Genuine question. I'm to the point where I'd rather buy it and put it under new managemement. What's the prices to buy, or just clone it?

For me to give you a dollar figure would be silly since CF isn't mine to sell. If Scarabaeus (our current "main guy"), Matt Hamby, or the collective IMPs want to entertain a figure then that's their prerogative.

Putting a price on CF is tricky because it's not just a function of how much revenue and profit it generates and what sale price makes walking away from that a good business decision. You're asking people (or a person, maybe, I don't know) to put a price tag on something that a handful of people have worked really hard on for a very long time, and subsequently to give control of that thing to someone who may not treat it with respect or care, forever. Folks should consider that.

Of course, if you have a non-trivial amount of money to do something like that and you have the desire to invest your own time into maintaining a game, you already have the resources to hire very talented people to create your vision for you, or even just rip us off if that's what you want.

Lastly, on top of the fact that selling CF would probably be against the wishes of almost all of the dozens of people who have put real, serious, not-armchair-game-running effort into the game, there's also the ethical issue surrounding the legality. The DikuMUD license prohibits anyone (us, you, anyone) from profiting from DikuMUD or a derivative work. We've always taken the DikuMUD (and Merc/ROM) license seriously and I would hope that we always will.

I just don't see it happening, sorry. But seriously, if trading money for not having to do all the work yourself is the proposition that interests you most, there are literally thousands of freelance programmers and writers out there who would be more than happy to make you the game you want. If that vision amounts to CF without all the #### Umiron/Valg/Obama ruined then that's what you'll have and if it steals all our players then that will be that, I guess.

Good luck. Running a MUD is a satisfying, agonizing, thankless, rewarding, fun, boring, ####ty, awesome experience. You build the game you want to build and play the game you want to play and we'll do the same. But if all this amounts to is coveting thy neighbors MUD then you're probably out of luck because I don't imagine CF will ever be for sale, or so I hope.

Selling LLC shares would in no way result in violation of Diku license (in civil law systems, that is).

>Selling LLC shares would in no way result in violation of
>Diku license (in civil law systems, that is).

I don't know if that's true or not, but it's certainly not the view of the greater MUD (development) community.

Either way, we don't care. Even if building a MUD on top of Diku and then selling it for a profit isn't an enforceable violation of the license, we know it would be against the wishes of the people who wrote the license and that's enough for us. We're not looking for loopholes, or to make money, for that matter. If we were, some or all of us would have taken our talents elsewhere years ago and done something commercial.

I get staff POV perfectly.

nt

Thanks for the serious response. Side note - this type of reaction is exactly why I don't want you to be a part of CF staff, and am willing to spend legitimate money on my end to take it off your hands.

I personally will leave the staff if you cut me a check for a million dollars. Put up or shut up time for you and your money.

And while that may be a serious offer (I definitely believe you would take me up on that), it's still more of the same. You may find it funny, or even witty to reply like this - but I legitimately believe that the staff is the largest part of the problem with CF's last 10 years or so, not the playerbase or emerging gaming platforms. Unfortunately, critique is met with the exact same kind of response, and the vitriol that typically comes from the playerbase is due to dissatisfaction.

One might argue that you can't please everyone - but when you're only pleasing the same demographic over and over, you're going to lose the demographics that you don't ever please.

I think you need to give a fair shot to the current staff. Most (almost all) of the current active staff is at 5 years or less of time on staff. And we have all come from the player side of things to try and improve the game (an option you also have) by whatever means we can. Are we perfect? No. Are we trying to make the game better? Everday.

Let me ask you a serious question: what was the last thing you did to be a positive impact on the game? Cause you have it in your power to be helpful 100% free of charge.

So many people forget that staff are actually the players who wanted to make the game better and had patience/resolve to pass immquest, not some invaders from Mars.

I've tried to get onto the staff a few times over the last ~5 years, but I'm not a great enough roleplayer that they considered it viable. I never felt like RP was where I could make an impact, but in area writing, new functionalities, etc - that I felt like I could make an impact on and where I was shooting for.

The third time I was given the "This was a good char, but try again once you've got more chars under your belt" I legitimately lost the desire to keep trying. You can only deal with rejection so many times before it's time to move on.

So - trying to contribute in the ways I'm being given as options, that I'm not good at - or try to contribute in ways I legitimately have skills in - and the only method I'm given is the first as a pathway to the second that's required. When I suck at the first, I never get a chance to contribute in any of the ways that I can legitimately be a value add to the MUD.

I guess a big point of my personal frustration is not being able to ever contribute and being excluded from that possibility because of standards that don't take into account strengths in one area because of weaknesses in another - which is a poor management choice in my experience and in my opinion. If everyone has to be good math to be considered intelligent, we're limiting our opinion about a lot of people with a narrow outlook that's small picture.

tl;dr - make more avenues for people to be involved in making the mud better without requiring staff status.

there was nothing like "excluded from that possibility". Ppl advised you to have more quality characters. It's not that hard, especially if you enjoy the game, is it not?

You could probably ask any Immortal, current or past if they ever wanted to have someone "take CF of their hands", and I can almost guarantee their going to give you a giant WTF look. No-one that Immorts does so without a passion and love of CF that we're obviously willing to devote time, effort, ex-girlfriends, and broken keyboards towards.

Secondly, you've made it very clear that you're disenchanted with the current staff, so you're more or less approaching it as "How much do I need to pay you for you all to walk away from CF." There's a reason hostile takeovers are called hostile. Is there a value I would put on my time? Is it right for me to accept money for the effort so many others have put in before me? Personally, I don't know that I could ever put a number on that question. It's like asking someone how much they'd sell their dead grandma's favorite rocking chair for - there isn't a value, and people may take the question itself a little offensively.

Generally, I think people can assume CF isn't (and probably won't ever be) for sale.