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Old 08-25-2004, 12:38 PM   #1
Rundvelt
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Old 08-27-2004, 10:49 AM   #2
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Come on, there has to be builders on the boards here!
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Old 08-27-2004, 03:34 PM   #3
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Well, and im prolly got get yelled at for this, but find a codebase with no OLC. from what i understand of it, it serverly limits what you can do, where as a codebase such as LPC, where you write the code itself with all the mob/room/object info. It allows you much more freedom to make every room, every monster, every object, diffrent. Give monsters fun little abilities to help them kill mortals, or make a weapon that can be only used by a specific guild, even if more guilds have the weapon skill. stuff like that.
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Old 08-28-2004, 05:41 PM   #4
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I am a bit confused about point 1. Do you build on a mud with a heavy Good/Evil theme? Why do you limit yourself so much right at the beginning?

I'd be inclined to say mprogs. First, you need to have some descriptions anyway, so every area will have them, better or worse. Even if you have a whole range of dynamic descriptions, in the long run they will not add as much life, randomness and dynamics to an area as well designed mprogs will. They are also harder to avoid, unlike descriptions that a player can pretty much turn off by using brief mode. But both are important, not just necessary.
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Old 08-29-2004, 04:40 PM   #5
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I begin by designing the theme of my areas (as almost all areas I do interlink and contain many small quest). After I come up with something that fits into the world, I design each room completely before moving to the next. This includes mobs, progs, descriptions, items etc.... That way once I'm done with that room I'm done.

But before all that, PAPER, everything goes on paper then on the world.
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Old 08-29-2004, 05:00 PM   #6
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What OLC limits you to depends completely on the OLC you're using. A good OLC system lets you do everything you mentioned.

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Old 08-29-2004, 05:12 PM   #7
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I think you're missing the most important step:
1. What need or desire among your playerbase or targetted playerbase is this area going to fill? Everything else proceeds from there.

I'd also think you can skip the "decide on good or evil" as that assumes a pretty one-dimensional approach to the world. Flushing out the theme kind of covers that step anyway, without having to limit yourself to one of two kinds of areas. (My theme will be....a community of artists dedicated to the pursuit of beauty above all else. My theme will be....an extra-planar fortress filled with cloud giants involved in internecine warfare over which God is most benevolent.)

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Old 08-29-2004, 05:28 PM   #8
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One thing we've found really handy here is to create standard forms on our wiki for keeping track of what's going on in an area from proposal to completion.

One starts out by filling out the proposal, which will include:
a) Area name
b) What need it fills
c) Out-of-role description of the area
c) In-role description of the area.
d) Overview of all sub-areas within the area
e) Overview of types of NPCs
f) Overview of major quests
g) Map

Once the proposal is approved, the person starts building, adding detail to the wiki form as he goes along. By the time he or she is finished, the form has a complete overview of the area, down to every NPC in it along with a link that takes you directly to the web mobprog editor with that NPC's prog loaded up, every quest, including the rewards, NPC shops and their contents, comments from senior builders, and so on. It's REALLY handy to have when someone who didn't build an area has to do some maintenance or upgrade work on it later and it's equally useful for those who need to review and approve areas. Its function is somewhat akin to commenting code, in fact. And really, for large areas, it's even helpful for the builder himself in terms of organizing and easily getting a second opinion on whatever he's working on at the time.

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Old 08-29-2004, 08:33 PM   #9
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In my opinion what separates an excellent area from all those that are just fair is often consistency.
Everything must work together in a zone to make it really good; rooms, mobs, objects, scripts and resets.

I hate futuristic objects in medieval zones for instance, or zones where you can skip from a hot jungle to a tundra of snow and ice in just a few steps. . Climate, ecology, vegetation, wildlife, population, economy, architecture, culture etc. are equally important. Usually I start up by writing a background for my zone, which outlines those features, and also some sort of a plot, that I can use as a base for quests. The next thing I do is always a map, on graph paper. The map may need to be adapted as the zone develops, but it is the backbone of the world, and prevents bad linking (which is usually annoying).

To me all descs are equally important, object and mob descs as well as room descs. I cannot stand objects without descs (which is very common in some muds). And the more extra descs the better for me. The players get a choice whether to read them or skip them, which is always a good thing.

I prefer room descs to be kept rather short, around 4-7 lines. If they are longer they get spammy, and just tempt players to put brief mode on. If you cannot contain what you have to say to 7 lines, make another room, or use extra descs. The extra descs are also excellent for adding hidden and secret things, which only the players that pay attention find. In our mud there are so many hidden features in the zones, that even the most confirmed hack’n’slashers start reading all descs sooner or later, when they realise what they are missing out on otherwise. In our mud we also have listen/smell/taste descs and look behind/above/under descs, which gives a lot of extra tools for the ambitious builder.

In my opinion a good zone should always have several 'levels'; the basic ‘hunting ground’ on top for those just out to kill as many mobs as possible, and an  ‘extra desc’ level, for those just like to read and delve into the depths of a zone. And then the ‘secret’ level, which takes a bit more time, effort and brains to figure out, and where the quests and rewards are usually ‘hidden in the high grass’ (metaphorically spoken).

Flavour, imagination and creative writing are things that vastly influence the general quality of a zone, but there are so many different styles of writing, that it is hard to set up any rules here. Again consistency is a key word. Always stick to the same style of writing throughout the zone. There usually is no problem recognising talent or mediocrity in a zone, whichever style it is written in. Checking a well written zone is a sheer pleasure to me, somewhat comparative to reading a good novel, but a bit more interactive than that, because of the code and the scripts.

Mob_progs – (or scripts, as we call the equivalent in Circle code) – are really important, not just for adding flavour, but for adding all kinds of quests, quirks and challenges to a zone. A zone without scripts usually looks a bit dead, however well written the descs are. But a zone with too many scripts gets spammy and irritating, so take care how you set them up, and be particularly cautious with Greet triggers.

I am no big fan of code generated descs. However much effort that you put into the variables, they always get repetitive at a certain point, and they usually lack ‘flavour’. IMO they can never replace well written individual descs. The only cases when I find them acceptable are in grids, or large spaced areas, where the descs would otherwise have to be totally repetitive, because of the excessive workload involved in writing hundreds of individual descs for a prairie or ocean zone.

The order you make things in doesn’t really matter; there are as many methods as there are builders. Some like to make all rooms first, others prefer to finish each room in turn, with descs, mobs , objects scripts and resets. Whatever method you find most effective is good.

Personally I always write down all descs in wordpad before even opening the OLC. And I really mean ALL, including the extra descs. Then I just copy and paste the descs into the OLC, which minimises the time I need to spend on line (which is important if you are on dial-up like I am). Writing everything down first gives you a much better overall view of the zone than you ever get in OLC. You can also trim the descs to a fairly even length, perhaps moving some sentences from one room to another, or even from a room to a mob or object, or the reverse. (Also this gives you a back-up of your work, in case the Mud shuts down, or you work for one of those Muds where Builders’ rights are not respected, and the Admin refuse to give you a copy of your own work).

The last important quality in a zone is Game balance. All Builders want their zone to be popular among the players. The easiest and – in my opinion – cheep way of ensuring this, is to put some overpowered equipment in it. Builders that do this have really misunderstood their role. If people play a zone simply because the equip in it is better than it should be, the Builder should be deeply ashamed of themselves, and the Head Builder too, for allowing it to happen. Some muds try to avoid this by not allow the Builders to create objects at all, they have a small, trusted team that do this in all zones. To me that is the wrong path to go. Mainly because to me Building entails the entire zone, and the objects are an important part of that whole. But also because I prefer to trust my Builders – up to a certain point. No zone goes into the Game Port, without being thoroughly checked by me and preferably one more Head Builder.

Also, in our Mud, completing a zone is usually the only way to get an immortal, and the content of the zone gives you a hint of what new imms you should keep a sharp eye on. If the zone is full of cheat equip and ‘cute’ scripts, you might not even want to admit the builder as an imm. I do believe in second chances though, mainly because I was given one myself. I was known as a major Troublemaker in my first mud, and the head Builder told me I’d never get an imm in the Gameport. I ended up Head Builder and Imp. One of our more talented Builders turned in a zone that was so crammed with various – and very advanced – ‘cheat’ scripts that it made my head spin. He didn’t get his imm until much later, after some long and serious talks. But he ended up as Head Coder and Imp, and I trust him more than anybody else on the mud.

Last, a serious advice too all prospective Builders out there. Don’t cheat. You MIGHT get away with it – at least for a while - if the Head Builders don’t know their job. And cheating and overpowered equip MIGHT be fun for you and your closest friends – at least for a while. But it isn’t fun for everybody else, and in the long run it isn’t even fun for you. Cheating ruins every mud, and cheating imms is worse than anything else. So, don’t cheat.

If you want your zone to be popular, put some challenge or original feature in it, something that makes the players want to come back to it, after the first time. To solve a quest, figure out a hard puzzle, or whatever you can think of. Use your imagination. The sky is the limit. You can do it.
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Old 08-29-2004, 09:04 PM   #10
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Ideally this is the case for the whole world too if you're going for 'world immersion.' A world full of disparate zones that don't make sense when taken as a whole tends to break the fiction, at least for me. 'Zones' are fairly artificial constructs to begin with in the sense that worlds don't stop and start at 'zone entrances'. I think for immersion purposes, the ideal would be that a player never recognizes what a 'zone' is. All he knows is he's in the world and he's just come across a village, or wanders into the mountains and encounters a cave system with trolls living in them, etc.

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Old 08-29-2004, 09:13 PM   #11
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That is rather obvious, and that is also how our world is set up.
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Old 08-29-2004, 09:33 PM   #12
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Well, I define "Descide good or evil" as a genral statement for the "styling" of the rooms. For example.

I might be building an area focusing on an empire. Depending on good and evil aspects to room descs, it depermines the feel of my area.
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Old 08-29-2004, 09:35 PM   #13
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Old 08-29-2004, 09:37 PM   #14
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My point was that 'good' and 'evil' are just two attributes out of a nearly infinite number that an area might have. Why limit yourself to black and white when there's a continuum. Heck, why limit yourself to a continuum when there are so many different ways to style an area that have nothing to do with 'good' or 'evil'.

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Old 08-30-2004, 02:50 AM   #15
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Creating a consistent world out of the zones from a number of different Builders is usually a job for the Head Builder, not the individual Builder - and sometimes a tough task.

There are however several ways in which the individual builder can help in achieving this impression. For example by taking care that the connection between their own zone and the main world is as seemless as possible. Or by adding references to other parts of the world to their descs, using mobs or objects from other zones in a quest, or something as simple as making a lookout place, from where you see the surrounding zones.

This is one of the reasons why the best zones and quests are usually created by good players, who know the world they play in inside out.

An apology to the list:  :-)
Sorry about the double posting on this quote. I thought I had pasted this comment into the first one, but I obviously must  have screwed up somehow. It was around 3 AM in my country by then, so I forgot to check it too before logging out.

Anyhow, since the post had already been commented on, I found it more correct to make a new post for this part, rather than just editing the first one.
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Old 08-30-2004, 05:20 AM   #16
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Old 08-30-2004, 08:57 AM   #17
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My previous post is kind of out dated, and just to show one of the different ways I have changed building.....

1) Decide Theme based on what is needed (Leveling area, mini quest, dedication).

2) Graph the area out on Graph Paper, each cell representing a room.

3) Initiate buildwalk, and create the entire area by walking in correspondance with the graph.

4) I still like to create entire rooms, which require 4 descriptions for all rooms not flagged indoors as to allow for change of weather, with the exception of mobs/objects/progs. Because of a new feature addreset.

5) Go back to beginning room and create mobs/objects etc for all rooms (initiate add reset).

6) Decide on mini quest and hidden items. Add all the extra descriptions and progs to mobs, rooms and objects for the mini quest.

7) Use a mapper and map the area, which records rooms and mobs in the room (and since you're an immortal nothing is hidden).

8) Convert map into text file and use spell checker (horrible speller)

9) Pray, have a nice mixed drink and copyover. (Anyone who uses lots of mprogs knows about that).

10) TEST!!! Test mini quest, and all mob progs for loops etc. etc. allow another immortal to test, then a player to test, and when I say test I mean try to break it, drag the mobs abuse the loop holes find the ways around the quest.

Luckily there are a few features that make building (with OLC) almost a snap. I think coders should cater to builder needs as much as players.
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Old 09-03-2004, 01:39 AM   #18
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I definitely see wonderful suggestions and methods outlined in these posts but there are a few considerations necessary that I’ve not seen mentioned yet even with the novella that Molly wrote or The_Logos’ corporate quality assurance model. I use to do Tiger Teams with 'written action modules' for the government and Molly and I have extremely similar upbringing in the world of Mu*s so I’m very familiar and agree with both.

However, I firmly believe whenever someone asks for building advice we normally have to consider they’re doing it as a volunteer and for the fun of the challenge. That means to me to keep the response as simple as possible and to hold the complexities of ‘layering,’ ‘embedding quests,’ or even mob AI until they really get into the heart of fleshing out their zone. I usually only hire from within our player base to avoid the issues of experience with balance or misunderstandings about what zone concept would actually fit in our world. So, with that being said, here’s my simplistic approach:

1. Select an appropriate theme keeping in mind where it fits in the world that you think would be fun to build.
2. READ THE GUIDANCE ON BUILDING FOR THE WORLD YOU LIVE IN! There are always tips and tricks and do’s and don’ts.
3. Map it on paper.
4. Create the rooms and describe them while keeping in mind the theme, flow and consistency. Experiment as you go by looking at things you say are there or the areas adjacent to you. Keep a few notes about things you want to be interactive, critters that would fit well, etc. Please create all your writing in such a fashion that you’re able to run it through a spell checker either before or after entering into the code.
5. Create and enable those critters and objects and again play with them. Do the things you see and experience meet your expectations? Think of special actions that would make them more fun, harder to kill, potential quests; basically anything that makes your part of the world come alive and add them yourself or get help from a senior advisor.
6. Get second or even third opinions on what you’ve made and DON’T have a thin skin. Ideas are things to consider and should be. This is not to be confused with ‘guidance’ from a senior builder which I advise heeding.
7. TEST and RETEST, then submit for proof when you believe you’re finished.

Obviously I simplified the process but it’s the basic gist of how I’ve trained and seen others train a whole slew of volunteer builders that actually enjoy the work and call it fun, as well as continue to build.

Rundveldt, you really knew what you wanted the theme to be before you started and good or evil is a balancing decision that’s guided by the theme. Other than that, you’ve got a good plan if your end result is to make it fun and come alive. As to mob_progs or descripts, you should decide since both are important. If you say there is a big rock in the room shouldn’t it actually be there and have size, texture etc? If you create a drunk, should he stumble, slur his words if any and burp? Do what’s fun for you or your audience.
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Old 09-04-2004, 10:26 PM   #19
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First post, although I've been reading the boards for a while. I just wondered exactly what you meant, Matt, by 'OOC role' and 'What need it fills' in your set of requirements. Does each area you guys build have one specific or main role only?
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Old 09-16-2004, 04:59 PM   #20
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In her post Sonya mentioned ’updating’ zones, and I’d like to comment on that, because the term ‘updating’ might mean different things to different people.

To some it might mean just changing the level of the mobs and the stats of the objects in the zone, to fit in with the general level of their game. That’s not updating to me, it’s just balancing the zone.

To some it might mean changing the names of the key mobs and some references in a few of the rooms, (like for instance renaming Midgard to Mos Eisley), and then replacing the name of the original Builder with your own. That’s not updating to me, it’s stealing – (and it is appalling to see how many Muds that do this deplorable thing).

But in 4D ‘updating a zone’ means something much more. Our Mud has been on line for almost eight years now, and during that time we have changed the codebase and made a lot of additions to the OLC, giving several new opportunities for the Builders.

Some of the oldest zones are only half the ‘standard’ size of  100 rooms, because we had a lot of inexperienced Builders back then - including myself - and figured that one small zone in the Game Port was worth more than ten unfinished big ones in the Buildport. And to tell the truth, some of them are really not all that good - including my own -  because we started out from scratch without any Stock zones at all, and needed the world to grow fast. So in those old days quantity meant more than quality, and some of the old zones could best be described as ‘hunting grounds’. And even if some of them are small jewels in their own way, since the Builder had a way with words, they still lack the depth and twists that the newer ones have, because in those old days the Builders just didn’t have the tools that we have now.

Every zone, simple or complex, is unique, because every Builder has their own style and puts some of their own personality into it. You could call it the essence of the Builder, or maybe the ‘flavour’ of the zone. What Sonya does when she updates a zone is to pick up that flavour and adapt her own style of writing to it. You need to be a good writer, with a firm sense of the valour of the language to do this.

Updating a zone in 4D includes adding all the extra descs (listen, smell, taste, feel) to rooms and objects, checking the balance, getting rid of any remaining typos, adding some of the new OLC options to make it more challenging (like scripts, hidden portals and containers, look behind/above/under objects, segmented mobs, etc).  Usually she also adds a couple of built-in Quests, and fills the number of rooms up to a 100. (At times she adds a 100 room grid to it as well). And while doing all this she sticks to the theme and style of the original zone.

The result of this rather unselfish work is a zone that the original Builder would recognise as their own, but which also is bigger, better and more challenging for the players. Naturally the original Builders keep their credits, she just adds her own name as ‘updated by…’. And in this she follows the tradition of 4D, where the work of Builders has always been respected and recognised. Maybe that’s why we have been blessed with so many amazing Builders over the years.

And you know what? Any good Builder is worth their weight in gold to any Mud, even if some mudowners are too stupid or too arrogant to acknowledge it. And I wouldn’t trade Sonya for anything.
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