Dex Stewart
Level: Smiter
Rank Points: 355
Registered: 01-19-2007
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From: Deadly Rooms Of Death - Journey to Rooted Hold

As you well may know, the topic of multiplayer DROD has been discussed and rediscussed...

The main arguments against a battle between smitemasters were stalemate situations (when both smitemasters kill each other) and simultaneus movement (when both try to go on the same square).
I tried to think of a way to solve these two problems.

My solution was that the different smitemasters do *not* move at the same time, but alternatively and get to see each other's last moves. The one who goes first has a quite small (if any) advantage at all if the space between the smitemasters is large enough and both the above problems are solved.
A new problem occurs however: It is quite easy for both smitemasters to avoid being killed at all.

This, in it's turn is solved by not letting lone smitemasters fight against each other, but rather teams of them.
I also designed a small arena to show what I mean. (See attachement). In this arena it would be East-West against North-South with the following movement order(I tried to make it as fair as possible):

    14  11  07  02    
                      
15                  03
                      
10                  06
                      
08                  12
                      
01                  13
                      
    04  05  09  14    

Fuse movement would happen immediately after the movement of the Smitemaster who lit the fuse.

It would also be forbidden for a group of people to use their swords as walls and completely isolate themselves between. This would be a quite easy decision I believe, so no long discussions required .

That would be my idea.

Please comment

By the way, I did not put this in forum discussion, as I do not intend this to be implemented into the game. I'm thinking along the lines of chat session or separate program.

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[Last edited by Dex Stewart at 02-16-2007 06:34 PM]

Syntax
Level: Smitemaster
Rank Points: 1218
Registered: 05-12-2005
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I think the issue of "who starts first has an advantage" is actually *the* fundamental flaw why multi player could not be set up. The first player will always have the advantage regardless of any initial setup and stalemates will be inevitable.

The only viable solution I see is a "race to the flag" scenario say where both players have to conquer 3 (say) randomly spawned rooms and then reach a common point in the common 4th room (the rooms and start points would be identical for both players). This would become more of a live optimisation challenge in brand-new rooms. There'd need to be a 20-30 sec move limit for each player and the ability to see the other player's after both have moved.

I'm almost of the opinion of most that DROD multi-player should never be attempted out of principle. A viable solution is to take DROD elements and create a different game in itself like Erik demonstrated perfectly with the Snake contest. For sir Pegg to mention this backs up my feelings that this was a stroke of genius (yet again).

DROD is single-player's haven of multi-playable concepts.

Ravon
Level: Master Delver

Rank Points: 220
Registered: 02-19-2004
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For the most part, I agree that multiplayer DROD would not work at all. However, roborally style DROD could be quite interesting.

For those of you who don't know, roborally is a board game, (and quite a fun one at that) involving robots, racing to different points on a board. The interesting thing about it, however, is that players make their moves in batches of fives before seeing what goes on.

In DROD, this could be thought of even simpler, say moves of two or three. Both players input their desired next three moves, for instance, 5q9. Once every player has inputted their three moves, all of the Smitemasters execute their given sequence. Move order could rotate clockwise each set of moves.

While this would get rid of one of the fundamental principles of DROD (move, see what happens, repeat) IMO, it is the only way multiplayer smiting could be implemented well.

Ezlo
Level: Smitemaster

Rank Points: 1214
Registered: 01-08-2006
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Ravon wrote:
However, roborally style DROD could be quite interesting.

This actually has been done before

BDR
Level: Master Delver

Rank Points: 106
Registered: 10-03-2006
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Ezlo wrote:
This actually has been done before

Dangit all, I would have liked that contest...

Ezlo
Level: Smitemaster

Rank Points: 1214
Registered: 01-08-2006
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Yeah, someone should do another one as an unofficial contest. I would run it, except for the fact that I want to play.

NiroZ
Level: Smitemaster
Rank Points: 1302
Registered: 02-12-2006
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Ezlo wrote:
Yeah, someone should do another one as an unofficial contest. I would run it, except for the fact that I want to play.

Hmm, I'll look into it.

NiroZ
Level: Smitemaster
Rank Points: 1302
Registered: 02-12-2006
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hmmm, would it be possible to hack up the 'snakes... to the death' code to make something playable?
It's not vital, but it would be damn cool.