The Mana World Forums

Who wrote master plan?

Irc has always been the best way for those people that disagree with you to ddos you ip address. Once you stand up for the people you will forever have to restart you internet connections, use proxies, and run the people around until they get bored. Irc is strictly for those that are willing to follow with out question. If you are going to try to disagree with people, understand, you will be attacked. dw

DarkWater wrote:Irc has always been the best way for those people that disagree with you to ddos you ip address. Once you stand up for the people you will forever have to restart you internet connections, use proxies, and run the people around until they get bored. Irc is strictly for those that are willing to follow with out question. If you are going to try to disagree with people, understand, you will be attacked. dw

irc.themanaworld.org encrypts user's IP so others can not directly see them.

there is over 1.5 billion gp in tmw economy(bank + what players carry)...much like real life where a very few control 95% of the wealth....
These money sinks in the game do little to promote these bug money hoarders to spend,
while at the same time punishing the remaining players who are not hoarding old bug money.
At present the economy is a shambles, instead of DEVs deleting old bug money or say money over 50 mill even...the resulting policies of money sinks and high npc prices are taking a serious toll on the mana world.

I'm not particularly rich (can't afford a crown/skull) but the problem doesn't seem rooted to rich players or players who hoard items. As I've said before in a different topic, there's an assumption that quests "NEED" to be harder for everyone or require more items/money because some players are rich. This is just WRONG. Just make the quests as you would for non-rich players. It doesn't matter that rich players will complete the quests sooner than others. You just hurt the ones that aren't rich or have many items.

Unobtainable rares, are unobtainable. You can only lose them unless they're reintroduced into the game so of course not everyone can wear/have them. Players will always charge what they want and if people want to pay high amounts for unobtainables that's their choice.

No matter how you look at it, players that have worked harder and longer to get lots of money or lots of items and continue to work hard will get more than those that don't have the time or won't put in the effort to get what they want. New players for mmorpg will always have a hard time catching up to old ones.

Has not a topic for this been made at least twice?

Things are fine the way they are being ran. There's just too few people helping.
It has been talked about so much that it does more harm than good.
There is a shortage of devotees with enough time to at least keep up in the
midst of better things to do than read dead horse analogies.

The "main" server will be alive as long as people continue
to play it. If you want to keep it around, invite people
over. We've lost some public exposure since moving away from
sourceforge and freenode (I'm not suggesting going back
though)

For a project of about 10 active contributors here is all the work needed:

• Mantis: eA, Lua, TMWXML, and multimedia bug reports. Used in place of whining.
• Wiki: Update references and guidelines and vote on proposals at the wiki.
• tA: Manage the main server and player affairs
• Dev: Manage a running development Manaserv with fresh data
• [url=irc://irc.themanaworld.org]IRC: Idle in about 4 to 6 IRC channels to not miss info[/url]
• Git:
  git:tmw
  git:tmwdata
  git:music
  git:tmwart
  git:tmwserv-data (old?)
  git:client-data (also a -dev under +tmw-admins)
  git:server-data (also a -dev under +tmw-admins)
  git:tmw-eathena
  git:tmwart
  Keep track of, and manage about 9 or more repositories (more if you code for Manasource)
• Forums: Sift through the forums

The list may not look very long... but this is the load of a small corporation (more-so considering our role in the software community)
It's not easy to be "just an artist" or "just a coder"... or "just a GM" even. Once you're under, it is all as a whole relevant to
whether or not effort would be for naught.

To me there seems to be about 5--10 routine coders, Maybe up to 20 when Wombat can request scripts.
So, despite Manasource being their own separate project, they are pitching in.

Artists!! Great Music, graphics, and dialogues are a heart-felt creation that requires isolation from mundanity and tight logic
I read a good remark on IRC that artists have a social interest in creativity, coders are only a little different.
The bad-reactions are few really, Artists get bored... or they become coders instead.

それでも、Strong evidence that Jaxad0127 is not a robot:
He enjoyed this scene scape.
and he mapped the area west of Tulimshar.

The main server is not dying as long as you play it. Dismount if you think it is dead.
I'm very thankful to those who have given a donation to buy RAM.

There use to be more people, so in response to the decline I think cut-backs are in order:

• Have a solid set of fewer git repositories easy to remember and watch. Using branches more (in place of -dev and -prod)
• "Small Task" needs to continue somehow.
• Having fun instead of worrying.
• Making it easier to get gp, harder to keep (more use of ingredients)
• Cause money to be less relevant to game play than power in contrast to other players and monsters.
  What kind of NPC would want a pearl? Why would the bow maker want your filthy bat wings anyway?
  Well... might there eventually be a natural switch to a different currency like pearls?
  Wealth springs up out of nowhere when a monster dies... MONSTERS　SHOULD　BE LIKE　PLAYERS, They have things they want. Like slimes.
  Items are persistent and limited, they do not fade away or spring up out of nowhere. Consequently
  Monsters would be limited too. They would have given names with their species names.

Sorry for the scattered thoughts and topic jumping.
There's no way to "run things better" without enough help. All that can be done is "clearing off the desk" some. Things will always be changing as long as it stays a development effort. It's not a business, It is a hobby, but not a "mere" hobby.

There's also the zombie-to-dragon monster ratio making it seem more dead than it is.

Rethinking the economy into the whole ecosystem is an idea.
We as humans are accustomed to an economy of "us and everything else".
From the ground up, rethink it. Monsters don't spring items to life out of nowhere.
Items do not fade away when on the ground. Looting monsters do not loot whatever items, they have things they want. "Wild" Monsters spawn with only some of their HP, they seek heal items, specific heal items.

The world state is saved to disk to survive restarts.
Oranges can be consumed, so they can safely appear at the orange trees at times.
Resources like coal and iron are also consumable into crafts, but do not come out of thin air.
What is an example of an item that will not be consumed? Weapons and armors break,
So any item can be consumed, but for those which are not yet able to be consumed, they must not come from thin air.

All items are consumable. They can break, they can be eaten, they can be used as ingredients. So they can appear from thin air. BUT much of that is not implemented. Some items persist while appearing out of nowhere (becoming worthless) These items must not come from thin air. A limited quantity of them is allowed in the world and saved to disk. No items fade away. Dirt turns into oranges, oranges into HP, and HP into dirt. The essence is dirt then.

The monster database should have an entry for every monster that will ever be in the game.
Instead of defining "mouboo" and then making mouboos plural appear and die and reappear, let's rethink that. Instead of "mouboo" we have a CLASS "mouboo" with members "alice", "bob", and "cindy"
They are players, but bots. They have things they want (HP at first) they can grow and get stronger, and they can...

I've talked enough.

Two things. Thanks kage for clearing up the Irc thing.. It used to be an issue. Glad it is fixed. The last ddos I got was because of my ip to this forum. But Irc has been used in the past.

Bsc the main take away in your post for me was you need more people helping. I created a playerset. I was told I was not to continue by wombat. It is not that people don't want to help, it is that the people in charge, wombat and slicer, make it impossible to help. Which is one point in this thread. The current development team is failing apart because of lack of morale and leadership issues. If wombat could have controlled his ego for 5 minutes and really read what I typed, you would have a complete playerset by now. But he insisted on being a little emperor, and you have nothing. All I every asked was for feed back. I told Reid that the large area I used was for shading model, wombat told me to stop working.

The current leaders have huge ego problems and feel they need to punish those that disagree with them. You want help? All you have to do is store the ego's.

yourmistakes wrote:i think this server is definitely on it's last legs. i can't wait to make level 99 and quit.

"Will the worm succeed to eat the full apple before falling from the tree ?"

I have a doubt about the actual end of this Tale ...

• • • 

DarkWater wrote:
[...] The current leaders have huge ego problems and feel they need to punish those that disagree with them. [...]

• • • • • • Ooooohhhh ...
            
            
            
            ... Really ???

Dark Water,

There are too many playerset topics scattered across the forums all involving that same old cursed
playerset which has driven us all mad and made us sick of hearing the word. The first topic had all the
same "leadership" overtones and uppity bullshit of calling people's energetic efforts to be involved ugly whence they weren't seen again.

"Your project is screwed" is what the word "playerset" means after all that. Most the playerset topics have gone nowhere. They've all been doomed, shot down in some way, ignored, turned-off, Stava was helping... then we said the "perspective" word. And talked about making a new playerset... and poof, gone.

But I'll mention a way out of this cycle after covering "leadership"....

In other software projects there is a "Benevolent Dictator", usually the initial author, who's role is resolving disputes to keep a project from being forked.

Elven Programmer use to humbly refer to himself as "the boss" when working with contributors.
Rotonen works with contributors in a lax, cosmopolitan manner.
Wombat came close to what Crush achieved in pulling together a team.

Topics such as "Yeti monster", and "Squid" tend to go nowhere because:

• The topic wasn't started by a celebrity figure and is ignored
• The initial poster ceases to be able to carry on with the topic even if he could have done it all himself with no help. Left feeling dejected.

But when the merited, old members create topics their's are seen, and they can pull together more people. They have a reputation for getting data into the game. The reason why Wombat seems out of place is because he is newer than Crush or Rotonen and has only recently started merging data in with tmwdata repository, yet he has still pulled together those contributors.

If I'm correct, then TMW's vitality lies in keeping senior members active.
As you read my words, the voice you hear likely sounds like a munchkin wearing a contributor's badge.
But when you read Len's words, the imaginary voice is probably more humbling.
I'm the "little person" and he's the "old wizard". On what basis?
If I'm correct, understanding that is a key to rescuing new people from humiliation and saving their time through redirecting their efforts. If I'm right we should be able to yell stop at topics doomed to fizzle-out and instead incorporate contributors into an effort that is populated where they can get to know each other and build merit. To keep that cloud alive and feed it one task at a time.

In my mind, Rotonen and Elven are the leaders, but Wombat is like a teacher's pet, I mean no disrespect. He knows where this sense is coming from.

Though they assert the authority to "shoot down" an effort, they tend to be flexible, find a loophole, or work with the contributor towards compliance. I was working on applying the Tritan appearance to the player set, but was told to help finish the player set first, and that I could come back to Tritans. In hindsight I'm glad someone stopped me from finishing that boring recolor. Courteous demand for higher quality has helped me seek to improve my skills.

Irukard tried to work with WinnieR3 and even nominated him to be a GM (he won when the Y/N options were inverted, but later died.)

When I worked on the current playerset, it was too hard. It was taking too long. I couldn't approach it without the back of my mind taunting me with remarks. I only had 1 simple animation to do: The 2 handed sword-swinging motion. 3 XCF files and months of bit-by-bit little at a time edits were disrupted. When suddenly Stava was kicking my ass with a rapid drafting of not just 1, but several animations!
That didn't last long either...

If wombat told you to stop working on a playerset, that's not him... It's the devil. All efforts towards a complete set lose their momentum or are EMBARRASSINGLY and hopelessly abandoned.

There is a way though...
1: Don't talk about playersets.
2: Don't create any forum topics about playersets
3: Don't read the old playerset topics
4: Plot carefully when to pull a few all-nighters
5: Do not tell anyone your plans.
6: Do not post any WIP (keep the project files though)
7: Do not start drawing until you already know in your mind what it looks like and are compelled to recreate it that way.
8:
9:
10:

I work two full time jobs, working with incredibly talented people, that have the egos the size of a jet plane. What you are describing in you post is a leadership/morale issue in your work group. I may come off as pushy and demanding but I just deal with ego's most of the day. Wombat is a morale issue. This poll proves that. At some point you are going to have to ask yourself, why are we losing people? At some point you have to ask why do other servers offer more quests, items, and goods?

If the 1.5 billion gp in game number is correct, god help us. If there is really 1.5 billion you need to enforce a 75% tax on all account that have greater then 2 million. You must remove that money. Now. That is a cancer that will kill this game. 1.5 billion is like 7.5 million per account, assuming we are still pulling down about 200 people. You need to destroy that money. My god how did it get that bad?

DarkWater, I don't think wombat's request for you stop working on a player sprite was because of his ego. More of a issue that we already have at least two others working on player sprites.

There is a difference from having a large ego, and being smart by not having everyone overlapping efforts.

About the money issue we do post stats publicly daily: http://server.themanaworld.org/moneycount/

It seems the script has stopped. I just requested Freeyorp to restart it.

If I wasn't such a heartless person, reading such crap would make me cry.
Players are the lowest class? This is the only game, where players can e. g. elect GMs.
Server dying slowly? WTF. There are 82 players online or more.
Not to mention that we do not go offline for a month without any message to players when the server is being DDoSed, like the others do. ;-)
You are complaining that you need time and money to earn things here? No comment on that.
Mindless moaning I am classifying as spam.
And server is AFAIK managed by Jaxad and Freeyorp.

Regards.

Oh!Oh! Another idea!
TooBigToFail™

• Make an NPC with a rough snapshot of all bank-held money (s)
• This NPC offers "risky loans" for different amounts. You are asked to pay it all back + n%
• No money is taken from you, you just can't get a new loan until the old one is paid.
• Once the debt is at the threshold (t), The NPC screams something like "We're too big too fail!"
• All bank held money except i is deleted. Those who have <i lose all.
• The NPC goes to jail.

This will make money available to the poor, but rich players will be mad at poor newbies and loan bots.

Or we can remove all zeny and tell rich players to go to hell when they Female dog, wolf, fox or otter about it. (for some reason were to nice so we tell bots and multi-boxers no more than once.)