I've now started 

http://wiki.us.netrek.org/netrek-dev/MarketIdeas

please try to make mods short and to the point,
and if you are expressing an opinion, sign it...

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Zach, please please use more paragraphs in your email; those huge blocks
of text are mind-numbing to look at. 

Now, on Paradise. I've never played it. I'd really like to. 
But I think it is foolish to put any effort into it until
there are clients for something besides unix. As Sturgeon
demonstrated, we don't have enough players to support more
than one kind of netrek right now. 

And I'm not sure the newbies are even reaching a point where 
Chaos or Sturgeon would make much of a difference to their
perceptions. Although wrap is kinda obvious. 

And I think suggestions that involve programming changes are
dicey; yes, an openGL client might be very nice, but do we
have the coders? And what can we do in the meantime? 


> are encouraged to play on the bronco servers. In the past having a
> good newbie server with bots also seemed to help. So if someone could

pulsar-zone has bots, but no continuous torps (which makes
it pretty unplayable for me; single torping would RSI my 
hands way too quickly). 

There's a problem, though, which is that since bots aren't listed
on the metaserver, there isn't a good way for newbies to know
to go there. I was thinking of suggesting changing the hostname
to something like "practice" or "newbie", and also stressing
use of that server in the newbie guide. But it is the least
admin'd of the current bronco servers; Matt clearly does not have
time to deal with newbie abuse issues. 

In regard to semi-retired players, I think once we get the tech pre-reqs
in place and ramp up marketing, that we should make a concerted effort
to get them back, even on a "let's try to save the game" campaign
basis. I think the clue games have succeeded because of scheduling;
people who want a solid game are more likely to make a set time than 
to drop in. 

I'm wondering if "newbie swim" / "office hours" would be feasible.
We set some times where folks will be around to obs for newbies
and feed them clues. Maybe some server params could be changed
during those times to make the game easier. 

As far as players who abuse newbs, I think we all have to speak up more
and let those folks know that their behavior is not ok. If every time
someone is a jerk, four or five other players call them on it, we should
hopefully at least reduce the severity of the situation.