Making certain animals Evil.

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Cogliostro
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Making certain animals Evil.

Postby Cogliostro » Wed Jan 13, 2010 1:51 pm

Normal animals, even predators, are more or less passive creatures. They randomly attack somebody once in a while and that's it.

What I want to suggest is that certain animal species (giant monstrous ones, very predatory ones) be "upgraded" to become pure evil. This is to encourage towns to work together to try and fight back the "monsters" if they show up.

The difference is that the Evil ones ALWAYS (instantly) hit back the person who has just hit them or any other animal; they are tough, they randomly strike people bit more often than normal animals, and they show up in evil red font in the animal list.

If the idea seems interesting, it can probably be implemented without any additional server load by putting it in as a "check" for evil animals present in town in the code that normally instantaneously handles hunting, instead of in the recurrent animal system code.
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Postby Piscator » Wed Jan 13, 2010 2:20 pm

This sounds a bit too much like hack&slash monster slaying to find a broad positive reception among players of this game. I also wonder if the introduction of quasi-NPCs is in line with the fundamental design principle of Cantr.
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Cogliostro
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Postby Cogliostro » Wed Jan 13, 2010 2:21 pm

That's only because I used the word "monster". It's in quotes, but still it causes trouble.
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Postby catpurr » Wed Jan 13, 2010 2:47 pm

This sounds a bit too much like hack&slash monster slaying to find a broad positive reception among players of this game. I also wonder if the introduction of quasi-NPCs is in line with the fundamental design principle of Cantr.
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Postby Piscator » Wed Jan 13, 2010 3:26 pm

It's not the word, whether or not in quotes, but the idea that's the problem.
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Cogliostro
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Postby Cogliostro » Wed Jan 13, 2010 4:10 pm

As if Cantr wasn't already a MUD, as if being a MUD was somehow a bad thing that left no room for personality and distinction!
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Ruby
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Postby Ruby » Wed Jan 13, 2010 4:11 pm

I see where you are coming from Coglistro. The spirit of Cantr is hidden underneath when you desire the town to unite and fight back against a monster. But I think the problem is just that. It's hidden.

IMO there are plenty of threats in the game already for people to unite against. The normal animals being one of them in some areas. (Did you read the Animal Explosion thread?)

There are also roving groups of bandits from time to time that your town would also have to unite against in case they attacked. And they would be much more clever than any AI directed monster.
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Postby tiddy ogg » Wed Jan 13, 2010 4:49 pm

All it will mean is that those animals become extinct. Due to their passivity and OOC conservation attitudes, in most towns leopards, wolves etc are allowed to continue their lives. Scarabs, I know, got wiped out deliberately on one island, and that is how it would have been in such societies if under constant threat of attack.
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Ruby
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Postby Ruby » Wed Jan 13, 2010 5:20 pm

There are plenty of IC conservation attitudes. Many, many towns rely on animals reproducing in order to get food. The same could be said about any resource in the game. Suddenly if too many people farming potatoes meant the potatoes would just disappear, you bet there would be a law about how many people can harvest potatoes.
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Dudel
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Postby Dudel » Wed Jan 13, 2010 5:37 pm

Animals are already rather aggressive anyway. People have been killed or at least near killed by them, already.
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Postby tiddy ogg » Thu Jan 14, 2010 9:45 am

Ruby wrote:There are plenty of IC conservation attitudes. Many, many towns rely on animals reproducing in order to get food. The same could be said about any resource in the game. Suddenly if too many people farming potatoes meant the potatoes would just disappear, you bet there would be a law about how many people can harvest potatoes.


There are. That's why resource slots were introduced once upon a time. Once there were no such restrictions.
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Ruby
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Postby Ruby » Thu Jan 14, 2010 10:37 am

It's most certainly not the same thing. Resource slots don't disappear once used nor do resources begin to disappear when all the resource slots are used. Killing of all the animals in a location means there is a chance that they won't come back. At least not anytime in the foreseeable future. When animals were first introduced this happened in many places very rapidly as everyone wanted the stuff that the animals produced.

Furthermore, I don't think I've ever seen all the resource slots in a location ever be close to fully used, but there may be a few places scattered around Cantr where it's true.
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Postby Cogliostro » Thu Jan 14, 2010 2:28 pm

For what it's worth, Ruby, I objected as belligerently as I only know how, when these resource slots were being discussed. People kept thinking it will "boost the economy" by creating scarcity which they always think is missing. That's foolish, and now that it's been put in place anyone can see for themselves that it didn't boost any economies, and is simply a silly inconvenience, or one more thing to parsimoniously legislate about for town-leader characters.
Drael
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Postby Drael » Sun Jan 17, 2010 6:33 am

Lol, recently I was attacked by a cow. Sometimes it does seem weird. I disagree with the general idea, personally, we already have enough villian PCs, and animal opponents is a little too fantasy genre for cantr IMO, but perhaps having an "aggressiveness" variable might make certain animals a bit easier to buy into - you know, more likely to be attacked by a wolf, than a cow, for example. Areas with lots of wolves, could be a bit more dangerous etc.

But even though it helps RP beleivability a little, it doesnt add much IMO to the fun of the game, and PD should have bigger proirities, like fixing the broken, game mechanic based, combat system - or some of the many other long term issues we have already.

Im sorry, I give this my thumbs down. Cantr has villians already who are player controlled, and much more interesting that NPC animals. Plus its semi-realistic, not fantasy genre.
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EchoMan
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Postby EchoMan » Sun Jan 17, 2010 10:07 am

The most hilarious attack I've had was from a deer. Normally (ok talking real life here) people doesn't have a chance of getting within 50 yards of a deer (unless they are sneaky ninja hunters or something) before they run away.

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