Tides

[proteus]

This is what happens when I read threads. I should be spending this time working a little more on my actual area before I take a break for Lost/Criminal Minds/Veronica Mars time. Why must Wednesday torment me so with entertaining TV?

Anyway, if we go the route of Night/Day, we should have tides. I don't know that there's any specific plans for major bodies of water in GMUD yet, but it could be cool to have certain areas accessible only when the tide goes out. Like perhaps an undersea cave, or an island that is inaccessible by boat due to inability to safely dock, but a land bridge appears when the time is right. It could be added to the list of ways the game might change at different times of day. Could be fun.

[The Crazy Animal]

See what you need is a DVR.

I was thinking about this when you mentioned it in the Time/Day/Night thread and thought water levels could be really fun not just in the case of tides.

Some brief examples:

Flood Plains: a low laying area inhabited by various creatures these areas tend to flood at different times of the year and depending on the water level different types of creatures can be found here.

Mangrove Swamps: A mangrove swamp is a salt-water area the generally has varying seasonal water levels at its lowest water level it is a mucky area with a diverse group of animals. However, at its highest water level the swamp is fully submerged with just the tops of the trees poking through the water level. Any local population in an area like this would need to be living out of tree houses and have boats of some type.

Cyprus Swamp: A Cyprus swamp is similar to a mangrove swamp but is freshwater while the water level doesn?t get as high it is prone to flooding and is very otherworldly when seen. ?I use to go camping in a Cyprus Swamp they are really cool spots?

Some other neat example that could be done with water level are:

Flash Floods: This would be a great area trap that could randomly wash players to different parts of an area.

Breaking Damns:  This would be a great plot in an evil quest take out a damn and flood a whole town. I could see people logging in and finding themselves in the middle of a newly flooded town and having to climb onto the roof tops and try to find a skiff.

I'm sure given a little time I'll think of some more but this is what rolled out of the brain.

TCA

[DeathCow]

Hey thats cool.  There is infact a plan for a major bodies of water.  The main area where all the towns are in kinds like a giant circular island.  A great deal of the maps edge is water, except for the se and eastern sections of the neutral side of the of the world.  That area is blocked by a giant mountain range. 

There is a mangrove swamp in the ne section of the 1 quadrant.  Thats the area where the evil druid/ranger town is.  Originally I hadn't made plans to have varible rooms/descriptions but that wouldn't be too hard to work out. 

Variable exits/descriptions could be cool, It would take a great deal of planning though.  I personally really like the idea of allowing players to permenantly alter the landscape of their realm.  Any changes made like this would of course require massive quests..other wise every realm would be exactly the same.

Its friday tv that reallly bothers me...the world stops spining when battlestar comes on.

[proteus]

I like the mangrove swamp thing, with variable water levels. Randomly, it occurred to me how interesting it might be if Majormud had tides, and the entrance to the Island Labyrinth spent half the day underwater. Of course, that is just a river. Meh. Or maybe the Sandbar being inaccessible for half the day. Heh.

Players altering the landscape could be interesting too. In fact, someone put something like that in the MMUD Ideas forum a long time back. Wonder if I can find it...

And I have a DVR, it just sucks to pick which show I want to actually watch while the others are recording.

[The Crazy Animal]

(I set my DVR up and I don?t worry about it anymore go out on Friday if I must. It tapes my shows and I?ll watch them later.)

With the Damn breaking idea, I had originally thought that it should be a time effect that should after a while go away but I?m talking something in time that might last real-time 3 or 4 weeks. In the meantime, while everything is underwater you could have NPCs out repairing the damn. It would be interesting to have some areas that when submerged that you could still enter but need some sort of water breathing device or spell. This way the realm has a return to normal ability but also has areas that can only be reached if the proper conditions are met in the realm. I think if you did it that way it would make for one hell of a repeatable quest.

However for something?s in the game it would be nice to have them be irreversible I would love to see the realm turn out to have the feeling of full immersion were it almost takes on a life of its own. Between times of visiting different areas, it would be very cool if they changed a little in most cases but a lot in others.

TCA

[Valentine]

With the Damn breaking idea, I had originally thought ...

...such harsh language....ok, I'm done making fun of the spelling.

Player-induced alterations to the map....interesting. Even something as simple as having PCs hired on by NPCs to help build up a town would add a nice facet.


...and then we all discover that we are just part of a mud....NPCs making their own game.

[DeathCow]

:p

[The Crazy Animal]

There is another windows mud server out there, which is still in development that was trying to implement dynamic path titles and descriptions. So as paths are more frequently used they would turn into roads and when they are not used for a period of time they would slowly turn back into paths. I thought this was a really could idea.

TCA

[ZLemur]

Duuuude...that's agreat idea...can you do that, cow? Dynamic room descriptions that change from 'animal path' to 'cobblestone road' or something. The more I read these ideas the more excited I'm getting about all of this.

[The Crazy Animal]

I would think "just being me" that if you could do the variable water levels you should be able to do the dynamic path titles and descriptions.

However it does make me wonder how many same room/same paths it would take mega to deal with this in order to reach a destination if this was in the game. hehe I can see it now.... lost looking for known room... known room found.... changing path.... lost.. looking for known room...... known room found.... changing path......

TCA

[ZLemur]

Rats...totally forgot about the idea of writing it so Megapud could figure it out...dynamic room anything will make mega have a nervous breakdown. unless you leave room descripts/exits all the same...but that not very dynamic. most people 'set brief' as soon as they make a new char.

[DeathCow]

It is a bit silly...The forest path out of the first town would quickly become a fortied city street...then in a couple week become a swampy muck of civilizations past.

[The Crazy Animal]

It would depend on the path it really wouldn't be that drastic of a change though. some thing more like:

In a village:
Dirt path changes to Cobble Stone Street

In a forest:
Overgrown Path changes to Cleared Dirt Path..

Mega could cope with it but it would just be funny to see it get lost so often...

TCA

[DeathCow]

Actually it would jsut make most people cry.  I dont like seeing people cry....Unless its because I've recently expanded that bitches cunt...wow what did I just say...Thats not right.

[The Crazy Animal]

Grin, I guess that just makes me a sadistic bitch because I?d love to see it in use in some places. I don?t think it should be used everywhere but a few areas wouldn?t hurt.

TCA