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Welcome to the T2T Newsletter!

On behalf of the entire T2TMUD administration, thank you for signing up for our newsletter mailing list! We will be sending these newsletter blasts periodically to keep you up to date with what is happening on the MUD: news and game updates, special events, pledge drive and marketing announcements and more. Please let us know if you have any ideas for articles or features - especially if you are interested in writing/creating them!

We hope you enjoy the tidbits in this issue of the newsletter, and we hope to see you on T2T soon. Happy MUDing!

Osse & Vingilote
T2T Marketing Team

T2T Pledge Drive Update

As most of you hopefully know, August is T2T Pledge Drive month! We have made a range of great reward swag available as thank-you’s for your financial support.

If you haven’t yet checked out the pledge drive site, click the button above. We just added a batch of new reward options, so even if you already had a look, it would be worth taking another.

So far, the pledge drive has raised nearly $1000, which will be used to help support and advertise the MUD as we work to upgrade and stabilize the server and attract new players.

We’d like to give a big THANK YOU to everyone who has contributed! Be sure to send us photos of your T2T pledge drive swag, and we might include it in an upcoming newsletter!

ALSO: Don’t forget that this campaign and the rewards are a limited time event, and will end at the end of August, so if you want some of this swag, act soon. Cheers!

T2T Marketing Plan: We Need Your Help!

We are still brainstorming ideas about the best way to promote and market the MUD. Vingilote and I are heading up this effort, with direct support from the rest of the admin and Aule. If you have any RL web design, graphic design, video production, or advertising/marketing expertise, and want to help, PLEASE reach out to us either by e-mail or on the MUD.

Here is an overview of what we hope to accomplish as part of our marketing and fundraising efforts:

• Comfortably cover all hosting and related costs for years to come.

• Upgrade the T2T server to support exciting new AI-based game systems (battlegrounds, AI-generated randomized dungeons, etc).

• Cover the cost of a professional website redesign to modern standards.

• Allow carefully targeted paid advertising on select social platforms most likely to yield new players.

• Facilitate outreach to organizations and groups of potential new players, such as the visually impaired, institutions, etc.

• Facilitate the creation of new reward merchandise designs and styles.

• Allow for the creation of video-based content to help market the game as well as tutorials for new players.

As you can see, there is a lot on the plate, so if you can help please reach out!

Recent Updates and Additions

If you haven’t logged onto the MUD lately, here’s some of the stuff that has been going on. As much as we’d LOVE to see you log in to catch up, keep in mind that you can now see recent updates on the T2TMUD.org homepage, in addition to news items!

• 08/15/21 - Osse: Some stone-gnawing pests have infested an old part of the Belegost, and there's a reward for younger adventurers who help exterminate them. Talk to Rili in the Belegost courthouse to learn more.

• 08/06/21 - Maglor: How the Pearl Carapace quest resets has been improved and will now be more consistent.

• 08/06/21 - Osse: The gossip in Belegost is that Glimdan the shopkeeper has a bit of a rodent problem he could use help with. Enterprising younger adventurers are encouraged to seek him out.

• 08/03/21 - Fuinath: Rumors swirl in the area of Kadar about an aged necromancer making a mess of things at some old barrows in the vicinity, and that she may be in need of assistance. There have been whispers that she has dark designs for whatever it is she's trying to find.

• 08/01/21 - Fingolfin: Rider NPCs will no longer keep on twiddling their thumbs as the mounts underneath them are attacked. Now they will try their best to repel their assailants.

Other News: Semote Review Underway

*You put a match in Aule's shoe and give him a blazing hotfoot.

Our favorite magical flying ship Vingilote has recently undertaken a review of the semotes (pre-set emotes) available on T2T. As you may know or remember, there are a LOT of these semotes available, and quite a few of them don’t work quite as expected, or are a bit more… suggestive than they should be, and have long been in need of review.

Vingilote has asked anyone with suggestions for updates, removals or additions to send a mail on the MUD for addition to the list of considerations.

A Blast from the Past…

This is the pig lord. He is 8 feet tall and has the sharpest teeth you have ever seen! It seems the evil radiating from Mordor has mutated this poor animal into what it is today.
It is carrying:
A HUGE pig canine (wielded).

Word of the Waves - Coming Home

(A few thoughts, both shallow and deep, from Osse)

I first logged into the Two Towers in the fall of 1995… November, I think it was. I was just a couple of months into my freshman year of college, and while the dorms were supposed to have T1 ethernet to every room, it wasn’t working… so dial-up it was.

I don’t remember exactly what led me to T2T. I must have seen it mentioned on Usenet or a Tolkien website… but it wasn’t long before I had pulled up a basic telnet client, and was connected.

From that day until about 2010, T2T was a part of my life. Most of that time was spent as an ainur, filling various roles, for better or worse. During that time I learned to code in LPC, the C-based programming language the MUD runs on, and that knowledge shaped my real life in unexpected ways.

I transitioned into an IT role, and then programming, and then got a job as a software engineer with a small company. My coding and web development experience eventually allowed me to launch my own niche ecommerce company in 2009.

The following year, I decided to permanently (hah!) retire from T2T in order to focus on family and growing my business…

And so I did, until May of this year, when on a whim, I logged in, fully expecting to be alone or one of just a couple of players. Much to my surprise, there were over 30 people on, and I recognized some of the names.

Chats with old friends ensued, and I started playing a mortal again, quickly slipping into the same playing style groove I had first developed back in the mid-nineties. Several weeks later, the admin agreed to restore Osse from an old backed up user file. Not long after I agreed to help out as a QC Overlord once again, and now as part of some sort of extended joke they’ve allowed me to take on a power role once again.

It is a bit surreal, to be writing this as a member of the MUD’s admin after all of these years. If you had asked me a year ago whether I’d be back on T2T I’d have laughed at you. I truly thought I had moved on… but all the while, it was there, a part of me. Being back is a little like coming home.

I am so thankful to the people who kept working to keep T2T alive over the past decade, even when times were a bit grim. I know the question was very seriously asked at times whether it was worth continuing. I for one am very glad they knew that the answer was YES. I believe that The Two Towers MUD really is a very special place, and as Power of Communications I am going to do everything I can to try to revitalize and rejuvenate it, and I hope that you will help.

Thank you again for subscribing to our newsletter list, and I look forward to hearing from you.

Osse
August 17, 2021

As a special thank you to you as a newsletter subscriber, here’s a coupon code for FREE SHIPPING (in the United States) from the pledge drive rewards store! Be sure to copy/paste it exactly as shown below, and please don’t share it with anyone - you have earned this special perk by being a subscriber!

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Also, as another fun little thing, the third person to send Osse a tell on the mud containing the text NEWSLETTER PRIZE will get a special reward.