Legend of the Green Dragon

Legend of the Green Dragon (abbreviated LoGD or LotGD) is a humorous text-based multi-player browser based game. It is a WWW-based implementation and homage to the classic BBS door game Legend of the Red Dragon. Originally written by Eric Stevens ("MightyE"), the copyright now contains both his and JT Traub's names. Version 1.0.0 was released in April 1, 2005. The final release from these maintainers, 1.0.6, was released in January 1, 2006.

As of October 2006, MightyE's server at lotgd.net has approximately 4,600 players, and there are some 5,500 players at the largest German server, lotgd.de. There are some 300 servers listed in the LoGDNET list. 

While it could be described as such, LotGD is not, strictly speaking, a MMORPG. It lacks massivity - typically, only at most a few hundred players are online at any given time, making it more comparable to many MUDs. Also, it does not offer any kind of group adventuring where players concurrently share group's benefits. The only feature that is "multiplayer" in the strictest sense is chatting and chat-based roleplaying. While the game offers player vs. player combat, it is one-sided. LotGD could perhaps best described as a multi-player game where players compete on various ranks, while the actual gameplay is mostly a one-player experience.

Game days
Game primarily progresses on daily basis. There are limits on how much combat can be done in each game day. There are usually one or more game days in a real-world day; MightyE's lotgd.net server, for example, has two game days for every real-world day. All dead characters get resurrected at the beginning of the day.

Characters
The player starts by creating a character. Characters can be male or female (which only affects the level titles, and marrying), and players can pick a race, which somewhat affects the abilities. Typical fantasy races (humans, dwarves, trolls and elves) are represented, as are some atypical ones (felynes and storm giants).

Instead of character class, the game has different specializations - Dark Arts, Mystical Powers, and Thieving Skills - which determine what abilities the "use points" the characters collect over time give..

Combat
The basic idea of the game is to gather experience, gold, and gems. This is done either by going to the forests and killing various monsters, or by fighting other players. After the character has gathered enough experience points, he/she must fight the trainer in home village to advance to next experience level.

The monster combat is done in forests around home town. Characters can look for monsters that are of same character level as themselves, or go slumming (looking for easier monsters) or thrillseeking (looking for difficult monsters), which will give an appropriate bonus or penalty to gained XP.

Player versus player combat is very integral part of the game, though it is not necessary to attack other players to advance in game, and many players refuse to do so. A player may choose to get certain bonuses in return of not attacking people and still risk being attacked, or choose to be completely immune from attacks, which also makes them unable to gain those bonuses and also to attack other players. The game only allows combat between logged-in and logged-out characters: If a character logs out, he or she goes sleeping on the fields, where anyone logged on can attack him/her. It is possible to go in a well-guarded inn for a night, which helps things somewhat, but even that won't save the character from PvP combat completely. PvP combat between two logged-in players has not been implemented due to several problems arising from statelessness of the HTTP protocol.

The combat system itself is turn-based. The combat itself is very simple, the only options available are fighting, using special abilities, or fleeing. There is also automated combat, which can be used if the player feels there's no real danger of dying (but which can be fatal if the player miscalculates something, or has a streak of bad luck). The combatants end up either hitting the opponent, missing, blocking the blow, or doing a riposte (causing damage to the attacker). Randomly, a "power move" is executed, which does a large amount of damage.

Dying in combat, or for other reasons, is not particularly harmful; an experience point penalty and loss of held gold is all that happens. The dead characters get resurrected in the beginning of the day, but resurrection can also be granted earlier by Ramius, the overlord of the dead.

Equipment and special abilities
As well as experience points, combat gives gold coins and gems. Gold is usually spent on better equipment. Gems can be used on various special things. Primarily, gems are used to buy mounts or familiars, which will fight by the character's side for a part of the day. Gems can also be used to purchase various potions, or spent on certain special events.

Goal and secrets
The goal of the game is to fight the Green Dragon that is terrorizing the land.

Upon completion of the task, the player must start over from the beginning, although not without a few benefits; the player has the choice of extra hitpoints, attack, defense, or forest fights. He or she may also keep any hitpoints he or she has gained permanently, as well as any gems, jewelry, and the pet/familiar.

One secret is an instance of meeting Crazy Audrey randomly while exploring the game. Characters who meet Audrey can pet her kittens, and play her kitten game. Rewards or penalties follow depending on the outcome of this game.

A large part of the game doesn't have any kind of obvious documentation, and other players tend to refuse telling "game secrets" to other players. Part of the joy of the game is to discover various things, since generally, nothing that happens in the game has any sort of permanent damage - though it may have a long-lasting good effect.

Notable non-player characters

 * MightyE, weapons merchant
 * Pegasus, armoress
 * Foilwench, sage
 * Bluspring, master trainer
 * Tynan, gym teacher
 * Elessa, banker
 * Seth, bard
 * Violet, bar maid
 * Cedrik, barkeeper
 * Dag Durnick, bounty hunter
 * SaucyWench, cook
 * Merick, the stable keeper
 * Deimos, haberdasher
 * Petra, tattoo artist
 * Heidi, witch
 * Lonestrider, leader of band of thieves
 * Ramius, Overlord of Death

In tradition of many role-playing games, many of the characters (or at least their names) are based on personae of the game implementors and contributors.

Donation points
Players can obtain donation points by donating money to the site. Depending on configuration and setup, some servers award players points for referrals or for reporting bugs in new code.

The points can be spent of "glittery" things, such as portraits (from pre-set galleries), colored names, custom titles, extra turns, and the like. Additionally, many servers have power-boosts such as the Storm Giant race which are available only to donators.

Features specific to Classic Server
The "MightyE's Classic Server", formerly called the Central Server, at lotgd.net uses a fairly unusual method of funding its operation. The gameplay itself is free, but people are encouraged to donate. The server has a fund drive indicator that is reset at the beginning of the month. Once a set percentage of the money needed to cover the monthly costs is donated, players get extra forest fights and discounts for healing.

Pop culture references
Much of the game's humor comes from the several popular culture references that can be found within the game. These references usually appear in the form of monsters. For example, one monster called the "Pair of Swallows" attacks with a weapon called "Coconuts." Upon defeating the swallows, the screen displays "I wonder if they were African or European," which is a reference to the movie Monty Python and the Holy Grail. Another reference is the monster "Tyler Durden" which attacks with "your fists" a reference to Fight Club.

Code Development
The game is implemented in PHP, and developed by contributors under a Creative Commons License. Formerly (in versions 0.9.7 and earlier), the game was distributed under GNU General Public License, but the CC Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike license was chosen for 0.9.8 and later, due to GPL's (admitted) inadequacy to cover web-based software to necessary extent.

The lead developers announced their intention to cease development as of December 31, 2005. They and the Directors and Senior Admins of the central lotgd.net server decided to move on to other projects. Their feeling was that they had created a stable platform and server to gift to the world. The remaining staff on the main server have encouraged the player community to become more self-policing in the future. The future of the code project has been unofficially adopted by a collection of LoGD module coders at DragonPrime.net who have released a beta version 1.1.0 as of May 2006.

The game supports an extensive moduling system which enables developers to significantly extend base functionality without the need to modify core code. Thus modules can be distributed to other users given they have a version of the game installed which is at least as recent as that under which the module was developed. Modules can be turned on and off within an administrative interface in the game.

The game's translator engine, and further modules supporting translation, have enabled the base code to be translated into many different languages. Stepping further from this are "themed" servers such as the largest server currently listed on MightyE's central server listing, Shinobi Legends which is an Naruto-themed game using the core code. Other themed servers include a Harry Potter themed server and a modern-city server. Some developers have even moved further and written entire games using LoGD's base functions. These include a Castle Siege conversion and games based on quest-style games from the 1980s.