Adding to our Playerbase - Campaign

[Alvana]

My two cents as a returning player after ~10 years. I recognize that I'm an odd duck so I won't claim that what I've found to be true will be globally or even commonly true, but I find myself in somewhat of a fascinating between-worlds locale and I'm happy to share what I've observed.

Tribal knowledge bad, Public knowledge good
By far the biggest hurdle for me has always been learning things that "everybody knows" like zone abbreviations, smob locations, and what components are considered "full dodge". Best way to lower those barriers, IMO is to capture as much of that information as possible and dump it on the Wiki. The wiki is a godsend, in my book. Stats like weapon damage, guides on crafting, and the maps on the zones with important rooms highlighted are super clutch. One thing that could make huge bounds forward would be to take what Ragyn did here viewtopic.php?f=75&t=11564 and have a section for that kind of info at the bottom of the common PK zone pages. I realize it's a lot of work to get that done, and I think I speak for all of us when I say "thank you, and well done, Ragyn". Yesterday there was some PK in the Caralain Grassland (at least that's as far as I could gleam) and I realized I knew nothing about those zone callouts. And there's really not a fantastic place to ask someone to just explain it to you.
The big difference between tribal knowledge and public knowledge is this: Tribal knowledge is something that the people who need to know just know because it's been day-in and day-out to them for a while now. It's unusual to ask questions about these sorts of things, and if someone with the tribal knowledge concludes that you need to know something, they'll take the time to light your torch. Public knowledge is something that's been captured or written down so that people who want to learn can go learn without needing a private tutor.

Communication between players
I love having global comms, (and I really really love banter) but they're a bit of a mess. There's some suspension of disbelief when it comes to people being able to communicate globally in an RP manner. But there's something really special about someone logging on and narrating "Tai shar Manethern! For the glory of the Red Eagle! (or whatever)" that just instills fascination. I love hearing clans make bragging announcements when someone joins or ranks up. And I'm not asking everyone who's PKing to find a different channel - I think narrates should be anything that moves the story forward, or that your character is saying to interact with the WoT world. I know DS is its own ballgame and they just narrate everything (because otherwise how will you know someone's new to DS? Dead giveaway.) but on LS, it would be nice to have more distinction between what belongs on which channel and what doesn't. I seem to remember back in the day if you narrated something about the football game, you'd get the MUD equivalent of a shoe thrown at you ("chat, not narrates [yournamehere]" or something of the sort), and Chat was viewed as strictly OOC and free-for all BSing while we rest in whatever square waiting for something to do.
This is on my wish list and I know there's no way to really do anything about it but... can we somehow make it not weird to voice chat on Discord? It sounds like a really great feature to have a Smob channel and LS/DS channels (and even the CCS channel, too funny!) but it saddens me that I never see them in use. I'd love to talk and hang out with y'all but I don't want to be "the weird one" on the community (where I'm playing a text-based game... in 2020... and it's based on a book series... oh yeah and even though I'm a 28 year old guy I'm most well known by the name of my female character because... I can explain).

On a personal note, some thank-yous
Thanks to Ominas for being a crazy and wonderful bastard and going full-RP when inviting me to smob. That pretty well single-handedly sealed the deal for me coming back for more than a nostalgia weekend.
Thanks to Kali, Darlanyu, Fyra, and Trysstianna for making me feel like a part of a family in the Tower.
Thanks to Adael for sharing everything you've developed and collected for Mudlet. What a huge leg up to be up and running immediately with a map and some helpful scripts!
Thanks to Weir, Hress, and everyone else who's compiled data or taken the time to record their findings and share that as public knowledge.
Finally, thanks to Elysia and Vampa (and any other active IMMs I'm forgetting) for all the work they put in to keep us up and running and having fun. You love this game and it shows.

[Rig]

Hey Alvana. Myself and a few others use the VoIP channels regularly, just on different servers. It is indeed very fun to use while smobbing. It's probably the only thing that keeps me sane when there's nothing to do but smob because of all the BSing and banter that goes on. Feel free to yell at me on discord and most of the time I will join a voip if I'm not busy.

[Skurk]

I don't think rogues are your problem. If you're too lazy to check where or set an alias for k h.whateverrace. I don't know what to tell you, other than learn to do it.

Playing a rogue is difficult as a human or ss. Sure some people that don't spam or travel the world oblivious to others make it look easier but, it's still difficult to stab and kill people usually. Now that numbers are low, you spend half your time searching the globe in search of a group of smobbers to try and land on one and pray you don't get jammed up in a door etc.

This is chortlesnorfling halerious. Just set an alias right? Oh and spam but then you use moves so gotta dia h.xx and notice that theres something there and switch to k h.xx Gotta be 100% focused the entire time you're online or you might get stabbed ever mind the fact that 90% of that time you're hitting scout hoping someone shows up. Then you have a sip of drink and bam you're dead. Or you're 1v1ing some ds abser- finally some pk.. you go to patty and spam k dark and crurious stabs you. Whats the counter play? Oh hes a master troll rogue and Im abs? Guess I leave. Not in abs? Well then maybe fight but then your pk is just notice on k h.xxx and if he gets low he'll leave or autowimpy away. Good fun. Really. Him sitting well all day so I never login to go look for pk in the north is chortlesnorfling great for the game. Sure.

I bricked a stab on a crit full kit ta'varen surrounded by a group of like 5 and just walked out - on a level 30 troll rogue basically naked. And I'm bad. Why am I able to go for this no risk play? It's rediculis.

As a newer ex player I'll tell you why I don't play anymore - the effort it takes me to reeq on anything not abs (abs btw is great and all but not really that fun to 1v2 or anything in) and then one break in concentration and a master rogue now has my kit. Great fun. When a LS murderer is on who you know is really good and in full kit you just go play something else, it's not worth the effort of worrying because 10h smobbing won't replace a good dodge kit, and ya know playing only abs is kinda lame. I haven't played for months because the effort to reward is so low. I'm actually an experienced PvP gamer too, climbed back to diamond (top .5%) in LoL in the month since I quit. imagine someone who has never played a PvP game and they come and spend their whole chortlesnorfling day trying to get something decent and suddenly bam some old 20y vet with perfect stats, master bonuses, full kit and perfect spams just stabs em while they look on the wiki to figure something out... but then What if you actually is dia and then attack them? That's right they can just flee off or auto you to death with 150 dodge and more damage than you. What if you're multiple people? Well np they just keep fleeing and spam good. Imagine that happens every time they look for pk. Do you think they're gonna stick around?

If you wanna play a rogue that's fine, but don't expect others to want to play with you.

[Zangief]

I'm actually an experienced PvP gamer too, climbed back to diamond (top .5%) in LoL in the month since I quit.

You are comparing WoTMUD to other games, when the only thing you can compare is the amount of time you spent getting good at either game. In this case, you haven’t put in the time to be a good PKer on WoT because 20 year old vets rogues are holding you down. We all had to face the vets here to make something of ourselves.

You just don’t choose to spend your time on the grind we call pk to get there, which is fine.

[Skurk]

Like Musashi said, Once you know the way, you see it in all things. No I'm not good at this game, but I can see the path to get there. It's not some special unique snowflake, just like one sport isnt more special and unique than another. It's a good game from what I've seen and if I put the hours in I'd probably learn to play decently. The thread is things that could attract new players, and I'm disagreeing with the idea that rogues arent turning new players off, and being someone that was able to deal with the toxicity in other games you'd think I'd have the ability to deal with that. And if I didn't have other options and things going on I might. The reality is though that its not fun to deal with rogues, especially good bonused rogues. I dont mind dying to a fade because while I'd die every time, there is counterplay there other than "you should be spamming and paying better attention". Dying to a stab sucks and it feels dumb. The fact that I could've killed one of the better players, or at least a competent player despite being terrible at rogues and half equipped, and that despite the fact that I bricked I was able to walk out, shows that the risk/reward on rogues is dumb. Playing against them is dumb, and having bonused rogues who just jump into pk when it's there then go back to providing nothing is bad for the game. I wont be playing again, not due to players being better, but because of how unfun it is to be constantly worried a rogue is gonna jump out, and the fact that even if I'm successful finding him there's basically 0% chance of me killing him. Even if I were good. Because of how safe it is. Whether or not rogues are balanced, they're stupid to play against.

You can continue saying "try harder" all you want, but most people wont because there's other good games out there that provide equally challenging pvp while also being reasonable in terms of counterplay. And also that dont require hours of reequipping when you die due to grabbing your water. Or ages to even find pvp. I personally mostly enjoyed playing, I only stopped due to being busy. Once I got some distance I looked back at how ridiculous it is and just decided to do something else. It's your game, you guys do what you want. This is just my opinion.

[Brione Furcas]

Like Musashi said, Once you know the way, you see it in all things. No I'm not good at this game, but I can see the path to get there. It's not some special unique snowflake, just like one sport isnt more special and unique than another. It's a good game from what I've seen and if I put the hours in I'd probably learn to play decently. The thread is things that could attract new players, and I'm disagreeing with the idea that rogues arent turning new players off, and being someone that was able to deal with the toxicity in other games you'd think I'd have the ability to deal with that. And if I didn't have other options and things going on I might. The reality is though that its not fun to deal with rogues, especially good bonused rogues. I dont mind dying to a fade because while I'd die every time, there is counterplay there other than "you should be spamming and paying better attention". Dying to a stab sucks and it feels dumb. The fact that I could've killed one of the better players, or at least a competent player despite being terrible at rogues and half equipped, and the fact that despite the fact that I bricked I was able to walk out, shows that the risk/reward on rogues is dumb. Playing against them is dumb, and having bonused rogues who just jump into pk when it's there then go back to providing nothing is bad for the game. I wont be playing again, not due to players being better, but because of how unfun it is to be constantly worried a rogue is gonna jump out, and the fact that even if I'm successful finding him there's basically 0% chance of me killing him. Even if I were good. Because of how safe it is. Whether or not rogues are balanced, they're stupid to play against.

You can continue saying "try harder" all you want, but most people wont because there's other good games out there that provide equally challenging pvp while also being reasonable in terms of counterplay. And also that dont require hours of reequipping when you die due to grabbing your water. Or ages to even find pvp. I personally mostly enjoyed playing, I only stopped due to being busy. Once I got some distance I looked back at how ridiculous it is and just decided to do something else. It's your game, you guys do what you want. This is just my opinion.

Isn't Skurk a rogue alt itself? Oh the irony.

[Skurk]

Yes, and my ds rogue is also a rogue.. ? Is that irony? My FC is an FC, my hunter is a hunter.. and my warrior is a warrior. I started on skurk so I mostly post on skurk.

I realise I'm coming across as bitter, and that's not the intent. I just felt like logging in and checking things out and then saw this "just alias k h.xxx" stuff. It makes me laugh, because aliasing is easy, it's sitting there your entire playtime spamming that is difficult. I really enjoyed when i played and the players I met were (mostly) extremely nice and welcoming. Also helpful and fun. I just think there's some things you guys are blind to since you've been playing so long. Its cool though, the game is there for you guys to enjoy.

[Iblis]

Agree that fighting most stabbers isn't a whole lot of fun, but I think it is fairly easy to learn how to counter them - I forget if I posted before. If you're in blight and you need to check the other window or your phone w/e. I try to just engage some blight trees, now I know I have a window of x seconds to do whatever. The first thing I do when I get back is I hit dia h.dark. Or go sit in a nohide. Whenever you are engaged you know you are safe, so if you don't want to spam dia x all the time, just wait until the mob/whatever you are on gets beat and then check if there is someone hidden in your room. Sure takes a little dedication to do so, but I don't think that is unfair to ask players to do.

If you ever come back, I think the trick is to just recognize the rogues you enjoy fighting and the ones you don't. Are a couple ones where I will just go in and do something else if they are the only one around and then there are others who make for some fun PK. Just like most other classes. Granted stabbers are generally more annoying since their "survivability" as a class is better than the others and it doesn't actually require them to "put up a fight" to get a kill.

[Skurk]

Yeah that's some good points iblis. I definitely know that all of my deaths are my own fault, and if I were better I'd have not made the mistake that caused them.

I think you boiled down my irritation with rogues very well, in that they don't need to engage or risk themselves in order to ruin your night. It's also just annoying to chase em around but that's mainly personal problem. I think if they didn't also have like 400+hp it might be more reasonable. And you're definitely right that some are more fun than others. I still much prefer to fight an fc or a basher though

[Arbies]

Iblis nailed it. Some rogues are fun to fight, others arent. Some of my favorite pk has actually been stab warring with people like jonny and dolens, while some of the worst has been trying to bash fermin. I almost always enjoy my late night fights with badd, and the times i dont it was actually because some bored channie showed up and ruined my fun.