What stops you from running a game?

[Paradox]

@L-B-Heuschkel

I’m curious if this is with the intent to be used with the automated combat systems? Since otherwise wouldn’t everything be just on the narrative side?

[Tat]

@L-B-Heuschkel said in What stops you from running a game?:

I’ve seen one game – yours, I think? – that used Luck as such a currency. I’m leaning towards maybe some kind of merit point also earned from scening.

It did, yeah – sort of, anyway. There’s a real simple inventory plugin that does the same, but it doesn’t have any crafting attached and I’m not sure it does the ‘tracking’ you want, but it might be worth a look as a starting place.

[L. B. Heuschkel]

@Paradox said in What stops you from running a game?:

@L-B-Heuschkel

I’m curious if this is with the intent to be used with the automated combat systems? Since otherwise wouldn’t everything be just on the narrative side?

I am thinking in terms of FS3 implementation, yes. It’s a hell of a lot easier if you ‘only’ do narrative.

[L. B. Heuschkel]

@Tat said in What stops you from running a game?:

@L-B-Heuschkel said in What stops you from running a game?:

I’ve seen one game – yours, I think? – that used Luck as such a currency. I’m leaning towards maybe some kind of merit point also earned from scening.

It did, yeah – sort of, anyway. There’s a real simple inventory plugin that does the same, but it doesn’t have any crafting attached and I’m not sure it does the ‘tracking’ you want, but it might be worth a look as a starting place.

Yeah. I’m actually looking at it and have been for a bit. Thinking maybe I can hack it together with the Advantages system that also exists, and come up with some kind of useful hybrid. In time. because again, I am not a great coder. XD

[Paradox]

@L-B-Heuschkel

I think that’s always been my ‘hiccup’ as it were in regards to the FS3 automation vs. anything else.

If you want to keep the tasty combat in, you are really handcuffed in what you can do. Otherwise, it’s far less restrictive.

Take for example even the simplicity of adding a ‘bonus’ to your actions based on a BG skill in FS3 automated combat.

[L. B. Heuschkel]

@Paradox said in What stops you from running a game?:

Take for example even the simplicity of adding a ‘bonus’ to your actions based on a BG skill in FS3 automated combat.

Yeah. FS3 allows it all. I do these things manually when running FS3 combat. But to automate them – well, that takes a level of comfort with rooting around in FS3’s code that I don’t have. Yet.

[Testament]

For what I’m doing, I actually took a lot of inspiration from Savage Skies on h ow they handled their magic system, as I think it was a pretty good one. Granted, I didn’t and still don’t have it all implemented.

I turned the different ‘schools’ of magic into Advantages, and based on the level of Advantage you had, is the level of complexity of spells you could cast. This is the point where I brought in certain aspects of DnD, such as Cantrips, miniscule stuff that you could caste repeated without issue. Actual spells you had a certain number of times that could be casted.

The unwieldy part, and I realize it’s unwieldy, is that some spells could only be used ‘outside of combat’ because there was no way that they could be implemented into FS3. At least, not that I know of. A limitation of FS3 is you can’t buff your teammates en masse, but you can debuff opposing NPCs.

That’s where I decided until I could figure out something better, that we just work with rolling everything out. This works, but I know it’s not the most elegant way of sorting it out. It works, but I’d like to improve it.

[Third Eye]

@lucidmaus said in What stops you from running a game?:

Laziness, for me.

Same. Also there are things I could learn but don’t enjoy (minimal dealing with code to install stuff and keep it maintained), and also things that can very quickly turn into a grind (OOC player management). Nothing that can’t be overcome if you’re into it but there are stretches of time when I just don’t want to deal with the demands of the treadmill and even when you’re just staffing it’s hard to entirely check out, let alone running the show.

[Jumpscare]

@BloodAngel I’m not versed on Thenomain’s codebase, but I think the first thing I’d ask any aspiring game creator is, “What part of your game do you want to make that can’t already be made with AresMUSH?”

And then I’d suggest taking that list of features and trying to make them fit into the AresMUSH guidelines. And lastly, I’d suggest asking the AresMUSH community for how to do the things that remain on your list.

In my opinion, Evennia and AresMUSH can do almost the exact same things, except you get more customization out of Evennia and more ease-of-use out of AresMUSH. If you have a setting and just want to run scenes on the web with other players, AresMUSH is ideal. If you want any of a traditional grid, in-game secrets, NPC AI, or automated combat, Evennia is probably the better choice. There are plenty of other choices out there, but those two appear to be emerging as the two modern choices with the greatest support.

Anyway, best of luck to your endeavors!

[Jumpscare]

@Testament said in What stops you from running a game?:

Savage Skies on how they handled their magic system

I agree here. Savage Skies had a good magic system within the constraints of AresMUSH.

[MisterBoring]

For me it boils down to three things:

1. Poor time management skills. I probably have the time to run one, but I am so bad at managing my own time that I don’t feel like starting a game would be a good idea.

2. Lack of code knowledge. I have plenty of coding know how, but don’t know MU code at all.

3. Financial stuffs. I realize the server requirement for a MU is pretty inexpensive, but my finances are as turbulent as an airplane attempting to fly through the wall of a hurricane, so there’d be multiple times where the game would vanish just because I suddenly needed that money elsewhere.

[BloodAngel]

@Jumpscare Thank you. I will look into that!

[KarmaBum]

@Testament said in What stops you from running a game?:

The unwieldy part, and I realize it’s unwieldy, is that some spells could only be used ‘outside of combat’ because there was no way that they could be implemented into FS3. At least, not that I know of. A limitation of FS3 is you can’t buff your teammates en masse, but you can debuff opposing NPCs.

It can be done using either @Tat’s magic system or custom combat hooks. We had a lot of (busted ass) custom commands on GH, including buffs and debuffs.

I am a lousy coder and was able to figure it out enough that it worked. A good coder could probably drop in custom hooks with relative ease.

[Testament]

@KarmaBum I really really love @Tat’s magic system.

However, I really really do not understand Tat’s magic system and I’m fairly sure my game would implode on me if I tried to implement it without someone holding my hand to do so.

[Tat]

@Testament said in What stops you from running a game?:

@KarmaBum I really really love @Tat’s magic system.

However, I really really do not understand Tat’s magic system and I’m fairly sure my game would implode on me if I tried to implement it without someone holding my hand to do so.

For the record, my magic system is heavily intertwined with FS3’s vanilla code and I don’t really recommend that anyone try to use it on a different game without being a real comfy coder themselves.

Many of my commands also have a tendency, to quote KB eloquently, to go ‘broke ass’ in unexpected ways.

[dvoraen]

Imposter syndrome is my answer to the topic question. I don’t have confidence in myself as a gamerunner or a coder. I have quite the idea for a homebrew fantasy setting based on personal writings, but Ares doesn’t have the functionality I think I need (e.g., custom magic and magical research systems). I lean strongly towards Evennia based on some of the work Tehom has done for Arx, but my inexperience with django kicks in and that veers me away from commiting, because I feel so daunted by the amount of research and learning-by-error ahead of me.

I also would hate confronting problem players or being the parental unit of a game. So there’s that too.

[Jennkryst]

@L-B-Heuschkel said in What stops you from running a game?:

… otherwise, a player will rack up several hundred magic thingies.

One of the more recent editions of Shadowrun… 5e or 6e, solved part of this! At least… in theory, if not direct mechanical practice here. You have items degrade in power over a short to medium time. Like, hours to days at most.

[Pyrephox]

I have reams of ideas; over the years I’ve put together about a dozen design docs with themes, mechanics, plots, etc. But I’m both very code dumb with a low threshold of frustration where it’s concerned…

And I’m also a giant flake. I just am. I have a hundred ideas every minute, and focusing on any of them usually requires someone else to be enthusiastic about one of them. That doesn’t generally happen, and I get distracted. Even if I put a game together, my expectations tend a bit more towards tabletop etiquette not ‘customer service’ and I suspect I would become seen as a tyrant very quickly. And then I’d get frustrated and leave.

It’s better to just shut that whole inevitable cycle down before I disappoint people.

[L. B. Heuschkel]

@Jennkryst said in What stops you from running a game?:

@L-B-Heuschkel said in What stops you from running a game?:

… otherwise, a player will rack up several hundred magic thingies.

One of the more recent editions of Shadowrun… 5e or 6e, solved part of this! At least… in theory, if not direct mechanical practice here. You have items degrade in power over a short to medium time. Like, hours to days at most.

That’s another way to go about it, yes. One which also requires you to code decay – and more importantly, to consider how you want that decay to impact different parts of the playerbase. People who play daily may spend their stuff daily and not be impacted as heavily as the async players who may take a week to spend loot.

[KarmaBum]

I am admittedly intrigued by the number of “code limitation” answers.

And then curious on the flipside: How many people who won’t open a game because of code limitations would still play on one where implementation was janky?

GH had a terrible implementation of FS3 that was totally unbalanced and all the custom code broke all the time, and people played there till the place was basically falling apart. As @Tat mentioned, her awesome magic code was often busted, and people still played SL till the day the doors closed.

Is roll play the limiting factor to role play?