Starting a new MUD
KDavis4342
Hi I am getting ready to start a new fantasy mud I am new at starting them and
I need coders and builders But I could really use a administrator to help me
get things moving I am willing to pay for the host if someone is willing to
help me get it going if you are interested email me at kdavi...@aol.com
Tyler
In article <19980227052...@ladder02.news.aol.com>,
kdavi...@aol.com (KDavis4342) wrote:
Let me see....
You need coders...
You need builders...
You need a administrator...
What are you going to do? Play?
Tyler
--
-------------------------------------------------------------------
"We are raised to honor all the wrong explorers and discoverers --thieves planting flags, murderers carrying crosses. Let us at
last praise the colonizers of dreams." --Peter S. Beagle
D Thorman
Ty.. you forgot he needs a site as well..
DT
--
Obsidian Graphic MUD
Alpha testers Needed
http://mudserver.ml.org
Tyler wrote in message ...
Tyler
In article <19980228022...@ladder03.news.aol.com>,
kdavi...@aol.com (KDavis4342) wrote:
> I now have a site i have bought i am running smaug1.02 i am needing coders and
> builders i would also like someone with adminstating skills to help me run
> things. email if interested kdavi...@aol.com
Ahhh, another episode from "The Rich and the Lazy"....
Richard Woolcock
D Thorman wrote:
>
> Ty.. you forgot he needs a site as well..
[snip]
Ah, but check the following:
> >kdavi...@aol.com (KDavis4342) wrote:
> >
> >> get things moving I am willing to pay for the host if someone is willing
At least he is willing to pay for the site ;)
KaVir.
KDavis4342
confused the wonderdog
Plenty of people dying to code.
Plenty of builders dying to build
Plenty of snotty little shits wanting to snipe at this guys for being
willing to pay for the mud
but not having time to code/build/admin 24/7 (WORKING maybe to pay
for it?)
Holly Sommer
Tyler wrote:
: Ahhh, another episode from "The Rich and the Lazy"....
That's kind of rude, Ty.
It's interesting. Apparently, the folks who most vocally espouse that
one shouldn't start a MUD unless one knows how to code are, in fact,
coders themselves. Some do double-time as admin types as well, but by
and large it seems to be coders.
Now, don't get me wrong, I firmly believe that a potential imp should
have some experience under his/her belt as at LEAST a seasoned player,
before trying out their luck at their own MUD, however... I don't think
that having programming skills should be a requisite for starting a MUD.
In fact, I think this was part of the drive behind the development of
the Merc family of MUDs - making the servers more accessible to the
"everyday joe". I'm not sure if the Merc team winces at how it all
turned out, but the server code is definitely more accessible (for
better or for worse).
I see nothing wrong, on an individual basis, if someone has a site, and
the desire to (co)admininstrate a MUD, for them to post an ad, seeking
coders and builders. If they are worth their weight in adminning,
they'll be able to retain whoever they recruit. If they aren't, they
won't. The possibility that someone is just another CloneMUD waiting to
happen shouldn't be grounds for rudeness like the above-cited quip.
It would seem that enterprising endeavors are being frowned up as
something which the "general populace" shouldn't be allowed to try.
I don't like seeing all the WoT's, and clones hollering for everyone to
do everything for them any more than the rest of y'all, but I don't go
looking for a fire to fan either, or make assumptions about someone I've
not at least spoken with. If someone wants to start their own game, more
power to them. They should, however, consider themselves forewarned that
having a clue is the most important first weapon in an imp's arsenal.
Time will tell if someone's gumption and attitude are sufficient for
running a MUD. For the present, however, rudeness does precious little
good.
Look before you leap should go for everyone, not just new posters.
-Holly
Richard Woolcock
I have a nice big garden, and I'm looking for dedicated, skilled gardeners
to do all the gardening for me. I also need a head gardeners to supervise
all the other gardeners, and a few people to build a shed for me. Only
skilled gardeners/shed builders should apply, and naturally I won't pay
you anything BUT - I *will* let you plant stuff in my garden for free, and
you can even chose some of the plants yourself, as long as you check with
me first. For my part, I will supply the garden, and sit in it, bathing in
the sun, while you do all the work.
D Thorman
I agree, and have a very nice relationship with my coder.
I have the resources (A mudserver and creative juices)
He has the know how to code and teach me..
Thus.. http://mudserver.ml.org
I can barely code.. learning some Visual Basic in a course
but hardly a crack coder.. I have put my MUD on the back burner to help him
with his.. but all the same, I enjoy mudding and wudnt let a lack of
knowing how to code get in the way of that.
So now I provide free server space for muds.. (currently full but ill put
anyone on the waiting list) there are muds on ports 6666, 3333, 4444 and
one coming to 7000.
Teskida
--
Obsidian MUD Server
http://mudserver.ml.org
Holly Sommer wrote in message <34FAFCB6...@micro.ti.com>...
Eryi
>Now, don't get me wrong, I firmly believe that a potential imp should
>have some experience under his/her belt as at LEAST a seasoned player,
>before trying out their luck at their own MUD, however... I don't think
>that having programming skills should be a requisite for starting a MUD.
>
>the desire to (co)admininstrate a MUD, for them to post an ad, seeking
>coders and builders. If they are worth their weight in adminning,
>they'll be able to retain whoever they recruit. If they aren't, they
>won't. The possibility that someone is just another CloneMUD waiting to
>happen shouldn't be grounds for rudeness like the above-cited quip.
I agree.. In fact, I find it better to Keep the Coders Out of The Imp'ing
Business all together. I find most Coders And Area Builders tend to be
Hostile and Lack the Interpersonal Skills to Interact with Players (I
attribute this to the fact they spend their time on the mud thinking of ways
to kill said players).. Experienced Player? A Must.. But a Coder? Not
Neccessary. I have a fine relationship with My Head Coder (Who in turn,
Controls the Coder Staff, Simply for the fact I feel it better the Coders
talk to someone who can relate and understand the code and not try to
bullshit around it) and Interacting with the Players it sent to someone else
and their staff. Creative Ideas are Passed through the Head Coder, who
buffers and interprets them into a plan of action for his staff... I find
this system works better than most I've seen, as long as it is Implimented
from the beginning so no one gets "lost" in the idea of a structured
environment..
Katrina McClelan
>I agree.. In fact, I find it better to Keep the Coders Out of The Imp'ing
>Business all together.
This is a rather silly statement. The term Imp'ing is shorthand for
implementing, and well, the person implementing stuff *is* the coder.
Generally speaking, the coder is the one that is going to have the power.
At least if they are any good at coding. It's a byproduct of the fact
that the program does what the coder says it should.
>I find most Coders And Area Builders tend to be
>Hostile and Lack the Interpersonal Skills to Interact with Players (I
>attribute this to the fact they spend their time on the mud thinking of ways
>to kill said players)..
True perhaps in stereotype, but not across the board. Personally I
disagree with the trying to find ways to kill players theory, and since
I'm a coder, I suppose I can offer better insight. For one thing, coders
spend alot of time designing all the class skills and spells and such too,
as well as the mob intellegence, and builders spend alot of time designing
all that treasure you can find as well as the monsters that guard it.
Implementation details are at least close to neutral. I personally don't
try to kill players when designing. The stuff I design is often capable
of it, but it's not the goal. The goal is to design the mob's behavior,
or the map's layout such that it makes sense. If the tomb designers were
worried about vandalism, then traps, particularly deadly traps are in
order. What else would they have done? It's not like they're going to
try and have the statues bribe them or something. Yes, it indirectly is
"us against them", but only because you take the roles of the populace
that is 90% of the time at best non-hostile to players, and rarely if ever
their friends.
My view on it is that the players are benefiting from my hard work as a
coder, and the area designers hard work at producing a world. If they
don't like the way things are, they can leave. It's not that I try to
chase players away, it's just an attitude you develop after months of
players whining about this that and the other thing all the while losing
the fact that I put *alot* of work into the mud they enjoy. Instead of
just enjoying the game they complain that they should be able to do X, and
Y, or that Z doesn't work quite like it should (meaning it doesn't work
quite the way that they could be at best advantage usually). The truth
of the matter is that as a coder I got someone to handle the players
because I didn't want to do it because of how "popular" you become when
it suits the players. I gave him full authority to do as he saw
fit when it came to players. But make no mistake, I was the "implementor"
and the one making final decisions when needed in terms of what direction
the mud was going. It really is a byproduct of the fact that the actual
implementing of the features not only is a lot of work, but also involves
defining how it all works, which is where the real power is.
>Experienced Player? A Must..
Yes, but only in the sense that they need to know how things work in game
play to make design decisions. But keep in mind you're talking about
administration, and mistakingly calling it implementation. A world
designer (coder/builder) need only be able to fairly shift perspective.
>But a Coder? Not Neccessary.
Absolutely nessecary to implement. Not to administer. Then again, you're
model of a mud developing and mine are likely different. I coded mine
from scratch. After spending 9 months designing all of the internals (and
I did probably 90% of the code personally, leaving small chunks of code to
trusted friends such as individual spells), from how fight.c worked, to
the god commands themselves, and who had access to what, you better
believe that:
1) I was not going to be working for someone else.
2) If I was, it would be so silly because of all the decisions I made in
the process of writing the code to begin with, I'd have been in charge
informally anyway.
You can do a stock and adjust mud from your model, but you're bound to be
handcuffed by:
1) the coder doesn't have the authority to just make changes, which slows
things down.
2) very few (if any) coders that are truely capable of cleanly changing
game mechanics are going to be willing to take the back seat to anyone
else.
Anyway, the long point is, that I don't particularly see a need for an
administrative ambassador to the players from the design staff anyway,
other than keeping order in terms of out of character problems. In
theory, the design staff should not have to interact with players other
than on a 100% pure social basis. It rarely works this way, most commonly
because of a jerk that logs in and harasses other players, but then I
don't rightly care if I'm personable to them when I'm kicking them off ;)
In the case where you do want a buffer, have the players elect a player
representative to funnel issues through. *shrug* I guess it boils down
to you can run a mud without builders and coders, but it'd suck (and be
100% stock). That not being the goal, you bring in coders and builders,
and they can run the mud independant from an administrator. So which is
more important?
-Kat
Jamie76W
I believe that Adminstration is the more important issue here. I know that I
have a different view for the most part than most of you since the games I run
and serve on are mainly MUSH,MUSE and MUX's where we dont have to worry about
mob programs, ect. What we do have to do is code a combat, econ, character
generation system from scratch. I have done all three at one point or another
and am currently working on my own distribution of a MUSE. I do have experience
with muds but find that for the most part combat being so easy it degrades RP
which is what I prefer. In my games I generally have myself and 2 other people
serving as System Directors, we share the work on coding and selecting an Admin
staff who in turn deal with the individual players. The only time we really
step in is if for some reason or another the Admin or Jr. Directors as they are
sometimes refered to cant handle a particular problem. The players for the most
part see us(System Directors) as the behind the scenes people. They have come
to learn that we are the ones making the game possible and will generally take
up their problems with one of the Jr.'s. I guess you could say that we are
implementors or coders in a sense but we do so much more by selecting our
admin, working on the source code, ect... and generally assuring that even the
admin are not above the law. This is not to say that we dont have our problems
because we do, it's not a perfect system but it works for us. BTW, if anyone
does have a perfect system send it this way :-)
Jamie Warren
Co-Developer DJMuse
System Director Highlander The Gathering MUSH
System Director HoloTrek MUSH
System Director Valhanna MUD
jami...@aol.com
ja...@valhanna.mudservices.com
elect...@hotmail.com
http://members.aol.com/jamie76w/djmuse.html
Eryi
Katrina McClelan wrote in message <6dg0g5$f...@cegt201.bradley.edu>...
>In <6dfti5$1fp$1...@ocoee.iac.net> "Eryi" <er...@usa.net> writes:
>
>>I agree.. In fact, I find it better to Keep the Coders Out of The Imp'ing
>>Business all together.
>
>This is a rather silly statement. The term Imp'ing is shorthand for
>implementing, and well, the person implementing stuff *is* the coder.
Actually, Imp'ing is a throwback to Implimentor, meaning They who Impliment
(Unsaid "the mud"). Maybe you would feel at ease if I said Owner/Forger?
>Generally speaking, the coder is the one that is going to have the power.
>At least if they are any good at coding. It's a byproduct of the fact
>that the program does what the coder says it should.
I've seen Coder's who Hold the power, and Its not a pretty sight. I've seen
Coders who Own the Mud, yet don't want and can't Fullfill the Administrative
Duties. Not a Pretty sight..
>>I find most Coders And Area Builders tend to be
>>Hostile and Lack the Interpersonal Skills to Interact with Players (I
>>attribute this to the fact they spend their time on the mud thinking of
ways
>>to kill said players)..
>
>True perhaps in stereotype, but not across the board. Personally I
True, Stereotypical, but, How many MU* have you been on where the Sense of
Mind from the Staff (From a Player's Perspective) are "Screw um.. Let um
bleed.".. Now, I'm not one for Coddling Players, Takes the fun out of the
game, but _I_ find (My own Experiences, Bad lucky maybe?) that the muds who
seem to actively try and drive you off are "run" by Coders..
>disagree with the trying to find ways to kill players theory, and since
>I'm a coder, I suppose I can offer better insight. For one thing, coders
>spend alot of time designing all the class skills and spells and such too,
Not Entirely True.. Coder's Code, You Maybe be Different, but Most Coder's
I know tend to not want to be involved with the planning, day-to-day
operation, or anything outside the realms of #define and if ().. Again, You
maybe be different, and there are exceptions (My Head Coder is one of them),
but generally speaking, this is what I see.
>as well as the mob intellegence, and builders spend alot of time designing
>all that treasure you can find as well as the monsters that guard it.
>Implementation details are at least close to neutral. I personally don't
>try to kill players when designing. The stuff I design is often capable
>of it, but it's not the goal. The goal is to design the mob's behavior,
>or the map's layout such that it makes sense. If the tomb designers were
>worried about vandalism, then traps, particularly deadly traps are in
>order. What else would they have done? It's not like they're going to
>try and have the statues bribe them or something. Yes, it indirectly is
>"us against them", but only because you take the roles of the populace
>that is 90% of the time at best non-hostile to players, and rarely if ever
>their friends.
>
>My view on it is that the players are benefiting from my hard work as a
>coder, and the area designers hard work at producing a world. If they
>don't like the way things are, they can leave. It's not that I try to
And they Often Do, and While, again, I'm not one to Curtail or Coddle
Players, I am Interested in maintaining some time of Public Relations
outside of the "This/That/The Mud over there sucks.".. Call me Crazy, but My
time may be spent working on a mud, but the moment I feel its wasted, The
plug is being pulled.
>chase players away, it's just an attitude you develop after months of
>players whining about this that and the other thing all the while losing
>the fact that I put *alot* of work into the mud they enjoy. Instead of
That is my point. Coder's and Area Builder's tend to be Overly Sensitive
about their "babies". They take on the mindset of "How DARE you say
something bad about this!" and tend to either burn out and go ballistic
(usually over public channels or through actions to the players), or just do
BAD work.. This is why I have Administration Staff (Yes, I call my Staff,
Staff.. Not Immortal, Not Gods, Just Staff) to act as a buffer zone between
the Players and those who DO put so much effort into it..
>just enjoying the game they complain that they should be able to do X, and
>Y, or that Z doesn't work quite like it should (meaning it doesn't work
>quite the way that they could be at best advantage usually). The truth
True.. The old saying goes, "If it Hurts you, Its a Bug. If it Helps You,
Its an Undocumented Feature." But it is always like that, both in Life and
in Fantasy Fiction.. Its Human Nature to want whats best for you..
>>Experienced Player? A Must..
>
>Yes, but only in the sense that they need to know how things work in game
>play to make design decisions. But keep in mind you're talking about
>administration, and mistakingly calling it implementation. A world
>designer (coder/builder) need only be able to fairly shift perspective.
There is a Long, and drawn out arguement that has raged in this Newsgroup
for a very long time. And this is just another offshoot of it. Whats
better, Admin or Coder? There are Positive Sides to Both and there are
Negatives as well. Administration Poeple tend to be able to think up more
creative things (IF mind you, They Thought about getting a half-way decent
Staff) because they don't look at a daunting task ahead of them like a Coder
MIGHT. But, your right, An Administration person Can Not Code (which isn't
all bad *See Below*)..
>
>>But a Coder? Not Neccessary.
>
>Absolutely nessecary to implement. Not to administer. Then again, you're
>model of a mud developing and mine are likely different. I coded mine
>from scratch. After spending 9 months designing all of the internals (and
>I did probably 90% of the code personally, leaving small chunks of code to
>trusted friends such as individual spells), from how fight.c worked, to
>the god commands themselves, and who had access to what, you better
>believe that:
>
>1) I was not going to be working for someone else.
>2) If I was, it would be so silly because of all the decisions I made in
> the process of writing the code to begin with, I'd have been in charge
> informally anyway.
>
>You can do a stock and adjust mud from your model, but you're bound to be
>handcuffed by:
>
>1) the coder doesn't have the authority to just make changes, which slows
>things down.
>2) very few (if any) coders that are truely capable of cleanly changing
>game mechanics are going to be willing to take the back seat to anyone
>else.
Well.. Not Entirely True. Treating your Administration/Coders/Area Staff
Fairly, and like a Person rather than just someone slaving on the off chance
someone might say something nice about it won't get you far. Also, a large
staff to start out with, Won't get you far. The Code base I used is, true,
Not "from scratch", but its close enough you can't really tell. I'm using
BTL 3.0, a Bastardized Merc 2.2 Derivitive. When I got the Codebase, And
went to compile, there were Over 3000 parser errors in the code. Our of 74
files, 70 had to be re-written to the point where it would just COMPILE, let
alone do anything else. Even the Header Files had Parser errors in them (go
figure). I am not one for Stock anything (which is why at the moment we are
ripping everything out and stripping down to brass tacks on the code), but
for those who are, more power to them (yes, another Big Flashpoint in
here).
>
>Anyway, the long point is, that I don't particularly see a need for an
>administrative ambassador to the players from the design staff anyway,
>other than keeping order in terms of out of character problems. In
>theory, the design staff should not have to interact with players other
>than on a 100% pure social basis. It rarely works this way, most commonly
>because of a jerk that logs in and harasses other players, but then I
>don't rightly care if I'm personable to them when I'm kicking them off ;)
>In the case where you do want a buffer, have the players elect a player
>representative to funnel issues through. *shrug* I guess it boils down
>to you can run a mud without builders and coders, but it'd suck (and be
>100% stock). That not being the goal, you bring in coders and builders,
>and they can run the mud independant from an administrator. So which is
>more important?
"Suck" is based on your perspective. :> And, Frankly, you in all reality
don't see the need because you are a coder. Players have Issues, ALL code
has Bugs (yes, given enough time, even the old "Hello World!" code would
break), and Players are the ones who find these nasty things. Coder's and
Area poeple tend not to want to hear about flaws in their hard work, and if
they DO hear it, they like to personify that its the person who brought it
to their attention's FAULT. A "kill the messager" syndrome. The Problem
with Player Elected "spokes-poeple" is that like most Media organizations,
you only hear what they WANT you to hear. You run into a popularity contest
among the players that leads to a downward death plunge (at least in my
opinion)..
You find poeple you can work with well, Get ALONG with, or even just
tolerate, who also do their JOB well, and you can't lose.
>
>-Kat
Eryi
Threshold RPG
In article <34FB84...@dial.pipex.comNOSPAM>, Richard Woolcock <Ka...@dial.pipex.comNOSPAM> wrote:
>I have a nice big garden, and I'm looking for dedicated, skilled gardeners
>to do all the gardening for me. I also need a head gardeners to supervise
>all the other gardeners, and a few people to build a shed for me. Only
>skilled gardeners/shed builders should apply, and naturally I won't pay
>you anything BUT - I *will* let you plant stuff in my garden for free, and
>you can even chose some of the plants yourself, as long as you check with
>me first. For my part, I will supply the garden, and sit in it, bathing in
>the sun, while you do all the work.
Wow! Great analogy.
*applaud*
-Aristotle@Threshold
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
VISIT THRESHOLD ONLINE! High Fantasy Role Playing Game!
Player run clans, guilds, businesses, legal system, nobility, missile
combat, detailed religions, rich, detailed roleplaying environment.
http://www.threshold.counseltech.com
telnet://threshold.counseltech.com:23
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
Threshold RPG
In article <34FAFCB6...@micro.ti.com>, Holly Sommer <hso...@micro.ti.com> wrote:
>I see nothing wrong, on an individual basis, if someone has a site, and
>the desire to (co)admininstrate a MUD, for them to post an ad, seeking
>coders and builders.
There is nothing "wrong" with it.
The problem is something that I think reflects the growing anger of the mud
community towards the army of stock muds popping up everywhere.
The problem is that they are hurting our hobby. How? Well lets say you are new
to the net, or at least new to mudding. You decide to check out muds. You go
to mudconnector (or some other list) and start checking out muds. Well, you
try a few, and by the law of averages now, there is a HIGH probability all you
are gonna find are crappy stock muds (since they unfortunately are
outnumbering the good, well developed muds). Well it doesn't take long for
someone to conclude "damn, muds are lame!" and just go back to playing Quake.
Tyler
> The problem is that they are hurting our hobby. How? Well lets say you
are new
> to the net, or at least new to mudding. You decide to check out muds. You go
> to mudconnector (or some other list) and start checking out muds. Well, you
> try a few, and by the law of averages now, there is a HIGH probability
all you
> are gonna find are crappy stock muds (since they unfortunately are
> outnumbering the good, well developed muds). Well it doesn't take long for
> someone to conclude "damn, muds are lame!" and just go back to playing Quake.
That is a very interesting theory.
Ty
--
-------------------------------------------------------------------
"We are raised to honor all the wrong explorers and discoverers--thieves planting flags, murderers carrying crosses. Let us at last praise the colonizers of dreams." --Peter S. Beagle
"Anyone who spends this one and only life worrying about going to Disneyland after death really has got a low self-opinion." -No. 6
"I know not with what weapons World War III will be fought, but World War IV will be fought with sticks and stones." -- Albert Einstein
-------------------------------------------------------------------
rr...@lanminds.com
Just from a player perspective (ok, and a minor admin's)....
I have always admired the work that coder's do. I personally can't
even imagine putting in the time that so many good coders do. But,
this does tend to mean that the coder is out of touch with the day to
day affairs of the world he makes. If I log on into the middle of a
major row, I want to be able to figure it out and get things calmed
down so that people can go back to enjoying being there. (Which is
especially true with those players who log on just to harrass the mud,
but can also occur with the "problem" players that every mud has.)
And that is where you need a good Admin or two... the kinds who can
look at a situation and say "Yeah, based on past experience this guy
is lying and that one isn't." and punish accordingly.
Also, it is good to have someone on the Admin staff who can tactfully
point out that things don't work quite as planned. Sometimes, things
just don't work quite the way that you expected... the coder failed to
think about what happens in this particular situation, or some idea
that is good on its face is just roundly detested by the players for
some GOOD reason (not just a matter of lowering power). And that is
something that the coder needs to know. Politely, of course, and
preferrably not from someone who's going to be directly influenced by
the change. One other thing a good admin can do is try and influence
a coder to actually code. Many times the coders are more concerned
with getting the mud perfect than with getting it playable, which is
allowable in some circumnstances. But I'm one of those people who
tends to think that a mud without players isn't a real mud.
I guess my point is that Admins and Coders are two different
positions. They don't do the same tasks nor do they need the same
skills. And the best muds will have good people with the appropriate
skills for each position, and these people should respect each other
and acknowledge that, and get on with handling their respective
duties.
Kira Skydancer
PS. While a Coder CAN be an Admin, being a good admin takes a lot of
time. And most coders do not want to put that much time into non
code-related activities. It does slow down the mud development if they
do.
Katrina McClelan
>Actually, Imp'ing is a throwback to Implimentor, meaning They who Impliment
>(Unsaid "the mud"). Maybe you would feel at ease if I said Owner/Forger?
Ok, that's a different term, but the person with shell acct access is the
"owner", (people/owners), and one of these people by nessecity is the
coder.
>I've seen Coder's who Hold the power, and Its not a pretty sight. I've seen
>Coders who Own the Mud, yet don't want and can't Fullfill the Administrative
>Duties. Not a Pretty sight..
This type of blanket statement is inevitibly false in some case.
>True, Stereotypical, but, How many MU* have you been on where the Sense of
>Mind from the Staff (From a Player's Perspective) are "Screw um.. Let um
>bleed."..
Alot, but I've seen this attitude develop in ANYONE that does
administrative work. As soon as someone has power, no matter what the
role is other than as administrator, they fall into the dealing with
whiney player stuff.
>Now, I'm not one for Coddling Players, Takes the fun out of the
>game, but _I_ find (My own Experiences, Bad lucky maybe?) that the muds who
>seem to actively try and drive you off are "run" by Coders..
Not really. I've seen both.
>Not Entirely True.. Coder's Code, You Maybe be Different, but Most Coder's
>I know tend to not want to be involved with the planning, day-to-day
>operation, or anything outside the realms of #define and if ().. Again, You
>maybe be different, and there are exceptions (My Head Coder is one of them),
>but generally speaking, this is what I see.
Actually, Personally, I spend alot of time (as a coder) cleaning up bugs
and writing/rewriting low level internals to the code. I'll clean up the
fight engine, make the database routines faster, fix a bug here or
something like that. Rarely am I actually the one "deciding how to better
kill players." And then it's from a balance point of view.
>And they Often Do, and While, again, I'm not one to Curtail or Coddle
>Players, I am Interested in maintaining some time of Public Relations
>outside of the "This/That/The Mud over there sucks.".. Call me Crazy, but My
>time may be spent working on a mud, but the moment I feel its wasted, The
>plug is being pulled.
Ok, we agree here... the thing I'm pointing out is that when players are
happy, you don't have public relations problems. The only time you hear
about it is when someone is upset at something.
>>chase players away, it's just an attitude you develop after months of
>>players whining about this that and the other thing all the while losing
>>the fact that I put *alot* of work into the mud they enjoy. Instead of
>That is my point. Coder's and Area Builder's tend to be Overly Sensitive
>about their "babies". They take on the mindset of "How DARE you say
>something bad about this!" and tend to either burn out and go ballistic
>(usually over public channels or through actions to the players), or just do
>BAD work..
Ok, here's the misunderstanding. This is not an issue of offense to "this
sucks". I personally don't care if you have a difference of opinion.
We'll disagree, but that's the end of it. It's when it's not the end of
it, and players carry on and on about it that gets annoying. My personal
solution is to just avoid the whole thing by generally staying hidden.
This is what I've seen work on several muds. Really my argument is that
the best player relations is none at all, not that the coder would be
better at it. The attitude problems arise when you have someone to deal
with player problems and it either (1) goes to their head, or (2) sours on
them after a while. The only people that I've ever seen admin correctly
hated doing it enough to avoid the whole thing and leave hands off unless
it was absolutely nessecary. Note that all of the above is irrelevant to
other role. Could be a coder, builder, whatever. Really you hit one of
the common rifts on the head. PLAYERS see the game as the coders and
builders against them. It's not really accurate, but in most cases, that
mindset is carried in by the player making the air hostile to begin with.
>This is why I have Administration Staff (Yes, I call my Staff,
>Staff.. Not Immortal, Not Gods, Just Staff) to act as a buffer zone between
>the Players and those who DO put so much effort into it..
I don't call them gods (lower case), sometimes I'll use immortal (because
they are in game terms), but I tend to perfer wizards, or as you use staff
too. We agree on that much.
>Well.. Not Entirely True. Treating your Administration/Coders/Area Staff
>Fairly, and like a Person rather than just someone slaving on the off chance
>someone might say something nice about it won't get you far.
Well, you've seen alot of coders gone power trippy, I've seen alot of the
reverse. At least 9 of 10 posts seeking a coder are looking for a slave,
not a partner. I wont blanket say that all of them do, but a high
percentage do. Then I suppose we're talking ideal, not the goof off stock
boy wants a mud to be kewl, so lets drop both lemmas. (see below)
>"Suck" is based on your perspective. :> And, Frankly, you in all reality
>don't see the need because you are a coder. Players have Issues, ALL code
>has Bugs (yes, given enough time, even the old "Hello World!" code would
>break),
And I fix them... what's your point, my code is far from perfect. It'll
never be perfect. That's just a given. What does this have to do with
administering. I listen to bug reports. There's a given way to report
them.
>and Players are the ones who find these nasty things. Coder's and
>Area poeple tend not to want to hear about flaws in their hard work, and if
>they DO hear it, they like to personify that its the person who brought it
>to their attention's FAULT.
You're talking about the running a mud because it'd be kewl person again.
A good coder knows bugs exist, and makes a point of fixing them. I
typically have a 5 min turnaround from hearing about a bug to fixing it.
There are exceptions where it's a major problem and not a silly logic
burp, but that's really not the point. The stuff that turns me off is the
(paraphrased) "this isn't to my best advantage, so it must be broken"
line.
>A "kill the messager" syndrome. The Problem
>with Player Elected "spokes-poeple" is that like most Media organizations,
>you only hear what they WANT you to hear. You run into a popularity contest
>among the players that leads to a downward death plunge (at least in my
>opinion).
>You find poeple you can work with well, Get ALONG with, or even just
>tolerate, who also do their JOB well, and you can't lose.
This may well work. The thing we disagree on is where it really matters
if you have an administrator, or what background (s)he's from. The ideal
picture has the owners capable of doing any of the work, from coding to
area building that needs to be done. The person would actually have a
clue, and not be some "luser" that is running the mud for a power trip.
When you have that, you don't have the kill the messenger twirps nor the
idea that it's us against them, or defensive about their work stuff.
Let's face it here, I have rougly 38000 lines of source code in the mud.
There is no human way that I haven't overlooked a few mistakes. When
someone finds them, I fix them. End of story. I think a difference in
opinion is based on administration detail. I don't include taking bug
reports in it. Typically you need to handle the idiot that logs in and
starts spamming obscenities or one that logs in and harasses other players
out of character, or nonsense like that. For this it really doesn't
matter who does it. It's not pretty when you have to deal with a jerk no
matter how you do it. There just isn't a pretty way to handle it. The
best player relations I've seen are where the wizards stay generally
hidden and out of the way. From my experience, there isn't a way to
handle player complaints (not to be confused with bug reports or
constructive criticism) that doesn't cause some friction somewhere. The
less you put that situation in play the better off you are.
-Kat
Katrina McClelan
In <34fc23d...@nntp.lanminds.com> rr...@lanminds.com writes:
>I have always admired the work that coder's do. I personally can't
>even imagine putting in the time that so many good coders do. But,
>this does tend to mean that the coder is out of touch with the day to
>day affairs of the world he makes.
Well, as a coder, this is partly, but not totally true. You'd be
surprised what I end up knowing by accident. Things get logged for the
sake of debugging, but when scanning logs you do "overhear" things.
>If I log on into the middle of a
>major row, I want to be able to figure it out and get things calmed
>down so that people can go back to enjoying being there. (Which is
>especially true with those players who log on just to harrass the mud,
>but can also occur with the "problem" players that every mud has.)
>And that is where you need a good Admin or two... the kinds who can
>look at a situation and say "Yeah, based on past experience this guy
>is lying and that one isn't." and punish accordingly.
I agree, but the thing is here, I don't need past experience. I have
logs of any command passed to the interpreter. I *know* what happened.
[snip]
All reasonable points, and I tend to agree, but see below....
>PS. While a Coder CAN be an Admin, being a good admin takes a lot of
>time. And most coders do not want to put that much time into non
>code-related activities. It does slow down the mud development if they
>do.
Ok, here's how I personally have seen it work. I have a couple trusted
people that help me out. All of them are authorized to handle player
quables and such. I obviously am too however. Between the three of us,
we have a pretty good grasp on what's going on at any given time. As far
as I go, I usually stay logged in when coding and glance at the screen
from time to time (obviously invis when I do). If anything happens it
shows up on public channels pretty fast and if I *need* to I can deal with
it. In all actuality, the extra help (in terms of players) is more to
have better coverage (we all sleep ya know ;) The real place where I
need administration is supervising the rest of the staff while they build
areas. *shrug* Maybe I'm unique in that I have not had too many cases
where problems occur, and then they aren't enough to warrent a full time
position. The two people that help me predominantly oversee area creation
and build/and or code. One of them maintains the editors.
-Kat
A. Eschenburg
Tyler wrote:
>
> > The problem is that they are hurting our hobby. How? Well lets say you
> are new
> > to the net, or at least new to mudding. You decide to check out muds. You go
> > to mudconnector (or some other list) and start checking out muds. Well, you
> > try a few, and by the law of averages now, there is a HIGH probability
> all you
> > are gonna find are crappy stock muds (since they unfortunately are
> > outnumbering the good, well developed muds). Well it doesn't take long for
> > someone to conclude "damn, muds are lame!" and just go back to playing Quake.
>
> That is a very interesting theory.
> Ty
I'm afraid that is not just a theory. Ive seen it happen with a few
people, who heard of me mudding and said "tried that, it was so damn
boring.". When they finally tried one of the muds i played, they changed
their view. Apparently they had hit on "crappy" muds.
I dont know if those have been stock's, but fact is, it is not easy to
find a good mud to stay on. When the last one i played on turned bitter,
i tried like 30 to find one to stick with. Not a good turnover, if you
ask me.
Axel
dss...@rit.edu
In article <34FD0107...@harlie.han.de>,
I agree... I have spent lots of time trying to find a mud out there that had
decent players, good, non-stock code, and original theme/idea. I finally
found one through someone's reply to a message in the r.g.m.* newsgroups, and
it's great. But I've seen so many MUDs where people took ROM2.4 or something
else and added a few patches to it, restrung an area or two, and called it
"their MUD". I had tried MUDding a few years ago, and was turned off by it,
cause it was _boring_. But I met some RL people who got me interested again,
and showed me a nice place to play. Finding a decent MUD through the
MUDConnector is tough, because that's where many TrashMUD's go first. Not
that I'm downing the MUDConnector, they do a great service, but it does get
old after you've logged into the 10th or 15th nearly identical MUD.
--Raptor
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http://www.dejanews.com/ Now offering spam-free web-based newsreading
Marc Bowden
Watch the trend for a few years, though...a darwinian evolution of sorts
takes place, where the games set up because any idiot can eventually collapse
on their own, and the ones worth surviving survive.
========================================================================
Marc Bowden - Soulsinger D R E A M S H A D O W
Human Resources Director --------------------------
The Legacy of the Three
telmaron.com 3333 206.246.120.2 3333 dre...@telmaron.com
"We did not choose to become the guardians, but there is no one else."
========================================================================
Andrew Pavlin
In article <6djtk6$aeu$1...@nnrp1.dejanews.com>, dss...@rit.edu writes:
> In article <34FD0107...@harlie.han.de>, "A. Eschenburg" <esc...@harlie.han.de> wrote:
> > Tyler wrote:
Hmmm.... maybe someone should start a survey on where they think the "good" MUD's
actually _are_, instead of just griping about the number of lame clones.
Or would that make things worse by clogging up all the "good" MUD's with newbies,
flamers, and jerks? :-)
Of course, first someone would have to come up with a definition of a "good" MUD....
lemme get my asbestos suit on first. :-)
For those that care, I am a newbie to MUD's, but an experienced professional
software engineer (19+ years) who is browsing this topic for information related
to some computer science research (not job-related, alas) I am doing. As such, I
would like to find a good, newbie-friendly MUD or MUSH to actually play a bit
(and see how these things work in practice), as opposed to just reading source
code (and wincing at the spaghetti code and patches! :-/ ). The few I have tried
(courtesy of MUDconnector) have all been quiet and empty; was it because I was
there at a strange hour, or because it was a "lousy" MUD and so no one would go
there? I don't know.
I _am_ actually doing research (currently reading Javelin's God's Guide to
PennMUSH), not just "leaping in to start my own MUD."
So, any of you MUD veterans want to start such a survey?
--
______________________________________________________________________________
Andrew Pavlin
Eastman Kodak Company, Office Imaging Division
901 Elmgrove Road, Bldg. 11
Rochester, NY 14653
______________________________________________________________________________
Richard Woolcock
Andrew Pavlin wrote:
[snip]
> Hmmm.... maybe someone should start a survey on where they think the "good" MUD's
> actually _are_, instead of just griping about the number of lame clones.
>
> Or would that make things worse by clogging up all the "good" MUD's with newbies,
> flamers, and jerks? :-)
>
> Of course, first someone would have to come up with a definition of a "good" MUD....
> lemme get my asbestos suit on first. :-)
>
> For those that care, I am a newbie to MUD's, but an experienced professional
> software engineer (19+ years) who is browsing this topic for information related
> to some computer science research (not job-related, alas) I am doing. As such, I
> would like to find a good, newbie-friendly MUD or MUSH to actually play a bit
> (and see how these things work in practice), as opposed to just reading source
> code (and wincing at the spaghetti code and patches! :-/ ). The few I have tried
> (courtesy of MUDconnector) have all been quiet and empty; was it because I was
> there at a strange hour, or because it was a "lousy" MUD and so no one would go
> there? I don't know.
>
> I _am_ actually doing research (currently reading Javelin's God's Guide to
> PennMUSH), not just "leaping in to start my own MUD."
>
> So, any of you MUD veterans want to start such a survey?
Better yet, are there any representatives of the mudconnector reading this
who would be interested in putting together a 'good mud list'. It is
already readily apparent that we have a lot of stock-critics (myself
included) - surely between us we could put together some sort of voting
system? This might at least let new mudders skip past the crap muds, thus
preventing the mudding community from loosing too many players.
KaVir.
Perthigal MUD
Richard Woolcock wrote in message <34FE20...@dial.pipex.comNOSPAM>...
>Better yet, are there any representatives of the mudconnector reading this
>who would be interested in putting together a 'good mud list'. It is
>already readily apparent that we have a lot of stock-critics (myself
>included) - surely between us we could put together some sort of voting
>system? This might at least let new mudders skip past the crap muds, thus
>preventing the mudding community from loosing too many players.
>
>KaVir.
The problem with any form of rating system is that it would be all too easy
for it to be manipulated by the admins or immortals of the MUDs. Say
submitting a perfect review 100 or so times in order to increase the average
rating.
The only way for such a system to work would be if a select panel of people
did the evaluating. Of course, then you run into the issue of who should
sit on the panel and why their opinion should hold any weight in the first
place. Then there is the time involved in reviewing any MUDs that are
submitting and ensuring that the quality of any MUDs which make the cut
don't take any sudden drops in quality.
Inevitably, you would end up with a list of MUDs which are run by people who
are either on the panel or close friends of people on the panel. Putting
together an unbiased panel would be next to impossible. Even if the panel
consisted of only players and no admins/coders/immortals, you would still
not end up with a completely unbiased system of evaluation.
I like the idea, it's just that the logistics of it would need to be worked
out.
Richard Woolcock
I didn't say it would be easy...however, I know of a number of people who
could be counted on to give reasonably unbiased opinions. It wouldn't be
perfect, but it would be a start (and obviously you wouldn't review your
own mud). If nothing else, it could at least be checked for originality...
after all, a 'good' mud is a matter of opinion, while an original mud isn't.
I for one know of a few muds I have visited which look very original, a
number of muds which have potential, and a horde of muds which suck. Were
I to rate my own muds, I would say the first (God Wars Deluxe) was above
average, but lacking in many areas, while the second (Dark City) showed
good potential, but was too incomplete to play. I would put neither on
the list of 'good muds', although Dark City - if I ever finish it - will
be a very good mud IMO - but then I wouldn't judge it myself, I would ask
the other judges to do so.
KaVir.
Threshold RPG
In article <34FE20...@dial.pipex.comNOSPAM>, Richard Woolcock <Ka...@dial.pipex.comNOSPAM> wrote:
>Better yet, are there any representatives of the mudconnector reading this
>who would be interested in putting together a 'good mud list'. It is
>already readily apparent that we have a lot of stock-critics (myself
>included) - surely between us we could put together some sort of voting
>system? This might at least let new mudders skip past the crap muds, thus
>preventing the mudding community from loosing too many players.
How about a "mud has been running for at least 1 year" or 2 years, or some
amount of time that would weed out a LOT of people.
Perhaps an easy way to keep track of this would be the time from when the
mud's listing was first posted. Sure, there would be abuses, but this would at
least rule out a LOT of muds.
Also, I know there are probably plenty of muds that have been open for 1 or 2
years (or more) that are still stock and crappy, but again, at least a lot of
the fly by nights would be eliminated.
Richard Woolcock
Threshold RPG wrote:
>
> In article <34FE20...@dial.pipex.comNOSPAM>, Richard Woolcock <Ka...@dial.pipex.comNOSPAM> wrote:
> >Better yet, are there any representatives of the mudconnector reading this
> >who would be interested in putting together a 'good mud list'. It is
> >already readily apparent that we have a lot of stock-critics (myself
> >included) - surely between us we could put together some sort of voting
> >system? This might at least let new mudders skip past the crap muds, thus
> >preventing the mudding community from loosing too many players.
>
> How about a "mud has been running for at least 1 year" or 2 years, or some
> amount of time that would weed out a LOT of people.
>
> Perhaps an easy way to keep track of this would be the time from when the
> mud's listing was first posted. Sure, there would be abuses, but this would at
> least rule out a LOT of muds.
Hmmm I have no intention of sticking my mud on the mudconnector until it is
fully playable. Other people in a similar situation - actually writing the
mud BEFORE advertising it - would have the same problem.
> Also, I know there are probably plenty of muds that have been open for 1 or 2
> years (or more) that are still stock and crappy, but again, at least a lot of
> the fly by nights would be eliminated.
True...but let me give a very simple example; Vampire Wars has been on the
mudconnector for 114 days at the time of this posting, yet it is based upon
a copy of my code that I wrote in mid-1995 and is virtually unchanged. Does
this make it better than the most recent godwars-style mud (God Wars Deluxe),
which has only been on for 4 days, despite having over 2.5 years of extra work
put into it? What about my current project - I doubt it will be advertised
for many months yet...
The real problem is the mudconnector is young enough to have picked up all
the crappy stock-muds as soon as it opened, so its very hard to find out which
ones are long-term muds and which ones are junk...
KaVir.
Threshold RPG
In article <34FE7C...@dial.pipex.comNOSPAM>, Richard Woolcock <Ka...@dial.pipex.comNOSPAM> wrote:
>Threshold RPG wrote:
>Hmmm I have no intention of sticking my mud on the mudconnector until it is
>fully playable. Other people in a similar situation - actually writing the
>mud BEFORE advertising it - would have the same problem.
Well, then once that mud is running for at least a year it will be even better
=)
>The real problem is the mudconnector is young enough to have picked up all
>the crappy stock-muds as soon as it opened, so its very hard to find out which
>ones are long-term muds and which ones are junk...
True, but at least "time with a listing" (assuming it is still running) is an
objective measurement. Any committee that votes, evaluates, etc. muds is imho
inherently bogus and will never produce anything worth utilizing.
dss...@rit.edu
In article <6dk4f2$216$1...@kodak.rdcs.Kodak.COM>,
apa...@nasa.kodak.com wrote:
>
> In article <6djtk6$aeu$1...@nnrp1.dejanews.com>, dss...@rit.edu writes:
> > In article <34FD0107...@harlie.han.de>, "A. Eschenburg"
<esc...@harlie.han.de> wrote:
> > > Tyler wrote:
> [snipped three consecutive gripes about numerous copies of stock muds]
>
>
______________________________________________________________________________
> Andrew Pavlin
> Eastman Kodak Company, Office Imaging Division
> 901 Elmgrove Road, Bldg. 11
> Rochester, NY 14653
>
______________________________________________________________________________
>
Yeah, looking at it from a CS student's standpoint, the code is pretty nasty
in most servers, and requires some modification just to get it to compile.
Then those who actually bother to go through and 'streamline' the code, if
that's even possible. I've been working with Ember code, (my personal fave) a
ROM-Merc-DIKU derivative.
A "good" MU*, n.: An online, multiplayer univrse where all the players enjoy
being there, and the imms care about building and improving the MU*.
Here's a preliminary def... Prolly needs some work, because quite a few mud's
are qualified by the last part, and very few by the first part. However, I
tried to come up with one that didn't bring RP or prefered M** codebase/server
into the argument.
I am an imm on Broken Shadows, which is run by my ex-roommate at RIT and some
of his friends... We're pretty newbie friendly, but don't have that many
players, because we recently moved to a commercial site... Anyway, the address
is bshadows.mudservices.com 4000, come by sometime...
Tyler
In article <6dl1c8$c51$1...@usenet49.supernews.com>,
thre...@counseltech.com (Threshold RPG) wrote:
> [snip] Any committee that votes, evaluates, etc. muds is imho
> inherently bogus and will never produce anything worth utilizing.
I must say I have trouble agreeing with this. If a committee was created
to simply examine muds and report what they contain in an unbiassed
manner. For example, it would take minimal time to:
A. Determine whether or not a mud is completely unoriginal
B. Determine how many players are on-line
C. Determine how original the world is
D. Get a feel for the atmosphere of the mud
E. Possibly interview a few players
IMHO, this would make the StockMUDs stick out, which is really all that is
needed. I still feel that unbiassed ranking of muds is possible if based
on the right aspects. I want to put some more thought behind it.
Tyler
--
rr...@lanminds.com
On Thu, 05 Mar 1998 09:33:18 -0500, le--Nos...@epix.net (Tyler)
wrote:
Actually, what would be so wrong with just getting player
comments/recommendations along with a feel for how long the mud has
been up? Part of the trouble with ranking muds is that people like
different things. I detest pkill, others won't play a mud without it.
There are good and bad muds of each type. Of course, this would give
muds with a large playerbase more influence, but a well-written review
by a player from a small mud might also be enough to attract players.
And having seen how some of the less-desirable players (imho) write,
it would be a good clue as to the sort of players that the mud is
attracting.
Just a thought.
Kira Skydancer
Richard Woolcock
rr...@lanminds.com wrote:
>
> On Thu, 05 Mar 1998 09:33:18 -0500, le--Nos...@epix.net (Tyler)
> wrote:
>
> Actually, what would be so wrong with just getting player
> comments/recommendations along with a feel for how long the mud has
> been up? Part of the trouble with ranking muds is that people like
There is nothing wrong with getting player opinions, but I wouldn't want
to base the rating on it - after all, if the player didn't like the mud
they wouldn't play.
> different things. I detest pkill, others won't play a mud without it.
> There are good and bad muds of each type. Of course, this would give
> muds with a large playerbase more influence, but a well-written review
> by a player from a small mud might also be enough to attract players.
> And having seen how some of the less-desirable players (imho) write,
> it would be a good clue as to the sort of players that the mud is
> attracting.
Perhaps, but I'm not talking about making a list of popular muds - I'm
talking about making a list of well-presented and original muds, so
that players don't get the impression "If I've seen one mud, I've seen
them all".
KaVir.
Joachim Pileborg
At 05-Mar-98 01:48:22, Threshold RPG wrote:
>In article <34FE20...@dial.pipex.comNOSPAM>, Richard Woolcock
><Ka...@dial.pipex.comNOSPAM> wrote:
[snip]
>How about a "mud has been running for at least 1 year" or 2 years, or some
>amount of time that would weed out a LOT of people.
>Perhaps an easy way to keep track of this would be the time from when the
>mud's listing was first posted. Sure, there would be abuses, but this would
>at least rule out a LOT of muds.
>Also, I know there are probably plenty of muds that have been open for 1 or 2
> years (or more) that are still stock and crappy, but again, at least a lot
>of the fly by nights would be eliminated.
Are you saying that a MUD must be older than a certain age to be
"good? So if John Doe and his friends open a mud tomorrow it isn't
a "good" mud, even though it is totaly original, has friendly imms,
and so on. Although, most of the muds I think is "good", have all
existed for more than 4-5 years.
/ Joachim
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Joachim Pileborg Phone : +46-(0)410-40915
C.B. Friisgatan 1 Cellular: 0705-654429
23142 TRELLEBORG Email : pi...@trelleborg.mail.telia.com
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=====================================================================
Perthigal MUD
Joachim Pileborg wrote in message
<1357.368T2...@trelleborg.mail.telia.com>...
>
>Are you saying that a MUD must be older than a certain age to be
>"good? So if John Doe and his friends open a mud tomorrow it isn't
>and so on. Although, most of the muds I think is "good", have all
>existed for more than 4-5 years.
To some extent, this is the case. The players are largely responsible for
how good a MUD is. Sure, the builders and Imps control the features and
areas of the MUDs, but is that really what makes a MUD fun to play?
Usually it is the players you interact with on a day to day basis who
actually control how fun a MUD is to play. It is the players who determine
how much role playing goes on. It is the players who decide the attitude
towards unjustified pkilling. It is the players who control the overall
quality of the MUD itself.
Yes, I will grant you that the coders and builders of a MUD control the
quality of the features and the quality of the areas which add a great deal
to the playability of the MUD, but I still maintain that this is greatly
outweighed by the control the players have.
Unfortunately it takes time to build a good player base who are gonna stand
behind a MUD. Most players come around for a month or two and then move on
to somewhere new.
-=Oberon=-
--
Perthigal MUD
telnet://perthigal.mudservices.com:8096 (Under Construction)
http://www.perthigal.mudservices.com http://mudring.mudservices.com
Piotr Banski
9331...@twnd-242ppp39.epix.net>
Distribution:
Tyler (le--Nos...@epix.net) wrote:
: > [snip] Any committee that votes, evaluates, etc. muds is imho
: > inherently bogus and will never produce anything worth utilizing.
:
: I must say I have trouble agreeing with this. If a committee was created
: to simply examine muds and report what they contain in an unbiassed
: manner. For example, it would take minimal time to:
:
How much time is 'minimal time', I wonder? A week? A month?
You don't want to say you only need say, 3 hours for this?
Or maybe you do, judging from the rest of the content of your post *sigh*.
: A. Determine whether or not a mud is completely unoriginal
According to what? Arbitrarily set criteria? Or is there an
originality matrix I don't know of? How are you going to measure
departures from 'originality', I wonder? How old are you?
: B. Determine how many players are on-line
When? At 12 pm.? Which time zone? On weekends or weekdays?
: C. Determine how original the world is
Err, how does this relate to (A)? Geeeez, this is sickening...
Accordingly, (D) should be: 'Determine how many players are not on-line',
perhaps...
: D. Get a feel for the atmosphere of the mud
How are you gonna do that? And how much time will it take? You gonna just
run around the most obvious places or take time to explore all/most of
the areas? Chat? Role play? Group and go hunting? Again, how much time is it
gonna take? A while, huh? Multiply it by the number of existing muds and
sober up... :)
: E. Possibly interview a few players
Whom? Just randomly chosen individuals? How many interviews will be
statistically significant for you? How _long_ is it gonna take, again?
: IMHO, this would make the StockMUDs stick out, which is really all that is
: needed. I still feel that unbiassed ranking of muds is possible if based
: on the right aspects. I want to put some more thought behind it.
Yes, you definitely should have put some more thought behind it, before
you posted :)
Piotr
Threshold RPG
In article <1357.368T2...@trelleborg.mail.telia.com>, "Joachim Pileborg" <pi...@trelleborg.mail.telia.com> wrote:
>>Also, I know there are probably plenty of muds that have been open for 1 or 2
>> years (or more) that are still stock and crappy, but again, at least a lot
>>of the fly by nights would be eliminated.
>
>"good? So if John Doe and his friends open a mud tomorrow it isn't
>and so on. Although, most of the muds I think is "good", have all
>existed for more than 4-5 years.
Okay I will repeat this for about the 10th time =)
By making a list of muds that have been open at least a year, you would
eliminate a LOT of the pure stock crap that are fly by night operations. They
pop up for a few months, spam the newsgroups, make a mudconnector listing, and
in a few months are gone.
Sure, a lot of crappy muds would still make the 1 year list (or 2 year least,
or whatever), but at least this is an objective standard of measurement, and
at least it would eliminate a lot of the WORST stock crap.
David Rudy
In article 1...@kodak.rdcs.Kodak.COM, apa...@nasa.kodak.com (Andrew Pavlin) writes:
>In article <6djtk6$aeu$1...@nnrp1.dejanews.com>, dss...@rit.edu writes:
>
>Hmmm.... maybe someone should start a survey on where they think the "good" MUD's
>actually _are_, instead of just griping about the number of lame clones.
About a year ago, a post was made titled "Tiro's LP Directory of 228 LP Muds"
which took the user counts of all the listed LP muds.
Look it up in the usenet archives or dejanews if you're interested.
>Of course, first someone would have to come up with a definition of a "good" MUD....
>lemme get my asbestos suit on first. :-)
While many would disagree, I feel that a high user count is a decent indication
of how "good" the mud is. At least it shows a willingness to continue playing
the mud.
I suggest you read Bartle's excellent paper on "People who suit muds", found
at: http://journal.tinymush.org/jomr/v1n1/bartle.html
The easiest to achieve 'stable states' of muds are achievement (hack and slash)
and socialization (RP, mushes). This puts LPMuds at somewhat of a disadvantage
as it is my opinion that many are exploration-based or attempt at some balance
between RP and Hack-n-Slash. This balance is the hardest to achieve state of
a mud, and hence muds that attempt this balance generally have less players
than, for example, a Mush.
Blatent advertising: The Two Towers LPMud had 150 users at peak yesterday.
>So, any of you MUD veterans want to start such a survey?
Me, not particularly. One has to remember that many of these stock clones are
created by the same players that were removed from other muds for various
reasons: cheating, abuse, harassment, etc.
This means that most any method devised of 'surveying' a mud for popularity
and/or usercount will be abused by these fools in an attempt to make their
mud look better.
A quick cross reference that you can do when looking up a mud:
1. Go to the mud player's directory and see how many people that play there
have listed themselves: http://www.mudconnect.com/mpd/
Spot check a few to ensure the listings weren't added all at the same date,
obvious mud recruitment.
2. Go to altavista and search for the mud's address, like "towers.angband.com"
and see how many player homepages have linked to that mud. If they like it
enough to link their homepage, must be pretty good.
This is used elsewhere: when Lycos published their "Best of the Net, A2Z" book,
that's how they got their data: "Lycos determines the popularity of a Web site
according to the number of links to it from other sites on the Web."
(More adversiting: The Two Towers was one of the only MUDs listed in that book)
(If there were a way to query AltaVista for just the # of matches, perhaps this
could be listed on the mudconnector pages. For now, have to do it manually.)
I hope these two referencing techniques help people when searching for a good
Mud to play. It's a lot of work to find a good mud. More work to create one.
David Rudy
Aule @ The Two Towers
dar...@aule.eng.sun.com.nospam
Ben Greear
Piotr Banski wrote:
>
> 9331...@twnd-242ppp39.epix.net>
> Distribution:
>
> Tyler (le--Nos...@epix.net) wrote:
> : > [snip] Any committee that votes, evaluates, etc. muds is imho
> : > inherently bogus and will never produce anything worth utilizing.
> :
> : I must say I have trouble agreeing with this. If a committee was created
> : to simply examine muds and report what they contain in an unbiassed
> : manner. For example, it would take minimal time to:
> :
> How much time is 'minimal time', I wonder? A week? A month?
> You don't want to say you only need say, 3 hours for this?
> Or maybe you do, judging from the rest of the content of your post *sigh*.
>
> : A. Determine whether or not a mud is completely unoriginal
> According to what? Arbitrarily set criteria? Or is there an
> originality matrix I don't know of? How are you going to measure
> departures from 'originality', I wonder? How old are you?
Well, for instance, if it was like the last 10 you visited...
>
> : B. Determine how many players are on-line
> When? At 12 pm.? Which time zone? On weekends or weekdays?
Whenever, ask the imps when the most and least play...make a rough
guess.
> : D. Get a feel for the atmosphere of the mud
> How are you gonna do that? And how much time will it take? You gonna just
> run around the most obvious places or take time to explore all/most of
> the areas? Chat? Role play? Group and go hunting? Again, how much time is it
> gonna take? A while, huh? Multiply it by the number of existing muds and
> sober up... :)
For instance, can you strike up a conversation with someone, is there
anything going on on the gossip channel if it has one...are more
advanced players willing to show a newbie the ropes for an hour or two
to get them acclimated... Check out the bulitin board, or whatever
passes for one...
>
> : E. Possibly interview a few players
> Whom? Just randomly chosen individuals? How many interviews will be
> statistically significant for you? How _long_ is it gonna take, again?
Talk to some high levels, they've obviously been there a while. Try to
find some really old players.... Who cares about statistics. It won't
be perfect, but most anyone can seperate the good stuff from the
bullshit.
> Yes, you definitely should have put some more thought behind it, before
> you posted :)
At least the poster gave _some_ thought....
>
> Piotr
--
Ben Greear (gre...@cyberhighway.net) http://www.primenet.com/~greear
Author of ScryMUD: mud.primenet.com 4444
http://www.primenet.com/~greear/ScryMUD/scry.html
Nathan Fenenga Yospe
Piotr Banski, is it true that on 5 Mar 1998 21:11:04 GMT, you made an ass
of yourself on rec.games.mud.admin:
: 9331...@twnd-242ppp39.epix.net>
: Distribution:
: Tyler (le--Nos...@epix.net) wrote:
: : I must say I have trouble agreeing with this. If a committee was created
: : to simply examine muds and report what they contain in an unbiassed
: : manner. For example, it would take minimal time to:
: How much time is 'minimal time', I wonder? A week? A month?
: You don't want to say you only need say, 3 hours for this?
: Or maybe you do, judging from the rest of the content of your post *sigh*.
3 hours gives sufficient time for a categorical analysis. Ten minutes would
be enough for most of the muds out there, unfortunately. I think you have a
bit of a lack of clue about the real state of muds... now, I do this when I
have a bit of time... rarely, these days, but still... going through all of
the muds on the connector, or with web pages that show on searches, and I'd
say three hours is plenty for most of them.
: : A. Determine whether or not a mud is completely unoriginal
: According to what? Arbitrarily set criteria? Or is there an
: originality matrix I don't know of? How are you going to measure
: departures from 'originality', I wonder? How old are you?
See my posts on the subject, or Richard's. Or several other people here. It
isn't hard to come up with a criteria for originality. Interface test, code
behavior test, and area scan will reveal the completely unoriginal mud with
minimal effort. I can do this in ten minutes for half a dozen Diku bases, a
half hour for several other LP bases... this is a good way to scratch those
muds off instantly, leaving the ones worth the additional effort for that 3
hour treatment.
: : B. Determine how many players are on-line
: When? At 12 pm.? Which time zone? On weekends or weekdays?
I don't find this a really sensible criteria contrasted to the originality,
but it is quite easy to determine. Ten or twelve checks in a single week is
all it takes, and those are a few seconds each. For an unoriginal mud, that
is. Some of the original muds are a different story.
: : C. Determine how original the world is
: Err, how does this relate to (A)? Geeeez, this is sickening...
: Accordingly, (D) should be: 'Determine how many players are not on-line',
: perhaps...
Original world means theme and areas, and can be distinguished from the one
that is unique, but unoriginal. (New WoD! New WoT! New Shadowrun! New This!
New That! We couldn't think of our own theme, but everyone seems to like X,
just look at how many Xmuds there are!) This is in the 3 hour segment, with
muds that are unoriginal still having a chance if there is a reason to have
hope for a positive atmosphere.
: : D. Get a feel for the atmosphere of the mud
: How are you gonna do that? And how much time will it take? You gonna just
: run around the most obvious places or take time to explore all/most of
: the areas? Chat? Role play? Group and go hunting? Again, how much time is it
: gonna take? A while, huh? Multiply it by the number of existing muds and
: sober up... :)
I can usually guage this fairly accurately and consistantly in about two or
three hours with a fair number of people online. And 85% of those existing,
and advertizing, muds never make it this far. A good trick for the maybemud
is a quick scan of notes, board posts, or whatever serves that function.
: : E. Possibly interview a few players
: Whom? Just randomly chosen individuals? How many interviews will be
: statistically significant for you? How _long_ is it gonna take, again?
I doubt he meant anything like that. This is part of atmosphere analysis, a
crude litmus test.
: : IMHO, this would make the StockMUDs stick out, which is really all that is
: : needed. I still feel that unbiassed ranking of muds is possible if based
: : on the right aspects. I want to put some more thought behind it.
: Yes, you definitely should have put some more thought behind it, before
: you posted :)
The irony of this had better not escape you. But I'm sure it does. This was
a formative discussion, a brainstorm on an essentially good idea. And there
you go, thoughtlessly going off. So of course you get toasted for it.
--
Nathan F. Yospe - Aimed High, Crashed Hard, In the Hanger, Back Flying Soon
Jr Software Engineer, Textron Systems Division (On loan to Rocketdyne Tech)
(Temporarily on Hold) Student, University of Hawaii at Manoa, Physics Dept.
yospe#hawaii.edu nyospe#premier.mhpcc.af.mil http://www2.hawaii.edu/~yospe/
Piotr Banski
Distribution:
Nathan Fenenga Yospe (yo...@Hawaii.Edu) summoned all his wit and wrote:
: Piotr Banski, is it true that on 5 Mar 1998 21:11:04 GMT, you made an ass
: of yourself on rec.games.mud.admin:
: : Tyler (le--Nos...@epix.net) wrote:
: : : I must say I have trouble agreeing with this. If a committee was created
: : : to simply examine muds and report what they contain in an unbiassed
: : : manner. For example, it would take minimal time to:
: : How much time is 'minimal time', I wonder? A week? A month?
: : You don't want to say you only need say, 3 hours for this?
: : Or maybe you do, judging from the rest of the content of your post *sigh*.
: 3 hours gives sufficient time for a categorical analysis. Ten minutes would
: be enough for most of the muds out there, unfortunately. I think you have a
: bit of a lack of clue about the real state of muds... now, I do this when I
: have a bit of time... rarely, these days, but still... going through all of
: the muds on the connector, or with web pages that show on searches, and I'd
: say three hours is plenty for most of them.
Well, you're a genius then... However, it might be hard to i) gather more
people like you to do this, and ii) make others believe that what you did
was a thorough investigation. And you do want the results to look
credible, don't you. Whatever you understand by 'categorical analysis', I
really find it hard to believe that 3 hours is enough to _honestly_ tick off
all the items on Tyler's list, and that's what I tried to point out.
: : : A. Determine whether or not a mud is completely unoriginal
: : According to what? Arbitrarily set criteria? Or is there an
: : originality matrix I don't know of? How are you going to measure
: : departures from 'originality', I wonder? How old are you?
: See my posts on the subject, or Richard's. Or several other people here. It
: isn't hard to come up with a criteria for originality. Interface test, code
: behavior test, and area scan will reveal the completely unoriginal mud with
: minimal effort. I can do this in ten minutes for half a dozen Diku bases, a
: half hour for several other LP bases... this is a good way to scratch those
: muds off instantly, leaving the ones worth the additional effort for that 3
: hour treatment.
Actually, when I saw people whom I respected - having read a lot of
interesting posts by them - take up this idea I was quite puzzled until
(after having posted what you cite) I realized that perhaps this is
because their main focus - understandably - is diku derivatives and,
generally, 'diku-likes', if you excuse the formulation. Cause there I can
imagine that you don't need much time to see that, aha, we begin in
Midgaard, then there is this stock area from www.games.org to the left, the
other one to the right, etc., and all the commands work exactly as on
the released version of diku/merc/rom, etc, etc.
I wrote that post from the point of view of lp - and well, if you say
that you need half an hour for lps then I'd venture a claim then you have
as little clue about lps as I have about 'diku-likes'.. The times when
you started in Larstown are fortunately long gone (although lima is
capable of recreating this feeling with the lpscript area.. *grin* :),
and fortunately, in the lp world there is little area stock, and when I
talked about the time you need in order to determine originality, I meant
(darrn my narrowmindedness..) lps.. From the lp point of view,
'originality' means something else than 'not using stock areas' simply
because there are no stock areas for lps (fortunately, though you may
recall some dork posting here - or on lp? - asking people for their areas
written for various lpmuds in order to integrate them.. For the lp people
it was ridiculous, while I think that posts asking for the url of stock
areas for 'diku-likes', apart from causing distaste, are not that shocking).
So well, if you allow me to take part in your brainstorming activity, I
would like to point out that the criteria for e.g. lpmuds and diku-likes
(once again, it is not my intention to hurt you with this term ;) - it's
simply a convenient generalization) need to be determined separately. And
this lack of uniform criteria might be another potential problem and
raise objections to the whole enterprize.
:
: : : B. Determine how many players are on-line
:
: : When? At 12 pm.? Which time zone? On weekends or weekdays?
:
: I don't find this a really sensible criteria contrasted to the originality,
: but it is quite easy to determine. Ten or twelve checks in a single week is
: all it takes, and those are a few seconds each. For an unoriginal mud, that
: is. Some of the original muds are a different story.
Whatever the different story is, again there is some place for objections
that not all muds are treated equally, and that the rating business is
unfair. Apart from that, there are muds which function mostly according
to the local time - from 8am till 8pm the uni labs are open and the mud
is crowded, otherwise (weekends included), the mud only has a few players
from other time zones. I will surely agree that for most muds this means
that they are crappy, but I also hope that you will agree that it's not
_necessarily_ so. Hence, a weak point in the project.
: : : : C. Determine how original the world is
:
: : Err, how does this relate to (A)? Geeeez, this is sickening...
: : Accordingly, (D) should be: 'Determine how many players are not on-line',
: : perhaps...
:
: Original world means theme and areas, and can be distinguished from the one
: that is unique, but unoriginal. (New WoD! New WoT! New Shadowrun! New This!
: New That! We couldn't think of our own theme, but everyone seems to like X,
: just look at how many Xmuds there are!) This is in the 3 hour segment, with
: muds that are unoriginal still having a chance if there is a reason to have
: hope for a positive atmosphere.
Again, if I can please join the 'brainstorm', I would like to point out
that perhaps you need to explicitly define the terms used in the
discussion - the words 'unique but unoriginal' at first strike as a silly
concept, until it is made clear that you are primarily thinking of
diku-likes and that by 'unoriginal' you sometimes mean 'using stock
servers/areas', and sometimes 'based on a common (stock) theme', if I
understand correctly.
This is of course a pretty natural confusion, but I hope you will agree
that in order to continue this discussion, it may be good to properly
define the terms used. Once this is done, Tyler's points A and C will not
sound as ridiculous as they sounded to me the first time I saw them
through my lp glasses (sigh, so I was too quick to write - doesn't it
happen to people sometimes? :).
: : : D. Get a feel for the atmosphere of the mud
:
: : How are you gonna do that? And how much time will it take? You gonna just
: : run around the most obvious places or take time to explore all/most of
: : the areas? Chat? Role play? Group and go hunting? Again, how much
time is it
: : gonna take? A while, huh? Multiply it by the number of existing muds and
: : sober up... :)
:
: I can usually guage this fairly accurately and consistantly in about two or
: three hours with a fair number of people online. And 85% of those existing,
: and advertizing, muds never make it this far. A good trick for the maybemud
: is a quick scan of notes, board posts, or whatever serves that function.
Sure, but you will probably agree that some people may again object to
this as too shallow an approach to the matter. Then, again it boils down
to the time you have to devote to this and to whether it is really worth
wasting it.
: : : E. Possibly interview a few players
:
: : Whom? Just randomly chosen individuals? How many interviews will be
: : statistically significant for you? How _long_ is it gonna take, again?
:
: I doubt he meant anything like that. This is part of atmosphere analysis, a
: crude litmus test.
There are so many different types of players, who additionally happen to
be humans and have a moody day sometimes or be in the middle of a fight
or hurry to rent a locker before their lab closes and not have time to
talk and as a result appear to be rude. Again, a fair assessment takes
_time_. That was my point. If you only want to be sketchy about these
things, you run the risk of being accused of unfairness. And then, if
this opinion prevails, the whole of your time spent on this survey is
wasted.
: : : IMHO, this would make the StockMUDs stick out, which is really all
that is
: : : needed. I still feel that unbiassed ranking of muds is possible
if based
: : : on the right aspects. I want to put some more thought behind it.
:
: : Yes, you definitely should have put some more thought behind it, before
: : you posted :)
:
: The irony of this had better not escape you. But I'm sure it does. This was
^^^^
I don't think it does. Like I said, the problem seems to be the point of
view. I have now tried to explain what confused me and why. I hope you
can see that too.
: a formative discussion, a brainstorm on an essentially good idea. And there
: you go, thoughtlessly going off. So of course you get toasted for it.
In about the same way I - wrongly - toasted Tyler's post, yeah :)
There seem to be a few weak points in the whole thing, e.g. the interview
part - we can all see the hot flames some players and formers immortals
spout in the newsgroups and we know it is usually (though not always) the
assholes that start such flames, and not the 'good guys'. And sometimes
it's so hard to get at who actually did what and why, and whom to believe
when you talk to them about their muds.
Also, the atmosphere - I think you really need time to determine what it
really is (if you need to use it as a factor in your survey).
Next, number of players. I used to play muds I considered really cool
which didn't have many players on at the same time. Yeah, I know - maybe
I have such a bad taste, and maybe not - I will actually mention some
names - Dartmud, several years ago - with a very revolutionary then
skill-based lib and the 'hexes' system, 5th Dimension, later to become
Legacy - again, what I think was a revolutionary mud then (skills +
hexes, as one of the few (two?) which used them at that time), under the
administration of Tensor - that one actually set the
coding/qc/administrative standards for me, or T'mud, later to become
Enulal, which recently went down for good, maybe not a revolutionary mud,
but still cool and addictive (well, it had a multi-protocol intermud
support, speaking of technicalities - not a very common thing). All three
rarely reached 10 players on when I played them and still, I daresay
they had _something_ in them that might possibly place them high also in
your hierarchy. (I'm finishing, yes, soon.. :)
And in the last point I return to what I said earlier: it seems that
when talking of mud rating a lot of people participating in this
discussion mean rating of what I called 'diku-likes'.
If not so, then you have a problem of nonuniform criteria. If so, then
perhaps the topic of this discussion should somehow indicate it.
Thanks for reading, to whoever got this far :)
Piotr
BSName
>Okay I will repeat this for about the 10th time =)
>
>By making a list of muds that have been open at least a year, you would
>eliminate a LOT of the pure stock crap that are fly by night operations. They
>
>pop up for a few months, spam the newsgroups, make a mudconnector listing,
>and
>in a few months are gone.
>
>Sure, a lot of crappy muds would still make the 1 year list (or 2 year least,
>
>or whatever), but at least this is an objective standard of measurement, and
>at least it would eliminate a lot of the WORST stock crap.
There is a point, that I think you are missing, here. I agree that eliminating
MUDs that are less than a year old would put a vast majority of the ShitMUDS
out of consideration, however you would also put the few good MUDs out of
consideration, too. What happens to the guy who has spent the last 2-3 years
lovingly developing his own unique MUD - writing and debugging offline - before
deciding it is finally ready, and brings it online? This guy could have THE
revolutionary new MUD, and watch it fall by the wayside, because newbie
players, not knowing any better, would ignore it, because it isn't on "the
list".
Admittedly, this is an extreme example, but you get the point. Is hurting a few
good MUDs worth getting rid of a lot of ShitMUDs?
My $.02
~~Scot~~
Piotr Banski
BSName (bsn...@aol.com) wrote:
: There is a point, that I think you are missing, here. I agree that
: MUDs that are less than a year old would put a vast majority of the ShitMUDS
: out of consideration, however you would also put the few good MUDs out of
: consideration, too. What happens to the guy who has spent the last 2-3 years
: lovingly developing his own unique MUD - writing and debugging offline
- before
: deciding it is finally ready, and brings it online? This guy could have THE
: revolutionary new MUD, and watch it fall by the wayside, because newbie
: players, not knowing any better, would ignore it, because it isn't on "the
: list".
:
: Admittedly, this is an extreme example, but you get the point. Is
hurting a few : good MUDs worth getting rid of a lot of ShitMUDs?
Maybe not so extreme. When will KaVir's new mud be rated? After it has
served its one or two years to qualify for the survey? Or take another
example - Crimson/2799, opened last December, completely scratch-written,
with a very interesting theme, great features and great scripting
language which might actually place it inbetween the diku-type muds and lps?
<AD>daydream.uvic.ca:5000</AD> There are not many players on it, and I'm
sure it does not reflect its quality at all. It's 4th month it's running
- how long till it qualifies? Its admin (_not_ the imps) is not the
friendliest person in the world - does it mean the mud is crappy? Some
players are jerks - so what? There are also others who are very nice and
very helpful - what's the chance that the surveyer will meet those? There
are some areas which may not be easily found by a first time visitor
(cause they are meant to be that way), or he may not be able to get there
alive or within the time period he wants to devote for it - will it mean
that the mud will get listed as 'too small'?
Here, a concrete example, for what was mentioned in the post cited here
and some other posts in this thread.
I just don't believe in the usefulness of this project :(
Piotr
rr...@lanminds.com
I will second Piotr's point about defining terms. Are we talking
about "good" muds, or "original" muds? A mud could be highly original
and yet not be fun to play. The classes could be drastically
unbalanced, the interface could be off-putting, the people who built
it could be real jerks. On the other hand, a minorly-tweaked "stock"
mud with good players, good imps, and good admins could be fun to
play. In which case the sheer number of players does tend to give a
better idea, possibly, about which muds are better. Although, I don't
like the really crowded ones (100+ players) myself, so maybe it
doesn't. Hmm.. here's a question. There's a site out on the net that
rates movies... basically you tell it how you'd rate a bunch of
movies, then if you ask about a new movie, it goes and sees how that
movie was rated by other people that rated movies the same way that
you did. (Ie, if I really love shoot-em-ups and explosions, it looks
at what other people with the same tastes said about the new movie.)
Think there's any way of doing that with this project?
Kira Skydancer
dss...@rit.edu
In article <34fec88b...@nntp.lanminds.com>,
rr...@lanminds.com wrote:
>
> On Thu, 05 Mar 1998 09:33:18 -0500, le--Nos...@epix.net (Tyler)
> wrote:
>
> Actually, what would be so wrong with just getting player
> comments/recommendations along with a feel for how long the mud has
> been up? Part of the trouble with ranking muds is that people like
> There are good and bad muds of each type. Of course, this would give
> muds with a large playerbase more influence, but a well-written review
> by a player from a small mud might also be enough to attract players.
> And having seen how some of the less-desirable players (imho) write,
> it would be a good clue as to the sort of players that the mud is
> attracting.
>
>
> Kira Skydancer
>
players can't type proper English.(prolly can't write or speak well, either)
It seems odd that so many people who MUD alot can't speak English well, even
those who live in the U.S, but it reminds me of The Wizard's First Rule:
People are Stupid.
Anyhow, I agree that a board of people "reviewing" MUDs would be biased, not
necesarily as a group, but individually, each toward their favorite
codebase/ruleset, etc. Interviewing players might be effective, however.
Spartacus
Perthigal MUD wrote:
>
> Richard Woolcock wrote in message <34FE20...@dial.pipex.comNOSPAM>...
> >who would be interested in putting together a 'good mud list'. It is
> >already readily apparent that we have a lot of stock-critics (myself
> >included) - surely between us we could put together some sort of voting
> >system? This might at least let new mudders skip past the crap muds, thus
> >preventing the mudding community from loosing too many players.
> >
>
> The problem with any form of rating system is that it would be all too easy
> for it to be manipulated by the admins or immortals of the MUDs. Say
> submitting a perfect review 100 or so times in order to increase the average
> rating.
>
> The only way for such a system to work would be if a select panel of people
> did the evaluating. Of course, then you run into the issue of who should
> sit on the panel and why their opinion should hold any weight in the first
> place. Then there is the time involved in reviewing any MUDs that are
> submitting and ensuring that the quality of any MUDs which make the cut
> don't take any sudden drops in quality.
>
> Inevitably, you would end up with a list of MUDs which are run by people who
> are either on the panel or close friends of people on the panel. Putting
> together an unbiased panel would be next to impossible. Even if the panel
> consisted of only players and no admins/coders/immortals, you would still
> not end up with a completely unbiased system of evaluation.
>
> I like the idea, it's just that the logistics of it would need to be worked
> out.
Greetings fellow Mudders,
It seems to me that the first order of buisness would be to compile the
criteria that make up a good/bad mud. A sort of questionaire that could
be filled out by one Administrator of each mud. Simply put 'a team'
would log into the mud, see who the imp's are, and set up a time for an
interview with one of them, and the mud would be 'scored' according to
the answers given to the compiled questionaire. A very large endeavor
indeed, but a start perhaps.
-Spartacus-
-+-Natural Selection-+- telnet://rage.telmaron.com:3250
William Long
Perthigal MUD wrote:
i would be willing to help out. am experienced mud coder/player for some
number of years now (including Valhalla dikuII)(not coder for that one)
i'm sick of all these young punks who can type ./configure ;cd src;make all
think they can get a mud going.
it makes me sick to my stomach. i would welcome the opportunity to "weed out"
the bad apples.
--
Son of Ra, Brother of Poseidon
JCain
Perthigal MUD wrote:
> Richard Woolcock wrote in message <34FE20...@dial.pipex.comNOSPAM>...
> >Better yet, are there any representatives of the mudconnector reading this
> >who would be interested in putting together a 'good mud list'. It is
> >already readily apparent that we have a lot of stock-critics (myself
> >included) - surely between us we could put together some sort of voting
> >system? This might at least let new mudders skip past the crap muds, thus
> >preventing the mudding community from loosing too many players.
> >
> >KaVir.
It would also be tough to come up with a balanced panel of tastes. You might
end up with a "good" list of MUDs with all of them being the same genre. I
think a good idea would be for many people to try out various MUDs and honestly
report on the good ones. The bad ones will probably die from lack of
advertisement or be played only by their creators. Which (btw) is fine.
mda...@worldnet.att.net
William Long <bi...@longboyz.erols.com> wrote in article
>
> i would be willing to help out. am experienced mud coder/player for some
> number of years now (including Valhalla dikuII)(not coder for that one)
>
> i'm sick of all these young punks who can type ./configure ;cd src;make
all
> think they can get a mud going.
> it makes me sick to my stomach. i would welcome the opportunity to "weed
out"
> the bad apples.
>
> Son of Ra, Brother of Poseidon
Definitely a good example of someone who would be a biased judge. Too
tempermental.
Jon A. Lambert
On Fri, 06 Mar 1998 22:32:59 -0500, JCain spaketh...
Perhaps it would be more useful if this is driven by implementor
request. It wouldn't become a McCarthyist effort to "weed out stocks".
Only implementors who are confident enough and willing to take the
criticism of an evalution would apply. This would save quite a bit
of time in performing needless evalations.
--
--/*\ Jon A. Lambert - TychoMUD Email:jlsy...@nospam.ix.netcom.com /*\--
--/*\ Mud Server Developer's Page <http://www.netcom.com/~jlsysinc> /*\--
--/*\ "Everything that deceives may be said to enchant" - Plato /*\--
Joachim Pileborg
At 07-Mar-98 00:13:46, Spartacus wrote:
[snip]
>Greetings fellow Mudders,
> It seems to me that the first order of buisness would be to compile the
>criteria that make up a good/bad mud. A sort of questionaire that could
>be filled out by one Administrator of each mud. Simply put 'a team'
>would log into the mud, see who the imp's are, and set up a time for an
>interview with one of them, and the mud would be 'scored' according to
>the answers given to the compiled questionaire. A very large endeavor
>indeed, but a start perhaps.
I agree that 'a team' of these reviewers should test the muds,
so that the review wont get too biased. However, I don't think
the whole team should review a mud at the same time, but more like
'today I check this mud out, and you can do it tomorrow'. The
exception is of course if the mud is aiming for people to group
together, the review team must remember to count that in their
reviews too.
Now to another problem. How should the admins of a mud know that
it really is the review team (or person) that has logged into the mud?
Sure, the review team can (and should) have a spokesperson that
mails a mud admin a couple of days before the review, but then it
allows the admins to prepare (they are constantly logged on to the
mud, are very kind to all players, makes lots of quests, that sort
of things), which isn't such a good thing.
Also, as mentioned in an another message in one of these threads,
this isn't for the really new players that have never tried a mud
(because they don't know what they like yet), but instead of the
players that are quite new to muds, but have decided what the like
in muds (as well as experienced players that want to change mud).
However, this is just the ramblings of a, more or less, man brain... :)
Joachim Pileborg
At 07-Mar-98 03:38:27, William Long wrote:
>Perthigal MUD wrote:
[snip]
>i'm sick of all these young punks who can type ./configure ;cd src;make all
>think they can get a mud going.
>it makes me sick to my stomach. i would welcome the opportunity to "weed
>out" the bad apples.
Uhm, I don't think the purpose of this review system (that is discussed in
several threads now) to tell the stock muds "You are a stock mud, shut
down permanently!", but more like "Here is a list of what most players
like, maybe you can get an idea or two on how make your mud better".
The Wildman
On 07 Mar 98 14:43:52 +0100, Wildman's eyes rolled up in his head and
froth dripped from his fangs when Joachim Pileborg
<pi...@trelleborg.mail.telia.com> said
the following fighting words:
>
>Now to another problem. How should the admins of a mud know that
>it really is the review team (or person) that has logged into the mud?
>Sure, the review team can (and should) have a spokesperson that
>mails a mud admin a couple of days before the review, but then it
>allows the admins to prepare (they are constantly logged on to the
>mud, are very kind to all players, makes lots of quests, that sort
>of things), which isn't such a good thing.
>
that a reviewer is coming by. They try to be in top form all the time in
case a reviewer drops by unexpectedly. How can this possibly be a bad thing?
It accomplishes the purpose - to improve the mudding world.
--
The Wildman
-----------
Gratuitous web page advertisement - http://www.microserve.net/~wildman/
Perthigal MUD
Joachim Pileborg wrote in message
>
>Now to another problem. How should the admins of a mud know that
>it really is the review team (or person) that has logged into the mud?
>Sure, the review team can (and should) have a spokesperson that
>mails a mud admin a couple of days before the review, but then it
>allows the admins to prepare (they are constantly logged on to the
>mud, are very kind to all players, makes lots of quests, that sort
>of things), which isn't such a good thing.
You are dead wrong here. The admins/immortals/players/etc should NOT know
when we are coming or even what name(s) we'll be using. When a restaurant
critic walks into a restaurant, he doesn't announce to the manager or staff
that he's a restaurant critic. In fact, the restaurant doesn't know it was
reviewed until it's published. I think this should be along the same lines.
Chris (Talison)
I think the easiest test to perform to decide whether a Mud is "good" or
not, is simply to see whether the Mud has sustained a large(ish) player base
over a long time. This obviously wouldn't tell the reader whether the Mud
was original, well coded etc..., it would however, well...show that its well
coded, playable, friendly,... *enough* to hold a large number of people's
interest long enough.
Getting these figures wouldn't take too long, maybe logging on a few times a
day to see how many users there are, possibly asking an oldish player a few
questions. Things would be easier if the Mud had a web page that showed this
data - Maybe have it so that if the Mud doesn't have this page, it is deemed
not worthy and not entered in the list. Accompanied with this info could be
a line describing the theme of the Mud and what period it is set in.
Doing it this way does have advantages:
- the requested info is not affected by bias
- it wouldn't take as long as other suggestions to compile
- the resulting list would be short(er) in terms of size of review on each
Mud and length (fewer Muds will fit the criteria)
- it is actually logistically possible (if the person/team in question is
dedicated)
- new, unoriginal stock muds with no players will be cut out (in my view a
good thing)
- the list will have Muds of all genres
- stock Muds that have large amounts of players will be left in (for those
who like stock stuff)
The last point may be viewed as a disadvantage to some but can be solved by
including a point on whether the Mud is stock or not in the small line of
description.
Disadvantages:
- it won't be detailed (I view this more of an advantage)
- it may cut out new quality Muds that have potential but have few players
(is it a common thing?)
--
Chris (Talison)
P.S. Is there a Mud better than the Discworld? Of my limited experience of
different Muds I have never found this to be true. - please only comment on
this if you have played both the Discworld and this better Mud extensively.
Thanks :)
Richard Woolcock
Chris (Talison) wrote:
>
> I think the easiest test to perform to decide whether a Mud is "good" or
> not, is simply to see whether the Mud has sustained a large(ish) player base
> over a long time. This obviously wouldn't tell the reader whether the Mud
> was original, well coded etc..., it would however, well...show that its well
> coded, playable, friendly,... *enough* to hold a large number of people's
> interest long enough.
All this would do is show muds which are both popular and well known. The
point of the review (or am I mistaken here?) is to give potential players a
selection of very different, fun muds to play on, so that they don't get the
impression that all muds are the same.
Even if it was decided to use player base (ie BIG is BETTER) to determine
the good muds, what about muds which allow multiplay?
> Chris (Talison)
>
> P.S. Is there a Mud better than the Discworld? Of my limited experience of
> different Muds I have never found this to be true. - please only comment on
> this if you have played both the Discworld and this better Mud extensively.
> Thanks :)
Define 'better'. If - according to your comments above - you believe a better
mud is one which has a larger player base, then yes, there a many better muds.
KaVir.
Phil Shadick
> At the risk of public ridicule.................An Attempt at a Practical Plan
One of the problems cited with this potential project is that because there are 28
billion MUDs out there no-one has time to perform this review properly. Another is
the difficulty of selecting an impartial panel. Thirdly, a reviewed MUD's moderator
(if that's the word) who gets slated might complain, "well that reviewer wasn't
objective/didn't spend long enough/is a wanker anyway." Finally, judging how good or
bad a MUD is, is an objective opinion.
Here's a suggestion. I think it answers most of the above points, at least in part.
1. Main Theme
Select a manageable number (wait before you flame) of MUDs to be reviewed. Whatever
that number is (50 ? 100 ?) break them down into smaller groups, classifying
them by theme/genre, and whatever else is most appropriate to group the like MUDs
together.
Further reduce these groups so that you end up with sub-groups of say, 4 or 5 MUDs.
Then, each MUD appoints a representative (could be anyone) to a review panel and
each representative reviews the 4 or 5 MUDs in a NEIGHBOURING cell (my idea to
eliminate bias). With a schedule of only a few MUDs, the reviewers can spend a
"significant" amount of time over a period of a couple of weeks or more to perform a
review. A modification of this plan would be to make the groups larger, but have the
MUDs appoint multiple representatives to the review panel.
Thus, you get several separate viewpoints on every single MUD and nobody in
particular has had to look at a thousand MUDs online.
Finally, each review panel votes on their favourite MUD (or the top two) in the
neighbouring group. Now you have a nice list of MUDs whose peers said they were
"best in group."
2. A Few Loose Ends (and there are plenty more as I'm sure we'll all hear !):
(a) Selecting MUDs.
Simply invite readers of this group who moderate MUDs to volunteer to enter the
review process. This will select against those who don't want to do the work, those
with crappy (to coin a phrase) MUDs who fear they won't fare well in comparison, and
those who don't read this group (but hopefully the word will get around).
(b) Who is doing the co-ordination?
Perhaps one of the individuals (someone credible, whoever that may be) posting on
this topic might offer to co-ordinate things, and invite others to join him/her on
an oversight committee/working group. Such a committee should ensure that it is not
perceived as biased toward or against any particular MUD or genre. By which I mean
try not to compose yourselves of people who all hate "stocks," or sci-fi or
whatever. How about a public election?
This committee should publish the names of the MUDs to be reviewed, break them down
into cells, and arrange with each MUD's representative to collect their reviews.
Next, the 4 (or however many) different viewpoints on each MUD can be looked at
together and compounded into an overall picture.
Finally, it should arrange for publication, presumably as a webpage linked from the
main pages devoted to this pastime.
The committee will have a helluva lot of work to do laying down and publishing the
groundrules (eg nothing still in testing), but I expect their interest in the
project will compensate them for their time <grins>.
(c) Criteria
Perhaps a matter for debate which needs a brand new newsgroup - maybe the project as
a whole requires it to keep the traffic off of this one. I think the criteria should
be debated in open forum, and that an Oversight Committee should finalise a survey
form based on the most popular ideas, after the debate seems to have run its course.
There's been a ton of posts on this subject so I won't add any more material here.
**********************************
Merely an outline of course. I'm sure there are flaws and other loose ends to tie up
before this could ever be practical.
If anyone thinks it doesn't suck too much as a CONCEPT, feel free to pick this ball
up and run with it. Include me out, because I know sod all about what makes a good
MUD!
Cheers,
Phil
Richard Woolcock
Phil Shadick wrote:
>
> > At the risk of public ridicule.................An Attempt at a Practical Plan
>
> One of the problems cited with this potential project is that because there are 28
> billion MUDs out there no-one has time to perform this review properly. Another is
[snip suggestions]
> If anyone thinks it doesn't suck too much as a CONCEPT, feel free to pick this ball
> up and run with it. Include me out, because I know sod all about what makes a good
> MUD!
You have some worthwhile suggestions, but as far as there being '28 billion MUDS' -
there ARE a lot of muds out there, but in 99% of the cases you can spot stock as
soon as you log on, and thus wouldn't have to bother reviewing the mud.
KaVir.
Nathan Alexander Simington
Holly Sommer wrote:
>
> It's interesting. Apparently, the folks who most vocally espouse that
> one shouldn't start a MUD unless one knows how to code are, in fact,
> coders themselves. Some do double-time as admin types as well, but by
> and large it seems to be coders.
Yeah...the coder perspective appears to be that many administrators
take coding for granted, and only an expert coder can be knowledgeable
enough about mud design to have a useful opinion. It's interesting to
consider why. I'm sure that the coders who have this attitude have been
burned before by cheesy admins, and I'm also sure that non-coding admins
would tend not to be aware of the actual potential of muds. It wouldn't
seem very productive, however, to counter-punch before the other
fellow's gotten started.
> Now, don't get me wrong, I firmly believe that a potential imp should
> have some experience under his/her belt as at LEAST a seasoned player,
> before trying out their luck at their own MUD, however... I don't think
> that having programming skills should be a requisite for starting a MUD.
> [snip]
> It would seem that enterprising endeavors are being frowned up as
> something which the "general populace" shouldn't be allowed to try.
>
I would say that the power of feeble stockmuds has been overrated in
this discussion group. If it's so cruddy, and the coders know what
would make it better...well, most skilled coders can almost write their
own tickets. There's always someone looking for help, and if they're
worth associating with they'll allow you to innovate almost at will.
I expect I'll be hearing from KaVir and Aristotle on this score (=
*cringes in terror*.
Regards,
Nathan
Nathan Alexander Simington
Hear hear (= Application for judgement sounds like the best idea yet
on this issue.
Richard Woolcock
Nathan Alexander Simington wrote:
>
> Holly Sommer wrote:
[snip]
> > Now, don't get me wrong, I firmly believe that a potential imp should
> > have some experience under his/her belt as at LEAST a seasoned player,
> > before trying out their luck at their own MUD, however... I don't think
> > that having programming skills should be a requisite for starting a MUD.
> > [snip]
> > It would seem that enterprising endeavors are being frowned up as
> > something which the "general populace" shouldn't be allowed to try.
Scenario one:
Clueless admin-type runs a mud, doesn't know what will and won't work well
as far as coding is concerned. Tells the coder/s what s/he wants implemented.
Scenario two:
Coder type runs a mud, likes to code and codes whatever s/he likes. Possibly
gets other imms to run the mud, but they cannot tell him/her what should or
shouldn't be added (ie, they cannot stunt the vision of the coder).
A good coder needs vision and skill. A good admin needs patience and diplomacy.
> I would say that the power of feeble stockmuds has been overrated in
> this discussion group. If it's so cruddy, and the coders know what
> would make it better...well, most skilled coders can almost write their
How many skilled coders do you know who write muds? I can think of maybe
a couple of dozen at most...just take a look at the rubbish people are
spewing forth onto the net.
> own tickets. There's always someone looking for help, and if they're
> worth associating with they'll allow you to innovate almost at will.
>
> I expect I'll be hearing from KaVir and Aristotle on this score (=
> *cringes in terror*.
I agree in most, but the sheer number of stockmuds IS putting potential
players off mudding, and I believe that clueless people (both admin and
coders) are mostly to blame.
KaVir.
The Wildman
On Wed, 11 Mar 1998 19:17:20 -0800, Wildman's eyes rolled up in his head and
froth dripped from his fangs when Richard Woolcock <Ka...@dial.pipex.comNOSPAM>
said the following fighting words:
>
>there ARE a lot of muds out there, but in 99% of the cases you can spot stock as
>soon as you log on, and thus wouldn't have to bother reviewing the mud.
was stock, not that I would have known, and is actually a pretty good one in
spite of that. Some stock muds are worth reviewing. Granted, this mud
already had a two year history when I first joined it.
Richard Woolcock
The Wildman wrote:
>
> On Wed, 11 Mar 1998 19:17:20 -0800, Wildman's eyes rolled up in his head and
> froth dripped from his fangs when Richard Woolcock <Ka...@dial.pipex.comNOSPAM>
> said the following fighting words:
> >
> >You have some worthwhile suggestions, but as far as there being '28 billion MUDS' -
> >there ARE a lot of muds out there, but in 99% of the cases you can spot stock as
> >soon as you log on, and thus wouldn't have to bother reviewing the mud.
> Hmmm... I don't think that's a fair assessment. The first mud I started on
> was stock, not that I would have known, and is actually a pretty good one in
> spite of that. Some stock muds are worth reviewing. Granted, this mud
> already had a two year history when I first joined it.
I think you are confusing stock muds with stock-based muds. Most of the muds
out there are stock based, but only a few of those have any serious changes.
When I call a mud 'stock', I am talking about a mud which is practically
unchanged from the downloaded source code.
KaVir.
Threshold RPG
In article <3506D12A...@mail.usask.ca>, trump...@cyberdude.com wrote:
>> It's interesting. Apparently, the folks who most vocally espouse that
>> one shouldn't start a MUD unless one knows how to code are, in fact,
>> coders themselves. Some do double-time as admin types as well, but by
>> and large it seems to be coders.
>
>Yeah...the coder perspective appears to be that many administrators
>take coding for granted, and only an expert coder can be knowledgeable
>enough about mud design to have a useful opinion.
The coder/builder/admin distinction is one that really should die. The best
muds are coded/admined/etc/etc/etc by a very small group of people (or at
best, 1 person). The traditional "wiz/builder/coder" staff of tens or hundreds
of people is what has given us loads of stock areas in circulation and a bunch
of muds that look like patchwork quilts instead of actual worlds.
>I would say that the power of feeble stockmuds has been overrated in
>this discussion group.
I think the negative effect on this hobby by stockmuds is being entirely
underrated. As a new mudder, I don't see how I could hope to stumble upon a
decent mud. 5 years ago when I started searching for a cool mud to play on I
had to sort through a bunch of crap back then, and I had heard a lot of great
stuff about muds and was prepared to go on a hard target search for a quality
game. Nowadays, with a lot 'flashier' types of entertainment out there to
entice players, if they cant find a decent mud after a few tries, its over.
-Aristotle@Threshold
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
VISIT THRESHOLD ONLINE! High Fantasy Role Playing Game!
Player run clans, guilds, businesses, legal system, nobility, missile
combat, detailed religions, rich, detailed roleplaying environment.
http://www.threshold.counseltech.com
telnet://threshold.counseltech.com:23
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
Richard Bartle
wildman-s...@microserve.net (The Wildman) wrote:
>Some stock muds are worth reviewing. Granted, this mud
>already had a two year history when I first joined it.
years?
Richard
The Wildman
On Thu, 12 Mar 1998 07:44:25 -0500, Wildman's eyes rolled up in his head and
froth dripped from his fangs when Richard Bartle <76703...@CompuServe.COM>
said the following fighting words:
only been open a few months, but has three years of coding behind it. Not
reviewing it would be unfair IMO.
BSName
On Thu, Mar 12, 1998 01:30 EST, Richard Woolcock <Ka...@dial.pipex.comNOSPAM>
wrote:
>I think you are confusing stock muds with stock-based muds. Most of the muds
>out there are stock based, but only a few of those have any serious changes.
>When I call a mud 'stock', I am talking about a mud which is practically
>unchanged from the downloaded source code.
>
>KaVir.
I swore I wouldn't respond to any posts in this thread, as I personally believe
the entire idea to be unfeasible and ludicrous. However, KaVir's post raises a
point that I have been wondering about, for some time.
First, I should clarify something:
1). I am NOT a good coder. I have started teaching myself C, using a MUD engine
to work with, but learning to code was only part of the decision to work with a
MUD. The other (and main) reason being that as an old-time AD&D player and DM,
I wanted to try my hand at creating a world (campaign) for a wider range of
players. I like coding, and want to become good at it, but that isn't the whole
reason for choosing MUDs.
2). I personally believe that downloading a 'stock' MUD, compiling it, and
throwing it up on a server for public consumption is pointless (using my frame
of reference, it would be like playing AD&D and only using commercially
available 'modules' and never making your own campaigns).
As a DM, my best pleasure from gaming was watching players enjoy the campaigns
that I had created for them. Generally, I stayed within the 'rules' of AD&D,
and just made an environment in which the players could play. More often than
not, I was successful at this, and everyone involved had fun.
Now, I have been subscribed to this newsgroup for about 4-5 months, and have
always been interested in the discussions of 'Stock vs. non-stock'. I was
always a bit unsure what was meant by 'stock'. KaVir's post clarified some
questions on this subject, that have been nagging me.
Here is where I would like to get some response.
If I were to download a MUD, compile it, and put it on a server and 'open for
business' (buying AD&D rule books, a few 'modules', and start playing), should
I be 'condemned' for having a [worthless] stock MUD? *My* answer to that would
be 'yes'.
On the other hand, if I write all my own source code, from scratch, and build
all unique areas (ignore AD&D, write my own RPG rules, and create all new
campaigns - basically make a new game), should I be 'condemed' for having a
[worthless] stock MUD? Of course not.
But what about the 'in-betweeners'? If I were to download a publicly available
source, make a few very minor code changes (to suit my 'style'), and strip out
all the 'stock' areas, and create the entire world, from scratch (i.e. Buy AD&D
rule books, ignore or change minor things that didn't suit me, but wouldn't
affect playability, and only used my own campaigns), should my MUD be condemned
as 'stock' (i.e. worthless)?
More than likely, if I ever *do* make my mud publically accessable, I will fall
into the 'in-betweeners'
category. I simply do not have the time, nor the desire (even if I did possess
the skills) to code a MUD from scratch. My primary goal would be to interest
enough players to play, and to give them a fun time, while playing. But that is
my motivation, and it doesn't *have* to be anyone elses. If all *you* want
(speaking generally to all the imps out there - not speaking specifically to
KaVir) is to make a MUD for the sole purpose of dazzling your fellow coders /
admins / whatever, then power to you. There is absolutely nothing wrong with
that. That is *your* motivation. But quite often (again, speaking generally),
it seems that much of the 'stock vs non-stock' debate smacks of "We are playing
cowboys and indians, and you are a worthless so-and-so, because you want to
play cops and robbers".
Anyway, let me know what you all think about this, if you think it's a valid
point. I've rambled on long enough.
~~Scot~~
Richard Woolcock
BSName wrote:
>
> On Thu, Mar 12, 1998 01:30 EST, Richard Woolcock <Ka...@dial.pipex.comNOSPAM>
> wrote:
[snip]
> First, I should clarify something:
> 1). I am NOT a good coder. I have started teaching myself C, using a MUD engine
> to work with, but learning to code was only part of the decision to work with a
> MUD. The other (and main) reason being that as an old-time AD&D player and DM,
> I wanted to try my hand at creating a world (campaign) for a wider range of
> players. I like coding, and want to become good at it, but that isn't the whole
> reason for choosing MUDs.
Well when I started coding godwars, I didn't know C either ;)
> 2). I personally believe that downloading a 'stock' MUD, compiling it, and
> throwing it up on a server for public consumption is pointless (using my frame
> of reference, it would be like playing AD&D and only using commercially
> available 'modules' and never making your own campaigns).
Agreed. Now imagine that any player could join any AD&D game - don't you think
it would give someone a bad impression if they found that all AD&D games were
exactly the same? After playing the same module two or three times they would
probably stop playing.
> As a DM, my best pleasure from gaming was watching players enjoy the campaigns
> that I had created for them. Generally, I stayed within the 'rules' of AD&D,
> and just made an environment in which the players could play. More often than
> not, I was successful at this, and everyone involved had fun.
I always preferred to change the rules of roleplaying games, or mix and match
the rules.
> Now, I have been subscribed to this newsgroup for about 4-5 months, and have
> always been interested in the discussions of 'Stock vs. non-stock'. I was
> always a bit unsure what was meant by 'stock'. KaVir's post clarified some
> questions on this subject, that have been nagging me.
>
> Here is where I would like to get some response.
>
> If I were to download a MUD, compile it, and put it on a server and 'open for
> business' (buying AD&D rule books, a few 'modules', and start playing), should
> I be 'condemned' for having a [worthless] stock MUD? *My* answer to that would
> be 'yes'.
Agreed.
> On the other hand, if I write all my own source code, from scratch, and build
> all unique areas (ignore AD&D, write my own RPG rules, and create all new
> campaigns - basically make a new game), should I be 'condemed' for having a
> [worthless] stock MUD? Of course not.
Agreed.
> But what about the 'in-betweeners'? If I were to download a publicly available
> source, make a few very minor code changes (to suit my 'style'), and strip out
> all the 'stock' areas, and create the entire world, from scratch (i.e. Buy AD&D
> rule books, ignore or change minor things that didn't suit me, but wouldn't
> affect playability, and only used my own campaigns), should my MUD be condemned
> as 'stock' (i.e. worthless)?
That depends on WHAT you added, and why. Adding clans, extra classes/races/levels
and a few areas doesn't make the mud original. Something as simple as changing
the classes and races to a specific theme, rewriting the areas to all fit that
theme, and adding a few small pieces of code CAN make the mud original, although
it will still have a 'stocky' feel which is unavoidable without a lot of work.
> More than likely, if I ever *do* make my mud publically accessable, I will fall
> into the 'in-betweeners' category.
Most muds fall into that category, my own included - yet I have never been
accused of running a stock mud.
> I simply do not have the time, nor the desire (even if I did possess
> the skills) to code a MUD from scratch. My primary goal would be to interest
> enough players to play, and to give them a fun time, while playing. But that is
> my motivation, and it doesn't *have* to be anyone elses. If all *you* want
> (speaking generally to all the imps out there - not speaking specifically to
> KaVir) is to make a MUD for the sole purpose of dazzling your fellow coders /
> admins / whatever, then power to you. There is absolutely nothing wrong with
> that. That is *your* motivation. But quite often (again, speaking generally),
> it seems that much of the 'stock vs non-stock' debate smacks of "We are playing
> cowboys and indians, and you are a worthless so-and-so, because you want to
> play cops and robbers".
My motivation is to create a WoD themed mud to the best of my ability. The
problem is that I am never satisified with my work - I am my own worst critic.
KaVir.
cimri
Hey Folks, and especially Spartacus!
Wow, what timing! A few friends and I have been working on a site, now
nearing
readiness, whose purpose is to review on-line rpgs (ORPGs), primarily
muds.
We didn't want to leave out other possibilities in the future, which is
why we
chose the somewhat more generic ORPG term. We are in this because we
love
MUDs and cuz nobody else seems to be doing this.
Anyway, I have written up a pretty detailed set of things one might want
to know
about an ORPG or MUD. I'll see if I can't put it in ascii plain-text
and post it
in the next message.
We named the whole ORPG/MUD review group "GameCommandos" just for fun.
Our motto is: "We Get in Fast, Play Hard, & Report in Full
Objective: Locate and Identify the games you'll love to
play"
Our general plan is to :
(a) have reviews done by:
- GameCommandos staff
- Players or similar interested parties
- Site owners or admins
(b) identify reviews clearly as to who wrote them
(c) allow anybody, including both sites and players, to request reviews
(e) make sure all reviews/info are identified as to their source
Reviews must, of necessity, include both subjective ("was it fun?") and
objective elements ("How many classes/races are there? Is it mostly
stock?" etc). These would also be clearly labelled.
That's the plan. We'd LOVE for input along these lines. We know we
can't do it all, and that a substantial part of the active folks in the
mudding community need to come together to make this work.
We've had the project in our heads for a few months, and started doing
the
HTML (etc) a few weeks ago. We have the site, a format, most of the
relevant
pages, and a pretty good working document on reviewing which I'll post
next.
I'd love to open this up to players and admins everywhere.
Best regards, Jay // Cimri
email to: ci...@technologist.com
>
> Greetings fellow Mudders,
>
> It seems to me that the first order of buisness would be to compile the
> criteria that make up a good/bad mud.
> -Spartacus-
Marian Griffith
In article <slrn6gfr8i.m5o.w...@foobar.net>, The Wildman
<URL:mailto:wildman-s...@microserve.net> wrote:
> Richard Bartle <76703...@CompuServe.COM> said :
> >wildman-s...@microserve.net (The Wildman) wrote:
] Some stock muds are worth reviewing. Granted, this mud
] already had a two year history when I first joined it.
> > Why not only review MUDs that have been around for at least 2 years?
> But is that two years online or two years of coding? Another good mud has
> only been open a few months, but has three years of coding behind it. Not
> reviewing it would be unfair IMO.
Any mud deserves being reviewed (fairly), otherwise you loose the whole
point of reviewing and you might as well start a list of your favourite
muds.
M.
--
Yes - at last - You. I Choose you. Out of all the world,
out of all the seeking, I have found you, young sister of
my heart! You are mine and I am yours - and never again
will there be loneliness ...
Rolan Choosing Talia,
Arrows of the Queen, by Mercedes Lackey
Threshold RPG
In article <slrn6gfr8i.m5o.w...@foobar.net>, wildman-s...@microserve.net wrote:
>>wildman-s...@microserve.net (The Wildman) wrote:
>> >Some stock muds are worth reviewing. Granted, this mud
>> >already had a two year history when I first joined it.
>> Why not only review MUDs that have been around for at least 2
>>years?
>>
>But is that two years online or two years of coding? Another good mud has
>only been open a few months, but has three years of coding behind it. Not
>reviewing it would be unfair IMO.
I think there is something pretty instructive about the fact that a consensus
cannot even be reached on such a minor detail as this regarding a mud review
panel.
Such a thing is doomed to fail. The fact is there are too many muds, too many
variables, too many cliques, too much infighting, and too much inherent bias
for there to be any kind of 'mud community' review panel.
Now, someone might get a group together who independently went around
reviewing muds, and that could work. The quality of their data/web site/etc.
would of course depend upon the quality of their results.
BSName
On Thu, Mar 12, 1998 23:47 EST, Richard Woolcock <Ka...@dial.pipex.comNOSPAM>
wrote:
[snip]
>Well when I started coding godwars, I didn't know C either ;)
*grin* Kewl. At least know I know now that it can be done. Lately, it seems
like the more I learn, the more I find out how little I actually know. I'm
still having probs with nested if() statements....mostly order of precedence,
etc....*sigh*
>Agreed. Now imagine that any player could join any AD&D game - don't you
>think
>it would give someone a bad impression if they found that all AD&D games were
>exactly the same? After playing the same module two or three times they
>would
>probably stop playing.
Exactly :)
>I always preferred to change the rules of roleplaying games, or mix and match
>the rules.
As did I....to a certain extent. However, it was easier to stay within a 'basic
framework' of rules, so that I didn't have to teach players *how* to play,
before actually getting down to business. But this was simply a matter of
convience. It was a lot harder, back then, to find enough players who knew
*how* to play. (Heh - I did much proselytizing for TSR back then. *grin*)
[snip]
>That depends on WHAT you added, and why. Adding clans, extra
>classes/races/levels
>and a few areas doesn't make the mud original. Something as simple as
>changing
>the classes and races to a specific theme, rewriting the areas to all fit
>that
>theme, and adding a few small pieces of code CAN make the mud original,
>although
>it will still have a 'stocky' feel which is unavoidable without a lot of
>work.
Agreed. I've always thought (and was taught) that in creating a campaign, the
whole *point* was to make a 'storyline' that remained consistant throughout the
campaign. It's just 'common sense' to me. It gives the players a sense of
continuity, and helps them to flesh out their characters, making them more
'real' to the players. It also helps the players to move smoothly from goal to
goal as they progress, in the game. As far as having a 'stocky feel' - well, we
*all* were playing AD&D, but it was quite common to hear how someone's campaign
was crap, while another's was excellent. The 'stockiness' wasn't much of a
factor, as long as the campaign was good. I believe that this can translate to
mudding, as well.
>Most muds fall into that category, my own included - yet I have never been
>accused of running a stock mud.
Which is basically supports the main point I was trying (albeit ineptly,
perhaps) to make. I think someone can make a good MUD, using a 'stock' engine.
>My motivation is to create a WoD themed mud to the best of my ability. The
>problem is that I am never satisified with my work - I am my own worst
>critic.
>
>KaVir.
*wide grin* I know exactly what you mean. It's the same reason I've been
tinkering with my MUD now, for the last six months, or so, and don't feel that
it's anywhere near ready to be opened yet. I don't anticipate opening (if I
ever do) for at least another year, or so....
I would like to take this opportunity to express my thanks, as well, for
responding to an obvious newbie's post in an intelligent (mature?) manner. My
oringinal post was *not* intended as a flame/put-down/whatever.
I'm glad it wasn't recieved that way. I often have difficulty expressing myself
properly, and I am glad you caught the spirit of the post. I was just
addressing some concerns, regarding what I find is a fascinating hobby.
~~Scot~~
David Rudy
In article 1...@usenet50.supernews.com, thre...@counseltech.com (Threshold RPG) writes:
>In article <3506D12A...@mail.usask.ca>, trump...@cyberdude.com wrote:
>>Yeah...the coder perspective appears to be that many administrators
>>take coding for granted, and only an expert coder can be knowledgeable
>>enough about mud design to have a useful opinion.
>
>The coder/builder/admin distinction is one that really should die. The best
>muds are coded/admined/etc/etc/etc by a very small group of people (or at
>best, 1 person). The traditional "wiz/builder/coder" staff of tens or hundreds
>of people is what has given us loads of stock areas in circulation and a bunch
>of muds that look like patchwork quilts instead of actual worlds.
I cannot disagree with this statement enough. A mud can be CODED by one
person yes, but never admin'd. One needs only to count the number of times
Aristotle has had to defend his actions to see the result: the 1 power coder
goes on power trips, has no peers at all to discuss things with, and takes
actions which are not well thought out.
A mud run by one person is not a mud (multi-user), it's a reich (rule).
>I think the negative effect on this hobby by stockmuds is being entirely
>underrated. As a new mudder, I don't see how I could hope to stumble upon a
>decent mud. 5 years ago when I started searching for a cool mud to play on I
>had to sort through a bunch of crap back then, and I had heard a lot of great
>stuff about muds and was prepared to go on a hard target search for a quality
>game. Nowadays, with a lot 'flashier' types of entertainment out there to
>entice players, if they cant find a decent mud after a few tries, its over.
I honestly don't know if stock muds are THAT big of a problem. As definitions
go, defining a 'decent mud' is a matter of opinion. An established codebase
(stock) that doesn't crash and has good imps can be quite decent for the first
time player. It certainly beats logging on to a super-custom from-scratch
mud that crashes on you, then you curse and get booted for not reading the
help files, then you come back on to try to figure out what is going on and
the admin on a power trip yells at you and makes an example of you for the
world to see.
For some, the 'patchwork' is the quality game. KoBra mud lost a lot of its
best features when it removed the patchwork of sci-fi areas and turned it into
a star wars theme only mud. The variety keeps them interested. A person does
not have to know the story of the entire game universe to be able to have fun
in a new area.
We each have our preferences. For me: I prefer creative muds, which means
that more than 1 person is working on it. I prefer muds where the players
and coders get fair treatment, and this practically demands a team of admin
that document policies and check each other. I prefer muds where you can
use straight telnet and have the features of mud clients available inside
the mud so that you are not disadvantaged. I like global communication
channels and want inter-player "tells" to not cost anything in terms of points,
so that I can talk to my friends freely. I don't like being told that I
HAVE to roleplay a world, as I often like to find out who is behind the
screen. But all of this is just me.
For a player to learn what THEY like, they need to experience a few different
muds. The only real harm is that when all the stock muds are the exact same
type, players out to explore a new mud end up finding more of the same.
And if they happen to not like that type, they might be gone from mudding
for good instead of searching to find something new.
David Rudy
dar...@aule.eng.sun.com.nospam
Hal Black
David Rudy wrote:
>
> In article 1...@usenet50.supernews.com, thre...@counseltech.com (Threshold RPG) writes:
>
> >The coder/builder/admin distinction is one that really should die. The best
> >muds are coded/admined/etc/etc/etc by a very small group of people (or at
> >best, 1 person). The traditional "wiz/builder/coder" staff of tens or hundreds
> >of people is what has given us loads of stock areas in circulation and a bunch
> >of muds that look like patchwork quilts instead of actual worlds.
>
> I cannot disagree with this statement enough. A mud can be CODED by one
> person yes, but never admin'd. One needs only to count the number of times
> Aristotle has had to defend his actions to see the result: the 1 power coder
> goes on power trips, has no peers at all to discuss things with, and takes
> actions which are not well thought out.
>
> A mud run by one person is not a mud (multi-user), it's a reich (rule)
Seems like you are against power trips and poorly thought out actions,
which are not a neccesary consequence of a small administration. And
the fact that Aristotle is asked to defend his actions is no evidence
either, it could merely be the petulence of people who are used to and
prefer a lack of administration and the deadlock that is the mainstay of
many muds with a huge ruling group.
There are problems with a single admin/coder, but they don't have
anything to do with what you've said. The problems result from time
being finite, and one person having too much to do. The best thing to
do is to start out from the beginning of your mud with a small group of
people who agree on the design goals and administration. That way, the
workload can be shared over a group of people without one person
experiencing overworking or burnout, yet the mud is a consistent whole
in administration and theme. Of course, people become disinterested and
fall by the wayside, and may change their opinion, so this is kindof
hard.
Threshold RPG
In article <350AAD5B...@nospam.edu>, Hal Black <hab...@nospam.edu> wrote:
>David Rudy wrote:
>> In article 1...@usenet50.supernews.com, thre...@counseltech.com (Threshold
> RPG) writes:
>>
>> >The coder/builder/admin distinction is one that really should die. The best
>> >muds are coded/admined/etc/etc/etc by a very small group of people (or at
>> >best, 1 person). The traditional "wiz/builder/coder" staff of tens or
>> >hundreds of people is what has given us loads of stock areas in circulation
>> > and a bunch of muds that look like patchwork quilts instead of actual
>> >worlds.
>>
>> I cannot disagree with this statement enough. A mud can be CODED by one
>> person yes, but never admin'd.
You have it backwards. The coding is the hardest part and takes the most work.
That is the only place where having more than 1 programmer would be helpful.
As for administration, 1 admin is by far the best. You have one set of rules,
that are applied consistently because it is always the same person
administrating. Problems are dealt with quickly and efficiently, since there
is no 'committee' to decide if some abusive or cheating player should be
deleted.
>> >One needs only to count the number of times
>> Aristotle has had to defend his actions to see the result: the 1 power coder
>> goes on power trips, has no peers at all to discuss things with, and takes
>> actions which are not well thought out.
A few times a year is a lot? You must be used to muds where there is so much
gridlock and internal strife that problems simply go undealt with. If you are
ruffling feathers, it is a good sign you are doing things right.
Furthermore, it is OBVIOUS that people who get deleted are going to be upset.
This does not eliminate the wrongfulness of their actions. If you think about
it, an admin has NOTHING to gain from deleting people for no reason. There is
no "advancement" in the ranks for him/her (since he is the only person), and
it certainly doesn't expand the player base. A single administrator is the
LEAST likely to make decisions based on reasons not associated to the problems
involved.
>> A mud run by one person is not a mud (multi-user), it's a reich (rule)
Whether or not a game is multi user has nothing to do with the number of
people running the game. Is AD&D not a multi player game if you have one DM?
You need to avoid such slipshod defining of terms.
Power trips by administrators result for the exact opposite reasons you
listed. Wizards/coders/admins go on power trips because they want to gain
internal power within the "political" structure of their game's hierarchy. In
a system with one admin, there is no such political structure, and thus no
basis/reason/motivation for a "power trip".
As for power tripping in relation to players, you are fooling yourself. Every
single person on a mud knows that the admin/programmer has superior "power"
than the players. Power Trips are things people do to PROVE or SHOWOFF their
power. When the distribution of power is a foregone conclusion, power trips
simply do not happen.
Stephen Blundon
Well that wouldn't be too bad an idea.
> You have some worthwhile suggestions, but as far as there being '28 billion MUDS' -
> there ARE a lot of muds out there, but in 99% of the cases you can spot stock as
> soon as you log on, and thus wouldn't have to bother reviewing the mud.
>
Nicholas Wolverson
In article <uLxrXSb...@nih2naab.prod2.compuserve.com>,
76703...@CompuServe.COM says...
>wildman-s...@microserve.net (The Wildman) wrote:
> >Some stock muds are worth reviewing. Granted, this mud
> >already had a two year history when I first joined it.
> Why not only review MUDs that have been around for at least 2
>years?
>
>
I personally feel a much better idea would be to start by reviewing the
muds that have been around longer and work towards the eventual goal of
reviewing them all. This could be done in a band based system, with the
MUDs that have been open 5 years being reviewed before those that have
been open 4, and so on. Given enough time, all muds would be reviewed,
and it would be relatively easy to review new muds as they're released.
A good compromise, no?
After a certain period of time, or after all if the MUDs have been done
the reviewers could always look back at MUDs that are older (younger??)
than a certain date, and make amendments. Or should an amendment happen
simply when it is suggested by players (obviously after reviewers check
out the MUD again)?
I don't think it is viable to look at how long a MUD is unreleased, but
coded for, as this can easily be lied about by the staff, introducing a
flaw into the review system.
I'm sorry for rambling, but...I ramble a lot.
Bye!
--
Nicholas Wolverson
http://www.btinternet.com/~n.wolverson/
"I MUST SAY THESE ARE VERY GOOD BISCUITS. HOW DO THEY GET THE BITS OF
CHOCOLATE IN?"
IVlacBeth
I was checking up on the UseNet boards, and noticed your request for a
newbie-friendly MUD. try <wolf.mudservices.com: 4000> I've been playing here
since just after it opend and have seen it change greatly. It is a wonderful
place, and while it has "stcok" areas, it has plenty of original and fun ones
as well.
John Adelsberger
David Rudy (dar...@inpg.eng.sun.com.nospam) wrote:
I hate to do this to a guy with such a cool company, but the sweeping
generalizations here, which I will refute with my own sweeping
generalizations in a flight of hypocrisy seldom seen by the eyes of
mortals, are such that I am almost reminded of George Reese, so...
: I cannot disagree with this statement enough. A mud can be CODED by one
: person yes, but never admin'd. One needs only to count the number of times
: Aristotle has had to defend his actions to see the result: the 1 power coder
: goes on power trips, has no peers at all to discuss things with, and takes
: actions which are not well thought out.
Muds with more than one person in charge are generally red tape nightmares.
A mud is not real life; in real life, people have rights, and democracy
is useful in protecting them. On a mud, you have no rights; consistency
and decisiveness are more useful than they are in real life.
I will neither defend nor attack Aristotle's mud or admin work; I have
never visited his mud, and probably won't anytime soon. However,
regardless of his talent or lack thereof, single admin muds are still
usually the best ones around. The one I play on has two admins, but
one does mostly code and the other mostly player issues and so forth;
they get along, and it works ok, but even then, they have so many 'sub
admin' positions that red tape is a nightmare.
: A mud run by one person is not a mud (multi-user), it's a reich (rule).
While a mud run by one person _is_ in fact a mud, it is also, to put it
more strongly than you have the nerve to, a dictatorship. This is as it
should be.
: the admin on a power trip yells at you and makes an example of you for the
: world to see.
I am no admin on a power trip, but I will be the only admin on my mud, which
is custom and does not crash any more frequently than any other. I do what
I do because I happen to enjoy it; if I find it to be unenjoyable for some
reason, I will either quit or do what it takes to make it enjoyable again.
: We each have our preferences. For me: I prefer creative muds, which means
: that more than 1 person is working on it. I prefer muds where the players
Creative does not mean that more than one person is working on it. The
best creative efforts of all human history are and will remain the works
of individuals.
: and coders get fair treatment, and this practically demands a team of admin
: that document policies and check each other. I prefer muds where you can
Or else a good admin. Imagine...
: For a player to learn what THEY like, they need to experience a few different
: muds. The only real harm is that when all the stock muds are the exact same
: type, players out to explore a new mud end up finding more of the same.
Thank you for saying 'stock muds aren't a problem, unless they're stock.'
This is truly enlightening.
--
John J. Adelsberger III
j...@umr.edu
"Civilization is the process of setting man free from men."
- Ayn Rand
Jon A. Lambert
On 19 Mar 98 22:15:55 GMT, John Adelsberger spaketh...
>
>David Rudy (dar...@inpg.eng.sun.com.nospam) wrote:
>
>: I cannot disagree with this statement enough. A mud can be CODED by one
>: person yes, but never admin'd. One needs only to count the number of times
>: Aristotle has had to defend his actions to see the result: the 1 power coder
>: goes on power trips, has no peers at all to discuss things with, and takes
>: actions which are not well thought out.
>
The notion that authority cannot be held by a single person and used
effectively and judiciously is fallacious.
>: A mud run by one person is not a mud (multi-user), it's a reich (rule).
>
>While a mud run by one person _is_ in fact a mud, it is also, to put it
>more strongly than you have the nerve to, a dictatorship. This is as it
>should be.
>
I agree 100%. I call the concept "benevolent dictatorship" (TM). :)
There's also an odd misconception that an authoritarian method of running
a mud means one and only one person is involved in the administration and/or
coding of the mud. Delegation of responsibilities and duties need not mean
giving up absolute authority.
Absolute authority does NOT corrupt. The intrinsic character of the
individual determines the level and nature of corruption.
--
--/*\ Jon A. Lambert - TychoMUD Email:jlsy...@nospam.ix.netcom.com /*\--
--/*\ Mud Server Developer's Page <http://www.netcom.com/~jlsysinc> /*\--
--/*\ "Everything that deceives may be said to enchant" - Plato /*\--
cimri
Hello! Couldn't care less about this exchange, but my esteemed
colleague's last
reference in this post, requoted at top for clarity, deserves a brief,
hmm, addendum:
> Absolute authority does NOT corrupt. The intrinsic character of the
> individual determines the level and nature of corruption.
As Lord Acton originally put it, and it was surely not under
inspiration,
"Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely."
(John Emerich Edward Dalberg Acton wrote to a church functionary in a
letter
with the well-known words above, and also wrote "The possession of
unlimited
power corrodes the conscience, hardens the heart, and confounds the
understanding.")
(The 'tends to' phrase is nearly always left out of modern citations.
pity.)
Anyway, just wanted to check if you were trying to contradict Lord
Acton,
or just make a distinction between 'authority' and 'power.' If the
former,
I think I'd respectfully take his side over yours; if the latter,
I'd be interested to know what sort of distinction you would find there.
And finally, I gladly yell out "Hear him!" to the "intrinsic character"
sentence. We are all pretty much lacking in that area, with some degree
of
variation between ridiculous and abysmal, but yes, there is _some_
variation!
Cheers, Jay // Cimri
Jon A. Lambert wrote:
>
> On 19 Mar 98 22:15:55 GMT, John Adelsberger spaketh...
> >
> >David Rudy (dar...@inpg.eng.sun.com.nospam) wrote:
> >
> >: I cannot disagree with this statement enough. A mud can be CODED
<snip>
> The notion that authority cannot be held by a single person and used
> effectively and judiciously is fallacious.
>
> >: A mud run by one person is not a mud (multi-user), it's a reich (rule).
> >
> >While a mud run by one person _is_ in fact a mud, it is also, to put it
> >more strongly than you have the nerve to, a dictatorship. This is as it
> >should be.
> >
>
> I agree 100%. I call the concept "benevolent dictatorship" (TM). :)
>
<snip>
Threshold Online RPG
In article <6et1kv$g...@dfw-ixnews9.ix.netcom.com>, jlsy...@spammenot.ix.netcom.com (Jon A. Lambert) wrote:
>On 19 Mar 98 22:15:55 GMT, John Adelsberger spaketh...
>>David Rudy (dar...@inpg.eng.sun.com.nospam) wrote:
>>
>>: person yes, but never admin'd.
>
>effectively and judiciously is fallacious.
And real life experience backs up your conclusion. How many Fortune 500
companies have 20 CEOs?
The reason individuals in governments do not have absolute power is because
governments control things like your libery and your life. Government would
function far more efficiently if one person was in charge. However, too much
is at stake to risk such a condiction.
A mud admin has 0 control over the lives of its players. The mud admin runs a
game. It is far more efficient and overall best for the game to have it run by
one set of rules. Poor management is what you get from 10, 20, or more admin
who each apply rules in a different way.
>I agree 100%. I call the concept "benevolent dictatorship" (TM). :)
>Absolute authority does NOT corrupt. The intrinsic character of the
>individual determines the level and nature of corruption.
And when the person only has "absolute authority" over a game that people
CHOOSE to play, it is in the best interests of the administrator to run things
in a consistent and fair manner. The admin has NO CONTROL over his/her
players. If there is abuse, they leave. It is very simple
Threshold Online RPG
In article <35119...@news.cc.umr.edu>, j...@ultra4.cc.umr.edu (John Adelsberger) wrote:
>David Rudy (dar...@inpg.eng.sun.com.nospam) wrote:
>: I cannot disagree with this statement enough. A mud can be CODED by one
>: person yes, but never admin'd.
>
>A mud is not real life; in real life, people have rights, and democracy
>is useful in protecting them. On a mud, you have no rights; consistency
>and decisiveness are more useful than they are in real life.
Poor David is apparently just jealous that there are in fact people out there
who are capable of programming and admining their muds alone. Maybe he wishes
he had the prowess to do this and thus he strikes out at one admined muds
insisting that it is IMPOSSIBLE!
>: the admin on a power trip yells at you and makes an example of you for the
>: world to see.
>
>I am no admin on a power trip, but I will be the only admin on my mud
This "power trip" accusasion levied toward single-admin muds is one of the
most ridiculous accusations from the multi-admin crowd. Power trips and power
politics are things that exist to a FAR GREATER extent on the muds with
multiple admins. That is where you have little power struggles, and other
bureucratic BS that cripples an otherwise good mud. On a single-admin mud,
there is no need for power trips. One person has absolute power, control, etc.
There is nobody to compete with for power. The admin knows it, the players
know it, so power trips simply have no reason to exist.
>: We each have our preferences. For me: I prefer creative muds, which means
>: that more than 1 person is working on it. I prefer muds where the players
>
>Creative does not mean that more than one person is working on it. The
>best creative efforts of all human history are and will remain the works
>of individuals.
Yes, this was one of David's more absurd points. I have hundreds and nearing
thousands of players who provide fresh ideas every single day. Players will
always provide far more ideas than a coder staff, so the suggestion that
single-admined muds are lacking in original ideas is completely flawed.
>: muds. The only real harm is that when all the stock muds are the exact same
>: type, players out to explore a new mud end up finding more of the same.
>
>Thank you for saying 'stock muds aren't a problem, unless they're stock.'
>This is truly enlightening.
Heh. Yes, that point was about as cogent as the rest.
Threshold Online RPG
In article <6eu9ur$417$1...@gte1.gte.net>, ci...@technologist.com wrote:
>> Absolute authority does NOT corrupt. The intrinsic character of the
>> individual determines the level and nature of corruption.
>
>inspiration,
>
>"Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely."
However, a mud administrator doesn't really have power. The real power is in
the hands of the players when they choose whether or not they will login to
play. It is not like you have influence over their liberty, their job, or any
other aspect of their life.
John Adelsberger
Threshold Online RPG <thre...@counseltech.com> wrote:
: In article <6eu9ur$417$1...@gte1.gte.net>, ci...@technologist.com wrote:
: >> Absolute authority does NOT corrupt. The intrinsic character of the
: >> individual determines the level and nature of corruption.
: >
: >As Lord Acton originally put it, and it was surely not under
: >inspiration,
: >
: >"Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely."
: However, a mud administrator doesn't really have power. The real power is in
A stronger argument, although this one is sufficient, is simply to point out
that corruption is a choice; Lord Acton said something which tends to be
very true, but human nature is not so simply described as this. We all
have choices, and those in positions of power are different only in that
they more than any other men need principles in order to _avoid_
corruption.
Threshold Online RPG
In article <3513f...@news.cc.umr.edu>, John Adelsberger <j...@umr.edu> wrote:
>A stronger argument, although this one is sufficient, is simply to point out
>that corruption is a choice; Lord Acton said something which tends to be
>very true, but human nature is not so simply described as this. We all
>have choices, and those in positions of power are different only in that
>they more than any other men need principles in order to _avoid_
>corruption.
Further, it is completely antithetical to the goals of a single mud
administrator to go on power trips and alienate people with brow beating.
Since people have NOBODY ELSE to turn to, if the one admin pisses them off,
they are gone.
Now, some players are really lame and the best thing to do is piss them off so
they leave (its often better than nuking, because then they are less likely to
try hacking in). However, this does not eliminate the simple fact that any
admin who succeeds in building a player base understands how to deal with
people in a reasonable and equitable fashion.
Jon A. Lambert
On Fri, 20 Mar 1998 09:48:00 -0800, cimri spaketh...
>
>As Lord Acton originally put it, and it was surely not under
>inspiration,
>
>"Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely."
>
>
>Anyway, just wanted to check if you were trying to contradict Lord
>Acton,
Respectfully, Yes.
Specifically, I don't see Lord Acton's statement applicable to the
"absolutes" involved within the microcosm of administration of a
MUD game server. In other words, I believe they are not a valid
arguments for mud democracy or against mud dictatorship.
Nor for proprietorship, artistic ownership, or baseball. ;)
Jon A. Lambert
On Fri, 20 Mar 1998 09:48:00 -0800, cimri spaketh...
>
>sentence. We are all pretty much lacking in that area, with some degree
>of variation between ridiculous and abysmal, but yes, there is _some_
>variation!
>
I agree we are all flawed.
I'm less cynical though. The range is much wider, from near sainthood
to moral bankruptcy.
Moral relativists would have you believe the range is "from ridiculous
to abyssmal".