Best posts made by Reason

How much interest would there be there in a Cyberpunk MU*? I've noticed that Cyberpunk Red is being released this summer (in anticipation of the CDPR Cyberpunk 2077 game), which seems like CP 2020 rules with a facelift.

I got as far as building a 5th edition Shadowrun MU* but never opened the doors once I started really digging into the Matrix and realized how terrible the Matrix rules were. 6th Edition appears completely unsalvageable -- much of that work on the never-opened SR site could be refactored into a CP game though.

Are there any redflags about the Cyberpunk (Interlock? Fuzion?) game system that make it unsuitable for a MU*? Too crunchy? Not crunchy enough?

Okay. Finished +sheet schema tonight, need to code a view up to it w/ a +sheet command, then finish CG and wire it up to build out finished +sheets, and wire up the +roll commands so you can roll skills vs. just dice.

Will see how much progress can be made between now and the new year.

Might be close enough to put a post in the Advertisements board.

-r

Zero progress over last two weeks. Welcome to FY21Q1, where life comes at you a million miles an hour.

Sometimes no update is an update.

Chargen still waiting on a good inventory system to manage individual pieces of gear. Everything else is done.

-r

@A-Meowley 100%

A key difference is unlike ye olde MU* code bases of yesteryear that were these weird soft-code languages that reminded me of some LISP derivative, Evennia doesn't have any softcode but because it's Python you don't have to like recompile the whole damn game when you make a code change, you just give it a quick reload.

So portable + easy to code. It's a super winner.

@derp said in What's So Hard About Ruby?:

So I've seen a couple of comments now to the effect of 'Ugh, Ruby is such a pain and so hard to program in', and admittedly I'm kind of lost on that one. Especially when it comes from people that can do MU-code and/or are working on Python for Evennia.

Python, to me, seems infinitely more finicky and picky about all of its various little whatsits and One True Right and Only Way-ism. And yet, people still think Ruby is harder?

Why? What's the deal?

Genuinely curious. I'm a ruby amateur, but I'm wondering if there's some kind of programming pitfall that I'm about to step into down the line.

Huh. I've never heard anyone say Ruby is hard to program in.

It is a pretty friendly language, all things considered. And both Ruby and Python share some common lineage. In the end I think a lot of it comes down to personal preference (which is generally true of most languages except PHP, which is an abomination and should have no claim to life).

-r

About half-way through w/ coding up a functional CP: Red Character Generation system. System is pretty clean and looks like it supports a wide range of play styles.

I've always maintained that there are really three things essential for a game: +dice, +sheets, and +CG -- and of those, +CG is the hardest to actually code correctly because poor usability will kill it.

So, if I get through w/ the second half of +CG I think there's a game here. Will hold back on making a formal Advertisement announcement until +CG is done, and +dice/+sheet are close to done.

-r

P.S. Sorry for the thread necromancy.

@thebigd Well. Should probably level-set expectations as "no promises". I'll probably start ripping apart and reimplementing chargen to further separate data + logic + view concerns and maybe make the code a little cleaner to manage and maintain in the next few days.

When that's done, I'll have chargen + sheet + dice code. Then there's the matter of a grid, and looking at any additional systems (like... how necessary is in-game mail in this day and age?) required for a "minimal viable product" alpha launch.

Currently I think I'll set the game in Night City give its the best defined in the CP:Red time period.

And even setting aside code, there's the matter of sourcing a crew of reasonable alpha players and some RP Admins to keep things lively -- I won't be able to carry this thing entirely on my back.

I had wanted to have that bare-necessities code in place by Jan 1. Probably pushing that back a little bit just based on the need to maintain a sustainable pace.

-reason

So, the unfortunate reality is that I had two AWESOME weeks over Christmas break to get deep on coding followed by... a good solid quarter of being personally oversubscribed to way too many commitments. My hope at the time had been to wrap the game up into a functional state and sort of get enough momentum that it could sustain itself while I periodically maintained a few bits or added some features as needed.

Boy that looks naive based on the last 3 months!!

That said, instead of just letting this die, I'll find some time to clean up the repo where my work was hosted and post that out for anyone that wants to either continue it, use it for inspiration, or purely just laugh at how duct-tape-and-bailing-wire-hacktastic the code I threw together is (but it works!). Sorry folks! Maybe next December I'll catch another break.

Until then, something something for all the fish.

-r

Coming out of post retirement to say: "Right on @Griatch."

P.S. I just pulled your Evennia Container. I realized I needed a pet AWS project. With Shadowrun 6th edition right around the corner, the timing just seemed right.

Let's see...

CharGen update: Roles, Attributes, and Skills are done. Weapons and Armor are done. Wasn't able to finish it up over Thanksgiving, maybe will find some time over the Holiday break.

Cyber / Gear are next -- really, the barrier to progress is that the process of building the data for all of that is such a manual process of cutting/pasting, it sucks the life out of your soul.

+Dice code is always trivial. +Sheet code can probably be iteratively improved as long as it shows the bare essentials in a usable form.

The more I read the core rules the more I think some automated +lifestyle code and +hustle code for side jobs is probably worth implementing as well.

Anyway, all for now.

-r

@ShelBeast Yep, totally fair question -- and actually, the unification of Magic + Matrix w/ the rest of the game system was welcomed. The issue I have w/ 5th edition Matrix rules is the Flat Topology of hosts that doesn't allow for more realistic opportunities for lateral movement through a compromised environment by a Decker. This makes compromising a system a more binary (no pun intended!) exercise of skill checks designed to speed up gameplay than a realistic topology designed to protect corporate data.

And this cuts both ways.

That said, I do have to acknowledge that modern networks have flattened to a degree. For an interesting read Google, for instance, has released all their white papers on their implementation of a Zero Trust network, though despite anchoring trust to the identity layer (similar to Shadowrun), it's more realistically implemented in gradients based on key dimensions of trust vs. system assurance requirements.

-r

I'm a creature of habit, so using + as a prefix to instructions intended to invoke game commands is just the syntax I've chosen. +chargen, +roll, +sheet, etc., etc.

...which I find myself chuckling about, rereading the above, given I haven't actually played on a MUSH in 10+ years. But hey, let's go with them being formative years.

Look on the bright side -- by being explicit that you want to interact w/ the system to execute some code on your behalf with a plus sign, you won't accidentally kick off a command when your pose inadvertently starts with a command keyword when you forgot to use 'emit/pose'.

As far as progress -- haven't done much with it since Thanksgiving. Looking to knock some more of this out over the Holidays.

Then have to decide if I host this somewhere and attempt to collaborate with a crew on running a game, or just release this code into the wild to exhibit a life of its own.

@HelloProject said in Need Python Code Projects:

Okay, I've decided that I'm gonna get a server up and fuck with Evennia and just read documentation.

That's what I've narrowed things down to.

Trial by fire.

Trial by fire works. Evennia code itself is super well documented so you can open up files and putz around looking for how stuff works.

It's good to have a working knowledge of Python though too. There used to be a good years and years ago in the 'Headfirst' series of coding books: "Headfirst Python". I've recommended it more than once to folks new to writing code that were interested in Python.

Not sure how new you are, but if you want some little projects to learn the syntax and some of the "guts" of Python itself you can probably score that book for cheap.

@Ifrit B A. Not A B.

@Griatch Good stuff. I actually decided to dust off my inactive account just to log in and provide moral support for Evennia.

-r

Evennia is neither MOO, nor MUCK. It's a Python library for building a multi-player text game.

It's fairly robust out of the box -- beyond just the wealth of builtin Python silliness you can use, I believe it also sits on top of an easy to use modern database abstraction and offers painless web-based connections for players.

I'm strictly guessing here, not familiar with your code experience, but I would guess that if you had 3 months to dedicate to coding, spending the first two months learning Python and the last month writing code would likely have a product that was more efficient, more readble, and more sustainable than hacking your way through MU* Softcode.

I seem to recall University of Michigan offering a free Coursera Python for Everyone course as well, here.

Interesting. I was wondering if an EP MU* would show up some day. It is a compelling setting. And using my new favorite MU* platform, Evennia, to boot.

Iiiiiiinteresting.

I'm utterly swamped or I'd volunteer to code monkey a few systems for you. Maybe June/July?

-r

Really one of the stand-out contributors to the genre over the decades. Creative, determined, and always generous (even in disagreement).

You'll be missed, EUBanana.

-r

Great project. Really appreciate all the work you've put into Evennia.

-r

@shaggy said in Games:

All the new games are Ares.
Am I the only one who just doesn't really care for Ares?

I like the concept of Ares -- something that modernizes the genre and improve the accessibility to natively incorporate the web is a step in the right direction. The fact that it's so thoughtfully supported is kind of like winning the lottery for folks that it's a good fit for.

That said, I'm not a huge fan of Ruby and for the VERY LITTLE poking around I've done, the games running it haven't fully grabbed me. My MU* lizard brain still craves a grid of some sort, I think. And a slew of arcane commands that start with @ symbols or + signs.

I dig the ability to elegantly emulate the play-by-post experience, though, and hacking something like that into Evennia some day might be neat.

-r