ToDo
Features are organized by game release version and are listed in approximate order of priority. The general idea of the ordering is that while we are in beta 1 (ie, right now), I will focus primarily on ideas under the beta list. Once all of those features are implemented and tested, I will declare us as in beta 2, will advertise for new players, and will finally bundle together a public release of the mudlib.
For a graphical, prioritized representation of the todo list go:
http://mud.simud.org/todo
beta
- more spawn points
Build more temples/chapels and allow players to select one as their spawn point. One goes on Maiko, one on Coco, and probably one more somewhere on Ihaya.
- crafting tree revamp (head 2626), weapon/armour rewrite
The basic problem here is that our current crafting recipes were thrown together without any regard to balance of any sort. There are recipes that produce items that weigh more than their required ingredients, there are recipes that have very high skill reqs for relatively useless yields, etc… It is also problematic that people grind crafting on completed products that are only good to be thrown away at some later point… and that weapons are entirely disorganized.
The solution proposed is that I will be implementing a much more flexible crafting tree with intermediary steps for recipes. In stead of crafting a sword out of x wood planks and x iron ingots, the iron requirement will be made more flexible and will be broken down into multiple other steps. Thus, you might use two steel rods (which are fashioned from steel ingots, which are fashioned from iron ingots and coal) and a block of wood to make the sword. Or, lacking steel (or the ability to work steel), you might substitute two bronze rods, etc… One recipe allows the manufacture of numerous different items this way, and players can get skill practice manufacturing metal rods in stead of whole swords. More pracs per item produced, less garbage to be thrown away, and more functionality out of each recipe.
- anthill, candle hill sewer maze -> goblin city (tail 2351, 2408)
Three “new” zones will be added to the game.
The anthill is meant as the first high level dungeon type area in the game. It is an enormous multi-level maze located in the desert southeast of Candle Hill. It will also be our first experiment in mob communication AI. The ants will talk to each other and will assist in interesting ways. The ants (and their cave) will be a source of valuable crafting materials.
The sewer system below CH is going to get a bit of an overhaul. There will be moving bridges that require you to flip switches to get around the zone. We’ll be adding some newbie friendly mobs to the area and will be connecting it to a slightly higher level cave zone that leads out to the southwestern desert (and thus allows non-magical access to town when the gates are shut).
Below the sewer maze will be a goblin city. These are a neutral/friendly faction of NPC’s who will have their own shops and currency. They will also eventually be tweaked to speak a new language (in addition to common). Players will be able to learn this language, and will be able to do business with the goblins in their own currency. There will probably be some automated quests based out of the goblin city. Eventually, we might also allow players to acquire residence down here, etc…
- quest journal, plot daemon
The plot daemon idea was originally written up here, and was later discussed in more detail on #simud.
For purposes of beta 2, I simply want all players to have access to a simple console rpg style quest journal that is updated when they progress in quests. The plot daemon elements are a v1.5-2.0 feature.
- hunger system
See: hunger system ideas.
- mining guild
The Guild of Miners and Gemcutters will provide advanced options for resource gathering and will be an ideal source of money and quests for newbies. More on these guys in a pending post.
- paper, books, spellbooks, language, deeds, currency (1237, 2435)
Spellbooks are already implemented and working. We’ll need to clean them up a bit to make them more user friendly, but they’re already pretty decent.
Paper and books already exist in the game as well, howbeit in a form entirely unlike what I would like to see. To quote my original todo doc on the subject:
Paper
-----
- sheets of paper come in 3 sizes (small - 20 lines, medium - 40 lines,
large - 60 lines)
- items written onto any page are quantified as an array of the following
struct {
int type; // category of item, possibly bitmask?
string language; // common, dwarven, elven, magic, etc...
string contents; // text, player name, spell name, etc...
}
- categories include:
writing, signature, drawing, spell, skill, deed, license, and permit
- potentially (esp if content is a bitmask) allow for a counterfit flag and
for a 'closure' category or somesuch - cursed books execute code on the
readers? 
- creating actual licenses and permits is a function of cities
- creating deeds to property is a function of the owner
- spells may be scribben onto any size sheet of paper to make a scroll
- however, in the case of scribing spells into pages of a book, spells have
a size requirement in lines - thus a book of short pages could never hold
any but the simplest of spells because we don't want content to span pages
(for sanity reasons)
- skills written into a book require 30 lines and give enough information
that a reader is able to 'memorize' the skill from the book and advance
from zero levels to one level
- skills must be written into books, licenses/deeds/permits may not
example:
given a medium length (40 line) page in a book, I may do the following:
> speak common
You will now use Common for reading and writing.
> write in book
You begin to write on page 1 of the book. Type ** or . to stop.
> Concentration is perhaps one of the most important skills that a mage or
> in fact anyone might possibly learn. The basic points to consider when
> learning to focus one's mind follow:
> .
You have written 3 lines onto page 1 of the book. There are 37 lines left.
> write magic.concentration in book
You have written the basic details of the skill 'magic.concentration' into
the book. There are now 7 lines remaining on this page.
> sign book
You sign page 1 of the book. There are 6 lines remaining.
> read book
You read page 1 of the book:
Concentration is perhaps one of the most important skills that a mage or
in fact anyone might possibly learn. The basic points to consider when
learning to focus one's mind follow:
Details on the skill magic.concentration have been written here.
This page has been signed by Allaryin (Sept 5, '04)
> memorize magic.concentration from book
You already know this skill.
Scroll Cases
------------
- allow people to carry a number of scrolls with them in a single item
- case is cyllindrical and takes a few seconds to add or remove a scroll
- only scrolls may be stored in these cases, probably?
- maximum of 10-20 scrolls per case
- case actually dests the scroll when placed inside and simply copies its
information into an array
- likewise, when a scroll is removed from the case, it is a freshly cloned
object
- examining the case will list the scrolls contained (by spell name)
Books
-----
- crafting books will require numerous pages (between 5 and 100) of blank
paper of identical size and other properties
- chances are that because this procedure is so much more complex than any
normal crafting, that an actual machine will be implemented to do the work
for players
- thus a bookbinding machine is a furniture crafting recipe
- perhaps they might have to craft the book cover separately and then use
it with the machine
example:
> use machine with red book cover and 9 sheets of medium paper
You insert the red book cover into the binding machine.
You flip a switch and the cover is clamped into place.
You insert 3 sheets of medium paper into the machine.
You a crank and a needle darts through the pages, stitching them to the
cover.
You insert 3 more sheets of medium paper into the machine.
You turn a crank and bind these pages to the cover as well.
You insert the last 3 sheets of medium paper into the machine.
Turning the crank a final time, you bind the last few pages are sewn into
place.
You flip the locking switch back into its original position and the thin
red book is released.
- when crafting the book cover, one will be asked for a title
- allow for writing onto the cover of a book as well (before it is bound,
treat the thing like a sheet of paper, ne?)
- once bound, the book will have id to its descriptive name as well as to
any title assigned to it when the cover was made
Title Deeds have been documented by the conversation in thread 4130.
As far as languages go, there is apparently not a whole lot of information written down on the subject ;( At least, I can’t find any posts on the subject. The idea is that players will learn languages (written and spoken count separately) one word at a time, through gradual exposure. When you hear/read words you don’t know, the text will be garbled through a filter.
Whenever you hear/read a new word, you’ll get practices. Sufficient practices will level up the skill, just like any other skill. When you level in a language skill, you’ll learn the word(s) you heard most often during your learning of that rank - possibly in addition to some other important words just to make sure you know them. Once you hit 100% in the skill, we’ll do away with the word list and you’ll no longer ever see that particular filter.
Quite a lot has been written on currency. I don’t want to dig through the threads right now. Important highlights:
- Every governing faction will be allowed to mint their own currency
- Shops must specify a particular currency to accept (they default to the currency of the government where they reside)
- Moneychangers will probably make a killing
The basic currency system is fairly well tested. We only need to add other coins to the mix (hence goblin town) to test things out thoroughly.
- stat rebalancing
Player stats should not all be pegged at their racial maximums. That’s silly. Why have stats at all if everyone’s are the same? Thus, over time, the sum of a player’s stats will gravitate toward an average value. If you get 20 strength but don’t keep working at it, your str will eventually decay.
- equipollence, memory capacity limits
This has been dealt with in my magic v2.0 article.
- inventory slots
The general idea is to go to a more Diablo/graphical RPG style inventory limitation system. This would prevent the 50,000 onion bug among others. A discussion on the subject happened in #simud a while back and is recorded here.
- ranged combat, associated recipes
Ranged combat is kind of our holy grail for this release version.
- It will be possible to ‘throw’ weapons in combat, and a combat form will be added to allow throwing small pointy objects as its primary action. Thrown weapons will have a range limit.
- Bows will make a ’shoot’ verb available, and will also have an associated base combat form. Bow range will be sufficiently large that it will only make a difference if the target is all the way across an overworld room.
- Spells (and other ranged attacks) will begin to require line of sight to hit. Spells will not have any range limitations so long as the target is within the room.
It should be possible to shoot an arrow into an adjacent room, possibly even hitting a target.
Ranged combat forms should default to attempting to stay OUT of melee range (as opposed to the melee combat form behavior that walks you toward your target). Bows will probably have a minimum functional range.
Projectiles will be retrievable. Thrown weapons will have ammo limits. Special arrows will be possible.
It will also be quite possible to throw a dagger while in a sword form, etc…
- halflings, orcs, new weight & body size rules
Halfling and orc will be the first player races released into the game other than human. This is largely because of the proximity of their racial centers to Candle Hill. They will also speak their own languages (the languages will likely come before the races become playable). We will allow players to choose a new race when new ones come online.
The racial stat modifiers are already written and are in place, we just don’t allow people to choose a race yet.
Body sizes are a new feature that will be unrolled as part of the racial system. Orcs will be slightly larger than humans and halflings will be measurably smaller. It will not be possible for orcs to wear halfling armour and vice versa. The body size system idea has been floating around for a while here, and hopefully will become functional as one of the last features in our beta 2 checklist.
Crafters will be able to specify target sizes for the clothing/armour they make (defaulting at their own body size).
- new shop system
Currently, player built shops are pretty dumb. You have crates with infinite capacity where you store the goods. Each crate has a price specified on it, etc… it’s clunky and hard to manage.
The new system would involve actually storing the goods in a back room of the shop and marking prices down on a chalkboard, with room for notes from the shop owner to customers.
Shops should have a number of small “appliances” (for lack of a better word) that could be installed that offer certain other services to customers.
v1.0
- fish, herbs, more butchering options (and derived items)
- cloth, dyes, more magical recipes, more cooking recipes, alchemy rewrite
- exotic weapon/armour materials, temporary item enchants
- advanced combat forms (thread 2437)
- spell resistance, magical item recharging, magic v2.0
- planeswalkers, priests, druids, rogues, craft/trade guilds
- furniture, domesticated animals, dragging things
- dwarves, elves - will be released in major quest events
- ihaya map 70%
Forgehaven, Western kingdom, entire orcish forest, Cru, Exile cities, Tol Ainmir. The only things not released at this point will be Terador, Buamer, and Asile.
- factions, city system
- shipping routes for city/settlement connection
v2.0
- individualized summons
- vehicles, mounts, final touches on ihayan continent
- planar travel
- templars, hunters, weavers (in that order)
- gnomes
- finish ihaya
Terador, Buamer, Asile. Every one of the associated smaller islands.