Ok, here's my problem, every so often I'll find a newbie that's seeking to get interested in combat, so what's the first thing I do? I get them to switch from Nexus and get a system.

Herein lies the problem, I used to reccomend MUSHclient and Treant because they were free and easy to use but now Treant isn't available, both Nezhas and Ethelons free systems appear to be quite out of date so I can't go suggesting them and I can't seem to find any good free systems for MUSHclient, so obviously I should reccomend they go over to of the other clients.

But I don't know the other clients nor any of the systems that go with them, so can anyone suggest which systems are good for each client for me? Would be much appreciated.

As a side note, how good is the paid version of AG? I figure I'll have to update to that at some point, that or switch clients entirely...

There's really nothing wrong with Treant, especially for a starter system. If it's not being hosted anywhere I could if Zarquan didn't have any objections. Otherwise there's really only m & m for Mudlet which is a pay system. I don't think there are any other public ones out there. AG would also be fine as a starter system, but it's not free and does have some issues from what I've heard.

It is unfortunate that Treant isn't being worked on any longer, but then again I really can't blame him for stopping.

He took it down from what I could tell, otherwise this wouldn't really be much of an issue.

Apparantly now the system is only being sent to established Seren players so that seems to make it clear he would mind someone hosting it, hence why I've not just given the newbies my copy (That and I don't have the instructions, I suppose)

And really, nothing else out there? Well that's a bit... Annoying, gonna make it a lot harder to get younger people into combat

I know he took it down from his site, I didn't know that he was only distributing (I'm assuming updated) copies to Serens. I haven't used Treant in a LONG time, so I haven't kept up. If that's the case, then I guess it's not an option. The instructions are easy enough, though. Anyhow, yeah, that's it as far as I know. Maybe Vadi is more aware of some free Mudlet ones coming down the pipe. There were a few being developed before that I was semi-paying attention to, but they haven't blipped on my radar for quite some time. Like I said, it's a shame there's not a maintained free system right now, as it is good for the newbies to get their feet wet without their brains exploding, but them's the breaks.

He's not really distributing it to Serens either. He's giving copies to people he feels it's okay to give it to, and that's it. There's no updates; he's said that if people will help get him the triggers it lacks he will integrate them, but so far, no one has. Right now there simply isn't a free system available, so I think you'd just have to switch your advice away from free systems, at least until/unless someone else offers one. I think we've gotten spoiled, and it's not normally something you can take for granted that there's going to be a competitive system available for free for a game like Lusternia.

An autosipper is all that's really needed for starters. I know Janalon made one for Mudlet somewhere a while back, I'm sure there are ones for MUSH as well. (not sure about Nexus, but I have a free one for Achaea, so it could be adapted for here if you know Nexus scripting).

Otherwise, my system wouldn't be a bad bet to start with for later, as well.

Well, I've been working on a system for mudlet that will use firstaid to cure afflictions. I'm pretty much a newb at coding though, so it's not perfect, and I don't have -near- enough lines yet, but it's something. If it's alright with Vadi, I'll steal the lines (affliction symptoms and cure messages) from m&m and put it up soon.

For taking the aff lines and symptoms - as long as there's appropriate credit given, that's alright then.

I still have my zMUD system that I'll hand out from time to time if people ask me about it. I tried making it more user-friendly for other people for awhile, but that got boring.

I don't want the system hosted or passed around, but it's not like I can really know you're doing it unless word gets back to me, and even then, what am I going to do about it?

We have gotten spoiled, and that's largely my fault. Too many people can take a free system and jump right into combat, which is good on some level, but it's really not something they've earned or built if it's completely free.

So, only established members of Serenwilde are eligible to ask me for a copy of the system now. I still haven't done much to it since the last public release because I've got a whole new system I'm working from now, and I want that to eventually become the one I give out.

I recommend you find or build something very basic, allowing them to auto-sip and maybe use some firstaid or a few simple hunting cures. If they want to get into combat, they can work up to that later.

At one point I was tracking at least five Mudlet systems that were in various stages of development... two were private (Sahmiam's being one of them) with three others being worked on for an open source release. Being a Mac and Mudlet enthusiast (and very vocal about this issue in my first year of play), several people shared their code with me-- among many things a sipper. All of that starter code was nullified when my hard drive failed a while back. If memory serves correct, the Mantis project might be the only one publicly available. Ooohh, and check out Cern/Demonic's work on small "module" sized codes for Mudlet... this is a good place to get started (and MAY contain a sipper).

There's a lot of problems with Mantis though. I used that for a bit, and finally got frustrated with it and started my own.

Mantis is useful if you want a jumping-off point to building your own system. I've never been motivated enough to start from scratch, but I built off Mantis, replacing parts of it as it became needed and got decent results. It kept me alive well enough, though its not something I'd consider complete enough to give out. Maybe someday though.

I don't think Mantis is being hosted anywhere anymore. The scripts themselves are still on Google Code, but I can't access them anymore (I was an idiot and deleted my Gmail account). Currently, I'm redoing Mantis from the ground-up (again), so when it's done (and by done, I mean DONE, not beta), I'll release it out once again. Until then, just have them build a simple auto-sipper, and learn the ropes the old fashioned way, like we all had to way back when.

There is need for an OPEN SOURCE project with full copyleft, mass source backings. Not sure if anyone is willing beyond the one or two peeps that have already contributed to this project and those like it.

I'm more than willing to start hosting a project like that. We can call it something else completely, and have the community donate code to it, much like the old Project L was supposed to be.

I'm afraid you'll find a higher percentage of system-less people complain about having no systems than the percentage of possible coders contributing to an open source project. In some way or another, Zarquan, Vadi, and yourself have all added commentary about the "burnout" about offering open source/public domain systems without compensation and without anyone else to step up. Afraid it is what it is... and that's why we haven't see any projects move forward.

I bet you would see so much more involvement if coders were compensated for development... and then the project went public.

I agree with that, but it was more about limiting the amount of free time I spent in supporting my system than earning credits. Compensation is always a good motivator, but there will come a point when even that is not sufficient to keep development moving forward.

My one regret is adding so many features and options to a free system that should've stuck to the basics and given a framework for users to expand it in their own ways. In a strange way, I'm glad it doesn't have perfect curing, and I'm sure mechanical changes to the game will amplify that as time goes on.

The free systems and plugins for Mudlet are still just in their infancy, but then so is Mudlet. Good luck to you in trying the open source model for your coding projects.

First post! Woot!

I'll tentatively put my hand up and say that I'm currently working on a system for Mudlet, and I've been thinking that once the basis is working nicely and I get a decent number of triggers in that I'll put it out as open source so that others can help me work on it. I'm currently on uni break, so I can guarantee that it will be getting quite a bit of time from me over the next couple of months.

As a warning though, I'm doing it as an attempt to learn some coding and it will probably need quite a bit of reworking before it's any good. So it won't be of any use when I first release it (apart from the sipper, which currently works ok). I guess this is probably just a glimmer of hope at the moment

Anyway, I'm looking for name suggestions at the moment ( It's currently called Krankenpflegerin, which is nurse in german for those who don't know ). And quite a bit of data is taken from Treant at the moment, notably priorities since I don't know much about the game yet, so I guess I'd need Zarquan's blessing to release it for that reason.

If you're just borrowing general ideas from my code, you don't need my blessing. I just don't want others hosting or giving out my code. Thanks, though.