Test to see if it does give that message, and bug it if it does, I guess?

Yeah. At work so I am giving an immediate reaction without the research. This is a 12-hour workday, so I won't get home for a while.

USually for things like this, they have in fact given thought to abilities that give masked/shrouded afflictions. If they missed one, they seem able and willing to code in exceptions where appropriate for skills.

o Affmessages will now pop up when you receive a hidden or masked
affliction.

Wha....? What's the point of them being masked then?

If it's simply unknown, that's one thing. If it's masked, that's entirely another. So long as only unmasked afflictions are reported, we're good.

I think the only thing that ever needs to be changed are things like the following (which are a pain to deal with as a system coder):

"You must writhe free before you may do that." -->Can be truss, entangle, ropes or shackles. Since all these affs already have standard symptom lines, why not just use those instead?

"You are impaled and must writhe off before you may do that."
"You are impaled, which makes movement impossible."
--> Similar to above. Crucify, gore, impale, pinleg all do the same but they also have their own symptom messages? Why be ambiguous here?

They can be dealt with, but those are some examples where it feels to be ambiguous for no purpose at all.


Things like knight messages are not that bad to guess at though, and the only reason you should ever have trouble is blackout (in which case, you can wound status like you would diagnose for another class).

Oh, another point a forgot about.

Whoever said it's ridiculous to find the lines, you need them anyway. Else you're system is prone to some very awesome lulz:

Someone illusions:

"You are now afflicted with sliced tendon.
You are now afflicted with slickness.
You are now afflicted with slitthroat."


^That would trigger a green/gedulah cure. Not good at all.

Now why those affs shouldn't have aff messages associated with them:

- There's a limit to how many lines people can illusion.
- Power costs for more lines too.
- If lines also give standard aff messages, systems can check for the RP line and the standardized line, and ignore it if both don't show up.
- Thus...illusions are really OP for those that are too lazy go get all the lines and dead for those that do.

Yup. Munsia likes to brag about that.

Oh, another point a forgot about.

Whoever said it's ridiculous to find the lines, you need them anyway. Else you're system is prone to some very awesome lulz:

Someone illussions:

"You are now afflicted with sliced tendon.
You are now afflicted with slickness.
You are now afflicted with slitthroat."


^That would trigger a green/gedulah cure. Not good at all.

Now why those affs shouldn't have aff messages associated with them:

- There's a limit to how many lines people can illusion.
- Power costs for more lines too.
- If lines also give standard aff messages, systems can check for the RP line and the standardized line, and ignore it if both don't show up.
- Thus...illusions are really OP for those that are too lazy go get all the lines and dead for those that do.

While that is certainly true, having aff-messages allows you to go into combat far quicker no matter what. Will you die? Most likely. But you'll also learn what lines give what afflictions, and that information is, as you already pointed out, extremely important. Without aff-messages, the best you could make would be educated guesses and long questions over channels and hope everyone there anchored their triggers properly.

Are aff-messages perfect? Of course not. Do they have inherent flaws? Sure! Do they have a purpose? Heck yes.

Zarquan:

If it's simply unknown, that's one thing. If it's masked, that's entirely another. So long as only unmasked afflictions are reported, we're good.

Okay, let's set terms straight:

Masked - You are aware you have been hit, but what aff you were hit with is unclear. You saw it but couldn't identify it because it was wearing a 'mask'. For instance, druidry squirrels. You see that you are hit by squirrels, but you could have been affed with blindness, amnesia, or nothing (bleeding).

Shrouded- That aff was straight up invisible. You have no idea you were even hit by an aff. This can be in the form of things like dreamweaving void where you simply get no message or the aforementioned nekotai mod, where you get the normal attack message but not one saying that you've been hit by any poison. That poison aff wasn't just masked, you had no idea that a poison was even involved. Shrouded, as in: "You don't have thirdeye up, so you can't even see this, because it's shrouded."

Ssaliss:

While that is certainly true, having aff-messages allows you to go into combat far quicker no matter what. Will you die? Most likely. But you'll also learn what lines give what afflictions, and that information is, as you already pointed out, extremely important. Without aff-messages, the best you could make would be educated guesses and long questions over channels and hope everyone there anchored their triggers properly.

Are aff-messages perfect? Of course not. Do they have inherent flaws? Sure! Do they have a purpose? Heck yes.

Standardized aff messages aren't inherently flawed at all. They're flawed in how they related to the game design. They have pay off, undoubtedly, but I think it's far easier to compile a list of triggers, pre-regexed for different clients, and make it publicly available than it is to redesign and code out all the classes that rely illusions. Aff-messages and the game-design are incompatible for this reason.

What classes "rely" on illusions? Certainly not most mages, in my experience, and playing as both a Glamours and Tarot bard, I found my illusions were helpful to an extent, but by no means vital.

Heh. I agree that using aff messages alone is not something you want for serious competitive combat. But it's definitely an excellent learning tool and I might be wrong here, but I think Ssaliss wanted it mostly to benefit beginners.

That said, there's nothing wrong with collecting triggers and then enabling aff lines when you get hit to confirm what you got. Infact, if you go with this method, you might even give yourself a little more resistance to illusions than if you didn't use them at all.

Rivius:

Heh. I agree that using aff messages alone is not something you want for serious competitive combat. But it's definitely an excellent learning tool and I might be wrong here, but I think Ssaliss wanted it mostly to benefit beginners.

That said, there's nothing wrong with collecting triggers and then enabling aff lines when you get hit to confirm what you got. Infact, if you go with this method, you might even give yourself a little more resistance to illusions than if you didn't use them at all.

That's my point. Illusions are nerfed because of aff messages.

What classes "rely" on illusions? Certainly not most mages, in my experience, and playing as both a Glamours and Tarot bard, I found my illusions were helpful to an extent, but by no means vital.

Illusions play a big part in combat. Group combat especially, and saying that they aren't needed or relied on is gravely underestimating them. A programmed illusion that sets off a wisp line....that's dangerous. If it's fake, you're okay. But if not...well, you're in for a ride. The value of such a line is that it puts a doubt in the opponent's mind. One false negative = a world of hurt, while false positives hurt too. If you're falsely curing a greenlock, you're out 3p, but if you miss one, that's probably going to kill you. If you diag, that's a hinder.

This game would greatly change if illusions suddenly became nonexistent or 100% detectable, and I think it's one of those things that's hard to quantify the extent of. They serve as a means to slip timed instas in, break groups up, hinder curing, create bad situations for others, etc, etc.

This exact conversation came up in envoys back when I was still one, and there was a good amount of talk. The conclusion, if I remember correctly, was that aff-messages were never meant to be added in such a way that it would affect the usefulness of illusions.

Actually, I think the newbies were what they had in mind when they created the aff-messages. I've just kept that thought when thinking of more things to help newbies in combat (and by newbies I don't always mean level-wise; I would consider myself a newbie when it comes to combat, for instance).

Ssaliss:

Actually, I think the newbies were what they had in mind when they created the aff-messages. I've just kept that thought when thinking of more things to help newbies in combat (and by newbies I don't always mean level-wise; I would consider myself a newbie when it comes to combat, for instance).

Right, and that doesn't contradict what I said. I'm for helping newbies too, but let's do it in a way that has measurable effects on game balance or none at all. A good analogy would be cutting off your main hand. It's certainly not vital to your survival, but start trying to imagine all the different ways it would affect your life. There are plenty of immediate examples, some worse than others, but it's nigh impossible to understand the exact consequences of such an action. You'd have to play this game one-handedly.

I'll concede the point that they probably do affect illusions more than they should. Though you could argue that if nothing changes, they're already able to do quite a lot in their current incarnation.

That said, I personally believe illusions can be overwhelming at times, especially the greenlock ones. I recall one log I read where the caster convincingly made someone believe they were locked without even having to use power. You could technically anti-illusion it. You can anti-illusion anything. But some things are awkward to anti-illusion and cause deficits in your curing elsewhere. I don't think that's ever been looked into or is ever really taken into consideration when adding new lines or classes.

Edit: Also, the wisp illusion mentioned would not be affected by aff messages. Nor would anything that merely has a psychological effect.

Rivius:

I'll concede the point that they probably do affect illusions more than they should. Though you could argue that if nothing changes, they're already able to do quite a lot in their current incarnation.

That said, I personally believe illusions can be overwhelming at times, especially the greenlock ones. I recall one log I read where the caster convincingly made someone believe they were locked without even having to use power. You could technically anti-illusion it. You can anti-illusion anything. But some things are awkward to anti-illusion and cause deficits in your curing elsewhere. I don't think that's ever been looked into or is ever really taken into consideration when adding new lines or classes.

Edit: Also, the wisp illusion mentioned would not be affected by aff messages. Nor would anything that merely has a psychological effect.

If someone can use illusions to make someone think they're locked, without using power, that's a major problem with their system. The only way I can get people to blow power thinking they're locked is by using power on programmed illusions.

You could argue that it is a system problem, but a pardonable one. Without aff messages, you'd blatantly have to ignore a line which causes problems elsewhere. You couldn't do it as a telepath, but you can as a telekinesis user.

But, going back to what I said, I'd only worry for telepaths or runists if illusions were too easily detectable with aff messages - but they already are.

Rivius:

You could argue that it is a system problem, but a pardonable one. Without aff messages, you'd blatantly have to ignore a line which causes problems elsewhere. You couldn't do it as a telepath, but you can as a telekinesis user.

But, going back to what I said, I'd only worry for telepaths or runists if illusions were too easily detectable with aff messages - but they already are.

I worry not only about telepaths, but guardians, monks, bards, knights, etc. Sure, they don't have access to those skills, but they help me in group combat. Affs or not.

Did Ixion just hit you or was that an illusion? That affects both Ixion and whoever used the illusion.

I'd love to make combat easier, but let's not hurt it in the process. The fix to illusions would take far longer to happen and balance than it would be to make it easier on newcomers via standard affs.