You put together a file of all the pieces of information that came hard won by you, and you upload it to the XDrive. People can then download it and make changes to it, and upload new versions, and the community can agree on which is better.
And the best one get's posted somewhere obvious for newbies like yourself to look at.
If you don't have access to the XDrive, email [email protected] with your MOO name/email and ask him for access to the XDrive.
-Kevlar
CF
Because yes, GMs can puppet. But maybe if we did this, then people would get better at playing different roles? And could be less attached to characters? Or could take That-TERRA-Agent-Who-Has-Been-Around-Ages and make them finally emerge out of the shadows into the light of fame and fortune?
I dont know. It has a lot of downsides. But it could be fun!
It would just sort of suck for newbies, to have roles forced on them. Unless they wanted to be Joe Street Cleaner, like a canned char? Or Jill the Accountant?
Personally I like the idea... (of bit-part chars, not being butt-raped by oldbies)
General opinion back then was that they'd be abused and players couldn't be trusted with them. ie, throw away character used to disrupt or attack other players without any long term repercussions on your main char, etc.
Point one: If its needed, do it. There's little point in running the same routine. Every now and again, you have to shake it up.
Have a useless leg, you amputate. Need surgery or you'll die - you go under the knife. Game needs a bit of Botox cuz its wrinkles are showing - you get the picture...
Point two: Just because people can, doesn't mean they will. Even bad folk like balance.
Despite what little devilish pricks you -might- be, that doesn't mean everyone else is. I'm pretty sure that if the Moo were under my control, I'd trust Lena entirely. I mean...seriously, what kind of long-term play do we have to put in to get a little trust? Been here 3+ years, you should almost be entitled.
Point three: You have no secrets. Its called a log, and its read thoroughly every day due to these little notifications on the screen. Seen them at a particular admin's house once. Nifty shit.
Admin are the bosses, they see -everything- you do and its their job to kick your ass when you screw up. You think your nasty little moosex was a secret...guess again! Hot shit just got proof-read, who knows...maybe fapped too as well! I've been hi5'd and told 'good job' before: after hitting up a girl for 'info' then her friend, then an enemy's girl...so on and so forth...like five..*cough* in a few hours *coughcough*. My point here is through all that jumble, that you are not immune, you're not invisible, and if you screw up, you'll get punished accordingly. Or hi5'd if they're amazed.
Point four: This would be easy, even codewise and I don't know shit about coding. Ten minutes tops. Setup some 'mini-bits' and watch accordingly...viola.
Different admin have different rules, each allowed to do certain things depending on their rank. Just assign them a lower rank, remove all rights and allow only the puppeting of their little NPC. Do anything else and the 'mini-bit' is removed. Make certain your other character gets the hookup for no reason, something bad happens to them to keep karma flowing and again, you loose the 'mini-bit'.)
P.S. Don't trust Lena on M.A.G. Her bullet-dodging skills need a few UE (lol, sorry hun, much love!).
Random memories for old time's sake:
"MAH ROOF!"
"No thanks, prefer not having to read an instruction manual to use my prick."
"Got it on E-note too mate."
"Pullstring? ...what the fuck?"
"Jeez, it smells like ass."
"Its them sewers unda Gold. Wut ya t'ink it'd smell like?"
"I dunno..money maybe?"
"You don't wanna go out there."
"Why not?"
"They take turns, fuckin ya for yer genes till ya die."
"How do I get there again?"
Point one, I'll come back to...
Point two, trusting long time players. Sadly it's been proven over and over here and elsewhere that when you entrust players with "powers" abuse will happen. It won't happen every time, but it will happen. Often it's not even malicious or intentional, just bad judgement, but it still happens. Don't get me wrong, I know what you're saying, and I'm making no judgements on anyone, but allowing players to puppet NPC's creates a whole mess of potential conflicts of interest and access to essentially OOC info. For example, Bob plans to assassinate Joe and discusses it with NPC Frank who is being puppeted by Joe's controller...
Point three, logs. Yep, there's logs, but unless someone can explicitly tell me otherwise I'd cast doubt on the idea they're "thoroughly read every day". Sure, some admin might be obsessive about reading the logs, but all of it, every day, as a policy for the MOO across the ebb and flow of active admin... unlikely.
Aside from that, fixing IC events after the fact is a nightmare. Sure, someone might get punished but the damage is done, characters have died, gear has changed hands, IC events have spread their waves across the pond.
Point four: 10 mins to set up. I'm rusty on my MOO-fu, but no, just no. It took Johnny a fair bit of time to create the gimped $alumni admin class, which is already what you're describing minus the ability to puppet and they still throw tracebacks and problems all over the shop. You can trust me on this, I am one. :D If it would have taken 10 minutes to set up, I'd have done it 10 years ago without a second thought.
So, back to point one... and despite all I've just said, yes, I totally and utterly agree. I like the idea, I've always liked the idea, but there's a lot of counter-points to the idea that it's simple, painless and without risk of abuse. If it were really that simple it would have been done purely because it was no effort to implement and remove if it didn't work. Hey, no harm done and we've only lost 10 mins...