Make Gleam More Fun

Aktillum

So I snorted 20 packets of gleam and injected 5 syringes and now I'm on rl day 2 of withdrawals. Okay, so I balled out (yolo) and deserve the super-long withdrawal time, but I never even got a Dexterity bonus. What's the point of gleam? At least its IRL counterpart makes you feel like a sex-God and lets you /Godmode during shootouts with the police. I propose some changes to gleam;

The High:

*10s pain Numb immediately after snorting

*5m Increased Avoidance

*Randomly afflicted with Heroism (the one that makes you believe you're on full HP)

The Low:

*Suicidal thoughts / random chance to Heartstop during withdrawals

*Much harder to wake from sleeping

*-1 Int for duration of withdrawal

Aepas

With how much gleam is frowned upon ICly most of the time, I agree with giving it ridiculous benefits. If I recall and do correct me if I am wrong, it used to give a speed boost? That would be interesting as well, being able to pull off impossible combos while on the effects of the drug.

So sure, you might become the best combatant in the realms on the stuff, you might just win all the ranked spars. But at what cost? I feel like there could be many good RP ramifications to choosing to do gleam, even if it does make you the best there is.

Achimrst

Add a minus to Strength and I approve.

Eurulis

Eh. The problem with Gleam is the fact that it's supposed to be more like a real world drug. It's not really supposed to give awesome benefits, it's more like a roleplay assistant. You get to play the junkie. But then again, I suppose it's how one looks at it. Aepas has a good concept there, for instance.

Aepas

Well I guess I view gleam as a sort of PCP/steroid mixture. It'll be like winning the tour de France a billion times then have everyone find out you've been doping.

Zii

Increased Dodge and Crit bonus with lowered XP gain during withdraw.

Blujixapug

Make it randomly remove half of thespacesand line breaks from anything you write, and occasionally insert random tangents and stream-of-consciousness diatribes.

Shirszae

I fully endorse the idea of making gleam more interesting. In some manner or other. Not necessarily mechanical benefits. Just a lot more flavor/possibilities/effects from using it. Both negative and positive. 

Shunsui

Numb(like monk numb?) from snorting gleam? Do you have any idea how f'king doped up every pk'er would be if that was put in? Screw withdrawl and city laws, even Targossians would start snorting the ground up orphans for that I imagine.

Synbios

Aepas said:

Well I guess I view gleam as a sort of PCP/steroid mixture. It'll be like winning the tour de France a billion times then have everyone find out you've been doping.

Side-effect: If caught using gleam to win Combat Rankings, you are immediately demoted to unranked.

Blujixapug said:

Make it randomly remove half of thespacesand line breaks from anything you write, and occasionally insert random tangents and stream-of-consciousness diatribes.

So the new drug will be made from the essence of Xenomorph, and will be named "Xeno"?

Sylvance

Do it so on a math.random timer it sends offensive tells to the first God visible on QW, with a slight bias towards Gods opposed to your faction. Then you can have monk numb.

ETA: And if no gods visible, then to any of the following players: Bonko, Proficy, Strata, Tanris.

Lianca

Gleam and the syringe are different things, with different symptoms and withdrawals.

Tesha

People already buy earrings of true love with tons of people, I shudder to think what would happen if gleam gave worthwhile combat benefits. Something fun that does not touch combat would be fine with me.

Fitz

I've never known, is gleam analogous to cocaine, speed, or pcp?

Turoi

Definitely not PCP. I always saw it as cocaine

Taraus

The point of it is to exist as an RP device, just like alcohol does. Giving it combat relevance is sort of a ridiculous (and unnecessary) idea. The only real thing that should be tweaked about it to add to the realism, IMO, is to add some sort of third party message to the withdrawal.

Aedin

Taraus said:

The point of it is to exist as an RP device, just like alcohol does. Giving it combat relevance is sort of a ridiculous (and unnecessary) idea. The only real thing that should be tweaked about it to add to the realism, IMO, is to add some sort of third party message to the withdrawal.

Withdrawal message when you do ql or Look make em have sunken eyes Person is here, with heavy dark bags under their eyes., or make constantly spaz out on emotes.

Eld

I thought there already were third-party messages from gleam withdrawal. At least, I remember getting annoyed with someone sitting at Crossroads trying to kick it, which I wouldn't have cared about if I couldn't see anything.

Jacen

I think you just see them eat. Lot of ginseng

Taraus

Nope, you don't see third party messages, not from gleam or the syringe.

Sybilla

For the syringe you see people's eyes rolling back in their heads. You don't see them falling over when they have those flying visions and they end up on the floor though. No withdrawal third party messages that I've noticed.

Fitz

Should probably add a third party message for cactus weed too.

Lianca

I disagree with third party messages for those on drugs, every person handles their dabbling or addiction differently, and how a character reacts to it should be up to the player to represent. There are very possibly a great many "medicated" just to be able to live a normal life, and the ambiguity in this aspect is something I like.

Sarapis

There used to be third party messages to gleam withdrawl. Perhaps they were removed because they were spammy and annoying, I have no idea - was when I was gone. I'm pretty sure when I put it in, withdrawl would have you doing things like begging random people for money if you had none in your inventory, head twitches, and that kind of thing.

Gleam is an RP aid, not a combat tool though.

Lucine

No, Tukio: We are NOT making gleam legal.

Sarapis

I may add in third party messages again when I'm in the code next. It saddens me to think that I can't see the despair of the gleam user reflected in his/her eyes. 

Aktillum

You scream things and beg for gleam through says during withdrawals. People also see you shiver. If it's just an RP aid, the price point doesn't really justify the RP. I mean drugs are expensive IRL but you get some sort of tangible benefit (I'm not advocating drugs, for the record). In Achaea, you just get some messages about feeling relaxed, and if you don't snort more you're on the ground sobbing like a little girl begging for a fix. At 1k gold per packet of gleam, it's not really worth the RP, unless I wanted to just carry around the same packet and emote snorting it around friends, or something.

Also, the withdrawals kick in way too fast without warning. I guess that serves to heighten the RP since it leads to weird moments, like being totally chill one moment and then screaming and begging for your fix in front of a group of people, but some warning like "Hey dude, you should take some gleam soon" would be nice. Those messages only kick in during the withdrawals.

I can understand not wanting to make it beneficial to PvP, but currently it just feels like Achaea's anti-drug message. Like, "don't do gleam or you'll waste all your gold and beg your friends for a fix". Which is a totally accurate portrayal of IRL drugs, but I think some depth can be added somewhere. Also like I said, the price point doesn't make it worth it as an RP mechanic.

Kyrra

I dunno about the message thing. I only drink coffee after I start feeling bitchy from lack of caffeine. I don't really spend my entire day assessing my moods for when I think I should make another pot (though I love that app that tracks caffeine intake).

Gleam is lame anyways. Just eat a handful of snow blossoms and watch the adoration from your city and order flow. The shivering is just from the intense feelings of love.

Aktillum

Kyrra said:

I only drink coffee after I start feeling bitchy from lack of caffeine. I don't really spend my entire day assessing my moods for when I think I should make another pot

I think there's a major difference between coffee addiction and drug addiction. Like, with a coffee addiction you make a pot when you're feeling bitchy. With a cocaine addiction (I'm going on hearsay) you're like, "Dude, this activity would be so much more awesome on cocaine". Coke addicts are always thinking about scoring their next fix. There's no parallel at all in your example.

I agree about snow blossoms, those have a tangible benefit. You see weird stuff, and you see NPCs that were previously invisible in Caer Witrin. Like you said, gleam is lame. Because it offers virtually nothing to the user at an extraordinary price.

Shirszae

Perhaps make gleam behave in similar ways to snow blossom, yet with a different flavor of sorts. As in, see different manner of things, etc. I still don't see any reason for it to have a mechanical advantage 

Aktillum

Okay, so forget I said anything about mechanical advantages. They seemed the most "realistic". If you've ever seen a crackhead get into a fight, you'd be amazed at their dexterity and ability to tank. It's not just a trope. Youtube "crackhead fights" or something.

Snow blossoms are 100 gold per cluster, and you only need one cluster to experience the benefits, which are both RP and mechanical (you need to eat them to solve a quest). Gleam just really does nothing aside from being an RP mechanic that nobody RPs because it's not worth spending 10k upwards per RL day on an RP habit that offers nothing, whatsoever, for the end-user.

Like I said, if it's solely an RP mechanic, I could just emote snorting gleam and never actually buy any. I could script my own withdrawal symptons and put them on timers. I never need to actually buy any gleam to RP a gleam addict, which makes it entirely pointless.