[MUD-Dev] Re: selling Godhoods

[lapsos]

  In general i've found in my experience the best and most creative
immortals/gods have little to no money in which to pay a fee even a
fraction of this.  In factuality I find that anyone who would be willing
to pay even $100 for such a position would be more in it for the pure
desire of having the position over actually Doing the job the position
requires.  What you can call the rich pri*k theory.  In this I ask how do
you handle people who opt to pay for the position simply to shove it in
others faces.

  Also I work for a mud, for free, as a coder and admin.  And I find that
allowing immortals/gods to simply wax mortals at their whim to be a good
way to kill your player base.  Mortals are finicky in that they like to
play without being harrassed.  How do you account for mortals who are not
happy with the actions of the immortals/gods and does it differ between if
the immortal/god is a free-god or a paid-god?

  During my time I have found that there is no real way to properly
explain what immortalship is like in as many words as you can generate.
There is always things that are either under-estimated or over-esitmated,
since being 'Immortal' is very different for each person.  How do you
account for people who pay for a immortal/god but were given a
mis-representation of the position based on what was most noted and what
wasn't noted enough?  Plus if a person is considering paying but would
like to Test the position first for some length of time, how do you handle
people like that?  And also if a person pays the 3k sum, immorts, then
steps down or is demoted.  Do they get re-subjected to the pay-per-play
setup and if so how do they react to that and how do you react to their
reaction.

  Have you ever had someone try and make changes to the contract.  If so
how did you handle it.  Also what is the difference between someone who
qualifies for a paid-god position VS someone who qualifies for a free-god
position.

  During my time i've done just about everything in these senses.  I've
been the newbie player, the vetern player.  I've down the building scene
and have done light LOW work.  I currently do adminstration and coder
work, as noted above, and also work on a client and a variety of other
things.  In all my experience I have found that on a topic such as muds,
which is generally seen as freeplay, people get extremely picky when costs
come into play.  More often then not those who have not the ability to pay
the costs are those who make the best players at the same time the worst
players can be found in the ranks of those who are not willing to pay.  So
my final questions are:

  1. Among your paying immortals how many have actually been Worth it
     compared to how many of your non-paying immortals have been worth it.
  2. What is it about your mud that is so spectacular that you charge for
     it and how high is that charge, and how have players reacted to that
     cost.  This also includes the charges for becoming a god, outside of
     the general ability to piss players off what other amazing powers do
     you give them with their fee.
  3. How willing are you, in the long run, to deal with the loss of what
     could turn out to be the best players you could ever have just to
     turn a profit and how profitable is that profit when all is said and
     done.
  4. How do you handle critisism from those players and admistrators who
     do not agree with a pay-to-play mud.

  In general I, personally, would never work for, play on or support a
pay-to-play mud.  But everyone is allowed their own choices.  My greatest
worry is with the influx of larger pseudo muds that are pay-to-play can
give people a mis-conception of muds in general.  A lot of people I have
delt with along these lines have assumed that either all muds are ptp or
that only the good ones are.  While the total people who think along these
lines is lesser than the total amount of mud players that number Is
growing daily.
	-William





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