ToME: the Tales of Maj'Eyal

Basically, the suggestion here is that if you have the Orb of Many Ways in your inventory, the portals that you use with that should have a "Change Level" option appear, like when you're on top of some stairs and the like. This'd create a little more unity as some portals get this command already (the fortress portals, the exit ones in the Maze and at least one other spot). Plus, the "change level" command creates the expectation that all exits will have that command and react to it. Breaking that expectation is a common source of confusion for newbies.

To accompany this change, there should probably be a little cutscene popup when you pick up the Orb, much like when you pick up the Staff of Destruction from the Master's corpse, to make it clear that it's an Important Item.

Good idea.

The first char I ever got anywhere was a dwarven bulwark in b36 or so. I didn't really play online or used the chat so when I got to the portal to the east I didn't really know what to do. I poked around for about 20 minutes trying to find a switch to activate the portal, decided it was bugged, got annoyed and stopped playing that character.

In short, I strongly support this idea.

Yeah, I recall having a little bit of trouble with that. Hell, I still sometimes get to a portal and go, "Uh, what now... oh, right, gotta activate Orb". In other words, even now it sometimes takes me a few moments to recall hat, especially if I haven't been playing for a while.

Also, rather than "Change Level", the command could be named "Activate Portal" or something similarly flavorful.