Richard Bartle: Players Who Suit MUDs

In this article, Bartle says that there are four main things that players usually enjoy in MUDs:

Achievement within the game content: players that focus on this aspect of MUDs like to set themselves goals to achieve, or objects to collect.

Exploration of the game: players that focus on this aspect of MUDs like to gain as much knowledge as possible about their environment. This can include finding their way around the game world, or looking for bugs and exploits within the coding of the game itself.

Socialising with others: players that focus on this aspect of MUDs like to make use of the features that allow them to converse with other players, or engage in roleplay with other players.

Imposition upon others: players that focus on this aspect of MUDs like to engage in combat with other players. Bartle says that players "use the tools provided by the game to to cause distress to (or, in rare circumstances, to help) other players." From my experience of online games today, I find that, although this does still occur, these types of players tend to stick mainly to battlegrounds or arenas, which are isolated areas geared specifically towards PvP (Player versus Player) gameplay.

In most cases, griefing (purposely irritating and harassing other players) usually occurs mostly as a result of opportunity. For example, in MMOs (Massively Multiplayer Online games) like World of Warcraft, when a new expansion is released, the maximum level that a character can reach is often increased. This leads to a rush of players into the new zones of the game, because they all want to reach the new maximum level. Griefing tends to happen pretty certainly here, as the players that like to grief will be in this area anyway, as they will also be levelling their own characters, and there are a large number of players for them to harass. These types of players don't often go to a zone to specifically harass players, they just harass players in the zones that they happen to be in anyway. If they are looking specifically for combat then they will go to the previously mentioned battlegrounds and arenas.

Most people will tend towards one of these four main areas in a game, but in games nowadays, there is less of an option to stick to only one of the areas. In most current MMOs, a player will usually need to reach maximum level before they can try to focus on one area to follow. For example, in World of Warcraft, to get to maximum level players will need to:

• Achieve: players will need to complete quests, collect equipment and collect money to progress
• Explore: players will need to travel to new zones as their level increases, and will become familiar with each new zone
• Socialise: players will need to interact with other players, to form groups for dungeons, where they can fight computer controlled enemies. They will need to work together with other players as a team to defeat the enemies and gain better equipment.
• Impose: There is not always a need to engage in player versus player combat willingly, but a player needs to be able to defend themselves against players that will try to harass them. Battlegrounds are also a good way to level a character, if they prefer that to always questing.

Player Interactions

In this article, Bartle also makes observations about how the different groups interact with one another:

Achievers

Versus other achievers: other achievers are seen as competition, but it is normally in a friendly manner, as opposed to in a fierce and vicious manner. They respect other successful achievers.

Versus explorers: achievers tend to look down on explorers, thinking of them as people that aren't good enough at the game to be a true player.

Versus socialisers: to achievers, socialisers are simply a way of gaining extra knowledge or information, they are seen as a waste of space, and are just tolerated.

Versus Killers: achievers don't like killers, as they will often interrupt the achiever's attempts to progress.

Explorers

Versus achievers: explorers see achievers as junior explorers, that have not yet realised that pursuing meaningless goals is a waste of time.

Versus other explorers: explorers respect other successful explorers, but look down on unsuccessful ones.

Versus socialisers: explorers see socialisers as unimportant, and are only useful to brag to.

Versus Killers: explorers find killers tiresome.

Socialisers

Versus achievers: socialisers like achievers, as they give the socialisers something to talk about.

Versus explorers: socialisers look down on explorers.

Versus other socialisers: socialisers love communicating with other socialisers.

Versus Killers: socialisers hate killers, because killers tend to hassle them more than they hassle the other groups.

Killers

Versus achievers: killers regard achievers as their natural prey. They are the most interesting to pursue, as they are skilled enough to possibly be able to escape.

Versus explorers: killers tend to ignore explorers, as they don't care about being attacked, and the killers get no emotional reward from killing them.

Versus socialisers: killers love to harass socialisers, as they are often weaker than the other groups, and will also get more distressed about being attacked.

Versus other Killers: killers tend to avoid other killers, except in pre-organised matches, so as not to risk being defeated.