I have never been killed by a moulis, so I don't know if they lay their eggs immediately after you die. But if there is a round or two delay, then I have a totally OOC and OOG suggestion: log off immediately after being killed and avoid the egg laying. Log back in a few minutes later after the moulis has despawned. Yes, it's trying to avoid game mechanics, but unlike slamming when stunned, this is justifiable, IMO.

My rationale is as follows: I agree that decaying (or being raised by a cleric) should rid the corpse of the verminous ova. I mean, if your body turned to dust, presumably the eggs are now lying in the dirt where you decayed. And if raised by a cleric, make it so that he/she could cast cure disease on the corpse first; let that rid the deceased of eggs. Sounds like a serious design flaw to me.


"So, what does that green line on the graph represent?"

"Oh, that's the projection of a hypothetical offspring from a union between Sauron and Cruella de Ville; we use that as a baseline for determining character alignment."

Might I suggest chronomaging to the landing if that happens again, to at least make the most of it?

:D

-Keleborrn.

Skayl hearts will also last long enough to kill you a second time. That being said, both need to be changed.


AIM: GS4Menos

>Here lies the formless world we´re living in
>Gravity is finally giving in
>High altitudes and still upward we go
>I was never meant to lead but to follow

It must change because a decay is a new body. No good reason you should carry along an egg and not a missing limb or blown nerves. Or so I feel.


AIM: GS4Menos

>Here lies the formless world we´re living in
>Gravity is finally giving in
>High altitudes and still upward we go
>I was never meant to lead but to follow

A good use for Paladin Purify.

<<It must change because a decay is a new body. No good reason you should carry along an egg and not a missing limb or blown nerves. Or so I feel.>>

Agreed, 100%.

I waited it out. I hate departing. And It was in prime too.

<<However, if a player specifically chooses to decay early, I'm not convinced that effects like a moulis spawn or a skayl heart should also terminate instantly. Your gear comes along. Your tattoos come along. Your scars come along. It is hardly a brand new pristine body, though I agree it was probably intended as such in the original design, where gear stayed behind upon decay. In the current implementation, however, even that missing limb comes along -- or perhaps doesn't come along -- if it was a scar and not a wound.

A small facet to this, but I'm pretty sure moulis are MUCH newer creatures than the original death mechanics. And since they are newer, it sounds like something that is probably intended that the moulis babies stay attached to the body.


-Adam

---

"You guys took all the pretty places." ~Anonymous

You don't arrive naked, you carry lots of stuff with you on decay.
You don't lose your 10x DB pin of awesomeness.
You don't lose your shade skink.
You don't lose your tattoos.
You don't lose scripted diseases.

and you don't lose moulis eggs.

Its not an injury, its something you carry, and you don't lose stuff that you carry, whether its stuff you like or stuff that you would prefer to be rid of.

It would be really annoying if every critter did this, but one critter doing it makes for a more interesting game.

Death also removes creature caused disease (including the special sort from apes near Illistim) and poison (wasp and dart forms as well I think), those would seem to be very similar in concept to the egg. Even if it was consistent, no creature should get to kill you twice in one fight.


AIM: GS4Menos

>Here lies the formless world we´re living in
>Gravity is finally giving in
>High altitudes and still upward we go
>I was never meant to lead but to follow

I'd be happy with some sort of penalty other than dying again, but decaying is fairly harsh already and piling another death on top of that that you have no way to avoid just isn't very fun. The moulis baby thing is pretty rare, but so is getting rescued from down there...

Things that challenge you and kill you when you fail can be fun, but challenge requires the ability to compete, in my opinion.

-Keleborrn.

>The game would be very boring if every critter was just a kobold with a different base level. Critters should do things which are unique to them. The egg is a unique challenge to the moulis. If you can't work out how to deal with it, hunt something else instead.

There are plenty of ways to keep things interesting without stacking multiple deaths on folks for a single event. Menos made it through the tower just dandy, without deaths or eggs to speak of. He is also well old enough to not return there to hunt. My skin in this game is only an interest in changing what I observe from the outside as a non-enjoyable danger. You died, the creature won. No need to add an extra insult on top of the injury.


AIM: GS4Menos

>Here lies the formless world we´re living in
>Gravity is finally giving in
>High altitudes and still upward we go
>I was never meant to lead but to follow

>Critters add all sorts of insults on top of it. They will mutilate your body in all sorts of different gruesome ways, hide it, eat it, spit on in, rob it ...
and lay an egg in it.

Ah, but as you most rightly put it "Death is not the same as decay. The concept is not the same at all."

All of these effects except the egg come to fruition before a decay. A construct does not appear at the altar and hold you in place until someone kills it, ice trolls are not in the temple riding folks about, scouts do not show up and ambush you in town when you decay, injuries from having your arms ripped off are restored with your new body (not sure if constructs give scars or injuries when they take arms, I am pretty sure grims give just the injury that is fixed on a decay).

No doubt there is some other example of some other effect that carries over. In the end that does not matter nearly so much as the fact that the grief effect from multiple deaths goes beyond fun danger into just annoyance for the sake of annoyance. You are quite free to disagree, but I know the GMs sure get mad when I kill someone more than once for a single offense. Lets see some equal treatment for angry plantlife I say.

Even if the egg had effects post decay that were able to be mitigated or healed (like eating some clove for missing arms), it would not bother me nearly so much. Death and decay is enough failure for people who die there.


AIM: GS4Menos

>Here lies the formless world we´re living in
>Gravity is finally giving in
>High altitudes and still upward we go
>I was never meant to lead but to follow

I appreciate the clarification of natural timer decay and of the instance this occurred in.

I can see a few potential ways to handle this.

1) Have the decay function check to see if the decaying character is located in the tower and check further to see if impregnated. If so, 'birth the babies', and leave a non-bleeding or huge scar on the body. This serves the principle of 'waiting out the birthing process', keeps the decay process intact, and limits the nasty double-tap effect to one of healing / herb use. By checking tower location first, you prevent having to scan each death for impregnation where it won't occur.

2) Have the 'birth the babies' timer reset (and perhaps double?) at point of decay. The intent here is to allow minimal recovery and a chance for the individual to get to the right location to 'cure' the infestation. This likely will lead to continued frustration, until the process is 'solved' and communicated -- but may introduce some cooperation, grouping and exploration of in-game lore. Of course, once the solution is known, scripts will be generated, etc -- making this a less attractive overall game solution.

3) Leave things as they are, but change the 'birth the babies' script to a heavy bleeder without instant death. This aligns with the first point above in preventing a double-tap, allows the introduction of scrapings in various towns to the amusement of the population, and still allows the for various multiple avenues of self correction (herbs, healing, in-game lore).

4) Add E's suggestion to the list of in-game mechanisms to fix this (and perhaps other 'infestation' category challenges), after determining appropriate lores / ranks / skills / level, etc. I'd recommend this be done irrespective of other potential solutions. This is less controllable by the character, and will likely result in more double-taps than either of the previous recommendations (unless co-implemented), but does offset the scripting solution and does lend some reinforcement to group correction rather than self-correction.

Each has pros and cons, of course. I would, however, suggest that the existing mechanisms of 'birthing' before decay remain, as they are a strong part of the tower's dangers.

Doug

I like that idea of not dying instantly, but instead getting a big fat stun and a nasty, nasty abdomen wound (please no roundtime though).

Then it'd be a challenge - make sure you have somebody around to unstun you or kill the babies, or figure out a way to help yourself.

That way moulis would keep their mostly unique ability to make a mess out of things after a player has decayed, but it wouldn't be such a frustrating thing.

-Keleborrn.

The tower is a hard place to go drag a body in from. If you set it to 5 minutes, you may end up with everyone just deciding to decay. The idea of any means of addressing the implanted egg sure sounds good to me though. Ditto making it a very bad injury and not just 100% kill.


AIM: GS4Menos

>Here lies the formless world we´re living in
>Gravity is finally giving in
>High altitudes and still upward we go
>I was never meant to lead but to follow