Hera: A Fairer Re-scoring

So I went ahead and tweaked the script to make it just a little more friendly. Low drives now have an even stronger weight in lowering a creatures' score, and there is no longer a penalty against creatures that sit in one place. Creatures now get a much larger point reduction for traveling as well. Additionally, the point gains and losses have been reduced by about 5x, so now a creature's score will slowly climb up and down now instead of jumping dramatically. To make everything fair under the new score system, I then reset everyone at a score of 75, and let them mill around a little.

A lot has been changing. PinkiePie, for one, has skipped the old stage and gone right into ancient, gray fuzzy hair and all. All that time spent at a score of 100 while she was resting did her no favors. Sad thing is, she seems to be resting even more now, and I have to slap her out of it every time. But all it takes is one slap-- then she's up and moving, eating, playing with toys, generally being a good norn until she decides to rest again. Maybe she's just incredibly lazy?

Lilac and Rishi's relationship has been pretty rocky-- I've tabbed over quite a few times to see Lilac beating on a now-adult Rishi. I think it's seriously about time that Rishi struck out on her own, if only for the sake of her own skin. She grew up in a comfortable land of almost infinite food, but there comes a time when every norn must leave that which she knows and make her own way in the world (especially if those around her are acting...violently).

Our delightful trio, Stella, Amina, and Loorea, have managed to travel out to the bridge, and are still huddled together! Norns traveling in groups? That's not something I see often. Sadly, it seems Loorea is doing quite badly, having aged to old already (though gaining a nice shade in the meantime!) and maintaining a pretty high score. Amina is still at the top of the pack, score-wise.

I know at this point I should up the population like I planned, but there's so much else I feel like I want to do first! I'd like to encourage Rishi into some traveling; I'd like to see if I can help Loorea get on the right track again! But I know that if I wait too much longer to open population slots, they're going to open themselves, especially as these creatures continue aging, so, here it goes. Amina is certainly likely to get her genes into this round, too, but if things continue as they are now, we could be seeing some offspring of Lilac!

Hera: Frustration Abounds and Tweaks are Considered

I... I don't know what to do. They've... forgotten how to eat again. Amina seems to have her head together still, but Loorea's trying to eat me again and Stella is trying to eat Amina. What is happening? To make things worse, they're remembering the parts of their re-training that that didn't need to... all that time that I was trying to get them to eat food? I started by telling them to look at the food, and tickling them for that, just to try to get them to pay attention. Now while they mill around whining about hunger, they're suggesting to each other, "maybe look seed" AGH. Maybe there's just something wrong with the plant life here, maybe they're giving off improper stims. Or maybe these creatures are just insane. I'm not sure what to do. Should I retrain them yet again? Maybe try removing the plant life and replace it with something else? Maybe I should just sit back and let nature take its course? As much as I hate to do that, it sounds like the least frustrating option right now.

Ah, at least things are going a little better in the swamplands, where Rishi has become a youth and is at least doing better than are resident would-be cannibals. Her newly-acquired score is hovering between 60 and 70 most of the time, while Lilac's seems to fluctuate pretty dramatically between the 60's and a solid 100. I think I might tweak this script to make the score transitions a little more gradual... I think ideally, the scores should edge up or down more slowly, point by point perhaps, instead of being so dramatic.I also might tweak the curve I have a little bit.

 Currently, the higher a creature's score is, the more weight satisfied drives have in lowering its score. It's basically set up so that a creature with a high score can easily lower it just by taking care of itself, but as it gets lower, low drives will factor less and less into the score until they do almost nothing at all. At that point, the only way for a creature to get a score down to 0 is to do a lot of exploring. But I think the other end of the curve is a little too shallow-- a score of 100 ought to indicate a near-dying creature, but instead it seems to be rather common.

I think before I continue onward, upping the population limit and making the way for some new babies, I'll go ahead and make those tweaks and see how they play out. With any luck, we'll be seeing new life crawling around soon! 

Hera: Retraining of EVERYONE ]:

So after the painful process that was retraining Stella, I found myself having to do the same with Loorea:

Times like these I really wish I had a working brain-in-a-vat so that I  could have a little insight into perhaps -why- exactly, these norns insist on trying to literally eat everything in their range, and even some things that aren't, before they eat anything actually edible. The fact that this extreme level of stubbornness has occurred with both Stella and Loorea, and to some extent, Amina, makes me believe it's not genetic, but learned. Funny thing is, I don't recall encountering anything like this in all of my C3/DS life-- it's very reminiscent of C2, however. Maybe this is supposed to be some sort of hidden "feature" in C2inDS, hah!

Had a bit of a scare with PinkiePie earlier-- I noticed that she was resting for an awfully long time, and for ten minutes or so, didn't move or sleep, but simply rested, with a score of 100, occasionally complaining about hunger or boredom. Finally I gave her a couple smacks-- a scripted method for forcing creatures out of sleep (and so I hoped, rest). She quickly jumped to her feet and began eating and playing with toys again. I was relieved, but I had to wonder what would have happened if she hadn't smacked her. Would she ever have gotten up on her own? Would she have starved? Of greater concern, is this the result of a genetic fault that might be passed on to any offspring? I don't have any qualms with helping out when creatures are suffering, but if creatures are suffering genetically, the last thing I want to do is have them reproduce and create more potential suffering creatures. But maybe I'm thinking too much into this based on one incident; she could have just been really tired!

Since the great re-training, Stella and Loorea have been doing alright on their own! For a while, Amina was stuck to Loorea's hip, following her around everywhere repeating "Approach norn." It was nice to see the girls socializing together, and they seem to be doing pretty well for themselves! I wish they would travel a bit more without my prompting them to push elevators, but oh well.

All this time spent retraining and guiding everyone in the right direction, I tabbed over to realize that Rishi was growing up, and fast! Gladly, she seemed pretty capable of caring for herself, wearing a big smile when I asked her to express. She's still hanging out in the swamps with Lilac, but neither of them are at all shy about using the elevines to climb from branch to branch. I hope they eventually finds the courage to leave the swamp; I think they might make great explorers. It won't be long now before Rishi is of breeding age, and while she won't be doing any breeding in the traditional sense, she'll be old enough to start getting scored. I think at that point, barring any more serious tragedies, I'll go ahead and up the breeding limit to eight, to allow for two more offspring in the world.

I'll admit, this is holding my interest for a lot longer than I expected it to. Maybe it's something about the scoring system that makes it a little more compelling. Funny, considering in all my attempts to make creatures more attachable, something as left-brained as a numerical score never came to mind. But it does make a very good at-a-glance indicator for who is taking care of themselves and who needs a little guidance (that, and these creatures seem to... need an awful lot of guidance). Maybe I'll think of implementing the scoring system as a separate script eventually, maybe with a sort of control panel that lets you control what, exactly, calculates into the score. I dunno, it's something to think about.

Hera: Retraining of a Star

Norns can be STUBBORN.

 So I started out today just spending a little time with Lilac, verbally guiding her through the motions of satisfying her drives, until I was confident she was on the right path. Rishi seemed a little lonely, perhaps seeking company of her own kind. So I tabbed around to try and find the nearest creature, when I noticed Stella and Loorea were both sitting at some pretty high scores. This did not bode well, I decided. Both creatures seem to be starving, and both of them insisted, adamantly, that they were going to eat plant.

Considering the plants weren't satisfying their drives at all, I suggested they eat seed, but they seemed to be perfectly deaf to me. I decided some retraining was in order, beginning with Stella. Breaking my own "hands off" rule, I picked her up and took her to an area with less distractions, placed an acorn before her, and insisted she eat it. The following fight ensues, for the next, I kid you not, fifteen minutes-- trimmed and sped up for your sanity's sake:

Complaining about her hunger for starch all the while, she tries to eat me, door, grendel home, plant, and elevator before it finally occurs to her that this acorn might be delicious. Agh... I... am so tired right now.

Hera: Ups and Downs Continue

Sigh... It really is a joy to see happy creatures--especially when they've given you so much trouble.

PinkiePie and Stella have both had the lowest scores as of late, generally taking great care of themselves, and it even seemed things were looking up for Amina, whom, despite her solid 100, found her way to the other side of the volcano and stared with all hope at the beach before her. I worry for her still, but at least she is getting somewhere.

I turned my attention to Loorea, who seemed rather bored and depressed. Upon encouraging her to push the elevine to go elsewhere, I realized that her large wings and tail were preventing the elevine from properly teleporting her upwards into the narrow elevator shaft. A little position adjustment though, and she was on her way. Eventually she met up with Stella, and the two happily munched some fruits together (Just hoping Stella doesn't get any ideas about munching her...)

Finally, finally the joyous alert appeared-- Lilac was pregnant! It was fitting that she would be chosen to carry the child, as she was still hanging out in the swamps, furthest from the general population. I did design the script to chose the creatures out on their own as the childbearers in some attempt to spread the population out as much as possible. But who were the genetic parents?

As soon as I saw that siamese head pop out of that strangely grendelish egg, I was honestly astonished. Is that a mutation, or...?

 Believe it or not, our newborn, whom I named Ginger, was a cross of Amina and Stella's genetics! I couldn't believe it; I thought something must have gone very wrong with the script. But when I went to check on Amina, sure enough, her score had dropped to a fairly respectable 68. I was seriously impressed! That beach trip must have done her a world of wonder.

I want that mini-story to end here, I really, honestly do. I want to go on to tell you how much fun Lilac had with a child to care for, how the lived happily ever after as best friends in the swamp. But sadly.... so very sadly things were not to be for little Ginger. Not even a few minutes out of the shell when she inexplicably dropped dead. No sign of disease or anything, just sudden death, out of the blue. Why? Just bad genetics are my only guess. We may never know, but I did save her genome, so maybe some day when I have time, I'll investigate and try to figure out just what went wrong.

But life goes on, as it usually does. It wasn't long after Ginger's untimely demise that Lilac found herself pregnant yet again. This young one, whom I've named Rishi, is also of Amina and Stella's genes. She's an eager one indeed, scrambling from her egg almost instantly down the elevine to feast upon the triffids, bramboo and carrots that flourish around the waterwheel. I certainly hope that she doesn't have the same complications her sister had; I don't think I could stand to lose another. I guess that's something I didn't entirely think through when putting together this initial six together -- I have no idea how genetically compatibly these creatures are. For all I know, they might produce many more crippled and handicapped creatures due to my own carelessness. I certainly hope not.

I'll finish this post with a cute picture of Amina and her new best friend PinkiePie, as they sit together in the tree, happily approaching each other to stave off loneliness. I'm really glad Amina managed to turn around and find a friend, even mother(?) a child! I think next I'm going to focus my attention on helping Lilac out, who seems to be following Amina's old trend of having the worst score possible. Rishi, meanwhile, doesn't have to worry about being scored until she becomes a youth, so until then, she's free to explore her world, make mistakes, and learn all she can in the meantime.

I can't remember the last time I had a world this....dramatic! I think the combination of the strange scenario and the variety of creatures from different sources is making for a very interesting world so far.