The_Disciple wrote:
OK, so if you're not talking about the number of players they appeal to (which is, judging by their player base, very small, like all text MUDs), then what are you talking about? You say it appeals to a a "wide variety" of players. What do you mean by variety? Do you mean that the Medievia playerbase is more diverse than smaller MUDs? I seriously doubt that's true. I'd imagine its playerbase is composed of the same kind of people that play small 40-player-simultaneous MUDs: white, black, hispanic, asian, rich, poor, from a variety of English-speaking countries, educated, not educated, etc etc etc.


--matt

It's playerbase size in part. It's large-ish for a text game.

Again, there was no WoW, UO, EQ, etc. etc. etc. in the early-mid 90's. The character/style/direction of Med was well established long before graphical MUDs came onto the scene.

Basically, like other populist/mainstream choices such as McDonalds, vanilla ice cream, or pop music, it is designed to be preferred by (or at least, tolerable by) the widest variety of player tastes.

For example, a MUD can be (basically, yes there are shades of gray) RP or not RP. Which of those two choices appeals to a larger number of people? Not RP. A lot of people won't care a lot either way, but I'm willing to bet there are more people who are unwilling to play an enforced-RP game than are unwilling to play a no-RP game -- after all, even people who enjoy RP probably play other kinds of games, even if they're not MUDs, that don't involve it.

How about keeping the same character forever vs. some form of permadeath? Again, people have preferences, but I'm willing to bet there are a lot more people who won't play a permadeath MUD than there are people who won't play a non-permadeath MUD. Uncoincidentally, Med is a non-permadeath game.

It's harder to balance a game with many genuinely different character customization choices than one in which the basic character builds are few in number. We've all seen players quit games in a huff over the perception that their particular character build was in some way not viable. There, Med has few choices and the two most different heroes are probably more alike than the two closest builds on many other games. No player alienation there.

What about PK? If we took a poll, I'm guessing the most popular choice would either be no PK, or only opt-in PK with no real loss to your character. That's pretty much what Med offers. (Yes, I understand you can choose to expose your character to the possibility of losing a level and some equipment, but ask, say, an Armageddon player if that's real risk.) Or, if not most popular, let's say the choice that would be a deal-breaker for the smallest number of potential players.

There, basically, is the "mass" (yes, I know, text mud = small) appeal of a game like Med. It tries to offer its players as many features as it can without introducing any that would turn a player off the game. And therein the social X factor can happen; you might play a game to play with your friends, but not if you totally hate the game. The craft of Med is to produce nothing a player will totally hate.

Well, the majority of people who are actually MUD players will probably prefer an RP-enforced game.  I don't think it matters about how many people in THE WHOLE would rather play non-RP or RP, I think the only thing that matters is the amount of individuals in the MUD community who would rather play an RP game, and the majority of popular MUDs out there, at least by my observations, are RP MUDs.

Even if not RP-enforced, they're still RP-encouraged, which, while not as strict, you will most likely suffer penalties for not RPing, so I believe it still classifies as RP.

For instance, Matt's games have a large playerbase, and they are RP games.  From what little I've experienced, the majority of players on his games are RPers.

Ilkidarios:

I think that given my personal experience, I also would
suggest that "no-RP || RP-optional" is the norm, and
Medievia's aim-for-the-center can be fairly judged
in that context.

But it's the aim-for-the-norm that was the point, I think, not
a declaration that RP'ers are a minority, and I think it
was an excellent point, well made.

-Crat

God no.

I'd say the truth for most of us is probably something like: it's a game that's seen more work than many, but it's not made to our taste.

Granted, yes, it definitely draws a lot more criticism and scrutiny because of the license controversy, and the greater problem it's a symptom of, that being that Vryce is a jackass.

(I have no idea if it would be fair to say that now, but 10-15 years ago the guy made a lot of enemies in the community with his antics, and that kind of bad press has a kind of inertia and life all its own.)

Without the controversy, for most people in the community, I imagine it would be just another popular game that isn't to their taste and that they choose not to play.

It depends on the kind of game. Med is the kind of game where many players start one character and play just that character for as long as they play the game. For a lot of games, that isn't the case, and character variation/customization becomes a much bigger issue, since it's one way to offer players a very different experience with each successive character up to a point.

They're either not true, or they require a very contrived and biased set of metrics to be "true." For example, to compare Med with a game wherein there are thousands of customization options on a player character and even be in the running, you'd need to decide that each of that game's unique classes, races, specialization choices, skills, etc. is really not a feature. I assume most sane people not working for Med would consider them features.

For myself, RP once held such an appeal that I played MUshes. However, I found the very tight restrictions on ic/ooc to be tiresome and eventually after a couple of storylines played out, the game become repetitive.  The one or two RP MuDs I played just seemed pale in comparison. The ic/ooc enforcement didn't make sense in the context of leveling (like killing bunnies to xp) or other npc interaction. Of course, admitted, it's been some years since I played an RP mud, so maybe it has changed.
In Medievia, the real interaction is with other players, either as cooperative groups, or as rivals and enemies. There is no need for RP, as rivalries and competition between groups (clans/towns) can become incredibly intense, as well as the teamwork developed between players.
The interesting thing about the Newbie system in place is that the further along you go, the more becomes available to you.  This is true in most games, where you must gain strength, ability,  and knowledge in order to succeed. I'm sure there may be some appeal to having equipment, stats, and everything else handed to you from the first day you log in, however, in a game where team play counts for a lot, development is an important part of the game.
There was a comment about 4 classes and only one race. This is done specifically to get a handle on balance issues. Balancing one race versus balancing 5, 6, or 8 is easier. Balancing 4 classes, versus any more is also easier. It allows the game to focus on new equipment and the means to aqcuire it with less (but still vital) concern for balance. Every class has advantages and disadvantages. The one you wind up with as a Hero, will determine your role in group activities, your ability to pk, and to do other things in the game, either solo or as a form.
While I don't knock the great many choices of class and race that I've seen on other muds for balance Medievia is very successful, and continually tweaking equipment to ensure that balance is maintained.
I guess what I'm trying to say is that Medievia is different. Love it or hate it, many people play it, many more have tried it, and many more will try it in the future.
The key for any mud to be successful (in my mind anyway) is service to the player, a well-thought out newbie system, a large enough player base to keep the game from becoming boring, constant growth, change, and finally balance.
I'm sure that anyone out there who is running any sizeable mud will agree.

WEll, I need to own up to something.

Really I seem to be the guy with the biggest beef about
the number of classes and races. And I fully admit and
agree that this is strictly a preference thing.

Ok? That's a judgment call on my part, and I'm not trying
to pass it off as "fact" that they're wrong for keeping the
stock/limited race and class selection. It's their mud, and totally
their right.

When I express shock and surprise it's about not just my
personal dislike of such limited options, though.

It's also that it seems to me to stand in direct contradiction
to the bombastic promotional statements about Medievia I've
heard. I too have heard stuff about how earth-shatteringly
huge and amazing Medievia is...so when I hear "4 classes,
1 race", I go ".......?"

Listen, I don't know how many times I have to say that I agree
it's their right to run however they want. But they're describing
their mud as biggest/largest game in the world
for features and size, and something about the most
detailed in, and I quote, "all of human history".

With those kinds of statements, I think it's wholly appropriate
and fair to ask about the severe limitations on detail and
features of the "most detailed game ever made in all of human history", which is the "largest game in the world
when it comes to features", when your player choices are limited
to 4 classes.

I think it's a fair question.

And the answers I've heard thus far are just flat weird. Unless
I'm mistaken, these are the basic arguments:

1) It's Medievia's right to run that way, so leave it alone.
2) Their players like it, so mind your business.
3) It's hard to balance a mud, this makes it easier.

The thing is, none of these arguments address the
real question.

How can Medievia be the most blah blah blah, when it has
fewer player options than the stock LP mud I used to play
in 1994?

Jeena, I think I understand your point that you like Medievia
and it suits you well. I think that's great, and hope you
continue to enjoy it.

My point is that there appears to be a disconnect between
Medievia's claims and their actual technical merit. You're
choosing to disregard that, perhaps because you feel a need
to defend your favorite mud, but what you're talking about
isn't speaking to the issues raised.

You say it's hard to balance a mud. I agree, and I suspect
many mud admins also would agree. It's hard to do a lot
of things. But if you're going to try to sell something as
the most featured and detailed ever, you're going to have
to explain why new players have *fewer* choices than the
average LP mud of 12 years ago.

I don't think that's an unreasonable position for me to take.

-Crat

No, it's generally considered pretty mediocre, except by its staff and players. The reason most discussions concern its licence violations are partially because there's not really anything else noteworth to say about it, except perhaps for pioneering the pay-for-virtual-items trend in muds (at least, I don't know of any other muds which were doing it earlier).

The comment wasn't so much in reference to the fact that it has 4 classes and races, but rather the fact that the class and (lack of) race selection are unchanged from the stock Merc code that Medievia started with back in February 1993, despite the numerous advances most other muds have made since then.

Specifically designing your mud around 4 classes and no races is one thing. Leaving them because they're what you got with your stock codebase is something else, particularly for a mud which claims things like being the "most detailed game ever made in all of human history".

Having played Medievia many years ago when I first started MUDding, I was semi-impressed by them.  However, design-wise, I found them severely lacking, especially in comparison to the H&S I played at the time (which hadn't been around near as long). The more exposed I became to MUDs, the less and less impressed I was by Medievia. When I learned of their unethical behavior, it wasn't a big leap to my present opinion of them: worthless.

It's far from the largest game when it comes to features.  In fact, given how long it's been around, it's well-behind MUDs that have been up and running for only a few years.

Original areas to explore is a loaded term when they're poorly-made and cliched.  As for an actual room-count, I would have to look up the figures (provided they're not exaggerated) and see if that claim even has some legitimacy or not.  There are some large worlds out there in MUDs.

In regard to detail, it's as shallow as a puddle.  In fact, I'd wager there have been dozens of MUDs which have had more detail put into them in the last year than Medievia has in all its years of operation.

As for Vryce, he wasn't just an ass years ago.  He's proven recently that he's still an ass.  That's not even taking into account that he's a liar and a thief.  He gives creedance to the old saying, "Once a horse's ass, always a horse's ass".

Ultimately, the reasons for Medievia's popularity are primarily ignorance and deceit.  The former afflicts a sizeable portion of their playerbase and most of their new players while the latter is their official policy in regard to pretty much everything.

My rating of them:

Code:  * (1 out of 4)
World:  1/2* (0.5 out of 4)
Staff:  No stars
Overall:  1/2* (0.5 out of 4)

Please don't think I'm trying to be offensive. I'm not. I'm pointing out the advantages as an active player in the game. Because there are only 4 classes and one race, it is possible to expand the game in other areas, such as equipment and equipment zones with less concern to balance.
There are more choices and options in the game than just class and alignment. Just the course of playing the game each day offers a large variety of choices in front of the player.
Am I supporting Med because it's my favorite game? In part. But also because I see a lot of blanket statements coming from people who have not played the game at all, or have played it only a limited amount of time. Or have not played it in years. Med is a complex game. I doubt anyone will deny that. It is one that requires character and skill development and growth. Most players who play Med, play because they enjoy the complexity of a game where the object isn't just to win or lose.

I can't think of a single MUD where the object is to win or lose.

I've played lots of MUDs over the years, never once have I seen a GAME OVER screen...

Jeena,

I'm not trying to be offensive either, and I do hope you
can see I've been respecting your opinion of the game
as a player. In fact, I'm rather impressed by how civil
everyone has been thus far.

I will absolutely not try to impugn your tastes in mudding.
You love Medievia, the people, the gameplay, the experience.

Awesome. Rock on.

But what we're talking about is *technical merit*, which is
something your staments strongly suggest you're not very
familiar with. You're saying, for example, that car X is great
because you really love it, and people misunderstand it,
and they should drive it and see for themselves.

Whereas in this example, I am saying that it is fine you
love car X, but it is advertised as the most powerful
and luxurious car ever made, when in fact it has 4 cylinders
(6 if you pay more) and its seats and controls are
exactly the same as they were on cars shortly after
they were invented.

It's great that you love it. But if you want to debate the technical
details, you'll have to do more that declare other people
fail to enjoy the complexity of mudding.

-Crat

Was it? I mean, you're speaking to motivation now and Vyrce isn't particularly talkative...

--matt

I'd agree that the majority of text MUDers want to roleplay some which is why RP encouraged is popular. Few want to be forced to roleplay all the time, which is why there are no RP-enforced text MUDs among the big MUDs and few of them that even reach medium-sized playerbases.

--matt

You can't look at MUDs as a checklist of features. Saying, "I have a mage class" is almost meaningless because it tells you nothing about the mage class. A MUD with a single class could be deeper and more wide-ranging than a MUD with a thousand classes. MUDs are single products/services, not a bunch of disparate ones lumped together.

What you're doing is the equivalent of dismissing Go because "there are only two kinds of pieces." (I'm NOT comparing Medievia to Go in terms of beauty/depth of the game, but the process of reasoning you're using to dismiss Medievia is the same as dismissing Go for that reason.)

--matt

Baram wrote:
Genocide MUD (opened in 1992) is all about winning and losing, and player characters are reset at the beginning of each 'war.'

A Tale in the Desert also ends and restarts when the game is won.

I don't think it's yet been argued that Medievia's
class system is technically superior to the class systems
found on other muds.

So far, nobody's said the 4 are any great shakes.

Until they do, it is an entirely reasonable premise that Medievia's
classes aren't that different from those found elsewhere,
and since they're fewer in number, they provide less
variety. If that is so, and Medievia's content is otherwise
as mediocre as has been suggested here, then the number
of classes is an obvious "feature" to be examined in
the context of the most detailed game in human history.

I don't remember saying that all muds with more classes
are better than all muds with fewer. Your Go comparison
is called a "straw man argument", where you set up
something you wish I'd said so you could argue against it.

My position is that Medievia's 4 classes and 1 race,
as I understand them from the posts so far, limit the
player experience. You're suggesting Medievia *could* be
equivalent in depth to 1,000 mud-depth-units
(perhaps 4,000?), despite the classes. Fine.
But I haven't heard that seriously argued here. What I've
gathered is that Medievia is so-so. And given that, the
number of classes is an entirely valid component of the
measure of available variety.

-Crat

Cratylus wrote:
Well, what do you mean by technically superior? When I think technically superior, I think more in terms of things like how many CPU cycles a feature uses with X player load. You seem to be talking about the design end rather than the technical end, and while certain design conventions might be argued to be superior, they are much more low level (it's good to lower the barrier to entry for the player, for example) than high-level decisions like how many classes to have. I don't see that one race is inherently better or worse than 100 races just like I don't having a single scalar representation of 'health' to be any inherently better or worse than multiple scalars representing different kinds of 'health'.

--matt

I'm sorry about your confusion.

Your post is interesting because it confirms my
suspicion that you don't actually argue points. You
seem to mostly enjoy nitpicking, rather than actually
discussing the topic at hand.

As to your question, it's irrelevant. Whether I mean the
one thing you said or the other, it just hasn't been part
of the debate, which was the point.

And this is a useful thing to point out
in the context of my argument that the few classes,
combined with arguably mediocre content are indeed
a valid point of critique for a mud claiming what
Medievia does.

-Crat

I would think so, yes. It's reasonable to make some degree of inferences about an engineer or artist from studying enough of their works, and while I wouldn't precisely call Vryce either, the concept it still sound.

After enough years of going in the same direction and making the same kind of choices, you have to assume it's intentional.

I couldn't agree with you more Matt.  In my experience, the amount of classes or races has no effect on my play experience.  As a matter of fact, MUDs that have TOO MANY races or classes often turn me away because I don't feel like putting the effort in and learning what each individual race or class does.

I've heard people refer to many of the classless or raceless MUDs I play as "Black Coffee" MUDs, because they think that the lack of races or classes makes it inferior to some MUD with a thousand races and some treasure chest's worth of pre-defined play classes.

I like the Go metaphor, but I'll use one I'm more inclined to.  The difference, to me personally, seems like the difference between Chess and Checkers.

In Chess, the pieces all have functions and traits, almost like races and classes.  There are certain ways you can use each piece, and there is a right and wrong way to play each piece.  Certain pieces can counter others, blah blah blah.  However, with Checkers, all pieces are identical in movement (except for kinged pieces) but their true ability lies with the player.  Your ability in Checkers does not often depend on your correct use of the piece, but your ability to play Checkers.

I've always been a Checkers man, while it's not often given the same credit as Chess so far as checks and balances and variety of play techniques, Checkers's strategical depth can be as good or greater than Chess simply because of the infinite amount of possibilities individuals can accomplish.  And just like raceless and classless MUDs, Chess players often dismiss Checkers as a fool's game.

I dunno, we'll see if this metaphor works as I intended, it sounds alright to me at this moment.

Interesting, now I know there are a couple out there.

As a side note, I just played my first Go game
ever last night. Pretty darn cool.

Ilkidarios, as I posted before, in a theoretical sense,
it is obviously possible for a mud with no classes and one
race to be "better" than another with dozens of each.

But that wasn't the point made. The point is that
Medievia is alleged to be a run-of-the-mill mud when
it comes to content, meaning that if its classes are like
the classes in other muds, the number of races and
classes becomes a fair part of the measure of the
truthfulness of their promotions.

-Crat

You're missing the point - logos took one of my comments out of context to attack it, and now you're responding as if it were an actual point.

The fact that Medievia has 4 classes is irrelevant. The fact that Medievia has no races is irrelevant. Heck, my mud has 4 classes and no races, so it would be kind of silly for me to use that as the basis for an argument.

The point I made is that Medievia's approach to classes is stock. Their approach to races is stock. Their approach to combat is stock. Many features of their game are stock. And not just "stock", but over a decade out-of-date stock. The vast majority of muds, even those which have changed practically nothing, are considerably more advanced than Medievia in many ways.

Now personally I don't have a problem with stock per se. But when such muds start claiming things like the "most detailed game ever made in all of human history" or the "largest game in the world when it comes to features", then I feel compelled to raise an objection (once I've stopped laughing).

Oh, okay, that was my mistake.

I mean, personally I've never played Medievia, so I can't really judge the game, but I've played other MUDs in which there are single races and only a few classes. I myself actually prefer a classless system like SoI, which is what I was implying by the Checker's metaphor.

However, having not played Medievia, I was not aware of the extent of the stock nature of it.