[Throttle]

Personally speaking, when I've been looking for a H&S mud, I've mainly looked for code that is simplistic but innovative. A mud might have a code that takes care of everything, runs smoothly, remains bug-free and so on, but if it's confusing and unaesthetic, and takes me six months to even vaguely comprehend, I'll lose interest fast. A mud's code should not be extremely alien to what the general norm is (standard DIKU, ROM, SMAUG etc.) unless you want to attract mainly challenge-seeking players at the expense of numbers. A mud such as GodwarsII is an example of that; I tried it out, and I found it to be an exceptionally well-written mud with impressive code and awesome ideas, but it was just way too different from what I'm used to. It is ultimately up to the individual's personal opinions and preferences, but my impression is that the muds that often rank within top10 here are the ones with straight-forward and recognizable code. This does in no way mean that the code is dumbed down or lacking at all, it just means that the guy coming from some other mud doesn't have to face the daunting task of learning an entirely new code while also presented with the obstacle of a game world and community that he's not familiar with. A great example of the opposite of my above reference is TorilMUD which has a fairly mundane code in many regards, but with great concepts such as spell memorization instead of mana, actual raid content, and no level restrictions on equipment. The latter will of course not go well with all muds as it depends heavily on other factors, such as whether or not it has PvP, but it is such a simple and easily comprehensible thing while also one of the mud's defining features.

Some other advice, all based on my personal preferences:

- Don't fall for the temptation of writing up thirty different races with ridiculous names just because you thought it would be neater than having elves and dwarves. You don't necessarily need to use the standard fantasy races, but nothing deters me more than seeing a full page of choices called trzgnfrÿk and zimbi'dabipop. Likewise, class selection (or your mud's equivalent) should be kept at a reasonable level. No cthuluists, no meta-augurers, no wing chun monks, no thaumaturgagogists. You don't have to stick with the fighter/mage/cleric/thief template, but one of the best muds I've played had four races and six classes, and players don't stick around solely based on their class selection if your mud is insufficient, but you will scare off a lot of potential players if the first thing that meets them is the choice of dozens of races and classes that they don't recognize at all.

- I honestly would stick with a simple, tried-and-true hit points system unless there's some very compelling reason that your mud can't do that. If you're running an RPI mud then you may want to consider such things as hit locations and actual bleed code, but if it's a H&S then hit points will do just fine. It also allows you more options for customization in your itemization system, and it's just a lot easier to manage than other often needlessly complicated or overly realistic systems.

- When considering your mud's itemization, I would recommend that you shy away from wildly curving stat progression. What I mean is that you should not have to give your highest level items +250 strength and +800 hp, it becomes so tame and clunky. I prefer a good old 18-stat-system, and hit point totals that don't number in the multiple thousands. There's no reason you can't balance your game's rate of progress and difficulty while maintaining a milder curve. If your level range is 1-50, make low-level items give bonuses of +1 and +2 to stats or hit/dam, and end-game items something like +5-8. That also prevents the pitfall of ending up with an itemization system where equipment means everything. It's also closer to what most mud engines come with by default, so i will both save you the trouble of coding a radically different system and alienating players who are used to the much more common D&D-like system.

- Don't create a code that greatly encourages the use of triggers unless you want your mud to become a game of "who's the best at writing scripts?". I have seen countless muds succumb to this, and not only is it unrewarding to find that the game you created is being played that way, but it also tends to shorten the longevity of the game for the players. If the main challenge is figuring out how to write a script that beats everything, they won't have fun for as long as they could if they had to play manually. You don't need to actively discourage triggers, but it's generally easy enough to write a code that both makes actual botting more difficult and prevents the playerbase from wanting to do it. In other words, make success rewarding, but also make the journey worthwhile.