Glaistig

Good. Not that you're ill, but I wasn't planning on writing any stories tonight. :P Hope you feel better.

:)) Most likely I won't even log on for another month or so.. but we'll see, won't we? It would be pretty cool to get to play MD without getting sucked in and addicted like everyone else. Right? I'd get to look at you all like little peons enslaved to the game while I'm just out here, having a good time observing and chilling. (Wow, Glai.. that was harsh. :P) What kind of stories? -.-;;

Cool, good to know.. I'm not too interested in roleplaying these days, except to observe how other people roleplay if it's a core game mechanic (which obviously it is). To be honest I'm not really looking to get drawn into MD, more visiting/'playing' just to find out what MD and its gameplay is these days. (Maybe it hasn't really changed all that much, aside from the superfluous aspects). More than anything else, I see myself as an observer. :P I'm going to head to bed now, but cool to see the responses so far!

I'm surprised anyone reads about me in the forums, since whenever I played was at least a couple years ago. @Aethon -- how new of a player are you? Since when did you join? Did you roleplay before MD? Thanks both for your insight; it's interesting to think of how a new player would approach and engage with MD these days.

informal observations so far: are politics mostly the bulk of this game? (from reading thread about power balances) players seem to mostly engage in the world by thinking philosophically about its philosphy I can see why I preferred a game world based more on the cut and dry mechanics (puzzles, combat system, game story) than such an involved roleplay/political system. too much to think about, a little abstract or too involving for an outsider to feel like delving into. so MD is more a simulation than a game for simple entertainment. mechanics are tailored towards simulation of political power, roleplaying than providing incentives to reach game goals/benchmarks (exp points for lvling up, accomplishments, etc.) "a true roleplaying game".. blergh. :P keywords to investigate: depletion killing [spoiler]Glai derails in a thought exercise: how would I change it? I don't know yet if you removed the roleplaying from MD, what would you have left? a little bit of controlled roleplaying would be fine, to add an element of gameplay above game mechanics. but, how do you control roleplaying? it spirals out of your hands and develops its own life, doesn't it? what is the ultimate ambition in MD? (of course, in this version it's to play another life, create your own character, so there is no definite endgoal. playing the character is the endgoal. but in a ver. of MD with the roleplaying element reduced, what would be the ambition in MD? forming bonds while testing combat play (card game) while exploring the story while having limited roles? a community based on a love for puzzles and innovation and exploring, while they.. while they what? build a mini-realm? protectors/adepts. hmmm not sure yet. are quests good? what if quests were more moderated, built by select few (rather than all) for the players to have objectives?) roleplaying developed naturally, wars would develop naturally, having heros/public interest figures would naturally draw interest size is a limitation; in the end, I don't know if MD could go beyond being a small realm, or even if it got bigger, it would require a lot of intensive attention having guilds would be interesting. creating characters (npcs) for players to interact with and build a world story would be interesting. but how would you avoid the development of active roleplaying and the consequent politicking? maybe some players love and cherish the politicking, the dynamism built into it, the building and interaction of their own world the magic of code / interaction with the game itself :) what is the goal in normal mmos? you fight monsters, you level up, you build alliances and guilds to fight boss monsters (potentially shaping the world?) and you do party quests to achieve an objective. sometimes some pvp for competition. classes draw some interest with specific skills assigned to each class (MD's principles underexploited here? what are creative skills mdfolk could have? gathering, spells--what spells? creating dungeons, changing maps for new areas to explore, new abilities (creating monsters/eggs, events, changing relationships)...) would require constant innovation. too exhausting I can always rely on MD to pull me into a mind trip, get me thinking :) even if the tracks my mind takes wouldn't be agreeable to most players/others.[/spoiler]

You might see me pop in once in a while, but I don't plan on doing much more than that. I'm quite busy these days! After six years, I'm mostly curious to see where the game has gone, where it is now, and what its fate is.. not necessarily to be an active player. I never really thought I would, but I'm pursuing software development now. As I told someone, one of the things I liked about MD aside from the community was how it demonstrated the creative magic (world-building) that can be made through code. So maybe thinking of software development reminded me of this game. So, I have a couple questions for you, current players. I heard this game is stagnating. What would you do to revitalize it? Say I'm a player who hasn't played for six years. I have no creatures, and little idea of how the game is played now. What are your suggestions for getting back into the game and learning more about the current MD world? What are the things I should pay attention to in this game world? This can be based on your gameplay style. This is what I see myself doing, the few times I may be around: reading dst's blog catching up with chewett reading the occasional MD forum post building up my creatures again following people's suggestions to observe current events ideally, gathering opinions, thoughts and impressions about where the game is going maybe doing a quest or two maybe make informal observations here In the past I was a heated player because I was so wrapped up and invested in the game. Now it's mostly curiosity that drives me, and I have the necessary aesthetic distance and detachment to enjoy myself on MD casually. So, I look forward to poking around MD to kill my boredom once in a rare while. Well, so now you know. If you see me, say hello :) edit: it's probably more like 5 years but the # doesn't really matter, does it? :shrug:

I didn't read all of it but it certainly seems interesting. A little more interesting than MD was in the prior days I visited it. I wish I had more time to check it out but I probably, most highly likely don't. I guess some things have gone on in recent times. Well, the LHO part is interesting. I think it's a bit high-commitment as was brought up, and has opportunities to fall through on some occasions, but MD has a way of maintaining high commitment in players while they last. The other issue is the amount of LHOs that will be needed so the attempt doesn't completely fall apart. You should get recruiting.. you can always scale back once you see that you have enough quality LHOs. But if you have too little, you risk the chance of entropy wreaking havoc on everything. However, overall, I think it's a good idea. It's a change, and something to try if you want to reel in more players. The real-life challenges is also a change that you can try, and I wouldn't be entirely against introducing it. However, I don't know if I personally would pin so much hope on it. It's novel and has merit, and can change the game, but I wouldn't make it the pinwheel of the game, even if you integrate it with the game and motivational system. As a new player, I don't know if I would be so keen to be spending time in real life doing these things as part of the game. Is it as fun as a fully-fleshed ingame system? Is it entertaining? The magic lies in fantasy.. not that there isn't merit in introducing real life into the game, but I would consider it another aspect. Not the salvaging remedy, as was the rpc system years ago. My personal opinion is to work on the ingame system. Fix the story mode, fix in-game puzzles and tests of wit and logic, fix principles or whatever they were called and battle fights and the combat system. Work on something that can truly work with all of those, community-wise or merit-rewarding, some final spin I can't visualize. Adding features, such as the irl one suggested above.. may only exacerbate the existing mismatched wonky systems that remain uncomplete by adding one more feature to the hodgepodge. However.. I haven't been here all this time, so I'm being pretty egotistic by offering my opinion. I'm sure Mur has heard this countless times. MagicDuel may never reach perfection, or completion, but it's good to see it's still kicking a couple years down the line. If one thing never changes, it's that MD keeps on changing, and it is a little interesting to see how it evolves and how the game takes shape and continues to live despite all my misgivings (once I've given up on my attachments, it's not so horrible to witness). Mur must have some drive. It will be fun to watch how the extended liberties to lho-figures kicks out. Not that I'll be watching.

Haha, I really liked reading all of this. Well, I didn't read all of it, but yeah. Reading my own response made me realize an interesting point, which pertains more to the nitpicky issue about roleplayers, in that I disliked them for exemplifying aspects of my own playing style in MD--the whole spin and drum of roleplaying in that desire for social acknowledgement, for the feeling of acceptance in a community you esteem. Seeing how this subordinated the other aspects of the game, literally, in fact, in terms of game development, and otherwise in the attitude of players toward the game, allowed me to see how it was shallow. Though I did not explicitly relate it to myself, it did lead to a sense of dissatisfaction and searching. Why was I playing MD, after all? It took a bit of internalizing to process the changes in the game, but it eventually led me to quit. There is certainly some legitimacy to roleplaying in a game. It added another dimension to MD, and it doesn't mean that players necessarily don't appreciate the more traditional aspects of its novel gameplay, battle mechanics, story, and player structure. Technically, roleplaying can be a creative exercise, and Mur's attempt to integrate it into part of the game system was another nod to MD's tradition of innovation. Isn't it natural to enjoy social interaction?--why not make a part of gameplay? I can see why other players can and will defend MD as it is now. But--it's not my thing. It requires too much suspension of disbelief for a shallow product, and I value more intellectual concepts in games than the social and dynamic alone. Yes, I enjoyed being a part of MD's community, but only while I liked that community for what it was. It's also not true that every community has its bickering and politics and drama, as some new players like to say; old MD's culture was very different from what it is now. I miss it. For further comment on the deal of roleplaying in games and MD's development, I would like to add that there is a [b]balance[/b] (eh, eh? principles!) between chaos/imagination and rote/order. MD is so innovative by part because of Mur's inclination to experiment. But as he is adding in all these elements and trying all these things, the game becomes more complex, unmanageable, and gnarly--kind of a bit like reality, eh? There is a value to that. A mini-society, how interesting, how cool. But it wears down after a while--how interesting is it when that's what you're acquainted with in real life, anyway? You can roleplay without going as far as asterisks, hence the normal sense communicated by "roleplaying games." Games by principle provide something different through rules, limits and simplification [b]in addition[/b] to fantasy and imagination: an alternate reality. I no longer see MD as an alternate reality (and I would rather see the aspect of roleplay and social play in MD executed in a more formal way). Mur has managed a bit by making his vision executable thus far. MD is a significant achievement. But I view it as unbalanced (in the end, though, since I'm disengaged from MD, I find that OK in a way--it's a compensation for MD's nature). Finally, even ignoring personal preferences in gameplay, whenever significant change occurs and a new culture takes place, it's natural that older players miss what they are familiar with and feel displaced by newer players. In addition, some changes are bound to dissatisfy any one player. It depends on a host of factors, but I guess this is what Mur would call the inevitable loss of players. Anyway, this is just a personal observation, provided to supplement my more mundane response. It looks like I've returned to my rambling habits. ;) From this you might get a better sense of what kind of person I represented in the previous MD community on the threshold of change, when it was dealing with the new roleplaying issue and game development. I used to be an incendiary anti-RP rabbler in the "stubborn old vet" school. As for why I still have some attachment to MD and bother replying to threads like this and visiting, it's the memories of good times that keep me going. :) Not MD as it is now; it's not mine any more.

Hello :)

Oh, good! You are experiencing one more level of the wonderful game we all love with the exclusion of myself, MD! Welcome, because, you know, if more people like you joined the forums, it might actually serve some sort of purpose! Meanwhile, how about getting further involved in different aspects of MD? For sure, your dedication to one of the first alliances and this newly-made decision to join the forums indicates an appreciable inclination! How about joining a project? Oh, I know, MDNP is just the thing for you! You can be a part of something that will undoubtedly somehow make MD greater, the creation of a newspaper for all MD players! What do you say? Interested? No need to be shy, of course, you can just say you are!

You know what, if stormchum can use hello topics to advertise consumption of questionable substances... Would you like to become more involved in MD without the pain of building a freaking roleplayer character or some other such useless thing? Join the MagicDuel Newspaper Project! No matter who you are and what your capabilities amount to, you can help out in some way, and contribute to a worthy cause! Ohohohoho, what fun! Just indicate your interest to receive more information! (not that stormrunner has posted yet, but he will!) Oh, and this is a hello.

Happy birthday! *uses birthday as excuse to procrastinate from working on MDNP during allotted time of 7th period class* :) But in good news, I am getting that virus removed, the one from over a month ago? The one that prevented me from working on the comp with InDesign? Yeah! My present.

Why does this feel so familiar? n____n

---the following spiel is not related to the suggestions--- Oh! That poor lost soul on Demo Account, left unanswered despite a plea for help. It's not like we can do this if someone else sends you a help request without a subject, but for the guest couldn't we just log onto the account and check the question, then send a reply in a new message? Well, it wouldn't be in the inbox itself since it's a message that's sent to you, but since you can't open the message, it would be in the outgoing messages tracker of Demo Account, right? Man, I'm so brilliant... Now I'm curious, even though we can't help the poor child anymore (since he's likely not to check that inbox now) I want to see the contents of that help request. *logs onto Demo Account to check* But it doesn't look like the message that was sent to you is still in the outgoing messages archive. D:! Did you manage to read it? What did it say? OMG SUSPENSE I'M DYING GRIDO TELL ME MAUN!