Talk:Realms of Despair

Forum link
For some reason somebody keeps removing valid information from this article. To whit, a link to a forum hosted by players of the game. This seems peculiar, especially in the light that there are other links to forums and player founded organisations in this article.

The other deletion pertains to the current status of the administration's policy. This policy can be summed up by a reference to an in game help file, Help Rights:

RIGHTS You have the right to remain silent or to hit the off button at any time.

There are also logged instances of high ranking administrators agreeing that this is the party line. If desired, these can be displayed for further verification. I'm hoping that whoever keeps vandalising the page by removing information will read this and desist. Afterall, Wikipedia is meant to be a neutral area to present information, not about furthering people's agendas or public defacements. --58.166.60.157 08:35, 17 February 2007 (UTC)


 * This is not the administrative stance for all players. That statement was only directed towards abusive, disruptive players who spoil the enjoyment of other players.  The "help" page in question was very old, not reflective of administrative policy, and has been removed.  Defamation to this article could be considered libel, and may result in punitive action.  Please keep your personal opinions to your own forums and blogs.  They do not belong here.  --Thoric 20:58, 18 February 2007 (UTC)


 * In order to prove libel, you need two components: 1) the statement made is false, and 2) loss or harm resulted from said statement. In order to bring punitive charges, proof must be given that the loss or harm was financial in nature. If you can prove a financial loss because of the statements made that you allege to be libel, then you've also proven that you're in violation of the DIKU license, to which Realms is subject. --Sammysamwfu 18:22, 20 February 2007 (UTC)


 * 1) The statement you keep placing on the article is false. 2) Punitive means punishment, and does not imply something financial.  3) With libel, the burden of proof is on the defendant.  4) Financial loss is not a requirement for libel.  5) Realms of Despair has no income, therefore there is no violation of the DIKU license.  Have you ever paid a cent to play Realms?  I don't think so.  --Thoric 21:20, 20 February 2007 (UTC)


 * Per Wikipedia policy, bulletin boards are not considered a reliable source. See Verifiability and Reliable sources for more details on what's considered acceptable, as well as Neutral point of view for information on how criticism should be presented. It doesn't matter if the claims being made are true or not -- that's not the measurement by which content gets included in the encyclopedia.  -/- Warren 21:08, 18 February 2007 (UTC)

immortals have the right to not read forum pages....or wikipedia for that matter. it'd be shame if you all spent some time improving the game, instead of running around like chickens with your heads cut off trying to stop every negative comment the players post.67.177.152.137 18:16, 20 February 2007 (UTC)Mike


 * I'm glad to see that things have calmed down. However, I'd like to point out that legal threats are against official Wikipedia policy. --GentlemanGhost (talk) 20:43, 25 November 2007 (UTC)
 * I would like to make it clear that I did not make a "legal threat". The punitive action I was referring to was within the jurisdiction of the game.  --Thoric (talk) 05:38, 27 November 2007 (UTC)

Acticle should not be deleted
Notability allows for pages which are notable within their own community group. As MMORPGs are in themselves significantly notable (i.e. numerous mentions in mainstream media, an entire South Park episode based around Worlds of Warcraft), and MUDs are the historical predecessors to MMORPGs, and MUDs in general are significant enough for a Wikipedia article, notable MUDs (i.e. MUDs which have a significant place in the historical lineage of MUDs in general), are most definitely notable, and should not be deleted. Realms of Despair is such a MUD based on the following criteria:


 * 1) Longevity - this MUD has been operating for over 13 years without going offline
 * 2) Popularity - this MUD has maintained a player base of well over 15,000 active player files for more than ten years of its operation, and had regularly surpassed 500 simultaneous player connections during its peak popularity (40,000 active player files during this time)
 * 3) Community contribution - Realms of Despair is the development ground for the SMAUG MUD code base.  This code is used by literally hundreds of active MUDs.

As for references in other media (besides being listed on a large number of websites), Realms of Despair was featured in a newspaper article in the Toronto Star (Canada's highest circulation newspaper), as well as a MUD specific magazine (The MUD Companion). It should also be noted that Google returns over 17,000 hits for "Realms of Despair". --Thoric 15:24, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

Article updates
Some ideas for updates to the article: I don't really want to write too much myself as I understand the page isn't to advertise the game, just give non-players a basic understanding of it. I expect too much fancruft could lead to the page's legitimity being questioned (again?). Lejman (talk) 22:15, 29 June 2008 (UTC) aka Petrograd
 * There are some councils not mentioned in the page, maybe Herald Assembly deserves mentioning?
 * Barbarians can join orders (but not guilds) if they accept the punishment involved in doing so.
 * Maybe we could mention immortals being the game admins, or the Hero system in use for listing notable non-admin players.

Usenet/Google Groups reference
On 7th April 2010, Marasmusine removed a reference to the date, presumably because of WP:USENET. However as stated in WikiProject_Video_games/MUD, Usenet posts "can be treated as reliable for establishing that a MUD was online on a given date, however (relying on metadata, the posting date, for dating purposes, not the post content). Since a handful of MUDs have now been online for fifteen to twenty years and counting, far longer than the bulk of online games, this may be an element of establishing longevity as a contributing factor to notability". I have therefore restored the reference for dating purposes. KaVir (talk) 16:20, 4 January 2011 (UTC)

Potential adds
As important as organisations are for RoD, they don't really say much about what you do on the game. It'd be nice to add some bits about basic aspects of the game, such as running, roleplaying, exploring, questing, pkilling, levelling and maybe even socializing. -- Lejman (talk) 14:12, 10 December 2012 (UTC)
 * To add, I'd like to restructure the "gameplay" section. It's entirely focused on organisations, which are important, but not everything. I'd like to see a section describing class, and how race and alignment plays in. Then keep a section for organisations, and describe the different aspects above (eg running, roleplaying, exploring, questing, pkilling, levelling, socializing).

External links modified
Hello fellow Wikipedians,

I have just added archive links to 1 one external link on Realms of Despair. Please take a moment to review my edit. You may add after the link to keep me from modifying it, if I keep adding bad data, but formatting bugs should be reported instead. Alternatively, you can add to keep me off the page altogether, but should be used as a last resort. I made the following changes:
 * Attempted to fix sourcing for http://www.andreasen.org/bartle/stats.cgi

When you have finished reviewing my changes, please set the checked parameter below to true or failed to let others know (documentation at ).

Cheers.—cyberbot II  Talk to my owner :Online 14:32, 31 March 2016 (UTC)

Request/Suggest updating reference citation link
Request to update the article citation for "The Game Archaeologist plays with MUDs: The games" by Justin Olivetti from http://massively.joystiq.com/2011/04/19/the-game-archaeologist-plays-with-muds-the-games/ to https://www.engadget.com/2011-04-19-the-game-archaeologist-plays-with-muds-the-games.html --Thoric (talk) 21:12, 10 December 2020 (UTC)