I’m not a fan of discussing moves that need to be learned, I think that’s always been one of those PM things that you need to find out by playing. Detect PL is usually pretty common though, and I want to see if it is working the desired way currently.
Right now it is programmed to tell you if someone nearby feels weaker/about same/stronger than you. It compares YOUR base PL to THEIR current (or hidden) PL. I of course think it should always compare THEIR current/hidden, it wouldn’t make sense for you to know about THEIR base if they aren’t showing it. And it definitely makes sense that you know what YOUR own base PL is, even if you are currently much lower or hiding. I’m curious if anyone would rather it compares YOUR current/hidden PL to THEIR current/hidden PL. It seems a little misleading to see someone feels weaker than you, then you fight and find out their current/hidden compared to your current/hidden they are actually stronger. I guess another option would be for it to tell you both ways, “feels stronger than your current/hidden PL, about the same as your base PL.”
Excellent question. I debated when I coded it on which way to go.
I’m good with either way, my only input will be to say that I’d prefer it not give feedback on both current/hidden and base PLs. I think it should be one or the other just for simplicity’s sake.
I’d say have it do your current and base vs their current.
Player has 50,000/120,000 PL, Detecting Reno with 100,000 current PL.
“Reno feels much stronger than you are currently, but not far past your known limits”
Since it can all be coded in now, just have a few different variations of the text for color if you want. Change the adjectives based on strength difference percentage: Similar strength, slightly, much, extremely, supremely (whatever) weaker/stronger.
Probably have the base PL comparison be slightly more vague than current vs current.
On another note for detecting PL, it would be cool if you could choose a direction (either out of 4 or 8 directions) on the character page and it would automatically feel a power from that direction if anyone is close enough and/or strong enough. Possibly showing with a graphic that changes size the strength/distance, possibly without a way to differentiate if they’re stronger but further or closer but weaker.
Edit: Could also go the Grendel’s Cave “You smell a hideous stench” route and make the text smaller/larger (or even color changes) based on distance/strength instead of (or in addition to) the adjectives changes, especially for anything that can be shown straight on the page and isn’t part of the actual email update.
Edit2: Doh, mixed up scouters working like detect pl, fixing.
Having detect PL compare both the user’s base and current PL to the target’s current PL seems like a good way to go, best of both worlds.
I do plan on making both detect PL and scouters have some sort of activation button so that players can see PLs from further away. I’ll probably do it similarly to how the dragonball radar works - have it show the circle portraits (or ? if you don’t have detect PL) of other players on the tile they’re on (or on a tile in the direction they’re in), and change the opacity and pulse speed depending on if they’re close or far away.
I’ve flirted with the idea of having a true detect PL–essentially, it could tell you whether someone is stronger than they appear and whether their concealed strength is similar, less than or greater than your Base PL. I think it’d have to be a pretty high-level/difficult skill to find.