Ideas
- 3-dimensional gridmap with a behind & above -view. This means that there
will be real differences in altitude that will affect visibility among other
things, and it is intended that the players do not see behind them, making
surprise attacks possible.
- Permanent death. When a character dies, it is removed and ceases to exist.
The same goes for Non-Player Characters (NPCs) as well. This feature has
received much criticism for obvious reasons: people don't like to lose their
characters. However, we want death to be serious. We don't want a world where
players run around attacking dragons blindly or acting against common sense in
general. Thus, permanent death is the best choice.
- Language system. Many races, cultures etc have their own language and it
can only be understood by other people who know the language. An orc player
might not be able to interact with an elf player at all. What this means
in practice is that the says, shouts etc will be scrambled according to the
language characteristics, ie. an orc says "Hello World" in orcish. Since the
orcish language emphasizes rough consonants such as r's, z's etc, an elf
character, who doesn't know orcish, might see the say as "Frrzag Wgold!".
Some real languages have been developed for certain races but their purpose
is only to provide words for some concepts and place names since we
unfortunately cannot rely on players to learn new languages.
- Very good battle system. Things such as hitlocs, exhaustion, stuns,
different combat styles, ranged combat (missile weapons and throwing weapons)
etc are all supported fully. The battle system is rather realistic: getting
into a swordfight is likely to get you either killed, crippled or otherwise
severely hurt and assaulting a greater demon will get you killed, chopped to
pieces and trampled into a bloody pulp within 2 seconds.
- All "guilds" are binded to cities and some other manifestations of
culture. There are no "guilds" whose only purpose is to train players.
- Learning things takes time and patience, you can't learn skills by just
stepping in a guild and typing "train ". The actual skill is always
developed by using the skill (with a few exceptions). Players can also teach
skills to each other but being taught only improves your theory in a skill,
never your practice (which is the part of the skill you use). Learning theory
improves your chances in learning practice and vice versa.
- No experience. There are no universal experience points. You can't become
a good farmer by killing monsters. The characters' abilities are measured in
their skills mostly. This also means there is no reincarnation, ie. you
cannot just get a reinc and re-assign all your fighter experience into mage
skills. The only way to become a good mage is by casting spells and the only
way to become a good fighter is by fighting.
- No levels. It is foolish to think that all living things can share some
sort of universal power-standard. A master magician cannot be compared in
power with a master martial artist since they use different types of skills and
manifest their powers differently.
- Multiplaying. It is allowed to have more than one character, however
playing multiple characters at the same time is NOT allowed (even though
denying that is probably needless since there is no sensible way of playing
several characters at the same time). This feature exists because of
variety, players can play different types of characters depending on their
mood etc.
- Very good skill system. Skills are arranged in a skill tree. They are
dependant on each other, for example evolving in "1-handed swords" will also
improve your prowess in "2-handed swords".
- Real economy (money circulates). The players can own shops, farm and
things like that. The point here is that the money really circulates, no code
will create money or remove money artificially.
- Gods are really the coders of the game and they roleplay just as much (if
not more) than the players. They can interfere, in their divine role, in just
about everything. They form their own churches (these are much like "guilds")
and rival among each other in power and in numbers of mortal worshippers.
- Divine point system for the gods. The gods gain divine points from mortals
who worship them and they must use their divine points in case they want to
interact with the mortals.
- There is no "main" city, there are many cities, villages, etc.
- No channels, no tells, only says, whispers and shouts.
- Uniform worldmap. Everything is portrayed on the same 1m x 1m scale, there
is no difference between "wilderness" and "area", it's all the same.
- Several types of magic. You can be anything from a necromancer to an
elementalist. The spells aren't used with a simple "cast" -command, some
spell systems might require chanting of words while others may require the use
of special ingredients.
- An event driven AI (Artificial Intelligence) for NPCs. NPCs receive
events and then do something. For example, a guard can receive a "help needed"
event from an innkeeper whose under attack which causes the guard to arrive and
whack the assaulter. Races will also have morale modifiers and things like
that, allowing them to behave differently depending on whether they are poor or
rich, weak or strong etc.
- Offline players. When the player quits the "game", he doesn't just
disappear but remains in the game as an AI-driven NPC. Thus, quitting the game
is not a way of escaping dangerous situations. The players should quit only in
some safe location such as an inn or their own home, otherwise there is a
chance of getting killed.
- Players run the game. If there is a player who should be removed for
inappropriate behavior, the players can handle the problem by collecting a mob
and killing the player together, the coders will not interfere. The players
don't have rules, they will make their own rules if necessary.
- Strict theme, there will be no areas such as "moomin valley" or "smurf
village". All areas will be unique Majik areas created exclusively for Majik
and not copied from anything. To be more precise, there will be no separate
"areas", all will be cities, villages, caves etc., not some "newbie zoo"-areas
full of exp-monsters.
- You don't play Majik, you live there!
Tommi Leino
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