Message-ID: <3A68A46E.39C01EE5@csi.com>
Date: Fri, 19 Jan 2001 15:32:47 -0500
From: John Colagioia <JColagioia@csi.com>
Organization: No Conspiracy Here...
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Subject: Re: desired level of automation
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Will Grzanich wrote:

> John Colagioia wrote:
> [snip]
> > Or if the player should otherwise be paranoid about these things.  I mean, I
> > would hate to see:
> >     ] THROW BALL
> >     (taking the ball first)
> >     As you touch the ball, tear gas streams from an orifice you hadn't noticed
> >     up until now.  No, wait, it's poison gas.
> >
> >     *** You have died. ***
> PMFJI, but - how would this be any worse than:
>       ] GET BALL
>       As you touch the ball, tear gas streams from an orifice you hadn't
> noticed
>       up until now.  No, wait, it's poison gas.
>
>       *** You have died. ***
>
> all happening before the player can voice his desire to THROW BALL
> anyway?  I mean, he KNOWS he's going to have to touch the ball before he
> can throw it, right?

There's only one difference that I can think of, really, but it's an important one,
for the way I often play:  a player can forget which things the PC has picked up.

For example, I'm very good at mentally overlooking things like the fact that the
ball is still described when I look at the room, and that it's not in my inventory
list.  So, I'll occasionally do things like "throw ball," and the "you're not
holding that" response reminds me that I'm an idiot--then makes me actually examine
the ball before picking it up (which--if I've forgotten that I haven't picked it up,
I'll assume that I already looked it over).

So the answer is how low the bar is for the player to jump over, I guess...If
"zoning out" can cause the player to screw up, better to give them the safety net,
and allow the more organized players "suffer" a tiny bit, than cut them out of the
game, entirely.


