The Miscreant Engine

[Sydney Freedberg]

... females become a very valuable resource, and one which should be protected. Men won't want women fighting because they can make and distribute lives. But if a woman's child is threatened, she will have every reason to protect it at all costs. Does this seem familiar at all? In essence, children and food are the two most fundamentally important aspects of human life, so if you model them with reasonable accuracy (artistic licence included), then human-like behaviour will just naturally emerge from that.

The idea of building family relations into the game engine is very, very, very cool. I just see one problem: Who wants to play a "very valuable resource" that other people actively discourage from going in harm's way? Without getting into the howling wilderness of the proliferating "gender bias?" forums, women's capacity to bear children historically got them oppressed by men. And it might be very hard to get players, especially adventure-oriented players, to sign up to be women if it comes with anything like a realistic chance of death in childbirth, incapacitation during late pregnancy, a year-plus of virtual breastfeeding etc. (My wife and I have a three-month old now. I have to say, I wouldn't want to trade places with her -- and I love this baby). So you could end up with players taking only male characters and then either creating female PCs as "mules" (second characters run semi-illicitly to backup a primary character) or simply marrying NPC women, in which case -- congratulations -- you've replicated the historical situation of women as chattel.

It's not that I don't like these ideas. I love these ideas. I just want to raise the yellow caution flag that Here Be Fifty Thousand Years Of Traps.

[Ben O'Neal]

I just see one problem: Who wants to play a "very valuable resource" that other people actively discourage from going in harm's way? ...
*snip*
... I just want to raise the yellow caution flag that Here Be Fifty Thousand Years Of Traps.

Actually, I don't think that things would work out quite like that. For a number of reasons:

-The players will be modern people. Whilst I acknowledge that sexism and shit is still around, the situation is much better than it was back then (medieval times). Just look at the "gifting" tradition in Everquest, where female PCs get free shit just for being a girl. Some people might interpret this as condescending. Fuck them. If someone wants to give me shit for free for no good reason, let them. Please. Chivalry is not condescending. It's just a dying virtue. In short, I seriously doubt there would be any "oppression".

-Female characters need to be good! If your offspring are a combination of the stats of both parents, you want both parents to have good stats. Thus "cattle" females would be rather hard to achieve. In order for a female PC to get good, she needs to advance, and the rules would be the same as for male PCs. Females would no doubt get into wars, and anything else the male PCs do, either because they are being played by males or because they are being played by females who want to do what the males do, but when the going gets tough, it'll be "women and children first".

-NPC wives could easily be made to be unable to progress, like marrying an orphan, just like NPC husbands. Marrying them would be the poor solution, and would't be effective for very long.

-Being the controller of the games most important resource gives you a shitload of power to get stuff. Alot of people play MMORPGs just to accumulate in-game shit, like furniture and land and castles and stuff... this is what The Sims is built on. Being a female makes this much, much easier.

-Whilst it is cool to kill somebody, I personally think it is much cooler to have other people kill them for you. Female PCs would find it easier to accumulate friends/followers who would kill for them. I've seen this happen in other online games like Ultima and shit, so these mechanics would simply be adding to what already happens. Shit, I see this stuff in real life too.

-Regarding the realistic complications of childbirth, like risk of death, incapacitation, and breastfeeding, these things could be dropped. They don't add anything fun to the game as far as I can see. I am only interested in the inclusion of mechanics and concepts that are fun and cool to toy with. I have no problem with keeping the good and ignoring the bad. After all, it isn't particularly realistic to "possess" your child's body when you die. :)

-Also, I think WyldKarde mentioned preventing a single user from having multiple characters by tracking their login IP. This is a good idea at any rate, but it would be especially helpful to prevent players making their own couples, which kinda negates the whole purpose of the mechanic, which is to get players to interact with each other in fun and interesting ways. Additionally, it's kinda hard to play two players simultaneously anyway. how can you make them both meet if you can only load the game with one at a time? You can't, so that option is simply impossible.


So in summary, I personally don't think that there would be any problems related to gender issues with this. Nothing about the mechanic is controversial (except maybe that men aren't in control of children, but I'm sure we can work around that), and if problems ever arised, they would stem from the players, not the game, and you can't do anything about that. But I've seen a few girls lurking around the forge (a total of four!), so I'd be happy to hear what they might have to say about this idea and how it might work. I love it to death, and I'ma badger Wyldkarde till he hits me or includes it!

-Ben

[F. Scott Banks]

Hmmm, I never woulda thought the "Legacy" feature whould have grown so much.  I just kind of included it as a way to permanently kill my people without them getting too pissy about it.  Also, a character who creates a great character who died from natural causes should be rewarded with a child who is a little better for it.  After all, the good players will level in half the time anyway because they already know how.  They'll have to in order to maintain what they've got going.

I'm starting to crack Ravien...I'll give you that.  Everyone comes to this MMORPG thing with preconceived notions of what will absolutely not work and this was one of mine.  Of course, this was a preconceived notion about something that hadn't been done before so I'm pretty flexible on it.

I think I can work this out.  Players can raise children the way they'd raise any other "herd" object.  The skills of the player go into the object being created (an enchanter making a dagger makes an enchanted dagger).  

This is the same thing, but taking random skills from the parents.  When the player creates a new character, he has the choice of using one of his children (if he has them) or a "protege".  A protege will be much like my original childhood system where the player simply picks the skills his parent "in this case, benefactor" taught him.  Protege's are nice because your second character could be a race that neither you or your partner are.

I might discard the protege system now that the offspring system is getting fleshed out, but I don't know.  In the meantime, the protege system does have the original "passing down of skills" formula so I'm keeping it for the time being.

Anyway, here's how I'm thinking of working the offspring system:

I'm thinking of awarding players "custody" of the child.  Upon the child's maturing into the age where they would be trained, the players decide which path of training the child will follow.  Do they loan their child to the Thieves guild?  Do they homeschool 'em (raising them like crops...which I do have in the game.  I just got rid of monster ranching.  Players can still raise armies of undead or fashion constructs though).  Adventuring players could then strike up agreements with more sedate roleplayers to raise children.  Dad goes out and wages war while mommy stays home and teaches the kids how to be like daddy (or vice-versa of course).

Extra children could be raised just to run the family business so both mom and dad can go adventuring.  A housefull of kids was how most feudal families made ends meet anyway.  This means that players can generate extra kids...some enterprising players may raise harems and have their own homegrown armies.  Since the NPC's are player-created, this system can be stretched to include things I haven't even thought of.  And there are the grandparents...they can be used to teach adventuring skills that perhaps neither parent have.  Four grandparents versus two parents equals some badass kids.  Mind you all characters have the same limits on the number of skills they may know, but no limits on how well they know them...up to 100% that is.

So, when the players get ready to retire, they look at their surviving children (players who send junior off to serve in the Imperial Guard may not get junior back) and decide who will controll who.  Back when only one child per family was the norm (and why was that when the system encouraged multiples???) who gets to control the "good" kid was an issue.  But with a family of kids, all gaining different skills through the tasks they successfully complete (and the degree of success in completing them) as NPC's...the problem might now be that players only get to pick one of 'em.

Sweeeeeeeeeet.

And now, if a player reaches permadeath before having childen of their own, they can take control of a sibling.  The idea seemed contrived when it was first suggested, but now it's starting to become a legitimate roleplay device.  Imagine killing an evil mage just to run into his sister a month later in a dark alley.

Ohhhhh....I'm all a-tingle.

Development Note:

Oh, by the way, I'm going to start building a MUD based on this engine.  No reason I can't begin to establish the game world, skill system, and roleplaying culture now.  When I finish the graphical client, I'll be able to simply lay it on top of the existing MUD.  Eventually, I'll have to break down and go with 3D graphics to see all my ideas come to life, but for now, this keeps the project affordable and playable while I continue to develop it.

[Sydney Freedberg]

Hmmm, I never woulda thought the "Legacy" feature whould have grown so much.

Well, because it's frickin' cool. Like self-organizing monster kingdoms, family dynamics give your world a life of its own.

A protege will be much like my original childhood system where the player simply picks the skills his parent "in this case, benefactor" taught him.... I might discard the protege system now that the offspring system is getting fleshed out, but I don't know.  In the meantime, the protege system does have the original "passing down of skills" formula so I'm keeping it for the time being.

I'd say keep it. Adopting an heir from outside your immediate family was common among both the ancient Romans (e.g. Julius Caesar adopted Octavian, later Caesar Augustus, the first Emperor) and the late medieval Japanese (especially to pass down crafts/martial arts skills to the worthiest student of the master, as I recall). No reason you shouldn't allow that option in game, albeit with some penalty in terms of getting less from your adoptive parent / mentor than you would from a real biological parent.

[F. Scott Banks]

Yeah...I'm struggling with the balance now.  I'm making the protege system a lot like living at a guild and learning those guild skills gradually.  It nice because it allows protege's to apply their own dynamic to the parent players skills.  If you're a halfling theif who raises an elf child as your own, you'll have an elf who performs your skill sthey way an elf would perform it.

So far, I'm getting things like elves who sneak and backstab like halflings, and humans who craft like dwarves.

The Vashar crossbreeds are so bizzare they're like entirely new races.  The first time I got backstabbed by a bite (which had somehow been envenomed with a toxin that induced blindness???) I liked it so much, I had to save the exact formula that created it.

So...balancing will take awhile, but I think I'll keep some of the unpredictablility in this little parenting mix.

[F. Scott Banks]

Well, I like to keep interested parties informed on what I've been doing with this thing.  

Since I've decided to make an early version of this engine operate around a MUD framework, I've been trying to see how much of the core gameplay would make the transition and what would have to wait for the 3d MMORPG version.  After all, since the MUD was just a way to establish essentials like character development, in-game world building, and the Adversary system (the command strings that organize enemy NPC's into collectives), I really wasn't expecting to get all of my ideas into the MUD.

Oh yeah, if you don't know what the hell I'm talking about when I say MUD, just click here.

But anyway, it looks like I'll be able to get everything in there.  Let me explain how...

The key revolves around a custom client made specifically for this particular game.  This was really just supposed to be a rudimentary graphical MUD client that I would later use as a platform to create my 3D game but it turns out it works pretty darm well on it's own.

The client contains a large window for the "scroll" that every MUD (and most MMORPG's) have.  This is where text appears, crucial to any game that promotes roleplay.  Above this is a graphical representation of the characters information (just think character sheet and you're dead on) with tabs for additional party members if that player is grouped.

Next to the "core" info is a simple graphical representaion of the "room" the player is in.  This is a first-person persective of a single wall of a room.  If anyone remembers those old adventure games where the graphics consisted mostly of looking down corridors, then you've got the idea.  Each room has four "facades", north, south, east, and west.  So each room is represented with four different pictures of walls.  Not exactly Worlds of Warcraft, but it keeps the focus on textual descriptions of rooms and objects.

Next to this window is a simple scrolling window with a listing of all characters and objects that are in the room.  Below these windows, is another that contains the descriptions of the room and the "facing".

Below this is the control bar where simple commands are.  There is also a blank row of buttons for custom macros (favorite spell, backstab/dirtkick combo...whatever).

So...that's the interface.  Clicking on certain characters or obects inspects them and (when I draw the pictures) will cause a graphic of the object to appear in the "eyes" window and a description of it to appear in the window below.

So...down to getting all this lunacy into a MUD.

Combat:

Well combat is pretty easy.  A graphic of the attacker and the opponent (nothing fancy, think old-school NES) facing each other will overlay both the room picture.  With each "tick," increment of time equalling about six seconds of "real" time, the two graphics will cross to the other side of the screen, passing each other.  There will be a simple graphic to indicate that an attack was made as they passed.  All crucial information will appear in the "scroll" window, same as with any MUD.

That's it...nothing fancy.

This simplification is giving me ideas as to how I can translate this into a simpler dice system but I'll wait until it's tight before I talk about it here.

Warfare appears in the same way.  Opposing "army" graphics charge at, and pass through, each other.  "Attacks" come in the form of "tactics" and "rounds" are called "skirmishes" but it's pretty much the same thing.

Parentage:

This has been hot lately, so I'll talk agout it.  It not really something that couldn't have been done in a MUD anyway, but since it hasn't (to my knowledge) been attempted before, I'll talk about it as if it's some great innovation.

Women will be the only ones capable of carrying a child.  NPC husbands and wives are available to the player who can woo them.  Mind you, all NPC's are related to actual active players, so it's not as easy as just going out and snatching a barmaid off the street.  It could be, but it doesn't hurt to be in the good graces of the active player (especially if you need their permission...it might be a character they intend to use when they retire).

However, husbands do not automatically pass their name onto the child.  If mommy's saving junior for her own use when she's too old to cave-crawl anymore, then he gets her name.  Mom chooses who gets the kid.  If she puts her family name as the child's family name, then the kid is hers.  Daddy better be nice, or his family name will end with him.  NPC's do what their spouse tells then though.  This is why permission is important.  A married NPC no longer obeys their parents, which means that training or skills could go unused and unimproved.  Worse yet, a master craftsman might end up making "heirloom" weapons or items for other families.

Wait...so how to families combine to create larger families?

They don't.  Combined families are called clans, the clan leader being the head of the most prominent family (a sticky subject, but basically it's dependant upon a combination of land ownership, standing armies, the "Legacy" rating of the family, and cold hard cash).  Clans are beneficial because it's where you'll get your army if you ever need one.  No one is going to pop out enough kids to man a garrison so your family is not going to give you an army.  Besides. being pregant takes a female char out of comission for one week of real time.  She can do anything but "adventure" as movement points and endurance are equal to that of "unplayable" NPC's.

Oh yeah...I put an automailer in the MUD code.  Your character will continue acting without your guidance and you will receive emails regarding their progress.  Weddings and births will happen without player input.  The character won't do anything life-threatening though.  If their home is destroyed in something like an orcish onslaught while they're offline, they will log in in their chosen "home capitol".  This means that refugees from destroyed cities will rot in refugee camps where they essentially do nothing until their players log back on.  Wait too long to log on and the refugee camp becomes a prison camp.

Fun fact, leaving a clan can really mess up families.  The resources generated by the family that left go back to the family.  This includes land, weapons, taxes, skills, and military service.  So, if you're depending on the Whitewater name to supply your armies with fish and spears, you'd better be nice.  Clans have to co-operate.  Just like marriage, it's give-and take.  An overbearing, power-mad player will find himself seriously hurting if he mismanages his friends.

So, that's what I've been working on.  Mostly I've been building this interface and adapting a MOO language to trigger the graphics and sounds in it.  Also, I've noticed that forge members who produce a product seem to be the ones who receive the most help from the community (who wants to work on a project that will never see the light of day?), so I'm producing a tradional pen-and-paper RPG of my own just so I can establish a track-record of finishing projects.

Content is done...I just need artwork and a nice layout.

But anyway...I appreciate everyone's help and I just like keeping everyone abreast of where this one is.

[Alf_the_Often_Incorrect]

Good things I have to say: That is a great epiphany in MMORPG design as far as I'm concerned. I say go for it! I think it'll be a great, unique RPG.

Bad things I have to say: What exactly building from the outside in entails may be hard to figure out. Still, give it a try (and I'd love to help if you let me; email me if so).

[F. Scott Banks]

Hey, help is always nice.  Doin' this alone is fun, but it puts the completion date well out of this year, even with my simplifications.

As far as building it from the outside in, I was just answering the question of "why to MMORPG's fall so short of anything resembling traditional roleplay?"  The best among them are pretty much just deathmatch games with leveling and fantasy themes thrown in.  

I responded by saying that it was because of the fact that MMORPG's are too shortsighted in design.  If the game is intended for thousands of players, why are you using a ruleset that revolves around eight players at best?  Using tabletop RPG rulesets is the first step in making an unsuccessful MMORPG.

By designing a game that is written with the purpose of building a larger gaming experience from the contributions of a vast playerbase, I have a better chance in making an MMORPG that is deserving of the term RPG.  This is because instead of picking a class and gettin' my fillin' of killin'.  I have to actually immerse myself in the game in order to do anything.  All of my actions effect the game around me.  If I become a powerful warlord, my armies will effect everything from the environment to the local economies.  If I become a wizard, fashioning enchanted weapons high atop my tower, I'll have adventurers beating a path to my door trying to buy, or perhaps take them from me.

MMORPG's allow the player to pretty much exist in a vaccum where they're playing a single-player video game with other players tossed in as window-dressing.  This game allows that too actually, but it also allows players to create functioning communities where everyone works towards a larger, attainable goal.  No more killing the goblin chieftan just to have him come back in the next reboot.  No more completing a quest that some other guy will complete twenty minutes after you're done.

Honestly, I just decided to do this to clear up some of the problems that I saw inherrent in MMORPG's.  Instead of condemming the genre and using their shortcomings to make myself feel superior as an old-school gamer, I decided to crystalize some of my ideas and see if I couldn't help the next generation of RPG's along.  

So, whaddaya do?  Maybe we can find a place for you.  Of course, this is really just to prove a point in all honesty.  I don't see this making anyone rich.  Although...I'm really hoping it'll boost book sales so...it might make me a few bucks.  Any artists want to be responsible for the "vision" of this little project...drop me a line.

I assure you, as an artist...I make a damn good writer.

PS:  I need cover art for the actual novel this is based on.  It seems most RPG artists are very busy.  Even the mediocre ones are booked solid.  I know of one artist who's damn good, but they dont seem to be picking up my hint that I'm trying to give them money in exchange for goods and services.

*cough* Ravien *cough*

[Ben O'Neal]

*cough* Ravien *cough*

Haha. Sorry WyldKarde, I've been really busy lately. It's exam period and I've got much studying to do for the next two weeks. But I promise, after my last exam, I'll get to work on a sample piece for your Outatowners game. I'm liking the Spindlermen right now, so maybe I'll have a crack at one of them. I can already see how cool they will look. Shame it has to be B&W, burnt flesh really likes colour.

Your latest posts seem really cool. I like the inclusion of clan mechanics. They make families cooler and more open. It's a really neat heirachy that is built into your game, rather than just tacked on. People<Families<Clans<Nations>Guilds>Professions>Skills. I like.

I also like the implementation of "names" being important. I'm not sure if you've given this much thought, but I think that you could really do alot with names. They could really become points of honour far cooler than some stupid number. Perhaps, you could allow very special players to be given a purely honorific third name, which could serve the same function as "Sir" in knighthood, but be more specific and tailored to their achievements. Just a few thoughts. I just like the idea of making names important and meaningful, and you're well on your way there. Good job.

Side note, why have you chosen to make female characters "sit out" for a week when they are pregnant? I ask because I feel that any penalty to anything needs strong justification. Is it a balancing issue? Or a realism issue? If it's the former, what is it balancing? If it's the later, why one week instead of 9 months, or one day?

Also, do "babies" require a period of time to grow? Or are they born as adult NPCs? I like the idea of investing resources into them to help make them better for when you take over them as characters (feeding them quality food, giving them an education, whatever).

Finally, have you decided if/how you are implementing food? As I've mentioned before, with the scale you are talking about, food and procreation really do become very prominent underlying causes for human behaviour. So if you can model both well (not realistically, just "well"), then you'll have a real winner I think.

But so far, I personally can't wait for this game to be finished. You can definately count me in as player. It'll be my first ever MUD though, so make it nice and easy to interface with ok?

-Ben

[Alf_the_Often_Incorrect]

Hey, help is always nice. Doin' this alone is fun, but it puts the completion date well out of this year, even with my simplifications.

So, do you want help then? (I prefer to wait for a direct answer before jumping to conclusions).

[F. Scott Banks]

Ahh...as far as help goes...right now I need a decent sprite artist.  I mean, the only reason I'm using old-fashioned NES sprites is because that's all I can do.  Anything nicer than Mario is a stretch for me.

As far as world building goes, Rooms and areas can be constructed with a simple kit that constructs the four facades of a room by where walls and doors are.  If you want anything fancier, you can place "appliances" (it's a theatre term for anything fake that's onstage, since object was taken, it's all I had) like skulls and torches to give some flavor to your areas.

However, the world builder is waiting for me to implement the core MUD code so that it recognizes rooms as four views of the same thing.  Also, things like lighting and terrain penalties have to be implemented into the ruleset so that making a pitch-black dungeon is worthwhile.  Depending on what you want to do, it may be a minute before you can jump in.  I've pretty much been counting on only myself so my scheduling has been revolving around everything from teaching my classes to rewriting chapters for my editor (hateful harpy...damn her command of the english language!).

I understand Ravien.  I'm jumpin' myself.  Take your time to get what you need done.  If you wanna throw some color on the spindlemen it's cool.  I should be able to squeeze a few color pictures into the book...probably to seperate chapters, so there'll be splashes of color inside as well.  Along with the cover and inside jacket.

Now...for what you're talking, with the names I guess they'd have to be part of a larger cultural theme.  Maybe goblins have chieftans while humans have Lords or Kings.  I suppose that much I should hardwire into the various races.  I'll have to establish my core cultures from the books.

Ohhh, I get to be a Nadjir and my girlfriend gets to be a Jensei Master.

Okay...calm down.  Make game first, then create badass uber-characters based upon overknowledge of game lore.

Muahahahahahaha!

P.S.:

The game time is six times faster than real time so:

game hour = ten minutes
game day = four hours
game week = one day + three hours
game month = four and a half days
game year = two months

so...

nine game months = six weeks

It's safe to assume that players won't put their feet up the moment the child is conceived (although death with kill the child at this point...resurrection will only save the mother).  The game won't inform the player of the "added inventory" for one month of game time, and only during the last three months (two weeks) is the mother under such strain that they cannot do much more than putter around the house.

So, that's why female players are off their feet for two weeks if they're with child.  Only endurance is affected though...anything she can do in some dank dungeon, they can do in their house.  It's just unlikely that she'll make the journey to a dank dungeon with her severely reduced endurance.

Oh...that and her armor won't fit.

[F. Scott Banks]

Awwww fiddlecrap...I never answer all the questions in a single sitting do I?

Food:

Food is a "herd" object.  Basically, that means that multiple objects are created through specific skills.  Instead of creating a single sword, a blacksmith with the proper skills can set up an armory that turns out dozens of weapons a day.  The more exquisite weapons are harder to produce, but there's no reason an army can't be equipped with masterwork everything (it'll cost an arm and a leg, but it can happen).

A "crop" is produced by players or NPC's with the proper "farming" skills.  Although meat can be raised like grain, let's stick with grain.  Besides, the economy is based on bread, not beef.  Each player needs to obtain 100% of their daily vitamins and minerals in order to maintain proper health from their food.

What...don't look at me like that.

I'm serious.  Races require six immutable vitamins in order to get the proper nutrients from their food.  Players will need to make sure that their races eat these "staples" so that thier hunger is balanced.  Although you may eat your fill in a single sitting, players will become hungry at a faster rate if they haven't eaten foods that contain these vitamins.  If they do, they won't be hungry again for another hour of real time.  If they don't...they'll need to eat sooner, thus making them eat more throughout the day.

Hunger affects core stats, so gameplay will suffer if you ignore what your body needs.

There are also six vitamins that character's can eat in order to keep their performance up.  They slow down the drain on vitals when skills are used.  These vary.  If your character casts a lot of spells, they'll need their perception and willpower up so they'll eat "brain food"  This will cause them to cast powerful spells without suffering the usual drain on their willpower.  Instead of casting spells at normal strength, they can put a little extra into it and not lose as much in the process.

This really just helps gameplay along.  Food won't give you special powers or anything, it just allows you to do what you normally do for a longer amount of time, or at a greater level of exertion, than you normally do it.

Also, it's not that hard to meet those nutritional requirements.  If you eat the food grown in your hometown, it will pretty much take care of you.  Elves eat birds and fish so if you live in an elven village, you'll see a lot of that on your plate.  If you find yourself in a dwarven village eating goat and potatoes, you'll be hungry again pretty quick (think chinese food).

There are also nutritional potions that you can drink, get your complete regiment of vitamins, and eat whatever you want with no consequences.   These cocktails can be expensive, however, as they are tailored to each individual and will only supplement a single meal.

But this is all underneath the game.  I doubt players will try to min/max their diet.  Some may come to realize that certain foods seem to help them do certain things, but these mechanics aren't really meant to be played they're just there to form a basis for the agricultural civilization that the game takes place in.  If food is the center of all commerce, government and economy, then I've got to somehow make it important.

[Ben O'Neal]

Regarding food. Sounds cool. You've got some really neat little aspects in there, that make food interesting. Because of this, I don't agree that you should have food "underneath the game". You should let players know how food works, just like you let them know how everything else works. This allows players to choose where they want to focus, and if they don't want to worry about food, then they can decide to leave it "underneath".

Also, it would be useful to know how food works when rationing food for long campaigns (if you add food spoilage, that would be mega cool). Food was actually a very important part of managing any army on the move (and stationary too), so I'd love to see it implemented in ways that are representative of it's tremendous importance.

But how does a player "interact" with food? How do they know when they are hungry? How long do they need to be hungry for before suffering penalties? Are penalties linear or exponential? What about water? Do characters have to manually eat (like selecting an action) or can players choose to have their character eat automatically? If they don't get a particular nutrient, will they die? Or can they sustain themselves on bread alone?

Water is arguably more important than food, and I'm sure it wouldn't be too hard to implement a quality of water either, so you could distinguish between water from a swamp (which would need distilling, which could be a whole other skill, or tied in with alchemy or survival or whatever) and water from a fresh stream.

Implementing water and food is really cool. Especially if you focus on how hard they are to obtain. Fighting wars over arable land and water spots is really cool. I'm picturing hundreds of desert warriors fighting over a small oasis, and I'm liking what I see.

And then you could implement droughts and flooding. Sweet.

But your game is looking awesome. I'm only worried that it might be too much for a single person to pull off.

-Ben

[Kirk Mitchell]

Right. This is simply THE COOLEST COMPUTER GAME I HAVE EVER HEARD OF! Put it this way: I thought Half Life 2 was cool. Now it is not.

I think I'll just sit back and let the genius' work, but if I get any ideas (after I manage to do more than quickly skim over thread) I'll tell you. ;)

I'm doing some art at the moment for Crux, but I might be able to do some sprite work at some point.

Oh, and I'd LOVE to playtest it when you get to that point.

Kirk

[Christopher Weeks]

I think food should stay under the covers.  In fact, as much as possible should.  The food system sounds easily simple enough that players will figure it out over time.  Let them.  That's just one more layer of game to the whole thing.  The more of those kinds of puzzles you have, the better the game will be.  I'd seriously suggest checking out A Tale in the Desert if you haven't yet.

Chris