| Author |
Looby Looing |
Armand
explorer
Joined: Nov 20, 2006
Posts: 532 |  Posted: 24-09-2008 17:39
Quote:
| "That's my point: it's unlikely that you'll do that simply because there AREN'T 10 warlock players roaming around in the land at any one time." |
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I think you misunderstood my scenario. I was talking about using MY (hypothetical) 10 warlocks simultaneously to attack your lone persona.
Quote:
| "I'd think: "great! time to give armand another bashing" |
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Well that is your personal preference. From my point of view, if I knew that people could amass huge quantities of points in no time (something which would easily be possible with multi-lining and looby), it would severely diminish the enjoyment I derive from PvP. Furthermore, the entire game would lose its sense of challenge (which is directly related to fun) because death would become meaningless. In my mind it would be like playing a video game on cheat mode: it might seem fun and novel for a few hours, but the lack of challenge makes it quickly boring.
To reiterate my point, here are a few other examples of how multi-lining and looby could be severely abused.
1. Bringing on armies of protectors at 1 stam and then dispatching them in quick succession with your main persona.
2. Multi-lining to circumvent various puzzles in the game such as the PC, gargoyles, and crown (the latter being possible to achieve in mere seconds with enough personae), and to team mobiles so that "hard" mobiles no longer have any worth. Your response to this might be "so what, whats the big deal?" but it IS a big deal because puzzles are a core feature of the game, so by nullifying them the game is severely degraded in quality.
3. Creating dozens of personae to go north and increase T values massively.
4. Having a dedicated magic user which sits in a safe room and casts spells that you find useful on your main persona (which may not even be a MU), thus circumventing the entire magic system of the game.
Bear in mind also that I just thought these up right now, and that given time to consider it properly, an experienced player could probably think of dozens more ways to gain hugely disproportional advantages.
Quote:
| "In case you hadn't noticed, MUD2 no longer plays like it used to BECAUSE of an imbalance of player types, not to mention the distinct lack of players compared to its hay-day." |
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I agree with the latter but not the former. There is no imbalance of players right now, only less players. Pkers have less targets, but there are also less pkers.
Quote:
| "they were never penalised to any great extent and the game played just fine" |
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I wasn't there so I can't really comment on this, other than to say that games do evolve and mature, and that what seemed to work just fine back when the concept of online games was very new and exciting (and the choice of MUDs very limited) isn't necessarily appropriate in a modern context.
Quote:
| "However, it's fairly common to b able to log onto MUD2 and find that you're the only one playing (well, visible anyway), so, in this instance what does it matter if I hoard treasure with one character, log off and go and swamp it with another" |
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It matters because your example is contrived. In practice there is never a time when you can be SURE that another player won't appear at any given moment (or already is there, but you didn't notice). By spending 2 hours on a hero gathering 15k of T, and then spending 5 seconds on your mage to swamp it, you completely remove any element of risk from the game. The level of wiz then becomes totally meaningless as a measure of achievement, because literally ANYone (even a newbie who only knows how to find surface T) can wiz simply by loobying.
Quote:
| "I was referring to newbies deciding to leave because they have been (in their view) overly reprimanded for doing something that the game allows them to do, when they weren't even aware that it was disallowed. You may not be aware of any instances of this happening, but I'll bet it has." |
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I'm sure it has happened, but not with any significant frequency. I think it unlikely that a reasonable wiz would "overly reprimand" a newbie on their first offense of loobying. Usually warnings are issued first, and explanations of the rule offered so that the newbie has an opportunity to learn the mistake.
Quote:
| "One point I was trying to make was that loobying DOES still go on, by both newbies and oldbies alike, and, given the lack of numbers of players nowadays, is it really the huge crime that it seems to be being portrayed as here?" |
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Whatever loobying takes place currently is very rare and the forms it takes fairly minor. If the rules were removed, looby and multilining would become common place and used to much bigger effect than currently. I'd be willing to wager that with multi-lining and loobying, I could make wiz in just a few hours, and maybe even in a single reset.
Quote:
| "why not go the whole hog and actually make it impossible for a player to circumvent it" |
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Because it would be impossible to implement this. There is no way for the game to be able to identify two personae as belonging to the same person, unless both personae are on the same account.
[ This Message was edited by: Armand on 24-09-2008 18:14 ]
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Samson
friar
Joined: Oct 28, 2006
Posts: 105 | Posted: 24-09-2008 21:05
[quote]In case you hadn't noticed, MUD2 no longer plays like it used to BECAUSE of an imbalance of player types, not to mention the distinct lack of players compared to its hay-day.
I wouldn't really agree, there are still the 4 suits playing.
Quote:
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I agree, if player base warrants it. However, it's fairly common to be able to log onto MUD2 and find that you're the only one playing (well, visible anyway), so, in this instance what does it matter if I hoard treasure with one character, log off and go and swamp it with another? |
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Perhaps because part of the learning curve of playing is about playing a high level persona for a period of time, rather than have a low level persona build a nice treasure trove and take all the risks then have the high level persona swamp it all in relative safety?
Quote:
| One point I was trying to make was that loobying DOES still go on, by both newbies and oldbies alike, and, given the lack of numbers of players nowadays, is it really the huge crime that it seems to be being portrayed as here?
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It does? Or are you referring to players coming on with an different persona after having to flee from a mobile and then attempts to regain kit left?
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Crazyfool
Wizard
Joined: Sep 16, 2001
Posts: 804
From: Llanelli
| Posted: 24-09-2008 21:30
Pippins mudmeet.
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ewarwoowar
cabalist
Joined: Jul 21, 2008
Posts: 40
From: West Sussex
| Posted: 24-09-2008 22:34
Quote:
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On 24-09-2008 17:39, Armand wrote:
Quote:
| "That's my point: it's unlikely that you'll do that simply because there AREN'T 10 warlock players roaming around in the land at any one time." |
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I think you misunderstood my scenario. I was talking about using MY (hypothetical) 10 warlocks simultaneously to attack your lone persona. |
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Sorry - I think I now understand where our differences lie: I've been talking only about loobying - multi-lining hadn't actually entered my head (naieve sap that I am!).
Now I see where you're coming from, yes, I agree completely with you regarding multi-lining. That should always be banned in my view, and punished where it can be proven to have been used (although I'm not sure how that would be done) as it really is cheating and no-one, in my opinion, could possibly plead innocence over that, even a newbie.
Quote:
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Quote:
| "I'd think: "great! time to give armand another bashing" |
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Well that is your personal preference. |
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Sorry again: that was actually meant tongue in cheek.
Quote:
| From my point of view, if I knew that people could amass huge quantities of points in no time (something which would easily be possible with multi-lining and looby), it would severely diminish the enjoyment I derive from PvP. Furthermore, the entire game would lose its sense of challenge (which is directly related to fun) because death would become meaningless. In my mind it would be like playing a video game on cheat mode: it might seem fun and novel for a few hours, but the lack of challenge makes it quickly boring. |
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I agree with your conclusions: loobying specifically to raise a character up quickly is essentially cheating and would remove the challenge for most of us.
All of your subsequent examples rely on multi-lining, which as I've already said, I agree should not be allowed.
Quote:
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Quote:
| "why not go the whole hog and actually make it impossible for a player to circumvent it" |
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Because it would be impossible to implement this. There is no way for the game to be able to identify two personae as belonging to the same person, unless both personae are on the same account. |
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Agreed - again, I'd missed the multi-lining aspect of your argument. If everyone stayed with the one account with three personas, then this could be handled by the game. The thought of having more than one account hadn't crossed my mind (I'm clearly not a devious sort...what have I been doing with my life?!  ).
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royston
ranger
Joined: Jul 14, 2007
Posts: 1217
From: Felixstowe, Suffolk.
| Posted: 25-09-2008 09:11
That last point occured to me. You could get round it easily. As it is, you cannot multi-line on the same account but you can if you use two. (I just met myself in the Tearoom  )
I thought at first it might be fairer to have these rules accessable for the benefit of newbies, but somehow it seems more in the spirit of the game that you have to find them out the hard way.
Some rules are more easy to interpret than others of course. Looby-looing is easy but bullying is more difficult. One person's bullying is another's robust play and much has to be left to the disctetion of the wizzes as to what is reasonable.
So perhaps it is better to leave things the way they are.
There is a fourth rule that comes to mind, the one about exploiting a bug.
Then there are the guides, of course, like the 'Two Level Guide'. Contravening a guide is within the rules but is frowned upon by other players. You don't get fodded by a Wiz; you get beaten up by Armand instead.
But this is how it should be. Who could possibly object to any Warlock attacking Blib the Protector and making him flee?
_________________
And death shall have no dominion.
[ This Message was edited by: royston on 25-09-2008 09:20 ]
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royston
ranger
Joined: Jul 14, 2007
Posts: 1217
From: Felixstowe, Suffolk.
| Posted: 25-09-2008 09:34
I keep on getting this mental image of Armand abusing the spring.
_________________
And death shall have no dominion.
[ This Message was edited by: royston on 25-09-2008 09:34 ]
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Armand
explorer
Joined: Nov 20, 2006
Posts: 532 | Posted: 25-09-2008 13:18
Quote:
| Sorry - I think I now understand where our differences lie: I've been talking only about loobying - multi-lining hadn't actually entered my head (naieve sap that I am!). |
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Ah ok, fair enough. You kept referring to "these rules" plural so I assumed you meant both.
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Armand
explorer
Joined: Nov 20, 2006
Posts: 532 | Posted: 25-09-2008 13:19
Quote:
| Who could possibly object to any Warlock attacking Blib the Protector and making him flee? |
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I object! I don't want just "any" warlock to attack blib, I want it to be me! 
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Tharg
friar
Joined: Sep 23, 2001
Posts: 78 | Posted: 25-09-2008 14:21
What's the rule on exploiting a bug?
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royston
ranger
Joined: Jul 14, 2007
Posts: 1217
From: Felixstowe, Suffolk.
| Posted: 25-09-2008 17:22
You can read about it here. OK it was a while ago.
http://www.muddled-times.com/v2/article.fod?IssueId=31&CategoryId=8&ArticleId=1607
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Heiach
Wizard
Joined: Oct 31, 2001
Posts: 549
From: I can't remember!
| Posted: 25-09-2008 22:58
Every time you cheat, God kills a kitten.
 
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