KinslayerMUD Forums

Growla wrote:How about have a newbie area where this mob teaches you everything, starting from the very basics? Have a dialog ask if this is your first time playing a mud when creating a character. If so, it sends you to said newbie zone.

I saw something along the lines of this at MUME, and I conciderably liked it. For newbies it is severely helpfull - it would dialogue with the newbie and lead the newbie around a specific town, teaching the newbie about shops (buying and selling), about practices (how to practice and what to practice), about exping and the basics of fighting, and how to talk.

It inspired, as Growla's post has inspired Smasher - so maybe the two of us combined can get this done within a reasonable time.

A lot of good ideas on this thread, especially the newbie school.

However, this game currently has all the elements of the game that we all used to play on a very regular basis.

If we're going to revive this MUD then what it's going to take is a little bit more effort from the "old school" players to stick around even though there's nobody on and nothing happening.

If we all do this, then we will all find more of what has kept us around here all these years.. PK..

I plan to pk some around Thanksgiving and Christmas, if only for an hour or so.

Cool.. Could use a few more Chases on my trophy list....

I'll make sure to log in when Chase is on if possible. Who am I to turn down free qps?

[5] Volgar

While I think there is a lot that can be improved with the game, and let me assure you we're still working on it, I think the largest problem is that people do not stick around to play when they see that no one is online. If you log off the instant you log on and see that no one else is playing the game, how can you possibly expect for them to stick around and wait for you next time? If PK is really what you're looking for, then stick around for fifteen minutes a day, ring the bell in Fal Dara while you're on, and sooner or later someone else is bound to come along if they follow the same pattern as you. The chances of two people logging on within the same 10-second time-span(that is how long most people wait before instantly logging off), are extremely low.

The other reason why having active players is essential for the game is that without them, new players have no reason to try the MUD out. I've worked with many newbies, and have had a bunch stick around. However, with the lack of consistancy of the playerbase, they fade away as well. We average well over twenty new players a day, guys. Give it a bit of effort and we could have fresh blood in the game. The problem is that very FEW of you are willing to work on the solution, yet so many of you continue to complain about how this game "isn't this and that", yet you've all had fun here for many many years before now. Things change, new zones are added, but the game is still the same. Channelers are gone, but they're coming back. It's still the same game. If you want Kinslayer to continue to be fun, then get with the program and make it fun again. What immortals are still active can't do it alone.

Now, as I'm rather certain that with that being said, it will still fail to act as the inspiration I've attempted to fuel in the past. So as I attempt to ponder some "incentives" for you guys to help us with keeping the newbies sticking around, I'd like for you guys to get rid of the "this game sucks that's why I don't play" attitude, and start giving me hopes that offering incentives would be worth my while.

Bring old pk zones back!

I never said the game sucks, but I have said many mant times "give me something to do while I am on solo", imping C&G was a vast improvement as well as the mercs but I now have perfect sets across all alts and only time I need to smob is when I die in pk and loose eq.

Imping repeatable quest would be enough incentive to keep alot of players active, finishing Merchant clan would or should give some of us something to do.

If you want this game to thrive, delete all this new stuff, and bring up the old mud. You can't argue numbers. So many more people played before galnor shut the mud down way back when. Even when the imms were corrupt it was fun as hell. Bring it back, for the love of god. Just open up a deeathmud with all the old zones and old chars, then we can talk to each other and maybe even get on this newer less fun mud every once in a while.

What new things make this game so "terrible" now?

pick your stats, the zones, all the quests, it makes it where people just sit around and do quests, instead of pking and interacting with others. Just look at the numbers galnor, something is obviously wrong. practices are worse, dodge and abs are different, everything ihas new names. Someone who played a long time ago, would not like this new mud.

also, if you have any messengers i'd love to talk to you and give my opinion on things on this new game.

the problem with the new stuff is people don't want to learn it so therefore don't want to play. when the game came back it was very unbalanced, stats were off wack, and everything was incorrect. Oldbies played for about 3 days and than stopped because everything wasn't as easy as it once was(exping, statting, pking, equiping, etc.) and there were more bugs than in the a whore's bed.

I know one of the reasons for statting being changed was to help people that didn't play that often. But it wasn't that difficult to stat someone. All you had to do was kill a tree and they go up 6 levels.

Pking used to be fun and thrilling. If people headed to mobs fine and dandy i could still do good if they were low at mobs. And if I died.... Oh well everyone has a decent set so noone needed my equipment so i could keep it.**** Now I'd rather die on my dodger than my abser any day(don't want to lose my claymore and be stuck with spiked axe). Last I played mobs used to be a big crutch that people wouldn't get off of. Made it not fun to play.

Granted some of these things have been changed but people have lost the will to play. Granted when something new is posted 5-6 people post within like an hour so we have more forum lurkers than actual players. What does that say?

**** I think that the equipment being hard to get is part of the problem. Before the pwipe stuff was easy to get and people would just have fun instead of worrying about equipment. Now you have a lot of pansy people that don't want to lose their equipment.

Also one more thing that could be done. In the old days city raids would go on if there were 2-3 people on one side. This no longer happens. If a city raid does happen it usually involves some channeler smob with pimp ass equipment and weaves that tears everyone up. If you do end up killing him his equipment is taken away from you. I know some imms would say have fun with him but some of us would like some rewards for our efforts and do things for rewards.

I remember when I was a newbie with crappy equipment cause I didn't know what to do. I had a channeler in abs/daggers and I was the only one on. An imm than loaded glass dagger for me(in a raid) even though I was a newbie, which is better than giving it to someone who never dies in my opinion, it can go through a few hands.

Ok, I admit changing the zones very quickly was a mistake. I assume most of you agree? I don't think it's that everyone loves the old zones because they were better. I simply think that everyone was used to them and the quick change was such a shock that they were hard to learn while still becoming used to everything else that had changed. However it's a bit too late to go back to the old zones, and I personally think the new ones have a lot to offer. Unless you guys can point out specific problems with the new zones I don't really see much point in going back now.

Secondly, stats. We've said over and over again, random stats are coming. They are -very- close to being done. Anyone who's said that in the past was misinformed. So I think that settles that dispute.

Thirdly, equipment, yes we've been a bit too harsh on this. I'll admit that as another mistake. Not only will I be increasing the loads, I will be adding other means of gaining equipment which will be an incentive for players to help new players. Keep an eye out for an announcement.

City Raids: Requires an immortal to manage. And sadly we're a bit behind on active immortals ever since the school season started up. If I actually see people on for more than the five seconds it takes to type who, then I may start one.

You tell Sodaman, 'hi'
You tell Sodaman, 'are you new?'
Sodaman tells you, 'hi'
Sodaman tells you, 'yes'
You tell Sodaman, 'ahh new to muds or new to this one?'
Sodaman tells you, 'both?'
You tell Sodaman, 'ahh cool'
You tell Sodaman, 'if you can get passed the text part it's pretty cool'
Sodaman tells you, 'how?'
You tell Sodaman, 'how...what? '
Sodaman tells you, 'will u help me?'
You tell Sodaman, 'sure i'll help you'
You tell Sodaman, 'ok some general instructions about muds'
Sodaman tells you, 'ok trin what fo i do'
You tell Sodaman, ''look' shows you the room you are in'
You tell Sodaman, 'you know all the basic commands?'
Sodaman tells you, 'ok'
You tell Sodaman, 'ok hmmm'
You tell Sodaman, ''score' shows you some basic information about your character. as does 'stat''
Sodaman tells you, 'ok'
You tell Sodaman, 'hmmm talking'
You tell Sodaman, 'we have some global channels. everyone that is a human will see what you type'
You tell Sodaman, 'like type 'chat hello''
Sodaman tells you, 'i have to be level 5 to chat'
You tell Sodaman, 'oh darn'
You tell Sodaman, 'forgot '
Sodaman tells you, 'trin i want to goe out of this crap ...lol ...sorry'
You tell Sodaman, 'get out of this game?'
You tell Sodaman, 'sorry to hear that just type 'quit''
Sodaman tells you, 'well got to where you see what you look like'
You tell Sodaman, 'hmm?'
Sodaman tells you, 'you cant?'
You tell Sodaman, 'you can't see what you look like because this is basicly words '
You tell Sodaman, 'but you can't see your equipment with 'eq''
Sodaman tells you, 'sorry trin this game suks'
You tell Sodaman, ':( ok well just type 'quit''

Just so you know we might be getting 20 actual newbies to try our game out but that's not a lot because I bet the ratio between people that try out muds and people that stay our very very little.

Yes, and that ratio is going to be 20 to 0 if no one helps them out. As I said, we had quite a few who stayed for an extended period of time, but they lost interest because there was no one online to keep helping them. There will always be people who can't get over the lack of graphics.

The biggest problem I have with some of the zones is how freaking big it is now. I kinda like certain parts, like gap actually taking a tiny bit of experience to learn. But I think the entire pass east of gap is massive, especially with all the aggros. Aggros should be in a pk zone, but not tons of tracking ones. I am excited for channies though. The old days of one basher bashing a troll and 2-3 channies destroying him with fireballs were rediculous. Making channies balanced with some creative weaves, like what that thread a few months back was about, seems like a good start.

A lot of people were calling for a second dimension such as trade/mining in this mud. I agree, but pkers have to be the primary focus because they are who used to play this game in the first place. Then as pk gets rocking and more people play, mining and trade can come in.

agree a 100%, pk is the primary focus to get back the old people, then we cna do stuff to get newer players. You need the old people first.

To be honest I have very little experience Niamh Pass, but as I see it it isn't a major PK zone. I could perhaps take a look at the MOBs and tone down the aggressives in there.

Could you elaborate on how it's excessively large, please?

well the distance between keep and caemlyn is insane. For how small the playerbase is atm. We need an easy to use ways or something. It just takes so long to get down there and back.

it's not excessively large. people just don't know the zone. though taking away the tracking ability of mobs would improve that zone.

I like the tracking mobs, it can make things interesting.

Interesting for you! I hate those mobs!

I like that zone the way it is but ogier mobs could use some buffing up so humans have a fall back spot beyond fd. I enjoy eastern pk more than everyday boring fd pk.