Player Magnet

[deathkamon]

So this poll is regarding towards some replies I had read in the Armageddon Confessional. I believe that our player base is at an all time low compared to even just two or three years back, and I think we need to get more players to join up. The only question is how we do this, and I want the Arm community's opinion on how we can get more to join.

[Desertman]

So this poll is regarding towards some replies I had read in the Armageddon Confessional. I believe that our player base is at an all time low compared to even just two or three years back, and I think we need to get more players to join up. The only question is how we do this, and I want the Arm community's opinion on how we can get more to join.

There is a strong possibility you are going to see a bump pretty quick actually. It usually happens somewhere around this time as schools have just let out for the summer.

[whitt]

First, I'm no wiley veteran, but I'm pretty sure the player numbers have been worse just in my time here.  

As for bringing in more players?  Get newbie friendly leaders in the newbie friendly clans and give them support to do things.  80% of the new players will not be at a level of skill or comfort to be much more than window dressing to an hRPT.  If there is frequent activity, hunts/contracts/explorations/patrols that keep the new players doing things long enough for them to learn the syntax and get comfortable with the concept of an RPI, then your numbers might grow.

Appealing to an attempt to draw back older players is great for a short influx of players (ala the Riots) but the new players that stick around are more likely to boost your full-time play numbers without constant staff intervention.  

[Yam]

MUDs in general are on the decline. I think Armageddon fills a niche that nothing really else does and has plenty of life left, but the only way to get new people is to advertise that it exists and then retain players who actually sign up. I think two things that can help are:

1. The staff should make a player recruitment/retention position. I asked them about it a few months ago (http://gdb.armageddon.org/index.php/topic,51064.0.html) and Adhira said they weren't looking at implementing it. I hope that position changes. I think we as players need someone on staff whose primary role is to find ways to attract and retain more players. I know there are people who are interested in such a role. It's up to the current staff to allow it though.

2. I also think we need to be better about new player intake and mentorship. An OOC channel accessible by new players (maybe their first 2 or 3 PCs) and helpers could work.

[nauta]

I had been meaning to write up a post on 'What Worked With Tuluk', but never did since I thought it might spiral out of control unless put right, but -- and this coming from someone who didn't start as a newbie in Tuluk...

Tuluk and its surrounding flora and fauna seems to have been friendly to newbies who wanted to do the 'independent/see the world' route.   Allanak and its surrounding flora and fauna is not.

I'm not sure if there's a solution or even if this is correct.  Just tossing it out there.

[BadSkeelz]

I had been meaning to write up a post on 'What Worked With Tuluk', but never did since I thought it might spiral out of control unless put right, but -- and this coming from someone who didn't start as a newbie in Tuluk...

Tuluk and its surrounding flora and fauna seems to have been friendly to newbies who wanted to do the 'independent/see the world' route.   Allanak and its surrounding flora and fauna is not.

I'm not sure if there's a solution or even if this is correct.  Just tossing it out there.

It's certainly been my experience with the Northlands. Personally I thought it was a problem for Tuluk as it allowed characters to radiate out into the grasslands as indie hunters with no real connection to the City or their fellow citizens. Allanak's wilderness is/was dangerous enough that banding together before going out (Typically by joining a clan) was the smart move.

[Miradus]

You are #2 on Mud Connector's top ten list.

If that's not drawing in new players, then there isn't much else that will.

[Armaddict]

I don't think 'Make things easier' is the way to go.  Skill progression as a whole is...kind of beyond the <24 hour character for the first time and something you get the grasp of down the line.  What you need is the hook.

My hook was a templar getting attacked in front of me by a player, the templar getting backstabbed, and my character backstabbing the backstabber.  Then I went out and died to a scrab.  My demand to roll up a new character was hard after that(it should be noted that the reason -why- was because that templar suddenly thanked me, said I would be involved in some things as a result of my loyalty, and then I went and died right when things were looking awesome), and I was hooked by my next character that served in a noble house and got involved in creation of the Borsail Wyvern's unit.  I had a mentor named 'Kiko' who was a young kid, but as a player, he knew a lot more than me and told me how things worked.

I was too noob, and got removed from my leadership position, but I was so noob that I didn't really realize I'd lost anything.


Anyway.  Point is...the hook isn't mechanics.  Arm has great mechanics, but if we're trying to hook people with mechanics, I think we're barking up the wrong tree.  Arm is singular in its roleplay experience and how dynamic relationships between entities in the world are.  What people -need- is for players and the game alike to provide excitement on a consistent basis.

If we could somehow maintain an HRPT like the last one, all the time...and not have all the players banded together in it?  I'm betting people would stick around more.

[lostinspace]

I had been meaning to write up a post on 'What Worked With Tuluk', but never did since I thought it might spiral out of control unless put right, but -- and this coming from someone who didn't start as a newbie in Tuluk...

Tuluk and its surrounding flora and fauna seems to have been friendly to newbies who wanted to do the 'independent/see the world' route.   Allanak and its surrounding flora and fauna is not.

I'm not sure if there's a solution or even if this is correct.  Just tossing it out there.

My first character was in Tuluk, I immediately stumbled across others willing to help me get started and figure out the game, no clans required. Others also showed me the surrounding area, and I managed to survive pretty much because the area was so rich in resources. Comparatively, I think the first three or four characters I made in the south all died within the first few hours after they were created. I didn't make it past a day played in the south until one of my characters joined the Byn and was shown how to survive.

Even the help files for Tuluk made it apparent it was the easier place to survive, which is why I ultimately chose it for my first character. I think if I had chose Nak, I likely wouldn't still be playing.

[Malifaxis]

HRPT - I have long been a fan of the old staff driven HRPTs.  Some of the plots in the past have been incredible, and with the talent we have on staff right now, I think they could make some amazing things happen.

Excitement Injection - We need a Steve Buscemi Meteor that's actually a egg that cracks open and releases a thousand evil psionically capable brainsnakes.   Kidding!  I like the level of excitement in game, I've been tremendously entertained by the level of roleplaying that's going on and with the increase in interest involving the gladiator events in Allanak.  If anything, I wish those could increase.  I remember the feeling of my first Arena as a newbie every single fucking time a character of mine walks in to that place.  If you need an initial hook to get someone really going on the game, you could do a lot worse than more Arena matches.

What would help draw new players is really pretty simple, from an Advertising perspective... and it's just a simple thing a lot of us can do, since we do it anyway.

Go to Cons and talk to people.  Wear your Armageddon shirt.  Don't have an Armageddon shirt?  Do Cosplay as a d-elf if you look like Path and Dig, or do cosplay as a Kadian merchant if you look like me.  Go as a Kuraci spicehead, or a templar, or a whor... well, okay, that might have ramifications.  But you get the idea.  Then... when people come up and ask you, tell them a quick bit about the game and offer them a business card with the game info on it.  Leave business cards out on tables, fold them into little eye-catching shapes if you want.  A lot of players here go to Cons at one time or another.  Put a bit of extra umph into it, and we could get a few new players at least.

I'd also like to say that I've been really impressed with the quality of new players we've been attracting.  There are some fan-fucking-tastic newbies in game right now, and it is terrific to see.  Kudos to you, chalton-boot wearers of the Known.  Kudos.

[Majikal]

I think we could do some community outreach things, I'm sure there's plenty of nerds out there that would be interested in Armageddon just don't know it exists. Dropping into an RPG discussion forum and maybe plugging a little blurb about Armageddon can always add a few playersa. =P

[nauta]

Relevant post on reddit:

https://www.reddit.com/r/MUD/comments/31bezx/what_would_it_take_for_muds_to_become_popular/

Also, didn't the Big Bang Theory mention mudding around 2013?  So the real answer is: we need a popular television series to discuss MUDs.

[Gazarsgo]

I only see 4 character bios on the website out of >50 characters on my account, and they go: 2016, 2006, 2006, 2002.

I was on yesterday evening and saw upwards of 50 people online.    That's huge!  Y'all are spoiled. 

The playerbase on Godwars 2 is much smaller, even counting the mults.

[Armaddict]

...holy shit, gaz, I haven't seen you in ages.  Welcome back?

[Norcal]

The poll does not allow for multiple responses, and I think we need more excitement, HRPT, and Advertisement.

As I mentioned in another post, not sure what exactly the staffs medium to long term vision for the game is, outside of the facet that they are cleaning things up and redoing guilds and sugguilds (Maybe races next?).

I think that if staff could post some teasers, on what is coming in the next three months or six months, put them on the website or at least links to them, it would help.  On helper chat we can see how many people enter the website, and there are really quite a few! We need something ongoing, new and exciting that they can quickly look at, to get them interested enough to create a PC. So combining advertising with ongoing exciting events, on our own site as well as on others who would be willing to help.

I think the idea of conventions is also excellent, for those that go to such events.

Finally for me,  I think the whole learning curve puts new players off. We have come a long way with this one.  I think that if we could have an expanded new player area which could have more tutorials (although long tutorials are a pain on any MUD) but also the option for helpers or staff to log into the area with an avatar and actually give players help that way, with syntax, emoting etc.

You could have all kinds of FUN with that, and another helper could come in and the two helpers could fight to the death..or some such thing.  Just an idea.

[Dresan]

The initial player experience is worth taking a look into, I tried to start playing the game again last week. Taking another stab at it today.

As a new character, I have three choices:

1. Join a guild: Nothing wrong with Guilds, except they bore me, and someone new might have a hard time finding the leader in order to get the interview.In my case it often leads me to store and go play something else for a couple months. Just not my thing.
2. Hunt: Hunting is fun and great, a strong enough character can take down a scrab if they are lucky. Too bad it is a poor way to make money, until you get better. And even then its only good if you or someone you know has a crafting skill.
3. Forage: Novice forage made me sleepy, then idle while I went to take a nap, when I woke up, I logged off and now a week has passed I'm trying to force myself to attempt it again. THough instead of playing and foraging right now, I find myself posting though. 

It might be worth considering upping starting foraging skill and perhaps implementing an old player suggestion of having a shop that buys unless shit and bits you find on the ground. Like bones, chalton skins, gith crap, 3-6 sid each. It still makes these things worth finding a player to sell to but gives you a reason to gather or hunt at least even if you don't.  

[Majikal]

I think it would be cool to see what each immortal was up to. Sort of a "thing's we're working on" update. When I take a look at a early access game on steam and I don't see recent updates or evidence of dev attention I avoid it. Maybe showing what you guys were working on as well as the recent updates that's already on the home page would show new players that we have active staff. This definitely adds some appeal to people that see our front page and honestly, I think a lot of us players are also always curious to see what you guys are working on so we can get just as excited about it.

Just something like:

CURRENT PROJECTS!
Xalle: PC poop script
Rathustra: Masturbation code
Adhira: Killing elves
Enthemu: Elven two-handed masturbation code
Akariel: Re-opening Tuluk
Brokkr: making 'l <target>'s boobs' codedly possible.
Jave: Working on making mudsex a coded skill.
Senga: Teaching Jave about sex so he better understands the code he's implimenting
Renenutet: Watching Jave and Senga.
Ath: making 'bastion' a playable race in armageddon. No configuration: tank
Nergal: Animating Twitchy to get newbs rekt

Edit: I knew I'd forget people. lol. Ath/nergal anyone else?

[Norcal]

You forgot Ath. Don't forget Ath!

[QuillDipper]

More Flame Decals on the site.

I feel like some bigger stuff like an hrpt would help. A lot of new players get turned off by the fact that plots and such are 'there but you just don't know about them'. I feel like a boon to the game would be if there was something overarching, that anyone could take part in even if only in a small capacity. Like assassinations are cool but the only people who get involved are the target, the assassin, and the person who hired.

But like, war prep, world-wide bounty hunts, dangerous threats near the city... The extent of a newbs involvement may be to help a Templar carry supplies to a wagon but it opens the door for more to happen and more importantly, SHOWS the been that things are happening, rather than just promising they are with no evidence.

[Riev]

More Flame Decals on the site.

I feel like some bigger stuff like an hrpt would help. A lot of new players get turned off by the fact that plots and such are 'there but you just don't know about them'. I feel like a boon to the game would be if there was something overarching, that anyone could take part in even if only in a small capacity. Like assassinations are cool but the only people who get involved are the target, the assassin, and the person who hired.

But like, war prep, world-wide bounty hunts, dangerous threats near the city... The extent of a newbs involvement may be to help a Templar carry supplies to a wagon but it opens the door for more to happen and more importantly, SHOWS the been that things are happening, rather than just promising they are with no evidence.

Even when not world-changing hRPTs, the idea that there is "something happening" is a big draw. When I first started, the Copper War was happening, and I was tasked with my first PC to cut logs in Halfling territory, selling to the Templars, so they could fashion spike pits.

I don't think that ever happened, but shit was that exciting.

[Malken]

If I were y'all of youz I would try and focus on what players can do because stating that the game really needs more HRPTs to feel alive and dynamic is like.. Duh, yeah. Everyone knows that. But you can't force Staff to throw HRPTs if they aren't feeling like it and if they felt like it surely they know that HRPTS are ever popular with the playerbase.

From what I read around the GDB and elsewhere it kinda feels like a big majority of you are happy doing mostly nothing and going with tiny plots involving yourself and a couple of your friends at best, maybe that's part of the problem. Are you boring? Is there mostly boring people left? What's going on? If there's a few exciting and fun characters left around, are you trying to help them out to be even more exciting and fun or are you mostly just gossiping about them on AIM and in game, tsk'ing and being offended because they are popular and you're just sitting at the Gaj doing shit nothing?

Best solution - Stop being boring. Yeah, you probably are, c'mon, admit it! *lowers voice* You know I'm talking about you but I still have faith in you, just stop being so boring and go do something exciting with your character, just once, try it, it won't hurt, babeh.

Malifaxis is a pretty good role-player and always have tons of interesting stuff going on around his characters - You should all gather around him like he's your divine light out of the darkness and help him achieve whatever it is he's probably up to. Don't be that pooper character who's just hanging at the Gaj bitching that his/her character is getting all the ladies/gold/attention and that life isn't fair because you aren't. Emulate the greats.

[gotdamnmiracle]

I would suggest finding some advertising on Twitch or one of the other popular game streaming sites. Most of these people are obviously familiar with games, have probably never seen a MUD before, and can speak English (which is fairly necessary in Arm). Even if we get 1% on some of the larger chsnnels that could be as much as hundreds of new players.

As I see it, it's simply a matter of creating a captivating advertisement.

Additionally, I think increasing the player-baseis key to improving the game. Remember we were all new once (more players = more staff = more game + plots). I am confident by this point all of you are experts at policing your own and dealing with scriptkiddies and just plain dbags, so that shouldn't be a concern.

[roobee]

Best solution - Stop being boring.

this

Malifaxis is a pretty good role-player and always have tons of interesting stuff going on around his characters

Do you have specific examples? Perhaps for his older characters?

[Armaddict]

No, don't crowd around him.








He needs enemies, too.

[gotdamnmiracle]

I want to emphasize the fact that I believe scant few individuals know what a MUD is and then the ones who find out are scared off in a matter of hours with syntax. There's a few things you can do to soften the code blow, but I sincerely think the only way to improve playerbase is with heavy-handed advertising. It's a numbers game and even if you make it very comfortable, there's going to be plenty who drop out.

If we're going to toss it against the wall and see which stick, we might as well make a pretty damn big pot.