Shattered Kingdoms

The number of players on this mud has been declining for years now and I think the reason is a lack of a clear strategy as to where the mud should go and the courage to admit previous mistakes.

I have been playing for quite some time but I think it has become boring for several reasons.
1. People are overly protected in cities and some aspects of the law system is in my opinion not very good.
2. Its hard to explore new places alone and even in groups unless you know what to look for and where.
A. Leveling at higher levels is extremely boring while at lower level it has become a bit easier, though it is still boring.

In general the idea of the mud must be to have as much fun as possible and then there has to be a balance of PK and RP. Trying to force the players to either RP or PK will always fail instead you have give people a carrot for RPing for example.

A good example of making the MUD a more boring place is all the law NPCs in countries and cities which makes people don't want to attack in cities as the life of an outlaw is quite boring and troublesome. Don't we want wars in cities/countries without the MUD autospawn all kind of assistance / outlaw PCs? It really limits your travel in the wild.
Another aspect is the ability for almost everyone to use law NPCs in combat and to cast all kind of spells on you. Every time you let people use NPC for casting spells/assist in combat you take away reason that a PC will do it, which ends up with less RP.
Also the idea of hideouts in cabal HQs and other places is in my view totally wrong. I think its okay that there are some places like the cursed woods where people can't be summoned from/gated because you can still search the area for the person.
A last thing is the quests/keys needed to go to places like the wastelands/ToM etc., its merely impossible for new/intermideate PCs to get to those places leaving a lot of territory undiscovered for the average player. And why does it have to be so hard to get to those places, whats the reasoning behind it? (I still miss the portal that transported you to the wastelands).

Well, my 5 cents, hope my english isn't too bad

I'm all for improving the mud and will likely be one of the loudest to shout for improvement-by-regression. That said, what on God's green Earth are you shouting about? I see no logic in your 'main points', not even in the sequencing markers.

And, oh by the way, I definitely have loads of OCD markers.

Well, if you don't see my points then I suppose you don't believe they are problem.

I think that all the focus are on small problems like: magma damage should do x+2 damage or x+4 damage or taunt is broken. The real problem is that people are declining from the mud and it certainly isn't because of those small things, rather its because there is missing a whole in the changes Dulrik makes. He doesn't have a plan as to where the mud should go, rather he gets an idea an implements it regardless of how it fits in the muds world.

I agree with post No1.

I agree, but this question is difficult and open to much speculation:

How do we make the game more fun?

While I understand some of the sentiments of the first post, there have been things done even this year to offset some of these old arguments. Some of the statements are valid. Yes, player count isn't what it was five years ago. There are a myriad of reasons which probably do not come from any single source. The spawn of bounty NPCs in wilderness areas, for example, has been reduced to a fraction of the rate in cities. That change was put in this year to encourage people who wish to explore in kingdoms they are outlawed in. Leveling has been made easier for all levels when Dulrik allowed ten free levels of enchants on gear before level thieves would steal it. We have made skill cost for lowbies almost nothing. What is it that a builder or coder could do to add fun to the game? Making leveling too easy for everyone has side affects that are negative as well. Personally I wish there were something more creative behind the bounty NPC system, but what we have is what we have.

Fun is not defined by everyone in the same manner. Things I enjoy about playing SK wouldn't please others and vice versa. The entire thing is balancing the needs and wants of the community with what is able to be achieved with its resources. Of course we want that to be as broadly defined as possible and allow for as many people to enjoy their time here as are interested. Player cooperation is most important. Its not about not flaming someone or PKing them into the dirt, its about doing something that other people want to be a part of. I enjoy my time on SK most when I've connected in a way that another player is enjoying what I'm putting out - as a player or an IMM.

Can we get like a detailed explanation of how this works?

Like what if I enchant something 3 times, fade it, enchant it 5 more times, fade it again, then enchant it 4 times and leave it there. Do the enchants that got faded(and the fading itself) still count towards the level?

Five successful casts. Fading counts as a success.

Not sure if Achernar was responding to Syn's hypothetical, but the way I nderstand it every enchant counts. That is, you've enchanted the item a total of 14 times (fades count too), at two levels per enchant, that means you've put 28 levels on the item. The first ten levels are not counted, so for purposes of having the item stolen, you've added 18 levels to it. Would this be correct?

One of the main problems I have is the NPC's. To do anything in this game you need an NPC. Now if it was a pet or so, I wouldn't mind. You know,a war party of 6 people + mounts etc, not a big deal. But instead you get war parties with 3 people 3 guards, 3 pets etc, and when buffed and fully equipped, those guard NPCs can pump out some serious damage.

A sorc using the bond servants, giving them GM haste, GS and other things with any weapon will destroy some stuff because they're all barbs with berserk and fury I believe. The whole MUD has shifted from where people used to hunt in large parties together to where it's smaller parties with half players, half NPC's. While yes, I can see this as a good thing for lower populated factions to defend themselves (probably why it was done) I feel completely that taking your law NPCs into warring cities is just...Overkill.

I mean, every city has some super powered guard NPCs of some sort. If they were just used as defense, then I could get on board, but I really dislike seeing a warparty of mostly NPC's.

Another gripe of mine is the fact that other than evaporating, potions have no downside whatsoever. A merc can literally just have 23789048904823 vials of heal and a few word of recalls and be almost unkillable unless you flat out zerg him, or manage to keep him bashed, which of course one missed bash, and he retreats, heals up and comes back. It becomes war of the vials, in which people don't really rely too much on their own skill more so than getting their l337 brewery friend to make them umpteen more vials.

While I'm on the subject of vials, I feel that too many spells are brewable. Sanctuary, armor, heal, cure blindness, cure deafness. Too many spells are brewable in my opinion and have no downside to their use other than they evaporate after so long, so you just need priest buddy x to make more. While I can see cure spells being brewed (i agree they're very useful to have) some things shouldn't be brewable, like Sanc. One of the reasons melee is / was so dominant is cause of the plethora of buffs that's available and easy to obtain, on top of the fact that they can heal without a cleric or priest thanks to vials / herbs.

That however, is just my opinon. Agree or disagree as you will.