I first started duris (and then basternae) years ago after growing tired of the same old mud done with 1000 different names. I keep coming back to one of its reincarnations year after year.

The Great parts of duris are unmatched anywhere. The most interesting classes and races in mudding period. No standard mage fighter cleric thief orc human here... Your race and class make a radical difference here.

The areas. Duris is simply huuuge. And not cookie cutter rooms stolen from other muds (we've all seen that). Different areas are >different<. Not simply another area with renamed mobs to breeze through And the overhead map is a godsend. Why every mud doesnt have this is hard to fathom.

It's scary. Seriously scary. You dont just jump into an area.. kill some stuff.. see your nemesis show up and log out. Or decide to grab coffee and log for ten. Someone.. or something.. will find you.

Full loot.. this is horrific in other muds. Mostly because equipment is a nightmare to come by. That just isnt so in duris. You can recover your corpse... if you can kill the thing that killed you fully equipped. More often you jsut re-equip. It still shocks me i LIKE this on duris (and hate it on other muds).

Full pk. Youre in a race/alignment war. A real one. You wont be chatting with your enemy.. one of you will die. ON the other hand there isnt really any lame newbie camping... if theyre there long enough to camp newbies an army is eventually going to show up and slaughter them.

This mud is HARD.. especially if youre evil. And thats a good thing.