Subject: Timing in Combat Systems

From: David Bofinger <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 28 Apr 1993 19:30:40 -0700

LambdaRPG's method of handling netlag is to keep track of how many action
points each creature in the battle has used. Creatures get separated into
two classes, call them proactive (things that do things of their own
initiative, e.g. players and some of the smarter monsters) and reactive
(things that only react when invited to by the system, e.g. the generic
monster). The idea is to not let anyone who is proactive get too far ahead
of anyone else, e.g. if I type in five-hundred attack commands against
Fubar, who is logged in from the New Zealand Antarctic Territory on an 8
baud modem and can't possibly say in time what he's going to do, the system
has to do something for him, based preferably on what he has previously set
as his standard action in that case, but otherwise on some default, like
"hit him back". Which costs Fubar action points, dragging him back to the
pack. If a reactive creature gets ahead you don't care, because reactive
creatures can be trusted not to act if they haven't fallen behind. And it's
important they don't, otherwise infinite loops become much more probable.

The effect of this is that game time (action points) is completely
emancipated from real time. So players with bad netlag can still compete
effectively, but there may be a price in suspension of disbelief. If you
don't think this is a good thing there are various compromises one can
make, e.g. a continuous trickle of action points to everyone, but this
requires you to choose a time scale for your combat, and any player whose
netlag isn't short compared with it will be in deep trouble, while any
player whose netlag _is_ short compared with it will get bored. LambdaRPG
was effectively a compromise because of the existence of proactive monsters
on heartbeats, like Prowler.

This is, IMAO, one of the (few?) things I actually got _right_ on
LambdaRPG, and would recommend to others.

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David Bofinger	AARNet:	[email-masked]
                Snail:	Dept. of Theoretical Physics, RSPhysSE, ANU, ACT, 2601
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"We stare at [the extraterrestrials] through the fence, and they stare at us,
and the only question is: who's throwing the peanuts?" -`Sundiver', David Brin