So the other day, some newbie (Riven, I want to say) was commenting on the newbie's aether that the map wasn't working, and further inquiries informed us that he as blind. Sadly, myself and another thought this was in-game blindness, and finding out otherwise generated an awkward pause, during which I believe the newbie left.

Are there any resources/links to direct future blind players to? I did a bit of searching in the forums, but didn't find anything, though I might have missed it. It'd be nice if there was (is already?) an in-game help file for this sort of thing, also.

Thanks!

Sounds very similar to a person I met not too long ago. I habitually tell novices to use their maps in order to learn the forest since it can be confusing at first, but this person said he couldn't read maps and I immediately suspected he might have been blind.
I noticed when I spoke to him he didn't respond because the second it happened, a bunch of power was added to the nexus (causing spam). I was wondering how they really deal with a lot of the text spam that comes and how they process all that information. Reading something like a map is next to impossible as well.
Are there things we can do to make Lusternia more accessible for the visually impaired?

We do have the pathing system (HELP PATHS), though this is limited to the preset landmarks, unless your org has a chelp with room numbers. I'm interested in seeing what other ideas you guys might have.

Speak to Faragan in future. He's an extremely intelligent player who is also blind. (And is always willing to help.)

He truly awesome.

If some of our blind players want to tell us (or have a more sighted individual share with us on the forums) some of the things they think are important to know for getting into Lusternia, I'm sure we'd be happy to make a helpfile for such players.

In the past, I've often told guides they can suggest the novice talk to Faragan. As Draylor says, he's very helpful and eager, and very smart.

One thing to remember about those who use screen readers, for us who do not need to, is that they often type phonetically. Occasionally I know Aison and others have had to point this out, because people think they're just illiterate.

I've helped a blind player recently and one of the hardest things I've discovered in helping them get around is the limit on the pathing system? i.e. helping them get to Tosha Monastery from Hallifax meant I had to get them to path to Estelbar, then Toronada, then Rockholm, then Talthos and then it was easier.

Over time you might be able to learn, I don't know myself, how a blind person's mind thinks but after a few years I barely have to look at an in game map on another mud I play, except when rooms change / update..but this limit of rooms is quite hard on learning? I don't think you can even path to Avechna from the bottom of the mountain because it's so spread out.

I don't currently know how they're managing with influencing, but learning to sip and argue and all that is quite hard because he had the prompt turned off because it was too spammy to deal with which meant he couldn't know when his ego was getting low. He didn't mind keeping trying and eventually had a few successful battles...my ability to help was limited as I don't understand the challenges very well. I'll direct him to Faragan next time I see him around too, maybe he knows better. I assume the same problems might come up in general fighting now that I think of it..

There was a time before maps and pathing.

In fact, they're pretty new!

Eventru:

There was a time before maps and pathing.

In fact, they're pretty new!

Believe they were introduced in late 2007, possibly early 2008. I know it was around the time when I first started playing.

Astrina:
I don't currently know how they're managing with influencing, but learning to sip and argue and all that is quite hard because he had the prompt turned off because it was too spammy to deal with which meant he couldn't know when his ego was getting low. He didn't mind keeping trying and eventually had a few successful battles...my ability to help was limited as I don't understand the challenges very well. I'll direct him to Faragan next time I see him around too, maybe he knows better. I assume the same problems might come up in general fighting now that I think of it..

If they do CURING ON, CURING AUTOHEAL ON, CONFIG PROMPT OFF, they'll automatically sip h/m/e as needed without getting a prompt.

For stuff where you need a prompt, you'll probably want to either set it up (or get someone to set it up for you) so that prompt text (and everything else you don't want read out) is gagged before being sent to the auto-reader. And you'd also want a really good client-side automapper/autowalker.