24 Jun, 2013, khyldes wrote in the 1st comment:
Votes: 0
It's 2013 and the number of codebases available to start a mud are staggering. If you were to choose an existing codebase to start a mud from, what would it be and why?

Just looking for peoples thoughts and opinions.
24 Jun, 2013, Dovkan wrote in the 2nd comment:
Votes: 0
Being new to the community, I would go with rom or smaug. Mainly due to the fact that I, personally, find them easier to work with and more flexible for windows users, such as myself.
24 Jun, 2013, plamzi wrote in the 3rd comment:
Votes: 0
khyldes said:
It's 2013 and the number of codebases available to start a mud are staggering. If you were to choose an existing codebase to start a mud from, what would it be and why?


You have the power to make that list a whole lot shorter. Start with what you want to accomplish, how much you are willing to learn vs. how much you want to play to your existing strengths, how much content you are willing to create vs. adapt.

Without knowing what you want, any thoughts and opinions you get from others may only serve to make your choice more difficult, or else take you down a path you don't really want to go.
24 Jun, 2013, Rarva.Riendf wrote in the 4th comment:
Votes: 0
Dovkan said:
Being new to the community, I would go with rom or smaug. Mainly due to the fact that I, personally, find them easier to work with and more flexible for windows users, such as myself.


Both are in 2013 awful choices. Using C for a text game is asking for problems for no reason at all. And I dont know about SMAUG, but ROM is full of choices that were made when computer had no memory nor storage at all, hence a lot of clever tricks that are nowadays not only useless, but even downright awful to work arounnd when trying to expand the engine.

And in the virtual machine era, you dont care too much about platform as well.

I would not suggest a codebase to start in, but suggest the one you should avoid: all the one in C.
Only thing I would suggest though, is trying to find one that also works easily through a brownser.
24 Jun, 2013, Kelvin wrote in the 5th comment:
Votes: 0
khyldes said:
It's 2013 and the number of codebases available to start a mud are staggering. If you were to choose an existing codebase to start a mud from, what would it be and why?

Just looking for peoples thoughts and opinions.


You're going to get all kinds of arbitrary answers to this question, but you have yet to outline what kind of game types you're talking about. A Roleplay Intensive? A talker? A hack 'n slash? A futuristic space explorer? What kind of game are we talking about, here? Various codebases are more geared towards certain usage cases.
24 Jun, 2013, khyldes wrote in the 6th comment:
Votes: 0
This wasn't supposed to be a hard question, and I'm not looking for advice on codebases, I already have a fully functioning mud. It was simply a question/poll to see what YOU would choose and why. I don't want recommendations based on MY preferences, but YOUR own. Simple.
24 Jun, 2013, plamzi wrote in the 7th comment:
Votes: 0
khyldes said:
This wasn't supposed to be a hard question, and I'm not looking for advice on codebases, I already have a fully functioning mud. It was simply a question/poll to see what YOU would choose and why. I don't want recommendations based on MY preferences, but YOUR own. Simple.


I prefer people not patronizing me after wasting my time with an ambiguous post.
24 Jun, 2013, khyldes wrote in the 8th comment:
Votes: 0
Or you could get off your high horse and just answer the question if you want to participate in the conversation. If you don't want to participate and feel like your opinion is too valuable to share with others, go do something else.
24 Jun, 2013, Ssolvarain wrote in the 9th comment:
Votes: 0
I'd still pick ROM. It's where I came from, it's where I am, and it's what I plan to continue with.

and lol@plamzi. Your poor, poor, valuable time. :lol:
24 Jun, 2013, Rarva.Riendf wrote in the 10th comment:
Votes: 0
khyldes said:
This wasn't supposed to be a hard question, and I'm not looking for advice on codebases, I already have a fully functioning mud. It was simply a question/poll to see what YOU would choose and why. I don't want recommendations based on MY preferences, but YOUR own. Simple.


Useless question, depends on too many parameters.
24 Jun, 2013, Omega wrote in the 11th comment:
Votes: 0
Personally, these days, with programming the way it is, scripting languages, the simplicity of expansion, I'd personally choose none of the existing, and write from scratch. Oh wait, thats what I did.

This is a question that cannot be answered in one way or another. I was a ROM mud player, I ran ROM muds for years, so if I had to pick a mud base to start with, and creating my own wasn't an option….. I would chose ROM. But that is simply history. Now if ROM wasn't an available option, I'd go with socketmud, or something that is stripped down so I wouldn't have to do it myself. Core frame work aside, I'm the build it yourself type of guy. I re-invent the wheel every chance I get. Hell, I just rewrote my FileIO system, not because I had to, because I wanted to. (plus it was better suited as a C++ system… but thats just me)

Anyways, I digress. The point is, a question like this is a hard one to answer, and for everyone here, you will have a different reason why they chose the reason they did. Of course thats the reason isn't it.

So to answer you properly, why I would choose rom if I couldn't write ground up.
  • Simple

  • Clean

  • Poorly Documented but easily followable.

  • Lots of addons available

  • Lots of guru's with the base

  • Easily portable to C++ (really, it is)

  • Skills / Spells already balanced

  • Light on memory/hd requirements

  • And finally
  • Because I already know this base


  • Honestly, if I didn't know it, I would probably chose something a little more complete, or a little more up to date, like RaM.
    24 Jun, 2013, quixadhal wrote in the 12th comment:
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    If I were to start a real MUD, with the intention of getting people to play it, I'd be tempted to use Minecraft.

    Yeah, you heard me.

    People around here seem to be edging more and more towards having graphical cuteness in their MUD clients, to the point that there have been arguments in other threads for not only moving to HTML5, but making text *not* be the defining feature that makes these games MUDs. If you're going to go that far, why screw around with telnet and text systems at all?

    In the past, the argument has always been that we're not artists, and we can't afford to make all the graphical assets needed for even a small game. Things like Minecraft show that this is no longer the case. Sure, the graphics aren't amazing like a AAA title, but they get the job done… and more importantly, they give you a world with enough basic physics to immerse the players, and easy ways to let them build and/or destroy the environment.

    Minecraft, as shipped, is just barely a game. It's really just "LEGO's with zombies". But, the modding community continues to plug away at adding all kinds of new features, many of which bring it pretty close to a playable RPG. This is without direct access to the source code, mind you.

    The alternative, if I didn't care so much about players and wanted to stay in the text genre, would be to figure out which available driver/mudlib combination would be the easiest to modify so that it no longer used TELNET, but instead sent data packets to a custom client. That custom client would use ncurses and thus have full control over the terminal window. That would allow maps, multiple scrolling regions, character status displays, and single keystroke commands, where typing things out would be left for interactions that required it.
    25 Jun, 2013, Kelvin wrote in the 13th comment:
    Votes: 0
    khyldes said:
    This wasn't supposed to be a hard question, and I'm not looking for advice on codebases, I already have a fully functioning mud. It was simply a question/poll to see what YOU would choose and why. I don't want recommendations based on MY preferences, but YOUR own. Simple.


    This doesn't lessen the ambiguity at all. This thread is absolutely useless without some context.
    25 Jun, 2013, khyldes wrote in the 14th comment:
    Votes: 0
    The context was a poll of opinion.

    Quote
    If you were to choose an existing codebase to start a mud from, what would it be and why?


    There isn't a double meaning there or an open form of discernment to be made. If you're too elitist and would rather nitpick over the supposed context of a question based on how you decided to read it in your moment of self-imposed superiority then move on. The fact that you would rather turn a simple question, a simple poll, if you will, into an argument over the meaning of the question instead of just contributing is pathetic.
    25 Jun, 2013, plamzi wrote in the 15th comment:
    Votes: 0
    khyldes said:
    Or you could get off your high horse and just answer the question if you want to participate in the conversation. If you don't want to participate and feel like your opinion is too valuable to share with others, go do something else.


    You can imagine me on a high horse, or you can imagine me with two children, two games in development, and still trying to help someone whose OP's most likely interpretation was that they were looking for a codebase.

    This is *still* the most likely interpretation, because why else would anyone care what other people think. As you can see, several other people interpreted it that way and took their time to respond. If instead of telling people why you want to know, you invite them to leave the thread, I'm sure your next thread will get the attention it deserves.

    P. S. Also, I prefer real coding to hypothetical questions.
    25 Jun, 2013, khyldes wrote in the 16th comment:
    Votes: 0
    Quote
    P. S. Also, I prefer real coding to hypothetical questions.


    Yet here you are trolling.. then again we all cant put skins on top of circlemud and claim we reinvented the wheel.
    26 Jun, 2013, Lyanic wrote in the 17th comment:
    Votes: 0
    khyldes said:
    Quote
    P. S. Also, I prefer real coding to hypothetical questions.


    Yet here you are trolling.. then again we all cant put skins on top of circlemud and claim we reinvented the wheel.

    I don't think plamzi, or anyone else in the first 15 posts of this thread were trolling. You asked an ambiguous question, then blamed everyone else for misinterpreting it instead of blaming yourself for phrasing it poorly. Now, you're even resorting to personal attacks, which could be construed as trolling.
    26 Jun, 2013, Davion wrote in the 18th comment:
    Votes: 0
    khyldes said:
    Quote
    P. S. Also, I prefer real coding to hypothetical questions.


    Yet here you are trolling.. then again we all cant put skins on top of circlemud and claim we reinvented the wheel.


    Most people who come to this website are seeking some kind of help, or greater opinion to gather inspiration. It's incredibly rude to treat others like this when they simply want better parameters and a better understanding to help you. Even if that wasn't the purpose of your post, it was not clear in the beginning.

    That said, with everything there is going on out there, I'd probably write something from scratch based off one of the bare bones codebases. I'm rather partial to Python so, I'd probably go with Miniboa as a starting point. If I wanted something more fully featured, I'd go with Evennia, because I'm also partial to Django. I would steer clear of the old C bases. They require a ton of work to simply get to where I'd want them to be.
    26 Jun, 2013, Idealiad wrote in the 19th comment:
    Votes: 0
    PlainText is a valid option for a C++ core with JS scripting. Arend has put a lot of work into it.
    26 Jun, 2013, Rarva.Riendf wrote in the 20th comment:
    Votes: 0
    khyldes said:
    The context was a poll of opinion.

    Quote
    If you were to choose an existing codebase to start a mud from, what would it be and why?


    There isn't a double meaning there or an open form of discernment to be made. If you're too elitist and would rather nitpick over the supposed context of a question based on how you decided to read it in your moment of self-imposed superiority then move on. The fact that you would rather turn a simple question, a simple poll, if you will, into an argument over the meaning of the question instead of just contributing is pathetic.


    Still useless question. I will pick the most apropriate codebase for my goal, sometimes even if I dont know the langage it is coded in. That was a useful answer, right ?
    0.0/74