[MUD-Dev] Interesting EQ rant (very long quote)

[Michael Tresca]

Vincent Archer posted on Tuesday, February 27, 2001 7:39 AM

> Asheron's Call tried to implement this with their magic system. It
> uses "secret recipes", and to discourage people from sharing said
> recipes, each spell had a use pool that would be drained if too many
> people were using it.

I saw this more as a control for style of play rather than controlling
the casting through ignorance alone.  We've used this principle on
RetroMUD and it works well -- because players communicate so often
outside of the game, and because trends can often erupt as a result of
incorrect information, our system reacts to those trends by
counterbalancing whatever bonus the players would get in proportion to
the number of players using it.

Thus, rarely used spells are more effective than spells that are
routine standbys.  Who cares "if everyone knows that fire spells do
the most damage" -- use those fire spells enough, and that's no longer
true.

Controlling knowledge is impossible.  Rewarding behavior with carrots
and sticks works.

Mike "Talien" Tresca
RetroMUD Administrator
http://www.retromud.org

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