[KaVir]

My players , with TinTin++ in second place, but only a handful use Wintin or CMUD. I think it very much depends on which clients the mud promotes - particularly if you've got first-time mudders checking out your game. SlothMUD for Windows users, so that's what most new players will download if they're using Windows.

I did initially notice quite a few zMUD users, but as they're slowly migrating over to Vista or Windows 7 they're finding that . Rather than paying for CMUD, as Zugg recommends, quite a few are instead switching to MUSHclient.

The open source clients have something of an advantage in this respect I think. I'm much more likely to invest my time customising something like MUSHclient, Mudlet or TinTin++, firstly because they are free (and therefore more likely to be downloaded by new players), and secondly because they're open source (meaning that even if the developer loses interest, as has happened with many clients over the years, someone else can carry on - or I can even do it myself if necessary). Thus no danger of running into the problem that zMUD users are now encountering.

And of course if I spend my time customising MUSHclient, that's what I'll recommend - and therefore that's what most new players will use when connecting to my game.

I would like to offer a Mudlet option as well, particularly for my Linux and Mac users, but I've not yet got the hang of its scripting system.