<!-- MHonArc v2.4.4 --> <!--X-Subject: Re: [MUD-Dev] banning the sale of items --> <!--X-From-R13: Fvzbgul Rnat <gqnatNG.Oevmban.SRG> --> <!--X-Date: Tue, 18 Apr 2000 19:11:42 -0700 --> <!--X-Message-Id: Pine.HPX.4.10.10004171022550.29114-100000#orion,U.Arizona.EDU --> <!--X-Content-Type: text/plain --> <!--X-Reference: 14586.40394.649544.676514#alyx,skotos.net --> <!--X-Head-End--> <!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 3.2//EN"> <html> <head> <title>MUD-Dev message, Re: [MUD-Dev] banning the sale of items</title> <!-- meta name="robots" content="noindex,nofollow" --> <link rev="made" href="mailto:tdang#U,Arizona.EDU"> </head> <body background="/backgrounds/paperback.gif" bgcolor="#ffffff" text="#000000" link="#0000FF" alink="#FF0000" vlink="#006000"> <font size="+4" color="#804040"> <strong><em>MUD-Dev<br>mailing list archive</em></strong> </font> <br> [ <a href="../">Other Periods</a> | <a href="../../">Other mailing lists</a> | <a href="/search.php3">Search</a> ] <br clear=all><hr> <!--X-Body-Begin--> <!--X-User-Header--> <!--X-User-Header-End--> <!--X-TopPNI--> Date: [ <a href="msg00450.html">Previous</a> | <a href="msg00452.html">Next</a> ] Thread: [ <a href="msg00429.html">Previous</a> | <a href="msg00344.html">Next</a> ] Index: [ <A HREF="author.html#00451">Author</A> | <A HREF="#00451">Date</A> | <A HREF="thread.html#00451">Thread</A> ] <!--X-TopPNI-End--> <!--X-MsgBody--> <!--X-Subject-Header-Begin--> <H1>Re: [MUD-Dev] banning the sale of items</H1> <HR> <!--X-Subject-Header-End--> <!--X-Head-of-Message--> <UL> <LI><em>To</em>: <A HREF="mailto:mud-dev#kanga,nu">mud-dev#kanga,nu</A></LI> <LI><em>Subject</em>: Re: [MUD-Dev] banning the sale of items</LI> <LI><em>From</em>: Timothy Dang <<A HREF="mailto:tdang#U,Arizona.EDU">tdang#U,Arizona.EDU</A>></LI> <LI><em>Date</em>: Tue, 18 Apr 2000 19:09:03 -0700 (MST)</LI> <LI><em>Reply-To</em>: <A HREF="mailto:mud-dev#kanga,nu">mud-dev#kanga,nu</A></LI> <LI><em>Sender</em>: <A HREF="mailto:mud-dev-admin#kanga,nu">mud-dev-admin#kanga,nu</A></LI> </UL> <!--X-Head-of-Message-End--> <!--X-Head-Body-Sep-Begin--> <HR> <!--X-Head-Body-Sep-End--> <!--X-Body-of-Message--> <PRE> Just as in the discussion of multiple characters per player, the absoluteness of the arguments on selling items troubles me. Yes, in any environment where players care enough about items, and they are tradeable there will be exchange. However, just as in the real world, putting up some road blocks will decrease the amount of trade. And this diminishment (or even perceived diminishment) of trade will effect the environment. Someone (Matt?) brought up an example of nightclubs and who might be given preferential service. To extend the example: At some nightclubs, an onsite drug dealer is part of the implicit service offered. They can't make it explicit for legal reasons, but it's worth it to the management to make the drug dealer comfortable, and let the clientelle know the extra service is available. At other clubs, drug dealers are most distinctly not welcome, because the management doesn't want to attract the same clientelle, not to mention risking the police raiding the club and spoiling everyone's good time. In the latter case, there's no way to gaurantee that drug deals don't take place, and some almost certainly do. But they don't set the club's atmosphere. Both approaches are arguably valid business decisions, but with different goals. It is reasonably argued that the game can be designed so that inter-world trade doesn't matter much, and so won't either attract much demand, nor heavily offend those who are offended by such. However, you gotta wonder whether such designs change the nature of the games offered, and possibly limit design choices more than desired. As it relates to Achaea (which I'm sorry to say I haven't managed to find the time to check out), as I understand it from discussion here, it's unusually heavily weighted towards RL skills being important. In other words, advantages acquired through native skill of the player, or skill the player (not the PC) acquires through practice dominate in-game advantages of equipment, or character skills? I may be wrong about Achea, but this sort of environment would make a lot of sense if one wants to minimize the troubles raised by inter-world trade. It's also counter to the standard of RPGs which often put an enormous importance on PC stats. A heavily RP-oriented environment would also be less vulnerable to alteration by inter-world trade, because one can't buy RP skill. I'm less concerned about the admins offering sale of items than about players trading between worlds. With admin-generated items, there are many things which can be done to minimize the impact. One can make sure that the items sold are ones which are "appropriate". Also, items can be made readily identifiable as purchased versus "won" items, so to maintain the prestige associated with acquiring items in-game. But this doesn't address concerns about players trading items amongst themselves for otherworldly resources (RL money). If it is possible, and openly acceptable for players to do this, that could seriously alter a game's atmosphere and dynamics (for better or worse). If trying to design a game where inter-world trading doesn't change things much, it seems that much of what's standard design would have to be abandoned. One way to avoid this is to disallow intercharacter exchange of items. This is done with certain items in some games, but prevents intraworld trade as well as interworld trade. Alternatively, one can make tradeable items of smaller consequence. But (particularly when tradeable items include characters themselves), this seems to lean towards a game system where player skills heavily dominate PC capabilities in importance. There's in-betweens also, such as level limits on items. These don't explicitly prevent trade, but limit the demand for items to those who may reasonably be expected to have ingame resources to acquire the items. I do wonder about the overall effect on the game's environment of rampant interworld trading. Whether one thinks of MUDs as isolated from the real world or not, I would expect that many players get into MUDs as an axis of acheivement separate from those apparent in RL. If measures of acheivement for PCs in a MUD closely mirror those of their RL players, this could turn a lot of folks off. Or not; while the effect of item sales seems apparent in EQ, I don't know if it has had much effect on UO (except for housing). ------------------------------ Timothy O'Neill Dang / Cretog8 520-321-4015 One monkey don't stop no show. _______________________________________________ MUD-Dev mailing list MUD-Dev#kanga,nu <A HREF="http://www.kanga.nu/lists/listinfo/mud-dev">http://www.kanga.nu/lists/listinfo/mud-dev</A> </PRE> <!--X-Body-of-Message-End--> <!--X-MsgBody-End--> <!--X-Follow-Ups--> <HR> <!--X-Follow-Ups-End--> <!--X-References--> <UL><LI><STRONG>References</STRONG>: <UL> <LI><STRONG><A NAME="00328" HREF="msg00328.html">Re: [MUD-Dev] banning the sale of items</A></STRONG> <UL><LI><EM>From:</EM> Par Winzell <zell#alyx,com></LI></UL></LI> </UL></LI></UL> <!--X-References-End--> <!--X-BotPNI--> <UL> <LI>Prev by Date: <STRONG><A HREF="msg00450.html">Re: Re[2]: [MUD-Dev] Alignment</A></STRONG> </LI> <LI>Next by Date: <STRONG><A HREF="msg00452.html">[MUD-Dev] Game Law Example (fwd)</A></STRONG> </LI> <LI>Prev by thread: <STRONG><A HREF="msg00429.html">RE: [MUD-Dev] banning the sale of items</A></STRONG> </LI> <LI>Next by thread: <STRONG><A HREF="msg00344.html">RE: [MUD-Dev] banning the sale of items</A></STRONG> </LI> <LI>Index(es): <UL> <LI><A HREF="index.html#00451"><STRONG>Date</STRONG></A></LI> <LI><A HREF="thread.html#00451"><STRONG>Thread</STRONG></A></LI> </UL> </LI> </UL> <!--X-BotPNI-End--> <!--X-User-Footer--> <!--X-User-Footer-End--> <ul><li>Thread context: <BLOCKQUOTE><UL> <LI><STRONG>Re: [MUD-Dev] banning the sale of items</STRONG>, <EM>(continued)</EM> <ul compact> <ul compact> <ul compact> <ul compact> <ul compact> <ul compact> <ul compact> <ul compact> <ul compact> <LI><strong><A NAME="00356" HREF="msg00356.html">Re: [MUD-Dev] banning the sale of items</A></strong>, Matthew Mihaly <a href="mailto:the_logos#achaea,com">the_logos#achaea,com</a>, Mon 17 Apr 2000, 16:22 GMT <LI><strong><A NAME="00404" HREF="msg00404.html">Re: [MUD-Dev] banning the sale of items</A></strong>, adam <a href="mailto:adam#treyarch,com">adam#treyarch,com</a>, Tue 18 Apr 2000, 00:06 GMT <LI><strong><A NAME="00410" HREF="msg00410.html">Re: [MUD-Dev] banning the sale of items</A></strong>, Kevin Littlejohn <a href="mailto:darius#connect,com.au">darius#connect,com.au</a>, Tue 18 Apr 2000, 19:48 GMT <LI><strong><A NAME="00429" HREF="msg00429.html">RE: [MUD-Dev] banning the sale of items</A></strong>, Raph Koster <a href="mailto:rkoster#austin,rr.com">rkoster#austin,rr.com</a>, Tue 18 Apr 2000, 22:19 GMT </LI> </LI> </LI> </LI> <LI><strong><A NAME="00451" HREF="msg00451.html">Re: [MUD-Dev] banning the sale of items</A></strong>, Timothy Dang <a href="mailto:tdang#U,Arizona.EDU">tdang#U,Arizona.EDU</a>, Wed 19 Apr 2000, 02:11 GMT </LI> <LI><strong><A NAME="00344" HREF="msg00344.html">RE: [MUD-Dev] banning the sale of items</A></strong>, Zak Jarvis <a href="mailto:zak#voidmonster,com">zak#voidmonster,com</a>, Mon 17 Apr 2000, 16:21 GMT <LI><strong><A NAME="00375" HREF="msg00375.html">RE: [MUD-Dev] banning the sale of items</A></strong>, Matthew Mihaly <a href="mailto:the_logos#achaea,com">the_logos#achaea,com</a>, Mon 17 Apr 2000, 20:16 GMT </LI> <LI><strong><A NAME="00407" HREF="msg00407.html">Re: [MUD-Dev] banning the sale of items</A></strong>, J. Coleman <a href="mailto:stormknight#alltel,net">stormknight#alltel,net</a>, Tue 18 Apr 2000, 19:48 GMT </LI> </LI> </ul> </ul> <LI><strong><A NAME="00304" HREF="msg00304.html">Re: [MUD-Dev] banning the sale of items</A></strong>, Ryan Palacio <a href="mailto:rpalacio#verant,com">rpalacio#verant,com</a>, Mon 17 Apr 2000, 00:28 GMT </LI> </ul> </ul> </ul> </ul> </ul> </ul> </ul> </LI> </UL></BLOCKQUOTE> </ul> <hr> <center> [ <a href="../">Other Periods</a> | <a href="../../">Other mailing lists</a> | <a href="/search.php3">Search</a> ] </center> <hr> </body> </html>