View Single Post
Old 10-12-2002, 07:15 AM   #101
Molly
Senior Member
 
Join Date: Apr 2002
Location: Sweden
Home MUD: 4 Dimensions
Posts: 574
Molly will become famous soon enoughMolly will become famous soon enough
Seraphina, I think you still don’t get my point.

I have nothing against variety. In fact I think that’s one of the great things about muds, that there are so many different styles, that just about anybody should be able to find something that suits their taste.

I have nothing against pay-to-play, as long as it is up-front and not in breach of any licence.

I have nothing against enforced roleplay, even if it isn’t exactly my own cup of tea. I quite agree with you that if there is an advancement system in a RP mud, you should also be rewarded for good roleplaying. (There is of course a rather big problem to decide who earns this reward and who doesn’t, mainly because of the different Time zones. I’ve never even met some of the players in my own mud, so how could I decide who is a good roleplayer and who isn’t? There is also the well known problem with all sports that are based on more or less subjective judging, that the question of favouritism, bias and sheer bribery could come into play (some recent scandal concerning figure-skating comes to mind…) But then again, that’s quite a different problem, perhaps worthy of a thread of its own.

I don’t have any problem with your example where 10 players of a tabletop game decide together to start at a somewhat higher level. What I WOULD have a problem with, is if only ONE of these ten players got to start at the higher level because he paid the Gamemaster 100$.

Get the difference? I just want everybody to compete on equal terms. And that’s why I am against muds that trade in game advantages for real money. That is also what I meant with my remark 'why play at all'.

If you are going to cheat or buy advantages in a skill based game, why play at all? You wouldn’t enter a chess Tournament if some of the players could get your Queen removed, by paying the Tournament leaders 1000 bucks, would you?

GenmaC, if by any chance your rather offensive remark was directed to me, let me tell you this:

I am not generally in the habit of ‘mud-bashing’, but there are some phenomena in the mud world that truthfully irk me. People who earn money by preying on the work of others and breaking licences, like Medievia, is one of those. And people who earn money through deception, half-truths, ridiculous exaggerations, blatant lies, and other unethical methods is another. If people choose to do things like that, they sort of lay themselves open to ridicule and criticism.

Now, my opinions of Mihaily and Achaea was mainly formed by the extremely sleezy advertisement campaign he ran on the MudConnector some time ago. And this opinion is not improved much by the fact that he uses a form of pay-to-play that I find extremely cheesy, namely selling game advantages for real money, while at the same time stating that the mud is ‘totally free to play’.

Since I never played Achaea, I don’t know the exact nature of the advantages you can buy there. Neither do you, if your statement is true that you never paid a penny yourself. There also seems to be somewhat differing opinions among the players, whether the ‘advantages’ are really ‘advantages’ and not only ‘cosmetics’.

But Mihaily does not strike me as a person who would do something just out of the goodness of his heart. He also does not strike me as a very truthful person, an opinion based on the aforementioned advertisements and several posts from him on these boards. He would hardly have shelled out money for that ridiculous and sleezy campaign, if it hadn’t given him a number of new players. And he would hardly have this option of buying stuff for real money, unless he actually expected to make some money from it.

So answer me this: If the things that you can buy in Achaea are as worthless as you and Mihaily claim – why on earth would anyone pay real money to get them?
Molly is offline   Reply With Quote