dragfyre @dragfyre@mastodon.sandwich.net

#Introduction time! Let's call it dragfyre 101.

I'm a (front-end) web dev, educator, blogger, dad, husband, Baha'i, and world citizen. I have deep thoughts about human nature and character, virtue #ethics, cooperation, #culture, #spirituality, #language, #education & #learning, #UX, #AI, #HCI, #Internet, and the interaction of all of the above. Google me and you'll find me on Twitter, Reddit, Youtube, Wikipedia, etc. I try to do the right thing. No politics or drama plz, and keep it SFW kthx.

So, I've posted an #introduction about myself, but maybe it's time for one for my #bots.

- @xyzzy: Interactive text adventure that posts random scenarios hourly.
- @lol: Mashes up toots from the public timeline at #MastodonSandwich.
- @videodreams: Dreamy gifs made from 100% free online content.
- @laughingman: Tracks the Laughing Man's rampage through old public domain videos.
- @bahai: Regular quotes from the Bahá'í sacred writings.
- @bahai: The latest from various Bahá'í news feeds.

How's #mastomonday gone for everyone? (Are we still doing that?)

For example, imagine you enter a room with an NPC. Then you type:

attack npc

Then let's say that your attack kills the NPC. Since @xyzzy has no memory of what you just did, you could type:

talk to npc

And the NPC would reply to you as if it was alive. This kills the immersion in the story, because you know that the NPC shouldn't be able to do that, but @xyzzy lets you do it anyway.

So, how can you code up an interesting fight mechanic within this system of static, unchanging scenarios?

The main challenge here isn't a programming one, but a storytelling one. I want to avoid a situation that leads to a major change of state: specifically, killing an NPC changes its state from living to dead.

For simplicity's sake, @xyzzy never keeps track of state, and has no memory of anything you've said before. If you're allowed to significantly change the scenario, this could destroy the user's immersion in the story by allowing actions that are impossible in the current state. #hci

wondering how to implement an "attack" command into @xyzzy, as most people familiar with text adventure games would probably expect to have one.

I mean, what are you going to do with a random, unremarkable life form that's minding its own business besides attack it? 🤷

Who put this spaghetti in my code?

Oh, right, it's me. #webdev #coding #cs

So, @xyzzy has a semi-permanent place to stay and rack up some uptime now. Yay! 🎉 Enjoy your text adventures, everyone, and don't get eaten by a grue. #bots #games #retrogaming #mastodon #fediverse

Perusing #mastomonday on m.s just shows me how disconnected I really am from the rest of #Mastodon. 😅

That's what I call intentional culture.

Speaking of which, is there anyone on Mastodon from #Kiribati? International date line represent 🇰🇮 #mastomonday #futuretuesday

Wait, is #mastomonday actually a thing now?

What if it's Tuesday here? 🤔

Quoth @lol: "If you're going to make a pink dragon, duck, then it's probably not scrooge mcduck because scrooge mcduck [...] is strongly anthropomorphized."