Welcome back, young one
Unfortunately I don't have much to contribute, my ideas come painfully slow, and I implement them even slower, but you should really check out the threads about how to make Nanny a better place for newbies (who later on will grow up to power-players, of course).
Really? I thought most become either achievers or explorers, or even more commonly, chatters/spammers (who look down upon power-playing). I spend more time discovering the best eq/power combinations than I do actually using said items/powers.
Like adding a way for normal players to give n00bs some sort of small quests. Browse the forum, there were several interesting ideas, methinks!
Your area was the first area I visited on Nanny. I followed the directions on the newbie booklet. Unfortunately the directions were so long and complicated that I gave up trying to follow them after getting past Everlaster. I attacked Echtor and due to a few unlucky hits on his part concluded that he was a weak monster before leaving the room.
I think there are more than enough places for newbies, considering that newbie-dom is so short-lived on Nanny. The only thing missing for them is what Ereshkigal suggested; a free eq dispenser of some sort. Aleea's area had such a thing and I always got my first lot of eq from there. I remember killing the orcs and the witch repeatedly. I miss that area.
My favourite areas are those that stress a wizards' personality and don't look copied. There are some areas that I would consider to be very good quality, yet I don't like them. There are others which I think are very poor quality, but I enjoy the sense of existence they exude. And then there are the insipid clones. The ideal area would have both the right sense of existence and a high standard of quality, but in regard to the former you can't please everybody, so you should just please yourself. That is the message I was trying to convey to Reece.
I'll toss in some ideas here.
Rewarde ingenuity (trying something that people would seldom think of trying). Some examples would be: using an obscure command to gain access to something, combining items together without being hinted to try it, examining an item in the room by its full name rather than an abbreviation, killing a monster by healing it, polymorphing in order to reach a difficult place (I HATE it when I turn into a frog and still get told I can't enter the hole or whatever - a wizard should check for this possibility), checking for an item that doesn't even exist in your area and has to be obtained elsewhere in the MUD (e.g. checking for climbing tools to descend a cliff), sipping a potion instead of drinking it in order to get a smaller effect, smelling an edible item instead of eating it to gain an effect, having a certain artifact reach its full potential when used in a very unique way such as when used with a certain guild power...
Make challenge monsters. I love the challenge of killing a seemingly unkillable monster, especially on my own. You can go crazy here. Give it 5000 hp while making it impossible to deal more than 2hp of damage to it at a time, and make it deal 100 damage blows every single round. Maybe invent a way to overcome it easily by doing something clever.
Uniques with an integrated theme. These are tough to come up with. I much prefer an item with an interesting theme about it than something with random drawbacks slapped on without rhyme or reason. Pay attention to the theme of guilds if you want to cater to a particular guild. Vikings are hardy and tough, lepers are fragile but carry a hidden power within them, darks and vampires are swift and accurate, etc.
Make monsters appropriately powerful. I seem to be of the unique opinion that most monsters are too tough in this game - that is, the average level for a monster is too high. People see things from the interests of a high level auto-pilot killer (which is the majority) and so anything remotely rewarding to kill they think has to be above level 15. I think the average monster level could be reduced a great deal without your area suffering. Humans should be able to go as low as level 1. When you do put in good "money" and "alignment" kills, it should actually be satisfying for a player to have detected them. Try to imagine that the average player is around level 10, even if they are not, and then you should gain a better perspective on what constitutes "powerful", "challenging", "weak" and "super tough". The more "worthless" kills you put in your area, the more likely the admin will let you put in a really cool kill with lots of money and an extreme alignment, since the others serve to counter-balance and camouflage the valuable kill. Maybe make monsters more scarce by making them appear randomly, or one out of 5 resets. Oh, and if you really want to challenge yourself, never, EVER put a guard in your area. It can be done believe it or not. Guards go in castles, but don't spread them around like confetti because you don't have any better ideas.
Instead of putting a guard in front of that chest in your castle containing a neat potion that heals you over time, why not put it on a hill surrounded by 40 small but dangerous level 3 goblinoids? You could even have this scene appear once per reboot, thus allowing you to make the potion even more powerful. The more scarce something is the better it can be... up to a point. Also bear in mind that armour is more beneficial against a hoard of low level monsters than a single high level monster, since the damage reduction is amplified by the number of hits received.
Make extremely hard-to-find items. I'll let you think of ways to make this happen.
Make sprawling dungeons with traps and tricks. I've yet to see something with that D&D-esque quality in NannyMUD, though some places come close. I want to see a place that I can spend an hour or two exploring without being able to leave to heal and rarely needing to because slowhealing is practical for once. Again, this isn't possible when most people think a challenge has to be above level 15. You'd be surprised what counts as challenging when it isn't possible to zip to green to heal up. Make a remote place without an easy way back and some "tough" monsters that are killable for a medium level player. Give people a reason to bring portable healing along with them for once. Portable healing is painfully expensive and useless in 99% of instances. This can change if you create a place that requires endurance and evokes a feeling of wondering whether you'll ever see the daylight again. Give a fat reward along the journey. (Look at Durlag's Tower or Watchers Keep from the Baldur's Gate series for an idea of what I'm talking about). Collapses of rubble, one-way portals, delayed crossing of landscapes, boats, ships and dragon-flight, can all contribute to the remoteness of a place.
Make time-based effects, e.g. werewolves only appear on the full-moon, vampires only come out at night, the portal to hell only opens at the stroke of midnight, leaves fall in autumn... even the druidic celebration days can have a purpose in the workings of your area.
Learn exactly how the inner mechanics of the game work. Do you know exactly how drinking and eating effects your healing rate, or how being wet affects it? Find out. Do you know how damage is derived from weapon class and dexterity? Find out. Do you know what limits there are on the number of hits you can perform at once, or how to circumvent this limit? You need to know all these things if you care about coding the most useful, interesting, and balanced items.
Write beautiful descriptions. It can make a world of difference to the feel of your area. Remember that less is often more (provide a skeletal description with short but powerful adjectives - let the player's imagination fill in the rest), and that the MUD has its own set of cliches. Also never dictate to a player what he is feeling, or what his opinion of something is. This is just bad manners if nothing else. And don't EVER write something that is meta-game, e.g. "This temple is unsuitable for anyone below level 15." I'm looking at you, Gogo.
This is my idea of a good description:
"A plain iron sword with a cold shimmer surrounding it. The hilt is made of black leather, and does not possess a cross-guard. Your skin prickles as your eyes rest on it." It is brief, subtle, and appropriately creepy.
An example of a cliche would be starting a description with "You" or "Your". Don't feel guilty, every wizard does this. I set a challenge up for myself once never to put either of these words in the long description of a room I was writing, just to see what I'd be able to come up with instead. Try it sometime. You might be surprised.
When describing something, don't draw attention to something that is mundane. For instance, don't draw a players attention to some rocks by saying they look like an ogre chewed them for breakfast. This is unusual and snatches their attention for a second longer than usual, but its just a bunch of rocks and increases the frustration level when exploring. This is like a dog rising to the scent of a buscuit and then not finding one. Don't put that scent in unless there's a treat of some sort at the end (it doesn't have to be powerful or beneficial, just interesting and purposeful).
Make every room count. I'm opposed to "connection rooms" where their only purpose is to make the area feel bigger than it is. Since rooms can be traversed instantly this is pointless. You can convey as much space as you like in a single room (see the road to Bromordia, which has broad expanses of farmland included in a single description). The only exception is when you want to deliberately convey an emotion - particularly suspense. My favourite area for suspense is Giltas'. Go check it out sometime but don't be surprised if you get killed, or at least scared. Pet's cave is another example of a suspenseful set of rooms (though they also serve another purpose...).
Probably the most important of all: play the game. Try different approaches of playing for a time, so you know what all the different playing styles feel like. Try out all the guilds and see how far you can get. Visit as many areas as you can. This is a sure way to find out what the game might be lacking. Maybe there not enough interesting spells, e.g. ones that disorientate you or make you spam, or magical scrolls and potions? Perhaps not enough spellcasting monsters, or creatures with freaky powers like petrification (causing fake ghost)? Are there not enough containers in the game with vast capacity but funky drawbacks like a spellpoint cost for inserting items or only accepting certain classes of item? Not enough monsters that have damage resistance and sensitivites? No powerful rings or gloves in the game? Can having hair have a higher purpose? Do the vikings not have an uber-item fitted to them yet? Every time you think of something that you'd think would be cool but isn't in the game, remember it.
Play other games. It will increase your pool of knowledge and experience which you can then draw upon for inspiration.
Use comedy. It helps. That and people sharing your sense of humour. Typo's area made me laugh a few times, and Meep's is fairly funny as well. Some other areas are not so funny but contain some sardonic humour. This is a good way to inject your personality into an area.
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