[MUD-Dev] Player-admins, was wimping/wiping and the big blind spot

[Peter]

Brian Green wrote:
>> > Peter: 'Ugh, how can you code if you don't know what's fun?'
>>         I have to raise a complaint against this mindset, as I've
>>  encountered it many times in the past and found it to be poorly 
concieved.
>
>Oooh, I think I'll do likewise with your points.
>
>>  You do not have to play a game in order to know what would be good 
or bad
>>  for your game, for in truth this is not that difficult of a thing.  
>
>If it's not that difficult, why do so many players think that admins
>screw it up on a regular basis?  Heck, why do so many admins they they
>screw it up on such a regular basis?  (Myself included!)
>
>The ideal situation would be to play your game exhaustively.  Play 
every
>race/class combination in every area using every possible skill. 
>Obviously, unless your MUD is extremely limited (or, you have given up
>the need to sleep and are independently wealthy), then this is
>impossible.  So, most people settle for playing a subset of the game 
and
>judging it from there.

	This wasn't what I meant. If you do that, you'll end up chasing your 
tail fixing things you percieve as problems that your players don't give 
a care about. Almost every admin plays their muds enough, sometimes too 
much. The problem with an admin playing their own mud is that they know 
everything. They'll know when they'll get that next skill, how tough the 
mob hiding the basement is, where to get eq.
	I'm saying play other people's muds. Play the muds that players run 
because they like muds so much they think it'd be fun. Look at what they 
change. Look at what they create. It may not be balanced, it may have 
typos, it may be ugly sometimes, but- it's fun. They scratch the right 
itches. Yeah, it'd be nice to play on a mud with a player-run justice 
system, but I like more to play muds that don't make me jump through 
hoops to use my eq.

[a big snip]
>>         Thoughout this all, the constant claim from the implementor 
was
>>  simple; "You don't play so you wouldn't know."  My claim was just as
>>  simple; "You don't have to play to write code."
>
>To split hairs, I think that you don't have to play in order to write
>code.  I can write a elegant code and not play.  But, I think the real
>question here is "Do you have to play in order to design a fun game?"

	And I think, simply, my answer is a resounding "yes." Play games. Have 
fun.
	Think about why you're having fun- is it because you're finding a 
well-orcestrated and excellently executed balance of powers between the 
character classes, or because you got a nifty new sword and there's a 
mob you just bet you're strong enough to take out now? Because the NPCs 
can hold a conversation, or because you finally found the key to the 
locked grate in the dark end of the sewers?
	Are you playing a game or are you watching a simulation? And which is 
fun versus intellectualy stimulating?






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