[MUD-Dev] History, background and religion

[Sanvean]

On Tue, 11 Apr 2000, Pileborg Joachim - FMT wrote:
> I know that most existing MUDs don't have either a history, background
> or religion. What I'm wondering is how many of you do have a (more or
> less) well thought-out history for your MUD? Are you borrowing stuff from
> our own history? How do you handle names (of people and places) in case
> you dont? Religion and gods? Do the implemtation of it all differ from what
> you first planned it to be, and why?

I'll delurk for a moment to say that on Armageddon MUD we've got reams and
reams of historical and cultural documentation.  I came on board about
fiveor six  years ago, and there was already an extraordinary amount
of solid stuff in place, which has only swelled to greater proportions
since.  We have two versions, one of which is accessible to the players
via our website, which has the basics of what they'd know, an
intermingling of history and folklore, and then a much more detailed one
for the staff, which answers a lot of the questions players wouldn't know.
But beyond that, we have the history which has been generated in game by
player actions or plotlines, such as the dwarven siege of Allanak, or the
destruction of Tuluk.  Again, the player versions differ significantly --
they don't know the exact reason Tuluk fell, unless they happen to be the
members of one of two particular clans.

The clans keep their own documentation, which we host on our website, and
password protect so (mostly) players don't have access to it unless
they're playing in that clan.  It's an imperfect system, like most, but it
generally works.  The majority of the clans have significant amounts of 
social/cultural stuff, including, for example, typical words and
expressions, styles of dress, traditions, songs/stories, etc.

To us, this documentation is vital.  It allows us, for one, to maintain
coherancy/consistency as staff come and go, or as they hand off the
handling of a particular clan to someone else.  For another, we're
a roleplay required MUD, so if we're expecting someone to play out a role
like an escaped mulish slave or a foppish Fale noble, it's unfair to not
give them all the information they need.  Additionally, the players know
they can affect the game world, and have a lasting impact on the history.
I'll note here that we differ from a lot of other muds in
that our staff members are not considered ingame deities - no one's
worshipping them.  The staff remains behind the scenes driving plots,
handling player issues, animating NPCs, etc.

I recently put in, for staff benefit, a series of 'Secret History
of (whatever)' docs, which are a compilation of ingame board posts, posts
from the immortal boards (which helps keep those a little clearer), notes,
emails, etc.  They're intended to give a new immortal an indepth overview
of the events surrounding a particular clan or place.

Generally, I don't recruit new immortals except from within the player
ranks, so anyone coming onto staff already knows a lot of the basics.  The
few times I've tried an immortal who hasn't been playing for a while, it's
been disastrous, no matter how experienced they may be with other muds.
And with new immortals, I usually give them access to the staff
documentation (it's all web-based, so they can poke around at leisure) and
have them read through it for a few days before even logging on to learn
the immcmds.

*returns to lurking*

Sanvean
http://www.armageddon.org
Armageddon MUD.  Roleplay Required.




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