There are certain features or options where a MUD really has to choose a path and take it. No choice is right or wrong, but that choice will attract some players and detract others. I just don't care for overland (ASCII) maps, for example. I probably wouldn't play a MUD that used them, even if they were optional.

Like HK, I'll know in a matter of minutes, or sometimes seconds, if I want to stick with a given MUD. Color, for example, has driven me from countless games in a matter of 30 seconds. Rainbows? I'm gone.

I'm probably being too picky, but it's just me being me and I can't help it, and I'm sure there are other players out there who will simply love or hate a MUD based on the way it handles on single aspect of the game, even a trivial one.

That's why I think MUDs are such a niche. For a few of them as there is to begin with, finding even 3-4 that one likes can be extremely difficult. As we play MUDs, we develop preferences that we look for in future games.

Honestly, I kind of like it this way.

I'm not even sure what to say at this point. I mean, yes, I guess it's true that some people have somewhat irrational preferences and will freely admit to it themselves. But I'm not sure what kind of reaction a developer is supposed to have to that…

Ok, So I need to really make sure I'm understanding you…

You're all for change and making things break the stock mold.

But.. You won't give a mud more than 5 minutes if they've got additional exits in the diagonal directions to save you from having to go n;e;n;e? Am I understanding that correctly?

If I am.. then uh…

…

Yeah. I'm at a loss for words…

Heh, I actually had to re-read that to realize you
meant you didn't like the Nightmare stuff. Go fig.
Different strokes, and all that. I think all that
stuff being available to an admin if they want is
pretty cool.

If you're saying you don't like NW/NE/SW/SE, that's
cool, you know. Whatever works for you. I'm a
fan of more options rather than fewer, but at
the same time, I don't think I'd be interested in
implementing NNE/ENE/ESE/SSE/SSW/WSW/WNW. I guess
it's maybe a matter of thresholds.

As an admin/maintainer though, I might be moved
to implement that stuff if it was "normal" and most people
expected it.

-Crat
http://lpmuds.net

I thought about this whole question of what can MUDs offer that is unique for a long time before starting work on my own. I narrowed it down to a few things that I thought a game could provide easily and effectively without TONS of game-changing modification and coding.

1) Advanced storytelling tools- The fact that MUDs are text based lends itself greatly to a storytelling atmosphere. Instead of trying to work on some type of graphical interface to compete with typical MMORPGs, I am trying to create a game that is closer to a story than a board game. Sure, there will be the typical combat, equipment, etc., but the point of the game is to experience the world and make your own mark. I've nearly completed an automated history system…whenever a player or organization does something of note, it is recorded into the world history. This history is searchable in a variety of ways, and allows for a new player to get a good insight into what has happened to bring the universe to its current state.

2) Dynamic content generation- This goes somewhat hand-in-hand with the history functions. We've created a few different programs that, when called, randomly generate a place, person, or event (based on existing person/place). For example, we could randomly generate a small planet that would have slightly scripted/structured artifacts and sites. Each one would be different than any other, based on random geography and biology, as well as creating artifacts based on the games history. Players could explore and discover these different things; what they do during this process as well as the final result would be added to the universe history (as previously described).

3) Ability for players to create- One of the biggest problems I've personally had with the standard MMORPGs is the lack of the ability to create or customize. We've looked into customization and creation for almost everything possible, from dye for clothing to building/remodeling player homes. We hope this ability to customize and create will make players feel more ownership of their corner of the world.

MUDs offer a vast amount more flexibility in about every area when it comes to comparing them against MMORPGs. I think it's a mistake to try and fight them in the areas they excel (primarily levelling/combat). Instead, I've chosen to capitalize on things that MUDs can do that MMORPGs can't. Offer tons of flexibility, customization options, creation of the world history, and ultimately ownership of the MUD itself. We'll provide the tools and framework, with the hopes that players utilize them to fit whatever desires they have.

I kind of agree with HK on the diagonal directions in standard areas, i dont actually like them myself either and do not use them in any conventional area i have mapped out. Tho as DH mentioned they make sense on overland maps as they make moving arround much easier. Also i might also like to add UP and DOWN directions are also not something that i use very often, in most attempts of adding a vertical height to muds just seems cheep and ineffectual.



I have seen this done and well it was just to cumbersome for my liking it ment that you had to use more keys than just the numpad to navigate and it was IMO awefull.



Overland is a horses and corses sort of feature, some like myself love it, others loath it. The one thing however that i dislike with some implementations is that it serves no other purpose then to allow you to travel one place to the next. This sort of defeats the purpose of having such a feature in my mind. vast tracts of empty space is boredom to me and i have stopped playing some games just because it took 30 minutes just to get to the next part of a quest.

It's actually quite a common attitude. Many players clamour for something new and original - but what they actually want is a game just like their old one, except with a few extra bells and whistles.

Of course this can work the other way as well. If you can attract and retain first-time mudders, then you'll be providing them a standard by which they judge other muds. If that standard is unlike anything else, they'll have trouble finding another mud they like.

I'll confess to being the same sort of hypocrite as HK. :)
(although, ifI found other games more fun to play than mine….)

And, I've had the experience KaVir mentions - my daughter talked a bunch of her high school friends into trying out our game. When they went elseMU*, they came back complaining other games were too easy.

I do agree with dbaker, and many of the things he mentions are common on MUSHes. There's more to MUDs than DIKU. Before we go "outside the box", we should look at some of theother boxes that have proven workable.

The trick, I think, is convincing people it's worth learning something new. That's not so easy, and though a good-sized playerbase is usually convincing, it's the old chicken and egg thing.

As a developer myself, the reaction I think is appropriate is "Oh well, it's their loss." You aren't going to be able to please everyone, and you'll gain players by having a certain feature and lose players based on the same feature. It's not fair, but that seems to be how it is. As a developer I understand because I've been a player and I know how people react to things, but you can't really let that limit your vision. If you feel extended exits are important to your game, more power to you, and for every person like me who leaves because they don't like it, you'll have someone else coming in probably looking for it.




Pretty much. Like I said, I've gone to great lengths to de-stock my game. I feel we have one of the deepest magic systems I've yet to encounter in any other game. I'm sure we've lost people because there is more to casting magic than 'cast fireball orc' and then sit back and watch. As a developer it is a frustrating trend, but as a player, there are some things that annoy me too much to want to put up with. Rewind about 5 years, I'm not sure I would even play my game now based on some of my personal bias and how much I've felt like we've moved the game from stock ROM. I'm sure plenty of people come in wanting basically ROM with a few add-ons and leave once they actually have to learn something. I've put a lot of work into my newbie school to cater to different experience levels, and our "MUD veteran, End of Time newbie" section -only- covers the things that we've added or changed from stock, yet most people still tend to skip that, then spend the first 20 levels asking questions that are answered in helpfiles or the newbie school. A lot of people will try to "practice" a skill and when they find that the syntax and system is a bit different, they'll leave. Oh well!




Actually, I liked that stuff when I played the game. Even still, I think back on some of that and think "You know, that was really unique." I've even tried to find a MUD like that since just for nostalgia. But after spending so many years within a particular branch of a particular codebase, going back to something like that would be very difficult. I think that MUD resurrected sometime ago, even though none of the areas and I think much of the code didn't make the transition, but I couldn't stop trying to check score, or worth, or many of the other conveniences and commands I've become utterly accustom to having. I'm not knocking the Nightmare LP stuff, it's just too far out of my comfort zone. Maybe if I had more time to dedicate to learning a new MUD, then I might put more time into learning an unfamiliar system. But like I said earlier, anytime I play another MUD, it's generally just to kill time between whatever I'm doing when I'm developing. It's just a lot easier to jump right into something I'm comfortable with.




Exactly. Even as a developer, I started off with that type of attitude. Midboss was actually a very strong agent of change for End of Time and even with my own attitudes as a developer. I think its very important as a developer to understand that as you make your game more and more unique, you stand a very real chance of isolating more and more potential players. That's the main point I guess I'm trying to contribute to the discussion. As a developer myself, I've made the conscious choice that making what I honestly feel is a better game outweighs losing players unwilling to learn a new system.

And I think that's where the problem generally lies, having to learn something new. I think so many players will invest sometimes years learning a particular game (and often times a particular codebase, as a result) and its very hard to ask someone to basically start all over when they come into a new game, and have to relearn sometimes even the most basic systems. I think that's one reason why people tend to gravitate toward games that are like their old ones. Even if they are starting over social and character wise, at least they have a pretty good idea of how the game works, if nothing else. As Sandi said, I think part of the trick is showing that the game is worth learning something new. I think its also in our best interests to try to present that information in as many and as easily digestable forms as possible, so that people can approach it in different ways and learn in the way that best suits them.

I agree that it's important to realize that not everybody will like everything – that is almost a no-brainer. What surprises me is that people willfully perpetuate this attitude when trying to break the mold themselves. It seems that if you're trying to convince people to be open-minded toward your game, it's nice to try to extend that same courtesy (even if you know that not everyone will).

I actually look for games that are different from my usual. I like finding new and inventive things in a game. Maybe they are rehashed from another game, but as long as it is modified to fit their game, then it is new and refreshing. I don't like playing only games that have the same features in my 'home' game.. mainly because..that's boring. if I wanted those features, I'll just go play my 'home' game and not look for something new.

It would be nice. But since I'm never really going to dedicate a significant amount of time to any game but my own, it's mostly a non-issue for me. Regardless, I do think its important for everyone to understand this :p

David, hopefully we're not "perpetrating an attitude", just honestly admitting our human nature among friends. :wink:

I do think it drives home the difficulty of reaching out to new players when our own behaviours/values/desires differ from the norm. At this point, it's been a while since most of us were "just players". In the (long) process of developing a (good) game, it's easy to lose sight of how things look to a newbie who doesn't know how things work.

Here's something I drew while thinking about this topic:

Stock:
kill mob -> XP -> level -> EQ + skills -> kill bigger mob


DeepMUD:
                 -> level -> EQ -> kill bigger mob
kill mob -> XP -|
                 -> bonus -> skills -> kill bigger mob

                 
Proposed:
                    -> level -> . . . win game 
            -> XP -|
           |        -> bonus -> skills -> kill bigger mob
kill mob -> 
           |        -> wear for AC -> kill bigger mob
            -> EQ -|
                    -> sell for gold -> have too much gold (this needs work!)

DeepMUD, of course, is my current game. We've put Creation in-game, so you choose a Race in the very beginning, then later a Class, and you add skills with 'gain', so the original "Creation Points" become "Practices", and thus you're basically buying your skills with XP. The 'proposed' would work if you had a balanced economy.


And before KaVir points it out, if you want to have crafting, just replace "kiil mob" with "make foo" in the above. :wink:

Well, right. :smile: What I meant is that if one realizes that one is doing something contrary to one's other principles, one should work out if those other principles need adjusting, or if the action needs adjusting, etc. So, if I tell you that I hate color in other people's MUDs and disconnect if I see any whatsoever, but then say how valuable I think color is in my own, I should at least try to give other people a chance to see if they're using it like I am. (or something like that – I think you see what I mean)

Hmmmmm… *ponders a moment*

Imagined:
                         +– drive mobs to local extinction, force them to relocate
                         |   allowing others to take their place in the local ecology
                         |
           +– RESULTS –+– improvements (or penalties) to faction standings
           |                 based on what you killed
           |
           |             +– skill improvements or "levels", you choose how to spend it
           |             |
military –+–    XP   –+– access to quests or special loot by spending XP as "fame"
           |             |   chaper repairs/hirelings
           |             |
           |             +– access to in-game guilds/societies to learn specialized skills
           |
           |             +– sell for gold
           |             |
           +–   LOOT  –+– better gear, easier killing
                         |
                         +– break down into componants, for crafting

                         +– better merchant prices, cheaper training
                         |
dipolomacy –+–  WIN  –+– improvements to standings with target faction 
  social     |           |   possibly resulting in loss of agression
             |           |
             |           +– access to quests/items otherwise unavailable, diplomatic
             |               fame is seperate from military fame
             |
             +–  LOSE –+– penalties to standtings with target faction
             |               possibly resulting in war
             |
             +–   XP  –+– win or lose, you gain XP, giving you better diplomacy skills


 crafting  –+–     XP    –+– allows access to new recipies, higher tiered harvestables
harvesting   |
             +–  PRODUCTS –+– useful or sellable goods
             |               |
             |               +– fame, granting access to crafting societies, special recipies
             |               |
             |               +– improved faction with customers if commissioned crafting
             |
             +–  FAILURES –+– components broken down further, or lost

research  –+–    XP   –+–  improved skills, speeding research, improving accuracy
            |
            +–   LOOT  –+– rare items discovered (from seeminly mundane "vendor trash")
            |             |
            |             +– hints towards ancient treasures/kingdoms (locations of places)
            |
            +– RESULTS –+– improved spells/abilities, access to variations
                          |
                          +– reduced cost (material/mana/etc) to use particular spells/abilities
                          |
                          +– yes, fame… as above, but seperate.

The key here is, don't make EVERYTHING in the game centered around killing mobs. Sure, it's fun, and most of your players will do that more than anything else… but we're trying to get outside of the box here. How about some non-combat oriented ways to advance or improve your character?

My earlier idea of socializing and gaining fame works ok if you have a large enough game with a big enough world. Since you only got XP for the first of anything you managed to have a dialog with, you have to hot-foot it all over the world to get beyond the first few "levels".

Likewise for things like research, you might always be doing research (as a background skill), but some actions will give you a boost of XP (such as, perhaps, examining an ancient altar, or discovering a location for the first time).



Another, seperate, idea here…

If you REALLY want a challenge… try to work out a semi-closed economy. That is, one where raw materials are only added to the world as the player population rises, so you never "junk" things, if you run out of iron… you have to find new iron deposits, or start recycling your old newbie swords to forge better weapons.

Note that the mobs have to obey this too. If your goblin tribe starts out with copper scimitars, and players kill and loot them, surviving goblins in the area that breed to replace the dead won't have copper scimitars to give them. Of course, they might call in a neighboring tribe with iron scimitars, but eventually you have to hit a limit where players need to find new areas to exploit, or recycle old gear, or live with wielding bone knives and leather shields.

What happens to a (semi-)closed economy when one or more people sit around hoarding stuff, if anything because they don't care to junk it? Will mobs and newbies forever be unable to have swords? Like you say, this is a big challenge… :smile:

This is something that I have been thinking about recently as well. An entire economy run by players…

I've been envisioning a mud that just doesn't have leveling, but able to do other things, like have carpenters to 'build' rooms for people who can pay for a house. Woodworkers to get the wood for the carpenters. Engineers to 'design' the house, blacksmiths to create the toosl needed for the house and so on
have a completely player run economy
merchants could teach mobs how to become vendors and then loan them out to people who want to sell items like crafters and such
diplomacy

kings
kingdoms
wars
alliances
trades

I don't have time now but I can expand on this later.

I have several ideas that I consider to be somewhat unique to the mudding community and I am currently working on them in one way or another. My current primary project is planned to behave in the following manner.

Players spend most of their time in a "lobby" like area, unless they decide to embark on an "adventure". An adventure is a well designed quest with it's own unique plot,npcs,locales and treasure. My idea is that the player will be presented with a list of "adventures" to go on along with a brief synopsis of the story and the goal. Adventures will be available to the players based on their class/race/level or possible faction involvement so that all players will not be able to participate in all adventures. (This will hopefully inspire players to try out several different class and race combinations). Each adventure will have several ways for a player to be victorious that result in differing rewards. Perhaps the adventure will start off with the player visiting a small hamlet on the coast that is being attacked by orcs. The player might decide to kill the orcs in the village to end the assault, maybe the player will travel to the orcish camp nearby to kill the leader and disband the tribe. Maybe the player IS an orc and decides to help them loot and plunder the village. Or maybe the character cannot fight at all and decides to visit the Orcish camp and talk them out of/bribe them out of attacking.
It might seem a little strange or boring but I think it would be an interesting take on typical mudding. It is designed more like a "module" from dungeons and dragons than anything else. I haven't tried to implement multi-player quests but the system is still in it's infancy. Rewards wouldn't be based on combat at all. While you could of course engage in combat, it is only one solution (And possibly not a solution at all) to the problem at hand. Solving the adventure by any means will result in some sort of reward, some better than others. Rewards range from various equipment and experience points to increased (or decreased) relations with related factions. My only real concern with the system is the amount of staff created content required…Currently it requires manually typed YAML files, hehe!

Well you can have an AWESOME political, house, religious, clan system in a game, but if you don't have
players to use it, it will sit and rot. I would someday like to expand to have a house system and political
system in my game, but right now don't have the player base for it. I am using clans with npc leaders
that induct/outcast give gear to players. I really just got tired of players wanting clans, taking clan
leadership position then disappearing, then new players not wanting an old clan but their own clan, and
constantly having to make new clans. However now, I have recently added two player positions
within the clans, but kept the npc leaders. Giving the player positions a few commands so they can
interact more and roleplay within the clans with other players.

Heh, just realized I maybe off topic quite abit. Sorry, but what I am getting it, is breaking the Mold is great,
but if you dont have a ready made player base, or a great way of attracting players, it is for naught.
I am 100% for something like what Fury suggested on mudconnect that we need a major mud list that
will list muds by stages, ( developmental, beta, alpha, open, etc. ) It would filter out some of the
hundreds of muds out there that clutter the mudlists that are still in developmental stage. Yah I know
it would be an incredible amount of work, and no one is willing to do it.