[MUD-Dev] The Player Wimping Guidebook

[Nathan Clemons]

On Tue, 1 Aug 2000, Matthew Mihaly wrote:

> On Mon, 31 Jul 2000, J C Lawrence wrote:
>  
> >       Wiping: is the act of doing a player file wipe. This destroys
> >       all player information, including hours played, gold
> >       collected, equipment earned, and all other facets of the
> >       character. It may or may not include the player's name.
> 
> People actually DO this?? I always thought player wipes were just a joke 
> threat, like the boogie man is to children. My lord, I have an extremely
> different sense of "responsibility" than most of you, but for crying out
> loud, wiping out your players has got to be the lamest, most asinine
> solution to a problem I've ever heard of. If you have to wipe your player
> base out to correct a problem in your design, you suck.
> 
> --matt

The other thing that Tenarius seems to have forgotten is that certain MUDs
also stay in beta for more than years. During beta, any and all changes
shall/will/must occur. The very foundation of the system is fluctuating.

During these periods of prolonged betas, after which several necessary
"nerfs" have been made due to new systems being implemented, the old
players have "had it easy" under the old system but have been able to grow
with the new system... getting the advantages of both worlds. New players
will never be able to come close to rivalling them. Under these
conditions, when the situation gets to be tense, the wipe is needed.

I do agree that the "balance by enhancing" principle is a good and viable
one. I plan on having many classes, and this will be the method I
use. However, the problem with this as most of us know is that the amount
of coder time is almost always the most limited. Thus the coders may put
in something for one class but it takes them a while to get the next thing
in for the next class... during which there is always the "envious
bitching" that occurs. ("But Stormy, thieves just got 'create
poison'.... when are us warriors going to get anything? We suck compared
to them.... waaaaaah...")

Another reason for wiping is for those on a themed MUD. For instance, the
Wheel of Time series. I have seen wipes occur several times on these, and
they serve two purposes: letting the RP reset (allowing players to truly
RP out 'The Final Battle') and also introducing major code changes as
well.

I personally have noticed that making major changes to the code-base seems
to work well during a wipe. They tend to skip the hubbub about the actual
changes in the frantic race to recoup the high positions of status they
had before.

The bottom line, however, is that players and immortals (scratch
that: people in general) will always have different opinions. When your
opinion is seen to have drastically distanced itself from those of the
immortals, it's time to move on. This applies whether you're a mort or an
imm. Chances are that you'll have to do this several times before you find
the final place that you can hang your hat. Or you realize that it
either: a.) isn't worth trying anymore or b.) you don't care anymore and
you just stop MUDding.

--
Nathan P. Clemons                       "Peace favor your code."
nathan at windsofstorm.net                 ICQ: 2810688
(v) 401.725.6061			(f) 603.372.9737




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