January 7, 2003
Posted: Tue Feb 11, 2003 3:26 am
Welcome to the Barren Realms MUD Newsletter!
Some of you may have noticed the website was down for a while. Our webserver was attacked with a virus and the server was handling some new security. We lost our bulletin board posts in the mess, but on the brighter side, we've installed a new one that's a whole lot more fun. Check it out at http://www.barrenrealmsmud.com/
Hope your holidays were great! Here's some news from the realms:
Erin: A new year, a new quest!
A new year, a new quest. Dress up your favorite t.v. or movie star with b.r equipment.
E-mail me a list of the items (all slots must be filled), why you would dress him/her or it like that. The deadline
is the 12th Jan 2003, my email addy is dreamkeeper_br@hotmail.com.
Comatose is sponsoring and remember, having fun is not optional,
it's mandatory.
All Spells are allowed so go have fun!!!!!!!
Please amke sure you state in the email your char's name as I dont mind read.
Please rememeber this is a family orientated mud so that means no Porn stars ok.
Also as we all life in different countries please give a decent amount of info on who the star is in r/l and who they play on what show or film.
this quest is open to every single level.
I was just thinking and decided, extra points will be awarded for those who also submit a pic of the person they choose.
If thats a problem maybe a link to a website where we can see who your talking about would also gain points.
Erin aka Dreamkeeper
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Ideas:
Its: for demons sanc should be a black aura not a white one
Xer: If The Guardian is the demon guildmaster, shouldn't he be of the race and have some unique appendage to hold over all demons?
Aelskare: When you type 'aff', it would be a good idea to have physical condition on there, too (i.e. many nasty wounds). With hitpoints different for each level, it might be good for newbies to see what condition they are in before they start fighting.
Podo: dirtkick can tickle but not while they have been blinded by it maybe allow it to still do some damage since the kender doesn't get many attacks anyways?
Rorin: Make hunger/thirst affect your hit/dam, the more hungry/thirsty you are, the lower your hit/dam would go.
Podo: stab as a command for kenders so we can keep stabbing during an attack
Podo: it would cool to be able to change the colors in our titles
RadicalEd: have body parts use their owners keywords, makes sorting my parts much easier
Cord: create a command that allows you to toggle whether or not your last logged-in date is displayed under your profile or not (ie, so we can turn it back on after level 151)
Ispep: dwarves making alcohol,dwarven brew should affect constitution
[
Cord: ignoring somone shouldn't just repress the text of them talking, but also keep your prompt for updating each time they chat something
Aelskare: Maybe when you type "aff", it could show your bodily condition (i.e. covered in blood, goner, etc.) along with hungry/thirsty, spells.
Characters that need to log in this week or lose their characters:
Abby, Anybody, Arodanos, Ascii, Auris, Babyface, Bellisima, Blu, Carick, Ciclope, Cutty, Darkone, Darkstar, Delta, Dionysus, Finalwaltz, Folk, Gannondorf, Gingus, Goradus, Griswold, Haile, Happy, Kirkegaard, Klic, Lavitz, Lectral, Mal, Marie, Morbidmonke, Odd, Oin, Pankurokku, Pendraco, Port, Pressure, Raistlin, Ramman, Rilyl, Rpgman, Sarah, Shadowlord, Tana, Tempeste, Tigress, Tupac, Whizper
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Responses by Divebomb:
Liam: when writing an area, i wish i could set damps +
dams for mobs
*DB: you mean what the mob does to a person or what a
player does to the mob? A mob doesn't even damp that
often until you get high into the hero levels. And
having to set what the damp is for a player against a
particulary mob would be tedious and take away a
feature of individualism for each player.
Terminal: just asking..but why isn't hide in the
affects list? - Terminal
*DB: This was a topic of discussion recently,
actually. It does not show up because you may THINK
you're hiding, but if someone walks in the room and
sees you, then you're not REALLY hiding at all.
Consider the "hide" flag to mean that the person is
attempting to hide, if someone has detect hidden they
just see how pathetic that person's attemp is. The
same could be true for sneak, but because it's used to
CR yourself so much, it's player-friendly to alert you
on the affect list. However, sometimes when you type
sneak the echo will say it worked when it really
didn't because you THINK it worked.
AMystery: we have warn to know when people connect. we
need a way to know if they are here when we arrive.
assuming warn doesn't do that
*DB: I agree (for those who don't know what he's
talking about, it's an imm perk)
Sinda: something as a affect, telling you that your
drunk.
-- Kiri : check affects
*DB: When you get to be not-very-drunk, there is no
notification that you are not drunk, which should be
indicative that you are merely tipsy and might stumble
around a bit, but not a lot. If you are wasted, then
it does show up in the affects list.
AMystery: enflame weapon should work on non magic
weapons, but be like taint, it rather quickly destroys
them
*DB: Rather quickly? Seems like it would either do it
not at all or immediately in almost all cases
depending on what the weapon is made of. I like it
better this way, it's not hard for people to stockpile
the "regular" weapons in such a manner that they get
the perk of flaming AND the best hit/dam weapon...
Claxem: You should be able to eat red pills regardless
if you're full. Who has ever been too full to take
their pills?
*DB: I agree. Pills should not have any hunger
content.
DwarfMan: You should be able to backstab with stab
weapons. I don't even have to explain why for that
one.
*DB: I'd like to see you backstab with a razor... Stab
doesn't necessarily mean the weapon can pierce through
armor, it just refers to the motion of thrusting.
Paladinkain: there really should be a 'help immortal'
so the newbies know what imm's are and what they can
and cannot do, so they know why they should listen to
them
*DB: Heros should also explain the hierarchy to people
who haven't played muds before - what is a mortal,
what is a hero, what is an avatar, what as an
immortal, what is an imp. It should be a part of
newbie-helping. Not that the help file is a bad idea,
but it SHOULD be getting explained already.
Anubis: a version of the newsletter readable from
inside the relms on telnet
*DB: Eh. Poor Kiri.
Grogar: remove the ablity to trip from mobs
underwater. if ya can't fly underwater anymore. it
really makes the underwater areas not fun to go to
anymore. and yes i used to go to the dark sea but i
just don't want to be tripped and die all the time.
*DB: I agree. You should not be able to trip mobs
underwater and should not be able to be tripped.
Whirly: for avians at early levels, if their dive
attack misses, the wind up going through one of the
exits in the room randomly, or hitting the ground and
knocking themselves out.
*DB: The blackout one has potential, but moving to a
new room is unnecessarily complicated considering we
don't have room designs that take size into account.
What if the room is: "The field behind the farmer's
house". You're going to dive into the farmer's house
because you missed the dive way out in the middle of
the field? *scratch*
Anakin: Cast change sex when you accidentally missed
a spell and casts "Ala-peanutbutter-sandwiches" just
for the fun of it *smirk*
*DB: Silly, silly boy.
Firebreath: make: put all coins <container> or put
all.coins <container> work
*DB: "Put all coins <container>" DOES work. Try it.
It puts all the coins you are currently carrying into
the container. Get all.coins <container> works to get
them back.
AMystery: plook should show the same empty slots that
look shows
*DB: Look doesn't show empty slots, therefore plook
does show the same empty slots. If you think plook
should show the same as "Equip" but on another player,
then i'm not sure i agree since plook can be used on
mobs and players. I don't need to plook a mob to see
that it's only got one slot filled...
Grond: How about a toggle -- call it MERCY or
something -- that allows you to stop fighting if your
opponent is stunned or bleeding to death or otherwise
helpless. It could affect your alignment, too.
*DB: Wow, talk about the biggest exploit in the game
ever. High level player goes around "MERCY" killing
everything then his alt or his friend who is 30 levels
below him comes in and casts "Cause light" on the mob,
getting all the xp with no work.
Ashes: how about being able to "note forward
(player)", so that in alternate characters pfiles we
could have all the notes forwarded to one character?
*DB: I really like this idea so long as it only
pertains to personal notes. I don't want to receive
the notes to all 5 times because I forward them.
(Removing duplicates like that based on the way the
note system is setup would be close to impossible i
think).
Dawne: how about with a higher percentage in
roundhouse, you become able to get up more quickly
after falling?
*DB: Anything that makes the lag on a failed
roundhouse better would be welcome. That skill's
power just does not merit the penalty for using it,
yet humans don't have much option unless they want to
blow through all their mana using laughing buddha.
=====
Response by Baltar:
> Paladinkain: force feeding potions, it sounds funny and i know it =
> wouldn't
> work out well, but still it'd be funny and occasionally useful
>
> DAEHDER:
> I don't know what you mean. You can quaff as much potions as you want.
I believe Paladinkain means the ability to force someone else to quaff a
potion. Shove that poison down the mob's throat! Frankly, sounds just
about impossible to do, particularly if you're in combat, so not really
very realistic...Maybe characters who can 'throw' could also be able to
throw potions, with a very small chance of having the potion take effect
if it hits? (If you really *want* a way to use potions on others...)
Baltar
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Kiri's WWW of URLs:
From Divebomb:
http://www.azoz.com/music/sponsor.html
From Eviene:
http://homestarrunner.com/sbemail51.html
One more reason why Jennifer Lopez is a moron:
http://www.intelligentx.com/newsletters ... 010703.cfm
Lord of the Peeps. I have nothing more to add.
http://www.lordofthepeeps.com/
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The Feline Butterology Theory
This question was posed to the Usenet Oracle:
If you drop a buttered piece of bread, it will fall on the floor butter-side down. If a cat is dropped from a window or other high and towering place, it will land on its feet.
But what if you attach a buttered piece of bread, butter-side up to a cat's back and toss them both out the window? Will the cat land on its feet? Or will the butter splat on the ground?
And in response, thus spoke the Oracle:
Even if you are too lazy to do the experiment yourself you should be able to deduce the obvious result. The laws of butterology demand that the butter must hit the ground, and the equally strict laws of feline aerodynamics demand that the cat can not smash its furry back. If the combined construct were to land, nature would have no way to resolve this paradox. Therefore it simply does not fall.
That's right, you clever mortal (well, as clever as a mortal can get), you have discovered the secret of antigravity! A buttered cat will, when released, quickly move to a height where the forces of cat-twisting and butter repulsion are in equilibrium. This equilibrium point can be modified by scraping off some of the butter, providing lift, or removing some of the cat's limbs, allowing descent.
Most of the civilized species of the Universe already use this principle to drive their ships while within a planetary system. The loud humming heard by most sighters of UFOs is, in fact, the purring of several hundred tabbies.
The one obvious danger is, of course, if the cats manage to eat the bread off their backs they will instantly plummet. Of course the cats will land on their feet, but this usually doesn't do them much good, since right after they make their graceful landing several tons of red-hot starship and cheesed-off aliens crash on top of them.
Some of you may have noticed the website was down for a while. Our webserver was attacked with a virus and the server was handling some new security. We lost our bulletin board posts in the mess, but on the brighter side, we've installed a new one that's a whole lot more fun. Check it out at http://www.barrenrealmsmud.com/
Hope your holidays were great! Here's some news from the realms:
Erin: A new year, a new quest!
A new year, a new quest. Dress up your favorite t.v. or movie star with b.r equipment.
E-mail me a list of the items (all slots must be filled), why you would dress him/her or it like that. The deadline
is the 12th Jan 2003, my email addy is dreamkeeper_br@hotmail.com.
Comatose is sponsoring and remember, having fun is not optional,
it's mandatory.
All Spells are allowed so go have fun!!!!!!!
Please amke sure you state in the email your char's name as I dont mind read.
Please rememeber this is a family orientated mud so that means no Porn stars ok.
Also as we all life in different countries please give a decent amount of info on who the star is in r/l and who they play on what show or film.
this quest is open to every single level.
I was just thinking and decided, extra points will be awarded for those who also submit a pic of the person they choose.
If thats a problem maybe a link to a website where we can see who your talking about would also gain points.
Erin aka Dreamkeeper
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Ideas:
Its: for demons sanc should be a black aura not a white one
Xer: If The Guardian is the demon guildmaster, shouldn't he be of the race and have some unique appendage to hold over all demons?
Aelskare: When you type 'aff', it would be a good idea to have physical condition on there, too (i.e. many nasty wounds). With hitpoints different for each level, it might be good for newbies to see what condition they are in before they start fighting.
Podo: dirtkick can tickle but not while they have been blinded by it maybe allow it to still do some damage since the kender doesn't get many attacks anyways?
Rorin: Make hunger/thirst affect your hit/dam, the more hungry/thirsty you are, the lower your hit/dam would go.
Podo: stab as a command for kenders so we can keep stabbing during an attack
Podo: it would cool to be able to change the colors in our titles
RadicalEd: have body parts use their owners keywords, makes sorting my parts much easier
Cord: create a command that allows you to toggle whether or not your last logged-in date is displayed under your profile or not (ie, so we can turn it back on after level 151)
Ispep: dwarves making alcohol,dwarven brew should affect constitution
[
Cord: ignoring somone shouldn't just repress the text of them talking, but also keep your prompt for updating each time they chat something
Aelskare: Maybe when you type "aff", it could show your bodily condition (i.e. covered in blood, goner, etc.) along with hungry/thirsty, spells.
Characters that need to log in this week or lose their characters:
Abby, Anybody, Arodanos, Ascii, Auris, Babyface, Bellisima, Blu, Carick, Ciclope, Cutty, Darkone, Darkstar, Delta, Dionysus, Finalwaltz, Folk, Gannondorf, Gingus, Goradus, Griswold, Haile, Happy, Kirkegaard, Klic, Lavitz, Lectral, Mal, Marie, Morbidmonke, Odd, Oin, Pankurokku, Pendraco, Port, Pressure, Raistlin, Ramman, Rilyl, Rpgman, Sarah, Shadowlord, Tana, Tempeste, Tigress, Tupac, Whizper
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Responses by Divebomb:
Liam: when writing an area, i wish i could set damps +
dams for mobs
*DB: you mean what the mob does to a person or what a
player does to the mob? A mob doesn't even damp that
often until you get high into the hero levels. And
having to set what the damp is for a player against a
particulary mob would be tedious and take away a
feature of individualism for each player.
Terminal: just asking..but why isn't hide in the
affects list? - Terminal
*DB: This was a topic of discussion recently,
actually. It does not show up because you may THINK
you're hiding, but if someone walks in the room and
sees you, then you're not REALLY hiding at all.
Consider the "hide" flag to mean that the person is
attempting to hide, if someone has detect hidden they
just see how pathetic that person's attemp is. The
same could be true for sneak, but because it's used to
CR yourself so much, it's player-friendly to alert you
on the affect list. However, sometimes when you type
sneak the echo will say it worked when it really
didn't because you THINK it worked.
AMystery: we have warn to know when people connect. we
need a way to know if they are here when we arrive.
assuming warn doesn't do that
*DB: I agree (for those who don't know what he's
talking about, it's an imm perk)
Sinda: something as a affect, telling you that your
drunk.
-- Kiri : check affects
*DB: When you get to be not-very-drunk, there is no
notification that you are not drunk, which should be
indicative that you are merely tipsy and might stumble
around a bit, but not a lot. If you are wasted, then
it does show up in the affects list.
AMystery: enflame weapon should work on non magic
weapons, but be like taint, it rather quickly destroys
them
*DB: Rather quickly? Seems like it would either do it
not at all or immediately in almost all cases
depending on what the weapon is made of. I like it
better this way, it's not hard for people to stockpile
the "regular" weapons in such a manner that they get
the perk of flaming AND the best hit/dam weapon...
Claxem: You should be able to eat red pills regardless
if you're full. Who has ever been too full to take
their pills?
*DB: I agree. Pills should not have any hunger
content.
DwarfMan: You should be able to backstab with stab
weapons. I don't even have to explain why for that
one.
*DB: I'd like to see you backstab with a razor... Stab
doesn't necessarily mean the weapon can pierce through
armor, it just refers to the motion of thrusting.
Paladinkain: there really should be a 'help immortal'
so the newbies know what imm's are and what they can
and cannot do, so they know why they should listen to
them
*DB: Heros should also explain the hierarchy to people
who haven't played muds before - what is a mortal,
what is a hero, what is an avatar, what as an
immortal, what is an imp. It should be a part of
newbie-helping. Not that the help file is a bad idea,
but it SHOULD be getting explained already.
Anubis: a version of the newsletter readable from
inside the relms on telnet
*DB: Eh. Poor Kiri.
Grogar: remove the ablity to trip from mobs
underwater. if ya can't fly underwater anymore. it
really makes the underwater areas not fun to go to
anymore. and yes i used to go to the dark sea but i
just don't want to be tripped and die all the time.
*DB: I agree. You should not be able to trip mobs
underwater and should not be able to be tripped.
Whirly: for avians at early levels, if their dive
attack misses, the wind up going through one of the
exits in the room randomly, or hitting the ground and
knocking themselves out.
*DB: The blackout one has potential, but moving to a
new room is unnecessarily complicated considering we
don't have room designs that take size into account.
What if the room is: "The field behind the farmer's
house". You're going to dive into the farmer's house
because you missed the dive way out in the middle of
the field? *scratch*
Anakin: Cast change sex when you accidentally missed
a spell and casts "Ala-peanutbutter-sandwiches" just
for the fun of it *smirk*
*DB: Silly, silly boy.
Firebreath: make: put all coins <container> or put
all.coins <container> work
*DB: "Put all coins <container>" DOES work. Try it.
It puts all the coins you are currently carrying into
the container. Get all.coins <container> works to get
them back.
AMystery: plook should show the same empty slots that
look shows
*DB: Look doesn't show empty slots, therefore plook
does show the same empty slots. If you think plook
should show the same as "Equip" but on another player,
then i'm not sure i agree since plook can be used on
mobs and players. I don't need to plook a mob to see
that it's only got one slot filled...
Grond: How about a toggle -- call it MERCY or
something -- that allows you to stop fighting if your
opponent is stunned or bleeding to death or otherwise
helpless. It could affect your alignment, too.
*DB: Wow, talk about the biggest exploit in the game
ever. High level player goes around "MERCY" killing
everything then his alt or his friend who is 30 levels
below him comes in and casts "Cause light" on the mob,
getting all the xp with no work.
Ashes: how about being able to "note forward
(player)", so that in alternate characters pfiles we
could have all the notes forwarded to one character?
*DB: I really like this idea so long as it only
pertains to personal notes. I don't want to receive
the notes to all 5 times because I forward them.
(Removing duplicates like that based on the way the
note system is setup would be close to impossible i
think).
Dawne: how about with a higher percentage in
roundhouse, you become able to get up more quickly
after falling?
*DB: Anything that makes the lag on a failed
roundhouse better would be welcome. That skill's
power just does not merit the penalty for using it,
yet humans don't have much option unless they want to
blow through all their mana using laughing buddha.
=====
Response by Baltar:
> Paladinkain: force feeding potions, it sounds funny and i know it =
> wouldn't
> work out well, but still it'd be funny and occasionally useful
>
> DAEHDER:
> I don't know what you mean. You can quaff as much potions as you want.
I believe Paladinkain means the ability to force someone else to quaff a
potion. Shove that poison down the mob's throat! Frankly, sounds just
about impossible to do, particularly if you're in combat, so not really
very realistic...Maybe characters who can 'throw' could also be able to
throw potions, with a very small chance of having the potion take effect
if it hits? (If you really *want* a way to use potions on others...)
Baltar
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Kiri's WWW of URLs:
From Divebomb:
http://www.azoz.com/music/sponsor.html
From Eviene:
http://homestarrunner.com/sbemail51.html
One more reason why Jennifer Lopez is a moron:
http://www.intelligentx.com/newsletters ... 010703.cfm
Lord of the Peeps. I have nothing more to add.
http://www.lordofthepeeps.com/
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The Feline Butterology Theory
This question was posed to the Usenet Oracle:
If you drop a buttered piece of bread, it will fall on the floor butter-side down. If a cat is dropped from a window or other high and towering place, it will land on its feet.
But what if you attach a buttered piece of bread, butter-side up to a cat's back and toss them both out the window? Will the cat land on its feet? Or will the butter splat on the ground?
And in response, thus spoke the Oracle:
Even if you are too lazy to do the experiment yourself you should be able to deduce the obvious result. The laws of butterology demand that the butter must hit the ground, and the equally strict laws of feline aerodynamics demand that the cat can not smash its furry back. If the combined construct were to land, nature would have no way to resolve this paradox. Therefore it simply does not fall.
That's right, you clever mortal (well, as clever as a mortal can get), you have discovered the secret of antigravity! A buttered cat will, when released, quickly move to a height where the forces of cat-twisting and butter repulsion are in equilibrium. This equilibrium point can be modified by scraping off some of the butter, providing lift, or removing some of the cat's limbs, allowing descent.
Most of the civilized species of the Universe already use this principle to drive their ships while within a planetary system. The loud humming heard by most sighters of UFOs is, in fact, the purring of several hundred tabbies.
The one obvious danger is, of course, if the cats manage to eat the bread off their backs they will instantly plummet. Of course the cats will land on their feet, but this usually doesn't do them much good, since right after they make their graceful landing several tons of red-hot starship and cheesed-off aliens crash on top of them.