[MUD-Dev] The Player Wimping Guidebook

[adam at treyarch.com]

On Thu, 3 Aug 2000, Koster, Raph wrote:
> It also behooves you to make the changes you make not cause net reductions
> in playerbase, unless you don't care about playerbase. But by and large for
> most mud admins, it's a decent metric. From the perspective of trying to
> keep players happy, they (in the aggregate, examined as player statistics)
> know what a good change is better than you do.

I agree, although I will play devil's advocate for just a moment and suggest
that simple number of players is not the only metric of success.

What if you make a change that causes half your playerbase to depart, but
the other half to enjoy the game twice as much?

What if you make a change that causes 1% of your playerbase to depart,
but the other 99% to enjoy the game twice as much?

If you replace your mud server with a Quake server and subsequently
double your playerbase, is this considered a good design choice?

Success is defined by you, the admin.  Most administrators agree that
a larger playerbase is better, but it is not the only metric.

Adam





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