Giving items

Die Jack'O die

One of the problems all RPGs suffer from is begging. Inevitably some player walks in to town and starts begging for things. It sometimes starts small, a few batwings, and turns into a "give warlord armor!!!" demand. Sometimes it turns abusive with the player slandering another player for not giving up items.

The solution to this problem came to me when I wasn't sitting on my can in town. High level players tend to sit in town quite a bit. Having done most of the quests, just boredom, or whatever reason, they just sit.

The solution is to get out of town and play again. How does this solve people begging in town? Well, it's actually not about not being in town, it's more about what the player themselves is doing. People come to town to beg, because they think it's a spot they can find lots of people, and someone will give them items. Out of town people might beg too, but at least out of town players have to play the game. Take for example the mountain snake pits. If you're down in the mountain snake pits you're probably capable of being there. I met a player who was very slowly killing snakes (archery) and they happened to need 3 Mountain Snake eggs. I had about 17 from killing mountain snakes in just that session, it was nothing to help the player out. I also noticed they didn't have decent gloves. The mountain snakes had dropped 2 pairs of leather gloves, so I gave up one. The point here is that the player was actually playing (they didn't ask, I asked them). I felt good because I knew this player actually plays the game, and I'm sure they felt good because it was another item down in what they needed.

So get out of town and move around. (Get up and boogie!)