Retromud history

                            The History of RetroMud
                            -----------------------

NOTES:
       -Any item marked with a "-" after the star is a reference to what
        actions of Cire constituted his eventual removal.
       -The mud's original name was RetroActive. The change will be
        explained later.

CIRE'S COMMENTARY: "Why Sorcerer decided to run a mud is unknown, I have
never asked him this. The reason i'm curious about why, is cause the
guy is UNBELIEVABLY busy, not as busy when he first started but now the
poor guy is being worked to death. Sorcerer can be credited with
the first ansi system we used as well as some of the nifty wiz
commands. He did work on other stuff, but as i advanced in coding
skill i sorta threw it out."

* Sorcerer created a MUD with several individuals who weren't particularly
  good coders. They created a previous version of Retroactive which did
  not go over well.

CIRE'S COMMENTARY: "Enter Zamphyr, Lambguy, Warlord, Ashlyn, Rage,
Sapphire: It's unknown what these fellows really contributed to the mud.
Many no longer code here for one reason or another."

* Cire joined Sorcerer, after disposing of the previous coders. Cire began
  immediately working on the mudlib and the mud. He originally wanted
  to call it BatMUD II. Cire managed to singlehandedly code a huge amount.
 -This caused a problem, however, as he coded most of that original MUD on
  his own, through both direct hacks of Bat's code (including the BATcity,
  the weapon code, armor code, emote code, the infernal knight's guild, and
  more) and his own original code. This would complicate things, as no
  code could exist on the MUD without passing through Cire's directories,
  preventing future wizards from coding at all.

CIRE'S COMMENTARY: "When I arrived I had NO coding skill in lpc whatsoever.
I can remember looking back saying 'How do i print something to everyone
but the user' (chuckle). I picked up alot of help from both Sorcerer and
Zamphyr, and was driven to make this mud and soon had completely rewritten
the city. At that time we used a Nightmare based lib. Sorcerer and myself
decided to try another lib we tried a lib called (??), and finally the TMI-2
based lib. I was very pleased with TMI-2's ease at expanding or modifing, and
thus we remained with it. I redid my city, and became bored with the lib the
way it was, it just did not have the 'options' I wanted. So I rewrote room.c
to be much more. Then I started on the commands dir and added or rewrote
almost all commands. From there it was time to redo the guild system. This
would be my toughest battle yet, so tough that I enlisted Duke to do the
basic skill/spell system. At the same time, he wrote the party system and
armor, as well as showing me the importance of shadows, and how they can be
used to greatly enhance the mud. During this time my coding skills soared,
and this time was when all were mocking me cause I was doing a 'bat like
clone', except the few: Duke, Talien, and Mithrandir"

* Alexxis joined Cire. Alexxis created the city of Abarack in two
  nights.

CIRE'S COMMENTARY:  "Alexxis came and disappeared quite fast, he is
responsible for the current city of Abarack."

* Hellfire joined Alexxis. They knew each other in real life, and
  Hellfire (aka Firefox on BatMUD), had been rejected for archwizhood
  on Bat, and in vengeance, became an arch here. Hellfire gave all
  rights of his areas to Retroactive. He specifically gave Talien
  rights to the Reavers guild (and the ability to rewrite them as he
  saw fit). Hellfire eventually went back to BatMUD.

* Duke likewise joined. Duke would later disappear from the MUD without
  explanation. Unlike Hellfire, Duke was an archwizard on BatMUD.

* Talien joined Alexxis. Talien knew both Hellfire and Alexxis in real
  life.

CIRE'S COMMENTARY: "Talien arived with the drive like my own to make this mud
the best mud. Although we fought frequently, we still worked well
together. He is a credit to this mud, and I'm glad he joined us.
His code is usually messy, and this i really don't understand, cause
most of his code is cut and paste of my own. However during last
few months I've noticed that his code is beginning to be more clean,
and less 'cut and paste'."

*-Alexxis is promised archhood by Cire if he uses Firefox's access to get the
  armor and weapon code from Batmud. He does so, but does not receive archhood.

* Mithrandir joins the MUD as an administrator. During a snooped commentary
  (by Cire) in which Mithrandir speaks of how he disagrees with Cire's
  administration, Cire nukes him on the spot.

CIRE'S COMMENTARY: "Mithrandir chose to leave us, as he had a chance for
creating his own mud. He was missed, but returned about 4 months l8er. I'm sure
it won't be long before he gets the title 'admin' once again."

*-Cire states that if he was not given the position of god, he would
  leave. Alexxis unwittingly revealed this situation to Sorcerer by
  asking to take Cire's position. Sorcerer spoke to Cire and asked him
  to stay, but did not make Cire god. Cire hacked into the code and
  gave himself godhood - Alexxis left when it was revealed what he had
  said. Sorcerer did not find out about this until a year later.

* The old wizard administration (pre-Cire) shows up and there is a brief
  but decisive power struggle. All previous administrators before Cire
  are relegated to wizard position. Only Ashlyn ever shows up afterwards.

* Hair joins the MUD, and codes the 'last tell' system. He is later
  removed for his absence.

* Hyper joins the MUD, codes up a storm, and disappears.

* Newton joins the MUD, and codes the entire resistance system. After
  the disagreement between Kierna and Talien, he does not reappear.
  Newton coded the Abjurer guild.

* Kierna joins the MUD. Kierna plays a mortal character as well known
  as Mia.

*-Cire, furious that no one will volunteer to test his area out, runs
  four events at once, killing every player on the game.

* Talien becomes Reimbursement Arch.

* In an incident in which Mia/Kierna becomes bugged, Kierna
  attempts to get Talien removed as archwizard.

* Mia/Kierna becomes the highest level player on the MUD. When told
  that she must remove either her mortal character or her wizard
  character, she suicides both.

*-Cire's character is removed off of Batmud. Cire, furious, codes a
  small shack in which the administrators of BatMUD engage in homosexual
  acts with each other.

*-Batmud retaliates. Retroactive receives several "e-mail bombs", which
  fill the directories, as well as frequent players coming onto the MUD
  from Batmud, with the sole purpose of harassing/annoying the players.

* Rayzam joins the MUD. Rayzam, Shaithis, Mask, and Slip all come onto
  the MUD. Shaithis quits after disagreeing with Cire's policies.
  Mask loses access to his computer, although he was supposedly the
  only one who could code castles. Rayzam codes bards. Rayzam has a
  prolonged leave of absence spanning several months, he does not return
  until the new administration is proposed by Sorcerer.

* TMI-2 coders find out that most of the MUDlib here is TMI-2 code.
  They demand its removal, due to the fact that Retroactive is receiving
  donations, and therefore, making what they consider to be a 'profit'
  off of the system. They give him two choices, either make one of
  their wizards an archwizard and give them a share of the donations,
  or change the MUDlib. Cire agrees to completely revamp the MUDlib, but
  fails to do so.

* Codog and Dryad join the MUD, a husband and wife team.

* Cire decides Sweetness will be his "MUD girlfriend". Cire creates a
  "promise ring" for Sweetness, which was actually a different name for
  the Blood Ring, an item in which all players have to battle for it
  to gain its incredibly regenerative powers (+60 overall regen, +5 to
  every stat). Codog and Dryad find out, reprimand Cire for his actions,
  and he nukes them both.

* Cire creates the world system taken without permission from Margaret
  Weiss' "Deathgate" series. He continues to code all guilds, and work on
  most worlds.

* Zoob joins the MUD, and works with Cire on Water world.

* Talien, Zoob and Cire collectively create races. Talien and Zoob provide
  the background and statistics to Cire's code template.

*-Cire begins calling women bitches over various channels.
  Calactyte mentions the Sentinel guild. Cire extremely irritated, zaps
  Calactyte several times, and kicks him off the MUD.

* Sorcerer steps in, after being greatly concern about Batmud's attacks,
  and finally investigates. He decides that there will be no god, but
  three administrators. Rayzam, Talien, and Cire are made equal
  administrators. New policies are developed for the purpose of regulating
  wizard and player behavior. Rights and responsibilities are clearly laid
  out so that the balance of power is divided amongst several wizards.

* Through a wizard vote, all wizards present decide that there will
  only be three guilds allowed to be assigned to any wizard. They
  also create several arch positions, including Fire World Arch,
  Water World Arch, Air World Arch, Law World Arch, Chaos World Arch,
  Stone World Arch, Guild Arch, and Bug Arch. Only one position is
  given out to any one wizard, and administrators are restricted to a
  maximum of one arch position.

*-Cire, an administrator, claims Water World Arch, Chaos World Arch,
  Guildmaster of Fighters, Mages, Thieves, Psionicists, Necromancers,
  and Infernal Knights.

*-Cire is caught querying Talien's history. He then takes down the
  entire mailing system, and later reveals to Zoob that he put in code
  in the mail system to snoop Talien.

*-Cire claims he is leaving the MUD and has a new site. He then
  states he has downloaded the entire MUD onto his hard drive.

* After hearing about Cire's actions, Sorcerer removes Cire without
  warning for fear that he will continue to hack the MUD in an effort
  to "drag it down with him".

* After promising to give Cire his code back, Sorcerer refuses when
  Cire claims he will create a new MUD with copies of all the previous
  Retroactive characters in an effort to compete with it.

* A massive amount of reorganizing goes on. Many wizards are assigned
  archhood positions and many players are made wizards. Guilds are handed
  out, world arches are given worlds.

* Many new wizards join the mud, including Elara, Ravenkall, Palaskar,
  Schmern.

* Alaron and Zilch join the mud, with some reservations on the part of the
  admin, due to their coming off a period of co-admining BatMud.

* During this period (1996), Sorcerer was rarely seen. Problems appear where
  large numbers of donations are not reported to the mud, but the checks are
  being cashed. Also, the mud lags heavily. The amount of money reported as
  being spent on upgrades is much higher than actual cost for the listed
  items.

* Alaron codes a working in-mud version of tar which can be used for backups
  and moving the mud around.

* Zilch determines decisively through testing a copy of the mud on Alaron's
  486 that Retroactive is definately not running on the P166 that the mud paid
  for and Sorcerer claims we are on.

* Talien(?) determines that in addition to not being on the machine they were
  supposed to be on, there is both an IRC server and a porn server being run
  on it in addition to the mud, to which the machine was supposed to be
  dedicated.

* By this point, over $1000 worth of donations are 'missing'. To the best of
  our knowledge, they were not legally received; id.net is a for-profit
  organization, and it is unlikely Sorc was paying taxes on them. No papers
  were ever submitted to get non-profit status, which would have made the
  receiving of donations legal. Talien's inquiries are met with threats to
  shut the mud down.

* Schmern is made the new Welstar arch, in addition to writing the new
  web pages. Alaron is made the new bug arch.

* The mud was crashing heavily, due to several bugs in the version of MudOS
  it was running on. Only Sorcerer had the access to update it, which he
  would not do. He wouldn't give anyone else access either.

* Talien and Rayzam decide that enough is enough. Talien takes over handling
  of donations, and begins to look for a new site, with Rayzam, Alaron and
  Zilch assisting.

* After checking out several prospective sites, CII in Manitoba, Canada is
  chosen for several reasons. Discussion is begun on a contract and
  handling of services.

* Alaron, who has been handling backups, gets the mud copied over and set up.
  The other wizards help get everything updated/debugged for the new MudOS
  version.

* Word gets out to the players, and within a couple of days, Sorcerer is
  noticed hanging around invisible to both players and wizards. Talien,
  Rayzam and Alaron decide that it is time to move while there is still a mud
  left, and boot/wizlock. Latest copies of players and castles are gotten,
  and most code on the old machine is deleted, including all savefiles except
  for the admin. The machine then crashes. When it comes up again, Talien is
  logged in... except it isn't Talien, and his password was changed (it was
  Sorcerer). All other coders had been removed.

* The savefiles are installed on the new place, final debugging done. We open
  at the new place under the new name RetroMud. Talien had already submitted
  the papers to become a company, RetroMud Inc. Papers were also being
  processed to receive non-profit status. Sorcerer is removed as well as
  all access.

* Alaron is made co-admin, joining Talien and Rayzam.

* Sorcerer creates new chars and attempts to spam/annoy players/wizards at
  the new location. His site is banished.

* Elara is removed for repeated security violations, giving himself access to
  code he shouldn't have access to and lying to the admins, in addition to
  other things.

* A concerted effort is made to rewrite any left-over TMI-2 code, which Cire
  hadn't rewritten as he had said he would.