New: Mystic Arena - GWNL (free, open-ended, email, mixed, modern, rpg)

From: lindahl@pbm.com (Greg Lindahl)

Date: Tue, 04 Sep 2001 19:13:00 +0000

Name:		Mystic Arena - GWNL
Email:		tyranth@execpc.com
Frequency:		continuing
Type:		fantasy, combat, sports
URL:		http://embark.to/thegwnl
Costs:		free
Last-Update:		2001Jul24
Keywords: free, open-ended, email, mixed, modern, rpg

Description:

Wrestling Not Extreme Enough for You?!?!

Then enter the world of Mystic Arena where you'll find all of the
attitude of a professional wrestler wrapped up with a selection of large,
extremely sharp weapons!

The GWNL (Great Wild Northern League) is currently searching out new,
fresh roleplaying talent to join it's league.  The GWNL is housed in the
city of Northtown, it's arena being a huge draw for the local community.
Here, some of the finest warriors have assembled to compete for the
ultimate prize, the GWNL Heavyweight Title.  The GWNL is essentially a
"real time" setting. No futuristic twists and turns, or ancient
civilization revistited. Here, we're trying to stay true to the origins of
Mystic Arena, which is a lot like professional wrestling, only with large,
extremely sharp weapons. The main reason we're here, the crux of the game,
is of course roleplaying. Interaction with other characters is essential
to the game and the flow of any good league.

Visit our webaite for more information about the league and how to
create your character!	 http://home.graffiti.net/gwnl

Imagine Wrestling - only with weapons - that's ARENA. Well, sort of.
ARENA is a combat simulator, basically. It requires players and human
input to turn ARENA into a real game, but it's a lot of fun if done so.
The setting can be almost anywhere, I prefer a near-future or contemporary
setting where (this is the only important thing!) gladiator fights are
still common. Modern time settings have the advantage of television and
other broadcasting technology, which is vitally important for those parts
of the game not depending on the program.

Each player is one Gladiator (or his manager or whatever) and there
are two parts to this game. Part one is the fighting itself. This is done
with the ARENA program, that takes the Gladiator data files as input and
simulates their fight. It also takes charge of the daily maintenance and
other stuff, but more of that later on. Now the fights have to come from
somewhere and that is part two. Part two is the communications part. Via
e-mail, echomail on FiDOnet or newsgroups, via whatever, the players have
to communicate. As in the WWF and other wrestling leagues, they insult
each other, claim to be heroes and of course much better than the rest,
and - very important - challenge each other to fights. Once two Gladiators
have agreed upon a fight, the GameMaster aka Commissioner starts the ARENA
program and then publishes its output. Sometimes, he will also have to
send a Gladiator a private mail, as Gladiators can increase their skills
with experience and buy new equipment with gold won in fights.

All other details of the game are in the hand of the GameMaster. He
may schedule fights himself, introduce titles or tournaments and much
more. The program doesn't care how the fight was arranged. Fighters also
heal with time, not automatically. ARENA runs maintenance once a day,
where all fighters regain Wounds and Fatigue. Most Gladiators will not be
able to have a fight every day, or not even every other one. The game is
designed for around 2 fights per week per Gladiator, but if someone gets
really hurt, it could well happen that he'd better stay out of the arena
for a week. Oh, yes. Gladiators CAN die in this game. It should happen
seldom, but it is well possible. The program doesn't kill (erase their
data files) anyone automatically, but I really recommend that anyone with
less than 0 Wounds is considered dead. Gladiators with 0 Wounds should be
considered very seriously injured, taken out for two weeks or even more,
and also get one or two of their attributes decreased. As usual, this is
in the hands of the GameMaster.

[ This is a new entry for the PBM List. You can find the list
itself, and instructions for adding games or comments, at
http://www.pbm.com/~lindahl/pbm_list/ -- greg ]