Answering machine NPCs

[JollyGreenGiant]

The discussion about the availability of merchants led me to thinking about something.  Could an NPC be scripted such that anyone could leave a message with it, and clan leaders could retrieve messages?  It'd work something like this.  You go to to the Kadius gate, where there's an NPC.

An eager-looking young boy is standing here.

> ask boy help

An eager-looking young boy says, "I can relay a message for you, just 'tell' me what you want me to say."

> tell boy I need five hundred pairs of grue leather boots, as soon as possible.

An eager-looking young boy says, "I'll make sure they get the message!"

Later on, the merchant comes around...

> ask boy messages

An eager-looking young boy says, "The dimwitted, flathead man said, 'I need five hundred pairs of grue leather boots, as soon as possible.'"

It might take some of the weight off of merchants, and might help people feel less like "there are no Kadians around."

[Akaramu]

I love this idea, I really do.

[Carnage]

I love this idea, I really do.

[grog]

What they said.

Guy should forget messages after a while. Like can queue up to 10 the rest is forgotten from too many.

Also the merchants shouldn't consider the answering machines word as law.
Just as a point in the right direction on who to talk to?

The answering boy says 'The figure in a green cloak says' I would like 10 anakore claw gloves for house wimpy nobles'
Somewhere guardsman Bob from house sissy is snickering about placing false orders.

[Bestatte]

That would be a neat idea, except what happens when you tell the Nenyuk npc:

I need an apartment near the Tembo's Tooth
on January 14...

and the Nenyuk agent doesn't show up til March 29, a month after your character is dead?

Or even if you asked Salarr:
I need a pair of hooked gloves
and the next day your buddy crafts a pair for you?

(Salarr probably is a bad example since the clan is very active and has a regular presence, but you get the idea)

[Ix Machina]

Or even if you asked Salarr:
I need a pair of hooked gloves
and the next day your buddy crafts a pair for you?

That's when Salarr uses the hooked gloves on you!  :shock:




Disclaimer: The above is a joke. Maybe. You never can tell with robots.

[Ayashah]

I really like this idea. Though I agree, the merchants shouldnt take it as an order till they 'confirm' it is still wanted. They can do that by using the way. Along with registering the short description, the person leaving the order should give their name. I DONT think it should auto register the name for the above named reason, pulling a scam. heheheh

But very very cool idea  First come first serve on getting the orders if there are multi-merchants in the House. HO! Merchant lazybutt just missed out on a 30k order due to never bothering to check around.

*grins*

[Dakkon Black]

I like this idea and in face similar has been discussed before but I hate looking for old threads. The basis of that one was make one of the guards outside of each house essentially an IC board. So the merchant could..

The slim guard

read board (read slim)

A bowl headed woman was here asking for a merchant. She would like to purchase a healers pouch and smelling salts. Her name was Poonani.

And perhaps give merchants of that house the ability to delete messages to keep it clean. That was if five people come by the little message boy isn't spewing out a novel all at once.

[Seeker]

This would do nothing to take the weight off Merchant PCs.  In fact, it would make things -much- worse.

Now a PC has to try and spend his play time trying to chase down the player who left this message.  This is much harder than many seem to think.  PCs often die, but a Merchant is now taxed to continue searching.  PCs often flee the city, but this poor PC Merchant must now wonder around looking in bar after bar for possibly months.  And the players must likely to use such an "answering machine" are -already- the ones who are not regularly interacting with, or seeing a Merchant character, so they may be playing at odd times, or just be the type of character that a Merchant would rather not deal with.

The only possible way that this might be a good idea for a Merchant House would be if such a Messenger required five hundred coins to see that the message was delivered.  No guarentee that anything would happen, just that it would be delivered.

Its a seller's market... just that simple.


Seeker

[Ix Machina]

On a more serious note, I have to agree with Seeker.

I would not like to see this implemented for my clan, for the main reason I stated in a different thread... the merchant house merchants and agents are not walking, emoting vending machines.

Something like this would simply reinforce the idea that a merchant/agent's sole purpose in a role is to provide stuff and consumables for pc's. This is very far from the truth. While merchants and agents are the 'face' of the house in taking orders, just like every  role, from rinth scum to senior noble, the player is here to play a role, with a life and personality outside of 'Would you like fries with that?'

So many times I would firmly state: No. No. No.

[Bestatte]

But, I -do- want fries with that!

I totally and completely understand and agree with the reasoning behind the idea. I disagree, however, with the idea itself. Rather than put in a new code to fix a communication problem (because that's really what it is), I'd prefer to see better communication.

Northlander experience here - southerners, eat your hearts out.
Kurac does an amazing job making sure their clan is represented by active PCs, and does their best to either deliver orders promptly or have an equally prompt explanation for delays.

Salarr has active representation up north.

Kadius - meh. Not the PC's fault, it's a southern-based PC and shouldn't be expected to be in the north at all, let alone sporadically. An IMM-created PC who shows up once a RL week would REALLY help matters, even if only to deliver past orders or straighten out pending orders for a temporary period until an active PC can be brought in.

Nenyuk - who's that? Seriously. Do we even -have- a Nenyuk PC in the north? Unless that Nenyuk is only playing between midnite and 6 AM on weeknights, EST, I haven't seen one in a couple of RL months.

[gfair]

just like every  role, from rinth scum to senior noble, the player is here to play a role, with a life and personality outside of 'Would you like fries with that?'

So many times I would firmly state: No. No. No.

I like the idea, and actually submitted this to staff several months ago.

The issue at hand isn't reducing Agents to order-takers, it is how easy or hard it is to get in touch with these people.  These agents will not suffer from an overwhelming amount of time being drawn off to take care of orders, it will actually save time - it doesn't reduce roles, it increases the role the shopkeeper plays as a merchant, by remembering things to pass on to his fellows in the House.  That has always been the case in the real world, why not in Zalanthas?

All this does is create an email-like system, represented as a realistic routine in game, that people can do.  It is especially helpful when Agents are few and far between, and I know that has been the situation in the past, and will change.

The truth is - the more the agents are around and well-known, the less this system will be needed, right?  The more inactive the agents, the more the orders pile up, and the more the merchant NPCs become essential links to PC commerce.

I like the idea, and think that with enough creativity and careful planning, it could work.

[Anonymous]

It's a great idea, but it will essentially limit interaction between PCs.  And I don't mean to sound condescending when I say we are not playing an item-delivery game but a Role-playing game.

What's the problem with waiting a couple of weeks if it gives you something to talk about when you see someone?  Or at least bug their little henchmen.

[JollyGreenGiant]

Oh yeah.  I did forget to mention that what brought on the idea was the lack of mudmail.  Mudmail being completely out of place on Zalanthas, so I was looking for a suitably Zalanthan way to approximate something similar, and probably only for merchant houses.

Still, I admit, it'd be even better if there were more separation between who talks to whom in a merchant house.  By that, I mean that a merchant House family member, i.e. Mrs. Kurac or Mr. Salarr, is trained from birth to handle accounts.  They know how to deal with nobility and other merchants and templars, and maybe high-ranking commoners such as Guard officers, Aides, etc.  Everyone else should be relegated to talking to merchant house employees - the crafters, merchants, hunters, and guards hired by the house.

This would do a lot of things.  I think it'd go a long way towards fixing the situation with unique, custom, and special orders.  A noble could still get in touch with a House merchant and order ten pairs of the super-nifty something or other boots, but your average commoner just wouldn't have that kind of access.  They're dealing with lower-level people in the merchant house, so for the most part, they've only got access to the kinds of items that those people can acquire for them.  Maybe in the long run, they get to know a few people, make some connections, and they get their hands on that uber-cool turban, but most people... just don't.

This also addresses the issue of incentives to join a noble House, as discussed in another thread.  Want access to the best stuff?  Join a noble House and you're that much closer.  Stay an independent, and, well, deal with things as they come.

It's a great idea, but it will essentially limit interaction between PCs.  And I don't mean to sound condescending when I say we are not playing an item-delivery game but a Role-playing game.

What's the problem with waiting a couple of weeks if it gives you something to talk about when you see someone?  Or at least bug their little henchmen.

Your role IS to deliver items when you are a merchant for a merchant house.
If its not then just have whats availiable in the shops and no special orders. In fact just get rid of the house merchants all together if they are just tavern sitting machines.

No problem waiting a coople of weeks. When it stretches into two rl months. Its ridiculous.

[Seeker]

Dead Newbie wrote:

Your role IS to deliver items when you are a merchant for a merchant house.

I disagree, and I think most of the IMMs would disagree, and I am fairly certain that anyone who has managed to play a successful PC House Merchant or Agent for any length of time over a few months would disagree.

I might concede that for a few that can be a -part- of their role, but you are making a mistake by demanding that every one who wears a Salarri cloak is required to service PCs, or shouldn't be permitted to play these character parts.  

CRW, not surprisingly, hit it right on the head.

we are not playing an item-delivery game but a Role-playing game.

Many of the Great Merchant Houses -will- have employees whose function is to hussle sales, but that does not mean that the PC you are looking at from a Merchant House is that type of employee, or should be forced to play that type of PC role to satisfy the odd, demanding desires of a few other individuals of the MUD.

Simply, these are not mandatorily subservient roles to the rest of the PC population, nor should they be expected to be.  


Seeker

[Ix Machina]

These agents will not suffer from an overwhelming amount of time being drawn off to take care of orders, it will actually save time - it doesn't reduce roles, it increases the role the shopkeeper plays as a merchant, by remembering things to pass on to his fellows in the House.  That has always been the case in the real world, why not in Zalanthas?

I don't know where to start here. The NPC's won't care. But any agent or merchant receiving 10 messages from an npc to go take care of an order yesterday, will.

The only time it saves is for the pc going up to the drive-through window instead of taking the time to find a merchant/agent/lackey and trying to get them to serve them. Seeker hit the nail on the head. Agents and merchants are not required to serve you, or deliver items.

Dead Newbie, you have a completely skewed view of the role of a merchant house agent, and it is that kind of view that leads to the frustration on the parts of many merchant house merchants and agents.

And yes, I completely agree with CRW. This is a role playing game not an item-delivery game, but I think with some people in merchant houses who are playing the roles of agents and merchants, they'd almost be hard-pressed to agree. Other characters and players WANT them to be item-delivery vending machines.

And believe me, there's nothing more sucky, or drains the enjoyment out of the game as fast as realizing playing Armageddon has become a tedious retail sales job without the perk of actually getting paid for it. I think most people have enough frustration in their daily lives without getting bombarded with the OOC frustrations of other players and the absolute drain that comes from trying to make everyone happy at the expense of building a character.

Templars also suffer from a degree of this, where instead of playing a character with a personality in a profession, you actually play a profession with a few personality quirks. It is even more draining as a merchant because you don't have the perks of power/nobility.

You may argue that 'But you get so much sid!', and yes, you do. However, oftentimes the frustration incurred OOCly is not worth the obsidian you make. Most merchant house agents/merchants would much rather play and interact than make 100k sid running around delivering orders and taking them and having that be the bulk of their play.

Having 'Answering machine NPC's', while offering one solution to the problem of not being able to find a merchant here or there, opens up even more problems with the workload of pc's already in the game. And it is work, IC and OOC.

[Lerl]

I think it boils down to whether PCs are expected to actually DO anything.  The answer is "No".  House hunters/gathers don't have to actually go get skins/rocks as they can do it virtually.  Merchants don't have to actually sell as they can do it virtually.  The game doesn't have mechanics/economics.  In fact most actual work is done virtually but virtual npcs.  Accept it.  I know there is a conflict since the buyer needs a non-virtual item.  But thats another issue.

Rick