Time of Day Meter
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Quinasa
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Time of Day Meter
It seems like a good idea. Nothing big but something added to the client to tell us the time of day in Illarion (and maybe the date?), possibly underneath the spot where it tells us what time it is where we are? Maybe a sun and moon dial or somesuch.
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Moirear Sian
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http://neon.sturmundklang.de/date.php
I know, I know... it's in German. But the system basically already exists somewhere, and you can reference that page to know the exact game-daytime and date.
I'd really like to see this tied into the client eventually, and, if you remember a while back, it was promised that some day we'd have day/night modes in game.
I know, I know... it's in German. But the system basically already exists somewhere, and you can reference that page to know the exact game-daytime and date.
I'd really like to see this tied into the client eventually, and, if you remember a while back, it was promised that some day we'd have day/night modes in game.
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Mimblethorp
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Nikago Fyrstyn
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Moirear Sian
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approximations:
2 hours real time ~ one day/night in Illarion
4 hours real time ~ 24 hours of Illarion
I'm not sure though, alot of people say different things, but that link I posted above seems to coincide with dates and times given in quests, like those wicked Mas days.
2 hours real time ~ one day/night in Illarion
4 hours real time ~ 24 hours of Illarion
I'm not sure though, alot of people say different things, but that link I posted above seems to coincide with dates and times given in quests, like those wicked Mas days.
Last edited by Moirear Sian on Thu Apr 28, 2005 10:23 am, edited 2 times in total.
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Mimblethorp
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Moirear Sian
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Last edited by Moirear Sian on Thu Apr 28, 2005 10:22 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Naybet Grint
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So, if I don't log in for a real week my character has been sleeping, or otherwise missing, for 42 days? Wow, but that is a lot of sleep, but then my character will need it because they only feel hungry and eat once every week or so.
At that pace days become more or less meaningless, and significant dates only affect those in certain timezones. For example if the first day of Spring is a significant date, a lot of players will miss it, because it is only four hours long. Then again, there will be another first day of spring in only two real months time. They happen all the time it seems. On the other hand, it does lead to the potential for meaningful aging (at least with shortlived races). Someone who started playing a bright young 20 year old 5 real years ago will have a creaking 50 year old to play as now. And you can have your character get pregnant with it only affecting them for 6 real weeks, then have the child character playable (as in able to walk and talk meaningfully) within a further 8 months or so. And see them through to adolesence with another 20 months. Which could be interesting. Its a shame though, if you want to play a child character. If you start them at 12 say, you have only a year of play with them before they hit 18. Can I ask those players who have a character who is a child what they think of that sort of rate of aging?
At that pace days become more or less meaningless, and significant dates only affect those in certain timezones. For example if the first day of Spring is a significant date, a lot of players will miss it, because it is only four hours long. Then again, there will be another first day of spring in only two real months time. They happen all the time it seems. On the other hand, it does lead to the potential for meaningful aging (at least with shortlived races). Someone who started playing a bright young 20 year old 5 real years ago will have a creaking 50 year old to play as now. And you can have your character get pregnant with it only affecting them for 6 real weeks, then have the child character playable (as in able to walk and talk meaningfully) within a further 8 months or so. And see them through to adolesence with another 20 months. Which could be interesting. Its a shame though, if you want to play a child character. If you start them at 12 say, you have only a year of play with them before they hit 18. Can I ask those players who have a character who is a child what they think of that sort of rate of aging?
In Pen and Paper roleplaying games there is a concept called "downtime." This is where you assume that the character has been up to something between adventures. You might fill in the blanks, or leave them blank, or use them to add something in later.
It doesn't matter what option you pick, though, just know that your character was doing *something* during that time. Other players should also play as though your character was doing something during that time, as well. Otherwise we'll have to quit our dayjobs to play Illarion at all times.
Aegohl
Edited to add:
Downtime can also be used by creative players to add to the uptime experience. For example, in one pen and paper game I ran, the player of one of the characters always roleplayed that his character was unlucky. The truth is that the character had great stats, though, and succeeded more than anyone else. To roleplay this bad luck, every time we played he would make up a long bad luck story that happened during his downtime--everything from getting in a brawl and getting a black eye all the way to getting divorced.
Aegohl
It doesn't matter what option you pick, though, just know that your character was doing *something* during that time. Other players should also play as though your character was doing something during that time, as well. Otherwise we'll have to quit our dayjobs to play Illarion at all times.
Aegohl
Edited to add:
Downtime can also be used by creative players to add to the uptime experience. For example, in one pen and paper game I ran, the player of one of the characters always roleplayed that his character was unlucky. The truth is that the character had great stats, though, and succeeded more than anyone else. To roleplay this bad luck, every time we played he would make up a long bad luck story that happened during his downtime--everything from getting in a brawl and getting a black eye all the way to getting divorced.
Aegohl
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Naybet Grint
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Sure, downtime is good and can be used well. But a week is long enough to require some sort of interesting explaination for what you have been up to. And I could come up with what happened in the last week for my character when I log off for an IG week. Only if I play ever single day (RL) I'm in downtime for 5 days or so (IG). Every day. Thats a lot of explaining what you've been up to.
It also means that things progress painfully slowly for characters, when they have to wait on OOC reasons, like a romance between two characters. If they can only be online together every other RL day, their characters have to live with 11 days seperation between every single meeting. Sure, you can claim that you spent your downtime together, but you can't actually advance the interaction between the characters in that time. Lets assume that the two players can get their characters online at the same time, and in the same place, for an average of an hour each RL day. And that to develop a relationship to the point where you can RP knowing each other as well as people who spend most/all of their days together would take as little as 50 hours RP together (which is suspect is an underestimate). Then it would take the characters 300 days to get to that point. Thats a hell of a long time. I know a lot of couples that have been engaged after a lot less than that and you'd get to the 50 hours level of knowing each other within a couple of weeks at most.
On the other hand, this sort of time shift leads to some things happening far too fast for the players. For example it would be interesting to play as a character in the last four months of pregnancy, but that only lasts 3 weeks of RL time. Which isn't long enough for the player to really explore the role, particularly as in has to constantly change as the child grows. Another issue is such things as the Varshikan rule "You must have been a citizen for at least a month before you may join the academy". This makes perfect sense, and a month is a decent wait for a character to stop people thinking of it as easy. But for a player it's only 5 days (PS can I have a ruling from Quinesa on what sort of month she means, my initial assumption was it was an RL month), and some players don't even log in a particular character that often.
My basic question is what is bad about having RL time and IG time running at the same pace? Or IG time at only double RL (or when there is an IG clock, something like 1.5 times so that people from each RL timezone can enjoy each part of IG time of day, although that might just be confusing). If RL and IG time matched it would be easy to say things like "See you tomorrow", or "Are you going to the council meeting at the end of the week", everyone would be able to keep track of the seasons better (its... winter at the moment? I remember the first day of spring was a few weeks ago IG, so it must be time for a new first day of spring soon), and people could agree more easily on the phases of the moon, and any other time based stuff.
All this said, any timebase will be a lot easier to manage once the client tells you the IG time and date. Thanks for all the hard work you guys put in. I hope I don't sound like I am simply criticising. My intention is to propose things that I think will improve the game, and to try to explain why I think they would an improvement.
It also means that things progress painfully slowly for characters, when they have to wait on OOC reasons, like a romance between two characters. If they can only be online together every other RL day, their characters have to live with 11 days seperation between every single meeting. Sure, you can claim that you spent your downtime together, but you can't actually advance the interaction between the characters in that time. Lets assume that the two players can get their characters online at the same time, and in the same place, for an average of an hour each RL day. And that to develop a relationship to the point where you can RP knowing each other as well as people who spend most/all of their days together would take as little as 50 hours RP together (which is suspect is an underestimate). Then it would take the characters 300 days to get to that point. Thats a hell of a long time. I know a lot of couples that have been engaged after a lot less than that and you'd get to the 50 hours level of knowing each other within a couple of weeks at most.
On the other hand, this sort of time shift leads to some things happening far too fast for the players. For example it would be interesting to play as a character in the last four months of pregnancy, but that only lasts 3 weeks of RL time. Which isn't long enough for the player to really explore the role, particularly as in has to constantly change as the child grows. Another issue is such things as the Varshikan rule "You must have been a citizen for at least a month before you may join the academy". This makes perfect sense, and a month is a decent wait for a character to stop people thinking of it as easy. But for a player it's only 5 days (PS can I have a ruling from Quinesa on what sort of month she means, my initial assumption was it was an RL month), and some players don't even log in a particular character that often.
My basic question is what is bad about having RL time and IG time running at the same pace? Or IG time at only double RL (or when there is an IG clock, something like 1.5 times so that people from each RL timezone can enjoy each part of IG time of day, although that might just be confusing). If RL and IG time matched it would be easy to say things like "See you tomorrow", or "Are you going to the council meeting at the end of the week", everyone would be able to keep track of the seasons better (its... winter at the moment? I remember the first day of spring was a few weeks ago IG, so it must be time for a new first day of spring soon), and people could agree more easily on the phases of the moon, and any other time based stuff.
All this said, any timebase will be a lot easier to manage once the client tells you the IG time and date. Thanks for all the hard work you guys put in. I hope I don't sound like I am simply criticising. My intention is to propose things that I think will improve the game, and to try to explain why I think they would an improvement.