Sharing a board note about Newbies

[Lycron]

I think that everyone should keep this note in mind, not just my followers so I am posting for all to see.

[ 15] Lycron: Newbies
Wed May 5 12:42:45 2010
To followers of: Lycron
Hey All,
Another thought crossed my mind, and that is newbies. As we all know
MUDs are slowly dying. Fewer and fewer people come into them and
several more are being sucked into WoW and worse (real life) - for the
few brave souls who still attempt to live a MUDder life style we
need to do everything we can to assure that they will come to find
TFC as a long term home. Whenever you see a new player, always
greet them, ask them if they have questions and offer assistance.
I'd like everyone to start storing 1 or 2 pieces of level gear that
they can freely offer to new players. I think that not only will this
benefit the new player and TFC, but it will help us so that we can
continue to thrive and enjoy the Realm many of us have called home
for over a decade.

Lycron

[Totec]

I have a bit of nostalgia about my early MUD years when it was so easy to coax my school and neighborhood buddies to check out "this radical game with no graphics!" and easily contribute to the growth of the player base.

Now I role play a professional who lives in a cube and keeps to himself, and it seems out of character to invite my co-workers to TFC with those same lines.

Thumbs up for player retention efforts. Now design a plan to make TFC a viral social contagion for player recruitment efforts...

[Tynian]

Now I role play a professional who lives in a cube and keeps to himself, and it seems out of character to invite my co-workers to TFC with those same lines.

That sounds familiar...

[Whistler]

I try to recruit too, when i come out of my cave....

last great place i made suggestions was to a teacher who teaches keyboarding (you know, what we used to call typing?) figure Muds are great practice for students...don't know if he ever passed on the info though...


-

[Corri]

Also please keep in mind - true new players need attention far more than they need gear. Offer ids, ask how their level was, send them occasional tells etc - especially if you notice they remain at level 1 more than 15mins!

[Kylor]

Here's an even better recruiting tool. Let's admit to ourselves that all the changes we have made to TFC to make it easier have not helped recruit at all. Let's take a serious look at what is available to us as far as players. New players... hrm highly doubt it because of reasons listed above as well as many others. Getting back old players who quit, yeah, now that's a much more viable idea. There are more older players who have quit that would come back then there are new players that we can convince to stay. I think we should change our approach. Let's code TFC back to the way it was before everyone started quiting and focus on getting people back that already know how to play and the value of playing. Instead of favoring the poor litttle newbie and trying to get some new faces, let's give the game back to the PKers who filled our who lists into the double digits. When TFC was booming with tons of players almost all of them were PKers. Now we have coded them out in favor of making the game easier and it has gotten us nowhere. For example. A guy makes a 70dmg set. He is obviously a hard working dedicated player. He now has a dmg cap and floating dmg, and purging limiteds to deal with. He quits. Some new guy comes in and yes the game has been made easier for him to compete with that big guy, but it's also become very complicated with fines and purging. He doesn't stay. I think we have coded out our most dedicated players in favor of newbies and whiners who never stick it out anyhow. Let's reverse these changes and bring back the booming days. Give the game back to the PKer and send out global emails to everyone and let them know TFC is back. No more dmg cap, no more floating dmg, no more purging, no more fines, no more debt, allow worn limiteds to pop like crazy. All the hard working players will have a reason to build that 70dmg set again and they will come back. Also, the poor whining cry babies that are the cause of all these changes won't have to cry so hard because the pit will become full of huge limiteds that are popping like mad so they can go make a new set again in a short time.

I support a radical change back to a PK based MUD that was -busy- I will even help get the word out to all those who retired because of these changes that ruined their hard work. I will also dedicate myself to writing new zones to give the wave
of come back players things to do. Thor's new area writer has been making leaps forward and Toku has said he would consider speaking to Tynian about streamlining the writing process to make it easier to get new zones out of peoples heads and into the game. Something that should have been done a long time ago since we just don't have much player base left.

[Whistler]

i don't think that most of the players who quit, quit because of those reasons, but i have been wrong before.

The two times I gave up on this game in the past, it was because of just the opposite reason. I stopped playing because pkers with 3 times my effective level (both alone and in groups) kept killing me before i could even reequip basic nonmagical equipment. (i'm talking about like 3-4 times in 10 minutes.) Which made it impossible to level. these players gained no equipment or xp for the repeated killing, just some twisted sense of superiority--showing me that there was a preponderance of juvenile sadists here, and I didn't want to waste my time associating with them. the changes that have taken place have reduced the vast majority of those types of players, so now the game is far more playable, imho, although i still think that the pk range is excessive.

I think that the majority of players that have left have done so not because of the rules changes, but simply because of the numbers of available new graphics games. muds by and large are going the way of the play-by-mail games. they're still out there, but the niche is much smaller than it used to be. while it would be possible to convert this game to a graphics game, it would require a full time job to do so, and probably take more than a couple of years work if done by one person.

and i think that many players (like my son) have developed more rl concerns to invest the time and mental energy this game can take. He tells me that when he gets out of work, he just wants to go on a game and kill stuff that doesn't require him to think. I was first introduced to the game in college, but after graduating, I found I had far less time to spend gaming. I think this may be true of a large number of former players.

I agree that we should seek out former players. But I think we should simply let them know that the game has changed a great deal and ask them to evaluate the changes for themselves. At the very least we should ask them WHY they left.

and as for new players, we should ask ourselves, "what kind of players do we want?" I for one, would rather not encourage the aformentioned juvenile sadists to play here.
a basic rule of capitalism is that you market your product to a specific target audience. The more you know about that audience, the better you know how and where to approach them.

What are the qualities we would like to see in new players? list some of them and lets put up a poll...we can work from that.


-

[Totec]

Kylor, I think you make some valid points with regard to a particular player archetype. There is a fairly standard article circulated in game development circles that I think you (and others) might find interesting regarding player types, especially since the analysis is on MUD ecosystems (though the findings are applicable to a wide array of highly successful commercial games) titled "HEARTS, CLUBS, DIAMONDS, SPADES: PLAYERS WHO SUIT MUDS" @ http://www.mud.co.uk/richard/hcds.htm. This article is useful in framing discussions such as these.

I would argue that the exodus away from TFC is not unique to TFC, but of all MUDs in a fierce competitive environment of diversions with vigorous marketing campaigns. That is to say that I disagree that game mechanics added to shield Achievers, Explorers, and Socialisers from overly zealous Killers are a principal cause of decreasing players. Nor do I believe that TFC at its peak player activity was populated with "all PKers."

Mind you, neither one of us can move beyond the realm of assertions without having polled players throughout the years for their self-identified player types or obtaining "exit" interviews when a player decides to leave.

Unlike Kylor, I think that the changes made to TFC to encourage a diverse player base beyond the world lopsided for Killers may have happened too slowly to retain the other player suits. My hypothesis is that free games catering to the Achievers, Explorers, and Socialisers exploded onto the scene and successfully attracted players away from TFC with their marketing strategies, fancy graphics, bells and whistles, and PK models that did not involve losing years worth of collecting shiny valuables in the blink of an eye. If I invest heavily in a game with my time (like making my Final Fantasy XI elven mage a super awesome guy with sweet equipment), I want to retain my investment (read: equipment) post death. If I'm going to lose all of my investment when I play, the investment required by the game better be low (like the countless rounds I have played Doodle Jump on the IPhone).

So while recruiting all the old PKers and reverting all the code check-ins of the last 7 years might sound great on paper, I think you would ultimately get everyone together for one last blood bath and come to the cynical realization that the experience will never live up to your romanticized version of the past when other types of players were bountiful lambs to slaughter.

[Lycron]

Kylor - I have posted several reviews, paid for multiple banners (along with Isolas) in the past few months and we have seen several new players, I spoke to them all as an ambassador/attendant. Don't assume TFC is easy because you've been here for years. The feedback was always the same, the newbie area wasn't up to their expectations, xp was terribly slow and the only person who engaged them was me aside from a few people saying hello. We need to stop assuming they have everything they need. Advertising isn't the issue right now. The stakes are too high for a true newbie on TFC. They level up to 10 in something like 20 hours and then are PK'd by someone within 30 minutes and everything was a moot point. They go away and never return.

[Anduin]

Actually Lycron, it's probably moreso that people don't really think they're true newbies so they don't go out of their way to help them.

[Kylor]

right right right, I forgot.. here we go with the arguements. guess what. you're all wrong. TFC can't be compared to other games and neither can its players because I have played other muds and nothing comes close. perhaps it would be one last blood bath but if it lasted a year and it was good then it would be worth it because a it stands we are dying slowly. newbies coming and not staying is nothing new and us rolling the code back isn't going to make that situation any worse. losing all your hard work in a blink is the best part about TFC because DUH you can gain years of work in a blink too so guess what it balances out if you stick with the program. You guys can argue all you want but I know alot of players that have retired and alot of them DID retire becaue of the dmg cap so you need to clean the crap out of your head whistler, I WAS THERE. and guess what, more left with floating dmg and tons of people left because of the purging crap. and actually there are still people who log on ONLY to tick their eq, and once they die they'll be gone forever too (piter for one). I am not in this to validate my points, you don't agree with me then fine. In the end I will just end up being another player that got fed up and went to play something else, and I feel regret just saying something so hideous because I love TFC and it has always been my home but something needs to change and so far the changes have been steering us always in the same direction, it hasn't been helpfull, and we need to look at a new direction.

[boromir]

Greetings,

My first memories of TFC was a Mud with Pkers. It was never a PK Mud. (earlry 1995)
I learned about PKers from getting PKed and then PKing a bit myself.

The last hmm 8 or so years, the PKers have become more and more prevalent and arrogant (almost overbearingly so). My first experience with PKers lost my weapon, all my gold and my TS; the rest of the corpse was returned. As an FLI, I have received tells from people who quit because they were pk'ed and taunted not once but often. Taunted as in here is your corpse, the gold, cool stuff gone and *sac* so is your corpse. THAT is NOT going to bring back or keep anyone for long at all. PKers are a part of TFC but they are Not the most important part. If we bring back more PKers, then the status quo wont change except that fewer will play. Why? Most of the PKers wont attack each other and with everyone waiting in safe (for the most part), the PKers will leave. (again). And we will lose players again.
I am not saying that PKing should be abandoned but NOT presented as the MOST important portion of TFC.

To those who want to create a PK-free TFC, good luck because you lose a part of what TFC is. Having been the victim of a 1.5 round pk thanks to two clavers (1.5 rounds is where the pkers hit you 8 or 9 times (yeah evil rangers) followed by you going "Oh Crap.." and then you wake up in your home town safe room), I can appreciate the frustration of getting pk'ed.

If you dont want to get pked, take steps to protect yourself. What steps you ask? I cant list them here for obvious reasons, two of them being 1) I'm not allowed to and 2) they are stated on this forum repeatedly.

Lets work on getting more players (old and new) playing on TFC. PKers will sort themselves out and will be there.

if you feel the damage limitations are too much, then they can be removed. To balance out the 1-2 round Pk that will eventually ensue, the other part of the change is that the victim only loses 2 items plus gold (victim keeps weapon and simples and restrings). Then the pkers can run around enjoying the 'thrill of the hunt' and victims lose two items and gold rather than everything. Everyone gets something: Pkers gain a chance to pk and victims gets their corpse back with 95% of their stuff.

I await your considered opinions.

[Totec]

TFC can't be compared to other games and neither can its players because I have played other muds and nothing comes close. perhaps it would be one last blood bath but if it lasted a year and it was good then it would be worth it because a it stands we are dying slowly.

Seriously, read the article I mentioned above. TFC's players easily fit into the categories it describes.

There is a great scene in the movie "An Inconvenient Truth" where Al Gore shows a scale. On one side there are gold bars, while the other side bears the planet Earth, and the scale is supposed to represent having to decide between the two. Regardless of your politics, we can agree that the scale depicts a false choice - if the planet dies, the gold bars are useless. In the same way, choosing to focus solely on the needs of PKers vs addressing the needs of other player types is a false choice.

A key point in the article (http://www.mud.co.uk/richard/hcds.htm) for this discussion is that PKers *need* more than other PKers playing to get their rush, and that the types of players in a MUD are interdependent on each other.

Boromir's post is an excellent example of balancing the interests of all player types when coming up with suggestions to enhance game play for everyone.

[Lycron]

Greetings,

My first memories of TFC was a Mud with Pkers. It was never a PK Mud. (earlry 1995)
I learned about PKers from getting PKed and then PKing a bit myself.

The last hmm 8 or so years, the PKers have become more and more prevalent and arrogant (almost overbearingly so). My first experience with PKers lost my weapon, all my gold and my TS; the rest of the corpse was returned. As an FLI, I have received tells from people who quit because they were pk'ed and taunted not once but often. Taunted as in here is your corpse, the gold, cool stuff gone and *sac* so is your corpse. THAT is NOT going to bring back or keep anyone for long at all. PKers are a part of TFC but they are Not the most important part. If we bring back more PKers, then the status quo wont change except that fewer will play. Why? Most of the PKers wont attack each other and with everyone waiting in safe (for the most part), the PKers will leave. (again). And we will lose players again.
I am not saying that PKing should be abandoned but NOT presented as the MOST important portion of TFC.

To those who want to create a PK-free TFC, good luck because you lose a part of what TFC is. Having been the victim of a 1.5 round pk thanks to two clavers (1.5 rounds is where the pkers hit you 8 or 9 times (yeah evil rangers) followed by you going "Oh Crap.." and then you wake up in your home town safe room), I can appreciate the frustration of getting pk'ed.

If you dont want to get pked, take steps to protect yourself. What steps you ask? I cant list them here for obvious reasons, two of them being 1) I'm not allowed to and 2) they are stated on this forum repeatedly.

Lets work on getting more players (old and new) playing on TFC. PKers will sort themselves out and will be there.

if you feel the damage limitations are too much, then they can be removed. To balance out the 1-2 round Pk that will eventually ensue, the other part of the change is that the victim only loses 2 items plus gold (victim keeps weapon and simples and restrings). Then the pkers can run around enjoying the 'thrill of the hunt' and victims lose two items and gold rather than everything. Everyone gets something: Pkers gain a chance to pk and victims gets their corpse back with 95% of their stuff.

I await your considered opinions.

I think you hit it on the head Boromir, TFC really is a MUD with PK. I know that to some people that is all it is, and thats why they left, and that is also why they caused other people to leave.






I was there for the code changes too and I remember seeing a bunch of immature whiny people leaving over it. As an implementor, it is impossible to please everyone so the best thing you can do is try to figure out what will prolong your work. Had Tynian not made those changes, TFC more than likely would have dwindled away to nothing and been gone years ago. I think its humorous that players pretend to be so up in arms against changing PK, yet as soon as a following gains some traction many people jump ship to avoid the PKs. Lets be honest with ourselves, there is a LOT more to TFC than just PK. I wouldn't want PK to go away, but I'm certainly not opposed to anything that would help us retain players. Once again, it is true people left over code changes - but a lot more left over the frustrations of being PKed by a bunch of immature brats. Thats my 2 cents.

[Anduin]

I was there for the code changes too and I remember seeing a bunch of immature whiny people leaving over it.

That's an incredibly unfair statement to make. They left because they didn't enjoy it, and get labelled as immature for complaining and leaving? I guess they should have stayed and been bored to keep TFC's player numbers high. Give me a break.

[Kylor]

I couldn't agree with anduin more. and you know what, I think boromir did make a valid point. roll back some of the changes that made people leave AND implement a change wherein people wouldn't lose everything when they die, now that is a forward thinking idea and I love it. People would come back and build huge sets and run around with a lust for the hunt, newbies would get to learn about avoiding PK without learning it the "hard" way. I like that alot. and there was one more very very valid point made. You -can't- please everyone. I agree. My point is that we've chosen to please the wrong group. You don't code out the most dedicated and most active players simply because they've gotten too far ahead. For once I feel a thread has been an arguement that actually moved forward, I thank everyone for their input.

[boromir]

Greetings,

One point I should make is that the reason alot of people left is that the PKers made TFC impossible for non-PKers to play. Non-Pkers left for many reasons in addition to the ones I mentioned in an earlier post, amoung them the fact that they were getting almost no chance to survive (the 1 or 2 round PK). Pkers left because of the rules put in place to level the playing field so that 1 round PKs would not become the rule. They could have changed they way they pked but didnt and instead they complained and left. That is their problem since whining and quitting didnt help anyone (pker and non-pker alike).

Now, I will admit that a 1 or 2 round PK is lots of fun if you are the winner. That did eventually 'kill the goose that lays the golden egg' because all the non-Pkers stopped playing even as the code was changed. So the PKers left as well ... since they really dont go after each other as a rule. And yes I will admit that there are some who did but those are few in number.

Just because a group of people are dedicated and active, doesnt always mean you wish them all to return. Especially not if their actions were the impetus to a greater number of others leaving.

In this particular case, we need to attract both types of players i.e Non-Pkers and Pkers.

Now, if these changes are put into place we all know there will be complainers that its still too tough to pk someone.

Guess what!!! Its supposed to be tough.

Its not the 'casual stroll to the corner 7-11 or Circle K" type of an affair. There are Pkers who I would welcome back with no question at all. Not because I could PK them but because they understood how to PK and were willing to put the effort into practicing and learning.

A couple of those PKers got me more times than I got away.

Others I did better at escaping than they did getting me.

I await your considered opinions!

[Tynian]

Kylor, I think you make some valid points with regard to a particular player archetype. There is a fairly standard article circulated in game development circles that I think you (and others) might find interesting regarding player types, especially since the analysis is on MUD ecosystems (though the findings are applicable to a wide array of highly successful commercial games) titled "HEARTS, CLUBS, DIAMONDS, SPADES: PLAYERS WHO SUIT MUDS" @ http://www.mud.co.uk/richard/hcds.htm. This article is useful in framing discussions such as these.

The article you referenced is ancient. I read it many years ago, and agreed with many of its points.

It may be time for me to re-read it. Regardless, it is a good read for anyone interested in MUD mechanics and player types.

It's pretty easy to see things from your own reference points and what you personally most appreciate from the game. It's equally is easy to grasp the point of view of like-minded people that you commiserate with. One's memory of the past has an alluring attraction, and I'm guilty of that, as well; however, we do tend to romanticize the past, and in the process, ignore other relevant information.

[Cadee]

Just in case anyone wants my two cents...
One of the main reasons I quit playing for a while was because I got bored. I saw that new code was implemented that made my class interesting again and I came back.
New code changes aren't always a bad thing to old players. I think some of the problem with the drastic changes that ran people off is simply the fact that they were drastic. I don't actually know, but I'm betting that a lot of people who left probably wouldn't have hated the changes so much if they had actually given them a chance. Many people have spent years learning the realm inside and out. They knew all the tricks, knew all the limiteds and places to go. Something comes in that either changes everything they knew or renders it irrelevant. It is hard to go from being the arrogant king of the mountain to scrambling back to your feet at the bottom. People were stripped of their crowns and left to struggle with the peasants, not a fun place to be after years of dedication and struggling to get at the top. A lot simply didn't see the point in putting in the effort to learn the game all over again while knowing that there was a high probability that it would all change again.
Another large problem with the declining player base is age. I've found that now that I'm grown I just don't have the time to play like I use to. I was once able to have multiple alts that were all very active, now I can't. Being an adult sucks...
And lastly, and in my opinion the greatest, reason people leave TFC is friendships. You form friendships with the people you play with a lot. When someone leaves it usually will set off a chain reaction. This has been a big one for many of my alts, all the people I grouped with stopped playing so I did as well. Now when I log on it is rare that I see people on that I know and that I played with before. It is often not a good idea to group with people you don't know and could possibly mob-kill you and steal your stuff, so this makes doing 'fun' things much much harder. Plus things just aren't as fun without my friends.

Anyhow, that is my opinion, which I'm sure many will argue with

[Kylor]

I won't argue with you Cadee. I'm too sad. Tynian is right. I romanticize that past and long far too much for it to come back. What I am not doing however is ignoring the facts. We had more players back then and it would be fun to have an active mud again. I also realize that we've lost non-PKer to a PK friendly code, and lost PKers to a watered down PK code. Nobody is saying that anyone is wrong about any of that so far. I don't want anyone to think this is about my love of PK or the fact that those I associate with also love the same things. It's about my love of an active MUD. So if I may summarize.

TFC's greatest hits album one
side A) We are losing non PKers to a PK mud that is over run with PKers but we're active and busy
side B) We are losing PKer because we watered down the PK code and limited code. and now we're not busy or active as much

next option, best of both worlds. we roll the pk code and limited code back to the way they were and draw the PKers back BUT! BUT! BUT! wait now! We allow all worn limiteds to pop like crazy so the people dying can make sets easier, we num the pain of death a bit so when people die, they don't quit.

P.S. Now we have a nice balanced game of two goods allied vs two evils allied and all 4 fli's are active. Now is the time to capitolize and swing for the fences!