Bubble.ro - because there is always something new to learn about

Aetolia - The Midnight Age

 

Category: Online Games

This article describes Aetolia, one of the best multiplayer text-based games on the internet. It also gives a few details about MUDs and why you should check them out.

What is a MUD?

In the gaming world, MUD stand for Multi-user dungeon and is a text-based, multiplayer game, usually with roleplaying elements. Text-based means that all game objects have a description which can be read by the player and any interactions with objects or other characters are done by typing specific commands.

The first MUDs appeared in the 1970's, in university centers, played and designed by college students. The inspiration for most of these games was the classical Dungeons & Dragons series, and even today most of the MUDs are set in a classical fantasy environment.

A particular category of MUDs is a MUSH (multi-user shared habitat), which strongly centers around roleplaying and social interaction (but mostly in-character), with little to no combat elements.

What is Aetolia?

General information

Aetolia is one of the four MUDs currently produced by Iron Realms Entertainment, one of the most important producers of online text-based games. The setting is in a world dominated by darkness, with vampires and undead roaming the land. You can choose to join them or try to oppose them, as a brave paladin or luminary. Or become one of the forest-dwellers, protecting the natural world from the taint of the foul necromancers.

Classes and skills

There are 16 classes you can choose, ranging from the classical paladins, monks, mages or druids to cabalists, bloodborn vampires or teradrims. The only way you can gain your class is by joining one of the guilds

Each class comes with 3 specific main skills, each of them being composed of a range of abilities. When joining a guild, you are inducted as a novice and have limited access to the class skills (you can only use two of them, and even those to a limited level). Before gaining access to the third one, you have to pass an interview and complete a series of tasks, specific for each guild. This is to make sure you have a good understanding of the world, game commands and learn how to interact with the other players before becoming a full member of your guild. Still, you will not be fully classed until you reach rank 3 in your guild, and if you leave the guild before that, you will lose these skills.

Apart from the 3 guild skills, you have access to a range of general skills, giving you various useful abilities (for example, weaponry if you want to effectively use any weapons) and a few miniskills, mostly granting you defences against specific types of attacks(magic, poison, etc.).

 Aetolia world open on Nexus client

Improving your skills - lessons and credits

There are 10 levels for your skills, and gaining skill levels can only be done by using lessons. Lessons can be aquired by leveling in the game, winning different contests, or by buying credits with real money. While Aetolia is free to play, it is still a commercial game.

Specifics of Aetolia

 Combat system

What many find appealing to Aetolia is the combat system, which is a trademark of Iron Realms games. It is based around a complex system of balances, each ability or healing method using a particular type of balance.

Unlike in usual hack and slash games, here you will need to first incapacitate your opponent, killing him directly will rarely work. There are many afflictions you can give your opponent by using various abilities, which have the goal of preventing him from attacking, curing any damage he takes, or running away. In turn, it is very important to know how to cure, which can be done by using various plants, salves and elixirs. This are also limited by specific balances, so you can't cure many of them at the same time, but you must make a choice what is more important to do at a specific moment of your fight.

Because the speed of combat is too great to keep up with it, most of the players use various aliases and triggers. To do this, it is important to have a good client. When you start, you can use the Nexus client Aetolia has, but later you will probably want a client with more options, like zMud, Mushclient or MudMaster2000. Some of them are free or shareware, others you must buy to use.

Health, mana, endurance and willpower bars for Nexus
Health, mana, endurance and willpower bars for Nexus

 Roleplay, social interaction and player community

Roleplay is required in Aetolia, although not enforced. The players are generally very helpful with newcomers, so it is easy to get used to the atmosphere of the game even if you've never played a MUD before.

There are also a number of community sites, where you can find resources and information about the game.

A final word on MUDs

 Before trying to play a MUD, you must understand that you will not find the pretty interface and graphics of a usual games like MMORPGs. But, if you have the patience to learn the specifics and to get used to it, you will probably find it much more entertaining than any graphical experience. You can literally interact with any object in the game and you are permanently in contact with the other players and the administrators of the game. The game is evolving permanently, new areas and skills are added, and players have an important role in suggesting new things to add to the game.

Useful links:

Aetolia home page
Iron Realms portal
Wikipedia about MUDs

Related articles:

MushClient starting tutorial

Posted by: Quarc on February 6, 2012 at 13:27.
 

» Comments

just visit


Posted by kezya on July 18, 2014 at 09:52 AM.

mma betting tips
We have a site for sports games. You must be interested. <a href="https://okbetsports.com/en/mma/">best mma betting app</a>

Posted by OKBet on July 14, 2023 at 08:44 AM.

Random Article


Search


Feeds


Bubble.ro RSS Feed

All Categories


Articles


Aetolia - The Midnight Age
How to create the histogram of an image using PHP
How to convert an image to grayscale using PHP
How to check if an image is grayscale in PHP
Interchanging 2 variables without the use of a third
Error launching browser window:no XBL binding for browser
Convert the AOL user session collection to a MySQL database
Introduction to Matlab
Creating a customized session handling system in PHP (part II)
Creating a customized session handling system in PHP (part I)
Firefox crashing with Yahoo! Messenger
ADL Search for oDC
Video codecs explained
Browsershots
How to use Auto-Away Message with oDC
Create complete Windows XP disk with SP2 and all updates
Data Execution Prevention error message in Windows XP
Google Mars
Logarithmic scale graphs in Excel
Urban Dictionary (or wtf does l33t mean?)
Learn more about BIOS
Backup your Firefox and Thunderbird settings
Syndicate your Yahoo 360 profile
What is Google PageRank?
'Cannot Open the File: Mk:@MSITStore' Error Message
Get your Gmail with Mozilla Thunderbird
E-Books links
Change the size of your Explorer thumbnails
Remove previews from Windows Explorer
How can I turn off system beeps?
How do I disable Internet Explorer?
What are proxies or how do I protect my anonymity?
How to set aliases triggers or macros in MushClient
What is RSS?
Palm Zire 31 fast review
oDC Installation and Basic Configuration
How I built a 2x80W amplifier (using power modules)
Leech/HotLink Protection
How to block referrer detection?
How to find out your IP address
Getting started with Mushclient
What is spyware and how do I protect my PC from it?
Stumble Upon - random surfing around the web
Automatic file backup for Windows users
How can I read foreign language sites?
Protect your web surfing privacy!
What is BitTorrent?
No more ads! Adblock for Firefox
Why use Firefox instead of Internet Explorer?
How do I create my own Yahoo ID?
© Copyright 2006-2020 Bubble. All rights reserved. Sitemap - Contact