Nekojin

I think I found the relevant PayPal transaction, and sent him an email. We shall see if anything comes from it.

Is there a lag between changing passwords for the Forums and the server getting the data? I don't seem to be able to log in. Or are the Forum and game separate L/Ps? I don't remember... =>_<= Edit: I remember now, separate logins for forums and game. And I've only recovered the Forum at the moment. The Challenge question makes no sense to me, though, so perhaps it's "locked" by the other person. *shrug* I'll figure it out, or I won't.

Thank you (and the others!) for the well-wishing. Sadly, this isn't the same computer, the logs are long gone. I looked through my old PMs to see if there was any contact info, and there was nothing there. However, I did find out that I stopped playing in August '11, so I've been gone for nearly two years. =O_o= I can only imagine what's changed in that time.

Some time back (I don't recall exactly how long ago, but it has to have been a few years), I played Wurm. I got involved, made a deed, and started working up my skills. And then burned out. That happens; I only seem to go for a few months on any game before getting bored with it. At that time, I sold this account (the one I'm posting from now). Included with the sale were the Deed and all belongings on it, plus (I believe) my ship. I came back today to see about making a new account, and was surprised to find that this account was still registered to my own email address, so I set about recovering it per the usual method. I checked the map, and as far as I can tell, my deed has pretty much vanished - most of the world near it is very similar to how it was when I left, aside from my own deed and a few others nearby that are also now gone. The person who I sold the account to (whose name I don't remember) said that he would hold the account for me until I got back. I was sure I was never going to come back to Wurm, and said so. He smugly assured me that I'd be back sooner or later. Well, today I'm going to eat crow, because I am specifically in the mood for the sort of experience that Wurm offers. So why, you're thinking, are you posting? I've got my account back, what else do I want? Well, I'm an honorable sort, and I'd like to thank the person who "held" my account for the past however-long it's been, and talk to him about negotiating for the account, rather than just yanking it back wholesale (which, admittedly, I've already done). For those opportunists - While I don't remember the person's name, I'm likely to remember it if/when they send me a PM, so don't try to pull a fast one and claim that you're that guy if you weren't. Cheers, and see you all in-game. = =

I'm not sorry that you are an active member of the GM community, but I am sorrowful for the circumstances that made you feel obligated to come back. Welcome back, and please know that for as thankless as the job often is, there are always some members who know how hard you work to make it easier for everyone else. Kudos.

This is true, but... is there any way for a new player to know that, other than by random experimentation and accidental discovery? It's the sort of thing where if you knew enough to ask the right questions, you'd already have the answer.

All of this is true, except... You don't get to see slope heights until you get to 15 in Digging. Until then, it's just guesswork, and with dirt being so uneven and rugged, it's not even "solvable" guesswork. The experience needed to read a slope without being given numbers is also something a newbie won't have. On my first day, I wandered semi-aimlessly, found an undeeded hut near the water with really rugged land and the beginnings of a jetty. I tried to help improve it. To this day, I honestly don't know whether I improved his yard or made it worse. It wasn't for at least another day before I got enough digging XP to get the "scores" off the slopes.

My small addition: 23x, 47y - more updates to follow in a week or so (adding a guard tower along the road for traveler safety, will be adding a publicly-accessible mailbox soon, too)

I'd like to see something for advanced diggers (50+ digging skill?): Flatten Down. This action, similar to the Flatten action, would attempt to flatten the tile, but instead of averaging the four corners, it would attempt to match the entire tile to the lowest of the four corners. Excess dirt would be distributed randomly to the 12 corners surrounding the tile (to represent the digger chucking dirt over his shoulders). This option would make flattening an area somewhat easier, especially if you're trying to drive a flat path through an uneven area (like the side of a mountain). To offset the increased utility, it would take longer than normal Flatten (possibly 2x time?), and as stated before, would "litter" the surrounding area with the extra dirt, which would still need to be cleaned up manually if the person wanted a truly flat path/area. Edit: Slight clarification.

I'd agree that a hard minimum range is counter-intuitive, and better solutions could be implemented. * Significantly reduced accuracy and increased damage when under optimal range. * Dramatically increased damage to the bow when an incoming melee attack is blocked, parried, or hits either arm or the bow itself.

Two things I hold to be true about PvP: 1.) PvP can only be fair in a perfectly balanced setting, where the out-of-game person is the only thing that matters. Planetside did this well - a new, low-level player could perform almost any given task, and just as well, as a many-months-veteran. However, the veteran had a wider range of things he could choose to do. Levels did not increase accuracy, damage, or any other element of combat, only increasing the number of proficiencies that a person could hold simultaneously. 2.) Any level-based/character-skill-based/equipment-based system will never be perfectly balanced. There will always be something that happens to work better, kill faster, defend more fully. The power-players will find these inequalities and exploit them. Many of the rest of the players will follow the power-players' lead, causing "FOTM" (Flavor Of The Month) shifts in how most people act. WoW isn't balanced for PvP, and never will be. Age of Conan isn't balanced, and never will be. Lineage 2, Warhammer Online, Dark Age of Camelot, EVE Online - none of them are balanced, and while their devs are constantly tweaking and tuning to try to make PvP balanced, it will never happen. Out of all of those games, EVE Online comes the closest, because as long as you have the skills to (properly) fly a given ship, the combat profile of that ship will only vary within a fairly small window... but even then, a small difference can be the difference between victory and defeat. I don't believe that balanced PvP is possible in an MMORPG. If you want balanced PvP, look to games like Team Fortress 2, or QuakeWorld, or World of Tanks, or other games that aren't trying to fit in the RPG genre at the same time.

For a prepaid card system to be financially viable, the game has to have a moderately large player base. Wurm does not have it. How many Wurm players do you think there are? For comparison's sake, let's take 7-Eleven as a possible distribution point. There are 36,842 7-Eleven stores around the globe. Assuming that we put five $25 game cards in each store, that would be 184,210 cards, representing more than 4.6 million dollars. According to the most recent stats on the server, there are 1840 paying players in Wurm. A good chunk of those are alts. The players are situated in countries all across the globe. How do you distribute prepaid cards so that the majority of them actually reach Wurm players?

If I have a horse (or any animal, really) on my deed, in a fenced off (but not locked) section, can other people come in and attack or steal them?

Imo, you are running a business. There is no of course to be taken from you personal desire to care for your players, not in the context that you need to run your busineess in a way that protects it from other people's greed. There is nothing in Rolf's statement that specifies how the reimbursement will be made - it certainly doesn't hint that it would be monetary in any way. AFAICT, the intent is that if he deletes your stuff, he'll try to replace your stuff as closely as possible (restoring from backup, etc) - that's it.

... That doesn't seem to answer my question... but perhaps it does. Are you saying that hitching animals - any animals - will allow you to make use of the full carrying capacity of the cart, and the only benefit from two animals is faster movement speed? Edit: Ah... I missed or misunderstood this line:

Lately, I've been using my Large Cart for hauling things - dirt, stone, etc. I can haul about 50 dirt with my 21.something Body Strength. How much would a single horse be able to haul? Two horses?

Aside from chat today, after your step-down, I haven't interacted with you at all, so I don't have anything to go on. However, from what you said in chat, I suspect you did your job as well as it could be done. GM is a tough and mostly thankless job. GMs as a whole don't get enough appreciation from the player base (no matter what game we're talking about), because most of their hardest work is never seen by the majority of the players. So, thanks for the service you provided, and don't feel guilty about stepping down. You've done a great job, and you're absolutely entitled to stop, regardless of the reason. If GMing in Wurm is anything like GMing in other games (and I have no reason to believe otherwise), you've more than earned your rest. Edit: And to all of the other GMs who are still doing the job, thank you. Please know that there ARE some players who know how tough your job is, and appreciate that there's someone around who is willing to do it.

I would be 100% behind this idea.

I've built a Settlement in an area that is apparently a point of contention. My deed is on the edge of Tundra, and I had to destroy some Tundra in order to make a suitable area to live in. I'm very much aware that Tundra doesn't grow back; I wasn't aware when I started making my home, but I became aware before I finished. And it doesn't change my decision to live here. At this point, I've made friends in the area, and there's nowhere else to move within a reasonable distance that isn't already claimed. The only unclaimed area around here is - you guessed it! - Tundra. After being told bluntly (and a bit rudely) that I shouldn't build here because it's Tundra, I looked online to see what's so special about Tundra. People say the same things about Steppe, after all, and that's valuable hunting territory. But as far as I can tell, there's nothing about Tundra that makes it worth preserving. It's rare(ish), and it doesn't grow back. Those are the only reasons to keep Tundra. But the negatives far outweigh those two factors (which aren't really even POSITIVE traits, just traits). Tundra doesn't grow trees, and only grows a very narrow selection of other plantlife. It can't be foraged or botanized. While Tundra does seem to generate monster spawners, it doesn't seem to generate the monsters themselves - I have a Unicorn spawner close to my house, and the only Unicorn I've seen so far was spawned down the hill, in the grass/trees area. And even after all of that, there are still people who want to tell others what they can or can't do with land - land that isn't theirs, that they haven't claimed and Deeded. Why do they have this sense of entitlement, to tell others where they can and can't settle? As more people join Freedom, the land gets more and more crowded, people are forced to settle in less and less convenient locations. The tundra will be destroyed eventually - it's inevitable. By making such a big deal about it, you're guaranteeing that griefers will go out of their way to destroy it. Do you really think it's a good idea to harrass newer players who are just trying to find a place to call their own? I've been given veiled threats over the matter. Is that really a sensible thing to do? For those who think that Tundra is, or should be, something special, I suggest you turn your efforts in a different direction. Rather than harrassing, and possibly driving away, new players, try to get Rolf to figure out some way to create Tundra. Maybe make Tundra unique and interesting in some way - some animals and plants that only spawn in Tundra, some other resources that come from Tundra. Snow Leopards and Snowshoe Rabbits, perhaps. And if you really, really think that Tundra should be untouchable and inviolate... make an alt, and go Deed it. Because that's the only way to make sure that it never goes away.

In my opinion, any unfinished ground-based item, whether it be a house, wall, forge, or whatever, should start to decay at an accelerated rate when it hasn't been added to for longer than a RL week. That said, if this were to be implemented, I'd also want the ability to set an empty wall segment as finished, so that you can designate that you actually intend for it to be that way (for stables, etc. as mentioned earlier).

Bought a couple of blue lanterns off your Freedom Market Merchant. Good stuff. Thanks a ton. ==

50s is not a small investment, if you feel wronged or wish to call others hoarders for not being able to access them, you can always buy your own.

"Hoard" in the sense of not letting anyone else use him.

Expanding slightly on my idea above: Ideally, the Traders are supposed to be NPCs that facilitate trade. Between the fact that Traders are the only NPCs that you can sell items to, and the fact that they're bloody expensive, people are naturally going to hoard them (not necessarily ALL people, but enough to stymie their main purpose), so that they can be the ones to buy out the Traders' funds. So, with that in mind, it would make sense for the Traders to shuffle their tradable goods around. At they same time that they "get together" to get their funds from the crown, they also do a little haggling and trading among themselves. Somewhere between 10% and 25% of the goods on all merchants simply disappears, to represent merchants using items, things getting broken, and so on. The rest get shuffled about among all of the merchants, divided up more or less at random. So rather than one merchant having, say, 20 chairs made by one guy, the chairs would be all over the place - perhaps one merchant would have 3, while another had 1. This idea allows people to hoard their own personal Traders, while still supporting the general concept of Traders facilitating Trade.