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Two landmarks suggestions
1. I suggest that a Major Trait be added whereby a person can travel to any person of his or her City as if that person was a landmark, including if the person has been killed and is a soul. With custom landmarks, numerous built-in landmarks, Traveller, Beloved and In Service minor traits, and the magnetic needle from Shop of Wonders, Landmarks seem like a pretty credible alternative to stuff like Mudlet Mapper at this point, and adding this option would pretty much seal the deal. This would be nice for people who for whatever reason don't use a client with a mapper option built in. However, being able to travel to anybody in the city even if they're a soul seems powerful enough that it should be a Major trait.
2. If you are using landmarks to travel and are boosted by the Traveller minor trait and magnetic needle Shop of Wonders artefact, you will be traveling so fast that you will exceed the "now, now, not so hasty" movement limit almost constantly unless you have the Armband of Celerity artefact. This forces you to re-enter the landmark command almost constantly, unless you do have the Armband. I therefore suggest that people using Landmarks to travel automatically count as having the Armband of Celerity while travelling with Landmarks, for the purpose of Landmark travelling without interruption.
Thanks for reading my ideas.
Comments
@Sarapis : Do you have any specifics in mind as to the direction in which you'd like to expand the use of landmarks?
The only suggestion that readily comes to my mind from your words is lifting the cap of 30 custom landmarks. I think the person would still need to have some idea of geography, but unlimited custom landmarks (which would still be mitigated by the 100 lesson per cost,) strikes me as meeting your criteria, because it would allow the person to use the Landmarks system without limiting the extent to which it can be used. In Service, Traveller and Beloved traits require pretty serious trait allocation, and most people don't have the Grimoire of Adaptation, so I think committing to the Landmarks system fully would be an easier decision if there was no limit on custom landmarks set, and thus no limit on the usefulness of the Landmarks system.
Results of disembowel testing | Knight limb counter | GMCP AB files
Nobody but novices are using the landmark system, so I'm not sure why the administration would take steps to expand this system to be more convenient for older players.
It takes under 5 minutes to set up the free map for Mudlet and that has much more functionality.
I often play from a mobile phone, and landmarks help a lot.
I use landmarks too, because I'm still using zMUD (though not for much longer) and I could never get the mapper to work at all, even with MXP.
I'd guess (because I haven't actually used the magnetic needle) that it's just barely hitting the movement limit (limit of 2 moves per second, autowalking speed of ~0.5 seconds per move), in which case making autowalking ignore the limit wouldn't significantly speed it up. It's not like you'd actually be travelling at 3 rooms per second, so it's not even close to a free armband.
Even when I do manage to get on my laptop somewhere with wifi, internet is -really- horrible here, and the mappers... make me loop. Back and forth again and again because of the lag.
I believe landmarks should be taken into account of the different areas of travels in which novices and younger players will encounter. Take a look at the Blademasters for example: they have to go about different areas in finding the quest items, as a new player or even a new blademaster this can be quite frustrating for them.
Yes, mudlet mapper is a wonderful tool yet as many stated not all will have access to mudlet and some choose to use a mobile device or tablet to connect to Achaea. Yet the thing about mudlet is not everyone can afford a system or even code..or have the desire to code.
I would like to see more of the blademaster questing locations to be added, as well as higher areas for hunting purposes such as Moghedu, Dun Valley, Istarion, Tsol'aa village, etc.
Just my thoughts.
@Antonius : I didn't mean get a free artefact. I meant while the person's doing landmarks, the movement is as if the artefact was there. Landmarks don't really account for most of a person's movement, all this would do is make the movement smooth so the person didn't have to spam the command.
The movement I am talking about combines the Traveller minor trait and the 2 crown magnetic needle artefact. Having to additionally buy the Armband of Celerity for this purpose, in my opinion, may be too much to ask.
@Santar : It's my impression that a lot of things are being developed and expanded to give in-game alternatives to stuff like SVO and even mudlet itself. I think using the landmark system currently is not as good as mapper, but if you invest in the minor traits and magnetic needle, it's a good built-in option. I don't know if it'll ever truly be better than mapper, but I think with enough smart upgrades it could be. At the very least, like @Teghaine , I spend a significant amount of time away from my computer with Mapper and Mudlet, it would be super nice to have good movement on a cell phone.
I think making landmarks movement optimal will always be iffy because you at the very least need the Traveller minor trait, and maybe the In Service and Beloved traits. And the magnetic needle, which at some point will be removed from SoW. So, there's a substantial investment, whereas mudlet and mapper don't require any of that. But I think landmarks can be made useful through some more additions. Also, I think the potential for tons more is there simply because Landmarks content is created by IRE, whereas mapper is not.
If the landmark system is to be expanded, I think the biggest glaring problem I've seen from it when I've used it is that it simply walks too slow. The couple times that I've tried using it in the past, it was so mind-numbingly slow that I immediately went and downloaded the newst mudlet map. So, if you want people to use this system and enjoy it, you have to speed it up.
It doesn't make sense to require an artefact for it(referring to the magnetic needle from the SoW), either, because most players that are using this landmark system are more than likely going to be low budget/new players, who generally do not buy frivolous artefacts.
Other than that, the system seems pretty decent in its current incarnation, for the purpose that it's used for(helping new players get acquainted without having to d/l clients and learn to use mapping script). It used to be a pretty terrible system, but it seems to have been updated a lot over the years(auto walking, custom landmarks, unlimited distance). Just fix the speed of the walking and I think it's a fine feature. Though if it really does cancel your landmark queue for walking too fast, that should be fixed.
It doesn't have to be changed to walk at maximum hasty speed to be effective, but it should at least walk at a similar pace to legit mapper scripts if you want anyone to use it.
I just did a test just now. With my mudlet mapper script, it took me 14.8 seconds to walk somewhere. And to go the same path with the landmark system was 38 seconds.
Nobody's gonna wanna use the system until you make those times comparable.
@Santar : Well, Traveller trait doubles the speed of landmarks movement. Magnetic needle doubles THAT. So 4x normal Landmarks movement. It speeds up to the point where you can't even walk continuously unless you have the Armband of Celerity. If you want, we can meet up in the game as an OOC meeting and you can follow me and see the speed of maximum landmarks movement, and compare with mapper, I have all the required artefacts and the Grimoire of Adaptation will allow me to get Traveller temporarily. The problem in my eyes is mapper is really good, (as you said) and you need additional incentives with the Landmarks system to make these expenditures worthwhile. Using Landmarks to its max potential requires placing custom landmarks, which I think cap at 30 and use 100 lessons to set one. And those traits and arties. Why use Landmarks when you get similar results from Mapper? The thing is, the Landmarks system is currently good enough that if you WERE to provide sufficient incentives to buy Landmarks-related stuffs, people would be very satisfied with the system. The speed is really nice, the options are nice -- it just needs to be nice enough to make the total package worth it. I think it's the sort of thing where the foundation for hte house is there, but the house itself isn't complete yet.
As for why we'd do it: people shouldn't need to use a third party client to play Achaea. Whatever we can reasonably do to reduce the need to use a third party client is on the potential list of game or html5 client features.
Just sent the coding goblins marching orders:
Sarapis, you and I butt heads occasionally, but don't think for a second I don't approve of the steps you're taking to make Achaea very user - and especially newbie - friendly. Kudos!
Thanks! We're doing our best.
I didn't use the system, but I'm pretty sure I'll start using it after this update. Love it.
@Sarapis : Thank you! This is a lot more than I hoped for. Just one question: regarding point 3, can we only Landmarks-walk to living citymates, or can we walk to them when they are souls? If it is the later, we would be able to run and rez easier using the Landmarks system, that's why I asked.
Also, regarding the Beloved trait: can we be allowed to add someone as a friend and they be able to reply to the friends request -- for the purpose of Beloved -- so if they are a soul we can run and rez them like I am asking in the above paragraph for the citywide and housewide Landmarks traveling?
Thanks again!
Nope, not going to be making you able to auto-walk to souls.
Gallop/Dash might be added at some point.
@Sarapis : Okie dokie, still, thank you for implementing all those other things!
I strongly dislike the new WALK TO PERSON function.
It has somewhat heavy implications on group combat, being that separating a group can often times play a huge role. Even under ideal conditions(without this new landmark system), you'd still have to farsee someone and then auto walk to that room(which is a big deal if you're in the middle of combat). If you're actively engaged in combat it's going to be a lot easier to just WALK TO PERSON than to use EQ/Balance to find them. If you add in the factor of veils, then it makes it even more easy for people to re-route to their teammates, making it near instantaneous with no delay or confusion.
Proposed solution: When you use WALK TO <person> there will be a 5 second delay before the walk to process starts.
@Sarapis : I just got a Landmarks-related concern from one of my friends. He is in the City government and says some of the time he likes to be alone, and the new WALK TO, anybody from our city can just walk to him and barge in on him and whatever private conversation/meeting he's having. He's worried that he'll have no privacy now.
Can we please have a function of LANDMARK SELF OFF/ON or something similar, so people can toggle on and off whether people from their House and City can walk to them? That way, they'll only be a Landmarks target if they consent to it.
I disagree that this causes any problems in group combat. The only situation this changes is one where there's no hinder/people between a person and the group and they're in an area they aren't as familiar with, or they're using HTML5 or CMUD and don't have the crowdmap setup.
Effective group separation, multiple rooms across totems or with your group splitting them, is completely unaffected, and anyone using this system (as opposed to instant-travel methods like empress, deliver, earrings) will have the same issue of having to cross those things as before. This functionality could be 100% simulated by setting up triggers for tell <person> Where are you? with a whitelist, reply I'm at gmcp.Room.Info.num, goto <replied number> with the mapper. Removing small coding hurdles for easier accessibility is always a good thing.
Cascades of quicksilver light streak across the firmament as the celestial voice of Ourania intones, "Oh Jarrod..."
If you're a leader, you're there for the org you're a leader of. If you're unavailable it's extremely simple to make yourself unavailable, but if you're around then you should be available for people to interact with or you should re-evaluate staying in your leadership position.
Cascades of quicksilver light streak across the firmament as the celestial voice of Ourania intones, "Oh Jarrod..."
There are multiple levels of interaction, and no, not every leader should be 100% available for a face to face conversation with anyone who happens to be able to walk in. Sometimes there are other things that are either more important or that are currently being dealt with.
Edit: For the record, leader or not, I don't like the idea of a citymate or housemate being able to simply walk to me whenever they want. At the very least, I'd like this functionality to respect the veil and if they cannot see where I am, they cannot simply WALK TO me.
I want code monkeys that work that fast.
Already addressed. If you're somewhere people can walk to normally, this changes nothing besides them being able to skip the 'sense <leader>' step.
Cascades of quicksilver light streak across the firmament as the celestial voice of Ourania intones, "Oh Jarrod..."