Decide Fate

[Fate]

I think its been suggested before but:

Basically every time you type fate, a random number between 1 to 100 is rolled.

You see:
You rolled 76.

If you Type fate showall
Then everyone in the rooms sees:
Bob rolled a 74.

Also if you  type: fate joe mary sue
Only those players see what you rolled.

Finally the command nofate makes it so you never get those messages.

The reason i want this command in the game is to allow competitions between people that arent coded:

For example two byners can have a pissing contest or whatever.

the ability for players to role numbers just for fun for example a player may decide that if they role greater then 95 they get pregnant.

There are probably a few other applications that this can be applied for, but its more of something just for fun and possibly used when two players can't decide who the victor should be.

[EonBlueApocalypse]

get rid of the numbers, and this could be cool.  just do one list for a scale of success, and another for comparative success.

"You fail miserably." or "You barely succeed."

and

"You succeed against joe-shmoe human with ease."

Also, add in a stat entry.

fate <affected stat> <all|player(s)>

I don't know to what depth this has been discussed before, I'm pretty new.

[Cyrian20]

get rid of the numbers, and this could be cool.  just do one list for a scale of success, and another for comparative success.

"You fail miserably." or "You barely succeed."

and

"You succeed against joe-shmoe human with ease."

Also, add in a stat entry.

fate <affected stat> <all|player(s)>

I don't know to what depth this has been discussed before, I'm pretty new.

An option to instantly compare your stats to mine should never be put in.

[EonBlueApocalypse]

An option to instantly compare your stats to mine should never be put in.

If the roll is 1-100 (or even 10-100), I don't see that very likely.  I don't know how stats are coded, but this could be coded effectively without giving away IC stats.

On the other hand ...  the dude with poor strength getting beat in an arm wrestle by the guy with exceptional strength?  Not only likely, but the guy with poor strength should really know what to expect.

What is the problem with that, just out of curiousity?

Edit:  I see the problem in this, now, but really, I don't think the actual gain is worth the trouble it could cause.

[The7DeadlyVenomz]

I don't really know about this. It's not the worst idea.

I do think there should be something for competitions like this....I'll have to think about it.

[Spoon]

Well, I'm going to start a pissing contest next time I log in, for sure.

[Lazloth]

Natural 20!

[Sir Diealot]

Twinks would all sit around arm wrestling, or whatever all day long, just to see who has the better stats.

[spawnloser]

An option to instantly compare your stats to mine should never be put in.

I was thinking about this for a while...and why not?  You arm wrestle a guy to see who's stronger...if there was some randomization added in, and no numbers to see, it could simulate this.  It'd only be able to be done for certain things maybe...like it's hard to truly test who learns faster or is smarter (especially considering the Zalanthan education system).

[creeper386]

I'm not a fan of this really. If you want to see who's stronger, well, there is at least one place that is a contest of strength.


Creep

[Cegar]

Twinks would all sit around arm wrestling, or whatever all day long, just to see who has the better stats.

Er... no?

[Synthesis]

I guarantee you a true twink would never sit around all day arm-wrestling to see who has better stats.

A twink would either a) Suicide his characters until one rolls exceptional strength or b) Spend all that time you're speculating about training his skills.

Arm-wrestling would simply be a colossal waste of time for a twink, because ultimately, the only thing that matters (as far as your stats are concerned) is what your statroll says.

That being said, I like this idea, as long as both players have to consent to the competition.  I'd imagine it going something like this:

> compete sue agility

> OOC: Joe wants to compete against you in a test of agility.  Type consent or refuse.

> consent

> You beat Joe badly.
> Sue beats you badly.

And once you have a definite end-result, you could emote out the competition without wondering who's just poweremoting over their abilities.  In fact, you could extend the competition to all skills and stats, really.  Want to see who can climb a rope faster? Compete climb strength agility.  With multiple skills and stats involved, you could even add a weighting system, so that the stats listed first in the command are weighted more heavily than the last.  Throw in the randomization factor (I think the randomization for each stat/skill should be normally distributed, and if the range of values is from 0-100, the mean should be 50, with a relatively small standard deviation, since skill and natural ability matter more than dumb luck, in most competitive situations), and you're all set.

(It would also be interesting if this competition command was incorporated into the skill-increase system, so that being beaten badly at wrestling [subdue], for instance, would give you an increase similar to a sparring session.  Obviously, skill-increase timers would have to be applied to prevent abuse, but this would open up amazing opportunities for RP-based training.  This way, you wouldn't have to sit there in code-based sparring mode for hours.  You could 'compete slashing parry agility strength', get the end result, and then emote the sparring session, and have the same coded skill-increase benefits that you would've gotten if you'd simply typed 'kill bob,' but with a much more beautiful and engaging visual result.)

Note that this would be a separate command than a "chance roll" command, with no competition involved.  A chance roll based on 1-100 would have a uniform distribution (each number has an equal chance of being rolled).

Both commands would be entirely out of character events, and shouldn't echo to anyone except the parties concerned.  Bystanders could figure out what was going on by the involved persons' emotes.

[EonBlueApocalypse]

Some cool suggestions, Synthesis.  I think if there were more prolific uses for this command (as some you outlined), it would be worth having.

[bardbard#4]

I think this is a good idea, and a potential for a valuable RP tool, but you have to realize that it is not the only thing that would have to change.

Stat-wise, characters are stagnant for the most part.  This usually isn't a huge concern, but if a new bit of code comes in that allows PCs to pit their stats against one another to determine a winner to an arbitrary task (which is determined by the ensuing RP), there has to be an allowance made for self-improvement.

Realistically, it is not difficult to improve your stamina.  If you have the motivation to go for a half-hour run every day for a month, your stamina and endurance are going to improve dramatically.  This could be the difference between "poor" endurance and "exceptional" endurance.  Likewise, agility and strength are also trainable traits.

There would have to be some mechanism whereby players can increase the stats of their PCs over time without the need for staff intervention.  Personally, I would rather see this as a hidden layer to what coded actions can already be taken rather than specific training exercises or new commands.  For instance, using the 'run' command a lot would gradually increase endurance.  Likewise, doing activities such as climbing and archery would increase agility.

There would be drawbacks, of course.  To maintain a certain level of physicality, the activities must be practiced routinely.  If a character suddenly stops doing whatever it is he was doing to get his improved level of fitness, that level would begin to drop, as is the case in real life.  Also, certain activities should put a coded toll on the PC.  Running a lot would require the PC to have to eat and drink more water.

To bring this back to the original 'fate' discussion...the reason this popped up in my mind was a hypothetical scenario.  Jo and Steve arm wrestle.  Jo woops Steve's ass.  Steve's ego takes a blow, and he decides to better himself so he can come back and unleash retribution on poor Jo.  Without something to account for the malleability of the human body, this could never happen.

Adding a dynamic system like this would do the game world a huge amount of justice, in my opinion.  It would blend well with the strides the staff are taking to make the game more real (things like SimDesert and Kruth shuffling).  I hope this is something people will feel is a valid idea.  Keep in mind that it's not meant as a powergamer's tool.  It's just a shift in policy to allow actions to reflect more realistically on a character's physical and mental traits.