1) Any new system should require minimal maintenance on the part of the
game administrator.
2) Any new system should be viewed with respect to how it might change
over time -- grow, alter, disappear, form.
In general, I think the explore command should be driven by a random
events table. This would require a minimum amount of maintenace on
the administrator's part while still allowing some variation of effect.
One way to implement this is to categorize types of resolutions to
an exploration and then have them randomly chosen. Types of effects
might be:
o Monster Encounters - A group of monsters will fight the explorers.
If the explorers win, they get gold and/or equipment depending on
the monster.
o Find Money - The explorers find gold.
o Find Lore - The explorers find some special information on how
things work in the game not normally known (be careful with what
is given out this way) or on skills.
o Rescue Captive - The explorers fight off monsters holding a captive.
The captive joins the explorers faction.
o Find Item - The explorers discover some equipment.
All of the above can be tossed out randomly and still have some
flavor. Here is how. The administrator (i.e. Rich) sets a table for
each location for each encounter type. When an EXPLORE is executed, a
table is referenced and the appropriate encounters are selected based
on the weights specified on the table. For example, suppose Pesbrand
has the following table values set:
o Explore Success 5%
o Monster Encounters 6
o Find Money 2
o Find Lore 1
o Rescue Captive 1
o Find Item 2
When an EXPLORE is executed in Pesbrand, there would be a 5% chance of a
result. 6 in 12 times, it would be a Monster Encounter, 2 in 12 it would
be Find Money, etc. The Find Item results could be further adjusted based
on setting up another table using the location inventory. Each time an
item is found, it is selected from the inventory, allowing for artifacts,
etc. Now, another location, say, the Ruins of Ogch, could have the values:
o Explore Success 25%
o Monster Encounters 10
o Find Money 2
o Find Lore 1
o Rescue Captive 1
o Find Item 6
In this case, there would be a 25% chance of a special explore result.
If there was a result, there would be a 10 in 20 chance of a Monster
Encounter, a 2 in 20 chance of Finding Money, etc. This would have a
different flavor than the other location. You would have a higher chance
of finding something and you would be more likely to find and item there.
Now, the real "joy" of this is should cities become something which
can be created or destroyed, these values could be randomly set up at
formation and each time the status of the city changes (a village
become a town, a town becomes a city, a city degenerates into a ruin
(only cities or towns should become ruins), etc.). Each location
would wind up with a "flavor" with the overall chance of finding
something with an EXPLORE dependant on what type of place you are
looking in (swamps might have a 20% find chance, ruins 25%, cities 5%,
plains 10%, etc.). Note, however, that this requires a minimum of
hands on work by Rich. I think that is a must. Any suggestions or
changes?
John Morrow - Varian [856]