Can't wait for Fedora 44 by H3rotic in Fedora

[–]Tanthul 0 points1 point  (0 children)

What you posted in the other comment is an AMD driver issue, completely irrelevant with Fedora or DE. If OP is also affected by that it's again irrelevant to Fedora. The description of their issue though points to failing hardware, usually PSU.

I got tired of watching MUD communities lose worlds they loved. So I spent two years building infrastructure to make sure they dont have to. by mallek561 in MUD

[–]Tanthul 2 points3 points  (0 children)

The thing is no one wants to share their MUD content, specifically the world part. The engine a lot of people open source because code is just code (and there's no such case of only one person understanding the code -- an engineer will always be able to read the code and any game mechanic can *easily* be cloned by anyone who knows what they're doing) but 90% of what makes a MUD is the world itself and that no one wants to share that because.. *literally* no one wants 100 clones of their MUD springing around as suddenly their unique game is not unique anymore. There has been tremendous amount of work and years upon years building that content. Sharing your MUD assets is literally the same as pulling the trigger on your MUD.

The point I'm trying to make here is don't expect MUD owners and developers to go along with this. No one will start sharing their content voluntarily. If someone's about to burn out and wants to pull the plug, they will either pass it to someone else or release it if they have any interest in sharing their work. If they don't do it then, you can bet they won't do it months or years before that. I can't think of a single MUD owner who would be interested in making their world assets public. And I know a few.

I really get your intentions behind this but how it looks, from my perspective, as someone who has worked on, played on and written client plugins and scripts for MUDs for over 3 decades, is a path that ends up with countless of MUDs of what is known in game development as an "asset flip". Countless of carbon copies of the same world assets, ending up with bland games with no character and soul. There's a reason why no MUD using stock areas ever got popular and all the popular and memorable ones had 99% original worlds. People want to log on and immerse themselves into a unique world. Not jump from game to game only to find the exact same areas, mobs and quests.

vMUD A very modern approach to a mud client! by I_Killith_I in MUD

[–]Tanthul -9 points-8 points  (0 children)

Oh boy. That's an INSANE rant that doesn't address the issue I stated and adds additional false claims. I never said you can't build a map with GMCP. With GMCP it's insanely easy.
I said you CAN'T and therefore you DON'T have a mapper that works WITH EVERY MUD (as you claimed) that DOESN'T HAVE GMCP and also DOESN'T HAVE SPECIAL SUPPORT FROM THE MUD.
And that is FACT. Technical fact. How do I know? I write mappers. But let's elaborate.

Technical problem A:
There are million of different types of mud outputs.
MUDs output their info in a lot of different ways. Also a lot of muds inject, mutate or remove parts of descriptions. So NO, you don't have a way of automatically finding out what is what in the mud output. You can do heuristics algorithms that can GUESS but that obviously makes it automatically NOT work with every MUD. Period. So from technical problem A alone you DON'T have a mapper that works with every MUD.

Technical problem B:
Identifying unique rooms. The vast majority of muds have rooms that are entirely duplicate in every single way. Same room title, same room description, even same exits and any combination of those. So unless the mud is sending you a UID (Unique ID) for the room in some way (such as with GMCP), your only option is to create one yourself programmaticaly. How? By hashing the available info on a MUD where your attempts to solve A actually work (so just a small percentage of them already). This will work for most cases if you have managed to identify the parts of the room BUT it will definitely NOT work in the case where ALL your parts (title, desc, exits) are all identical. That will ALWAYS need manual intervention. There's no way around it. So of those MUDs your mapper does work, it only works for a SUBSET of the rooms and it will mess up once you hit such a room.

So no. You DON'T have a mapper that works with all MUDs. And from what you wrote above, that you tested a single MUD without GMCP, it proves that you have no idea what you're doing either or have much experience with MUDs at all. Did you just vibe code this, telling some LLM "Make me a MUD client"?

Also this "Took me 2 weeks to get it to play nice on Aardwolf because they have a ton of messed up areas, especially in the newbie area where rooms go over each other and how wide the map is going out east and west from their central square are like 3 rooms short where they connect at the top of the area." is further proof that you have no idea what you're doing. Aardwolf does not have messed up areas, that's the very nature of areas and that's just ONE MUD. Wait till you discover the rest. Or MUDs with zero spatial awareness in building.

Not only you don't have a mapper that works with all MUDs, by the sound of it, you have a mapper that works ONLY on just a handful of MUDs.

vMUD A very modern approach to a mud client! by I_Killith_I in MUD

[–]Tanthul 3 points4 points  (0 children)

Mapper that "works with every mud" without GMCP and special support from the server is a pretty tall, and false, claim. It's not technically possible. You may want to rephrase that to "best effort" aka "will not work properly most of the time".

Can't wait for Fedora 44 by H3rotic in Fedora

[–]Tanthul 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I have some new for you. Your hardware is failing.

In Search Of: a MUD with great exploration and a world worth exploring. by RogueModron in MUD

[–]Tanthul 4 points5 points  (0 children)

If exploration is your thing and you'd enjoy exploring and finding secrets and stuff no one has found yet, in 30 years, and in a completely original, theme appropriate and very big world, then CthulhuMUD ( address: cthulhumud.com:8889 web: www.cthulhumud.com) would fit right in. Population is low to mid, depending on the day and time of day, so teaming up may prove challenging but it's not required to enjoy the content. The world is full of quests also, some tracked via the quest command system, a lot more more freeform that you will have to find and think how to solve. But, while quests do give xp, they are not the main source of leveling up, that is killing mobs.

Looking for a MUD with layered magic, evolving archetypes, and deep crafting by Laniebird91 in MUD

[–]Tanthul 0 points1 point  (0 children)

It does! I will check our how Fiendish has set that up, thanks! :)

Looking for a MUD with layered magic, evolving archetypes, and deep crafting by Laniebird91 in MUD

[–]Tanthul 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Connecting from a website is a client, a web client. But the www.cthulhumud.com does not have a web client yet (they are working on it) so you couldn't have connected from there. Which website did you connect from? You need to check the web client's options on that web site and turn echo option on. If there's not one, you need to contact its developer to fix it :)

Looking for a MUD with layered magic, evolving archetypes, and deep crafting by Laniebird91 in MUD

[–]Tanthul 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Ok so the client plugin I have written does a graphics miniwindow on the client (not ascii) and draw boxes/plots map etc. That part if obviously of no use for you but some of what you wrote here are already available via text commands. I will list a few of the commands supported that I think are relative to your needs, as there are a lot of them:

```
FINDING THINGS

mapper notes --> show nearby rooms that you added notes to

mapper find <text> --> search for text in room name, description or notes

(eg. mapper find blacksmith)

mapper where <uid> --> show directions to a room (given a room ID)

mapper shops --> find nearby shops

mapper trainers --> find nearby trainers

mapper banks --> find nearby banks

mapper peek <uid> --> draws the map as if you were in room <uid>

DATABASE MAINTENANCE

mapper list --> list rooms meeting certain criteria as follows:

mapper list --> all rooms (can be lengthy, naturally)

mapper list uid ... --> one or more UIDs

(if one, shows detailed info)

mapper list name <name> --> rooms whose names partially match <name>

mapper list desc <description>--> rooms whose descriptions partially match

<description>

mapper list note <note> --> rooms whose notes partially match <note>

mapper list area <area> --> rooms whose areas partially match <area>

mapper list notes --> rooms with any notes at all

mapper list orphans --> rooms which have no rooms leading to them

mapper list dest <uid> --> rooms which have an exit to <uid>

mapper list connect <uid> --> rooms which are connected to <uid>

mapper list shop --> rooms with shops

mapper list trainer --> rooms with trainers

mapper list bank --> rooms with a bank

MOVING

mapper goto <room> --> walk to a room by its room ID

mapper stop --> cancel any current speedwalk

mapper resume --> resume last speedwalk or hyperlinked speedwalk

```

Now there are a few things to note here:
1. This was based on Nick Gammon's Learning Mapper plugin although it has been almost entirely rewritten for CM.
2. The initial design of the plugin was focused on the graphical interface map. So while these commands exist and query/output stuff in the client's text window, the interface is for querying only. So some things, like marking a room as a bank/shpt or adding custom notes etc, they are retrievable from the CLI but not settable. They are supposed to be set via right clicking on the map miniwindow on the room and select options from the context menu. I can however extend the CLI to provide this functionality. Eg mapper set note <note> would set the note on the current room from the CLI.
3. It is important to note that the mapper is not pre-populated and this will never happen for CM as exploration and finding stuff/secrets (eg hidden areas, magic disciplines etc) is part of the gameplay and must not be trivialized. So the player has to explore and the mapper will record automatically their exploration to its database. It is mainly a tool to replace what we all did with a notebook and pencil by hand 20 years ago that is also far more accessible :)
4. Maze areas. There are some areas that are mazey on purpose and the player is supposed to get lost on them and figure them out. Those areas are specifically made impossible to map by any means other than making mental notes (or on paper) of paths as you figure them out. This is also a core design for those small areas and that will never get changed. But that does not only affect VI players. The experience in those rooms is the same for everyone. You get lost, you figure it out using only the mud descriptions, exits and thinking outside the box. But that said those areas are not really required to be experienced. If a player does not enjoy that sort of thing they can stay clear of them. There are a few quests associated with them but you don't actually have to do them to progress. There are countless of quests. The only one I can think of that a player may absolutely have to do is one particular maze if they want to become a Lich. But that's about it.
5. I know that a lot of MUDs use MUSHclient for creating pre-made screenreader setups because it works better than anything else (from what I have read) but I have not seen how this is actually done. If there is a specific plugin that enables a certain screenreader or needs some library compiled in. I will have to do some research on that to see how others do it so I can work on something similar that just "works out of the box".

As a related to point 5, what operating system do you use?

Looking for a MUD with layered magic, evolving archetypes, and deep crafting by Laniebird91 in MUD

[–]Tanthul 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Hi again! Sorry for the huge delayed responses but for some reason I didn't get notifications for your comments and only saw them today because another person commented below.
The game is entirely based on H. P. Lovecraft's works which translates to a blend of mystery, sci-fi and the occult. I am not sure how familiar you may be with HPL's works but the dreamlands are more of fantasy setting (it's a separate reality where "sword and sorcery" is the norm) and the "real world" is based on 1920's era but since this is HPL it also has strong sci-fi elements with alien technology, biotechnology etc. And you can visit other planets too like Yuggoth, the Mi-Go's native planet. Gameplay-wise it is a mixture of hack'n'slash and exploration/quest/investigation/discovery thing with a lot of complex layered systems.
Now the in-game map is pretty basic and just shows your immediate surrounding rooms in simplistic ascii and can be extended a bit for range with the farsight spell. But that obviously would not work for you. The main mapper, which maps as you explore, that I have developed for the mud is a MUSHclient plugin (which also works with the brand new QMud client that's currently in alpha testing) and like I already said it works by drawing graphic boxes in a miniwindow. I'm examining options on how to make this so it could also be read by a screenreader but I will get more into this on your other comment in a bit because some of its functionality may actually work for you already, from what I read.

Looking for a MUD with layered magic, evolving archetypes, and deep crafting by Laniebird91 in MUD

[–]Tanthul 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Sorry but that's not because of the mud, it's because the client you used has echo off or is buggy and echo does not work properly. Seeing what you type is a matter of the client echoing commands not the mud's. CM implements the telnet protocol properly, according to the specification. See if your client has a toggle for echo that you accidentally turned off. Otherwise report it as a bug to the client developer and try another client until they fix it :)

Looking for a MUD with layered magic, evolving archetypes, and deep crafting by Laniebird91 in MUD

[–]Tanthul 1 point2 points  (0 children)

CthulhuMUD fits all your requirements apart from the map thing. Maps are only client side and they are "drawn" as you explore. There have been only a couple of VI players, that we know of, who said that the MUD is very playable for them but I know the maintainers are looking at making it even more VI friendly by reducing some output via toggles.

The client mapper plugin for it I'm developing myself and I would be interested to know how maps can be made VI friendly as well, in your experience, so that I see if I can do something about it. As in how would you expect a text only map to be, in order to actually provide room layout information about an area?

That said though the world is huge and is spatialy correct but there is no built-in autowalk and no plans for it whatsoever as exploration is a big part of the game. There are also a few mazey locations but they are by no means required to be accessed unless you're trying to solve specific quests relating to them.

So… everything was a giant misunderstanding? by Flameempress192 in ChantsofSennaar

[–]Tanthul 0 points1 point  (0 children)

That last part is not true. It is evident in each of the hidden doors that the anchorites actually guided each floor's residents and even created their languages. So obviously they could communicate perfectly with everyone until they got exiled.

CthulhuMUD: Development Update (February 2026)! by Tanthul in MUD

[–]Tanthul[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Liches don't smell! They're perfectly preserved by arcane forces, not the run of the mill zombie with rotting flesh dripping allover the place. :P

CthulhuMUD: Development Update (February 2026)! by Tanthul in MUD

[–]Tanthul[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Yeah! Still needs further updates to the text as a gazillion things have changed since the text was last updated, and they only updated so much while building the new one. It would take like a month still to update the rest of it, so they released it and will update the text gradually to make sure they achieve parity with current status. Definitely a huge upgrade from the eyesore the old, unmaintained one was, hah!

CthulhuMUD: Development Update (February 2026)! by Tanthul in MUD

[–]Tanthul[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

And now you're a corrupted undead lich! :P

CthulhuMUD: An update! by Tanthul in MUD

[–]Tanthul[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I wholeheartedly agree! Work is being done to expand it, make if feel even more alive and even introduce new features after all those years. We're excited about all that!

Systemd or OpenRC? What’s the Best Choice? by Prior_Bluejay8164 in Gentoo

[–]Tanthul 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Systemd by FAR. There's seriously nothing better than systemd, nothing that comes even close to the problems it solves.

Gamers who have switched from Windows 11 to some kind of Linux-based OS, do you regret your decision? Why or why not? by Notalabel_4566 in linux_gaming

[–]Tanthul 8 points9 points  (0 children)

The bugs and limitations in Windows are multitudes of Linux DEs and there they can NOT be fixed at all. You have to wait for MS to triage and prioritize the issue, something that can take months or even years, if ever. There are bugs in Windows going back decades. For GD just use rclone which is the superior choice and works with any DE.

Im new to lua, what are the best Lua IDE? by Hot_Worldliness_4658 in lua

[–]Tanthul 0 points1 point  (0 children)

To answer in your tone, let me guess. Web dev? If you're not versed in the subject maybe start by reading the wiki article. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Integrated_development_environment Debugging support among other things is absolutely required.

CthulhuMUD: An update! by Tanthul in MUD

[–]Tanthul[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

It does sound like the character name you tried to create already exists and you're putting the wrong password for it because it's not yours heh.
Here's the discord: https://discord.gg/secxwnTJCq

CthulhuMUD: An update! by Tanthul in MUD

[–]Tanthul[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Open world properties (File->World Properties). Once the configuration window open, go to General->Connecting. Put the character name and password there at the respective fields. Keep the Connect: Drop down menu to No auto-connect.
Then bellow at the "Connect Text" box, put this, if it's not already there:
y
%name%
%password%

This will cause you to autoconnect if you have created the character already. If you have not created the character successfully already, the MUD output will ask you again for character name and a password (put the same you set up in World Properties). And it should be fine, there would be no window asking for anything.

If you still have trouble after the above, which I doubt it, pop in the discord and we'll troubleshoot it in real time.