Advertisement.

Simple as that, the main reason most p2p muds are bigger is because they can afford full sized advertisements in magazines dealing with RPGs such as Inquest and whatnot. And, together with the initial large playerbase comes the advertisement by players trying to bring other people in as well.

If free (as in free beer) muds could put up huge advertisement without putting a triple mortage on the server, would they have more success as well? It's marketing people. The p2p muds simply have the ability of throwing vast ammounts of money at a problem until it get's solved or solves itself, including the aquisition of fresh and new players. Free muds are locked in a tight battle for every player they can get. How many absolutely NEW free mudders are there every month? And I mean people absolutely new to mudding, not old timers... Sadly few in the free (beer) community, but allot in the p2p community.

Back on track, I have to abstain about commenting about marking p2p muds. One side tells me to agree to differentiate said muds from the rest, but I also realize that this ranking is about MUDs. If it is a MU*/MOO/blah, then there should be no difference between p2p and free. Tough call... Really tough call.