marriage issues and suggestions

[Nard]

I was witness to the following Issues:

Two players (Zeshadok,Okurweniec) were unable to marry though they seemed to do things correctly.(both spoke to the officiator, rings were equipped, they stand in the right area...
The point is that when one or both players say "marry xxxx", nothing happens.
I tried with Jenalya; then with Okurweniec and alone too various situations and servers.
I was unable to reproduce bug without Okurweniek, but it happens with him whatever the server.
server used were: official TMW, Auldsbel (January update; Easter script upgrades), and testing server. Okurweniec tried on his own local clone too and used different clients.As several accounts and multiple players were used, the bug is not likely bound to an account.

I noticed the following things: Marriage procedure changed after the Reid'inn release on official TMW, and easter event quest release. Jenalya could not find any script modification about marriage within this period.

Before: Player A speaks to officiator. Player A gets rings , exchange, A and B equip their rings. Player A to say "marry B", , server broadcasts globally "A is asking to marry B". If player B says "marry A"; server broadcasts globally: "A and B are now married"
Divorce could not occur if both partners were not both on line at the same time.

After: Player A speaks to officiator. Player B has to say "marry A", server broadcasts locally, player B is asking to marry A. Dialog appears to player A saying B asks to marry her/him and asking yes or no. If PLayer B says "marry A"; server broadcasts globally: "A and B are now married"
Divorce can now occur if both partners are not online at the divorce instant (nice). If one of them is not present he/she will never be aware that divorce occured and believe he is married until he wants to divorce or marry again.
this dissymmetrical procedure is difficult to figure to players, and it often happens that players do several trials before they marry, thus breaking the fun of the event. If not really a bug it is a misconception, a lack of ergonomy.

I suggest reverting to the initial one which was much simpler OR something like the following:
-Both players initiate the procedure (saying "marry xxx"for example)
-(necessary checks and escape procedures, local or global broadcast...)
- officiator NPC says her/his fun speech which could be audible from all present players (it would be nice)
- officiator asks both players if they want to marry the other one
- if they both say "yes" (no dialog) goto EndOfMarriageProcedure (speech, flowers spawning, broadcast....)
- if not goto FailedMarriageProcedure (kill everybody, warp everybody in random places, or whatever you find fun...)

I find the actual easy divorce has to be kept because it often happened that one of the two partners leave the game without saying a word,thus leaving the other stuck. But there is a need to make the left partner aware that Divorce occured ( and make him/her pay too?)
Divorce fees are quite high now, they should at least be shared between partners and, and maybe lowered a bit if both partners agree with divorce.

Problem of the wedding ring: there is actually only one ring slot. there should be 2 ( chars have 2 hands) and the wedding ring should be a special one that could stay equipped even if the other ones are too; thus players have to choose whether to use inzuwilt or use other rings. It is not nice and marriage coherent. (actually a second ring slot would not be sufficient since chars can get 2 rings). Inzuwilt spell could be extended to answer map name and number of other partner when not on the same map.

Marriage in Tulimshar:
the script of officiator is different from Hurnscald's one. if it is nice to have different speeches, the tulim NPC's one is a bit strict and could be a bit nicer.

Multiple marriage
Some original developers imagined quite funny things about marriage. Why not allow them: multiple partners (as long as partners agree when marriage occurs)
http://wiki.themanaworld.org/index.php/Marriage

[Big Crunch]

make sure you have the color of the text to 'default' if you are using manaplus. That is a common problem i've noticed. Dont know if its the issue you are referring to, however.

BC

[Freeyorp101]

Before: Player A speaks to officiator. Player A gets rings , exchange, A and B equip their rings. Player A to say "marry B", , server broadcasts globally "A is asking to marry B". If player B says "marry A"; server broadcasts globally: "A and B are now married"
Divorce could not occur if both partners were not both on line at the same time.

It has been a local request broadcast and a confirmation dialogue on the non-invoker's end since 2008, long before the inn was introduced. [Link]

Marriage works fine for me locally.

From the coordinates Ali-G gave me, those experiencing problems were standing outside of the accepted area at least in the Hurnscald area on at least one occasion. Can you provide more information about the steps those experiencing problems were following?


---Freeyorp

[Nard]

As I said to Jen and you, the problem does not seem to have a script origin. I am certain to have noticed a difference between before last January and last easter though.
I will verify about Big Crunch's remark with Okurweniek, I Think Zeshadok didn't use any colored text. (as far as i remind :/)
however, I noticed that under certain circumstances I was not able to reproduce, client inserts some control character at the beginning of each chat sentence.
It usually has no consequences but could be for some scripts if they are not local.

about the coordinates: I helped a lot of players to marry and married my chars too. When I was witness, I had a particular attention with them:
lower left bench in Hurnscald marriage
lower left carpet in Tulim's one
both chars standing or sitting.... and so on

[Nard]

make sure you have the color of the text to 'default' if you are using manaplus. That is a common problem i've noticed. Dont know if its the issue you are referring to, however.

You were right Big Crunch! Thank you for Okurweniec and Derpella; they could marry yesterday evening (server time).

By the way this is still a bug even if caused by non official client, and unsupported feature. It remains that this problem can occur again with some dialogs which involve magic system, and it would be better to solve this issue even if not priority one. More, colored text might be included in future official client and problem will reappear.

other suggestions & issue remain available, particularly the one concerning marriage dialog which I find really unfriendly.

[o11c]

By the way this is still a bug even if caused by non official client, and unsupported feature.

Yes, but it's not *our* bug.

More, colored text might be included in future official client and problem will reappear.

At that point, we'll have to do something about it.

That said ...
I mentioned on IRC that I think it's really stupid the way marriage is implemented (by magically detecting what you say (the tree-hugger quest suffers from the same problem)). It would be a lot cleaner (of the script side) if it just used an input box that said "type the name of the person you want to marry".

[Nard]

Yes, but it's not *our* bug.

yes clearly. I report it to 4144
If I understood well, you use magic system to detect player sentences. Wouldn't it possible to add a function to the server which would pass players sentences said within some special tiles without using the magic system (these tiles could be accessible only on required conditions if needed). Maybe It could simplify scripters' work a lot

It would be a lot cleaner (of the script side) if it just used an input box that said "type the name of the person you want to marry".

There are surely several workarounds to solve the problem. However, as a user, I like some kind of realism, and I found nice the way marriage happened (as a player I repeat) before some obscure eventual "logic tick overflowing" was reset by server update and made the 2008 modifications available last January. To be clearer: I 'd like the following scenario:
Player A speaks to officiator. Player A gets rings then trades one of them to player B
A and B equip their rings.
Player A has to say "marry B" and player B says "marry A" (B has to say it within an alloted time for the marriage procedure to be initiated)
various eligibility tests
Officiator says her/his speech which is "audible" on global chat by all players in the vicinity.
Officiator asks player A if he wants to marry B, A has to answer yes or no (within alloted time again, dialogs are still "audible" in vicinity)
Same for player B
If both answered "yes" server broadcasts globally: "A and B are now married" (eventual additional event)
If not (officiator says marriage failed ; optional additional fee and event)

Please note that I know that I ask you additional work. This is not a criticism of your work, but an idea to improve (in my opinion) the fun of this game.

[o11c]

The tick overflow I fixed is not related to the marriage system.