindset in my opinion is the problem.


There are probably a hundred other things that are more conducive to getting new players then having a limited mindset on the inventory system and deciding other players aren't playing realistically.

[FantasyWriter]

But strength IS part of the issue, when you are a half giant, four "large bags" is the equivalent of four plastic shopping bags.  Three chests (I'm thinking the ones you can carve different panels for) would be the equivalent of a human carrying around three large college textbooks or a stack of three banker boxes.  The inaccessibility of many areas to mounts or the inability to stable mounts with things packed on them is also an issue.

Historically, you rode into town on horseback, you could reasonably park your loaded mount in a public stable and and leave your things there under watch, or if you were the paranoid sort, load all that shit up on your shoulders and march into the bar or public house carrying the shit the way some characters do in game.  Not everyone has a "base" or apartment. I tend to avoid them like the plague because I prefer interacting with other characters as opposed to hiding in a apartment and spam crafting/gickering/kanking all the time.

Edit to add: Sometimes you come in from hunting/grebbing, and all that stuff WAS on your mount, but the shops are closed and or not buying what you have, so you have no choice but to lug it around or junk your hard-days work, something insane on an IC level.

[Night Queen]

It's not the same, because it's about shape, not weight, a crate is not the same size as a book, even to a giant. It's impossible to hold several crates - and even be holding other things or even fighting(!), it's just silly, as a few people have said

And sure, there's lots of issues, but fixing none because there's too many is self-defeating, it'd be good to start going through this kind of stuff, to make it less of a hard sell to convince people to come here when there's people saying only code matters!

[mansa]

To clarify my position on this topic:

I really don't care if characters have large items in their inventory for every instance in the game, with the sole exception of combat.  My suggestion that if those characters were to enter combat, those items would be dropped.
* Large items being defined by an ArmageddonMUD coder.  My suggestion would be the weight of a "blocky stone" object, since it is the largest rock item you can forage.



I don't want to have the characters with large items in their inventory to have their combat skills lowered while holding those large objects.  Dropping those items should be easier to code.
I don't want to have the characters with large items in their inventory to have to fumble around during crafting / socializing / exploring / achieving with object management.

[FantasyWriter]

@NightQueen

I guess I am seeing a bigger scope from what the OP than what you are talking about now.  Is the perceived lack of how it affect combat your biggest concern?  I thought you were talking about the ability to carry that kind of stuff around in general.  Like this:
https://ibb.co/0cKhFN5

[Tranquil]

To clarify my position on this topic:

I really don't care if characters have large items in their inventory for every instance in the game, with the sole exception of combat.  My suggestion that if those characters were to enter combat, those items would be dropped.
* Large items being defined by an ArmageddonMUD coder.  My suggestion would be the weight of a "blocky stone" object, since it is the largest rock item you can forage.



I don't want to have the characters with large items in their inventory to have their combat skills lowered while holding those large objects.  Dropping those items should be easier to code.
I don't want to have the characters with large items in their inventory to have to fumble around during crafting / socializing / exploring / achieving with object management.

I agree completely. Strength is supposed to let you carry huge things. That's why muls and giants are made. Nothing stopping them from carrying eight chests whilst hauling stuff around.

However, I still think this shouldn't be abused in combat, for the many reasons stated above.

Just another way to abuse and go about the set 'limitations' of a race, in the stage of combat that often way too heavily favors strength in almost every way.

[Riev]

Is the issue that strong characters are carrying chests and you want to attack them so they drop the chest?

Is the issue that strong characters are carrying chests during combat and utilizing objects inside them?

Is the issue that strong characters are carrying multiple chests rather than using a backpack?



What I'm reading is "half-giants should not be able to fight well if they are carrying a bunch of things".
What I'm responding is "why can elves have 12 pockets full of jingling coins and dangling glass jewelry they stole and can still sneak and hide".

[Filthy_Grey_Rat]

/I/ think the problem is, when you see the half-giant:

The mud-faced, floppy-eared half-giant
  - he is carrying a wooden chest
              more wooden chests
                too many chests



Perhaps we can just change the text to read: he is burdened by a wooden chest


And change the return from inventory to : In your inventory (instead of hands)


Wouldn't that fix the  problem?

[Kaathe]

hopefully helpful facts:

Several clans have gigantic/giant-intended-use backpacks that themselves are about the size of a trunk or a crate. Most giants do not know about or use these items.

I checked the database and found four! Half are kadian, half are indy. They aren't flagged specifically as HG packs, so I may have missed a few. They're bigger than chests but smaller than crates.

Thanks to analyze changes and opening up darkmoon crafts to indies, hopefully we'll see the indy ones in use.

My suggestion would be the weight of a "blocky stone" object, since it is the largest rock item you can forage.

Many weapons are heavier than those blocky stones.