[crossfire] map design guideline

[Juergen Kahnert]

On Sat, Jun 09, 2007 at 06:21:20PM +0200, Nicolas Weeger wrote:
> > introduce a "map design guideline". Only maps which won't violate
> > the policy are allowed to add / stay.
>
> Yes. I'd be slightly less restrictive,

Think the other way. Don't make the policy to be to restrictive. ;-)


> Well, you could argue the player should be smart enough to figure a
> way to have the dragon don't burn his treasure :)

I could also argue that the monster has to be smart enough to not
destroy its treasure. Why should the monster hoard treasure if every
treasure hunter will be killed by suffering the hoard? ;-)

So having player take care about the treasure and having maps which
help to reach this goal would be better. :)

Having monster also taking care about that would be the best. :p


> Well, IMO we shouldn't try to explain *all* maps and *everything*.
> Overall story, then small hints, whatever.

There don't need to be hints everywhere. But the map should be coherent
without logic errors.


> Trying to justify the existence of all and every maps is an exercice in
> futility imo - but that doesn't mean we shouldn't try to harmonize maps.

Getting harmonic maps is the goal, not the way to them.


> > need some more monster types, to avoid a bad mix of monsters without
> > having just one or two monster types in the map.
>
> Yes. And describe what monsters can coexist with what monsters.

Easy and most obvious is to not mix the enemy races like angels with
devils, faeries and goblins / trolls, ...

But indeed, we need a list of coexisting monster types.


> > There's also some coding stuff missing. Don't let players solve a
> > quest more than once. Flag a player who started a quest and only let
> > players enter the quest map with this flag and without the "quest
> > finished flag".
>
> This is really a map design issue. Using existing archetypes, or
> scripting, it should be the map maker's decision to implement such a
> restriction.

Is there just a single map implementing such a restriction?

Anyway, I would say it should be part of policy. Maybe with coding
support to clear the quest map if someone enters who already solved the
quest. It's already a confession to the game that every player is able
to do the same quest. How often needs someone to be rescued, or a chief
be killed, ...?

But the same player shouldn't be able to collect uniq quest items more
than once. Wouldn't make much sense. Sure, there could be quests which
may be made multiple times, but in general it's not logical.

It's a role playing game, right? What's wrong on having a focus on role
playing instead of monster slaying?


> About the "catching" part, that could be part of the game, but
> remember that having a player-managed economy (in this case monsters
> trading) is hard to maintain. Also I don't really want players to need
> to catch monsters sometimes to train just because no one did it.

It's all about rewards. If you get better and better catching weapons,
which are more and more effective against monsters, you'll have a lot of
players catching monsters. ;-)

Or just hard to get ingredients for formulae as a payment for monsters.
But you're right, would be hard to balance. Anyway, wouldn't it a way to
improve gameplay?

I think this is better than having lots of generators like in raffle?
What's that for a world where such things are common?

Try to avoid visible generators. Or make them look like a cave which
could be made to collapse (destroy generator). Make the world look more
consistent instead of having all over hack and slay computer game parts.



On Sat, Jun 09, 2007 at 02:21:59PM -0700, Mark Wedel wrote:
> There is already a map guide document that more or less describes good
> vs bad maps.

Didn't remind that. After reading it right now, I realized, that I've
read it in the past.

> However, a lot of maps predate that.

That explains why so much maps violates this guide...


> Not trapping big monsters is difficult - unless you have a completely
> empty room, it is hard for something like a big demon not to be
> 'trapped' in some way.

Yep, but most maps shouldn't contain a big demon...


> and if you have a big empty room that the entrance leads to, you now
> get the problem you come down the exit on top of a monster which
> doesn't work very well

Place an invisible director in front of or under the exit. Should avoid
such situations.


> I also don't have too big an issue with a group of monsters without a
> big plot behind them.  Seems perfectly reasonable for me for a tribe
> of orcs to being living in a cave.  Or for that matter, the dragon
> cave makes a similar amount of sense - dragons have to live someplace.

As long as it's self explaining, you don't need to place a single
written hint. Just should be logical and consistent.


> I don't think that every map also has to be part of a quest or have
> special/good completion items - having some maps just be places to go
> and kill things, get random loot and some exp seems perfectly fine.

Sure, did I said anything else?

I said: "It's important to keep / create some hack and slay maps."
Player like those maps to level up their characters.

But not every map, just a few, well balanced ones.


> I agree that there probably is not enough different difficulty
> monsters.  I don't necessarily think we need more monsters, but rather
> variations on what we have.

Correct, far better than mixing monsters without sense.


> orcs should be able to gain exp also.

Maybe built-in support. Would help map makers a lot to just alter the
level of a monster to get a stronger version of the same type.


> I'm wary of limiting players from only doing a quest map once - a few
> reasons.  First - it can limit play options to the point where a
> player doesn't have a lot of places to go.

Keep enough random maps for leveling.


> Second, it can be hard to enforce - how do you really note they
> completed the quest?

Not really, after you gave the quest item to the one who has sent you,
you finished the quest.

Or if nobody has sent you, after you got the quest item. There are ways
to define the end of a quest. I don't think this would be a problem at
all.


> This could lead to a case where the player wants to go to the dungeon
> for exp/whatever, so just skips the last phase that marks the quest as
> being completed (doesn't turn the item in, kills everything but the
> boss, etc).  So in that regard, doesn't really help things out.

Sure, may happen. But if the item is valuable enough, this wouldn't
happen to often. I don't consider that as a big problem.


But just having hack and slay without role playing, that's a bigger
problem for a RPG. Just my opinion.

    Jürgen