PlaneShift

Gameplay => Wish list => Topic started by: defender43 on February 25, 2006, 11:03:32 pm

Title: Random name generation
Post by: defender43 on February 25, 2006, 11:03:32 pm
I think it would be beneficial to RPing if the system, when it spawned Rogues, Fanatics, and other nameless, fightable NPC\'s randomly generated names.

Instead of instantly knowing where a rogue is, you\'d come down an alley, and see a man. You come up to him, wanting to chat, and-- oh no!-- He pulls out a dagger, and as you try to run, he chases after you, slashing at your back.

That\'s more like it. And better than Rogue hits such-and-such for so-and-so damage!
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Post by: peeg on February 25, 2006, 11:16:32 pm
Yep. I like the idea.
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Post by: Karyuu on February 25, 2006, 11:16:32 pm
That\'s an interesting suggestion :3 The only point I\'d make is that you aren\'t supposed to know anyone\'s names from a first glance anyway, so everything should be approached as you would normally - in the sewers or the wilderness, with caution.

Unique, though!
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Post by: BrotherCaine on February 26, 2006, 12:10:50 am
I agree, here\'s my contribution to the effort.

http://www.gamasutra.com/features/19990917/infinite_03.htm
http://www.gamedev.net/reference/articles/article2016.asp
http://www.ruf.rice.edu/%7Epound/
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Post by: hook on February 26, 2006, 12:39:11 am
I dunno ...it sounds rather wierd to me, because how could you know the name of some stranger attacking you?

...of course, if it were a person known to you already (even for being notorious, known all around already), it would have been another thing.

But even so, I think it would be more interesting with the combiantion of recognition factors ...you know - distance, fog, rain, etc. make visibility poorer and thus harder for you to identify someone - foe or friend!

Now THAT would rock!
when you come nearer it\'d be like:
\"some distant figure\" -> \"a male dermorian\" -> \"\"
...maybe even more stages like \"figure holding a weapon, walking your way\" or \"male dermorian with a scar on his face\" (if you don\'t know him)

...this would also make sense for the standard question to NPCs \"tell me about yourself\" ...now it doesn\'t make much sense, that they introduce themselves although they have their names litteraly shining about their heads :]

p.s. sori, me sleepy ... english go bad... :P
p.p.s. sleep! now! *bump* ZZzzzZZzzzZzzzzzzzz...
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Post by: defender43 on February 27, 2006, 01:17:54 am
Yes, but what I\'m saying is, if he has a name, he\'s just like anyone else... until he attacks you. If he has a sign above his head that says \"Rogue\" You know that he\'s a Rogue from two blocks away. But if that sign says \"Signar Lefusco\" you don\'t know he\'s a rogue until either you notice his clothes or he attacks you.

Know what I mean?
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Post by: zanzibar on February 27, 2006, 01:23:37 am
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Originally posted by defender43
Yes, but what I\'m saying is, if he has a name, he\'s just like anyone else... until he attacks you. If he has a sign above his head that says \"Rogue\" You know that he\'s a Rogue from two blocks away. But if that sign says \"Signar Lefusco\" you don\'t know he\'s a rogue until either you notice his clothes or he attacks you.

Know what I mean?




If it was done well, it would be sweet. :-D
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Post by: Vaylos on February 27, 2006, 03:38:41 pm
It\'s a neat idea, i\'ll give it that, but face it, you\'re not going to know the name of every tom dick and harry in the world. And as it is a world of High fantasy and adventure...I think any adventurer would be pretty cautious.  

What i\'d suggest is perhaps having some mobs being named mobs, known for their notoriety. (maybe have a wanted list, or randomly generated bounty list?)

These may or may not be strong mobs, but they shouldn\'t be thought of as \"bosses\" Although there could always be quests dealing with certain named mobs i guess...I dunno...some people don\'t like the \"quest for mob\" idea.
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Post by: hook on February 27, 2006, 04:23:22 pm
But I have to admit, that I rather like the way things work now.

You meet a rogue, have no idea how tough it is untill you either examine it closer or attack it.

Maybe it would be slightly cooler if the name was more descriptive, but not hinting much on the \"toughness\" of the character itself.

But names hanging on the heads of just about anybody is quite confuzing ...I mean, imagine being in a crowd in the city and trying to find your friends, while you obviously don\'t know even 5% of the whole population around you - they\'re all strangers to you.

I do support the idea in such way that NPC\'s (like attackable or less importaint ones) should get their names generated.

But the name should only show up if you learn it somehow - usually by asking them about themselves or maybe even if they are unmistakebly them (like notorious gangsters you know from posters, the current mayor, if your character knows his name, allthough he has never seen him in person before etc etc)
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Post by: Vaylos on February 27, 2006, 04:30:26 pm
As far as name clutter, i\'m sure eventually the devs will code a way to turn certain names off.  EVERY mmorpg known to mankind has that feature I think :P
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Post by: hook on February 27, 2006, 04:53:42 pm
True.

But if you haven\'t noticed, PS isn\'t like \"every MMORPG\" ;)

We do things differently ...and we\'re proud of it :]s
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Post by: Nyramael on February 28, 2006, 05:58:52 am
What would be better than the same rogue with a random name is a list of rogues with set names and skills that can appear at any rogue spawn point. That would reduce the spawn point camping and associated problems because eventually a player will meet a rogue that will take him out. And people won\'t be so keen on camping in any one spot in particular. I like the original suggestion as well. I haven\'t thought out my alternative too well but it would be nice to see something like it.
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Post by: hook on February 28, 2006, 10:46:04 am
So basically you\'re suggesting that we should divide rogues into difficulty categories and name them Tom, Dick and Harry?

I don\'t think that would neither solve the problem of camping - because already now rogues (and other mobs) have different abilities - nor would it be really realistic.

I mean ...you meet a Larry rogue and know you can kill it, but then a Bob rogue spawns and you say to yourslef \"Oh, blimey! It\'s a Bob! Run for your life!!!\"

Naaaah, I\'d still rather that you cannot judge a mob\'s skills from it\'s outside. It always seemed rather illogic in some MMORPG\'s that you could just put your cursor over the mob and already know how hard it is to kill.
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Post by: Nyramael on February 28, 2006, 11:52:21 am
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I don\'t think that would neither solve the problem of camping - because already now rogues (and other mobs) have different abilities - nor would it be really realistic.

I mean ...you meet a Larry rogue and know you can kill it, but then a Bob rogue spawns and you say to yourslef \"Oh, blimey! It\'s a Bob! Run for your life!!!\"


Yes that\'s a fair enough point, as i said i haven\'t really thought it out, but it would atleast add some more varity to the game.

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Naaaah, I\'d still rather that you cannot judge a mob\'s skills from it\'s outside. It always seemed rather illogic in some MMORPG\'s that you could just put your cursor over the mob and already know how hard it is to kill.


I would tend to disagree with that. A trained master of the sword, or a skilled warrior with decent enough intelligence between their ears should easily be able to way up their opponent. As you would know, how well you rate your opponent determines on your intelligence stat, so if your character is stupid then it says words tot eh effect of you don\'t know whether you can beat this guy.

If however you are intelligent, and a new warrior, and you see a battle-scarred rogue in armor standing around comfortable with a shiny good looking sword, then you should be able to figure out that you are going to die. If you are stupid with little intelligence, then you might go ahead and fight him. If you are intelligent and a skilled warrior and you see a nervous, unscarred rogue in sweat, looking at you, then obviously you\'d be able to guess that you can take him out. And likewise with a skilled rogue you should be able to tell that they\'ll put up a good fight.

I think it is rather logical that your character can observe an opponent and way up their strengths depending on your characters mental stats and experience.
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Post by: hook on February 28, 2006, 05:27:04 pm
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Originally posted by Nyramael
I would tend to disagree with that. A trained master of the sword, or a skilled warrior with decent enough intelligence between their ears should easily be able to way up their opponent. As you would know, how well you rate your opponent determines on your intelligence stat, so if your character is stupid then it says words tot eh effect of you don\'t know whether you can beat this guy.

If however you are intelligent, and a new warrior, and you see a battle-scarred rogue in armor standing around comfortable with a shiny good looking sword, then you should be able to figure out that you are going to die. If you are stupid with little intelligence, then you might go ahead and fight him. If you are intelligent and a skilled warrior and you see a nervous, unscarred rogue in sweat, looking at you, then obviously you\'d be able to guess that you can take him out. And likewise with a skilled rogue you should be able to tell that they\'ll put up a good fight.

I think it is rather logical that your character can observe an opponent and way up their strengths depending on your characters mental stats and experience.

True ...but that doesn\'t have anything to do with what the poor bloke\'s name is :(
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Post by: zorbels on February 28, 2006, 07:32:18 pm
I just skimmed over most of the posts. The only thing I have to say is do we really want to know the name of the persons we kill? Seems a little weird to me. If the dev are going for realisim in the game, then in my opinion that is not natural to know the name of the \"rogue\" you would kill.


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Originally posted by defender43
Yes, but what I\'m saying is, if he has a name, he\'s just like anyone else... until he attacks you. If he has a sign above his head that says \"Rogue\" You know that he\'s a Rogue from two blocks away. But if that sign says \"Signar Lefusco\" you don\'t know he\'s a rogue until either you notice his clothes or he attacks you.

Know what I mean?



 Technically there is an opition to turn tags off so that you don\'t see the names at all, so that solves the problem really.
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Post by: defender43 on March 01, 2006, 02:55:55 am
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Originally posted by hook
I mean ...you meet a Larry rogue and know you can kill it, but then a Bob rogue spawns and you say to yourslef \"Oh, blimey! It\'s a Bob! Run for your life!!!\"


That\'s just it, though. Rogues aren\'t cranked out of a factory, they should each be different. And once you kill that particular one, doesn\'t it make sense that, since he\'s dead, he won\'t be attacking people anymore?
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Post by: Nyramael on March 01, 2006, 05:49:00 am
Thinking about the whole topic of labels i realised that the NPC labels just make it blatantly obvious that you are dealing with a rogue or not friendly creature (which you could guess anyway by their gear).

I think rogues are slightly different, from time to time, i think it\'s a result of the random number generator in combat, sometimes the same rogue in a spawn spot when i was about the same level as him would do more damage, and other times not hit me at all.

Also i think labels should be something that players set on each individual person they meet. So that way a character meets someone, they become friends, you should be able to recognise that person later, i.e. attach a label to them. That way strangers are strangers until you meet them, or are introduced to them. That might also make NPCs blend into the crowd a little better to.

Some more random spontaneous, not fully thought out ideas :P
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Post by: defender43 on March 01, 2006, 05:55:15 am
Nyramael, there is a different thread for that. This thread is about generating random names for Rogues and Fanatics and Gladiators, and why it should/should not be implemented. You are off-topic.
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Post by: Nyramael on March 01, 2006, 06:25:00 am
sorry about the off-topicness

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That\'s just it, though. Rogues aren\'t cranked out of a factory, they should each be different. And once you kill that particular one, doesn\'t it make sense that, since he\'s dead, he won\'t be attacking people anymore?


I thought that in PL people don\'t really die they just go to the Death Realm and return later if they can figure out how to get to the portal. Should this or shouldn\'t his apply to NPCs/rogues that we beat up?

meanwhile on topic...

I think that some rogues should have names and be slightly more powerful than others. So that way you have infamous and well known rogues around causing havoc, and also unknown weaker rogues who no one knows about.

While throwing in a random name might make things a little nicer and more interesting for the role playing, it doesn\'t actually make that much sense that you can be walking down the street and know someones name just by looking at them.

In a sense we do have a few players who are like that, some fanatics and NPCs who have \'normal names\' and if you approach too close will turn on you.

Correct me if i\'m wrong but what i am guessing your idea is, is to have NPCs about with names so that you don\'t know which one is friend or foe.

This would only work well if the NPCs moved around much more often and covered a greater territory. rogues/attacking NPCs and merchant/trainer NPCs that travel from Hydlaa to Ojaveda would be really interesting.

please note that when i go slightly off topic i\'m not trying to divert the thread or anything i\'m merely making suggestions in attempt to further, test or oppose your ideas. Again, sorry if i go too off-topic with suggestions.
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Post by: defender43 on March 02, 2006, 04:55:39 am
No, that post is very on-topic. You keep bringing new ideas and stating their relation to the idea.