To Any MMORPG Game Developers, Past or Present

Amathe

I am not myself a game developer, nor am I in any field like that.

But I have always thought it would be exciting to design and build a game that reflects my own personal vision of what a fantasy world might look like. And then I got to thinking, other than the players (whose behaviors are all over the place), does your own world that you created or help create ever surprise you? Do all the various good, bad and neutral computer NPCs and mobs ever end up doing things that were unexpected?

And I don't mean bugs. 

Cryomatrix

I'm not a designer, but I assume the NPC's would rebel just like in Westworld and take over the world. That would be hilarious if someone programmed that into a fantasy world. 

iixviiiix

Yes , once i toy with world editor and create a unit with charm , but i forgot to spell immune it and it get charmed , then the PC use it charm back at me and whole units get charmed and i like WTF , but it's fun lol .

ChildoftheShadows

Richard Garriott talks about an interesting one here

https://youtu.be/KFNxJVTJleE

TheDarkrayne

You mean ghosts in the machine.. the I, Robot version/definition. It's definitely a thing but I'd assume that most people consider them bugs, not surprise A.I., so they get 'fixed'. I've seen things happen like certain mobs always finding each other and then staying with each other. Then, they try to fix it, but they somehow find each other again.

Westworld is kind of built around this whole concept.

Amaranthar

ChildoftheShadows said:

Richard Garriott talks about an interesting one here

https://youtu.be/KFNxJVTJleE

Richard's not 100% correct in that there were a very few who knew about the plants being "mowed" and all that related spawning stuff.
One of the problems with that was that players were building up their skills by killing all those critters.
Also, they never ran away until they were mortally wounded and then it was at a very slow limp-speed.
Rabbits fought back!

One of the strangest things that happened in UO was "Super Chicken."
Animals built up skills too. But they usually died so it wasn't a problem. Then in a wildly unexpected turn of events, one chicken somehow ended up surviving many attacks to the point that it could kill newbs, and then more advanced characters, and eventually even the top end players.
The GM's had to put together a player event to hunt Super Chicken down and take it out of the game.
Then they had to add limits to how much advancement animals could do.

(I'm not a game developer, and I didn't work on UO.)

Amaranthar

UO, being the first truly massive game, and being such a great concept full of fantastic ideas, experienced a lot of unexpected things. (And still the best game ever, in my opinion.)

I hope someone who worked on it will add some comments here. I can think of several "surprises" that were funny for the rest of us, but I probably should give those developers/GM's a chance to speak first. If they are here.
I'll wait a day or two and if they don't, I'll share.

Limnic

Amaranthar said:

ChildoftheShadows said:

Richard Garriott talks about an interesting one here

https://youtu.be/KFNxJVTJleE

Richard's not 100% correct in that there were a very few who knew about the plants being "mowed" and all that related spawning stuff.
One of the problems with that was that players were building up their skills by killing all those critters.
Also, they never ran away until they were mortally wounded and then it was at a very slow limp-speed.
Rabbits fought back!

One of the strangest things that happened in UO was "Super Chicken."
Animals built up skills too. But they usually died so it wasn't a problem. Then in a wildly unexpected turn of events, one chicken somehow ended up surviving many attacks to the point that it could kill newbs, and then more advanced characters, and eventually even the top end players.
The GM's had to put together a player event to hunt Super Chicken down and take it out of the game.
Then they had to add limits to how much advancement animals could do.

(I'm not a game developer, and I didn't work on UO.)

Asheron's Call also had that mechanic with mobs. Some players took to intentionally grooming a mob to be really powerful, then dragging it through high pop areas, or otherwise specifically training up the banderlings in newbie areas. It's wasn't an exceptionally common activity, but some people certainly made it a hobby.

Amaranthar

Limnic said:

Amaranthar said:

ChildoftheShadows said:

Richard Garriott talks about an interesting one here

https://youtu.be/KFNxJVTJleE

Richard's not 100% correct in that there were a very few who knew about the plants being "mowed" and all that related spawning stuff.
One of the problems with that was that players were building up their skills by killing all those critters.
Also, they never ran away until they were mortally wounded and then it was at a very slow limp-speed.
Rabbits fought back!

One of the strangest things that happened in UO was "Super Chicken."
Animals built up skills too. But they usually died so it wasn't a problem. Then in a wildly unexpected turn of events, one chicken somehow ended up surviving many attacks to the point that it could kill newbs, and then more advanced characters, and eventually even the top end players.
The GM's had to put together a player event to hunt Super Chicken down and take it out of the game.
Then they had to add limits to how much advancement animals could do.

(I'm not a game developer, and I didn't work on UO.)

Asheron's Call also had that mechanic with mobs. Some players took to intentionally grooming a mob to be really powerful, then dragging it through high pop areas, or otherwise specifically training up the banderlings in newbie areas. It's wasn't an exceptionally common activity, but some people certainly made it a hobby.

Yeah, UO had a Gate Spell, and players would draw Demons through them to banks in cities, and all hell would break loose.

Amaranthar

DMKano said:

Amathe said:

I am not myself a game developer, nor am I in any field like that.

But I have always thought it would be exciting to design and build a game that reflects my own personal vision of what a fantasy world might look like. And then I got to thinking, other than the players (whose behaviors are all over the place), does your own world that you created or help create ever surprise you? Do all the various good, bad and neutral computer NPCs and mobs ever end up doing things that were unexpected?

And I don't mean bugs. 

Heroes of Telara (a very very early predecessor to Rift) had an unforeseen mob behavior that actually was how the entire Rift system came to be.

It started as mobs that were supposed to peacefully coexist near the beach started fighting - the devs noticed that as more would spawn the fight was growing in size.

This is how the idea of rifts spawning 1000s of critters that would roam the zones and fight each other came to be as Rift Invasions years later when Rift was developed. 

This story was told to me directly from ex-Rift developers 

What was the mechanic that started the MOBs fighting?

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Scolioz

I was a developer on a mmorpg title a very long time ago.. 

and the answer is..  No.