---------- Forwarded message ---------- From: Douglas Fotheringham Date: Apr 14, 2007 6:35 PM Subject: MUSHing looks Muddy To: trinsec@gmail.com, boris@moderncommand.com here you go. I can ammend stuff from the further discussion if you like, but it's no-where near as neat. __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Tired of spam? Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around http://mail.yahoo.com M*U*S*H* - Saturday, April 14, 2007, 7:54 PM -------------------------------------------- Boris says, "ok...let's gets started, then..." Boris says, "First of all, thank you very much for coming..." Boris says, "As opposed to my last session, which was a lecture, this is a conversation. I have about 10 minutes worth of data and initial thoughts, but I would very much like to make this a two way street conversation. Just so you know, I will cut off our conversation about 10 minutes before we end, and ask for very specific recommendations and suggestions to help pennmush for the next 10 years." Boris says, "I would invite everyone to look at +bbread 5/3" Boris says, "take a moment to grok that data (and thanks to Javelin for access to the logs)" Sketch was wondering how you got that. ;) ============================================= M*U*S*H Event Announcements ============================================== Message: 5/3 Posted Author Mushing looks muddy Tue Mar 27 2007 Boris ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Hey folks! I'm posting this well-before my talk so people have a chance to comment/digest on these numbers. I'd like to hear back from anyone with any comments and/or additions! So here's some data for you to chew on: Mudconnector search results for server type: MUSH: 209 Mudconnector search results for anything with MUSH in it: 245 Top Mud Sites search results for anything with MUSH in it: 120 Top Mud Sites search results for server type MUSH: 107 Top Mud Sites search results for server type PennMUSH: 48 Google directory for mushes ( http://www.google.com/Top/Games/Online/MUDs/MUSH/): 1769 Open directory results for mushes (http://dmoz.org/Games/Online/MUDs/MUSH/): 139 HTTP GET requests of 1.8.1p9.tar.gz: 211 HTTP GET requests of 1.8.1p8.tar.gz: 60 HTTP GET requests of 1.8.1p7.tar.gz: 218 HTTP GET requests of 1.8.1p6.tar.gz: 102 HTTP GET requests of 1.8.1p5.tar.gz: 120 HTTP GET requests of 1.8.0.tar.gz: 102 Total HTTP GET requests for the 1.7.4 line: 244 Total HTTP GET requests for the 1.7.5 line: 125 Total HTTP GET requests for the 1.7.6 line: 1240 Total HTTP GET requests for the 1.7.7 line: 4158 Total HTTP GET requests for the 1.8.0 line: 1634 Total HTTP GET requests for the 1.8.1 line: 1523 Total FTP hits for the 1.8.0 line: 189 Total FTP hits for the 1.8.1 line: 152 ======================================================================================================================== Boris says, "As mentioned in the introduction, I'm here to talk about the future of mushing. It is my position our genre is graying, and while I don't think it's dying, I wonder about our future health. As the entry point for computers is GUI's and eye-candy games, and command-line exposure is waning, I am concerned in 15 years people may look back at that thing called "mush" and wonder what the big deal was." Boris says, "If we could leave this conversation with three or four specific ideas for strengthening the pennmush community, I would be happy to support implementing them. The purpose of this conversation is to talk about the long-term (10 to 15 year) survivability/health/life of pennmush." Boris says, "To jump right in then, I believe MUSHes today should focus on more coded systems, and drift back towards our original ancestry of Muds (get it, mushing looks muddy?). I also think MUSH games today should exploit the advantage we hold over over MUDS: sophisticated in-game object and room creation for players (Second Life, anyone?)." Boris says, "To be quite honest, the issue (for me anyways) is time. I don't have time to carefully administrate pose-based roleplay game, but I have time to run a /coded game/ - where a player could login, and start playing right away with coded systems...with or without other players on." Boris says, "I look to the interactive fiction community for inspiration. They can be found on rec.arts.int-fiction. It seems like interactive fiction really has carried the Infocom (single-user text-based gaming) torch for quite a while (for those who don't know, a new interactive fiction authoring system has emerged: http://www.inform-fiction.org/I7/Inform07.html - it's almost entirely natural language system, and very inviting as a literature creation device). Their community is small, but vibrant and alive. They have (in my opinion):" Boris says, "Done a good job inviting new users" Boris says, "Continued developing and extending the IF language to be accessible on a variety of platforms" Boris says, "Held a pretty high-profile contest every two years - one in which exceptional writing and novel use of the interactive game engine was recognized." Boris says, "I see how the mush community is doing a good job: welcoming new users, continuing to develop the pennmush server, and ensuring pennmush runs on the latest hardware and on the widest possible client-base." Boris says, "I'm not sure if we are advertising ourselves well, and I would love to encourage novel/good MUSHes, to create a rubric or get an all-star judge panel to evaluate a mush and then award prizes to mushes who are doing interesting things." Boris says, "I note Javelin's new podcast is doing this exact thing..." Boris says, "" Boris says, "I'm very interested how we can encourage new players to our genre, foster leadership amongst our ranks, and reach out to different constituencies to keep pennmush alive, healthy and well" Boris says, "Finally, I'm interested in examining success. What is success anyways? is it number of games, number of players, numbers of good games, etc..." Boris thoughtfully taps on the podium, and looks at the audience. nails drools a little. Boris says, "See, the thing is, I love this genre." Boris says, "From the heady days of Zork and Adventure, to the rise of MUDS and MUSHes, I have always deeply enjoyed text-based gaming" Boris says, "I would love to contribute something to the genre. Perhaps my ideas the genre us graying are a bit off. Perhaps my ideas we should float to more coded-based systems aren't correct" Boris says, "no matter, I am very interested in taking an active role in encouraging the vibrancy of pennmush." Boris says, "to that end, I'm here, and quite eager to..." Boris says, "...begin a discussion..." Boris raises a grue-like eyebrow, and tries to smile without baring his fangs. "Comments?" nails raises a hand. Sketch tries to take this all in.. Boris says, "Ide?" Ide says, "yes, thanks" Ide says, "I have a few thoughts about this" Boris says, "please..." Ide says, "About coded systems. I agree that the current model of play in most mush games is broken, and that coded systems are one way to solve the problem" Boris nods and listens Ide says, "However I don't think coded systems a la typical muds are the way to go -- while it's hard to constrain social problems with mechanical (i.e. mushcode) systems, I think we can introduce new social mechanics for mush games" Boris says, "please continue..." Ide says, "Second, regarding the IF community" Sketch wanted Ide to go on with code. ;) Blast. Ide says, "I'm an active participant there, so I see the relevance of what you're saying" Ide is trying to be brief :) Tokeli says, "Don't be so brief you leave us hanging. D:" Ide says, "However, it's also interesting to bring up IF, because there's one constant refrain in the community there: that the IF community is small, insular, and needs fresh blood" Boris says, "we have quite a bit of time...and we are all eager to hear your thoughts :-)" Boris nods Sketch especially wants thoughts on coded systems. It's his forté. Ide grins, OK, thanks. I'm interested in what other people have to say as well. Ide says, "So you see the parallels to the mush world in the IF world quite a bit" Ide says, "Finally, as to advertising mush and keeping the form alive" Ide says, "all I'll say to that right now is, hell yes" Boris encourages you to type up some ideas on coded systems - it seems as if there is some interest in that topic. Would you like to continue, Ide? Ide is done, thanks. Ide says, "I'll write up some points while other people are talking" Boris says, "Thanks Ide. Maybe we can come back to coded system later in the conversation. Anyone else?" Gab does have some thoughts, if that's cool. Sketch says, "I'll take a shot on something that came to mind. IT's short." Sketch grin. Err. :D Gab X) You go first. Boris says, "let's see, I saw Gab first, so go at it, Gab" Gab coughs. "Okay. I come from a MUSH where roleplaying - the interactive story-writing - is paramount to the environment. I do not know much about coding - heck, I barely know how to build, though that's something different as I understand. My opinion was always that even if you had a blank room and no special coding at all, that as long as you had good players, the roleplay was all that mattered. However..." Boris nods Gab continues, "The coding does come in to play and could be quite handy for things. I mean, I always thought the point of MUSHes were to roleplay with other people, not do things by yourself. Though I have to admit that I - and I'm sure many others coming from my genre - don't have any idea what kind of capability coding can have. I think that if we had the opportunity to learn more about it - in things like these lectures here - we would be more open to, say, learning new code and updating to new versions. Example, it wasn't until Sketch drove us all crazy that we updated our version." X) Sketch grins. :D Boris says, "good point Gab...are you finished for now?" Gab has 2 more items, but will be brief. :3 Boris says, "please take your time :-)" Gab can now see some benefits - even in her limited scope - of how the more 'advanced' coding could benefit her MUSH. "But moreover from this, what I drew from your thoughts was 1) Having the staff of a MUSH be taught to be better leaders. To be united, not only with each other and not only with the players, but with other MUSH leaders as a sort of community. I think it would lend credibility to any MUSH and help the whole community strive." Boris really agrees with that. Please continue... Gab says, "Annnd 2) What you mentioned on advertizing. A lot of times, the only way I found out about a MUSH was from other people - by accident - or by websites. I think a web presence is essential for spreading news of what we have to offer. We get more players from our website than *any* other resource, except when our players post art and whatnot places. So, google searches for our theme, and people posting artwork... that's how we get players. If there were a resource, maybe, helping people get websites or.. I dunno, a webring of advertising for other communities..." Gab isn't sure if she's going off on a huge tangent here, but that's basically all she has to say. X); Gab really wouldn't mind including a section on her MUSH's website about MU*s in general, other MU*s, etc. Sketch says, "In fact, they're the FIRST hit on Google..." Boris says, "Thank you Gab, excellent point. I would like to quickly reminds everyone that if they don't know about Bartle Player Types, as a member of this community you should grok them: http://www.mud.co.uk/richard/hcds.htm Sketch?" Sketch says, "On the topic of success: I'd say, success in regards to the NUMBER of mushes would be the amount of mushes that are both 1) Unique. 2) Strong. Strong as in, not dead/dying. <-- In short, having 100 Star Trek MUSHes with 5 players each isn't success." Sketch says, "And we have that, I think. O:D" Boris agrees Sketch says, "We need good, solid, unique MUSHes. Not SPECIFIC unique, like: In THIS universe, Luke JOINS Vader (although I admit that's a good one), but more theme-wise. A dozen Trek MUs is just excessive. Arabian Moons is awesome, for instance. We also need to keep our 'centers': M*U*S*H, BrazilMUX, so forth." Boris says, "excellent point" Boris quickly reminds everyone to think of specific suggestions - I'll be asking you for them in about 30 minutes Sketch says, "Regarding the 'Second Life'-ish ideas, I've also been kicking around a sort of MUSH that has a very wiki-like structure, even in THEME. The world itself is highly mutable, and the admin are mostly just there to make sure no one is flagrantly twinking. It's an experiment I wanted to try a WHILE ago, but I never got around to writing the theme, setting up the basic code how I wanted...but regarding what's been said, I think it would be interesting to see what would happen if I pulled it together... :) It's a roleplaying MU, not Social, since that needs clarification.. Rather 'wild'. ;p" Sketch says, "That is.. Unpredictable. Today you have fire-powers, tomorrow you're a monkey. :)" Sketch says, "WIKI-Life! ;) Okay, now I'm done. Heh." Ide grins. Boris nods. Thank you Sketch! I note the MUSH family really is the only major mud-branch that has extensive in-game object/room creation. Nails is next up. nails clears throat. nails says, "Woo, Sketch finally gets to witness me speaking. :) I've taken an odd road through my MU* history. I started on Social games, I've never been into RP, but I've ended up as staff on many places, and bounced around many projects. I'd say that one of the key issues that plague the community as a whole is a lack of perspective. Many people in the community have no sense of the scope or scale, there is no single source of metrics that can tell us what is out there, what games exist or how they are used. So I think it's important to keep an open mind when we ask questions and realize that there is probably more out there than any one of us knows about. (more)" nails says, "Community building is key. There are already places out there, both games and websites. The problem we run into more often than not is fracturing of effort. Everybody wants to start something new instead of teaming up and supporting the existing efforts. That leads to a loss of focus, and new players and game admins don't know where to go to find the information they need." nails has more. :) Boris says, "excllent point" nails says, "As to coded systems: I'd say the majority of people who come to me looking to start new games do not have strong technical backgrounds, and don't have the wherewithall to code complex systems from scratch. They have an idea, a vision, and they want to bring it to life however they can. I think if there is to be a big push towards coded systems, there needs to be a concerted effort to generate softcode packages that people can install and configure without having to start from scratch. 90 percent of the code on most games is a case of reinventing old wheels. It's a tragic waste of effort." Sketch says, "Wow. That's really insightful there. And entirely true. I'm sure anyone who's listened to +softcode here, for ONE day, will agree. :p" nails says, "Also on that point, I've heard debates for close to a decade on freestyle vs codeheavy game systems. I personally don't think it needs to be a competition. Designed properly, any game can support either style of play. Or any shade of gray in between, even." nails says, "I'm almost done :)" Boris whole-heartedly agrees Sketch says, "Do go on." nails says, "Advertising: I've had daydreams off and on for years about putting up an ad on a billboard. Much of the ideas about advertising are geared towards internal audiences. I don't think that's necessarily helpful." Boris says, "wow - nails, thank you. Are you all set?" nails says, "This ties into the 'greying' of the community. I disagree with that as well. I run into college kids all the time who have just found out about it. I don't see MUSH as in a competition with MMORPGs, it's a different experience altogether, and I think there will always be an audience for literary endeavors (shout out to the IF crew!)" nails says, "MUSH will be here for a long time. I don't think it's broken, I don't think it's dying. I think there's plenty of opportunity for growth and progress, but I'm happy and optimistic." nails says, "The end." Gab handraises, if appropriate. :O Boris says, "ok, Ide is next up, and then Gab." Ide says, "OK, thanks" Ide says, "A few things (again), I'll try not to cover too many topics :)" Ide says, "Greying of the community: I have my doubts too, but a few recent polls, on community.pennmush.org and Electric Soup, have started to swing me over to agreeing with this assessment" Ide says, "All the polls (without fail) show that players new to mush in the last 2-3 years make up only 10% of the mush community" Nyssa nodnods Ide says, "The challenge is to verify the accuracy of that data, of course" Ide says, "Moving on" Sketch has always wondered if 2-3 year newbies don't know the polls exist. O:) nails dittos. Ide acknowledges that possibility Tyr honestly rarely visits MU*-related websites. Nyssa visits a few occasionally. Boris says, "Ide - good point, please continue." Ide says, "Regarding what Sketch said about the problem of 100 Star Trek mushes with 5 players each (paraphrasing)" Ide says, "People start these new games for many reasons, probably the biggest being they want a sandbox of their own" Ide says, "Ironically (if you're looking at this from a density perspective), one of the strengths of the mush platform (it's relative ease of implementation) becomes one of its faults" Ide says, "I don't think we want to make it harder for players to start games" Sketch rubs his hands at the idea. ;) Gab X) nails notes that the ease of implementation is something that has changed gradually over time. The barrier to entry has steadily lowered year to year. Ide says, "But we want to understand why players become dissatisfied on one game, in order to figure out if there can be mechanisms to retain those players" Ide agrees with nails. Sketch says, "It's true. Kudos and curses to the devteam! And myself and all of you by proxy. O:)" nails says, "Every issue we raise should be considered in the context of the nearly 20 year history of MUSH." nails says, "devteams, Sketch :)" Boris whispers "this is called churn in the game design world: new players coming and leaving, and new players coming... Ide says, "OK, so I've covered greying, fracturing of community...finally, we were talking about code earlier" Tyr says, "All...four? Five of them?" Sketch says, "Oh! My apologies. Very true." Tyr says, "Depending on how you want to count, the number could be higher." nails says, "Curses to people like me, too. :)" nails, enabler. Ide also agrees, MUSH is a hydra, not a snake :) Ide says, "OK, my last thought, about code" Ide says, "this is just a teaser actually" Sketch says, "TinyMUD bites everyone. :)" Boris again quickly reminds everyone to think of specific suggestions to keep pennmush alive and well for the next 15 years - I'll be asking you for them in about 10 minutes Sketch has 2 so far... Ide says, "When I talk about coded social mechanics, I'm referring to many of the ideas from RPGs that have come out in the last 3 or 4 years. There is a wealth of ideas about how players can RP that we could directly implement on a mush, that can have an impact on (what some people see as) the problems: world ownership (i.e. having to call in staffers to judge), asynchronous play, the social contract between players, players' differing creative agendas, etc." Ide says, "There's going to be another event here about that later this month, but I'll give the mic to the next person up. thanks." Boris says, "ok folks..." Sketch, randomly, suddenly wishes Luigi were here. Tokeli o.O Gab makes her quickcomment now? :3 Boris says, "AH! Sorry Gab, please, go ahead!" Gab was really interested by the comment on softcoded packages that nails mentioned. "When I first found out about MU*s, I tried making my own... but of course could do nothing but the very, very basic. I've always wished/wanted/etc. that there could be installs of pennmush that included things like a nice who list, channels, etc. that anyone could install and use without having to be savvy at coding. Heck, maybe it'd make a standard that would raise the bar for MU*s in general... maybe giving some better ones a better chance at survival." Sketch says, "Do we HAVE to keep it to an hour? O:)" Gab s'allrights'okay. Just had to comment. :D nails will be quick, too. Boris says, "nails?" Sketch would MUCH prefer this drag on and we get so much more out of it, even if some of us have to leave. nails says, "I think it is extremely important when discussing any of these points to keep in mind the nearly 20 year history of MUSH and its bretheren, particularly considering its future. A lot has happened over the years, a lot of decisions were made, and I think we benefit from awareness of this as we make new decisions. We can't live in the past, but we have to remember it when going forward." nails hush. Boris says, "ok folks - I'm going to summarize what I heard, and then I'd like to open up the floor to specific suggestions...I am very open to keeping this conversation running for another 45 minutes or so...but I'd like to have some concrete ideas in place." Boris says, "1) We agreed to advertise pennmush in non-traditonal avenues. We agreed how important advertising is." Boris says, "2) We identified a problem: many similiar themed mushes with low player-bases is not as good as a few mushes with high player-bases. Part of the reason? Many players want a sandbox to "make their own mush"" Nyssa nodnods Nyssa says, "Luigi...Bah.." Boris says, "3) We identified an issue: our community (for a lot of different reasons) is fractured, and community building is key for our future health" Boris says, "4) We identified an issue: there is tremendous duplication of effort" Boris says, "5) We agreed we need to keep our "centers" open (BrazilMUX, M*U*S*H, etc...)" Nyssa cheers! Boris says, "6) The idea of the genre graying was disputed - there are young people interested in our genre, and we are not in competition with MMORPG's - we are an alltogether different experience." Nyssa says, "Absolutely." Matrix waves hand on the young people part. Tokeli nods. MMORPG's suck. Boris says, "7) An interesting point was raised: as time has gone on, starting a new mush has become easier, the barrier to entry has become lower - a double-edged sword, as players with less experience and technical skill can start mushes that might not have legs" Boris says, "those are the major points I heard. Let's start with the suggestions, and then we'll continue the conversation." nails says, "the caterpillar parable." Sketch says, "Got mine." Boris says, "sketch?" Nyssa says, "I'd like to bring up another point. Player base shouldn't rely on selling a ts genre." Sketch says, "If someone has theirs, go ahead. I'm still typing." Sketch grins. "One of the reasons I like PokemorphMUSH is that it doesn't. It's just awesome in its own way." :) Boris says, "well, here are 2 of mine:" Sketch says, "Also brings up another point of mine, but... that's for later." Boris says, "1) I think we need to make a list of magazines, websites, and communities we should reach out to. I'm thinking between 25 and 50. That's my first one." Ide says, "bring on the mush street team :)" Boris says, "and my second suggestion is a bit more personal. I note that advertising agencies realize the value of "word of mouth" advertising. I would like to ask that people here agree to invite a friend to check out mushing..." Boris says, "not a big thing, but just ask them to logon, help them get acquainted with the genre, and answer any newbie questions they might have" Boris says, "nails?" Nyssa says, "I find it's difficult to get ppl off their high game-console horse to try out Mushing...The most common resulted comment I got was...'this is boring'." nails says, "Critical Mass. Ide's heard this enough from me, but I'm not going to shut up until the problem goes away. This covers the 100 games w/ 5 players. it also applies to the 'centers'. New information (advertisements, documentation, etc) should be put into a *finite* number of sites/resources, so that information is easy to find. All of these should work together, and people wanting to contribute should focus their efforts on helping existing sites, not making new ones and further compounding the fracturing/duplicating and wasting effort." Langley raises a hand to comment on that. Boris says, "one moment, langley :-)" nails says, "Every time during this lecture that the subject was "How can we help PennMUSH", I think that is a sign of a fracture there. I think community building should be codebase agnostic, genre agnostic, theme agnostic, RP style agnostic, etc." nails says, "Thundercats, Ho!" nails is done. Boris says, "oooh. good point" Molikai says, "Amen." Sketch says, "Ho!" Boris says, "langlet?" Boris says, "langley?" Boris grins Nyssa says, "RIght on, nails!" Sketch is ready with his three points. Langley says, "Well, I've obviously not been here, as in on this place, long. But I've had many years of experience and the problem I often run into is that....many places aren't willing to allow the players to help their 'existing' site. Offers of help, even when it's obvious help is needed, are often shot down because they 'have their sandbox' and don't want to share their shovels with people that aren't in their circle?" Sketch says, "Aye..." Boris nods Sketch says, "I have, occasionally, had to fight tooth-and-nail just to help. ;)" Ide points to the tinymux wiki :) nails was mostly commenting on community resources in that rant, where hopefully the problem is less so. "In that sense, I think the community should back the resources that do welcome group effort (The tinymux wiki, M*U*S*H, Electric Soup). Nyssa agrees nails says, "It's only through group effort that resources will expand to meet the needs of our future *massive* community." Boris says, "excellent suggestion - let's move on to Sketch?" Sketch says, "Spam warning. O:)" Sketch says, "My three points taken: 1) Unity -- Let's get lots of MUSHes together for parties, let's have the admin discuss successes and failures regularly, and help each other out. 2) Experiment -- Javelin knew what he was doing. Don't forget that. Every March 31st (before April Fools'), people would be on the edge of their seats, or have left on vacation. This year, it was MY turn, and I've had tons of praise regarding the *STRUGGLE* people had to go through to get their voices back. Be bold. Try new things, teach people about new features, and new plots. Frustrate your players, because only THEN can they have the happiness of real success. You'll drive some people away, but unless you do something knuckleheaded, the players worth keeping will endure it and hope you do better next time. 3) Organize -- Lists of MUSHes.. Categorizing of MUSHes--not by THEME. Like... Does this serve for Killers/Socialisers/Achieves/Explorers best? What systems are coded, and how are they coded--and why are they special?" nails ducks... and covers. Sketch says, "heh. 2 is huge." Boris says, "really good sketch" Nyssa shrugs Nyssa says, "Bring it on." Boris says, "any other suggestions? I've got..." Boris says, "8 so far" Sketch says, "I think a lot of them are similar. :)" Boris agrees Nymeria says, "3) is interesting, especially in combination with trying to be (as nails put it) code base agnostic, rp style agnostic, etc. It might be easier to bring people together, and to get them to consider different and new things, if they know precisely what they're getting into." nails says, "The MUSH list issue has recently been an active topic on Electric Soup. I encourage people to chime in." Nyssa says, "I think intimidation is a big issue for sure." Boris says, "could you talk about that a little more, Nyssa?" Nyssa says, "It's well, instead of helping the newbie, pointing him at the help then idleing only says that 'you aren't worth the time' I've seen a lot of that in the past." Nyssa says, "That's intimidating." Boris says, "aha." Langley nods. Nyssa says, "Some newbies need their hand held, so to speak." Boris says, "so new players aren't welcomed in a meaningful way?" Boris says, "that's suggestion #9. Be genuinely friendly and welcoming to new players" Sketch says, "It's true. A major fault of our excessively channel-based MUSH, and channel-based players. It's like IRC." Nyssa says, "That's not a generalization Boris." Boris says, "ah" Nyssa says, "I'm saying this more in terms of acknoledgement." Boris nods and understands :-) nails says, "I think improved cohesive documentation will help that immensely. Perhaps there could also be a community wide (and i mean whole MU* community) codification on newbie helping." Langley says, "In the beginning, when a game is new, the staff is ALWAYS over eager to help, but once they get their numbers where they feel they want to be...not so much so. Then you get into players finding places univiting and wanting to fracture off to build a place where they know they're gonna make players feel welcome!.....until they get their numbers." nails says, "MU* candy stripers, or something." nails is not wearing that dress, tho. Boris says, "well" Nyssa says, "Exactly, nails put it more into perspective than I did." Boris says, "I think we could ask "what does helping a new player look like?"" Boris says, "it's not saying, "go read help"" Sketch says, "Regarding documentation/assistance/leetness: I have plans for M*U*S*H I hope will pan out. Big plans. Horribly slow plans to process... :)" Gab grins. It's like... good customer service. X) Sketch says, "Leetness, there's a word I'd like to re-define." Tyr makes a note: Plenty of time to disrupt Sketch's plans. Ide grins nails says, "Sketch, maybe your plans and my plans can do lunch." Boris says, "it's engaging a new player, and offering assistance to them....when I was new, it was very simple: an older player reached out, and showed me the ropes. He probably took 2 hours, but it made all the difference!" Sketch says, "Hope so. Have to get them past the other admin first. *laugh*" Sketch says, "Right, Boris." Sketch says, "Same for me." Gab is guilty of the not-letting-people help. For lots of different reasons, though she is really trying to get the players' voices heard now. Educating the leaders, I think is a great way to improve *tons* of situations. Educate the staff! Unite staffers from different places. Rock on! :D And apologies if this is out-of-turn. Nyssa says, "Something that has been lost in today's everyday dealings...I mean, when was the last time you talked to someone real off the bat, concerning calls to companies? ;)" Sketch says, "Same for all of ANYONE here, isn't it?" Ide says, "a culture of mentorship -- M*U*S*H and MPUG do a good job of this on softcode channels already" Gab hms? What do you mean, Nyssa? Sketch says, "Didn't you have a helper? Who here didn't? :) I think that IS vastly important. More than we may realize, because we forgot..." Sketch did, anyway. But... Nyssa says, "I mean, have staff go help instead of, take a number." Sketch says, "Or have other *players* help." Boris says, "good point" Nyssa says, "Or force them to Chargen." Sketch says, "Critical mass." nails says, "Many games have assigned or annointed 'newbie helpers' as part of the overal staff structure." Langley says, "Seasoned players could be given 'mentor' positions on games. Not full staff positions, just a list of players people can go to for help if staff is busy?" Boris says, "does anyone have anymore suggestions? I'd like to share what we have so far, and I'll post them to community.pennmush, and electric soup, and the tinymux wiki" nails says, "A lot of these things are already done, they just are not codified. This is what I was talking about regarding perspective." Nyssa says, "I look at it this way, do I want to attract player base, or not? WHat can I do to achieve that?" Ide has a point about softcode packages Sketch also does. nails says, "Ideas need to escape the bubbles of individual games." Boris says, "ide?" Ide says, "These have been done in the past -- MiaM, SGP" nails says, "cough cough Museon." Ide says, "and are still done informally -- coders swap code all the time -- yes, Museon :)" Nyssa says, "I find it's best to get to know the player and where they stand in what they know." Boris says, "ok..." Nyssa says, "Personal interaction does that the best." Ide says, "Mux releases SGP with their distro now as well" Ide agrees with Nyssa. Nyssa says, "All this relates with the intimidation point I made." Boris says, "so in the interest of our original goal: specific suggestions for keeping text-based games alive and well:" Boris says, "I've got 9, and here they are:" Boris says, "1) make a list of 25 to 50 magazines, websites, and communities we want to reach out to." Boris says, "2) invite a friend to mush!" Boris says, "3) don't think "what can we do to help pennmush", but rather, "what can we do to help text-based gaming"" Boris says, "4) The community should back the resources that do welcome group effort (The tinymux wiki, M*U*S*H, Electric Soup)" Boris says, "5) Unity -- Let's get lots of MUSHes together for parties, let's have the admin discuss successes and failures regularly, and help each other out." Boris says, "6) Experiment -- Javelin knew what he was doing. Don't forget that. Every March 31st (before April Fools'), people would be on the edge of their seats, or have left on vacation. This year, it was MY turn, and I've had tons of praise regarding the *STRUGGLE* people had to go through to get their voices back. Be bold. Try new things, teach people about new features, and new plots. Frustrate your players, because only THEN can they have the happiness of real success. You'll drive some people away, but unless you do something knuckleheaded, the players worth keeping will endure it and hope you do better next time." Boris says, "7)Organize -- Lists of MUSHes.. Categorizing of MUSHes--not by THEME. Like... Does this serve for Killers/Socialisers/Achieves/Explorers best? What systems are coded, and how are they coded--and why are they special?"" Boris says, "8) I think improved cohesive documentation will help that immensely. Perhaps there could also be a community wide (and i mean whole MU* community) codification on newbie helping." Sketch says, "7 is an expansion of 1." Boris says, "and 9) draw up a "how to be friendly to new players" guide (MU* agnostic). If we want to be funny, we could make a "how to drive players away from your MU*"" Sketch chants merge merge merge... :) Boris says, "ok ok..." Boris says, "merge we shall." Nyssa smiles Boris says, "7 and 1 shall be squished together" nails says, "Oh!" Boris says, "nails?" Sketch says, "What do we call ourselves? MU*?" Boris says, "hmmm" nails says, "also add: Death to outdated and pessimistic/detrimental myths!" Nymeria says, "I don't think its necessarily possibly for all games to be newbie friendly, though. You can be friendly to newbies, yes, but you might still have a setup that makes getting started on your game very difficult. And then you should probably make that plain. :)" Nyssa says, "MU* is comprehensive.!" Tyr says, "Em-You-Asterisk?" nails says, "MUstar" Tyr :) Nyssa says, "Um, nix the period." Tyr says, "That sounds vaguely Arabic." nails says, "(the star is silent)" tramp finally catches up on scrollback after a nice afternoon nap... and raises his hand to offer input. Tyr ahs. Boris says, "I generally use multiplayer text based games...I know it's a mouthful, but it's pretty all-encompassing" Boris says, "tramp?" tramp says, "couple comments (about the collection of comments)..." tramp says, "the 25 to 50 website thing..." Boris says, "mm?" Gab >) MUstar. tramp says, "I specifically want to point a finger (sorry Amberyl) at mudlistings..." tramp says, "The one thing that was always missing from mudlistings was the ability to ignore games that had been open less than a year or which have an average daily player count of less than 10 people (or at least move all those to a separate category)." tramp says, "so that you can SEE the games that are succeeding (so to speak)." tramp says, "The othe rcomment..." Nyssa says, "That's cliquish" Sketch hush. "Let's not *argue*, just discuss.." :) Nyssa says, "I run a game that's like that. Does that mean it should be ignored?" tramp says, "What? not wanting to see clique-started games?" tramp says, "anyway... to the newbie issue." tramp says, "Nyssa was correct that all games cannot be newbie friendly." Nyssa says, "I never said that. I said they should be." Nymeria says, "I was responsible for that one. :)" Nyssa says, "Ah." nails says, "N(star)a" Nymeria chuckles. tramp says, "you can't expect every game to make their world... their connect sequence... their application processes, etc... such that they are perfectly attuned for an absolute newbie (someone who's never logged into a MUSH before). It takes too much work. Trust me. Been there. done that. // Sorry Nyssa/Nym... your comments were nestled together." Ide points out lists like TMC, which despite its faults, lets you search on date opened and player count (not perfectly accurate, but it's possible) tramp says, "Every game can't be MUSH 101." Boris says, "good point tramp..." tramp says, "likewise, I suppose... no game really WANTS TO BE ... MUSH 101." Gab has a problem with newbies that can't read even the best documented things. :( So nothing is really fool-proof in the end. nails says, "I agree. I think it is likely that different games will have different social environments, both OOC and IC (if they have IC), and that it's unreasonable to expect that. That's one of the reasons that we get to have choices; people get to run their games how they like. I think it's more pragmatic to guide new players towards games where they will be better received." tramp says, "I think I'm the only person in the world so far who had the cojones to do that... to full completion." Nyssa says, "Part of this is to get ppl into MU*ing too." Boris says, "so might you suggest a new-player rating for mushes? "this game is appropriate for people who have be involved in text-based games for X years?"" Gab ooo. I like that idea. Boris says, "be=been" Boris says, "or maybe something like that?" Nymeria says, "That's not a bad idea." tramp says, "yes. that's at least a good suggestion to start with." Boris will add it Sketch says, "Regarding Nyssa's MUSH, and why it should be on a list: It's a UNIQUE mush. It is NOT a trek mush with 5 players. Therefore, in my own eye, that deserves attention. It lacks players due to lack of advertisement/general knowledge, not because there's dozens like it. :)" Molikai is a bit.. It strikes me that quite a few people would take that as, 'You mean I'm not good enough?' and then there's the question of.. who /decides/? Maybe some form of nomination system by people who have experienced it? tramp says, "or at least something like "this ain't a good place to begin, if you want to enjoy MUSHing"... or something like that." Langley says, "Something like that, yeah, but years experience isn't really a good gauge? I have friends that I've introduced to this whole mess that caught on in no time flat and others that still struggle after three years." Boris says, "ah" Boris says, "well, we could phrase it like:" Nymeria says, "People could take it that way, true, but if you're careful how you phrase it, it will help some people at least." Boris says, "this mush assumes you are familiar with text-based games, and understand the genre. New players may find themselves frustrated..blah blah blah" Sketch says, "Idea:" tramp says, "you just don't want to make this 'rating' such that it could, in any way, imply anything about the 'quality' of the game... outside of that one assessment (is this someplace a clueless noob could get a good start?)." Nyssa says, "Exactly" Boris listens Nymeria says, "Of course, if you do things very differently, people with 5+ years experience might still struggle. I saw plenty of that with our CG when we opened. ;)" Sketch says, "Make a scale of newbie-friendliness. 1/2/3/4/5. Don't assign values to the numbers. If people get frustrated, just have them move up the list." nails says, "If there are going to be ratings, we need ratings standards boards with elected and appointed officials..." Ide says, "yes, a true/nil boolean sort of thing would work best in the way Boris phrased it" Boris says, "how does this sound as a suggestion:" nails says, "this game is rated MSRB 13+ / naughty language, some fart jokes" Nymeria says, "A lot of the mudlists seem to have a rating for newbie friendliness/newbit suitability, so they are familiar with the need for such sorting." Boris says, "clearly state (on connect.txt, or something like that) if this MU* is appropriate for very new players" Ide grins Nyssa says, "We have to remember, we were all, at one time a clueless noob." Sketch says, "Yikes! Discussion's kinda breaking down... Speed's cranking up anyway. :)" tramp says, "And Molikai's nomination thing wasn't a bad idea (like rating posts on slashdot). Somewhere on this MUSH there's a thing that allows people to take quizes/polls and I know the guy who wrote it. That might not be a bad place to START with something 'universal" Boris clears his throat. tramp says, "a common set of 'evaluation' questions on some website "rate this MUSH'." nails hush Boris says, "yea...we could use a rubric, Tramp. perfect for this sort of thing." Boris says, "I need to go spend some time with wifey now..." Boris says, "I have absolutely enjoyed this conversation" Nyssa does too.. Vadiv takes it we've completely gotten off the topic of...what? Boris says, "and I willpost the suggestions in the 3 areas I discussed" tramp is glad he got here in time to throw in his 2 ducats. Ide says, "thanks Boris, you did a great job" Boris says, "thank you very much for coming" tramp also wants to add (last comment really)... Sketch says, "Absolutely freak'n amazing, Boris. :)" tramp says, "before the log closes..." Boris says, "and I look forward to other events this month" Boris says, "eh?" nails applauds! tramp says, "RP is becoming less the focus of MUSHing because MUSH servers can DO MORE... each and every day. it's not a demise... it's progress." Nyssa is glad she had to the time to attend. Boris says, "good point" Nyssa agrees with that one tramp. Boris says, "THANK YOU everyone for coming!" tramp claps for Boris. nails thinks this idea that RP is going away isn't really true. Boris goes down the few steps to the seating area. Boris comes down the few steps from the stage. Boris has arrived. Ide cheers. Boris says, "thank you everyone!" Boris says, "that was a really interesting conversation." Nyssa says, "Thank you for your vested interest!" Vadiv will have to read the transcript of this and give his own speech on his ideas. Langley doesn't ever want to see the day where RP isn't the focus of MUSHING. "Don't you all love it when your character comes alive through development to the point that what you type in poses surprizes you? Sketch says, "Yes." Gab was very glad to be invited here for the discussion. Thank you. :3 Molikai says, "Mhm. Sorry I've been so quiet - Flatmates birthday, people descended. ;) But yar. THis has been very.. Interesting." nails says, "I think there are different playstyles on different games. I think people have a tendancy to gravitate towards specific types of games, and that affects their perspective." tramp doesn't RP, Langley. nails says, "Just because you're seeing x doesn't mean that x is the overall trend out there." tramp says, "but I still enjoy MUSHing." Sketch says, "I have two things remaining I'd like to say." Sketch says, "They're rather big. Anyone still logging? ;)" Nyssa says, "I think it's all inportant, but shouldn't be all inclusive. MU*is the whole hog, not some sideshow. ;)" Molikai is still logging, yep. Molikai will say when he stops. :) Sketch says, "* Regarding softcode packages: There isn't any staff I know of that wants their +who to look like somebody else's. Ever. So that's the major problem with a Hardcoded +who/+where, and such. Everyone WANTS to code their own. But what we CAN do is supply a 'heres how did it--' and tutorials regarding that. Also, we can make backends. Functionality is given, and all people have to do is wrap their who-display function around a--> u(who_core) or u(where_core), which return sorted DBrefs given criteria. :)" Sketch says, "* In regards to the cross-MUSH-unity, which I wholeheartedly agree with and am actually trying to ACHIEVE in my own failure of a one-man-army way, there IS a problem. It's a problem of 'lumping'. I'd like to bring up a particular example, in fact: Gab's MUSH, which is highly popular and very cool, first-hit-on-Google for its keyword, has great players, is 'Pokemorph MUSH'. Thus we have a history haunting us in this case: Furry==Sex!!11. Which is definitely not the case on hers, but! A lot of MUSHes will not WANT to help each other, for fear of: 1) Promoting Competition. 2) Inflicting themselves with a negative image they feel others produce. ... Sorry. I don't have easy answers for that one." Nyssa says, "It's true. I wouldn't want to promote ts genre mu*s." tramp says, "didn't you suggest inter-MU parties earlier, Sketch?" Sketch says, "I did. ;)" nails says, "Party at my house!" tramp says, "I think that's a great idea and should start with admins." nails says, "BYOTS" nails err tramp says, "maybe start with just gamegods only." Sketch says, "Nice." tramp says, "... and trickle down from there." Sketch says, "Can we save details of that discussion for later? I'm TIRED. Wow." -- ---------------------------------------- www.mackenty.org Bill MacKenty, M.Ed. Instructional Designer Hunter College Campus Schools http://www.hchs.hunter.cuny.edu/ 646-963-6339 xyzzy ---------------------------------------