there are more ships than living characters

[Auryn]

If people are so unhappy with the hoarding, not allowing newspawns to work for vehicles.... Do something about it! In character. If you're not happy about it, surely they aren't either. Shake up the leadership! Viva la revolution!

[Slowness_Incarnate]

I find that my characters are the exception to this rule. I've always traded or made vehicles for newer players because my characters are all so old..and they don't need five cars.

[SumBum]

If people are so unhappy with the hoarding, not allowing newspawns to work for vehicles.... Do something about it! In character. If you're not happy about it, surely they aren't either. Shake up the leadership! Viva la revolution!

This is a great thought, but I've seen too many times when someone spawns with this preconceived notion that the leadership is sleepy, hoarding mountains of stuff, and should be overthrown before even taking the time to get to know the town and its people. The most ironic incident happened in a town where the leader kept very little in storage and wasn't terribly sleepy.

[saztronic]

To be clear, I'm not unhappy with the hoarding, exactly.... it's more what the hoarding represents.

That is: an underpopulated, over-resourced world that undermines aspiration.

I remember when most roads were paths.

I remember when having or getting access to a tandem bike was a big deal.

I remember when aluminum first became available, and building a pickup truck, and what an amazing thing it was to have one.

I remember when rigging became available, and scrounging around for timber, and suddenly rakers could almost fly across the water for the first time.

I remember when sabers were about the best weapon you could hope to have or want... before crossbows, before battleaxes, and what it was like when those were introduced.

Now there are more ships than people, and every raker and sloop is rigged. There are more crossbows than sabers. Darters and carts and rickshaws and tandem bikes litter towns like a hundred forgotten salvage yards -- except for the one guard/junkyard dog in each that generally has all the keys. And there are stockpiles of resources everywhere... hundreds of thousands of grams of limestone or hematite and healing foods lying in the middle of towns, or in their storages.

The sense of adventure, of striving to do better than others, getting there first, doing the hard, amazing thing... not there anymore. Is it... getting the first ever platinum/gold/pearl/sapphire/emerald/diamond/whatever crown? Eh. OK. Not bad, but what would I do with it?

And sad but true, for many there is no pleasure in being rich in a world where everyone is rich. Part of human nature is the satisfaction of looking down on others, knowing that you have things they don't. I understand the hoarders -- there's nothing weird about their behavior. But in a world of hoarders, there's nothing very special about them either, no special satisfaction in having achieved something on merit. Just being spawned into it, lucking into it, or being so old that you've oulasted everyone else.

As for revolution, armed conflict, taking over towns... I've thought about it. And it's not as hard as people think, mechanics or RP-wise. Except for the fact that with only 209 English speaking players, and an even smaller fraction of those awake or capable enough to do anything significant, gathering an army or even 5-6 people that will go take a town of a dozen, you probably create 3-4 CRB issues just trying to do it. People have to leave their characters asleep, or decline to participate, or know the invasion is on its way before it happens, or all manner of other issues.

So... yeah. This is why being reminded that there are more ships than characters does not impress me.

[LittleSoul]

Except for the fact that with only 209 English speaking players, and an even smaller fraction of those awake or capable enough to do anything significant, gathering an army or even 5-6 people that will go take a town of a dozen, you probably create 3-4 CRB issues just trying to do it. People have to leave their characters asleep, or decline to participate, or know the invasion is on its way before it happens, or all manner of other issues.

..That is sadly true. With such a small english player base, everyone is pretty much everywhere important if you assume they all have 15 characters, so it would be easy for someone to CRB and suddenly spring into action to defend themselves..

That's a really sad, annoying realization.

[Uma]

I hope vehicles decay one day.

everything should decay.

but i have funny ideas about stuff. I kind of think food should decay, fast, unless you store it in a celar, seal it in a barrel, or build an ice box (if they existed). raw food should decay faster than food that 'keeps well' like cheese or i guess bread? (bread crust will keep it longer than raw meat in any case). I also think a person should only be able to carry about two fistfulls of substance or 5-6 'objects' without dropping them again. liquids should require containers and potatoes should be moved in sacks. tools should requier a satchel to carry lots of them.

anyway that's a side track but relevant. if all vehicles required maintenance, and food decayed quickly, it would be a juggle to maintain the vehicles and get enough food to live. division of labor would occur instead of some one living off of the 40 years of sleeper potato harvesting or 10,000 grams of inherited meat in the newbie hut.

heck i think automotive vehicles should routinely have parts 'go bad' on them and boats should routinely 'take on water' and take pailing out, as well as patching up the hull with new wood.

random events, random hazards etc would liven up the game and get rid of the glut of vehicles.

anyway i'm rambling

[SekoETC]

Good ideas, Uma. I especially like the ideas of vehicles requiring replacement parts and boats leaking.

[Uma]

oh and roads should decay! real life roads get back very frequently and with frequent use!

the more advanced a vehicle, the more it's parts should decay over time. it would be most interesting if there were conditions that were predictable.

driving in the desert leads to part A going bad, driving in a damp enviroment, part b (mud riders routinely ruin their vehicles due to neglect) not driving it for a while, could ruin part C, and driving it A LOT could ruin part D.

the vehicle could just 'get' the status associated with it. a car not driven for 5 years gains "bad oil". some one could spend a few hours diagnosing the vehicle. see it needs an oil change. oil change job requires some oil, and 50 iron (a filter). randomly, once a year, 1 vehicle per 40 could get 'flat tire' makes it drive SLOW until fix. fix? 1/4 of it's rubber cost.

boats would just be leaks. status like "bilge full of water", "hole in the hull (above water line), hole in the hull (bellow). bad rigging (fixed with rope and canvas) bad ropes, bad rutter (Requires stopping at a dock. makes turning bad? i dunno.

anyway, i wish i knew how to program. I like cantr. I wish i could help mor than just wild ideas

[Chroma Key]

If people are so unhappy with the hoarding, not allowing newspawns to work for vehicles.... Do something about it! In character. If you're not happy about it, surely they aren't either. Shake up the leadership! Viva la revolution!

This is a great thought, but I've seen too many times when someone spawns with this preconceived notion that the leadership is sleepy, hoarding mountains of stuff, and should be overthrown before even taking the time to get to know the town and its people. The most ironic incident happened in a town where the leader kept very little in storage and wasn't terribly sleepy.

This reminds me of an incident where a newspawn was throwing a fit for not being given a raker a few days after spawning. *shudders* A raker, yes, you read that right. Yes, there was very little in the storage, and no, the leader wasn't sleepy.

[HolyRoller]

I must say that I agree with a lot of the sentiments in this thread.

I started playing about 7 years ago. While I wasn't around for the very beginning of the game, it was early enough on that there were nowhere near as many resource hoards or vehicles, and if someone was carrying a crossbow, crowbar, and wearing something fancier than hide clothing you knew they were rich, trouble, or both. There were cars, but not all that many. There were fewer maps (The "best" big coloured atlases weren't around yet), so there were still mapmakers and explorers.

I too feel that having too many resources readily available takes away from the game for me - especially since I'm a bit more into the simming element than rp'ing. (Nowadays, anyway. I used to be all about rp.) A stockpile lets you work for, say, hematite rather than have to go on as many trade missions. (Or go out and find it in the mountains). Fortunately, 3 of my 12 chars are in remote, yet resource-rich locations. This makes it more fun, and much more like the game used to be.

I'm all for a game reset, honestly. I know it's been discussed many times. I miss the fun that comes with building all the machines, and that pride that comes with finally smelting steel or completing a jewel encrusted weapon. (Nostalgic sidenote - I also miss all the clans that used to be around. Especially being one of the MacGregors!)

Then again, maybe I'm just guilty of "golden age thinking." I sometimes think it would be great to live in the 1400s IRL, when people explored and discovered all new things. I wouldn't enjoy the diseases or lack of technology though! Like now in Cantr - we don't get to find new islands, be the first to have a car, or be the ruler of an area just because we've got the only decent weapon. We also don't have chars starve so easily or get the sneezing sickness!

[hyrle]

I recently had a character catch a sickness after breaking into a wooden cart that I believe hadn't been opened since the 2000's. (A dead body had obviously been inside.) I had no idea what it was, but he didn't cough or sneeze and wasn't sick for long. (He just ate double the normal food for that day or two.) In any case, I thought it was cool.

[HolyRoller]

I recently had a character catch a sickness after breaking into a wooden cart that I believe hadn't been opened since the 2000's. (A dead body had obviously been inside.) I had no idea what it was, but he didn't cough or sneeze and wasn't sick for long. (He just ate double the normal food for that day or two.) In any case, I thought it was cool.

Cool! I had no idea sickness was still around at all. That's what the sneezing sickness used to do - you'd eat more, and it would say "You sneeze" in the events. I don't know why it was taken away, maybe just because it got annoying?

Are there any regular sicknesses still around? I stopped playing for a year/year and a half and from what I can tell animal domestication is the only major change, new items aside.

[Uma]

i think a lot of our "in my day, uphill both says" rosey tinted glasses would adjust nicely if we allowed things to decay. stockpiles, vehicles, buildings. everything. it would look kind of depressing a little while, but no one could upkeep all of the things people have built and it would return to 'simpler time' without punishing people who have built up beautiful, in depth relationships and societies. they would maintain what they have.

ie i think we don't need a reset so much as a great decaying to begin

[Doug R.]

I don't know why it was taken away, maybe just because it got annoying?

It was removed because it was impossible to figure out the cure, since the symptoms did not present in any certain manifestation outside the sneeze (you could go three days with no sneezing, think you're cured, and sneeze on the fourth day.) Also, it had no impact on the game at all, other than being an irritant.

Corpse sickness is still around. It's plausible that there's a cure for it as well, but as it's also mainly an annoyance, I doubt any effort will be made to find it.

[hyrle]

I'm pretty sure that my character caught "corpse sickness", but he didn't need to take a cure. It just went away on its own and hasn't come back. There were no sneezing or other events... just something on my character page saying I was sick.