I'll be first to comment.

I've seen that site and used that site's info. Personally I find it really enlightening to see some zones I've never explored. It actually gave me the urge to go to these zones (even lowbie zones) to test the info first hand. In addition, I even find some extra info that I missed in zones I've explored thoroughly (or so I thought).

So, for new comers, the existance of such a site is definately a boost in terms of getting into the heat of things.

It also gives the impression of 'Arctic Rocks!' in the sense that players actually went all the way to build and maintain such a website. Certainly you won't find fanatics in lousy muds.

It also lays a ground for a helping community, where info's are exchanged and shared. It's like saying 'Welcome newbie! We're here to help you for the duration of your stay in Arctic. If you need help, we're here.' Yes, carebear mud.

On the other hand, the site does nothing but spoil the fun for old players and the creators. Months of intense searching/figuring and creating all laid out on the screen just like that. We see hear plenty of this in other threads. 'Arctic is meant to be hard. If you can't take the heat, quit!'

Finding a middle ground is hard. New comers don't have the chance to give their views. We only hear one side of the story in the forum, and we know which side.

I guess the choice here depends on the following questions:

1. Do we need new players who can't take the initiative to explore themselves?
2. Are there even new players joining Arctic?
3. Do the creators (present and past) care about having a walkthrough for their zones?
4. Do the present players care about the walkthroughs?
5. Will the walkthroughs kill the present playerbase and the future ones?
6. Do we want only 30 intense real mudders or 70 newbies with 10 intense real mudders? Quantity over quality?

Personally as an old player, I would like to have more newbies/newcomers joining the game. The faster they learn (through walkthroughs) the better they'll become, the more chances they'll stay longer. No matter how much the present players are addicted to the mud, they will have to leave. Even the high imms (who put their passion into the game) have to go. It saddens me to see the low population we have nowadays.

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Gulca stops following you.

[color=blue]Honestly, you can't stop people from giving out the info they gather if they choose to do so, so some sort of basics would be interesting to see, and having the imms not go nazi on people for 'game info' that is/should be common knowledge would help.

I'm not sure of the site you're talking about, but I've seen the arctic encyclopedia site, which is just a forum where people go and list item stats and zone info, but knowing where to find things is not always a bad thing. Arctic's probably the smallest MUD of the several I play atm, and only Arctic has such a strick info policy. On one of the other MUDs, I know where almost every item loads, but that doesn't mean I can lead it, or others can, or that it'll load for us. You don't have to say what spell(s) Cyan loads, we all know it's a short list, and even if every person who plays arctic could lead to it, so what, you think they're going to beable to beat that mob, or alot of other hard as balls fights?

Yes, log leading is lame, and people/clans giving lots of zone info to their fodder who can then pop shinies for the leaders is just as bad, but unless Hoss and others plan to redo every zone constantly, and risk fucking zones up royally, it's not going to stop.[/color]

I think it actually beneficial to the mud. I think it is a major tool that helps balance big clans/experienced players vs neutrals/newbie clans.

Truthfully, I think this may even go hand in hand with the no maxing of some equipment. Lets face it, the no max equipment helps more experienced players with less playtime and smaller clans, but it helps newer players very little. How many newer players know where two or three different +dmg items load? How many newer players know where two or three nice primaries load?

Enabling them to do a few zones that now will load some of the better no max gear might actually be a good thing.

Here are the problems:

Have you ever actually tried to explore a new (or at least new to you) high level zone with a neutral/newbie clan group?

Big clans can go explore new zones easily and with relatively little chance of dying and almost no chance of not recovering their gear. Most of the time they have a group far exceeding what is needed to do the zone and are good players capable of completing hard, suprise fights. This is especially true if they are exploring a new zone.

However, I remember trying to explore DKO when I first started and accidently letting Tsu Wei out. Half the group died. Then half the group died again trying to recover the equipment (and this is an easy high level zone).

Second, have you ever tried to keep a neutral/newbie group together while trying to figure out keywords in zones you are exploring? Half the group will recall within the first 5 minutes. This means the more ambitious neutrals never have a chance to learn higher level zones independently.

Finally, equipment is more important to neutrals/newbie clans than to the bigger clans and experienced players. One, in the rare event that they can't put together a cr group, a bigger clan can easily go repop its equipment fast. They will not have to sit and try to get a group together for hours to go hit Shadow again to repop the item they just lost. Second, most of the time bigger clans/experienced players have backup sets of equipment anyway that many neutrals or newer players don't have. When you just got your first ever 3d6 primary, you probably will not try to figure out a new zone if it means a good chance of losing all your gear.

"There is a medium between giving a newbie enough to be addicted and giving a newbie so much that he has no reason to want more."

I agree. However, I don't think easy access to directions through easy high-level zones will do this. If anything, it builds confidence and the desire to go learn and explore the harder high level zones.

I think as online console and computer games continue to grow in popularity this might be important for Arctic to sustain itself. It is getting easier and easier for new players to go explore, die, and say "Well, I will just go play Halo 2". On the flip side, I do think some of the information out there is too much or about zones that do not fall under what I have mentioned.

Making the site with game info secrets isn't good but i can see where it coming from - some stuff is too hard to figure or meant to be figured only by accident. So you either have to give up on the secret or share info about it and get other ppl to help you figure it out. For clans it's an irc channel, for neutrals it's a site... But site sux, it's too open for everyone, i'd say let newbies learn how to keep secrets and make new clans :) Keep changing kws for cheat files untill those who makes them gets tired to re-figure stuff or quit the game.

Don't need such players, they would quit the game first time someone random them. That is no fun and waste of game time !

My thoughts.

Mathros: Terk is not referring to ArcticMUD Encyclopedia

The "other site(s)" and why it is acceptable. It just tells you what is there and not necesarily how hard the fights are or any complications (it is NOT a walkthough of the zones). It just gives a rough flow of the zone... enough for you to test / try and play with those zones.

Some suggesstions to make the mud somewhat newbie friendly...

Pick 1-3 cities (1 neutral at least) and make them newbie friendly. When I say newbie friendly... put the city map online (not a box by box map... a pictorial representation similiar to a command map in RtCW or ET)... provide directions to 1-2 zones which are newbie friendly for a solo person (allows them to get up to lvl 5-10ish). Do a step through explaination of mudding like reading the descriptions and such. An actual intro to mudding on Arctic linked from the main page.

Perhaps providing a zMUD configuration file for Arctic online that supports the automapper (I could provide to you if needed) would help out. I just have a couple of last bugs to fix. Make it so the MUD is easier to use.

A contributer would making it newbie friendly is the Clan/PK system.

Ancient Cartographer of the Black Dragons

"Don't need such players, they would quit the game first time someone random them. That is no fun and waste of game time ! "

That is true to an extent, but other aspects of the game take care of "weeding" out people who don't really want to play (general learning of game mechanics, leveling, pkilling, etc). In general, the more people who play the more fun it will be.

"some stuff is too hard to figure or meant to be figured only by accident"

I don't think the mystic vault combo should be out there, but I don't think there is any real harm to the game if there are basic walkthroughs of zones like Graknar, DKO, etc... (not zones like Pax, Shadow, CV). I don't like the idea of sharing kws at all, but a hint in a walkthrough I could see as acceptable (i.e. "You will notice an object of interest in this room").

I disagree with placing information on high level zones on the mud.arctic.org page.

Perhaps a better picture of the than this: http://mud.arctic.org/zones/map.phtml

of the world would be helpful... draw in a bit of the roads... point out where some low level zones. ohh and fix the locations of the stuff that is labeled so people can actually use it.

The key points... Teach a newbie to mud, help them level a little and enjoy the game --> Increase your player base. Please don't hand over the keys to the kingdom.

On an related subject... How about some cookbooks for brew/scribe in the shops. I already know how it works so I don't need anymore... but some sort of help would be a boon to the new ppl. I have the lores on the components which I don't really think helped in figuring it out.

Terk: If you need help PM me. I can provide you with some stuff which you could review and potentially post on the site.

Ancient Cartographer of the Black Dragons

I'm pretty sure I've seen the site Terk is referring to, and I think it has some cool ideas - especially with regard to the mapping system. One of the hardest things for new players to overcome is moving from town to town, or getting back to a new zone that someone has taken them to. It would be nice to offer something more in the way of directions for major towns and low level zones.

Now, I think giving explicit, step-by-step directions is a bit too much. I mean, even when I'm telling someone how to get from Balifor to Kalaman, it's almost never in terms of "6n6e" crap. I say things like, "favor north over south, east over west" or what have you. People don't have trouble following unclear directions, but until they've cemented the whole route, they do have trouble remembering the exact nature of those directions.

So, I'd suggest implementing something similar to their map system. I mean, you could even make it look really slick - bring up some sort of overlay showing a generic route from place X to place Y, only for a select group of low level zones and major towns. You could even have a giant shaded area indicating a possible location for not-so-low zones. This would all be really easy to do by using CSS to place the map as the background image, and a dash of javascript to throw up a transparent image with only the desired path/region colored in.

All in all, keywords and important knowledge shouldn't be given out. Period. But seriously, new players need something to hook them. If they can't even find their way back to the Brog Village without bothering some experienced player, they're probably never going to develop much interest in the game. Once they figure out basic movement, [i]et cetera[/i], then it's possible that some one will group them. But not before.

[color=blue]
I know he isn't, I even said that I hadn't seen the site he mentions, but that I've seen the encyclopedia site.

I know when I started in 98, things were somewhat easier, to a point. However not knowing certain things, like Arctic not using the 3d6 stat system from D&D, are small things that can help players a good bit. Thinking back then that 17 str and 16 con was a decent warrior/barb, and not knowing you could roll a 24 str/con one, can be rather huge, as stats help a newbie mch more than an experienced player I'd say.

Moving from town to town isn't really a problem. The road signs point you in the right direction, and it's how I learned my way to the major cities orginally.

I'm for giving some basics to newer players. Doesn't need to be things like "if you kill mob Y in zone Z you can load a 3d5 1/1 weapon", but even some sort of hint that a better-than-store weapon can be found in lowlvl zone B, would be good for these guys.

As for the protection of game info, I really don't see why all info is treated equal. A newbie asking how to get further into the pal cemetary shouldn't be treated the same as someone asking for a leader's log of some high lvl zone like FT. Also, the person who decides to answer shouldn't be punished because they helped a lowbie/newbie, giving the other person a detailed FT log is something else.

The problem seems to be that Arctic is made with the experienced MUDer in mind, but the newer MUDers shouldn't be excluded. Arctic's very newbie un-friendly, and thaatll kill the MUD more than randoming RGB/BSP/Wilds who hide behind their clan.[/color]

As far as the newbie walkthru zone, look at sign, sign says type n and hit enter to go north type newbie zones, I hate hate hate them. Arctic was the first mud I ever played, but I learned quick enough. I will say what beniffited me more then anything else, was a friend brought me in, and helped me out. He was a newb to, I think level 8 after a month or two of playing, but it was enough that I got acclimated, and from there we learned more.

The point is, I would hate to see a newb school, I think it would take away from the feeling of the game. Something better could be done, perhaps a mentor/tutor/something system.

AdamG

Kamij $.02

The difference between new players getting help back then and new players getting help now: The mud wasn't full of elitist assholes.

People who recieved that sort of help back then don't necessarily feel inclined to give out that sort of help now. It all comes back to a problem that has been discussed to death here already.

As a playerbase, we have to realize that we are responsible for more of our own destiny than we are willing to admit.

This means that the warring clans of the mud warn unknowns who are grouped with known enemies before obliterating them. This means when you see some character wearing training armor sleeping out in the open somewhere you don't immediately stab/bash/steal from them. This means when you're in a city and someone yells 'Where is the mage guild?' You don't reply with some smartass joke.

In the end, there is no system that can be coded, advertising to be done, or game information to be shared that can stop us from being assholes and driving away new people. Are there new people? Certainly, while the numbers aren't astouding, I do know of at least a couple people who began playing this wipe for the first time ever.

I doubt this will be a popular opinion.

Threads like this to my mind are an example of the problem we should want to solve. Terk's seen some site, others have seen some site, but hell if I can find it. The information [u]is [/u] out there, publicly available, but we'll act as if we've never seen it and certainly didn't learn anything from it and we'll do everything we can to ensure I never find out about it. I'd never suggest that any one person should give up knowledge they've picked up on their own, but what's up with no direct reference to the material you're talking about? Trying to avoid "spoiling" it for me and others? Laughable motive at best. I believe the reality is that no one (well, no non-creator) is interested in protecting the actual game information, they're interested in protecting the power that comes from control of that game information.

I mean, really, so a clan is posting information that all the other clans just pass privately. What's the big deal? Afraid neutrals might get some independence if they stumble across it?

What, honestly, do we care if some subset of the playerbase is never challenged by the game? Do I know the difference between a leader that learned a zone by carefully working it all out or reading it on some hint page somewhere? More to the point, does that make a difference once I refer to MY log from being led and teach yet another person? I find it incredibly unlikely that 20 new players starting tomorrow with full walkthroughs of every zone would have any effect on the majority of the existing players, even after a full wipe playing with it. Except maybe we'd get called in to help with corpse recoveries in zones we don't know more often. 'But I don't think someone who hasn't done all the work I did should be able to know zone X without doing all that work.' [i]Waah.[/i] You and the other dinosaurs that think that way can keep playing your dying game until it blinks out. I'd prefer having enough players around that I could do something at an odd hour, or perhaps even that there be an actual newbie on once in a while to help out.

Maybe music file sharing is the right comparison to make. We all know that if you police the crap out of the internet, you'll reduce large-scale and anonymous sharing, but you'll never stop guy A from handing it off to guy B. But even in a more open environment, not everyone shares everything, whether because they believe it wrong or don't like or want the material shared. I'm not trying to make some 'information wants to be free' argument, but rather trying to suggest that the right way to handle this is accept that some things are going to be passed in this manner, attempt to ensure that the availability is somewhat equitable, and trust people to make the right decision for themselves.

dpille: The reason that stuff doesn't get posted it the fear of retribution from the Admins. Look at what Terk's initial reaction is. I can't blame him... creation is alot of work. The site has a bit too much information to be posted here. If you look around enough you can find it. It isn't a walkthrough but keywords and maps are there for most of the low-mid zones.

Ancient Cartographer of the Black Dragons

I must say honestly the best newbie advice I ever got was, always see invis always carry a recall. That was over 10 years ago. I still play some, not nearly what I used to but all in all that advice helped me become a better player. I found my way to zones and found my way to cities. I learned many keywords alone or in small groups. I find these types of sites an afront to people that have spent countless hours actually figuring stuff out. Even the simple act of traveling from Tarsis to Palanthas to buy a lore scroll when you were a newbie. My opinion doesn't carry much weight I am fully aware of that but I had to respond to this thread. The problem is and will always be, if people are given the information and it's not earned in any way then they wont have any loyalty to the game. Think about it. Would you go buy the hottest new game for your platform if you could have a walkthrough to it the day it came out? The joy of zoning at least for me was the unexpected the chance that hey this is fun but we might die here.
New players have to learn to let go of theirs shinies and realize zone knowledge owns all. You can die a thousand times but if you learn a zone from it then you win. Unfortunately it would seem the attitude of I just started and I want to oblit NOW has taken over. Damn shame.

Enubis

I appreciate Russ W's point, but I think it flies in the face of real-world evidence. There are like, what, a hundred gazillion people playing World of Warcraft, and it's _all_ spelled out for _everyone_ somewhere? Sure, that game will fall below the bazillion-player mark someday, but I don't think because of any of the reasons we're discussing here.

I'm repeating myself, I know, but re: 'affront to people that have worked hard' I just can't believe that it matters. I guess it all depends on whether you see this activity as an opportunity for a power structure to exist or as a game we all play together. My point would be that none of us really know the ultimate source of any kind of information we get in any way other than standing there ourselves. If it's not unacceptable to have the other person standing there with you working a keyword tell you what succeeded, I don't think I understand why it'd be unacceptable to read it elsewhere.

Also, we're increasingly all adults here, I would think we can responsibly decide how much stuff like that we want to read in order to make the game more fun.

Hardcore mudders are dying in general. It would be crazy to hope that new players who log onto the mud spend 10 gaming days before deciding if they should stick longer or not. It will probably take them 1 or 2 days of running around before giving up.

All those arguments about handling info and spoon feeding are valid only if the new players stick around for the rest of the wipe. We need to proof to them Arctic is worth playing, instead of new players should proof they are worthy of playing in Arctic. That's the attitude of most of the present/old players.

The main attraction of Arctic is it gives a common place for a group of players to have fun. I like interacting with other people. Newbies would too. I think the deciding factor whether a newbie would stay in Arctic would be the interaction to the playerbase, rather than to Arctic's zones.

It is ok for 'elite' players to ignore newbies or to be mean to them. It has always been this way. However, if there are enough newbies around, they would rely on each other's shoulder to carry on their fight in the game. The thing is that newbie groups are hard to come by, therefore they leave pretty quickly if they meet some obstructions in their first few days of play testing.

Sure, keep the eliteness around. That'll attract the most hardcore players and Arctic will remain the hardest mud around. It's always lonely at the top. I'm sure that is what we wanted all along.

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Gulca stops following you.

[color=blue]While creation is hard work, making zones with assinine Kws and parts that are so tedious/absurd to do simply deserve to be shared once found out. Why? ?Because making a zone unneededly difficult just because you can is moronic. This goes for all the creators out there who seem to think it's fun to use vague kws that require a thesaurus because you though it'd be funny to use very uncommon variations of words.

Now some things like the zoneinfo.doc really just aren't cool, and depstie some of the outdated info on it, the only harm things like that do is give info to everyone that most clans tend to leak to their players.

On the flip side, few things are as mind-blowingly retarded as being in a group that's exploring a zone for the first time, everyone's trying to figure out kws, and then when someone figures one out, they dn't tell the rest of the group who has been trying, but then proceed to tell all their friends. This goes for basic kws, not 'important' ones, like Istar's final kw, which you either have a moment of clarity and know what to try, or you never figure it out unless via dumb luck.

WoW has many reasons for being successful, being easier to run on a PC than a game like EQ2 helps, as does the fact it's not owned by SOE, who might be the worst company even when it comes to MMOs. It's a game with a layout and difficulty designed with its hardcore diablo/wc/sc players in mind. They couldn't go and make it challenging and complex, because they know it'd blindside most of their players. I will personally never touch WoW again. It's best summed up as proof that people want easier games and don't care for a challenge.[/color]

I find this issue really complex, and the more I think about it, the more unsure I become. In the end, I've decided to go with my initial gut reaction.

I don't think it really hurts having more people know more zones, even if they didn't "earn" it.

I think I have been to this site, but I honestly don't know if its the one you are referring to. I have certainly been to similar sites

Sometimes the information posted does piss me off. When I think about the number of times I have died, and worse, gotten my friends killed, learning something new, and now I see it free for others, it irks me.

But after mulling it over for a while, my perspective has mellowed. Getting killed, going back to CR, dieing even harder on the CR, and basically spending a few hours trying to CR the CR of the CR has been some of the funnest mudding and has created the best stories. Those Dragons CHEAT I say!! Regardless of what happens in the future, I've already had my fun learning it my way. It doesn't affect me at all if someone else goes there and leads it from a walkthrough. I've still got my fun and stories.

Sometimes these sites have given me a lot of extra, unexpected enjoyment. I'm referring to zones I've run so many times, I've stopped reading the room descs. I just use them for xp. But getting an unexpected hint about something in the zone I missed, suddenly makes the whole zone fresh and new again. I run it again, reading everything in minute detail, in case there is even more I missed and hasnt been hinted. I start to appreciate the Creator's work much more, because I can now see an extra level of detail to their original work.

But the real enjoyment for me comes from the randomness of the battles (saves, stuns, missed bashes, etc). There are plenty of fights that can still screw you, no matter how many times you run a zone, no matter how much zone knowledge you have (earned or otherwise). The only way you survive these kind of fights is if you have been in them before and know what to do. And that sort of experience can't come from cheat guides. So in the end, there is no real shortcut gained from free zone knowledge.

Paul

Blah blah blah blah blah is all I really have to say about the passing of information. What is fun is when you're in a group following someone who you KNOW is reading off a piece of paper(site) on how to lead the zone... and it takes them 5 minutes to analyze what the paper has said before each fight and then they tell you exactly how to do the fight. I'm thinking of one person in particular (Char: Jenn) in which I was laughing my ass off the entire time I was in his group while doing Storms. Ah the memories...

But back to the topic at hand: blah blah blah you can't police it so why bother? It does hurt the people that actually spend hours figuring shit out, but honestly, the game has become more "work" than "play" these days. You run around doing the same rank mobs again and again trying to achieve a "mediocre" rank. If you pop a unique elite item then you are hunted by BSP who will just log their stunners/tent mages and come after you if you try and fight back. So, in the end, information sites are only helping people that really do need help to make the game more a game and not a job. And maybe, just maybe they will find a spell like stun/prism/tent (HAHAHHAHAAH yah right, Aristox/Hoss have basically guaranteed that only the top clan(s) will have these...yeah, lets change silvanesti, make it harder, AND put some of the best stuff/spells in there. sounds like a great way to help the mud).

I'm thinking about my doorbell, when you going to ring it? When you going to ring it?

-Sean

p.s. It wasn't meant to be a rant about BSP (moreso towards the immorts who I believe should take a more active role in balancing the mud) who I think have done a good job at playing this game, they have just done what no other clan has done recently: acquire and retain a significant number of players. Gjob.

I personally think Aristox/Hoss made a really great job in "adding/changing" things but bad in "removing" part (Mithas/hct/brew-scribe system/some other minor stuff like making that one zone with diamonds unfigurable).
If your clan is buff you have no fun doing Nightlord. You want the challenge. Harder stuff is more of challenge and therefore more fun. We don't want 'the game has become more "work" than "play" ' by spamming ranks only and Hoss did a great work by letting us to have this fun for a while.
Everyone can form the same amount of people ([url]http://mud.arctic.org/forums/viewtopic.php?t=1570[/url]) than BSP and try to win harder things. If you are too lazy for it then it's your own fault. We spent/spending a lot of time and put tons of work to keep us at the top.
After spending a lot of time to figure the zone, generally, you don't like when everyone gets it for free. You don't like when everyone (who don't lazy to read the site and all he has to do is just to copy/paste a kw) be able to repop your shinies.
When BSP was a problem to neutrals? Who? Besides those Malthrouses who continuously trashes us and therefore has to hide his chars. Every neutral player can explore all he want. We don't kill for equipment. You must have mixing BSP with that other clan who had their 'outlaw hour' of randoming last wipe when was at the top. I don't see fun killing anyone who don't want to fight back. Even you, Sean, have gotten peace 2nd time for free after backstabbing us first time and that incident with Huma which pissed our leader off hardcore ([url]http://mudlogs.foghaven.net/mudlogs.php?log=297[/url]).

Sorry for runglish, tried my best.

One problem we don't think about is that some people have actually CONQUERED this game. What do you do when you beat the living piss out of the last guy on Zelda? You say FUCK YEA! and move on. The only clan that moved on from Arctic (I think) were the Shriners.

BSP has been on the top or fighting one other clan for it for how many wipes now? 3-5? Jesus christ guys, doesn't that get boring? You have all this info and numbers, which is power on Arctic as it stands, and no one can touch you. Even Wild and it's allies get bored and quit when trying to fight against you, because you never EVER move on.

But yea, how does this tie in to info sharing... Almost every other game out there has FAQs and cheats posted for it. Arctic has probably been the most info-protected game I have ever seen, and back in the day it was better for it. But now, logging on during primetime and seeing 30 people online... This might need to be rethinked (rethunk?). Knowing stuff is ONLY FUCKING HALF OF THE BATTLE. Yes, listen to good old GI-Joe. So, those neutrals can get to Glymmer?! GO FOR IT KIDS! Other players will gladly repop their un-CRable gear.

What fun is a game if you never EVER get to see the endgame? If players even manage to get past the incredible lack of newbie help, how far can they possibly get without joining a huge clan? Not very far considering the asinine confidentiality of game info.

If you're so concerned about newbies steamrolling your zones, MAKE THE FIGHTS HARDER! It's a lot more fun being able to GET TO THE FIGHT and failing than it is being stuck wondering if you ever had a chance of winning.

Uh oh work's over.

Oh yea, most of the older players have spent more time in the zones than the creators spent making them. Boo fucking hoo to too many people running your zones. Stop being idiots and understand that it's a compliment that your zones have lasted this long and are still being ran.

Well, I pretty much agree with Matt.

"So, those neutrals can get to Glymmer?! GO FOR IT KIDS! Other players will gladly repop their un-CRable gear."

I agree... the harder fights are self regulating. Directions to Sleet are great, but its not like someone who has mudded for 6 months is going to get to gether a group of friends and go do it (successfully).

"It's a lot more fun being able to GET TO THE FIGHT and failing than it is being stuck wondering if you ever had a chance of winning."

Yes... I think it will keep people interested if all of a sudden they can find fights they have never done because they weren't in a major clan. The excitement is really in figuring out how to and successfully winning a fight, not dting twice and spending five hours trying to figure out kws to find the fight.

What an excellent thread this is. Time for a paradigm shift in the land of Krynn perhaps? Maybe if the mud wasn't so clearly elitist centered people wouldn't feel the need to spite the admins with such sites as the arctic mud shining path, the arctic mud encyclopedia, and other random posts to forums that leak 'sensitive game info'. This can not be stopped obviously, those sites are up, recorded, and archived on many machines. The real question is whether or not the admins will condone it in full or in part.

The implications of pages like these as I see them are this:
-greedy players will seek them out to achive advantage over others(or at least reach the mark of the rest)
-elite players will be pissed because now the game is ever so slightly normalized against their favour.
-mid range players will benefit, and likely play more
-new players will start out stronger and with more confidence and interest
-quitting players may contribute to the public pot as an outgoing gesture of "fvck you".
-stupid players may get themselves into even more trouble
-busy players will seek them out for the l33t aut0b0t scripts
-infrequent players that do not search the web for mud related information will not be affected
-admins will be pissed, neutral, and some secretly glad to see these pages.

In general I'll give these sites two thumbs up aristox's azz

Mwahaha that really cracked me up. Bravo! Encore!! "wild applause turns into standing ovation"

Back to the topic, while it's indeed somewhat ridiculous to try policing the internet, the fact that info protection has been a distinct feature of Arctic and constituted a large part of it's attractiveness in the past, should be fairly obvious. As Matt already pointed, this is very unique, and should be supported and stressed on when trying to bring in new players. I just don't get how joining the mainstream can make Arctic more competitive.

I think these are great points. I think destiny for the most part moved on to Everquest and became the arctic lords over there. But when a clan or clans had a taste of the endgame or have actually conquered there foes, its time to change the game up alittle. Adding new systems,races/classes,gameplay etc... Arctic is no different then any other game. You play a game once you reach endgame or beat the game at one point or seen someone else do it, it is time to make a "expansion" so to speak to the game and change it! I mean now the overlords decide they want to change it up but it might be alittle to late. I mean how do you see 20-35 people online at prime hour? That is a serious issue. And one step to fixing that issue is not really putting a stress on a site or players who go to a site to obtain info. It dont hurt the mud because they still have to go threw the zone. Chances are they wont even get that chance because the mud is dead. There nothing new. No incentive to keep playing. No new gameplay systems. No info being shared with players so when the old leave the new is left in a void of nothingness wondering if they will ever see endgame. But noo that won't happen because people quit on you or clans force you or your clan to have limited time on the mud. I mean how the hell can players old and new learn a fcking game if their time is limited. Again, no new systems,gameplay or incentives to keep playing. The result of all this is a normally 70+ playerbase reduce to 20-30.

[color=blue]Most people who play(ed) Arctic will never reach the 'endgame' simply because Arctic Pwipes, and many players can't spend 8+ hours a day on the MUD. Many alittle more of a gap between wipes wouldbe good for the more casual players, but it'd probably just drive off the 'endgamers', as they'd all get some rank 50+ chars and get bored stiff.[/color]

Keep in mind i'm retired now, but...
I am slightly in favor of those sites.

If a site has some basic Arctic information and walkthrough for some low level zones then thats great, anything to give newbies some help to get into the swing of things and let the [b]addiction[/b] build.

Item stats isn't really a big deal. In my pre-imm days, I was keeping my own stats and I had accumulated quite the handwritten list. (yeah old timer).
I thought it was great to find out the secrets of each item and be able to reference an item the next time I came across it. Now I wouldn't have put it on a website but I wouldn't have acted like I didn't know if someone asked me the stats on an item.
[i]I don't think there is a big benefit to a player or any hurt dealt to the mud to know the stats on a large amount of items.[/i] Getting the item is the main issue anyway. Even no lore items...if you know the stats of an item you figured it out using lores and stuff, no big deal there because anyone can do that.

The only problem is how much information is given out. When it comes to walkthroughs on quests or high level zones, I'm less happy about that. Theres no challenge when you follow a walkthrough line by line. I'm not one of those players. I'd prefer to figure out as much as I can and if I had a walkthrough, i'd probably look at it for a hint. Depends on what makes this game fun for you. Getting goodies or solving something mostly on your own. [i]I think we should accommodate both players.[/i]

I think the good players have an innate knack on how to play this game better than others, a better feel for the game and situations they are in. This makes them better pkillers and zone leaders than others. "Walkthrough kiddies" may get the goodies but I doubt they'd hold onto them for very long. And thats fine with me, the good players would have gotten them anyway but the "walkthrough kiddies" at least had a chance to have an item or two.

As a creator I am kind of torn of seeing my zone secrets posted for anyone to read and solve. Its not like I don't want peope to solve things but I don't feel exactly happy when someone just visits my zone for the first time and destroys it. As a creator I think the solution would be that if you are going to feel this way, design a more dynamic zone that minimizes the impact of zone logs. And also remember, this game is about the players fun, not your fun.

-Axiom One-

I am kind of against the mass spreading of my hard earned knowledge. I am also majorly pissed about game info being traded to clans for peace, and info spread through clans like sweet bread. To see some idiot who before could not walk from kalaman to tarsis lead storms is just wrong. Down with info spreading. Up with spell spreading!

It is almost impossible for a neutral to explore. Try shouting "looking for a few 1x people to explore with". Everyone's gonna be like "uhhh I don't wanna die" and "this is boring. fuck this. where's my fucking equip? I want exp now!" I have tried!

maybe u shouldnt explore with 1x chars ... have a fun char, in 20's, to explore with, try a class u dont normally play

Knowledge is more important than equip. Why do you expect random ppl to help you to get it ?

This was an issue during the period of 180million exp required for 1x. It surely doesn't take playing 8 hours a day to get one or two or five chars to 1x over the course of a pwipe now. The people who [i]do[/i] play for those 8-16 hours a day will always have an advantage, but there are things that can be done to limit how big of an advantage it is.

Exactly. There are a number of "endgame" fights on Arctic that can be laughably easy or utterly impossible. Sometimes that certain mob just sits there and does nothing for whatever reason, but other times it spams immortal-level prismatic sprays and stuns and other horriblenastydeadly areas every single round. A few of these fights aren't even always considered "endgame" because of comparably lameass loads (or load changes) and sometimes result in the clan leader logging on later and saying "you fucking massripped WHERE?!". Mass save roll failures can make any simple fight deadly also. That said, play skills should still count highly: save roll luck should not always determine victory or loss.

Even with more dynamic/chaotic fights, people still shouldn't have access to a complete walkthrough of every zone. I think Most non-top-clan players (or wannabes) and newer players get excited when they actually make it through a difficult zone and/or just [i]barely[/i] win that tough fight. But recently there has been effectively no possible way for newer or nonclanned players to do anything harder than storms without someone going out of their way to lead it, dying horribly/repeatedly, or drawing unwanted attention from others.

Hell one zone, Celestial Valley (and a few others I probably just don't notice), doesn't even have a helpfile. How the shit are newer people supposed to know about and/or explore this zone and others like it? Assuming they're even aware of "help stat", they have no way to know what level it is or that it might load some really neat stuff. And even if they stumbled on the zone by some miracle they wouldn't know the name for it!

In the area of information there has to be a middle ground created if Arctic is going to have any future beyond a wasteland of an old-player-elite-clan PK-Mud. Arctic's site itself should provide detailed info about low-level zones (without question), the majority if not all mid-level zones, and a decent number of "lower tier" high level zones. There should also be a listing of [i]every[/i] zone and some direction (or vague hints for the highest-tier) toward each one. These directions should be more precise than current zone helpfiles for most zones.

The game NEEDS new players to survive, and older mortal players simply can't be counted on to teach them the ropes anymore. I know I surely wouldn't take the time to teach newbies stuff if I was playing actively again, I usually waste enough time dealing with dumbshit clan members. Heros could definately be given more powers in this area: more access/freedom to walk newer players through low zones, incentives to do so, and loosened rules about what they can tell these players. Any info posted on the site itself (as suggested above) could be told outright by heros. Damn me for suggesting it if you like, but a joinable/leavable Newbie Chat Channel would not be a horrible idea. I'd be willing to help in the form of answering a quick question or two seen in such a channel while soloing or doing routine small group zones. The "threat" of giving out supersecret info could be fended off by immortals keeping an eye on what's being asked and answered and a strict warning/punishment system about asking for and giving too high level info. Changing the mindset of seeing the giving of low-mid level info as a threat would simply take time.

This stuff should be done in conjunction with a serious overhaul of "the PK system", but I'll make a new topic for that since this is the zoneinfo area.

The "oldschool bigclan elite" players will bitch and moan without doubt. We've all been a part of "NO INFO SHARING NOW JUST DEAL WITH IT" for as long as we've been here. Seeing where it has taken us, I'd say it's worth giving sanctioned info-sharing a chance. The "oldschool bigclan elite" players can take their turn "dealing with it" instead of the newbies we sorely need.

Matt

Hey Matt is posting again. Must be the holidays and hes bored at work! ANYWAYS, good points etc.

Rick

[color=blue]Way to completely miss the point mavlad.

People think it's easy to get a group and explore, or atleast they act like it is with their "get a group and explore and learn the game" mantras. However the bottom line is that a neutral can't just 'get a group' to explore.

And nes, this is going ot come as a shock to you, but you can explore alot more with a coupel 1x chars than some low-mid 20 trash.[/color]

but, the low-mid 20 (or high 20) "trash" (whatever, bullshit) have less to lose and more to gain ...
how many people only have 1 char?
how many people with only 1 char care that much about exploring, when there are people to talk to, and information sites to visit?
i'm not saying that 1x chars shouldnt or dont explore
i'm just saying that all the friends on mud i know use non 1x chars to explore

The game is not made up of people who want accomplish PVE, it is made up of people who want to accomplish PVP. (Obvious Exceptions such as Cyan Exist)

The 'serious' playerbase can beat the most difficult fights in the game several times a day.

Since most of the difficulty lies in numbers and not skill, why not let everyone see how its done and allow them to be happy with having new things to do?

Is this kind of info leaking really such a big deal? Perhaps more effort needs to go into creators updating their zones, not just in order to protect special items or what have you, but because with time these zones should evolve through the natural order of things. Active creators who want to keep their zones interesting and keep them worth learning and understanding should update keywords and puzzles in their zone so that the log/shared info hungry leaders fall behind the curious explorers. Obviously a lot of this is done, and mainly between pwipes, but a lot more could be done very subtily by encouraging creators to slightly alter one or two keywords at random on a fairly regular basis. Other things could change as well, such as room descriptions, zone DIRECTIONS, locations of death traps, zone entrances, etc. This leads to players having to approach every zone with caution and an open mind, and believe me it makes the entire experience far more exciting and interesting.

Some zones in the game right now are so poorly designed that the zone itself isn't really worth learning, and the zones are always treated accordingly through steamrolling the zones and ignoring the basis for any keywords or equipment loads. Take Spire of Gilean for example, the zone has not changed in so long that it is simply a routine, and could be labeled an "eq run, or cash run or book run" or something, the zone will always be done the same way, and the only difference between doing it now or doing it 5 wipes ago is the % rate that the equipment loads at. If that's not boring, I'm not sure exactly what is. Whatever happened to immortals wanting to challenge the players and throwing in an extra nomagic room or DT or secret passage or something at random? Sure in many cases it was cruel and unusual punishment for the first clan to discover the changes, but it's also a great way to keep players on their toes and interested in zoning. And to those of you who die from these changes and lose some nice equipment (that you loaded in boring eq runs that you nearly slept through) and decide you should quit the game or quit doing that zone because of it, I feel sorry for your lack of interest in one of Arctic's finest features: Zone Exploration.

I whole heartedly agree. If zones could become so dynamic that a DT room could be thrown in every so often that would rock. Imagine a zone leader leading a group of people into a crush room. OH my freaking god could you imagine the spam during the explaination of that? Not to mention the eq distribution that could possiably result from quitters. Those who say the hell with this I quit!

Enubis

It'll be easier to re-distribute equipments by making every big mobs having pwk and eating the corpse after that. Simple to implement. Straight to the point. But like random DT, doesn't improve the game play at all.

------
Gulca stops following you.

They already have a couple mobs sorta like this - unfortunately they don't eat the eq, just kill everyone in the room.

~Rorc

I don't see how a creative effort to constantly improve zones (not limited to adding random DTs of course) would not improve gameplay, I think it would drastically improve gameplay on the whole. Imagine global events, like for example, the knights of Solamnia assaulting the dark knight outpost and storms keep. This could temporarily change the zones so that when you arrived at DKO you would find an army of solamnic knights fighting an army of dark knights and you could participate or sneak by them and trash their zone. However, the dark knights being prepared for an assault by the knights may have set traps in their zones or hired more soldiers... the possibilities are endless, and I can't imagine that it would be too difficult to implement these global events on a fairly regular basis, since there are quite often global events related to hollidays, games, chaos day, etc.

Some of my favorite times on Arctic involved these changes you talk about. There really was a battle between good and light in Storm's Keep. Tarsis was attacked by Shadows and a New Tarsis was reborn out of the Shadows.

During Hallowe'en week it used to be dangerous to hang around Solace because random REALLY tough mobs would attack you in the inn.

I remember chasing some God character thief (he stabbed for like 400 on a standing tank and ALWAYS one-stabbed casters) around the mud. He killed SO many of us. It was a change from the regular routine.

I'm playing a thief this wipe, and I have to say, it's been fun seeing what I solo with a thief that I can't do easily with a dk. I've noticed that a DK can handle solo many rooms that would eat a thief alive, but takes SO long to do it.

Back to zone information though, the original point of this thread.

I found that site Terk was talking about, largely because when he mentioned it existed, I took extra special care to see if I can find it. The features I use, more often than not, are the item searches. Oh I need a +health item, okay let's search the link and find out where one loads.

Absolutely nothing anyone would consider elite is listed by this site. It has tonnes of items, but the best item I found (and popped 2 of) was a +2 hitroll wrist worn item. I had some fun finding the zone it was supposed to have been loaded in, and exploring the zone a bit to find the item itself, which surprisingly, took like 2 hours. I never even would have found this zone if this website hadn't mentioned it existed.

What makes this site acceptable to me is that it is incomplete. If a site like this existed and it listed ALL of the items, and where to find them, it wouldn't be fun. The fact it lists some of the items of the game, and allows you the thrill of trying to find them, is the cool part.

Dave

Education replaces force with reason.

This used to happen alot more than it does now. I think one of the big problems is that its underestimated how much time it takes to really set something like that up, a time commitment of some people willing to control some of the mobs, etc. Another problem was unappreciative players complaining about the caliber of rewards that resulted from quests like these.

My biggest gripe about information is the fact that anything that becomes well known is inevitably changed. Items and keywords are the most likely victims of their own fame.

I think stuff you mentioned like random dts, secrets exits etc wouldn't rock, in fact they would suck bigtime and the moment they went in everybody, including those in favor now, would scream hell. It boils down to what people want, which is:

[b]MAXIMUM DAMAGE[/b]

This means equipment and spells. Some people (few) like exploring new zones and learning their secrets, but once they learn them, they want to keep the knowledge and invest on the time they spent there (even if this is just the time it takes to read a zoneinfo file). They don't want changes, unless their enemies have already found the same secrets and they have some ahem ahem way of learning the new kw/exits etc faster than the competitors. This is how it is and if you don't agree I don't mind because you don't exist!

YES!
And oeoe.
Where is my mind? O-eo?

one way to ahem ahem learn new secrets is to ahem ahem explore
some people explore more than they zone
some clans actually explore
but the majority of people want: Levels, Ranks, Coins, shinies
and will spend more time re-lvling, re-popping shinies, etc than exploring

Heres a thought, remove decay and make sure every item in game is fragable?

So all it'd take to keep my perfect set forever would be to get: imm_heat, Imm_acid, imm_cold, and imm_elec.

Then I could be super and never have to worry about repoping any gear and can spend more time focusing on getting spare items for alts - for when gear frags.

~Rorc

or maybe Matthew was following in the vein of Drakantus and meant that equipment would be fraggable by melee damage, and use as melee as well ... so every item would have to have a durability score, and be repairable anywhere ...

no

Doesn't work that way. If you have an imm_heat sword all that means is the sword won't get fragged by heat, your other stuff will. Good luck finding even a single item with imm to every form of equipment damage.

Affects immune_electricity = I cannot be hit by electricity. Effects immune_electricity = it cannot be damaged by electricity. So, if I get one that's Affects immune_electricity (along with the other immunes) then i cannot be hit by a frag, which means that my equipment can't be hit by a frag . . .

~Rorc

True, and you would also be completely immune to all magic damage. The lack of item decay is only a tiny problem compared to how overpowered it would be to have a completely immune character.

I think it's impossible, because you can only get immune items of a couple types in certain slots.

Anyway, even with immune of every kind, your gear still gets fragged from physical damage.

[color=blue]If you can get a full set of eq with all those resists, sure. It'll work in theory.[/color]

Umm - we've had chars like this in the past:
Immune_Heat bodyworn (also available on belt or held)
Immune_elec held (also available in other forms)
Immune_cold legworn (also available in aboutworn)
Immune_acid shield

And as for the physical damage part - repairs are cheap, and there's at least 1 mob in the game to repair each item.

~Rorc

You don't have immune_magic.

ok, so add feetworn, aboutworn, armworn, and ranks

Still not that hard. . .

~Rorc

Information sites used to matter, but not anymore.

I don't think anyone zones anymore except for people who know all the zones. Maybe kos and myth zone once a week, but not from what I've seen. If I went and posted a file that I have collected for years that has some zones like istar and dun mir in it no one would even run the zones heh. What I mean is there are no new clans, no new players, no competing clans, and information means nothing anymore because no one has any [b]motivation[/b] to play. Of course you will probably disagree with me and if so maybe I should just post the info to test my hypothesis. What harm could it possibly cause? Only harm to the creators (who I could care less about) and to the players who actually spent the time learning the zones (props to these guys for spending the hours of painful time to figure shit out, I know I never would).

Then why don't we see people with every immune running around the mud? Oh, thats right, it's damn near impossible.

Sure, it's easy in theory. In practice, you might get it if you are the leader of a major clan. Otherwise, no chance. And even if you do get immune to every form of magic, physical attacks can still kill you and frag your gear.

since we're theorizing in the land of dragons and nymphs,
if you were the leader of a (the) major clan
and managed to get all these items
(assuming of course there were no alignment/gender/class restriction issues)
i think it'd be safe to say you'd also have a nobash and be lim_dam
not to mention a clan of fodder to rescue you .... it would take a lot of single rounds of lim_dam'd melee to frag an item

OK, well I read through about 1/2 the files on this list. Basicle there's 2 standpoints, and Im trying to be objective about this:

A:Clan's who dont want to share there zones/"elite/tenured" players who spent allot of time exploring and want to force everyone else to do the same.

B:People who are willing to share information on all but the most elite zones and feel that they shouldnt have to be arround to have info shared.

Im a little from column A, a little from column B.

I was anoyed on the shining path (which is now pw protected, anyone knows how to join, Id love to get back in, I Go explore lowbie zones for fun and love"d the help it gave) gave away info regarding the Ergoth quests, that the encyclopedia gave away walkthroughs on thiewar, dko, exc. Granted, allot of this has changed, the information was vague from the start, and the quests in ergoth are kinda confusing, I was still anoyed that people had a hand up over me.

I think we can reach a middle ground on all this. Part of it does cause the imms more work in changing zone locations, kw's exc from time to time on high lvl zones. Part of it should include pw protection over clan databases (I hear mavlad has a compleate list of basicle all eq in game, and its not given out other than by a item by item basis, smart choice, tedios, but smart)

Limit eq is always going to be limited, so 100 people a day spam a zone, well, that sucks but there's currently 50 a day spamming it now.

Personally, I'd love to see the shinning path assimilated into the arctic sight. I dont think in most respects to much info was being given out. You still have to explore some what, if it wasnt for that, I would have never learned Kal cem or aghar caverns to name a few, and those are generally mid lvl zones.

It is hard to get a exploration group going anymore with the low player base. this would not only inspire new players with fun and exiting quests, but give veterans who dont belong to a major clan to load atleast decent eq so they might group with them and learn higher end zones they can in turn lead ounce they figure out kw's exc.

Im in KOS, we learn solly by exploration on our quests, its fun but tedios, sometimes, you just dont want to spend a month figuring out Largus by yourself, its imposible, it can take 3 months to find a group to explore it, and maybe 6 months to find someone willing to teach it.

Ok, Ill stop ranting, you get the point.

A couple thoughts on this. One, while exploring zones and learning secrets yourself is a lot of fun, some of the keywords are just silly. It seems they have been made especially tough to figure out for the sole purpose of being tough. Take for example a fictitous zone with a with a large tree. You look at the tree. "looking closer you see the tree has notches carved into it, like footholds". You look at the footholds "they have been carved to allow someone to get to the top of this tree". So you start: climb tree. no good. scale tree. no good. use footholds. no good. And this goes on. I have found myself on thesaurus.com to try and figure out words compatible with 'lift' and 'move' it's just silly. They are all synnonyms, why should only the most obscure word for move work?. Now in this case.. make the hard part to look at the tree and realize there are footholds in the first place.. not to figure out how to climb them... when you KNOW that is their whole purpose! I think many keywords should have aliases so the multiple phrases that all mean the same thing will work. Or if somehow the verb 'move' is used, when 'shift' is required... give some feedback to at least hint us in the right direction. It reminds me of some spoof I saw on muds somewhere, about a guy complaining how he was not intelectual enough to play muds. You enter the room.. you see ye flask sitting here. ok, 'get ye flask'. the game responds 'you cannot get ye flask'. And so he comments "here I spend my afternoon contemplating and trying to understand why I cannot get ye flask".

Second though, is that I almost exclusively solo. I do not participate in clans, and most of the people I deal with are neutrals. While people in clans, or who involve themselves with groups can share all their knowledge on secrets and keywords, a neutral doesn't have access to any of this. But when he yells for help it will get him in trouble. I guess my point is just that the information is being shared anyways. I do not have a problem with sites that offer hints to the riddles at the least. I don't know what the correct balance between outlawing all info sharing and legalizing it in all forms is.

You realize, if a keyword is too obscure and makes no sense, you can always submit an IDEA on it to see if it will be updated. Sometimes creators think a keyword is totally obvious, and it is, to them . . . If the creator didn't include a keyword that would make more sense, there's always an option to have it changed. . .

~Rorc

~Rorc

Dran is committing copyright infringement on Homestarrunner and StrongBad.

I would prefer you use the BUG command for that sort of thing.
The idea file is a difficult monster to tackle, and I only go through them monthly.

I didn't bother to read all of the posts, and I probably won't, so I'll just post my comment.

As someone who has been around Arctic for many years I can say that I personally found that site very interesting. The first thing people need to realize is that that site was for their clan only and as such was password protected (atleast... I believe it was) when the clan was up and running. What they did was nothing more than what EVERY clan in the history of Arctic (or ANY other game for that matter) has done, they gave info to their members to help improved the clan. The main difference is that they had someone who was dedicated enough to take the time to create such a nice site to help make the process easier.

Did I learn anything new from that site? Sure did, and I'm glad I was told about it. I mostly just looked at the directions to various zones so that I could go explore them first hand, without looking at any of the other details. The site got me interested in simply exploring a new zone again and I loved that. But, that's the kinda gamer I am, I don't go around looking up spoilers and such before I have experienced a game first hand and simply enjoyed it the way it was meant to be played.

Now, even though as a veteran player the site didn't spoil anything, that doesn't mean I agree with such info being public. I have no problem with basic info that the general populace knows (such as the nook), but when it goes into great detail about how to do this and that.... then I draw the line. Newbies should have to learn something first hand even if the experienced players want to force feed them everything just to make them better fodder right away.

We all know that most veteran players want to simply steam roll every single zone, even the brand new ones, because they are soo damn jaded anymore. But I really enjoy just taking it SLOW and exploring a zone so that I can see how well made (or how crappy lol) it is. At times that has been very hard since most of my friends have been playing Arctic since the Shriner days and all they wish to do is find out what eq loads and if it'll give them an edge.

Getting a player to earn the game info rather than look it up is like trying to get a kid to eat his brussel sprouts. Yes it's overall good but many many people don't like that sort of thing even though it is good for them. Now if you want to "addict" a lots of kids, you give out candy not brussel sprouts. Game info sites are like candy. If Terk wants addiction, the game info sites a great for that. If Terk wants players to earn their stripes then the game info sites hurt that. But does anyone really believe that back in the day when there were lots of clans and addicts running around, they were big into exploring over info sharing? The game info policy simply does not fit with the goal of addiction.

Clans have been sharing game info for years and collected the lion's share of addicts - the imms must know this. But the straw that breaks the camels back is when the site is available to the public. Now if clans can share game info for years in a "members only" area, why can't the unclanned do so to the same degree? Alternately, if the public isn't allowed to share game info, why don't the clans have a similar restriction? Whether the imms decide to uphold the pure game info policy or allow players to become more easiliy addicted, a level playing field in terms of "allowable conduct" is all I ask.

Obiwan never told you.

I can imagine a way that will make both party happy.

For the new arctic site, there should be a section where people can submit their own adventures for each zone.
The submitted text will be reviewed by a staff member who will be sure that not every key info is revealed.
This tale of each adventure could give a basic hint about the whole zone (about where to go, what is the goal, what to look for, etc... you get my idea) but won't reveal specific keywords or tactics for battles against mobs.

Then a new player comes and going to check the list of zones and he can see if a zone has submitted adventurer tales. Maybe it will urge the player to explore this zone as well... OR urge the player to explore the zones that has NO tales submitted yet, so he can make the first one!

This would also provide a good and fun read for a few minutes each day :)

imagine the adventures some players would have...

"I was wandering this field of mice, moose, and dingos...when an OUTLINE attacked me! I didn't know what to do! If you're going to enter this area, I suggest you beware of any outlines you see!"

or maybe from Corey's perspective...

"So I was eating this box of cookies, when I saw someone walking around my area that I roll new characters in. I promptly popped 3 more cookies in my mouth while I cast invis on myself. Then I killed him, ate more cookies, and took the board from his corpse. If you need the board and its not on the ground, you can find it in someones corpse. *CHOMP CHOMP* C is for Cookie, that's good enough for me, oh cookie cookie cookie starts with C!"

If we had a moderated forum dedicated to "tales" where the imms could review the content, it would give the info-sharers and seekers a "legitimate" context for this. The imms could regulate and remove information kind of like the way the government regulates and taxes booze and smokes. And just like the government knows if they are too loose, they lose too much revenue but if they take too much (or prohibit the stuff) it just goes underground and out of jurisdiction. The imms would then actively decide whether to generously allow info and risk spoiling the games or to aggressively remove info and risk people going elsewhere.

Obiwan never told you.

It works the other way as well. Just think about prostitutes and Amsterdam :)