I feel we have too many forums as it is.

Any in depth discussion on the subject of player killing and/or how it should work within a mud could be discussed in the 'Advanced Mud Concepts' forum.

How about collating all the fora here into one big forum with everything in the same place?

Most of them are rarely used anyhow.

I don't know if a PK forum really is needed. PK is not something you can really discuss, it's just PK simple as that, player killing, nothing special about it. There are things you can discuss about the PK and the way you do it, but that's not going to go very far, it would be pointless to have a forum for it, when it is so one dimensional and doesn't really go anywhere in the end. You won't have much to show for a 900 PK and 100 death record. That's just my opinion, I think roleplay outweighs PK 100 to 1. Because in the end you just killed a bunch of players, now Roleplay and PK is a very good mix and I happen to excell at that, although some would disagree that I am just a PKing twink at a RP mud. But you will always have people who say that about you if you roleplay evil characters who might not give you a second chance if you give them a reason to slit your throat.

Right - and you've hit the nail on the head.  "It isn't necessarily a definable part of the mud" - it is a generic concept, which can apply to any mud to a greater or lesser degree.  If you talk about concepts within a roleplaying environment, then they're going to be of interest to the players of many other roleplaying muds.

PK, however, is extremely codebase specific.  If you talk about your PK concepts, then it's unlikely to be of any relevance to anyone else (unless they play the same mud, or one very similar).

It's not me you need to compromise with - I do not run TMS.  I moderate a couple of the other forums, but even then only by Synozeer's approval.  If you desire a new forum, it's him you must ask - I am simply discussing my views on it, as have you and the other posters (including at least one moderator who was for the idea).

In all honesty, such a forum would be of great advantage to me personally, as the developer of a PK mud.  Indeed at one point in time I was even thinking of putting together a whole set of discussion forums aimed towards PK muds (eg "building within PK muds", "coding PK features", "designing PK features", etc).

But in the long run, I just don't think a generic PK forum would be of value here.  There are already forums for building, coding and design, and what's left is really just too specific to each individual mud to be of much value in discussion.

But as I said before, it's Synozeer you need to speak to (although I've no doubt he's reading this as well).

Pkill isnt really all that codebase specific. There are a lot of things in pkill that are common to all muds, besides 95% of the mud belong to some of major codebase groups, hence share very big parts of the code.


no comment...

Exactly my point; all of these forums would be beneficial to administrators who are looking to develop or re-work combat systems, clan infrastructure, or any number of different parts of a MUD that deal with pk.

As you said, however, most if not all of these topics could and should be discussed in the other forums currently active on TMS. But as I said, being able to flag a thread as a pk topic, and then having a forum where I could browse the most recent pk-oriented topic, would be of great benefit to me personally; I think it would also end up helping many more MUD admins to focus specifically on pk- and combat-oriented discussions without having to stumble onto the latest and greatest discussion on MOBPROG development for a Wheel of Time series code base.



............

Yes, we are all aware that you twink out an RP-based MUD. Thank you.

-Visko

The best way to have a new forum is to prove that there is a demand for it. Right now there is just a lot of talk about the possibility of demand.

Start a bunch of Pkill discussions in the forum that best fits currently, Possibly roleplaying? Or maybe Tavern.

In either case, if enough discussions are started and continued it would prove that there is a demand. And, to save spam, they would have to be moved to a new forum.

*shrug*

In the how ever long we've had a coder's forum on here, there's been (as far as I can remember), not a single discussion on pk systems from the coder's point of view, so using that as a reason to have the forum doesn't fly.

I have a few questions for those who really want such a forum actually.  What exactly do you want it for?  What real purpose will it serve on here?

Taking my mud in example, sure a good pkiller could come from another mud, learn our system, and fare well, but there's no real point in discussing bits and pieces of it with others who don't play on Feudal, the system is more than likely different enough that it would be pointless.

My greatest fear in having something like a pk forum (and yes, I've stated this before), is that it would simply turn into a huge bickering flame-fest of who thinks who is the best pk stud on whatever the #### mud they might play on.  And honestly, we have no need for that here...

And for those who think I'm anti-pk, well, you couldn't be any further from the truth in that thought...

Well, I know I have several topics I would like to see discussions about as I am in the eternally slow process of creating a PK mud.

Creating an environment so the best PKers rise to the top - This is basically my mission statement.  Most of the discussions would be for this purpose.

Classless - I use to be pro-class, but I'm slowly realizing that at least a classless system might support the goal better because it lets players invoke strategy from the very beginning beside a narrow choice of a class/race combo.  I'd like to hear thoughts on that.  

Advancement - levels or not?  How is it handled?  At somepoint is the only way to advance through PK only?  Should it be?

Identifying the best PKers - what systems do people use to quantify the ability of being a 'good' PKer?  This might be connected to a levelless mud topic.

Balance - this is huge issue of course.  How do you create and maintain balance?  How do you balance out a previously unbalanced situation without creating even more unbalance?  What methods of control to admin use?

Rewards for PK/Penalties for dying - Given the nature of the game, players will die fairly often.  What is too much? What is not enough?  Are the rewards mostly intrinsic to the player? Etc.

Separation - Team based or not?  How do you handle PK when everyone lives in the same town?  Are there written rules players must abide by, or is everything hard coded?  And how well does that work?

Vision in a roomless environment - 360 degree vision or first person?  What about trying to backstab someone?  If FP, what's to stop players from making an alias/trigger to look all around them everytime?  

Range weapons in a roomless environtment - How to balance it.

And yes, I know these could all 'fit' in another forum especially since we have a catch all forum.  But again, that's not the point.

I just don't understand this 'fear'?  That's what a moderator is for.

Um I don't think having a PK forum was a good idea.. why don't we nag Syno for allowing comments to be posted on the reviews again.. I'd rather have that.. yeah.. pk forum's can be handled locally, many of us have wildly different MUDs so I dont know how well that can possibly turn out. Might get ugly in there.