Shops opening and closing annoying?

[da mitey warrior]

I'm against the change.  I have better things to do with my limited time than camping out at a shop waiting for it to open.

[Tamarin]

I think if the day hours were extended, and the night hours shortened, I would be ok with it.  I think that a lot of the vendors (i.e. not shops) should definitely pack up during the night.

And if stores close down for the night, you should not be able to walk into them, in my humble opinion.  They should be -closed-.  Not just not selling stuff.

[UnderSeven]

It might be neat if they were closed down differently yes, but as far as waiting?  Give me a break, if you catch the VERY start of dusk, the next morning isn't very long away, we're talking 20 mins? Maybe?  I mean arm time flies.

[Angela Christine]

It might be neat if they were closed down differently yes, but as far as waiting?  Give me a break, if you catch the VERY start of dusk, the next morning isn't very long away, we're talking 20 mins? Maybe?  I mean arm time flies.

From dusk to dawn is three hours: dusk, late at night, before dawn.  That means at least 30 minutes.  As mentioned, many stores are not open from Dawn to Dusk, if they were I'd be happy as a fly in shit.  Some shops open at Early Morning, Late Morning, even High Sun.  And those are just the typical shops, some more esoteric shops keep stranger hours.  There is litterally no way of knowing when a given shop will open or close except to camp in the shop for a cycle, which could take an hour or more.  Wasting time walking to a closed shop is annoying as hell.  Having to camp out to learn the hours and then keep a record OOCly so you know when all of the dozens of shops in the game will be open is also annoying.

The shop hours should be obvious.

Every regular shop should be open at least 5 or 6 hours of the 9 hour day.


AC

[Gilvar]

I will make it a mission of mine to add a talk prog to as many shopkeepers as I can adequetely change that allows you to ask them their hours. May take a while to get going, and I'll let everyone know when they can start trying this... (if its possible).

[Anonymous]

The city holds 500k people. If anything, I think there isn't enough movement delay to represent that, but I'm not a masochist.

If that's what the movement delay is intended to be for....then what in the hell is the movement lag outdoors for?

Anyways, I'm for the added realism for night and day. Now if only the crim code could be altered to reflect the decrease of vnpcs on the streets at night...*sigh*

[Angela Christine]

Gilvar is cool.  Maybe I'll make up a limeric about hir.  Gilvar rhymes with silver, right?

Anyways, I'm for the added realism for night and day. Now if only the crim code could be altered to reflect the decrease of vnpcs on the streets at night...*sigh*

Bah.  I think the population would vary based on the interaction between the time of day and the weather.  

When it is stormy, yes, everyone would want to be inside before dark.  You can barely see during the day, so you could get lost on your own street at night, because it is so dark and stormy that a torch does not help.  

On the other hand when it is hot and clear, I think that many people would choose to work through the night, and rest during the heat of the day.  On a clear night you can often see without a torch, so the darkness is not a major problem for people moving around inside the city.  So during a wave of hot clear weather, there might actually be more people out at night than at midday.  At midday people take a seista, the water cost is just too high to work (and sweat) in very hot weather.

AC

[UnderSeven]

Wowowow, I love it AC,

So maybe we should be considering arm a more night time based culture.  I remeber reading somewhere that people in deserts travel at night because in the day it's quite simply impossible, but yet on arm it seems to be quite the opposite.

People will hate me for this, but maybe there should be larger penalities for being out in the heat. . teehee
0

[Twilight]

I don't like it that shops aren't open 24 hours in real life, I'm not sure why I should like it on the MUD.  I find it fine if I am logging in for 1+ hour sessions.  If I am logging in for 10-20 min sessions I find it extremely annoying.  As long as it is only kind of the periphery shops, it is definately liveable though.

[Petra]

I dislike it.  To me, it sacrifices playability for realism.  The biggest flaw, I find, with Arm is the amount of time it takes to do anything.  The game demands hours and hours of attention.  I've seen standard desert training sessions in various clans take up to 4 real hours from start to finish and all that was accomplished in that time was mounting up, going on a short expidition, slaughtering a few gith (or whatever), and returning.  I would prefer not to be restrained in this manner for something which (in my opinion) adds a scant measure of realism, at best.

[UnderSeven]

I disagree, first let me point out your example holds little relevance.

The difference is when you are talking about multiple pc exercsions it takes time to account for the fact many people are having to play in sync with one another.

Shop opening and closing is on a very clearly defined time ration and I believe most the time they are even opened.  To boot arm days and nights don't last that long in real life and finally, we already don't treat them differently enough except to note that in the night sometimes you can't see.  No, this is a great feature, but I think it still needs a little work.

Shops need more realistic hours, for instance if people work from dawn till dusk as laborers, than the shops are likely going to try to be opened for the people when they get off work, rather than closing up themselves.  In addition I believe Petra was comming from a byn point of view who DOES have to work during the day in arm and likely sees more closed than opened.  This maybe should be a touch adjusted.

[Candi]

I think the store hours are a bitch and therefore exactly like real life. It's just as frustrating in game as it is out.  :shock:

It also seems like the higher brow shops should have the most limited hours, while those who are seemingly struggling to keep themselves afloat would keep longer hours out of sheer necessity.  After all, if you need to sell those bandanas to keep yourself fed, you're a little more motivated to stay out there and find a buyer.

I dislike it. To me, it sacrifices playability for realism.  

There is the quandry for those people with limited RL time trying to juggle online necessities for their characters.  Added restraints like this one definately make it even more frustrating.   :?  You have to feel sorry for them since it can really take the fun out of the game.  It's a choice between convenience (adding to the enjoyment/"playability") and realism (adding to the drama/intensity).  It seems most gamers are going to end up voting for realism when it comes down to it.  Hey, it's no consolation...but I feel for you.  

So maybe we should be considering arm a more night time based culture.  I remeber reading somewhere that people in deserts travel at night because in the day it's quite simply impossible, but yet on arm it seems to be quite the opposite.

I think that this is definately the more realistic approach.  It makes sense in a desert environment that evenings and early mornings would be peak.  This is probably a good topic for a thread of it's own.  Could this even lead to some form night-time lighting in the main drags?  

[Anonymous]

Shops need more realistic hours, for instance if people work from dawn till dusk as laborers, than the shops are likely going to try to be opened for the people when they get off work, rather than closing up themselves.  In addition I believe Petra was comming from a byn point of view who DOES have to work during the day in arm and likely sees more closed than opened.  This maybe should be a touch adjusted.

I dunno, that seems a little too much like a RL concept that doesn't hold up in Zalanthan terms.  I think the vast majority of jobs out there aren't punch in and punch out jobs, other than maybe those who work in the obsidian mines but I'm not sure if those aren't all slaves.  Anyways, I imagine a lot of people are kept busy from dawn till dusk but could very well get an hour or three to run to the bazaar every now and then when need be.  Factoring into it that a shopkeeper who works throughout the night is increasing their operational costs by having to provide sufficient enough light sources to allow their customers to see during the dark hours.

That and since most commoners don't have two sids to rub together, the working stiffs probably aren't the target demographic for your average seller.