Agreed. :P

I personally don't like strictly naming damage only just because I am one of those competitive players. Say the range for your "vicious hit" is 100-200 damage. Mine is hitting for 100, while someone else is hitting for 150. We both receive the same message, yet's he's stronger than me. I like to know that, so I can figure out why, and improve.

Now, if you generate enough messages to where the gap is only 1-2 points of damage between each, I wouldn't really care as much (though some people may) and you'd end up basically giving way the numbers anyhow.

One solution for that is to make damage messages relative to the percentage of damage done. So a 'scratch' would be 1% health damage, a 'vicious hit' maybe 10%, and MASSACRE somewhere around 40%. This avoids the weird scenario where you obliterate a mob 50 times before it dies.

What I've done in the past is having a relative and absolute term in the same sentence. Example:

You obliterate a fido with a terrific slash.

obliterate was around 25% or > damage done compared to the targets.

Terrific was a certain number of damage, but there wasn't really an attempt to hide damage done. So I kinda agree with KaVir.

That reminds me of another pet peave of mine…I've always hated those "DISEMBOWEL", "OBLITERATE", "ANNIHILATE", etc, messages, and when I ran a Diku they were one of the first things I removed. Actually I did have a "disembowel" message, but if you saw it the fight was pretty much over - the only question was whether the recipient would die of blood loss before their guts poured out onto the floor.

I don't actually mind hiding the numbers behind combat messages, as long as those messages are descriptive and interesting. But don't just tell me that I've "maimed" or "mutilated" someone - I want to know which bodily members I've hacked off or incapacited. And if I "disembowel" or "eviscerate" someone, I don't expect them to do anything more, other than die very messily, and perhaps scream a bit.

I think if "obliterate" describes removing a large percentage of their living, then it's appropriate.

Honestly, no. If I "obliterate" someone, I don't expect to see anything left, except perhaps a bloody smear on the floor.

http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionar...

Main Entry: oblit·er·ate

1 a: to remove utterly from recognition or memory b: to remove from existence : destroy utterly all trace, indication, or significance of c: to cause to disappear (as a bodily part or a scar) or collapse (as a duct conveying body fluid) : remove 4 <a blood vessel obliterated by inflammation>
2: to make undecipherable or imperceptible by obscuring or wearing away
3: cancel 4

I'm sure you also find it utterly ridiculous in any game where any sword strike doesn't slay someone in one hit if undefended? I personally avoid realism at all cost when it deters gameplay design goals.

Lol, this entire dispute is funny. I guess you'd rather it say, "You are obliterating a fido [snip]"

That would, after all, be more dictionary-approved.

I've also considered this type of relative terms:


do no harm
barely harm
only slightly harm
harm
greatly harm
devastatingly harm or devastate or obliterate, whatever
edit: Or decimate for Elanthis. :)

I'm pretty sure anyone would know what is meant by "devastate."

Plugged into a sentence:

<aggressor> <relative> <target> with your <absolute> <damage_type>.

Resulting in:

You devastate KaVir with your terrific slash.
You do no harm to KaVir with your pathetic slap.
You only slightly harm KaVir with your strong bludgeon.

There's plenty of design goals that wouldn't lend itself to such a system, but for my goals I actually like it quite a bit.

With a purely numeric system, I'm not in favor of using just descriptive messages. Even if you use a percentage range, if you are hitting an opponent for 5% of their health and he's hitting you for 7% of your health, that's important to know. It sounds like a very small difference, but it comes out to you needing to hit the opponent 20 times while your opponent only needs to hit you 15 times. That is, he kills you in 3/4 the time it takes you to kill him, which in turn means that if you're attacking at a similar rate (as in most round-time based games), you're going to lose for sure.

At the end of the day, with any numeric system, the only numbers that really matter are the speed with which you will kill your opponent and how much of your "resources" will be consumed in the process. Those two numbers tell you whether or not you will win a particular fight and how many opponents you can tackle before needing to retreat. Even games with complex sets of actions can be reduced to those two numbers via averages and statistics. Games that rely far more on player skill, reaction, and tactics are a different story altogether, but those are harder to do in a MUD (not impossible, no), since you can't expect a player to react too quickly to an opponent's actions due both to the relatively low speed that the human brain processes text as well as the time it takes to type out any response action command, even abbreviated.



My pet peeve is when armies or opponents get "decimated" but yet are totally defeated. I know the modern definition accepts that interpretation, but to me, it still means to only kill 1/10th of the target. ;)

Such aggression, and you were being so nice too. :cry:

Actually, I kind of like the relative vs. absolute scheme: it lets you know that although you landed a very solid hit, the opponent just shrugged it off.

No, I find it ridiculus when the game explicitly tells me that I've slain someone (several times per round!) and yet they just carrying on fighting.


This isn't about realism, it's about language usage. You're sending the player messages that are flat-out wrong. How does that improve the gameplay?


No, I'd rather it tell me what actually happened. If it says "you decapitate a fido", I expect its head to fall off. If it says "you disembowel a fido", I expect its guts to pour out. And if it says "you obliterate a fido", I expect the fido to be gone without a trace.

We can just agree to disagree on this one. :)

For an individual person, I imagine it would mean overwhelmed by grief or helplessness. So the combat sequence might go like this:

You decapitate Runter with your terrific slash.
You decapitate Runter with your terrific slash.
You decapitate Runter with your terrific slash.
Runter erases you from existence with his amazing headbutt. That sure did hurt!
Runter cuts off your arms and legs with his incredible whirling attack.
You rip out out both of Runter's eyes with your skillful finger-jab.
Runter look at you.
You break Runter's nose with your amazing double-kick.
Runter devastates you with his cruel remarks, reducing you to tears!

Might want to look up the definition of "devastate" again, KaVir. Just saying, since you seem to be rather particular about exact definitions.

1 : to bring to ruin or desolation by violent action <a country devastated by war>
2 : to reduce to chaos, disorder, or helplessness : overwhelm <devastated by grief> <her wisecrack devastated the class>

Which definition did you have in mind?

Maybe the one not involving grief or helplessness. :wink:
(Maybe you think the examples are somehow restricting what the definitions can be applied to…?)

Now you're just being cheeky. :)

You mean the one that applies to places, such as countries and cities? It would be pretty interesting to see a mud where each player was a country rather than a creature, but as far as I'm aware that's not the case for Runter's mud.


Could you give me an example of the word "devastate" being used to refer to physical damage to an individual person (outside of Diku)?

Clearly we just need to make up new words for combat! Elanthis demoderalizes KaVir in the sterplexum!

(Unrelated but funny story: I had a meeting with an old client last week about upgrading some server software to modern OSes and hardwasre. While reviewing the software requirements, the client showed me the Downed Services warning messages shown to employees upon system login, and it said "RecSys Server FOLDED!" I inquired as to why the heck it said "folded" instead of "downed" or "crashed" and who the heck picked such a weird term. The client looked me in the eyes and said, "Uh, you did… remember? You were irritated by the old servers saying 'abended' when a service crashed, so you said, 'heck, if they can make up a word, so can I!' and used 'folded.'" I felt pretty stupid, naturally. But I still think "fold" is a better verb for it than "abend" :p )