Where Survey Results: March 2014

[Nyr]

Raw data for March

Total new accounts created:  280
Duplicates (created multiple accounts out of confusion/staff accounts/etc):  1
New accounts minus the above: 279



Where people came from
(noteworthy results mentioned, some might be concurrent)

Topmudsites:  16
Themudconnector: 105
Both:  1
Google:  29 (note that these can probably be attributed to either TMS or TMC)
Search/web: 11 (these also can probably be attributed to either TMS or TMC)
Friends/other players/family/co-workers/homies:  25
Reddit:  12
Random forums:  17
TVtropes:  2

A smattering of some miscellaneous answers:
yourmother
i didn't
Cat Rambo



Login data

Actual logins (created a character that was approved and they logged in):  72
1 hour or less in playtime: 24
1-2 hours of playtime:  10
2-6 hours of playtime:  13
6-20 hours of playtime:  14 (7 logged in as recently as Sunday this week)
20+ hours of playtime:  9 (6 logged in as recently as Sunday this week)

GDB Accounts created in January
Of these 13 active/high playtime players above, several have already created GDB accounts and have already been posting.

It looks like doing a two-part review of actual playtime + recent login time is a better way to determine the folks that are presently sticking to the game from the month.

Will create a survey that will go to the most active retained new players, and also a survey that will go to the most active not-retained new accounts, but only a select few.  While I started with the latter, I think the former will be important to get these retained players plugged in to the GDB community and to let them know "hey, we see you're here and contributing, can we do anything to help you get acclimated further?"

Still working on getting tools that will track origin, start location, racial choice, length of time in newbie area (if at all), login time window, and possibly playerbase interaction (did they interact with another PC or not).

Survey Results from last month's "why didn't you love us" survey (in brief):
2 responses.  Both interacted with other PCs.  Both loved the interaction with PCs/high level of RP.  What did they find to be challenging/frustrating/annoying?  For one, it was the static sdesc stuff not being replaced with a name eventually.  For the other, it was the slowness of combat and movement.  The combat/movement person did stop playing because of that reason...the other one had things come up and still likes the game, they just didn't have time anymore--their dislike was not their reason for leaving.



If you're one of those people above?  Feel free to chime in here!  Getting your perspective on things will hopefully help out future players.

[FantasyWriter]

Slowness of combat? What game did they come from. Armageddon has much quicker combat then the other muds I have experimented with (not that many, I admit).
Especially PvP combat in Haven. I remember the ONE time I accidentally got locked in combat with another PC, it took over 30 minutes (and staff intervention) to finally break us apart.  Swore I would never again get in PvP again in that game.

[BadSkeelz]

If they're used to Iron Realm games, where you practically need a degree in computer science to set up your poisoning/antidote-ingesting and combat skill macros to fire at sufficient speed to keep you alive in PVP... yeah, I can see why they think Arm is "slow."

[Patuk]

Slowness of combat? What game did they come from. Armageddon has much quicker combat then the other muds I have experimented with (not that many, I admit).
Especially PvP combat in Haven. I remember the ONE time I accidentally got locked in combat with another PC, it took over 30 minutes (and staff intervention) to finally break us apart.  Swore I would never again get in PvP again in that game.

IRE, probably. It does have much quicker combat.. Or more fleshed out combat in general. Still, yeah.

[Nyr]

Slowness of combat? What game did they come from. Armageddon has much quicker combat then the other muds I have experimented with (not that many, I admit).
Especially PvP combat in Haven. I remember the ONE time I accidentally got locked in combat with another PC, it took over 30 minutes (and staff intervention) to finally break us apart.  Swore I would never again get in PvP again in that game.

Many hack/n/slash games move as fast as you can type.  Combat still goes in rounds but it scrolls much, much faster than in this game.

[FreeRangeVestric]

Heh. That's a reason that I enjoy the combat system here, actually, though I haven't really tried other ones very extensively.

Can't please everybody, I suppose.

[slvrmoontiger]

I'm not sure if this has been asked before I can't remember. Are you making sure that some of these people don't just log on and go link dead. I've seen so many times what appears to be a new player logging in and going link dead. Just wondering?

[Lizzie]

I'm not sure if this has been asked before I can't remember. Are you making sure that some of these people don't just log on and go link dead. I've seen so many times what appears to be a new player logging in and going link dead. Just wondering?

I was going to ask the same thing. A bunch of new players lately have logged in, and then - nothing. They just log in, and their character stands there for hours (and sometimes days). One or two of them have logged in, interacted, and then just stood there idle for up to an hour (that I've noticed) - and then all of a sudden they interact again, indicating that they didn't go linkdead at all; they simply stopped trying to interact while their character was logged in.

As for movement/combat delays - RPIs tend to be slower than H&S DIKUs. I don't know if DIKU comes with a delay or not but I do know that RPIs address those systems specifically.

[Nyr]

I'm not sure if this has been asked before I can't remember. Are you making sure that some of these people don't just log on and go link dead. I've seen so many times what appears to be a new player logging in and going link dead. Just wondering?

If you're linkdead you aren't accruing time on your account.

[Barzalene]

They might be fiddling with their client.

[Nyr]

I was going to ask the same thing. A bunch of new players lately have logged in, and then - nothing. They just log in, and their character stands there for hours (and sometimes days). One or two of them have logged in, interacted, and then just stood there idle for up to an hour (that I've noticed) - and then all of a sudden they interact again, indicating that they didn't go linkdead at all; they simply stopped trying to interact while their character was logged in.

A bunch of new players drop link like this on a regular basis, mostly because they don't understand the quit command.  When they drop their link they aren't there anymore as far as our tracking is concerned. 

And yes, some players have logged in and then taken some time to react/respond as they deal with the client (as Barzalene suggested) or maybe they just aren't paying attention to the window.

There hasn't been a case yet where the people we're tracking as new players just log in, leave their account online, and idle for days to skew the numbers.

[Cale_Knight]

Slowness of combat? What game did they come from. Armageddon has much quicker combat then the other muds I have experimented with (not that many, I admit).

Diku stock combat goes by rounds, and every round you can get your maximum attacks based on how many attacks you have (I think stock has 2nd and 3rd attack, and dual wield) and whether you're hasted, and all characters in combat fight during all rounds, so a 1v1 combat can still have 10 or more attacks per round, every round, and that doesn't even take into account skills or spells being used.

So yeah, combat in Arm is very slow and deliberate compared to other MUDs. Personally, though, I consider that one of its strong points.

[Nyr]

Slowness of combat? What game did they come from. Armageddon has much quicker combat then the other muds I have experimented with (not that many, I admit).

Diku stock combat goes by rounds, and every round you can get your maximum attacks based on how many attacks you have (I think stock has 2nd and 3rd attack, and dual wield) and whether you're hasted, and all characters in combat fight during all rounds, so a 1v1 combat can still have 10 or more attacks per round, every round, and that doesn't even take into account skills or spells being used.

So yeah, combat in Arm is very slow and deliberate compared to other MUDs. Personally, though, I consider that one of its strong points.

And this is a game where players take issue with spamwalkers.
In other games, those would be "efficient players."

It is a different environment, to be sure.  It's not for everyone.  The hope in the survey is to find things that are real sticklers that we both can and should change.  The other survey for players that have stuck to the game may not need to be too much different:

• Welcome to Arm
• what do you think has drawn you to the game/keeps bringing you back--or rather, what stood out so much that you've decided to play here?
• is there anything that is causing an undue amount of frustration/challenge/hardship for you that you think we should be aware of?
• Here's a link to the GDB, this is our forum and we chat about stuff like the game and your mom, we'd love to chat with you there