User:Paulandon

ideas page. please feel free to use any of this in your own thoughts or discussion, but leave my page for my own notes. thanks.

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Two thoughts that came from this post: http://news.battlemaster.org/pipermail/discuss/2009-December/041449.html

I think Gloria brought up a good point. I certainly felt very discouraged when dueling was stomped down on (especially in a realm that has no issues with 7-up and cookies), but I would be happy if things were a bit more interesting other places. Dueling is one of the few "hold your breath till turn change" parts of the game; I find it much duller without it.

"Realism" aside, I find another nice part of dueling is it serves to actually prove who is top banana with the sword. So, some ideas:

Tournaments - right now, it seems as if everyone is just randomly thrown together. I think a seeding would help duelers who weren't at the very top to gain a bit of a reputation. I would propose something similar to what is used in many soccer tournaments:

Each tournament, you gain points of reach round you progress (i.e., 3rd round is 1+2+3=6pts.). The results of your last (5? some number) tournaments is added up, and you are seeded based on this number. Only your most recent tournies count, so newcomers can climb the ranks. The biggest difference is it will help mid-level duelers avoid being matched against the champion in the first round and never gaining a name for themselves.

Academy Training - right now, it is just click and some random numbers decide if you improved or not. Some ideas (not mutually exclusive - any or all might work):

- New link - duel at academy. Two players can agree to a training duel that will occur only where there is an open academy. No training advantage - just a "sporting duel" or whatever it used to be called.

- Chance of injury in training

- Chance to injure the trainer - with a realm-wide "rumor" sent out. "Sir X injured his trainer! I would steer clear of him."

- Rumors of thrashings - similar to above, only just a message that might build/tear down your public reputation. "Sir X of Y thought he was good enough to work with an advanced trainer today, but was quickly taught otherwise. Snickering at Sir X's expense is on the increase in the pubs of Z tonight."

- Duel the trainer - actually make some decisions like a normal duel. More work to do on this idea.

- Series of messages based on how well you did, similar to getting an estimate % now.

- Ability to "Show off" at the academy, just like at a tourney.

Battles - a little vague, and most people just like to RP what happened in their battle, but perhaps there is some way of translating swordsmanship to "awesomeness in battle". Just as "Sir X was spotted wearing...", perhaps you have a chance of having been spotted "ferociously smashing skulls" based on your swordsmanship, which could increase your honor a little for the battle.

- another bit that would be fun, although perhaps a pain to be realistic, is if everyone who was wounded was assigned a "wounding unit", which would be reported. So, instead of "Sir X was wounded" it would be "Sir Y's Screaming Eagles brought down Sir X" ... in a barrage of arrows/cavalry charge/clash of swords -depends on unit type.

It's not to replace the RP, just to stimulate it a little.