View source for Q&A Log 08-19-2010

[Public] Staffer Rebecca says, "Q & A session is happening in the TP Room Nexus."

You vanish with a bolt of lighting and thunder and reappear next to Rebecca!

The Nexus for the TP rooms. There is a statue of Silvante the Moogle Pope, Spirit and Build Wizard in the middle. Just because he can.
[Exits   : [TP2] TP Room(#399E), [TP1] TP Room 1(#396E), and [O] OOC Nexus(#393E) ]
[Players : Rebecca(#225PCW2) ]

Blobbus has arrived.

Mook arrives fromt he OOC Nexus.

Mook has arrived.

Leetle arrives fromt he OOC Nexus.

Leetle has arrived.

Leetle sits.

Leetle says, "I have some questions. :)"

You say, "Always good.  :3"

Rebecca says, "Please, ask away."

Blobbus says, "YOU MAY ASK THREE QUESTIONS, CHOOSE WISELY."

Leetle says, "Well, I have less questions than most since I pester you folks as things move along."

Blobbus (ok, not actually limited, but sounds impressive, right?)

Legion snickers.  What'cha got?

Leetle ponders a few things.

Leetle says, "We're in what, limited beta or something right now?"

Blobbus says, "We're in alpha."

Leetle says, "Cool.  How are things moving along to Beta?"

Blobbus says, "It's like beta, but the framework isn't complete."

Leetle nodnods.

Blobbus says, "Beta is when most of the stuff is there, but you're still adding features and content."

Leetle says, "I've alpha and beta tested dozens of video games in the past decade."

Aden arrives fromt he OOC Nexus.

Aden has arrived.

Leetle waves to Aden.

Aden is here to observe. Does not have any questions.

With a thunderclap and a flash of lightning Kioshi suddenly appears next to Legion!

Kioshi has arrived.

Kioshi says, "ahem was eating dinner"

Blobbus says, "As far as moving on to it, the code is progressing fairly smoothly, next chance I get to sit down and just code, I'll whip through a large chunk of it all at once."

Leetle says, "The questions I have are less about mechanics and more about what's happening in a meta sort of way.  If those are ok to ask?"

You say, "Suresure."

Leetle says, "Coo. :)"

Blobbus says, "RL's been a bit rocky this week, but I'm back in "the zone" so it'll be soon."

Aden says, "Actually."

Aden says, "I want to know somethin'."

Blobbus says, "Rather, soon that I get to the mega-code-binge."

Leetle says, "My biggest area of curiousity is what happens with the characters who've been here a year or so, roleplaying various situations and generally having fun while stuff's been happening in the background."

Leetle says, "Stuff like beginning xp.  I have a summoner who's managed to get one of the great spirits attention. :P  Will all that be worked in somehow?"

Aden says, "The stat system here is not terribly clear about the compounded stats. The derived ones, I mean. Why are some stats lower than others, even when the base stats suggest they should be different?"

Blobbus says, "Well, the tentative idea is that when we go live, there'll be a time skip to right around the year 900 OV, probably just a little before."

You say, "Clarify, Aden?"

Aden says, "MATK as compared to PATK, on me."

Blobbus says, "Ah."

Rebecca says, "Hold on, folks.  One question at a time for logging purposes."

Aden says, "I have little to no physical skills. I went out of my way to avoid them."

Blobbus says, "Ok...so...my knowledge on Leetle's question is as follows..."

Blobbus says, "We havn't exactly gotten around to specifics on XP, so the details are a little sketchy as far as that goes."

Leetle nods, "Okay.  Hmm, Aden's question is a good one."  Sits and listens.

You say, "The answer to Aden's question, actually, pretty simple."

Kioshi says, "as for storyline.. you'll want to get with us, like in regards to the spirit rp it'd be silv, so that we can work that out. :) As for Aden's question *looks to Blobbus and Legion*"

You say, "PATK is derived from (Strength+Dexterity) * 1.5"

You say, "MATK is derived from(Attunement + Acuity) * 1"

Aden says, "I see."

Aden says, "And RATK?"

Aden says, "And the other derived stats?"

Blobbus says, "On the wiki, if you search for "Blobbus System Mechanics Notes" (My system-notes, not my-system notes, by the way)"

Blobbus says, "It has the formulas for everything there."

You say, "http://coi.ginkosoft.com/wiki/index.php?title=Blobbus_System_Mechanics_Notes"

You say, "The bit in parentheses after Floor is the base on-sheet derived value."

Aden says, "...math."

Blobbus says, "It's a tiny bit obscure to read, since it's scratch-sheet notes, not a described article."

Aden dislikes looking at equations.

Legion shrugs, that's how it works.

Aden says, "Okay, I have another question."

Aden says, "First, a demonstration:"

[CHECK]: Aden rolls (Attunement+Arcana) result: 10

Kioshi says, "mmk?"

Aden says, "How do successes work here? What determines difficulty and how do you know how /well/ something works?"

You say, "It's not success-based."

You say, "It's straight value comparison."

Aden says, "How do the rolls work, is what I meant."

You say, "Compare result vs. defender's check or GM-declared target number."

You say, "Highest number wins."

Aden says, "...hmm."

Blobbus says, "It can be opposed, or with a target number chosen by judge."

Aden looks at the math on the page.

Leetle says, "Sounds fairly easy."

Aden says, "...alright, I think I've got it. o_o"

Legion nods, it is.  As for how well you do, well, if the number is significantly higher, then you are simply a badass.

Blobbus says, "Now that I'm off the phone again..."

Aden says, "Let's see. My Arcana and Attunement work up to 23, divided by three is... Seven or eight, depending on if it's rounded or not."

Blobbus says, "It's generally rounded down, but the remainder is factored in,."

Aden says, "...what are the X,Y,Z values on the page, what do they represent? Stat/Skill/Subskill?"

Blobbus says, "1/3 remainder adds 1d2 to the roll, and 2/3 remainder is 1d3 to the roll."

Aden says, "...hmm."

You say, "XdY+Z?"

Blobbus says, "Ok...basically, the first "functions" there are how it rolls dice..."

Blobbus says, "And how it determines how to choose what to roll for dice..."

Aden says, "Okay."

Blobbus says, "The general idea is that the first one explains "Here's how we roll one die of arbitrary size""

Blobbus says, "Roll 1dX"

Aden hum~

Blobbus says, "The second one, Roll XdY+Z is how it uses that to roll a dY, X amount of times, and add Z to it. "

Blobbus says, "Those two are pertty simple, they boil down to the computer equivalent of "Roll Dice""

Blobbus says, "They're there purely because I'm pedantic about these things."

Blobbus says, "The next part is the important mechanic."

Blobbus says, "Points Convert."

Blobbus says, "You put in a number from 0 to whatever (though it's locked to 24 for PCs, and like, 36 for NPCs if we need it)..."

Blobbus says, "And it outputs X, Y, and Z for the dice."

Blobbus says, "The way it determines them is...   Points Minus 1, Divided by 6, Minus 1. Rounding down."

Blobbus says, "That determines how MANY dice to roll."

Blobbus says, "It outputs 12 for the number of SIDES to roll."

Blobbus says, "ALWAYS."

Blobbus says, "And the modifier is the remainder of Points, Minus 1, Divided by 6."

Blobbus says, "So, say we have 14. 14 - 1 = 13. 13 divided by 6 = 2 remainder 1. You are rolling 2d12-1 for your roll."

Blobbus says, "With me so far?"

Kioshi chuckles

Blobbus says, "If I'm rambling on too fast, I apologize, it's been a crazy day and I've not wound down to not-hyper yet."

Leetle says, "It's ok. :)"

Leetle says, "That's what logging is for."

Blobbus says, "The good news is, the system handles all of this, so far."

Blobbus says, "Also, as you'll see with the next section, it takes into account every point you put into it, there's no wasted fractions."

Blobbus says, "Oh crud, that prior example missed a step."

Blobbus says, "It should be: 14; 14-1=13; 13 / 6 = 2 rem 1; Count = 2 + 1 = 3, Sides = 1; 3d12+1"

Blobbus says, "Same thing I said before, but add 1 to the amount of sides."

Blobbus says, "That way, if you take 0 and feed it in, you still get 1d12."

Kioshi says, "we're nice like that :D"

Blobbus says, "The max, 24, is 5d12."

Blobbus says, "Though the thing will allow NPC settings up to 36, which is 7d12."

Blobbus says, "Anyways...since there's been no questions on the prior step, I'll just move onto the next one for now and review later."

Blobbus says, "Now..."

Blobbus says, "Here's where stats and such come in."

Blobbus says, "All checks of this nature will be Stat+Skill+Subskill."

Blobbus says, "Or Stat+Skill+Spell, or Stat+Skill+Something."

Blobbus says, "The third one changes with whatever type of thing you're doing. The first example was skill checks, the second was casting checks."

Blobbus says, "The third example was just to represent that there's probably others I'mnot remembering right now."

Blobbus says, "Anyways..."

Blobbus says, "What you do is this: Take your Stat rating, Skill rating, and Subskill rating, add them all together, then divide by 3."

Blobbus says, "this will give you a number between 0 and 24, as well as a remainder of 0, 1, or 2."

Blobbus says, "Equivalent of 0/3 1/3 and 2/3 respectively."

Blobbus says, "Basically, the result of the division is the Level and the Fractional. The level is what you feed into the dice calculation. Say we ended up with level as 14, and the remainder 2/3..."

Blobbus says, "14 is 3d12+1, so it rolls this."

Blobbus says, "Then, for the fractional, if it's the 1 remainder, it rolls 1d2-1 (Result: +0 or +1), if it's the 0 remainder, it rolls 1d3-1 (Result: +0, +1, +2)"

Blobbus says, "It then adds this together."

Blobbus says, "The fractional is basically how it handles those extra points that would get rounded off."

Thaylorn arrives fromt he OOC Nexus.

Thaylorn has arrived.

Blobbus says, "It gives you a 50/50 chance of 0 or 1 extra points, or a 33/33/33 chance of 0 1 or 2 extra points."

Blobbus says, "And this is what all of our checks are based on."

Blobbus says, "It ends up being something like:  Xd12+Z + 1dR-1   with X, Z, and R being based on your points."

Blobbus says, "As outlined above."

Kiatsa arrives fromt he OOC Nexus.

Kiatsa has arrived.

Kioshi waves at Thaylorn and Kiatsa both

Kiatsa latches onto Kioshi's arm~

Blobbus says, "At this point, everything is related to the identities of the (Stat+Skill+Subskil) parts for the rest of the document."

Blobbus says, "This check mechanic is how it handles attack and defense check."

Blobbus says, "So far, we've had nothing to do with PATK/RATK/MATK/DEF/MDEF yet. The check for that is unrelated."

Kioshi patpats Kiatsa

Blobbus says, "As you know, all stats, skills, and subskills are from 0 to 24."

Blobbus says, "The PATK/RATK/MATK/DEF/MDEF and other derived ones similar do not fit the 0 to 24 pattern."

Blobbus says, "All check-type mechanics will be 0 to 24. This is not the same for, say, damage calculation."

Blobbus says, "PATK is (Strength+Dexterity)*1.5 rounded down."

Blobbus says, "RATK is (Insight+Intelligence)*1.5 rounded down."

Blobbus says, "RATK is (Attunement+Acuity)*1.0 rounded down. (Yes, I know multiplying by one won't require rounding)"

Blobbus says, "MDEF is (Strength+Stamina)/1.5 rounded down."

Blobbus says, "ER!"

Blobbus says, "My bad..."

Blobbus says, "DEF is (Strength+Stamina)/1.5 rounded down."

Blobbus says, "MDEF is (Resilience+Willpower)/1.5 rounded down."

Blobbus says, "Now..."

Blobbus says, "The way attacks work are as follows..."

Blobbus says, "The attacker rolls their attack check based on their weapon/spell/etc, the defender rolls their defense based on how theyy're defending."

Blobbus says, "If the attacker's roll is greater than the defender's roll, then the attack hits, otherwise it misses. this favors the defender in a tie."

Blobbus says, "If the attack hits, then we move on to damage resolution..."

Blobbus says, "Essentially, you take the attackers PATK/RATK/MATK plus the similar PATK/RATK/MATK value of the weapon's attack, and then add or subtract a randomly rolled value that can be + or - 50% of that ATK value."

Blobbus says, "This is the attacker's damage."

Kioshi nods to Blobbus

Blobbus says, "On the other side, you take the defender's DEF/MDEF, add all their armor's DEF/MDEF, add or subtract a randomly rolled value that can be + or - 50% of that DEF value. This is then treated as a percentage and capped between 0% and 100%"

Blobbus says, "Noting that attack is capped between 1 and infinity."

Blobbus says, "Inotherwords, you will always do at least 1 damage."

Blobbus says, "If you can hit in the first place."

Rebecca says, "So, does this explain things for people?"

Blobbus says, "Essentially, the attack is multiplied by the soak, then that amount is subtracted from the attack, and the result is once again capped at a 1 minumum."

Leetle hmms.

Blobbus says, "This is how damage is calculated."

Kiatsa drools.

Blobbus says, "And that's how that all interacts so far."

Blobbus says, "The good news is, all this is handled by the system."

Leetle has reconnected.

Blobbus says, "Right now, you have to copy the four parameters from +attack and +defend and run +calc with them, but it handles the rest for you."

Leetle has dropped a connection.

Blobbus says, "When we get automation done, it should handle all of that by itself."

Blobbus says, "I plan on having a utility eventually that can give you stuff like, "The damage my weapon currently does" and stuff, but for now, we have what we have."

Kioshi nodnods, "right, that help guys?"

Blobbus says, "The key design goal of the combat system is making it so you don't have to do all this wacky math yourself, and you can focus on actually RPing the scene as it happens, rather than having to deal with all the crazy math while doing it,"

Blobbus says, "As you may have heard us say before, the theme we're going for is, "Tell us a story." and, as such, detracting from that storytelling by forcing you to "Solve our math equations." is really not the intent of it."

Leetle says, "Darn, but where will I ever use my a^2 + b^2 = c^2 if not here?"

You say, "AlgebraMUCK!"

Blobbus says, "I think I made one of those once. It involved space."

Blobbus says, "It did not live long,"

Rebecca says, "So, any other questions from folks?"

Leetle says, "Hmmm."

Legion looks about?  Questions?  Comments?  Concerns?

Kiatsa is just here to watch~

Leetle says, "Mine are just mostly timelines basically."

Leetle sees flavour, fluff and background stuff getting posted on a regular basis, so that department is all good, methinks.

Kioshi nodnods

Kioshi says, "Minion and I will be getting back to work on Abilities soon.. he had a rough week"

Leetle nodnods and knows.

Leetle offers typing help. :)  "Or ideas, too."

You say, "Is there anything y'all'd *like* to see?"

Leetle grins.

Kioshi smiles and nods to Legion, "dis be good question."

Leetle says, "I'd like to see airships as separate entities like the muck that shall not be named. :P"

Kioshi noogies Leetle in meantime.

Leetle says, "But I know that battle is probably long lost. :P"

Leetle squeaks!

You say, "We're wanting to handwave that away, specifically because we have not found an implementation of ship-to-ship combat that is not tedious and irritating."

You say, "Thus, better to make ships a backdrop against the important part; the people on them."

Kiatsa liked d20 Future for ship combat. *.*

Leetle hmms and thinks that from time to time, the ship IS as important as the people.   "But then I am biased."  Ahem.

Legion chuckles.  Anyone else?

Blobbus says, "While there's a number of ways we could integrate it into the system, it does depend on a lot of different things. For now, we still need to get the automated combat system going in the first place before we even consider how to begin with more complicated constructs like that."

Leetle nodnods.

Leetle says, "Is there going to be an active noble scene?"

You say, "Politics is something we'd like to have active, yus."

You say, "That depends more on players than us, however, so."

Leetle says, "I guess what I mean is, issit going to have NPCs to start it off, which slowly give way to PCs as they make their way up the noble chain..."

Legion spreads hands.  Can't really say, there.  First we need to have nobles to scene for, honestly.

Leetle volunteers. :D

Leetle says, "Ohohoh!"

Leetle says, "Third slots. :)"

Kioshi says, "ah that"

Leetle says, "Yeeees :D"

Kioshi says, "we've decided that as soon as we go into beta we'll be offering out third slots."

Leetle says, "Soooo.  When? :P"

Kioshi says, "we'll be going into beta once ZTS is finished and perhaps xp added.. so hopefully not too long"

Leetle has an idea for a noble. :D

Blobbus says, "Like I say, soon as I can, code binge will move us a lot of the way there."

Leetle will send hot pockets and VHS tapes.

Blobbus says, "I'm hoping I can do some coding tomorrow, as today was a sleep-dep trainwreck."

Leetle nodnods.

Blobbus says, "What with the MUCK being upgraded to the latest version, I can now do some stuff a lot more efficiently than before."

Leetle says, "I'm the last one to rush ya. :)  I'm just happy we're so very near. :)  It's been a long year."

Blobbus says, "As I may have mentioned before, I'm a ProtoMUCK developer, and I've been rather actively improving the codebase lately, which sparked others to do so as well. Numerous bugs have been squashed, several features added, and soforth."

Blobbus says, "Now that I've gotten certain things added that needed adding to pave the way for the future, I can once again focus primarily on writing the inserver code to start us getting there."

Kioshi nodnods :)

Leetle nodnods.

Blobbus says, "But anyways, like I say, I plan to sit down and code tomorrow, and I'll be getting to bed at a workable time tonight,"

Blobbus says, "Now that the AC's properly set again, anyways."

Blobbus says, "As I mentioned, I'm hoping to have the combat timing engine to a working state soon."

Blobbus says, "The one thing I'm really hoping to get is feedback and testing in regards to combat."

Blobbus says, "As it stands, to date, I've had like, one person ever test it and provide feedback on it."

Leetle nodnods.

Rebecca says, "So we're going to need some play testers who beat ZTS into the ground."

Leetle cracks knuckles.

Blobbus says, "Well, when ZTS gets done, we will. But I was also implying our current combat system as it stands without it."

Blobbus says, "Meaning +equip +attack +defend +check"

Blobbus says, "There's a bbpost somewhere."

Kioshi says, "we did do a battle scene recently, Blobbus.. it all worked well"

Blobbus says, "8/5"

Blobbus says, "That's the one of note."

Blobbus says, "Oh, and +hp is in there."

Blobbus says, "Pretty much, the more feedback I get on it, the better."

You say, "So, git to fightin, y'all.  :3"

Blobbus says, "When the timing system comes out, it'll let you decide who goes first, and who's turn it is a lot better too."

Blobbus says, "Right now, it's left up to whoever's doing the scene, and probably is, for example, round-robin decided by a coin flip or whatever is come up with."

Blobbus says, "Eventually, the system will feature a more complex timing behavior than what it'lll do initially. Specifically, when we get automation done, as oposed to when I roll out the timing system."

Leetle nods.

Blobbus says, "Essentially, it boils down to three phases of a "turn" per player...three points, and three waiting periods."

Blobbus says, "First, waiting for your turn, which is followed by the "choose your action" point..."

Blobbus says, "This part always occurs between actions."

Blobbus says, "After choosing your turn's action, there's a waiting period that's a "warmup" period, like, say, for casting."

Legion coughs.

You say, "Actually if y'all don't mind, we should probably save this explanation until the system's out."

Leetle nods, "Sure."

Blobbus says, "Agreed. It's not fully hashed out."

You say, "So!  Thank you all *very* much for coming, and we'll pop up this log under the last.  :3"

Blobbus says, "Pretty close though."

Leetle says, "Woo!"

Leetle says, "Thanks for the info session. :)"

You say, "Always glad to clarify when possible."