[MUD-Dev] Wild west (was Guilds & Politics)

[Richard Woolcock]

Derrick Jones wrote:
> 
> On Fri, 12 Dec 1997, Matt Chatterley wrote:[snip]
> > The other large problem is that many game administrators think having a
> > player-run council will be great, and wipe out problems. However, they
> > fail to define the duties of the council and expect it to enforce things
> > it cannot (for instance, things wizards normally use logs to enforce and
> > other OOC matters, when the council is an IC construct). Also, they
> > dislike surrendering power to the council in some cases, and instead begin
> > to 'direct' the council - basically turning it into a front for
> > themselves.
> >
> Hrm...If you're expecting players to help admin the mud, why not simply
> promote a core group (those you feel can be trusted) to godhood (or
> whatever equivalent) so that they actually have the ability to do their
> job.  Giving greater powers to fewer players lets you err on the side of
> caution a bit more in selecting them from your playerbase.[snip]

>From experience I can tell you this will not work.  For a few weeks, it
will be fine - but then the ex-players will begin to tire of the whining
and pleading of the other players, those little mortals who they once 
thought of as friends, and they will start ignoring them completely, or
sideing against them (which the players will despise, even if they ARE
in the wrong).  They will get called 'traitor' and 'turncoat', and may
well leave the mud, saying that they can't deal with the attitude of
the other players.

A long time ago, on my old mud, I coded 'Watchers'.  These were designed
to look out for cheating imms, and had their own special channel which
displayed any imm commands.  They were immune to snooping, and impossible
to identify (although imms might start to wonder why the watcher was 'Busy
already' every time they tried to snoop), and they didn't even know who
else was a watcher directly (obviously you would remember the person who
had made you a watcher, and anyone else you had made into a watcher).
Only a player could be a watcher, never an immortal.

This worked fine until someone became a Watcher without knowing what it
mean't, and started asking an imm for help *cringe*.

Anyway, I would recommend selecting maybe 1-3 players who you know and
trust - who do NOT have immortal characters - and make them representatives
of some sort of Council.  Their role could be to collect the views and
opinions of other players, and then get to directly argue the points with
the top imps.  This means that you don't have to listen to constant 
arguments from all the players, but the players feel that if they have
something really important it will go right to the top.

Just a thought.

KaVir.