[MUD-Dev] Re: A world without charity (was Discussion of MUDsystemdesign, development, and implementation)

[Michael Tresca]

From: Eamonn O'Brien [mailto:decado at esatclear.ie]

> These two points basically sum up the heart of the proposal, would
> trading the ability to give items freely to your friends be too
> much of a tradeoff if the payout was not having to compete against
> twinked out chars, and playing in a game where a player with a
> higher real life bank balance has an advantage. I don't doubt that
> for some people this would be a worthwhile trade, the real
> question is probably would more people rue the downside than would
> enjoy the upside?

What's wrong with having the items scale in power to the person
using them?  Therefore, a newbie can't get actually achieve the
item's full power until they've earned it by level or ability or
whatever.  I suspect much of trading is instant gratification.  A
newbie character purchasing a +100 sword with RL money (say, $100)
is not as likely to bother.  He STILL has to get his character
powerful enough to take advantage of it, and additionally, it avoids
the domino effect wherein a weak character with a powerful weapon
becomes more powerful, which lets him get more powerful weapons,
etc.

The non-twinkers can still give their equipment to their friends.
They still get the benefit of not having to go through the effort of
retrieving the item. But they can't flat-out use the item to their
advantage.  It's like stock that doesn't vest until you've been with
the company for a certain period of time.  It's supposed to "incent"
you to stick around.

RetroMUD does this now.  Works fine.  Or am I missing something?

Mike "Talien" Tresca
RetroMUD Administrator
http://michael.tresca.net
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