Imperian's activity has been slowing the last couple of years. Retirement has allowed players to group together on larger games and is a behavior we expected.

Fear not, Imperian will never close as it costs us very little to keep the game running on our servers. Iron Realms has decided to make a significant change to some core systems in Imperian. The game will transition from a "Free to Play" game, to a "Free" game.

Imperian will turn off credit sales and transition to a completely free game over the next month. The game may occasionally offer items, such as phylacteries, for sale on the website. Sales will not be the norm and will likely only happen a couple of times per year. Characters will be able to generate credits and lessons from in-game activities. A tentative list of ways character may generate credits is below.

Imperian as a "Free" game is an exciting chance to try something new in Iron Realms. Most MUDs do not have the resources to provide servers, code, and support at the same level of Iron Realms. Imperian will continue to enjoy these benefits. Imperian can refrain from the time-consuming activity of designing and implementing promotional items. Development time will focus on the story and making improvements to the game.

Imperian will be looking for someone who would like to drive the story forward. I'll be focusing more on IRE-wide matters, but I'll still be here daily to take care of any issues or problems. Dec and Eoghan will continue developing the game world. Oversight of the game story will be overseen by Eoghan and myself. Our new person will be deciding which way to go, making the daily decisions, planning and running events. I will post more about this position in the next couple of days.

On August 1st we will set the retirement value of your character and it will no longer change. Characters will continue to be able to retire at any time after that point. Characters will not be able to increase retirement value by earning more credits. New characters will not be able to retire. Also, you will no longer be able to use retirement credits from other games on Imperian.

Here is a tentative list of how a character will be able to earn credits in Imperian.

Characters may gain BOUND credits for the following activities.
- Spawnwave Rewards: Up to 10 per day at diminishing returns per wave done
- Achievements: We will be changing many achievements to credit rewards
- Major Quests: 1 to 10 credits for completing major quests in the game
- Major Bosses: Reward credits when killing major bosses in the game
- Building and Guide Volunteers: We will be increasing payout here.
- Crafting Approvals: We will review the amounts.
- Help File Bounties: Credits for improving help files.
- No-Brainer Lesson and Credits: These will exist at a gold cost.

Characters may gain normal credits for the following activities.
- In-game Prizes: Admin will reward for gem hunts, events, arena contests, etc.
- Credit Auction: The game will periodically sell credits for gold.
- Credit Market: Will continue as currently designed.
- Organizations: These will generate credits based on member activity.

Penned by my hand on the 8th of Letum, in the year 169 AM.