yeah that would be nice like the old donation museum, don't have to keep a list then

As soon as I get some time I'm planning to write (expand actually) on the story behind the creation of Mith Mail of the Frost (from Longir's B-day raid)- I have some thought sin my head just need to write them down (I'll post to creative writing forum when I do).
Zrubavel

So, I decided I would give this thing a go on my local server.  From the above comments I came up with 3 main requirements:

+  No input required from DMs when a new raid item or special drop is created
+  Minimal input required from map wizards when building the museum maps
+  Minimal input required from VOLs

From this, I came up with the basic template for how a script based museum could work:

+  Player visits museum
+  Player marks item in inventory to be submitted to the museum
+  Player talks to museum curator
+  Curator gets marked item and checks it against list of exhibits to see if it is a new item
+  Assuming it is new, item gets added to list of exhibits and a no-pick copy is created in the museum
+  Player is then offered the chance to type in a brief description - which will be displayed on a sign located next to the exhibit
+  All players can then walk over the new exhibit and examine it, but cannot pick it up.

I then added the following enhancements:

+  There is no way to conveniently identify "special" items verses standard drop or shop items
+  So, a player could submit a plain wooden arrow to the museum and the museum curator would put it on display
+  A VOL/DM/GM would visit the museum and inspect all the exhibits (I would be happy to do this of course )
+  If the VOL found an exhibit that was not worth displaying, such as the plain wooden arrow, the VOL would talk to the museum curator and set that exhibit to not be displayed

From the map wizard's point of view, I wanted the museum maps to:

+  Be easily extendable, so if another room was required to be added to the museum, this could be done with no LUA scripting changes, and only minor "configuration" of the room
+  Easily allow different rooms in the museum to contain certain types of exhibit (e.g. the Ring Room, etc.)
+  Allow more than one museum to be created (e.g. Stoneglow Museum of Armour and Weapons, Iluma Museum of Magical Artifacts)
+  Cope with alterations to indiviual rooms without worrying about what exhibits might already be displayed in that room

Other general points:

+  Any player should be able to edit the sign for an exhibit
+  VOL/DM/GM should be able to review the list of "un-displayed" exhibits and select one to re-display


-----------


So, after a bit of work I came up with a working set of prototype scripts to see if the whole thing was possible.  I haven't implemented the proper GUI NPC interface yet and some of the other things need work on, but so far I have a set of scripts that handle the basic "submit exhibit, display in room" and "re-display all exhibits when map is reloaded into memory".  It works quite well!

Before I continue - any comments, esp. from the DEV team / LUA scripting experts?

Not a dev and not an expert, just wanted to tell u that it sounds great and especially i like the idea of different museums in different towns - most of course i'd like a ring room for ... okay, i guess u'll figure out. if not, read my signature :mrgreen:

Cya

Okay, while I think this is fundamentally a good idea, it may fall under category of "Spoilers" because I think one of the game's strengths is
the randomness and surprise of items dropping.  Even though the original idea was to use special drops from obsolete versions, the natural
thought progression would probably make people want to see all of the current special items available as well.  But frankly, I don't want to know.
I would rather bide my time and hope that through some miracle of statistics, and good choice of hunting grounds, I get something nice to drop.
That's half the fun of the game. (in my humble opinion)

That is a good point gnub ... maybe the answer is that when a new special drop is added, a DEV team member would need to add it to the museum straight away, and then just as quickly "suppress" it.  That way, you won't see it ...

Good point though, and I definitely don't want to put a lot more effort into this if the Daimonin community decides it isn't wanted ...

EDIT: Now I've slept on it, I'm going to change my answer to gnub somewhat.

(1)  If you don't want to spoil the surprise, then don't visit the museum!  We already have the situation today where people will (sometimes) /shout the details of a special drop or raid item if you ask them to (and sometimes if you don't ).

(2)  I think I might change the "sign" functionality.  I originally intended for the player to be able to type in a couple of lines of text to say something about the item (where it was found, etc.), but:

(a)  The NPC GUI isn't really suited as a text editor, so the whole interface would be a bit clumsy.

(b)  This really would give away all the surprises!

(c)  It means a whole lot of additional coding

(d)  Potential for abuse by players who could change signs to show inappropriate text.

I think I am going to pull back on the details displayed on the sign.  I will just put exhibit number, exhibit name, possibly the date/time it was submitted to the musuem and the name of the player that submitted it.

As this is all generated by the script, then there is no user interface required (much easier for me!)

I think "name of player" is important - it adds an extra dimension to the museum, i.e. bragging rights - which player found the latest drop first?

One thing I like about the museum idea is that it adds something new to the game, unlike anything we have today.  It will allow players to get their name "onto the map".

Anyway, just my 2c worth

Let me know what you think!

I think u slept very well :mrgreen: as u say, noone has to visit the museum and evryone who wants to know any stats can find them there - will prolly save lots of typing in auctions and sales ... I agree also in going without NPC-player interaction regarding the information on the sign.

ur 2c are worth quite a bit, i think (at least...2c )

My thoughts/suggestions:

1. Add name of player and item story to the signs, and only allow items with a story to be displayed, (which would exclude all of the "moment raid" items, but not "official this is a planned 'raid'" items), which also means Vols, and GMs/DMs would not need to be involved

2. I would be concerned about parts of the museum not being loaded when it calls to place an item in that part of the museum

3. I would like to see this in the game and would fully support it

4. Spoilers are always there when your looking for them, this just makes it easier to find them, thus doesn't enable people who like spoilers, but rather, de-clutters Shout with spam about the stats of "such-such item", ecause the player can always "go look in the museum".

5. Vols, DMs, GMs should have to power to add items of special importance that do not have a story, and instead of using their name, should be able to do so with the name of the raid above it instead of a real player name (or whatever player name they want to add to it)

Just my thoughts

Sorry, planes, but i disagree: these are for me some of the most interesting items, cause they are egoed very often and/or players keep to themselves. when sxs made her list in a thread some days ago cause she left lots of her special items in server restart after hallo-raid, I saw names of items, i never heared of - but I'd like to know that there are funny things like portable wholes, arrows +4 (lucky me - the only raid item i got ...) etc. pp. - I think, that is the use of a museum: look at things u won't find in rl/game or if so only by fortune or by buying for a huge amount of gold/mith

Nobbit

Edit: lol, don't want to set a new post to this, but planes: I read thought No 5, but I don't see a need to leave it up to this persons to put it in or out. I think, every raid item or special item (besides special presents given to one player that is of absolutely "no use" like a congratulations letter and this kinda stuff) should be in there, so i just suggested to take out this part of ur first thought, that is already thought, though - whatever, it's only my opinion and if there is no1 else joining this discussion we might get this straight in a pvp - mwuahaha :mrgreen:

Which is why i posted thought number 5, giving the Vol/GM/DM the ability to add these items to the museum.  If they are starting a raid, they might want to make a template item or two to know what they will be giving away right?  Why not make them in the museum?  Just a thought.

Interesting thoughts guys!

Some replies from me ...

@TPK thought (2) - Don't worry, that's all handled (hence my recent posts about ReadyMap() in the scripting forum ).  My testing included adding items to the museum when map rooms were/were not loaded, and it all worked perfectly well.

Item stories - now why didn't I think of that?  Seems like the obvious way to sort out interesting items from rubbish ...

But, I agree with Nobbit as well - there will be many items that really *should* be added to the museum but that don't have stories.  So it seems that we can't get away from having DM/GM/VOL involvement one way or other.  The question is which way is most efficient?

I would tend to think that it would be better to have VOLs add items specially to the museum, rather than have to "suppress" them so they are not displayed.  This would also be better from a code point of view (don't have to store and search through a huge list of rubbish).

So, if a player has an interesting item but with no story, they ask a VOL to add it to the museum for them.  They give it to the VOL, who puts it into the museum and manually sets the contributor name.  VOL then gives the item back to the player.

Obviously, ego'd items cause a problem here ... do DMs or GMs have the power to pick up such items, or is there another way round this?  Need ideas ...

One additional point, which ever way we go, when comparing new items with items already in the museum, I wasn't planning on comparing qua/con or things like cursed/dammed/properties.  The museum also wouldn't accept any un-id'd items.  Any ego'd items given to the museum would be stored as un-ego'd.

I don't know whether DMs/GMs can pick up ego'd items.  I would imagine they could, or if not, they could use 1337 DM/GM powers to "place" it into their inventory, and when they are done with it, to "place" it back on the round.  I thought i remembered that, but i would have to verify.  Maybe Smacky, or Longir could inform us?

Update!  The Museum of Ancient Treasures is now online!  You can get to the Museum by going into the main part of Stonehaven Castle and go into the library (which is down the main entrance corridor, take first corridor on your right, then first door on the left).

You can only add items with a story (and you don't loose your item when you add it)!  Hopefully, I'll get a new item added to the Home page soon.

Arrrghhh, sooo many unique (okay, nealry unique items) to learn about and i can't get on ... This is really mean, Torch 

But otherwise: Very nice and great job!!!

<----- REALLY likes the idea of a raid item museum!!!!!
Maybe if I get the chance I can work on a map for a museum ^^