Spamfunet Nanny Forum

Seems like Nanny is losing ground every passing year :(
This is truly a sad picture ... i mean ... is it possible for Nanny to even die
at a certain point? Horrible   :cry:

There were certain debates in certain guilds and clubs about this. What can we do to keep the game alive and enjoyable. Some think we should modify the game structure thus making it more attractive for certain active and somehow old players but gaining practically nothing in terms of population.
I'm curious and dazzled in the same time. If you open the http://www.topmudsites.com site you'll see some muds with enourmous player peaks (some of them allowing multiplaying though) but with no substantial extra features to justify their top positions.
I think one of nanny's major problems is advertising. Is there even a way to vote for it in those ranking sites? are there nanny banners at least on the players personal sites?
Advertising is everything. We can't let this beautiful game die and passively watch other inferior muds growing :(
Nor it's a solution changing and morph it into a puny clone. the game it's highly original and with great potential. We just have to show it to the world.

Good news I guess... I thought all MUDs were losing players, but if some MUDs can attract new players, Nanny should definitely be able to also. Can't say I've tried that many different MUDs, but I really like Nanny and its diversity.

I've got the 'advertise Nanny' on my agenda for some time, but I haven't done much about it, apart from a little survey on a game news group...

Here I guess we all can do more, but then it's important that a newcomer can get into action quickly. The 'newbie line' is a good idea, from another  thread.  

One problem with helping out newbies, is that there seem to be some non-newbie players that act very newbieish to gain some easy XP/gold/whatever, and this have made me a bit cautious about giving out money for example.

Anyway, spread the word, but please, no lamers, eh ;)

One alternative to handing out money, that also is fun for the newbie, is to come up with small 'quests' like here you get "20 gold, buy a rope and bring it to me", then you give em some gold, then they usually ask if there's anything else they can do, then you can say, get a level first, then I got an important job for you, etc. I had a newbie digging up and clearing up worms at the trashpile across from the milkbar in no time, and he said he was having a blast.

We could brainstorm here what could be good 'player-quests' for newbies.

Buying a rope was not so good, since the shop with the ropes and backpacks are not on the map, and it is a fairly important shop to know about, but you could say it like this:
"If you stand in the village shop, in 3 moves you will reach the Adventurers' Outfitters, buy a rope and bring it to me."

Another:
"I need some cheese that only can be found inside the Blanka's newbie area, bring me 5 pieces of cheese and you'll get <coins or equipment>. The location of the area can be found in your newbie booklet."

"I need a special wand that is rumoured to be in the village trashpile across from the milkbar in the village. The trashpile can be reached by moving 3 times from green. You will need a shovel that can be found in the Adventurers' Outfitters shop"

etc

Edit: a newbie line is a good idea, a line where experienced players can easily join/leave to help with any questions for a while.

Indeed it's painfull giving up 10k from your 2M hard earned coins  :twisted:

Newb line IS a good idea. Also a free share room for the adventurers where everyone can come and donate something useful for the newbs(except Carrion ofcourse  :) )
Player quests won't stop fake newbs but i don't think this is such a big problem at the moment. Even lamers can be educated  :wink:
We need more players or soon the wizards will be the only ones around.
And being a god without believers is no fun  :)

Bah! Carrion has about 40k I think :P AND can't give any of it to newbies :) Seriously, it's obviously not out of risk of going broke or anything, instead it's the way I am, in RL and in Nanny. I just can't stand people that tries to get stuff for free pretending to have a worse RL/Nanny life than what is actually true.

Kymn's idea about 'player quests' is very interesting, hopefully can more players make newbies' lives more interesting and rewarding!

I think Kymns idea is excellent! When I started muddig I didn't care much for money, I didn't know what to use it for, seriously how many milkshakes can you drink at once?... I wanted to learn how to PLAY the game good, how to find things, move around, interact with others and so on. I think that is the clue to get new dedicated players, showing them what the game is about and all the posibilities this game represent.  Throwings money at someone does not help (the only once who want that are those pretendig to be a newbie cause they are lazy... atleast that is what I think.)

(sorry for the poor english but I am in a little hurry)

Aye, newbie line is definitely a good idea. I like the player quest ideas too. The player quests could be much easier to implement with a dedicated player base of older players helping out the newer ones. We also need to GET the newbies to the game. A good idea would be to brainstorm for lots of different ideas that these quests revolve around. The best things these quests can do is get the new players to explore the mud and see how much is out there. Money doesn't help a newbie as much as experience and FRIENDSHIP. A mud revolves aroud communication and friends in the game. That is always what kept me logging into Nanny.

/Snafu :D

Just to add to the discussion, player quests does not have to be restricted to newbies only, it's fairly easy to create an adventure for a higher level character. Tools like dannocs safe arena can help to create a truely enjoyable adventure.

But back to newbie ensnaring. If we had a newbie line, we could use it to give challenges to newbies, for rewards, gold or loot. Who came up with the newbie line idea btw, does the admins know about it?

Great Ideas here.  

If one of you wizzes can get a Newbie line implemented I'd be happy to be on it, work with new players and create and give player quests.  

To be honest, I've never fully understood why this Mud didn't have a newbie line in the first place.

They probably thought all newbies being in Adventurer's Guild when they first logged in would negate need for newbie line...

There is one major issue with that:

It is a guild and players can only be in one guild at a time. This causes lack of higher level characters because most players think they need to be in a guild OTHER than Adv Guild to be someone (which we all know is nowhere near true).

The newbie line would probably be best implemented as a club in which anyone can join so that the more established players can help newbies.

/Snafu :D

I think there's some more subtlety involved as well.  Being on a line across guilds doesn't only provide the opportunity for new players in the Adventurer's Guild to have more higher level players to interact with, it also begins to foster that other elusive element that I have heard referred to as well - partying.  

Granted, there are some guilds that do well when several members band together to pursue common causes, but it seems to me that all guilds that I have played can be complimented by members from other guilds in new ways entirely.  This starts by having open communication across those guild lines and, outside of a very few club lines, this really doesn't happen.  

I would imagine that initiating a newbie line, even if it was through a newbie club, you would find that not only would a higher percentage of new players stick around longer, but that they would also begin to understand the benefits of working with others.  We, as a community, could win in two ways.

Just my two cents worth,

In my experience, the Mud is on the whole Newbie unfriendly. That is the case from the top down and vice versa. When asking why other Muds fare better than this one when it comes to keeping Newbies playing for more than 5 secs, you only have to try playing those other Muds.

On those, other players try and contact new ones and give assistance - rather than smart arse remarks. Wizards (and particularly admin), greet you when you start and try and get help for you/make you welcome - rather than shouting unfunny remarks to newbie questions.

When I came back here, I kept on playing largely in spite of the attitude of other 'experienced players'. RTs were no better than any other players, well need I say more.

A Newbie club would be a good idea and, if it contained Newbie quests, all the better. It would need to be incorporated into the game though, individuals trying to give mini quests just seems patronising to me.

I tend to help new players in the Cult mainly - which is further down the line than Newbies usually - but its not my role to improve things - you need to build it to make them come.

M

PS wouldn't parties be a good idea? Yeah - I remember them once.

You know, I've been thinking about this and you are absolutely right.  There seems to be this culture, present in many MUDs but pervasive and overwhelming on Nanny, where players act as though having been around longer somehow makes them better - players, people, you name it.  I remember encountering that a lot as a new player which makes me wonder why I stuck around at all, and I've not only seen it as a pervasive problem still, but I've found myself getting suckered into the mentallity as well.  Granted, I haven't berated a newbie for the mere fact that they weren't around in 2000 or something, but I have found myself buying into the idea that being around a while means you must know something about the MUD - which is just not true for several reasons, none of which I wish to go into now.

Thinking about it from this perspective, however, suggests that a huge portion of the problem is not the new graphics games - those seem to be leaching old players as well - but rather that when new players do sign in  they become frustrated by the attitudes of those they find here.  It may be something that seems as innocent as discussing what the MUD was like back "in the day" but it implies to the new players that they've missed all the good things and that they will never be able to achieve the levels and accomplishments of players who started playing when the MUD first started.  
On the other hand, I've also seen older players brandish their longevity against newer players as if it were some kind of badge of honor.  This is the type of behavior that will most effectively chase off new players and lead to the demise of the MUD as a whole.  Does it matter when a player first started in Nanny?  Does their level of knowledge or achievement somehow tie into the number of years ago that they discovered the MUD?  The obvious answer is not at all.  Again, examples of why these aren't true are already posted elsewhere, so I won't bother to repeat it here.  

What this really means though, and feel free to call me a cynic, is that a newbie line won't be helpful if there are people joining it simply in order to stroke their own ego by putting new players down.   Don't think this won't happen, it happens now and I know it's why several of the new players I met in the past year did not continue with Nanny.

For me, the creation of a Newbie club would mark a commitment to improving things in that regard. If it was just a line, then I agree that it would become just another source of sarcasm.

If, however, it was led and monitored by an admin - and if membership was restricted to individuals that want to help (like yourself) - and if membership was rewarded with a special mortal status which over-wrote that of paragon in todays terms - see how attitudes would change!

For me, attitudes can be changed by making the game reward those that behave as we would like - if you build it they may come - and stay.

I also passionately beleive that the admin should look at party play. The times I shared partying with Gangrene, Iznogoud, Magicchild, Benyamin and many others are some of the best that I have had here - as Snafu said, communication is everything.

M

A newbie club would be excellent, with a bit of effort it could provide support for player quests, from both the newbies and the experienced players perspective. Toplists for both sides could be made to encourage participation from both sides.

Encouraging parties is also something that would greatly enhance the mudding experience, me think, as we discussed on the other note http://spamfunet.com/nanny/forum/viewtopic.php?t=187, where Snafu clearly offered himself to code it <nudge Snafu> :wink:

Anyways, anyone who takes command over these two projects have my admiration and support (I offer my help in case it is needed).

Hmm,m the easiest way to make newbies feel welcome is actually give them something to do, might not be able to kill those rats in blankas or the rabbits or whatever... bring in more for the experienced player to do, perhaps professions and similar... thinking about the bigger mmorpgs out there a profession might be nice, since then if you want to access a newbie area you need to talk to a newbie/low-lvld character and ask him to get it for you, thereby create communication...

i know that most people just probably create a second char to go get the goods for this but then again, it's easier to simply ask someone else to do it and give them money for it...

Ex.
a board where players can post:
Kenpo wrote:
I need to 10 peices of rat milk. They can be found in XXX's area... be careful, good aligned less than level 6 need to enter, beware of the ogres..

something like that... and then offer a reward for newbies to get...
Reward: 5000 xp and 2500 gold..

then make it availble for those posting a note to pay in xp and gold...

give the room boxes for storage to get the goods when you log back on.

so:
lowchar gets the goods, goes to the board and reports done on the note, deposits the good and gains the gold/xp

mechar: goes to the box and collects the goods.

an easy way to make small quests for players that need soem good motivation for starting to play...

just a thought, lemme k now
/k-man

Excellent idea, methinks... But the XP/gold would be given personally (XP through a party), right, or do you mean automatically via this 'club'?

Excellent idea.  If I understand correctly, the higher level characters can then actually "pay out" some of their experience to the lower level characters.  Will have to find a way to safe-guard this against abuse or it would never be seen in Nanny, where protecting all of us from those god-awful cheaters is more important than actually having a fun thriving community, don'cha know.
<cough>  <cough> <Ahem>
sorry about that, don't know why I suddenly slipped into a Texas accent...

you would have to pay the desired amount of xp to the board and then the newbie who finish it can collect it from the board...


an easy way to get around this is to put level reqs on your requests...

like:
none above level 5 may choose to take this adventure upon himself/herself...

however, since item don't save on logout and we can't carry stuff around with us for all times, the items would have to be placed in a container of sorts wich we can collect when we log in.

further more we need something to spend all these cool item son, say for instance alchemy, fletching(ranged weapons anyone? ;), crafting, like swords or magical ring that might give light, or an additional 5 hp or sometihng like that...

i'm quite D&D inspired as you can see, but the more small things you can do around in a mud, like craft, make scrolls etc the more fun stuff there is to do...

also would like to say, toughen up the monsters a bit, give them more hp/armor and give us more experience, anyone can kill anything(with a few exceptions)... it shouldn't be that possible for a lowleveld char to even stand a chance against highlvld monsters...

/k-man out

another thing i came to think of is that money has absolutely no value in nanny... more than for healing

so when creating items or similar you would have to spend money + xp and the required ingredients, be it rat milk or dragon's blood...

also you should only be able to posses one or maybe max two professions/crafts. that way you need to rely on other to help you out... perhaps you need to be two to even make an item? enchanted swords perhaps?

(i looked around in the forums and profession lists in d&d, world of warcraft and everquest a bit... might not be the original nanny idea but it will give people something else to instead of the xpgrinding that nanny is now. perhaps even make questpoints something that might be neeeded to make even cooler items.. 6000 qp, 100k xp, 100k gold, a longsword and some vampire blood, dragon's tooth. => longsword with the ability to steal life from the opponent and grant a small amount to the fighter. just an example)
/k-man out

I would love to see those kind of things on Nanny. Vincent's Hunters Guild was similar in that all their equipment they made themselves...but there were...administrative differences that closed that guild. We need many more things like that. I'd imagine it gets pretty boring killing the same old stuff day in and day out. We definitely need more to spend our money on. Kenpo is right in that our money doesn't mean much (on a daily basis) except for healing, and it should have many more uses.

/Snafu :D

Hey all!

I think that all the above ideas are really good and things like a newbie line would probably make a difference. Advertising is also good. But... I think that key to any successful mud is that the administration has a driving motivation, a vision, that they are good leaders that manage to share this drive and vision with the underlings. I cant say how it is nowadays since I am not exactly active, but I remember that when I used to hang around... I always had a sense of blah and apathy from the admins. So as long as they dont feel like it, not much will change.

couple of more years, and nanny will be a place filled with old geezer  :P

:idea: To attract new players we could try to increase our ranking at http://www.mudconnect.com/  by voting for NannyMud. Three votes, telenet-connection, link to homepage and search, per day and person are possible. To reach top ten :) its enough with 7-8 people to vote  each day. Its easy to reach top 100.


Vote vote vote
- Hair

Kymn if I may say so is very bright, so is Yavathol and Loreley and all you veterans. :)

I must say that the idea of player made newbie quests to get people interested in the game is sweet. :)

It is done in World of Warcraft and that game is the most popular MMORPG in the world. :)

Let's say I make a quest for a newbie in which he gets to explore the world and actually has a reason for killing rats and rabbits and also gets much cooler rewards than if he would just kill rabbits. :)

Grea idea. :)

You must get 3 bottles and milk the cow behind the milkbar, bring me 3 bottles full of milk and you will get this leather cap and some slamm xp for example. :)

Thus he would learn about milking the cow to get free milk and learn how to move around Larstown. :)

Or: I am feeling very cold now that it's winter, please go to the toyshop in Larstown and buy me a blankie. :)

Or: I need a rose for my dear beloved husband, bring me a rose and I will give you your reward.

Or: My nephew wants to be a big knight when he grows up, kill a wolverine and bring me it's helmet for a nice suprise.

You actually get to use the newbie items and get some greater rewards for it! ^^

And then you could give quests which makes them explore other areas, like: I have a friend living in Bromordia and I have written him a letter but I don't trust the postal service. Please bring him this letter and see too it safely. I would suggest checking the tourist office for the directions to Bromordia. :)

I've seen a system like this, elsewhere, and it's very great.  They have players named "Newbie-helpers" (perhaps something instead of paragon?) which devote their time to give hint and sometimes fetch a piece of eq that a newbie could benefit from (a backpack, torch and possibly a weapon).  They never gave you money, but they answered even the most obscure questions if it was in any way game-related (and ofc, if they had a good answer).

Anyhow, a system something like this could, and should, be implemented I think.