Welcome to the Barren Realms MUD Newsletter!
Visit us at: telnet://barren.coredcs.com:8000/
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IDEAS:
Criterion: a spell called possession... an evil spirit infuses a player and has a random set of effects,
in evil alignment chars it gives bonuses, in good alignment players it detracts, but the catch is it jumps
and leaves a player for another player
Ginsu: when you use the replace command the first time, have the message give you the help files for both items
and preferably also the levels
Ginsu: how come once you cut the head, two arms and two legs off an undead mob it is still able to fight?
shouldn't the torso either die or turn into a tasty edible object on the ground?
Mathiu: actually make it so Hunt works
Ginsu: demon combos, if you have both the hook and the tentacle then you should have a more powerful attack when
you can hook and crush something. perhaps one command that tries to use them both together. moderate chance of
success. some other combos would also be interesting, hook and quills or spikes, others that I haven't thought of yet
AMystery: I was just thinking about rebalancing. If there was an equation that controlled how hard a mob was
based on a level range, we could have mobs that balance more exactly with the players level, so a perfect
match would be just that. so one algorithm p
AMystery: why does blindness or being in a dark room keep you from seeing who someone is when they chat?
you can't see them with a light either. it only makes sense on say and even then you should recognize the voice
Luc: Heres an idea for a piece of equipment, Ring of Pure Flame its a great ring, but you would think
it would be flaming
Sasarai: An ability or a spell that lets you have vision enough to scan when its raining
Erin: The Suggestion: For those players who have been in BR to have some kind of
who title instead of Ava. Maybe something like Elder or another suitable
option.
The Reason why : Over the years BR has seen players come and go, but few
have stayed, when you consider the sheer numbers. I understand that not
everyone will make immortal but it would be nice to show those who have been
loyal to BR for years that people do know who they are and do appriate not
only their loyalty but their knowledge aswell. At this time there is no
visible difference from someone who has been playing for years, to those who
have been playing six months and got their first ava4. A who title isn't
that big a deal but to those who would gain such a title it would mean
something.
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Characters who need to log on or they will lose characters after 1 1/2 years inactivity:
Creusa, Geno, Paragon, Raynne.
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Article by STARS:
The Hopeless Addict
I’ve been mudding for about 8 or more years now, which is a significant portion of any person’s life. That’s about 26.7%
of my own life, or 10% of an 80 year life span. That’s one out of 8 days spent as a mudder. Of course it would only
drop down to ten percent if I were to never play again, or somehow (perish the thought) Barren Realms ceased to exist.
Barring any unforeseen calamity, however, and as long as I have a computer and time to kill, I’m going to be playing
Barren Realms. The final percentage, then, will be about 72.5% at the ripe age of 80. But this percentage is
exaggerated because it assumes I am playing 24 hours every day since I first started mudding. For a more realistic
estimate, how about the actual amount of time I spent actually logged on to Barren Realms? What are the numbers
of hours, days, and years? I can measure the time I am logged on today, but it is impossible to go back in time to
measure every moment I’ve spent logged on to Barren Realms, so I have to make a number of reasonable guesses about
the past 8 years. When making these guesses I have to make a few assumptions about mudding.
First assumption: When most newbie mudders first start playing, they become addicted very fast. I am no exception to
this assumption, so in the beginning I played a lot. I spent nearly every free moment tapping my fingers on a keyboard,
furiously trying to avoid an untimely death before leveling. I forsook friends, family and girls. Who needs an
expensive girlfriend when you’ve got free entertainment more addictive than sex? I only say that, because, let’s face
it; I was a loser with chicks back in the old days. I’m better now.
Second assumption: Although it seemed like I spent every waking minute playing this game, I actually took time to eat
and shower (occasionally), and even to sleep. So, I can’t claim to have been playing 24/7, even though it probably
seemed that way to anyone who bothered to wonder where I was.
Third assumption: Average playing time tapers off to a steady rate somewhere along the line. There are bound to be
varying amounts of time when I play more, or play less, depending on other variables in my life. I will have to
assume, therefore, that all these little ups and downs cancel each other out and I spend about the same amount of time
each day, on average. Let’s assume that there is a steady deceleration of time spent on BR between the 1st year and
the 4th (when I’m guessing it became a steady amount of time for me).
Ok, I’ve worked out some numbers that give a very loose approximation of time I have spent playing this game…
Scavenger (that’s right, blame him) introduces me to a cool new game. Hey, this is kind of fun…
There are only 24 hours in a day, right? When addiction truly took hold, I tried to squeeze in as many mud hours as
possible. But even the most dedicated addict can’t feed his or her addiction 24/7. I will now try to break down the
number of hours I did NOT spend playing BR.
I was a lazy bum, so we can pretty much assume I was getting my beauty sleep for a healthy 8 hours. Next, I include
the time I spend cooking, eating, showering, sitting on the toilet, doing the laundry and anything else my mother quit
doing for me somewhere along the line. I generously say that all these things take up about 4 hours a day. Next comes
work, but since I was almost always “between jobs”, then we can toss that right out the window. Unfortunately, I
didn’t own a computer in the old days and I had to rely on the computer labs at the school I was pretending to attend
(I even made it to an actual class now and then). If I recall correctly, the labs opened up at 7 am and closed at 10-11
pm. But as hopeless an addict as I was, even I could not sit down in the library basement in front of a computer
for 15-16 hours every single day. I had to take at least a few breaks, you know, go to class and stuff. So, of the
12 hours available, I probably took an additional 2-3 hours off to allow my bloodshot eyes time to heal. So, let’s say
I played for about 9.5 hours a day when the addiction first took hold of me.
Total addicted hours per day: 9 hours 30 minutes
Assuming there is a steady decrease of time spent mudding over the next 4 years, and that the amount of time during
the 4 years after that remained constant, we can calculate an approximate total amount of mudding time over the last
eight years. In order to do this, however, I have to figure out how much time I am spending in Barren Realms right now.
The best way to figure this out would be to buy a stopwatch and time every moment I am logged on throughout the day
and write it down. But, hello, I’m a lazy bum! So, I’ll just make some educated guesses.
Stars’ average BR activities during an average week day:
I wake up about 7-8 am every day. First thing I do is go to the bathroom. Then I wash my hands and look in the mirror
at the poor slob who really needs to get a life. Next, I go back into my bedroom and turn on my computer. Since I
have no patience to wait the 30 seconds for my computer to boot up, I go make myself some breakfast, usually a bagel
with low fat spread or a bowl of cereal with skim milk. After my nutritious breakfast and vitamin supplement, I
turn on the TV to some headline news program. Then I sit down in front of my computer. This whole process usually
only takes a few minutes, so I’ll say that I am probably logged in to BR 10 minutes after I wake up. I sometimes chat,
but usually I’m just around in case anyone wants to talk to me, or I spot a newbie that needs help. Normally, I play
a game or work on homework during the morning time before school. My first class usually starts about 9-10 am.
Total morning BR time: 1 hour 35 minutes
Ok, fast forward through tedious hours spent listening to clueless professors blathering about meaningless things,
and it’s time for lunch. Now, sometimes I do log on to BR during lunch time, but this is rare so I will assume I
only spend about 1 total hour per week logged on to Barren Realms during lunch time.
Total lunch time: 12 minutes
Ok, fast forward through the rest of my humdrum class schedule, and it’s time to go home. Yay! When I get home,
I check the mail, and then dump my backpack on a chair before collapsing on the couch. After getting up again,
what’s the first thing I do? I turn on the TV to watch Dragonball, yeah! Then, of course, I turn on the computer.
This is where it gets a little tricky. These times vary a lot. Sometimes, I’m logged on from 4pm to 10 pm.
Other times I log on just to check notes, and then I head back out the door for some other appointment. But on
average, I’ll guess that I spend half of the time between getting home and going to bed logged on to BR. Half of
six hours is three hours.
Total evening time: 3 hours
Total weekday time: 4 hours 47 minutes
This, strangely enough, is a little over half of the total time I spent while hopelessly “addicted”.
The weekend, of course, is a different matter entirely. Every other weekend I have my children, so I don’t play
much BR at all. I’ll be generous and say 1 hour total during these weekends. But, on the weekends that my sons
are not over, I spend most of the day logged on. It’s kind of like the addicted hours sometimes, but I don’t actually
play as much. I may be logged on, but I’m often working on some project (maybe one of my BR areas) or doing homework.
So, on these days I spend close to the 9.5 hours a day average that I started out with. And yet, I’m often out
running some errand that I couldn’t get done during the week. So I have to take off a few hours for that, at least.
I’ll be generous again and say 7 hours per day.
Off weekend time: 30 minutes
On weekend time: 7 hours
Now we’re getting somewhere! Adding all these numbers up, I get 62.83 hours over a two-week span, which makes a
daily average of 4.49 hours per day. For the sake of ease, I’ll just say 4.5 hours.
So, if there is a steady decline in time from 9.5 hours per day to 4.5 hours per day during 4 years, I can now
calculate the average daily hours I have spent playing BR over those first 4 years. If I am right in everything
I suggest (not entirely likely), then I averaged about 7 hours per day over those first four years, which is
2555 hours per year, or 10220 hours over four years. Combine this with the last four years at 4.5 hours per day,
and we have a total number of hours at 16790 (just under 700 days) during the last 8 years. This is nearly
two whole years of BR time! If I keep up my current pace for the next fifty years, then I will have spent an
additional 82125 hours, bringing my total up to 98915 hours on BR, a whopping 11.3 years of my 80 year life.
I will have spent 14% of my lifetime logged on to Barren Realms. There are bound to be errors here, but even
if I am off by 10%, then my total would only drop to about 10 years or may be as high as 12.5 years.
Your friendly neighborhood mud addict,
-Stars
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Kiri's WWW of URLs:
From Sgetsuo - an online gaming site
http://www.itsyourturn.com/
This is an online Sobriety site. I found it while looking for web directions. It actually looks pretty cool.
http://cybersober.com/default.asp
From scavenger, an online zip code decoder
http://acg.media.mit.edu/people/fry/zipdecode/
Another direction website
http://www.streetlookup.com/
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Things computers do in movies
COMPUTERS & ELECTRONICS
Word processors never display a cursor.
You never have to use the space-bar when typing long sentences.
Movie character never make typing mistakes.
All monitors display inch-high letters.
High-tech computers, such as those used by NASA, the CIA, or some such governmental institution, will have easy to understand graphical interfaces. Those that don't, have incredibly powerful text-bases command shells that can correctly understand and execute commands typed in plain english. Corollary: you can gain access to any information you want by simply typing "ACCESS ALL OF THE SECRET FILES" on any keyboard
Likewise, you can infect a computer with a destructive virus by simply typing "UPLOAD VIRUS" (see "Fortress")
All computers are connected. You can access the information on the villain's desktop computer, even if it's turned off.
Powerful computers beep whenever you press a key or whenever the screen changes. Some computers also slow down the output on the screen so that it doesn't go faster than you can read. The *really* advanced ones also emulate the sound of a dot-matrix printer.
All computer panels have thousands of volts and flash pots just underneath the surface. Malfunctions are indicated by a bright flash, a puff of smoke, a shower of sparks, and an explosion that forces you backwards.
People typing away on a computer will turn it off without saving the data.
A hacker can get into the most sensitive computer in the world before intermission and guess the secret password in two tries.
Any PERMISSION DENIED has an OVERRIDE function (see "Demolition Man" and countless others).
Complex calculations and loading of huge amounts of data will be accomplished in under three seconds. Movie modems usually appear to transmit data at the speed of two gigabytes per second.
When the power plant/missile site/whatever overheats, all the control panels will explode, as will the entire building.
If you display a file on the screen and someone deletes the file, it also disappears from the screen (e.g Clear and Present Danger).
If a disk has got encrypted files, you are automagically asked for a password when you try to access it.
No matter what kind of computer disk it is, it'll be readable by any system you put it into. All application software is usable by all computer platforms.
The more high-tech the equipment, the more buttons it has (Aliens). However, everyone must have been highly trained, because the buttons aren't labelled.
Most computers, no matter how small, have reality-defying three-dimensional active animation, photo-realistic graphics capability.
Laptops, for some strange reason, always seem to have amazing real-time video phone capabilities and the performance of a CRAY Supercomputer.
Whenever a character looks at a VDU, the image is so bright that it projects itself onto his/her face (see "Alien", "2001").
February 4, 2004
Original idea behind the ring: make it a good ring everyone can use, and make it a magical weapon, so that it could be enflamed. Failing: wearable weapons are bad, so that idea got cut short. Short version: I'm not planning on revising Dragon Desert, so deal.Luc: Heres an idea for a piece of equipment, Ring of Pure Flame its a great ring, but you would think it would be flaming
-EB
Your local know-it-all.
Your local know-it-all.