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Old 09-20-2012, 06:36 PM   #1
plamzi
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Thumbs up The Bedlam Experience

You've seen the Bedlam banners on TMC and TMS for the past 2 years, and perhaps you'd like to know more about the game than what's in its brief listing. As Head Coder of the game and its custom clients, I'd like to take this opportunity to share with you my vision, most of which is already a reality. Like other games have done, I anticipate using this thread to post major news and have it all in one place for the prospective player. (We have been in hectic development since the end of 2009, and show no signs of slowing down). Special shout out to Lunez@DSL who encouraged me to write this long overdue post.


About the Game

Bedlam is an intelligent hack and slash game, with strong emphasis on team PvE and massive amounts of loot (including random artifacts). It is like Diablo 3, except a lot better, and requiring brains.

The kind of player who does well in Bedlam is one who enjoys exploring custom zones, solving puzzles, and refining strategies for taking down bosses. If you're looking for intense RP, or intense PvP, or completely brainless entertainment--you won't find those here. We tolerate RP, and have some PvP (arena style), but our strengths lie elsewhere.

We aim to provide a relatively casual, extremely user-friendly, and long-lasting experience. All players can access a real-time web-based map, browse the extensive help files online, or use one of the hundreds of enhancements that make your early journey in Bedlam easier.


The Bedlam Class/Skill System

We have 14 well-defined classes and no multi-classing at all. We believe that having a top-notch character in each class (rather than one mediocre char with an identity crisis) enriches and lengthens a player's career. It transforms not only the way they engage with the world, but also how you interact with other human players. Most late-career players have over 10 alts at max level, and pick the class that will do best for the kind of goal they have in mind today.

Spells and skills are defined by class and unlocked by level. They can be practiced up to a point, after which they have to be improved by use. The number of spells and skills is very manageable--our aim is for each one to be unique and uniquely useful. Each contributes to the profile and playing style of its class: the solo necromancer conjures beings from the Nether and raises corpses, the explosive sorcerer deals massive spell damage while re-absorbing some of the mana he/she expends, the ranger dual-wields and is able to attack from a distance.

For late-career players, there are hero powers (extremely powerful skills) and perks that produce unique random loot (with more controllable crafts on the horizon).


Combat

There's an undercurrent of automatic attacks, at a speed determined by many factors, among which weapon weight & type. Passive skills are also automatic. Manual attacks include offensive spells (which can deal additional damage or have after-effects if the opponent is of a certain race) and offensive skills that vary greatly in their ability to debuff or damage the opponent. The Ranger, the Warrior, and the Assassin have ranged combat skills (bows, crossbows, and dart-shooting blowpipes respectively).

Combat can get pretty intense if you want it to be. For those who choose the thief classes, combo points gathered from successful attacks can be spent towards more powerful attacks. Other classes rely on surprising synergies to achieve "steamrolling" in groups. Warriors boost others' morale, clerics can stock up on healing runes, knights provide an excellent 'meat shield' for sorcerers.

Beyond the usual range of debuff attacks, certain classes can shoot magical arrows and darts from a distance, and all thief classes can coat their weapons with various venoms. Some debuffs are very powerful, but only last a few precious seconds, during which you have to seize the initiative.


NPC Followers

A wide range of followers are available so you don't have to wait for other players to increase your firepower. Wizards can charm wildlings, necromancers can conjure and raise, warriors and knights can mount, and everyone can buy mercenaries. Warrior and mage mercenaries can be ordered to use skills and spells, and can execute multi-commands (e. g. 'w;s;cast 'fireball' dragon).

All NPC followers are saved automatically, together with their equipment, and restored to you when you re-enter the game. This means that your quest for better equipment will include sets for yourself as well as for your typical followers (Spiders, Animated Liches, or your favorite mercenary).


Quests

In addition to the occasional game-wide events by a human QM, and the many intricate zone exploration puzzlers, Bedlam sports a custom auto-quest system. In less than two years, our library has grown to include 230+ individual quest episodes. Auto-quests help new players learn the main city, guide and reward exploration, equip you with better gear, and generally ensure a sense of purpose, sometimes even a storyline. Group auto-quests and race-against-peers quests are also available. The highlight of the quest system is an easy web form through which all players can create new quests (subject to approval).


End Game: Overview

Long-term goals include:

* Build optimal gear sets for multiple alts and NPC followers

* Form or contribute to a player clan

* Buy and expand a private house, adding storage rooms, furniture, and lodging

* Buy a private flying mount, a dragon, or a wraith, or <you name it>

* Purchase and stock your own shop for the benefit of other players (and your pockets)

* Compete in one of many categories in the online leaderboards, including quest completion rate

* Become a Hero


End Game: The Path of the Hero


When a character reaches level 60, he or she has the option to complete a series of quests unlocking The Way of the Hero. This enables them to level further, and is also a game-changer. For a hero, and for those who group with Heroes, the game becomes 3-4 times harder. In exchange, Heroes get special powers as well as the ability to get random and randomized loot from ultra-hard bosses. The Hero is basically a specialzed craftsman, able to create entirely new items every time he or she topples a boss.

More professions like Hero are in store to cater to varying tastes. These will include artisans able to craft items while on the move, and even offline.


The GUI Clients

Bedlam has probably the most visual graphical MUD clients currently in production. Our iOS app enables total newbies to keep up with seasoned veterans using mostly touch. The Facebook/web app not only integrates our top-notch real-time map, but also sports player avatars with changing states, mob icons, environment backgrounds, and clickable text elements.


In Conclusion

As you may have gathered already, Bedlam is our way of re-thinking the hack'n'slash MUD for new generations of players, and new leaps in technology. But perhaps none of the above features would matter if we didn't have a core community of dedicated and helpful players who welcome new prospects and enjoy showing off the things that make Bedlam a long-lasting delight. We hope to meet you in Garathorm!
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Old 03-18-2013, 12:30 PM   #2
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Re: The Bedlam Experience

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Old 03-18-2013, 02:06 PM   #3
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Re: The Bedlam Experience

I really think I'd prefer to imagine how my characters look, and that has always been something I really liked about text gaming. I'm not sure I'd want to play as Pro Wrestler Heel of the Week or Ill-Advised Facial Hair Man.
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Old 03-18-2013, 02:52 PM   #4
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Re: The Bedlam Experience

We cater to a wide variety of tastes, with all-text custom GUI's for Mudlet and the web. Take a look at this Mudlet video, for example:



You are also able to set your own textual description, for those of your fellow players who use a text client and wish to read it.

Of course, if you mind playing a game in which *some players* may see your character graphically depicted in a way you didn't imagine, then there's not much to be done about it except to say that Bedlam is not an RP game.
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Old 03-18-2013, 03:47 PM   #5
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Re: The Bedlam Experience

What I meant is that I don't want to have to stare at pictures of my character while I play, especially if they don't look very appealing. I know that I have no control over the imaginations of others and do not intend to control it for them, but having pictures for me limits my imagination to what is presented.
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Old 03-18-2013, 03:58 PM   #6
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Re: The Bedlam Experience

Right. I'm sure many people in this community share your view. But the community is small, and getting smaller. By providing visually-rich clients we allow veteran mudders (on their preferred client) to rub shoulders with people who are actually new to mudding.

Many of those who discover muds through the mobile app go on to play on an all-text client when on a desktop or laptop.

And conversely, some veteran mudders find the mobile app handy for playing on the go. It was designed with utility in mind, not looks. With two people on mobile apps, one on text-based and one on the GUI, my money is on the latter.
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Old 04-17-2013, 04:20 PM   #7
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Bedlam iOS v2.0 promo codes

The Bedlam iOS app v2.0 is now in the (see screenshots below)

Here are 5 promo codes for TMS members. Post here when you claim one.

LNPME7PJKA9L
NELPWH6WJNKJ
AW4JHPKJWM6E
KYFPMP6J3P9M
EJWKE4ALFPPT
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Old 06-05-2013, 11:13 AM   #8
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News 6/5/2013

New Original Content:
The White-Gold Cathedral and Warded Castle by BigCheese.

Explore the Cathedral ruins and its vast catacombs. Confront undead and mystical creatures in your quest to restore the body of the legendary Meklar.

Client Enhancements:
Our free, industry-leading HTML5 web app features several new modules, including the new Guild & Boards UI.

Links:




Other Changes

AI: Hunting mobiles and mobiles headed home can now open doors. Bosses have a chance to dispel debuffs at any time.

PvP: Chars with high spell resistance also have a chance to dispel debuffs. Several combat skills have been rebalanced to make skill combos less fatal.

Accessibility: You can now configure your custom prompt to be sent only on request, or only on change. (Your custom prompt can be in a screen-reader-friendly format.)
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Old 11-12-2013, 10:05 PM   #9
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Old 11-13-2013, 11:17 AM   #10
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Re: The Bedlam Experience

Plamzi... that looks sick .
So there's not a text stream of like 'You slash the undead scary knight dude' etc?
Or room descs and all that? I remember your game came from the Diku/Merc/Rom line originally.
Love the directional controls too, very nice.
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Old 11-13-2013, 11:36 AM   #11
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Re: The Bedlam Experience

Heya,

The server is still very much Diku/Circle, fully playable via any telnet client. (We also have a superb Mudlet GUI and a web-based app that rivals the commercial offering from Iron Realms.)

The app used to flash battle messages up until recently, but they are neither exciting nor interesting, so attacks are now represented graphically. If you don't have an iDevice, you can glimpse what that looks like in the screenshots on . Any non-visualized events (of which there are many) are flashed in text for iPhone4 users, while iPhone5 users see them in an always-on event box at the bottom.

Double-tap on room name (or exa room) opens up the text description in an overlay window. There are quite a few places in the world where the description holds clues, so I don't imagine ever phasing those out. Same goes for item and mob descriptions--they are all there when needed.

You already know this, but others may not:
The new mapper is an open-source plugin that anyone can leverage, either via , or independently after grabbing it from .
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Old 11-20-2013, 06:36 PM   #12
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Re: The Bedlam Experience

Greetings, Seasoned Adventurers!

The full version of Bedlam MMO will be free in the AppStore on November 21 and 22, 2013.

Join us in Garathorm and find out why some of us have been playing this game for over a decade.

Existing players: This will be a great time to help strangers and recruit for your guild!

Plamen
Bedlam Dev



** EXCERPT FROM THE PRESS RELEASE 11/20/2013 **

How many Mafia Wars clones does it take to start wanting an intelligent and deep MMO on your phone?

Bedlam is a high-fantasy, open-ended adventure unlike any other. A vast world that's been growing since the late 90's as a Multi-User Dungeon is now modernized and visualized beautifully on your iPhone. Explore thousands of locations in over 100 areas, 12 very different classes, limitless loot.
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Old 04-02-2014, 11:06 AM   #13
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Re: The Bedlam Experience

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Old 12-12-2014, 12:50 AM   #14
plamzi
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Re: The Bedlam Experience

The hybrid UI (using Mudportal MXP sauce) is now live on Kongregate:



The full GUI has been "saved" and re-purposed towards another project
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Old 12-12-2014, 09:32 AM   #15
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Re: The Bedlam Experience

Plamzi: I'm a power player who loves building skill sets and collecting loot/items/gear. I also love RP and the detail text offers that graphics do not, so I can't see myself playing Bedlam. But I heartily applaud your effort to bring MUDs into the modern era in a way that appeals to today's gamers. That's a tough nut, and I really hope you succeed.
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Old 12-15-2014, 01:50 PM   #16
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Re: The Bedlam Experience

Thank you, sir.

FWIW, I think even the most RPI admins and fans can reap significant benefit from the stuff I've been sharing in the past few years. There is nothing innately graphics-only or innately non-RPI to trying to reach more players over the web, for example. It's already the case for many years that no platform comes with a telnet client pre-installed and easy to fire up. The telnet-only side of the fence is a lonely pasture, and getting lonelier.
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Old 12-17-2014, 08:06 AM   #17
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Re: The Bedlam Experience

I agree with you, and am in fact seriously considering moving my game over to your platform. My only hesitation is, I love the ability to code on the fly that LambdaMOO gives me.
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Old 12-17-2014, 10:19 AM   #18
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Re: The Bedlam Experience

We're going off-topic here, and that's fine by me, but maybe some moderators can step in.

Well, so, first off, you can at your LambdaMOO server in under 5 min. Judging from the screenshots I googled, I see MXP links, which are going to look better and feel more at home in a browser than anywhere else.

Secondly, the new Havoc engine I'm working on was designed from the start to enable dynamic code changes (you would think that since it's all script this would be easy, but in fact it turned out to be tricky to have both dynamic code as well as high performance through caching).

Havoc is in its alpha state now, so changing the code beyond modifying entity procs still requires access to the core scripts. But I've been evaluating solutions like Codebox that will enable multiple contributors to modify the code at runtime at the same time. And you get the benefit of a solid IDE rather than telnet-based editors, which, let's face it, we've moved beyond.

I'm not familiar with LambdaMOO at all, but I like this screenshot: This seems to be part of some MXP-driven OLC menu. It's very close to what I initially had in mind for OLC in Havoc, but I'm starting to move away from this idea, except from maybe some very basic stat adjustments to fix issues or test things more quickly.

One of the reasons I'm moving away from the text-based OLC approach is it seems that it will take you to a place where you have to maintain menus for each type of entity, which can get tedious in a game that evolves quickly. The other reason is that, well again, web forms do that kind of thing better:
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