Armageddon MUD

[Bronn]

@ganymede said in Armageddon MUD:

Your fellow player(s) (staff?) have by implication highlighted a common sentiment coming from existing players: what have you as a newbie done to earn anything? But the question a newbie is going to come in with is: what has the game done to warrant my time, attention, and interest?

As an aside, @oryx and @rahnevyn are staff, although if they identified themselves as such I've completely missed it.

I just wanted to highlight this part of your post because it brings up a really good point, and I think it's more of something to pose to someone involved in game design and administration. It seems like people who play Armageddon eventually forget what it is like to be a newbie. If other players are anything like how I was when I played, and I think they are, I sunk time and effort into Armageddon and got nothing for it. In fact, I got less than nothing: I was actually insulted and degraded in exchange for my contributions. That's after over 10 years being associated with the game in some capacity.

It's simple gambler's fallacy. You sink in time and effort and immediately get shat on, but you hope it doesn't happen again. That's how delusional you have to be to get through the introductory phase of playing Armageddon. And I mean that in the gentlest possible way: it's a sort of delusion where you hope that something will be mostly okay, because it is mostly okay. It's just a weird feeling here or there that tells you that this might not be healthy.

After that, it's smooth sailing until you wake up and realize how much you've sunk in and what you actually got out of it. For some people that takes over a decade and a sudden, bizarre attack on you as a person.

It's pretty easy to compare Armageddon to a cult. You enter, demands are made of you, and if you willingly accept those demands you are bilked and degraded until you are discarded, all under the illusion of "fun". Compare to just about any other game that wants players and is organized enough to actually help new players succeed and have fun.

[ShaLeah]

@kanye-qwest

Recruiting is a constant task, winter in particular cause it sucks so most of us stay indoors and chill doing whatever so it @ThugHeaven came here recruiting, awesome, we can always use more Arm-addicts

The only way you can repute whether or not Armageddon offers the best in RP or storytelling is if you actually check it out if you're looking for a new roleplaying place to frequent. Not YOU you, the general you.

I'm mos'def'knee NOT for general recruitment. I think of Armageddon as a "survival of the fittest" environment. Anyone can join, only true residents will become players. It's always been this way. Look at the disgruntled, some spend YEARS trying to make it work. That's crackageddon.

I prefer to deter with honesty than attract with selectively enticing sharing.

[Kanye Qwest]

@ShaLeah Well, this is specifically a board - and thus, a thread - for advertising and enticing new players to games, so maybe go back to doing whatever it is you usually do.

[ShaLeah]

Like I said @kanye-qwest both times I added my 2'sid:

*Read all this and if you're feeling intrigued at all, come give us a try. The worst that could happen you're witnessing right here. But remember you're also witnessing the best.

Make up your own damn mind.*

AND

The only way you can repute whether or not Armageddon offers the best in RP or storytelling is if you actually check it out if you're looking for a new roleplaying place to frequent. Not YOU you, the general you.

We've already gotten some from @ThugHeaven's post. Thank you Boo!
Hell, even if we get just one it was worth it.

You gots to work on your trollin' @Kanye-Qwest, your namesake would be sooooo ashamed. Heh. I crack myself up.

[fortydeuce]

From earlier:

if you are still having trouble, you can ooc that you're still getting your bearings as you're new.

Except people are free to ignore that as they wish, and screw you up anyway, per your own statement.

Let me put it this way: I just started on a game with a very expansive theme. I am two weeks in. I am still learning. I know I'm still making mistakes, because I'm still learning (though I think I'm making less of them now than I was two weeks ago!). One of the first things I OOCly asked, two weeks ago, was how to refer to a certain character in manner of speaking, and that person responded. Two seconds. Done. Now, I'm asking more different, complex questions, because I'm starting to get my bearings.

The website is all well and good, as is going to a Discord or message board or whatever, but if I can't OOC simple corrections, or ask for more complex clarifications, and get a straight and reliable answer each time without being left to my own devices for it, and if I run the risk of my character dying for unknowingly getting it wrong (as opposed to "knowingly," which is a whole different ball of wax), that's not an environment that would make me come running back to play.

[Bronn]

@fortydeuce said in Armageddon MUD:

From earlier:

if you are still having trouble, you can ooc that you're still getting your bearings as you're new.

Except people are free to ignore that as they wish, and screw you up anyway, per your own statement.

Not only that, but it happens on a regular enough basis that reviews have been written about it on places like mudconnect and mudlistings, even within the past few months.

The truth is in @ShaLeah 's latest statement. The game is an exclusive club, and survival of the fittest reigns. They want players who are willing to lose while they get to have fun.

In some games, that works just fine. In a roleplaying game it's hard to justify. The <1% new player retention rate should be a warning sign and instead it's a point of pride. Oh well.

[ShaLeah]

@bronn said in Armageddon MUD:
They want players who are willing to lose while they get to have fun.

In some games, that works just fine. In a roleplaying game it's hard to justify. The <1% new player retention rate should be a warning sign and instead it's a point of pride. Oh well.

Please don't "they" like my opinion of an ideal resident is the shared opinion of the entire community. I assure you, it's not. If the amount of people being vocal in defense of those accusing doesn't clue you in I don't know what will.

Like I said before, like others have said, it's harsh, not for everyone. If you think you'd like a harsh roleplaying environment but reading this has made you scared then at the very least you should take away that Armageddon is a place where reading the instructions is necessary unless you want to end up like the ones bad mouthing it. Or you can let others opinions lobby you with their agenda. You might be good at playing an aide and politicking!

I hope to see ya'll in game, for real.

[Bronn]

I don't really care about how many people you managed to rope into signing up for a forum account to jump in and defend Arm's honor. Once someone immerses themselves in Armageddon for a while it becomes blatantly obvious that players - especially the veterans - have formed an exclusive club.

It shows whenever staff apply rules differently to certain players. It shows whenever certain players are just utterly rude on the GDB and Discord and they get a pass because they have max karma or they're current or former staff. It shows whenever I get an e-mail from my crazed stalker saying the game is better off without me.

Armageddon has a lot of bad people, a lot of vindictive people, and a lot of haughty people associated with it and that is a huge barrier to entry for the game.

[OldFrightful]

God save the poor soul who point outs everyone is just saying 'if you don't like it FINE but here am I arguing every point and you better drop it instead of retorting, WAIT YOU RETORTED, how dare' ad nauseam.

Mommy, daddy, please stop fighting. I love you both very much even if I don't see myself playing Arm ever again. It is okay to agree to disagree when the conversation hasn't gone anywhere in 12 pages. Having the last word isn't worth that much.

I do want to comment on this one particular thing though, since I think this post didn't really get a balanced perspective:

@arkandel said in Armageddon MUD:

@evilcabbage said in Armageddon MUD:

sure, but by that same token just because you roll into the game as a 40 year old veteran of hunting does not mean we should have to give you knowledge, because you the player haven't even done anything to earn that.

You (which I assume means 'staff') don't need to give anyone anything. What players have 'earned' is up to the game; some allow more experienced characters to be rolled, some not so much. The one caveat here is that it needs to be universal - if you went and told person A that they haven't earned their stripes so they can't be a veteran, but went ahead and approved person B's veteran character then it'd be a big no-no.

Either way you have got to make it clear what expectations are from newly rolled characters' skill level. It shouldn't be trial and error (especially if your players will get the impression it's subjective, erroneously or not), this sort of thing ought to be clearly stated ahead of time.

you just jumped into a world that you are unfamiliar with, in a land you don't understand yet as a person, and you want to start at like, the height of a career.

By nature newcomers to games don't know much about what's going on, but unless you only roll newcomer characters as well then the latter's IC experience will be greater than their players. For instance if I rolled a peasant on Arx, knowing nothing about Arx OOC, my character will still know way more than I do about the world. You can't escape that fact, even though a well documented friendly web site for your MU* can certainly help.

but i'm personally not going to tell you where to find ginka fruits or where to get such and such shell that sells for like two thousand coins because it's so ridiculously rare. there's things you have to do yourself, you have to make mistakes and learn from them.

You get to choose what you tell players, sure. It's your prerogative.

if you roll in as a new player into the game, you have to take into consideration this: can i, as a new player, believably portray that i am, in fact, a 40 year old hunter?

A better expectation to have is this: "Am I, as a new player, allowed to roll a 40-year old hunter?" If you make your game's rules what they need to be, ensure they are visible and keep them fairly applied universally then no one gets to complain; they might choose to not play there, that's their prerogative, but you'd have done everything from your end to help them make an educated choice.

Armageddon started off as an RP-lite DIKU (class-based) hack and slash. So there's no skill allocation. With one basic exception (you can do a special application for very minor skill boosts), everyone comes in around the same level. The only advantage a veteran player has against a newbie if they both roll in as grizzled 40-year-olds is OOC experience, which isn't a thing you can feasibly police or restrict. Neither character has the coded skill to immediately run off and explore the world. The area around the main city is fairly open with only a handful of 'secrets', and I say 'secrets' because while you may be discouraged from sharing them OOCly, you will find them out pretty quickly if you interact with other players.

My experience with seeing 'clearly clueless newbie' usually resulted in them getting immediate help or someone going out of their way to ICly take them under their wing, btw, so I don't think the 'dropped into the world like a helpless baby and left to fend for self in wilds' picture that some people are drawing is really accurate. YMMV but I would confidently say it's been the norm for a long time. Really dangerous, lawless areas tend to be clearly marked if you're paying attention to your surroundings. The areas where people might readily jump to PVP tend to be remote and thus difficult for a new player to stumble into.

Furthermore, the game probably has the best documentation of any running MU. Like, really, go take a look at the site if you haven't. It gives new players plenty of information if they care to use the resources available to them. This includes a big button on the front page that says 'LIVE HELP!'. When I was on the helper team, there was almost always 2-3 people on it ready to chat OOCly about whatever non-secret thing.

Now that said, lemme reiterate my first post:

I played it for about 12~ years off and on. I don't think it'll really appeal to most of the crowd here, but if you're okay with the above caveats and up for trying something new, it's worth a shot.

Full disclosure, the reason I quit is because I knew too much about magic, mechanics and the world. Without mystery and uncertainty I no longer found it immersive, and that immersion is what made it fun for me.

I really don't think Armageddon will appeal to most MUSH players. The cultures are very different and that's okay. Best of luck to anyone who does try it! My advice is to play for the trees, not the forest.

[Hedge]

@bronn said in Armageddon MUD:

It's simple gambler's fallacy. You sink in time and effort and immediately get shat on, but you hope it doesn't happen again. That's how delusional you have to be to get through the introductory phase of playing Armageddon. And I mean that in the gentlest possible way: it's a sort of delusion where you hope that something will be mostly okay, because it is mostly okay. It's just a weird feeling here or there that tells you that this might not be healthy.

After that, it's smooth sailing until you wake up and realize how much you've sunk in and what you actually got out of it. For some people that takes over a decade and a sudden, bizarre attack on you as a person.

That's uncomfortably accurate and I was happier not thinking about it that way.

[Arkandel]

@bronn said in Armageddon MUD:

I don't really care about how many people you managed to rope into signing up for a forum account to jump in and defend Arm's honor. Once someone immerses themselves in Armageddon for a while it becomes blatantly obvious that players - especially the veterans - have formed an exclusive club.

Please review the forum rules.

If you wish to criticize the game or those who run it then you - or anyone else - are free to create a new thread in the Constructive or Hog Pit section and please do so there.

[Bronn]

@arkandel Sorry. I'll bow out of this thread and move on. I've said my piece.

[Thenomain]

@arkandel said in Armageddon MUD:

@bronn said in Armageddon MUD:

I don't really care about how many people you managed to rope into signing up for a forum account to jump in and defend Arm's honor. Once someone immerses themselves in Armageddon for a while it becomes blatantly obvious that players - especially the veterans - have formed an exclusive club.

Please review the forum rules.

If you wish to criticize the game or those who run it then you - or anyone else - are free to create a new thread in the Constructive or Hog Pit section and please do so there.

I'm taking this brief opportunity to reiterate the chilling effect of the forum rules as stand—through disrupting conversation threads—though will concede that as staff doesn't enforce them strictly then it's not as chilling as it could be.

[ThugHeaven]

I came here to advertise the game as per the rules. It really turned into “yes it is! No it’s not!” On a level that I haven’t seen since grade 8. It’s really gone into game philosophy, grammar, Tomb Raider and took all kinds of turns it really shouldn’t have and should’ve been stopped a long time ago.

@evilcabbage whats happening is there are people really waiting for one of us to say “Our game is better than yours” because a while back Jeshin came in here and had that kind of attitude and made a whole thing about Muds vs. Mushes. I think it left a bad taste in people’s mouths. So they’re just waiting for something like that.

So, here’s what I’m proposing: Let’s hit the reset button.

Keep in mind there are people that feel strongly about the game. Both ways. There is a board where people would love to see the game shut down and buried for good. There are also players that would love to share the same game with as many people as possible and hope you would enjoy it too. Those are two very extreme points of view. So @ShaLeah is right, it is that kind of game.

Armageddon is a game where you’re in character as much as possible, but that doesn’t mean you can’t break character or say “I made a mistake...do over.” It’s not a game that would appeal to everybody that posts here. But there is no game like that. It is very much a game that recognizes its flaws and it tries to make them right. Just like in a mush, I’m sure staff has had serious discussions about ways to take down some of those barriers to entry.

It’s a game where the world is unfair and characters are flawed. I felt like this forum was mature enough to look at the initial ad and say “it’s not for me” and move on to talk about VASpider or whatever the hot topic of the week is. In the very least I thought I wouldn’t have to say “...then this game isn’t for you.” I was wrong.

If you can’t deal with a minimal amount of ooc chatter...then this game is not for you.

If you can’t deal with the possibility of your character meeting an abrupt end....then this game is not for you.

If you don’t read documentation...this game is not for you.

If you want to do everything alone and figure things out on your own...you’re going to die a lot. If you don’t like that.....this game is not for you.

If you want to play a Mary Sue that knows how to do everything or eventually learn everything....this game is not for you.

If you don’t want your character to die....this game isn’t for you.

If you are not alright with your character being treated poorly, for their race, accent or class..this game isn’t for you.

If you’re the type of player that needs to know all of the things...right now, when the question comes to you...this game isn’t for you.

If the game isn’t for you, then no hard feelings and good luck wherever you end up. I didn’t come here to debate the pros and cons of a system where ooc is kept at a minimum. I didn’t come here to say one way is better than another. If you played it, didn’t like it. I hope you find or found what you’re looking for.

If you’re still interested after the debacle this has turned into, feel free to visit the site or ask me basic questions. I’ll be here forever, because I mush too.

[Apos]

@bronn said in Armageddon MUD:

The truth is in @ShaLeah 's latest statement. The game is an exclusive club, and survival of the fittest reigns. They want players who are willing to lose while they get to have fun.

There's nothing inherently wrong with that. But games internal philosophies are going to wildly diverge when you have someone that's chill and wants more players to pop in and has a collaborative mindset (like @ThugHeaven probably from her posts) and then you have dudes that are clinging to an original, 'roar I survived the worst shit thrown at me and now everyone should, sink or swim newbs' competitive mindset.

So yea those two are pretty hard to reconcile, and if you're like, 'well, newbs should have to learn that like I did', that's okay, but that's definitely a competitive design choice and that is making the game way more niche and that does mean anyone with ooc knowledge of how the game works has a huge edge on someone new coming in that does have a competitive mindset. Again, if you wanna do that, it's fine if you do, but yeah of course that's going to be a huge turnoff to most people. The more game-like, mechanical aspects are going to be dominated by people that understand it the best and can use it to their advantage, which is true for every game, but if it has a more competitive bent it's going to be a whole hell of a lot less newbie friendly since unless you specifically create safeguards, you're pretty much relying on every single player to oocly play nice.

And for someone that has a more collaborative approach, working within that framework is a little swimming upstream. Sure, if a new player interacts with them personally, they'll probably have a positive first impression and be more likely to stick around, but the odds of that aren't great. Remember how the first MMOs had no tutorials? Notice how they all do now, with specifically designed newbie garden areas? Yeah. There's a reason for that, and it's not because gamers got worse. And if you are relying on people to find out things on their own and specifically limiting ooc contact in order to keep immersion, giving intuitive tools for them to do so is going to be an extremely large factor in how many stay or not. The really competitive mindsets will see that weedout as a good thing, whether you agree or not really just depends on your goals for the game.

[Lotherio]

@thugheaven said in Armageddon MUD:

and made a whole thing about Muds vs. Mushes

This isn't something one person started here, its decades old and predates the early incarnations of what lead through various entities and into MSB today.

Edit: This thread is like a flashback to the 90s for me, when I was in some of those conversations back in the day.

[Ortallus]

@evilcabbage said in Armageddon MUD:

i mean you can find some of that stuff in helpfiles, but i'm not going to personally give you the digs on every single location to hunt every great beast in the entire world just because you rolled in as a 40 year old character.

Now you're just being melodramatic.

Every great beast in the world?

No.

The location of a few forests where I can get decent game?

Absolutely.

And besides that, do you not approve backgrounds to some extent? Or at least have creation guidelines?

[rahnevyn]

@fortydeuce said in Armageddon MUD:

The website is all well and good, as is going to a Discord or message board or whatever, but if I can't OOC simple corrections, or ask for more complex clarifications, and get a straight and reliable answer each time without being left to my own devices for it, and if I run the risk of my character dying for unknowingly getting it wrong (as opposed to "knowingly," which is a whole different ball of wax), that's not an environment that would make me come running back to play.

Simple questions and clarifications are the intended uses of the OOC command on Armageddon. It's perfectly reasonable to use it for that and expect a helpful answer. As I mentioned a couple pages back, the limited OOC channels were a design decision. There is no player-to-player private OOC channel and no game global OOC channel. This means any use of OOC is room local, which has the potential to disrupt other players' immersion if it goes on too long. That is probably the main reason help discussions are encouraged to move forums, PMs, or more recently the discord chat. It isn't out of a desire to be unhelpful, but rather out of the belief that too much OOC distracts players from their roleplay and interrupts scenes.

I'll restate again, too, that the risks of dying because you the player made a mistake are being overblown in this discussion thread. I can't recall anyone being killed for mistakenly claiming they were literate or for not bowing to the wrong person (unless they went on to say their character had no need to bow, in which case they moved on from ignorance of the setting to just ignoring it.) My experience is not universal, but it is extensive.

As I mentioned before, I am an Armageddon staff member and I am happy to answer any questions, provide help or clarifications, or listen to your experiences (both positive and negative) with the game. You can contact me at rahnevyn@armageddon.org

I'm disappointed in the impression Armageddon has left with some former or prospective players in the past, because I don't feel like it accurately reflects what our MUD is. It is a game, not a cult or a club, and like most MU*s a labor of love, where dedicated staff and players collaborate to tell gripping, emotional, and exciting stories. That's been my experience, and I hope it would be everyone's.

[OldFrightful]

@Ortallus He could tell you or just link you this helpfile, which would be the equivalent, and this map for a rough idea. These are both things a newbie could reasonably stumble upon too, it's not very hard to find on the site. It's not actually secret information. When he says 'the digs' he probably means things like lairs, secret watering holes, super exact directions, etc. And like I said in my last post, it is super easy to learn about those things ICly. Your character would not necessarily know about them for being a 40 year old hunter, because a 40 year old hunter probably doesn't know everything there is to know about the super dangerous world. They got to 40, after all!

[Ortallus]

@oldfrightful said in Armageddon MUD:

@Ortallus He could tell you or just link you this helpfile, which would be the equivalent, and this map for a rough idea. These are both things a newbie could reasonably stumble upon too, it's not very hard to find on the site. It's not actually secret information. When he says 'the digs' he probably means things like lairs, secret watering holes, super exact directions, etc. And like I said in my last post, it is super easy to learn about those things ICly. Your character would not necessarily know about them for being a 40 year old hunter, because a 40 year old hunter probably doesn't know everything there is to know about the super dangerous world. They got to 40, after all!

No, and I agree, but really I think people are splitting hairs.

Does that 40 year old hunter need to know where every hunting spot is?

No.

Does that 40 year old hunter need to know how not to make basic social faux pas that might get him killed?

Yes. Absolutely yes. And that includes going into the wrong neighborhood where he might get mugged.