As of July 31, 2001
THIS GAME IS NO LONGER RUNNING.
Epilogue: It was a noble endeavor, but one victim to the many problems a PBEM is subject to. The main problem. The time I had to put into it was more than the pleasure I got out of it.
Main Problems:
- No schedule for posts. Players would be at radically different points in time. Discontinuity caused problems.
- Dependence on DM interaction. 90% of communication was between me and the players.
- Changing rules. I was constantly tweaking the rules, that kept players off balance.
- No obvious goals or rewards. Players had no real way of knowing how well they were doing, or have any achieveable goals.
- Too much DM mediation. I had to do all the page updating by hand. Some automation would have made things easier.
- Unclear PC relations, it was unclear if they were competitors, collaborators or team mates. Or juts unrelated people on the map.
- Too many NPCs. I kept some of the choice positions, and important roles for NPCs. Players roles were too insignificant to require interaction.
So... The game has ended. I still keep in contact with many of the players, and as far as I am concerned, their characters are still in charge of those areas. But the regular e-mail game is over. I leave the pages for as long as my provider (thanks Ben) allows for your reference and as a cautionary note.
New Rules Alpha Test is up at http://www.malaan.com/alpha/. These are likely to be the revised and simplified rules for city management and player advancement. Check them out and send me comments.
In order to preserve privacy, I've replaced all the '@' with '#' in e-mail addresses. Replace those when you contact one another.