conceptional problems

[ngl]

How are you guys planning to solve some of the conceptional problems of fallout multiplayer like fast Travel, killing important npcs, player housing, enviroment inventories?

When i read of plans to open a mmo like server with dozens of players, then the probability of major problems with increase exponentially. New players wont find any loot, because its all taken away by other players. Griefers will kill NPCs, so that questing will get impossible. There wont be a safe spot to put things in, when dozens of players would have to share one player owned house.

I dont write this to dosencourage but because of my curiosity. I guess a coop enviroment for 2-4 players should be easily doable(given that you guys can pull it off to introduce a stable mp code). With more players, i cant imagine anything better than a deathmatch enviroment. And there are lots of better games for that tbh.

[foxtacles]

A few thoughts of mine (though the mod is not that far to seriously deal with the problems you mentioned yet):

Fast travel can be enabled / disabled via script.

NPCs state are reported to the server; the script can enable / disable / kill / resurrect / godmode etc. them. Callbacks will be like OnNPCDeath, OnNPCStateChange.

I don't have a idea about the housing, but I'm sure scripters will be able to script their own Housing system; i.e., OnPlayerCellChange will report that player X is in cell Y, which belongs to the house owned by player Y. Player X will get a message to leave the house within 10 seconds (or so), otherwise he will get automatically removed / kicked / whatever. It's up to the server script to handle such situations. A door to the house may be locked in the first place except for the owner.

Environment inventories will be more difficult, but I can think of various ways to deal with that, too.

Your concerns are right, and there definitely will be problems which can't be solved immediately, but in my opinion there's always a solution, it just may take some time for the implementation to be up and running ;) Let's just say I'm confident we can make it 8)

[Goz]

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Godlike, in my head i couldn't found the anwers to ngl problems, but you solved them all... *clap*

[General Alexander]

about the housing... each player will be able to have his own safe zone to keep his (and his friends) staff - in a different locations where he will be able to enter throw usual map or script command. This zone on the map will be seen only by its owner and his allies. just be patient - we have only started.

Staff will be respawn at merchants several times in a week/day. U can also kill npcs in wasteland to take their staff and then sell it to any traider in a town or to a merchant party.

[ngl]

Instancing (if your code supports it) could be the easiest solution for all this problems. Wasteland world for every player, but instances for every object, so you can only enter it together as a group. This could also solve any performance problems that might occur in the future.

[KorroBravin]

A way to fix the lack of loot would be to have stuff spawn in the containers like the NPCs do. Every few days new loot is added to world object inventories, and if more dangerous NPCs are around, better loot. Just my thoughts anyway.

[Galerion]

Have a question, if i put something in a container. Can someone see that?

[KorroBravin]

At the moment, no. the only thing that is communicated between players is other players positions, and that is a little buggy as well...

[foxtacles]

Player inventories are synced, too :D

[Galerion]

Small Tip:
You could give all containers a Script, which tells the server what objects are in there, and then you can use maybe a function which add the items in all several containers... would that be possible?

[KorroBravin]

Ah yes, but you cannot interact with eachother's inventories (like trading) yet, correct?

[General Alexander]

correct

[Genocyber]

From the discussion with my flatmate, It came to my attention that programmers just like to get on with it, if a problem arises they figure it out. Infact thats why he programs in the first place, to overcome challenges which then become oppertunities - this is why my mate programs. So conceptional problems arnt really problems at all, there infact oppertunities - the main reason he programs in the first place.

Im not sure if this is the reason why Recycler programs, but its an intersting look into a programmers psyche that should help us understand the process programmers have for projects like these.

[foxtacles]

Pretty much that. This project started nearly a year ago because I've been looking for a challenge which is both interesting and rewarding (I refer to knowledge and skill in fields of programming / computing here). I came up with the idea of writing a multiplayer mod for Fallout 3, similar to SA-MP. Up until know, I've learned a lot about network programming, reverse engineering, and C++ in general. That fact and considering that there's a large interest in such a mod, I could never think about stopping work on vaultmp. It's too awesome 8)

[tybalt]

A way to fix the lack of loot would be to have stuff spawn in the containers like the NPCs do. Every few days new loot is added to world object inventories, and if more dangerous NPCs are around, better loot. Just my thoughts anyway.


Maybe an idea for later revisions but instancing should be easier to implement and i would fix a lot of problems that can occur. Everything instanced except Wasteland and big cities would help a lot to balance things out.