[SnowTroll]

I've played so many muds that have thousands of rooms, even tens of thousands of rooms, while fewer than 100 rooms ever get used. When I poke around, map, and explore, other players tell me I'm doing it wrong, and that if I want to level fast, I should go to this place, then this place at this level, then this other place at this level. Sure enough, they turn out to be right. There's no reason to go to 99% of the mud's areas unless there's an oddball piece of gear I want there, or if everywhere I want to level is crowded and I need to settle for a second or third string area. That means there are some really well written, well designed areas out there in various muds that see no traffic, simply because whoever built that area didn't give the area good mobs to level off of or lots of good loot. Sometimes, I walk around with a sword or staff or cloak that's maybe a point or two better than the one most people my level wear (most people just skip past it going to the high-return areas and get the next piece of good gear everybody knows about). So players who've been playing the mud for 10 years ask me, "Where did you get that staff?" It's that bad in some places.

I really enjoy muds that give me experience per room, or per area, or even just muds that keep track of my exploration for bragging rights. I'll usually try to thoroughly map a mud just for fun anyway. But exploration incentives are a good way to get people to really appreciate how large and colorful a mud's world is, how well the areas fit together, themes and interactions, and so on.