Madman

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Madman (I)
God of Insomniac Torments
Implementor
Status Retired
Retired 10/1998
Race Aarakocra
Classes Believed to be Mage
Areas Written Too many to summarize
Immorted Demi: 06/1994
Lesser: 09/1994
God+: Unknown
Imp:01/18/1996
Following Madness
Admin Duties Area Coordinator (199?-199?)
Code Writer (199?-199?)
MUD Manager (199?-199?)
Artwork above is a commissioned work by a private party. Copyright 1997 by Jennifer Williamson. The image above may not be reproduced or downloaded without the author's permission.



Also Known As: The Destroyer, The Runner of Quests, Nightmare Unleashed, Insanity Personified, God of Creation and Torture


Madman's Immortal Profile/Bio

(Taken from the TFC Website Archives)

Once, long ago, in a land called Generic, Madman was conjured up by the gods Bloodangel and Angel of Death, and cast into the mortal realms to battle amongst the forces of the world. Heroes in honor and skill until he was among the feared heros, the quads, riding into battle on his Silver Dragon. Life was good...

Then the vortex came and laid waste to the world of Generic, and the quads were swallowed into the void. Somehow, somewhere in its mighty fury, the great god Tynian found him, and transformed him from human into a bird. Not just any bird, but the mightiest and noblest of bird races, the Aarakocra. Through battles, quests, and rescues, the huge black Aarakocra grew in favor with the gods until such came the time that he was deemed worthy of immortality...

The young demigod chose to become an agent of evil and gathered a following to terrorize the land. The mornings of Madness commenced and the legions of Madness ruled the world. Another calling soon found him and he dedicated himself to the conjuring of many new lands and creatures to populate the world.

Today if you happen to see him, he will tower over you; wings draping down to barely scrape the ground. Within the inky darkness of his cowl glowing eyes will dance like specs of fire. And his black armor will shine with an unnatural light. His pet panther will be close by, and his demon is always just a summoning away...

A word of warning: He does not suffer fools gladly and expects people to use their brains as much as their brawn. If you are not quick witted, he may throw you in a heap or bowl you over on one of his flights to survey the world. To those that find favor with him will find life pleasant...to those that annoy him, existence will be most painful.


Additional Biographical Information:

Once, long ago, in a land called Generic, Madman was conjured up by the gods Bloodangel and Angel of Death, and cast into the mortal realms to battle amongst the forces of the world. He rose in honor and skill until he was among the most feared heroes, the quads, riding into battle on his Silver Dragon. Life was good...

Then the Vortex came and laid waste to the world of Generic, and the quads were swallowed into the Void. Somehow, somewhere in its mighty fury, the great god Tynian found him, and transformed him from human into a bird. Not just any bird, but the mightiest and noblest of bird races, the Aarakocra. Through battles, quests, and rescues, the huge black Aarakocra grew in favor with the gods until such came the time that he was deemed worthy of immortality...

The young demigod chose to become an agent of evil and gathered together a following to terrorize the land. The mornings of Madness commenced and the legions of Madness ruled the world. Another calling soon found him and he dedicated himself to the conjuring of many new lands and creatures to populate the world.

Today if you happen to see him, he will tower over you; wings draping down to barely scrape the ground. Within the inky darkness of his cowl, glowing eyes will dance like specks of fire, and his black armor will shine with an unnatural light. His pet panther will be close by, and his demon is always just a summoning away...

Mud Contributions:

Many TFC players will not remember what it was like to have Madman as an active Implementor. They will not know of the many quests and challenges he created. They will not know the amount of coding and work he did. The following is taken from the statue of Madman, which can be found on TFC. (written by Molo)

Madman has done all of the following (and more), during his time at TFC:

  • He was the first out of only two gods to be promoted to Greater God.
  • He was the only Implementor to play TFC as a mortal, and be promoted to all of the Immortal ranks.
  • Madman was the third Immortal to bear the responsibility as Area Coordinator for TFC. During his tenure as Area Coordinator, Madman replaced or redesigned most of the standard merc areas, orchestrated the creation of the ocean and Southern Continent, and authored a staggering 42 areas for TFC, ranging from newbie areas to level 50+ areas. He was the designer of the modern TFC world.
  • Created the Area Writers Guide, which was the first real documention on how to write well-balanced areas for TFC.
  • Created and administered the original TFC web pages, which include interactive maps, continually updated information about the status of the mud, newbie helps, area writing information, race and class information, and links to the personal TFC pages of many of our more creative players.
  • Expanded the Adventurer's Guild, worked with Ivorytiger on creating the temple area, and created the Timerian Museum.
  • Managed TFC's extensive set of on-line help files, writing a large number of them himself, and making sure that all of them were easily accessible to anyone wanting to read them.
  • Created and ran more TFC-wide quests than any other Immortal in TFC's history. Some of these quests can be read about in the Room of Records, and were always of the highest quality and challenge.
  • Madman's first code for TFC was submitted before he was actually an Implementor. He created the process by which special procedures could be attached to exits, such as the code that prevents non-newbies from entering newbie areas, non-believers from entering temples and other such code.
  • In addition to general programming tasks, Madman created or contributed significantly to the following code. This is by no means a complete list.
    • Re-wrote the pet adoption code, including the ability to save pets.
    • Revamped the notes system.
    • Created the Questor/Initiate mortal to Immortal questing code.
    • Created the newspaper.
    • Created the option for races to have multiple hometowns.
    • Wrote all of the code supporting the Mountain of Knowledge, including bounty hunters and the Magistrate, and all of the functions surrounding them, such as bribe, and the jail, as well as the code for the various helpful mobs at the MoK.
    • Wrote the vortex, and all of the support code necessary for the vortex.
    • Wrote the room and exit special affects for most of TFC, including water and air currents, and gas rooms.
    • Wrote the code supporting Mt. Molotov.
    • Designed and developed Captain Meryl's sailing ship.
    • Greatly expanded mobs' special abilities, such as those seen by the demons.
    • All area support code for version 3 was written by Madman.

Current Description:

A black creature rises up and towers over you; wings draping down to barely scrape the ground. Within the inky darkness of its cowl glowing eyes dance like specs of fire. He glares at you and growls, "This better be important..."
Madman is bathed in the essence of charisma.
Madman is in perfect health.
Madman is using:
<used as light> (Glowing) a crystal skull
<worn on finger> (Glowing) the Ring of Storms
<worn on finger> a carved onyx ring
<worn around neck> a crowsfoot medallion
<worn around neck> a black cloak
<worn on head> a crested black helmet
<worn on legs> black steel leggings
<worn on feet> gleaming black boots
<worn on hands> razor-sharp talon extenders
<worn as shield> the Black Shield of Falworth
<worn about body> black plated body armor
<worn about waist> the Belt of Despair
<worn around wrist> a black steel bracer
<worn around wrist> a black steel bracer
<wielded> a Doomstaff
<wielded off-hand> a can of Mountain Dew
<held> a Rift Orb
<worn with pride> the Medallion of Godhood

Character History:

Historical Snippet

11/29/2002 - Log by Cordir

Duvel says (in common), 'madman had his, well, oddities'.
Duvel says (in common), 'but then, aarakocrans always seem strange to other races'.

You say, 'but he was a really good force within the mud.'.

Duvel says (in common), 'he was great'.

Gore says (in common), 'creatures who eat maggots are strange'.

You ponder the question.

Duvel says (in common), 'grubs are far better'.

Trivia:

  • Madman was the first and only Implementor to start as a mortal and work his way up to the highest MUD rank.
  • Madman had two followers who immorted: PSYKILL and Mort.
  • Rumors have stated that madman briefly worshipped two different immortals in his mortal days, but this is unverified.
  • Madman had two 'pets' - but the most famous of which was Scar the Demon. Most immortals, prior to his Retirement, had to fight Scar for the privilege of becoming an Immortal. (Tokugawa was the first to ever actually kill Scar, rather than die to him.) (All mortal equipment had to be removed: Madman preferred the mob dying / corpse eating method to the 'remove all / drop all' method.)
  • Madman was the only Immortal promoted to Implementor outside of the original three Implementors.
  • From the TFC Forums: "If not for Madman's hard work, TFC version 3 (October 1997) would have looked much different. One cannot overstate the work Madman put into version 3. Not only did he facilitate a large amount of code changes, he personally wrote many of the areas that comprise the southern continent. He also added a lot of functionality for area special functions. In fact, Madman is TFC's most prolific area writer (42 areas are still in play!), built much of the southern continent himself, and ran many quests during his tenure."
  • One of Madman's favorite musicians was Ozzy Osbourne. He would regularly greet the mud by forcing everyone to 'mosh' or shout 'OZZY IS KING!'


Player Provided Information:

Cordir
11/22/2011
Madman was one of the formative influences on me as a new mudder. He was evil, he was interactive, he demanded respect and he had a sense of humor. I was deeply honored when he RP'd with my little bitty mortal mage, having her clean his office or give his demon a bath. I think I got to see a side of Madman that few did, and I treasure it. His contributions to TFC were countless, and from a writing standpoint, I can only stand in awe of his prolific vision.


Personal Timeline:

Most of Madman's promotions have been lost, however:
Madman was promoted to Demigod in June 1994.
Madman was promoted to Implementor on January 18, 1996.
Madman retired on October 4, 1998