[Jazuela]

I don't know how long ago it was or the circumstances in which you tried Armageddon, Misao. But last I recall, most of the times when you'd come across your example, is when you come across a new player who doesn't know how to use the emote system yet.

Just to make sure we're on the same page, the example I'm referring to, from your post, is this:

Would you be too happy with a fiction book that you bought if it went 'A female dwarf smiles. A female dwarf says 'Greetings, traveller'. A female dwarf takes a swig from a mug of ale.'?

In Armageddon, there is a detailed and sometimes complex dynamic emoting system - where the above is -more likely- to look like this:

Kicking out a chair from under the bar beside her, the female dwarf says to you, in southern-accented sirihish, "Have a seat, tell me how's the storm been? I haven't been out all week."

The female dwarf takes a sip from her chipped ceramic mug, then licks her lips free of the froth.

And...
All this is done with special symbols, so that it is dynamic. That means, the other people in the bar see...
Kicking out a chair from under the bar beside her, the female dwarf says to the red-headed man, in sirihish, "Have a seat...blah blah blah..."

Note that the if everyone is from the south except the red-headed man, then everyone will see "sirihish" - they won't see a special accent because to a southerner, southern-accented sirihish isn't an accent at all. It's normal. And, if it's an elf looking on, who doesn't speak sirihish at all, the elf would see what the dwarf is doing, but it'd end up like this:

...the female dwarf says to the red-headed man, in an unknown language, "Mufr e peyk, sarg pl blah blah blah etc."

It is a difficult system to learn, and definitely not suitable to every taste. Plus the combat system is a slowed-down and improved version of the original diku, which isn't agreeable to everyone. But at least, those who are used to diku combat, would feel comfortable with it since it's something they're used to. The nice thing, is that combat isn't necessary to gain influence in the game world. Not so nice, is that if you don't know how the combat system works, and someone tries to kill your character, you will be ill-equipped to know what to do to defend yourself. Things like "draw sword" and "hold shield" and "etwo" and "flee west" aren't necessarily intuitive. Nicer though, is that there are help files for everything. Less nice, is that the help files aren't cross-referenced or organized intuitively. More nice, is that the staff who writes these help files welcome improvements and suggestions and "fixes" from the player base.

Most mushes are -primarily- storytelling, with very little adventuring or coded physical conflict resolution (aka a combat system), if any. Some RP muds are -primarily- adventuring, with no storytelling, and some are just PK and mob-killing with no adventuring or storytelling. But most..are a combination. I think that's really the main difference between the average mush and the average mud, aside from the code itself. In summary, I feel the main difference is in the emphasis.