This project began with a small group of friends from GemStone IV who wanted to wander beyond familiar halls and see what other MUDs have to offer. Our goal is simple: step into new worlds together, share the in-character stories of our adventurers, and also pull back the curtain with out-of-character thoughts on what each game does well (or not so well). Think of it as a traveler’s log—part diary, part guidebook—as we explore strange lands, meet new communities, and compare how different MUDs shape the player experience.

First Steps into Aetolia: Day One with Mudwalker

Our first night in Aetolia was equal parts chaos, laughter, and wide-eyed confusion.

Our characters were

Chaguan an Ogre Void Seer, Malosa a Shaman, Pickett Copperbuckle the Gnome, & Castien

Aetolia is a dark, perhaps grimdark, setting. While the players seem inviting the settings makes it known from the start you are entering into a more fallen world than some other high fantasy settings. Of course that didn’t stop Pickett from making a character obsessed with colors.

Right from the start, people were torn between character concepts:

• “Maybe I’ll play an imp locked into a 2-year servitude contract.”
• “Predator means I can control a direwolf—dark Lithy meets Arbeia!”
• “Or maybe I’ll just be a gnome Sylvan. Gnomvlyn is real!”

The tone was clear: we weren’t taking ourselves too seriously. The idea of killing slavers felt more appealing than starting in the “slave city.” So the group settled on Duiran—which we playfully called the “eco-terrorist” city—home of shamans, wardens, rune carvers, and void seers.

Confusion was constant but fun:

• “How do you even log out?”
• “Apparently you type ‘qq’ instead of ‘exit.’”
• “Without Lich, how the hell do you find anything?”

MUD’s are a hard thing to get into, even with decades of experience between us the fact we were in a brand new “world” with brand new systems still made navigating interesting to be sure. We have things to learn, and things to unlearn.

There was excitement too. The Nexus client impressed everyone—built-in maps, point-and-click movement, even music that caught some off guard (“suddenly fantasy music starts blaring!”). The in-game help system turned out to be robust, better than expected, and the community on Aetolia’s Discord was welcoming and responsive.

I was at first glance put off by the lack of information on the wiki but the in game help was incredibly robust and in its own ways keeping it in game, instead of having you swap back in and out of the game, really did have its own benefits over a wiki.

We stumbled through the tutorial together—escaping slavers, scraping together gold, and finding our way to our starting city. The Academy Quest became a highlight once someone finally clued us in with the magic words: ACADEMY TRANSPORT. That discovery alone earned a round of laughter and relief.

There were plenty of moments of culture shock:

• Realizing emotes are freeform (“emote smiles grimly” instead of preset verbs).
• Seeing entire shop inventories that dwarfed even the biggest lists in the last MUD we played.
• Learning you can multiclass later, so first picks didn’t feel so stressful.
• Finding out that, yes, smoking pipes are very much a thing—and apparently built into the herb/healing system of this particular MUD.

And through all the stumbling, there was the camaraderie.

By the end of the night, people were tired, confused, and still figuring out where their characters were. But there was a spark of excitement too: stumbling into a new dark world with eco-terrorists, foxes, and way too many pipes.

And that was enough to keep us coming back for Day Two.