### Aidan — Thu Jul 01, 2004 6:57 pm someone either needs to save dp or put it out of its misery. _________________ I did it like this I did it like that I did it with a wiffle ball bat --- ### Zao — Thu Jul 01, 2004 8:37 pm W3rd. Or at least put out a rough 3.0 release date to masturbate to. _________________ Let this be my writ of misanthropy To a thankless world of men Who have perfected nothing, Save the art of accusation. --- ### Vargus — Fri Jul 02, 2004 1:10 am **Zao wrote:** --- ### Fred Sanford — Fri Jul 02, 2004 6:00 am Nah, just kill it. FL can use that 20 bux a month to buy booze and girls. --- ### Vargus — Sat Jul 03, 2004 5:59 am "someone either needs to save dp or put it out of its misery." Screw that negative attitude, dp isn't another world out of our control, it's up to each of us to make a difference. Not to toot my own horn (you knew I would), but I've done/am doing more than anyone else (players, not gods of course) providing descriptions and other things I shan't discuss. Your quote would be an example of being part of the problem rather than the solution (complaining while offering no ideas). We could use a more active immortal though, someone who has time do a little arena/quest action here and there and spark some interest. It seems the code base or whatever is so closely guarded that none are trusted enough to fill this capacity. It's a shame, too. I could fix Amber, for example, put in better descrips, more items, items that make sense for the mobs they load on, change some stuff up in no time at all. For example, I could create a couple badass new items for Benedict (maybe his bionic arm) and tweak him to the mob he should be in about 2 minutes, and this tiny thing alone would be a greater change than we've seen in Amber since they all got upped in 2.1(?). Even tiny changes, new items, whatever, can spur new interest and get the rock rolling which has been still for quite some time. The winds of change do need to flare up a bit, and this goes twofold. The gods got lives, too, like the rest (majority.....minority......anyone?) of us and are obviously limited in their time, and what IS done goes on out of sight so the excitement level continues to ebb in the face of virtual in-game stagnation since december 98. The players need to step up and help, too. The only question we are left with is why the few who are willing to help are essentially not allowed to do so, when other, technically higher risk people with blatant, heavy bug-abusing (to me, a bug-abuser is more likely to mess with the code than an 7-year honest player, but that's just me) histories have been in the past, and contributed nothing. The stagnation, favoritism, and paranoia since the hacker have got to be cleared up if any of this well of help and improvement is to be tapped, cuz there's really been no big changes, arena stuff, or motivation at all to play in quite some time, and the results are obvious. The solution is so close and for some reason kept so far away. Perhaps rather than this far-off, enormous version change, a few changes could be made to the game in the here and now? I find it better to add in bits and pieces, as any problems with new material/code can be instantly isolated and fixed, whereas you may have a multitude of problems by introducing all at once. Perhaps even more importantly, it shows the players they are not playing in an empty wasteland but a changing world with imagination and excitement, and this is all it really comes down to. Just tiny things like making non-load mobs like Khal'mast, Sky, Aleister Crowley load even 1 item can have huge positive results. If the gods don't have the time to do this, some people do, and have the discretion and intelligence to be responsible, good imms despite the qualms of others. Some of the authority required to make positive changes should therefore be partially delegated to such folks. _________________ Oh! Liz'beth! I'm comin to join ya, honey! --- ### Fred Sanford — Sat Jul 03, 2004 9:25 am **Sanford wrote:** --- ### Frontline — Sun Jul 04, 2004 11:39 am Too bad this will never happen. Frontline is far too distrustful of anyone, its ridiculous. I joined the imm staff way back to try and help with the stagnation.. I haven't told anyone specifically what went on, but many the opinions I've brazenly stated about FL, the mud, and so on were formed as a result of this enlightening experience. Let me diverge a bit here and tell a bit of boring, breviated background history. I'm not sure exactly the reason, but I don't think FL liked me from the start of my immhood. Any good I tried to accomplish was met with disapproval. I had the skills, the time, and the ambition to do a lot of good for the mud, and in hindsight I feel that FL reamed me for some personal reason. Here I was, a student from a good school studying comp. sci., a nerd with a passion for programming who had a lot of free time on his hands. And I loved DP. Hell, I was the perfect candidate for busting out code and making DP better. So I spent a few months doing what I could as a very limited power imm, building as well, and after throwing out many not so subtle hints that I was very interested in coding, I got 'fired' for being inactive at a time when I was the most active immortal (a couple weeks after the hacking incident). Anyways, what's the point of all this? It illustrates my point in this post and others. DP is dead because of negligence and distrust, pure and simple. And unless something miraculous happens, nothing is going to change. Perhaps in a year or so FL will lose complete interest and finally cancel the wolfpaw account, and all the hopeless DP addicts can go play something fresh. And yes, I'm bitter.[Wink] --- ### Ragnorok — Wed Jul 07, 2004 1:04 pm Good, poignant post, Vargus. It sucks things have gotten to this point, it really does. I would seriously like to see DP returned to its former glory, but we're all powerless to stop the slide into ruination. Such a sad state of affairs. _________________ Oh! Liz'beth! I'm comin to join ya, honey! --- ### Whistler — Wed Jul 07, 2004 5:10 pm Against my better judgement I'm replying to this obvious flamebait topic because some of what has been said is correct. No, I'm not talking about Vargus' incessant whining of "Oh noes, FL doesn't like me T.T". I'm talking about the idea that DP needs to shift from a immortal-driven game to a community-driven game, and that I've been remiss in not giving you guys the proper tools to do that. I'm currently away from home on business, but when I return Doragar and I are going to figure out what we can do to a) involve interested people in the community more and b) figure out some things to do to allieviate the stagnation. I realize that actions speak louder than words so just hang on until Dor & I free up some RL time and you'll see some positive direction coming from us. FL --- ### Mar — Fri Jul 09, 2004 4:52 pm As much as I dislike Sanford, Im going to have to agree with him.. San, I do believe you could help if given the opportunity, You could add some changes that will get people back. But even if you do, how long will it last before everyone just adapts to the changes and gets bored again? The point Im making is that small changes may bring some back for a while... but you're going to need a BIG change to resurrect this place, and whether you hate me or not... and state that *IM* The reason that no one plays, step back and think about it... players that have been playing the SAME game for 7+ years are getting bored because of not seeing any changes, Something needs to be done to keep people interested, even something small like doing quests every wednesday like it says on the log in... people WILL log to do them, this is just my opinion... say what you'd like disagree or whatever, I only re-registered to respond to this. --- ### Morpheus — Sat Jul 10, 2004 10:13 am In case you guys have forgotten, FL *DID* try to do wednesday night quests. I think it was only the third wednesday when nobody showed up... It's pretty difficult to hold regular quests with no participation, so I cannot fault FL for that aspect of participation. **Quote:** --- ### Doragar — Tue Jul 13, 2004 3:57 am I disagree... small, regular, interesting updates can be quite enough to keep players participating. The mud just need to have some level of dynamics to the world, giving players new places to explore, or new skills to play with. Part of what people don't seem to understand is that the current version of dp is *frozen*. As I understand it (FL, please correct me if I am mistaken), the 3.0 version is incompatible in certain important ways with the current version, making any import of small changes (i.e., adding a new zone, etc) essentially impossible. The advent of 3.0 has to be an all-at-once update, and I'm sure the changes are huge. Hopefully, that will hold player interest for some time, but I don't think it's realistic to expect the old pbase to come running back for 3.0. Many have moved on for good, and eventually, anyone will become bored with 3.0. Stagnancy is what kills us. The mud (be it through the efforts of staff or other volunteers) needs to establish and sustain some level of regular update activity in order to maintain and grow a new pbase. _________________ --- ### Mar — Tue Jul 13, 2004 12:28 pm Solution: Take what you have for 3.0 assuming its semi playable and open a test server up so we can jump on and help try things out, find bugs, and add usefull suggestions. BETA TEST for god sakes. I'll also say this again. FL, give the mud to someone who has the time to deal with it. It was given to you, so pass it on. Its not an admission that you've failed as an admin, its just the natural course a mud needs to go to keep on surviving. You can still be involved, but its obvious that having you run the show isnt working out right. 6 years since a major update is to long and i"m surprized the rest of the mud didnt quit long ago like I did. You have good intentions, what you dont have is the time needed to run a mud. I'm sure you can find a multitude of other people willing to pay for it. --- ### Frontline — Wed Jul 14, 2004 3:26 pm i believe they did ptest it with a select few players. _________________ boxing --- ### Fred Sanford — Sat Jul 17, 2004 2:09 am **Quote:** --- ### Unknown Correct. To make areas backwards compatible would require manual editing of area files. FL and I will discuss alternatives to try and spice the current version up a little, but it's a bit of a bandaid solution. **Quote:** --- ### Unknown Beta testing is certainly on the cards and while I do my best to iron out bugs during code production, the only people that can reliably do it are the players who seem to find an infinite number of ways to beat the system. Having said that, there is still a core component of code in development and while you can safely play 3.0 today, I'd prefer if it were finished before letting you loose. **Quote:** --- ### Unknown You make this sound so simple, like passing over the keys to the car. I honestly don't know how many people are conversant with C but you need to know the in's and out's of it because it becomes YOUR job to fix it when it breaks. Then there's the Unix system the game is run on and the requirement to pay the monthly fee to host it - these alone reduce the number of eligible contenders down to mabye one or two I'd imagine. Unless of course you want someone who's never played the mud to run it. --- ### Unknown You make a good point. --- ### Unknown I think everyone pretty much agrees that the best thing for DP right now is to get an update out into production as soon as possible, whether it is "fully baked" or not. I think people would rather play something that perhaps doesn't have 100% of the features and has some (read: many) bugs than play the current version for the n-teenth time. One of the major undertakings in 3.0 is the seperation of "code" from "content" so that adding things like quests, etc. doesn't require someone that is skilled in C programming, or a recompile/reboot of the game. Hopefully this will open the door for content creation by folks other than myself and Dor. --- ### Unknown On a pretty much unrelated note, check out this ridiculously overdescribed, yet badass dude: (Don't ask where he's from [Razz] ) Down from [ 003 ]: [ 004 ] The Black Pit of Ir'Razzi Stepping down rickety stairs into the dark basement, your nose is rudely assaulted by the foul stench of death and decay. The first glance is enough to tell you that this is a room of ancient, unspeakable evil. Through dim light are visible dozens of bodies on hooks hanging from the wall, and skeletonized cadavers have been carelessly piled in the corner. Rising steps lead to a black sacrificial altar to the south. The walls and floor are marred with blood, and long, foul smelling entrails droop from several abdomens of the men on hooks towards the floor. An old wooden staircase leads up out of this black hell. [ Exits: up ] Description for corpses/bodies/men: The men impaled on the hooks are either emaciated and dying, or dead and rotting. Others have been kept in large test tubes, preserved in a bubbling yellow oil. Their faces are aghast with horror, puffy and bloated. Most of them have been badly disfigured by the black magic of Ir'Razzi; some are hideous, anthropomorphic mixtures of man and beast, others are horrific abominations with gouged-out eyes, arms for legs, legs for arms, and other sick mutations. The "experiments" perpetrated on these poor unfortunates give a small sense of the unrestrained, overwhelming evil of the obviously insane Ir'Razzi. Description for altar: The altar is covered in blood and gore, obviously the scene of many gruesome and unrighteous experiments, executions, and sacrifices. The scientific instruments strewn about the unholy altar give a curious insight into the mentality of Ir'Razzi and his brutal, yet inquisitive mind. The altar has been marked in a neon yellow paint with the horrible symbol of the Dark One. Mob: Ir'Razzi the Black Never before have you seen such malicious evil as in the soulless gaze of this mad mage and "scientist". His skin is a steaming black, as if charred by flame, and rabid yellow eyes dart about beneath thick, furry eyebrows. Ir'Razzi's features are freakishly distorted, with long ape-like arms, and his head is a hideous bat-like abomination of wormy, oozing flesh. A forked tail rises from behind in anticipation, as Ir'Razzi utters an inhuman shriek of surprise and anger at you for having disturbed his work, and moves to confront you in a truly bizarre shuffling motion. loads: a sacrificial offering !ranger !mystic !psionic !thief !warrior !cleric !good !neutral INVIS HELD cha -3, con -3, damroll 3 Loads: 7% Descrip: A small golden trinket, held inside interwoven strands of devil grass, this offering gives off a pungent, terrible smell and radiates illusory waves which seem to distort and bend reality in its close proximity . loads: Ir'Razzi's wicked black blade WEAPON STABS !good !neutral !warrior !paladin !ranger !avatar !psionic !mystic !cleric Item is: 4 mana regen, -2 con, -2 charisma, 2 hitroll, 2 damroll, 5d6 damage (17.5) Loads: 5% Descrip: A long, serrated black dagger, this dark blade has been the perpetrator of countless murders and "sacrifices". It is an unquestionably evil weapon, incredibly sharp but cursed and unhallowed. A trail of black, dead light follows its swiping course through the air. loads: the Shroud of Death item is: about body MAGIC !good !neutral con - 5 cha - 3 damroll 2 Mana_Regen by 8 !ranger !paladin !warrior !ninja !assassin !thief !psionic Loads: 9% Descrip: A cloak of darkest, deepest blackness, the Shroud of Death floods the air with evil. The spectacular shroud quietly twirls about of its own volition in a wonder of liquid grace in nearly formless black swirling strands. A white skull graces the back, partially covered in crusts of dried blood. Loads: 3000d3 coins Ir'Razzi is : EVIL SANCT MAGE SENTINEL LOOT AWARE PROTECTION FROM GOOD !MINDBAR (not in game but hopefully can be implemented, I HATE mind bar [Razz]) 3800 hps (level ...36? Loads: a dark keychain (to tower) 100%, max 3 in game _________________ Oh! Liz'beth! I'm comin to join ya, honey!