19 Mar, 2007, Zeno wrote in the 1st comment:
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For those who have some sort of Newbie Council (a group to help newbies) on the MUD they run, how do you manage it? Who can join? What must they have before they can join? Do they get special powers when they join (goto)? What are the rules? Do you offer rewards for joining it?

I have a Newbie Council, but I'm wondering what everyone else does. Not many people join it. So I'm looking to see if I'm doing something wrong.
19 Mar, 2007, Kayle wrote in the 2nd comment:
Votes: 0
We've got a newbie Council on MW, Venia runs it, and members receive the ability to auth new players, and they get to override the hard level limits on various areas. They also regain access to the newbie channel so that they can help new players. However, none of this has any actual benefit yet because we have no players, and Venia is an Imm anyway and can already do all of that above. >.> But that's what ours does.
19 Mar, 2007, Omega wrote in the 3rd comment:
Votes: 0
my mud has a system where players get when they log-in to the mud, are given a newbie flag, this goes away after 5 hours of play or 5 levels gained.

once you lose your newbie protection, you nolonger fall into the newbie group.

Now, we created a method to have players work on a council, where they had another flag, those with it were
able to wander in newbie area's, (nomatter their level) use newbie channels. We didn't give them goto or anything because, hey, they're players, nothing spells fun like giving players goto and watching the fun begin.


But yeah, we use a newbie council, it works when you have people who don't abuse it. There are some other commands to those in the council, aside from the ability to use the newbie-chat.

they get to see invisible newbies, and can 'outfit' them, with the newb command. gives them the basic newbie equipment if they need that level of help getting off the ground. tis a nice setup.

recommend it to everyone. :)
19 Mar, 2007, Omega wrote in the 4th comment:
Votes: 0
on your question about rules, it is very basic, they cannot give stuff to themselves, <coded in> or to other people in the council.

they can only give a newbie the newb pack of goodies once.

they cannot battle the monsters for the newbies, ie, the quest mobs.

they have no restrictions to when they are online or anything, and dear god, never give them imm commands
that was a bad situation when we did.

they join by prooving their knowledge of the mud, and being friendly with other players and staff, and have had atleast 100 hours of play-time with their main character. (that shows they know the mud big time, and not botting for like, 100 hours, actualy playing)

rewards for joining it are safety from pker's in newbie area's, aswell as getting <based on class> a skill/spell that is offlimits to everyone but those in the council.

Also certain quests become available to the council that aren't available to non-council. (as my mud is quest driven apposed to hack/slash)

you may only be a member of the council for 500 hours of game-play (seems like alot, but its not) after-which, you can nolonger be in the council, this is so that people don't abuse the system or get too well known.

pushishments for violating the rules are swift and harsh, usualy resulting in the deletion of the character in-question, and in some cases, all their characters to proove a point.

as for how we manage it, when the position is free'd up, the mud puts a message in the who saying that we are looking for a new member of the council, when we find one, we put someone in the job, when all the spots are filled, we tend to move from there.

Note on this, we try to pick people from different time-zones so that there is more often-then-not a council member online.



now as for people not wanting to join your council, doing what i did worked for me.

you could try giving council members a bonus to QP or XP gained.
Or combat a method of detecting a council member helping a newbie and give them council-points for it
that they can later use to 'purchase' unique items with.

Or you could simply say, you have to be a member of the newbie council for atleast 100 hours (and do a good job) before you can be the leader of a guild. (that one always gets people interested)

plenty of methods you can do :)
19 Mar, 2007, Zeno wrote in the 5th comment:
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The reason I haven't given rewards for being in the Newbie Council is because I believe that makes people join it for all the wrong reasons.
20 Mar, 2007, Omega wrote in the 6th comment:
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true enough, joining for the wrong reasons sucks, however, giving them a bonus, or a method to proove their worth to the mud.

Like, i won't trust someone to run a guild if they cannot help a newbie, so that is a big part for me. You can't help a newbie get better in the mud, tell them what commands do, or explain to them how the mud works. Whilst the fact that you've been playing it long enough shows that you know how, then your not qualified to run a guild, as there is allot more to it on my mud then just adding/removing people.

with that said, i do it as a way to gauge people, the rewards they get for doing it aren't nearly as great as they may seem, whoo hoo, an extra quest or two, wippy, doesn't mean much, but players think its the world.
25 Mar, 2007, Brinson wrote in the 7th comment:
Votes: 0
Once my mud is ready to open for beta (not for a while), I intend to use what is I think rather commong, the hero system. My plot is heavily deity driven, with the concept that mortals can attaint immortality if they posess the ability and knowledge required. This being said, many mortals worship immortals to suck at their power. I intend to have a stage between mortality and immortality for people of exceptional RP value to the mud who exhibit an aptitude for the plot. These people will be rp'd as a sort of weak immortal who has not yet mastered the final stage of ascension. They will be able to approve descs and will be the only people allowed to break my No-OOC rule(only for dealing with newbies, of course). They will be able to transfer newbies to them, and back to where they were, or recall them without penalty, but they won't be able to transfer to a vnum.

I don't think I'll give them goto, but I may allow them something like a scry skill to know the room of someone below a certain rank. If you can't recognize a room, you probably aren't experienced enough to be helping them.
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