I have never been able to keep an interest in building games because there never seems to be a point to them. I like your idea of breeding it with an RPG, but of course you are right about the problem of one player who just destroys the world for everyone.

One possible way to help this a bit might be to implement property ownership, like some games do (RPGWO comes to mind). Each player may claim a single parcel of land (in RPGWO it's 20 x 20, but you could use whatever numbers you want). On that land they may do what they like, and players may not make changes to other players' land. If building space seems cramped, or for greater flexibility, you could have one or more underground levels for digging caves and dungeons, and/or a second floor that can be accessed with stairs. Anyone can build or destroy things on unclaimed parcels of land, but once they are claimed, the person who owns it has control over it. Players can give each other building rights on their own parcels of land, so a group can get together and make a town or guild or large dungeon or whatever.

I'm not sure how you'd go about coding this, but I've seen it done so I know it's possible. As for the RPG elements, you could restrict players in what monsters and weapons they can make. (If one player creates a powerful monster, and another creates an even more powerful weapon, there's no way to balance it out.) Maybe players earn the right to create more powerful items by adventuring and earning experience points killing monsters and completing quests. To keep this in balance as well, you could make it so that players can only kill monsters on public land, or other players' land, and no one can create monsters on public land - so players will have to travel to other players' areas to adventure and gain experience. Maybe a player can only create a certain type of monster after killing that type a certain number of times.

Sorry this is all rather rambling, but I'm making it up as I go along. :P I hope some part of this is useful to you. I'd love to try your game once you get it up and running.

Don't think of it as a building RPG. Think of it as an RPG where your primary form of interaction is through altering the world. With that in mind, start thinking, "What restrictions will be placed on characters?"

Build commands should become spells with various effects. Something that might create a wall, or create a bunch of open space. Start players off with the ability to perform basic actions, and gain experience for using them in a proper manner (for a simple example: if you drop a tree in the middle of a field, you get +50 experience).

Then, have a way for the world to interact back. Areas that restrict the use of spells, or create monsters, or create monsters that restrict the use of spells. Perhaps a chunk of the world would become permanently locked until a certain monster is defeated. Perhaps players would have no way of directly defeating a monster, instead having to create and lead OTHER monsters to it. And creating a monster isn't as easy as pressing "MAEK MONSTAR," you have to create an environment that would attract certain monsters (like a bunch of open fields would spawn a giant, or a bunch of caves would spawn a goblin).

It's an interesting concept, if you look at it in the right light.

But see, if their maps are too big when it comes time to load them it becomes lag max 5000 and no one likes lag max 5000.
If you use a different method and add the map on before you start running the server, bad things happen. Plus you might have to constantly open and close the server and that just doesn't work often.

Thats no way to think :D!
See if I like something I drop everything else and start doing that....
...
No wonder I never get anything done D:!

But... But...
I like emoticons :D!
just not picture ones.

Probably for the same reason you used to hit return after every sentence--because he likes to. 0.o

DivineO'peanut wrote:

Jtgibson wrote:

you could just reward points for time spent in the game.

Ugh! I hate that system. You actually need to spend time in the game doing nothing to earn points? That's a game ruiner. When people have nothing else to do without points, then what? They will start idling inside the game, clog the server, and annoy the players. Eventually, players may quit due to boredom of having to wait to continue progressing. Points should be earned by action, not by idleness. </mini rant>

Didn't usually happen in Hedgerow Hall. If the game is more about the community and less about the hack and slash, it's a great system.