Background: I played a bit of FL over 15 years ago. I played with some friends, but the community did not appreciate feedback from a newbie. Once I got deep enough I realized I was more right that I initially let on. Rather than raise a ruckus, I decided to go learn D&D 3.5. Once the source was released I popped back in after going through the code but was told that things would not be opening up and that I should go pound sand. I did. Nowadays I realized that all my other games have discords and wondered if FL was still alive. It was a bit hard to find, but that's why I spent four or so hours explaining myself yesterday. I have been encouraged to share my thoughts due to have a unique perspective of being a highly-knowledgeable noob. I've never capped a character. I did get the worst possible race/class combo up to 35 because the adventurer class did not exist at the time. But most of it was just banging my head at the game alone and getting face-stomped repeatedly, so I don't know what 90% of the map feels like, or the quests, etc.
Legend:
Quote
Like, an outline I have Roman numerals, letters and numbers
I) is an in-game code change. It's mechanical and requires an admin to change.
II) is an out of game change, like the webpages.
III) is a community metagame change. Nothing changes on the website or the code, but it is a change nonetheless.
a) these changes are easy or obvious, and hopefully unanimously approved.
b ) these changes either require a small about of effort or might require discussion before approval
c) these are larger changes that either need to be clearly communicated before implementation or have more far-reaching effects
Change number one
Change number two
etc
I am available on discord as Light; that kind of connectivity is the only reason I thought to come back. In no particular order, from the chat last night:
IIIa1) I saw a reddit post a friend dug up claiming FL to be very noob friendly. This has not been my experience. The good news is that I think we can all get behind such an idea, and the massive changes that will be required as priority 1. This isn't hypothetical. I'm trying to drag a friend through FL as his first MUD, since he likes MMOs. I wish to spare him the pain I had all those years ago.
IIb1) There are no easy start guides/videos/etc with clear, step-by-step instructions to get people into FL as their first MUD. It should spoilered be on the main pages (theforsakenlands.com). We could even hold a competition to see who does the best with this (not me. I just found out today that my gmud's text was broken ... for years). There should be a walkthrough explaining exactly how to rank 30 an adventurer. It should be clear and concise a 12 year old could follow it.
IIb2) Most of the maps need reworked. I'm not talking about the rooms in game, mind you. This MUD needs extra content like a hole in the head. No, it needs to verify what is already in place so maps are 100% accurate to the room by room level with consistency and readablility so new players should be comfortable running around without getting lost as long as they can follow a map on a second monitor. This isn't 2003 anymore. Unfortunately, I am bad with mapping, but Magick has agreed to be assigned to the case. Special thanks to him on that.
IIb3) The (new) wiki needs reworked too. For instance, here is an attachment to a consolidated list of titles. New players cannot be expected to cross-reference 20 webpages just to read 'who' titles. The bard appears to be the old 0xp bard (it's the new bard to me since it doesn't have hide, just not the new, new 475xp bard). Also I heard the necro titles are outdated. I don't know any of the rest of it. I have no choice but to trust what is on there until I start seeing discrepancies -- exactly what causes new player frustration
Ia8) Titles should also have level and class for others, just like it has for yourself. Up-front, transparent information coming from the wiki into the game is always a good thing.
Ib2) The help files are woefully lacking. Need to figure out how to withdraw an item from a satchel? Help Withdraw won't help you! Help take? There need to be "SEE X" at the bottom of synonyms. Like everywhere. Want to search for armor values? Help armor won't help. No help for 'pierce'. Want formulas? Too bad! Want at least comparative numbers on something like weapons? Nope, go to the wiki!
IIIb1) My words when I left of 'enjoy a shrinking player base' have proven true. But I didn't expect the game to be almost identical to what I left. Yes I've heard there are new ninjas, but think about the changes to DotA over same period of time. I believe play base growing to be priority 2. I would appreciate threads on what others think the best approach is once all noob-friendly changes have been implemented. I think Let's Plays (like every other popular game) to youtube/bitchute/LBRY/Brighteon and streaming to Twitch would be a good first step. I do not think voting on a MUD boards I have never heard of to be the answer, although of course others are welcome to vote there.
Ia9) Any objections to the above can be worked around. No metagame challenge is insurmountable. All it requires is a little out-of-the-box thinking, which I don't mind sharing. Problem solving is fun. For instance, I am aware of "who" cowardice and admins actually trying to stop people from advertising FL on twitch. I assume this was long ago. A simple 'who streamer' could condense this information into a stream-friendly, filtered version for others who are not the streamer worrying about character privacy. Games that allow stream snipers are more fun, not less, even besides the obvious risk to the streamer. And I have the counter-examples to prove it: https://www.youtube.com/user/nr3756/videos https://www.youtube.com/user/codprodigyx/videos https://www.youtube.com/user/fsdfajklklj/videos https://www.youtube.com/c/ChaseTheBro/videos
Ia10) The prompt should be adjusted by default, as probably should a bunch of other commands, I don't even use because I do everything the hard way.
Ia11) Practicable skills without any hope of use or learning should show up at 0%, not 1%. The player save code can stay the same, just the output from prac needs intercepted to show 01's as 00.
Ib3) Stats are very opaque to newbies. The game says to do certain things, like practice up to 75%, but then rewards the opposite for players who know better. In D&D, this is called 'trap options' and is considered poor design, even for the game that is famous for it. Simple way to avoid 1 prac'ing is to make the learn % scale up so that between 50 and 75% prac (base, so before item effects), learning goes from 0 to the full int value. Thus players practicing from 0 to 25 to 50 don't stop and instead go all the way to 75 whilst a player at 74% might decide to just eat a small learning penalty rather than an entire prac.
IIb4) I heard mods were okay greping/exporting full item ID information. Once that happens and it's on a wiki, it should be easier to help navigate new players to items that boost stat (which I personally think is a bad practice since its existence means new players would logically have to search all items before assigning their point buy, if they wanted to 'route' correctly like a speedrunner. A simple mortorium on stat boosting items below level 45 or whatever would fix that without disrupting capstone play at all. I would be fine with a more straightforward, but more draconian change to just make boosted stats not help if in excess of base amount. Not base maximum, base amount. This would permanently fix some hidden optimization information that I hear happens with cabals and stats.
Ia12) the Desc EditOR command will replace your desc with "editor" instead of being interpreted as the edit command. Also the description process itself is also a hassle. Not the writing, the inputting command. It always eats the text I get it improperly half a dozen commands, and the correct entries always get nuked three times, minimum. Eventually I get it, but man is it unnecessarily frustrating.
Ia13) reminder on the mostly agreed-upon pray to admin seperation to talk to rulers/admins/immortals (I do not use the word gods, it's an ego trip at best, sacriledge at worst). Also I'll reitterate that I do see admins functioning as admins, but not as in-game RPing. For instance descriptions are done via summon, not the admin hiding, gating, and looking. I am 100% fine with the 'immersion-breaking' stuff, so there's no judgement here. I'm merely stating how its seems it's always been done as evidence against the in-game RP justification for saying 'gods' rather than 'rulers'. And as far as the baggage from D&D, that game's gods were just epic spellcasters who gave into their pride and became idols. They in turn often worshipped higher beings, so there is nothing wrong with calling so and so the ruler/highest agent of Chaos rather than 'the god of chaos'.
Ib5) The probe command is broken/useless. It seems it used to be the exit command? The help on the exit command is also irrelevant. So here's what probe needs to be: an automatic exit command which only fires when it shows a yellow entry. If it automatically fails, then it should say so.
Ia14) The Scroll 0 command should be default. This isn't 2003 with 480p screens. People run 4k monitors now.
Ia15) There is no help on the feed command or drunkenness (drunk/alcohol)
Ib6) Metagame analysis on the new point buy system suggests that character styles of a single 'dump stat' were not preserved. Elves/Drow seem to show this most clearly. Boosting all PB amounts by 10 and dropping lowest scores to 12 should fix this, and have no other effects.
Ic1) Why was the flee penalty removed entirely? Sure it was dumb to compound 10 XP for running from two plasma beasts at level 1, but why reward cowardice? A straight -10xp from current xp (or more like -100xp given the xp adjustments) would be fine. I'd be fine with a temporary de-leveling, but if that subsystem isn't already in place then there's no pressing need to add it.
Ia16) "A black crow flies in.
Randall says 'Welcome, a black crow. Do you wish my help in training you?' "
I'll add more later because I am going to go through the base game and I will find a ton of things that just make no sense, like how the base game isn't up front about item balance between alignments. Perhaps some of this metagame information (don't buy items, kill/request them!) can be in a walkthrough, but a lot of it can be simplified without the game losing anything. For instance I learned today that shops are purposely made useless due to code limiting item level. That information should be gated primarily via pricing like every other game, not level.
Already DM'd to ella mud school stuff, provided here in the name of transparency:
Spoiler
Ia1) scroll 0 should be the default, or at least prompt as a question during character creation. As should all "quality of life" commands.
Ia2) Also recall should be allowed inside mud school. Yes, newbies like me will get lost and not know how to look around at where they are. A forcible starting point is useful, even from within there
Ia3) the mud school is called "The Font of Creation" in the where output?
Ia4) The Library of Literary lament tells plays too look at a placard that tells them to record feats in a journal which encourages them to help Journal. But help journal gives NO reference to journaling...
Ia5) The Training Hub says to Look Sign which says to Help Mana, but that refers to Mana Charge...
Ia6) Telling bordole 'scan' makes it tell you to Where Bordoli but that doesn't work because his name is Bordole
Ia7) The East wing tells players to Look Poster, and that command says to Help Quests, but there is no Help QuestS entry, only Help Quest
Ic2) I'm not going to focus on additional features (mechanics or fluff) for FL, but I'll give a teaser. The one thing I am sure I could help with would be pushing the limits of the game once all the rest of it is smoothed out. For instance even D&D 3.5, as large as it is, was pushed by me (and to my knowledge no one else) by applying point-buy ideas to the OMG/LoD DotA philosphy of equal skills. It would be right up my alley to balance skill levels and assign point buy values to allow fully custom characters (races and classes). It might sound strange/difficult/impossible to others, but it's no big deal for me. I find it fun, actually. Now that would bring back players.
Titles.txt Title Cmud Script.txt