What is Karn famous for? His beer, of course:
#OBJECTS #1 stein brew inn red beer alcohol drink~ a stein of Karn's special brew~ A tall stein bearing the logo of the "Red Beer Inn" stands here.~ porcelain~ drink 0 AOz 3 3 'ale' 0 0 1 20 50 P E stein brew inn red beer alcohol drink~ The stein is made especially for the Red Beer Inn, Ayreon's famed inn that lies just outside the gates of Midgaard. The logo stamped into the bears the name of the inn beneath the profile of a dwarf. ~ E logo~ The logo on the stein displays the portrait of a dwarf in his middle years. Above the portrait is the word "Karn's", and beneath the portrait are the words "Red Beer Inn". ~
If you have read the previous chapters, you may recognize the similarity of the object above to the the mobiles described in those previous chapters. We begin with a virtual number, or vnum, of "#1", and immediately below we give a list of keywords which a player may use to access the item. Beneath the keywords is a short description of the item, which is itself followed by a long description which players will see should they come into a room and the stein is sitting there unused by other players. Line five designates the material type of the object; line six describes the object type, the extra flags, and the wear flags, in that order; line seven assigns the appropriate flags associated with the item type (there are five (5) in all); and line eight determines the level of the item, the weight of the item, the item's cost, and the condition (which, on Dawn, is always set to "P".) Once the flags have been allocated, a couple of extra descriptions are given, to add a little more flavor to the object and reward the player for taking the time to examine it.
One of the flags above deserves some special mention. The wear flags tell the mud server how an item may be taken and worn, if it can be taken and worn. The flags, however, are not necessary, and can be left out altogether by placing a zero (0) in the slot. This sometimes is a good idea for those items a builder does not want taken from a room, like a painting or a pit or a table or a tree stump. Here's a table we'll place in the Red Beer Inn:
#2 wooden ashen table furniture~ an ashen table~ A plain wooden table awaits a pint or two.~ wood~ furniture OR z 0 1000 N 100 100 1 10000 0 P E wooden ashen table furniture~ The table, plain-looking and built of solid ash, is round and can seat up to six people comfortably. ~
By leaving out the "take" flag in line six, or the capital "A", you guarantee the object cannot be taken by a player or mob. This is especially important for objects like fountains, where they are a mainstay of an area. The table we made is another example: our inn is to have tables, and it would not do to have all the tables missing from our area.
Sometimes as a builder you may not want furniture like the table above cluttering up your room. Instead you want to provide the description of the tables in the room description, and have the furniture there, just not out in the open. Let's design the third room of the inn:
#3 A Room Filled with Tables~ Half a dozen tables stand about the noisy room, surrounded by inn patrons and topped with plates, bowls, bottles, and mugs. Chairs also crowd the floor, many of them occupied but a few stand empty and await the next lucky guest. A dart board hangs just off-center on the southern wall; nobody's playing, being too occupied in their beer and cheer to care. The barmaids move deftly in and out between the tables (and the occasional slap on the rear), frequenting the bar off to the north and returning with near-overflowing trays. When customers eventually have had their fill of good meals and good times, they leave west -- sometimes staggering, sometimes not -- through a room of coat-laden racks. ~ 0 0 0 D0 The bar over there bustles with customers and barmaids. ~ ~ 0 -1 5 D1 The tables continue that way. ~ ~ 0 -1 4 D3 There aren't too many racks, but the ones you see are overstocked with coats and hats. ~ ~ 0 -1 2 E plates bowls bottles mugs ceramic~ The dishes on the tables appear to be fine ceramic. You guess the owner should only want the best for his guests. ~ E darts board~ The board is dusty and hasn't been used for a long time. No wonder -- there are only three darts pegged into the board, and one of them is missing a tail. ~ E bar~ The bar does appear to be where all the action is taking place. ~ E trays~ The barmaids use them to carry their orders. ~ M 100 H 100 S
You'll notice we did not describe either the tables or the chairs using an extra description. This is because we intend on placing actual table and chair objects in the room, only without the long descriptions. Thus we rewrite the table object above:
#2 wooden ashen table furniture~ an ashen table~ ~ wood~ furniture OR z 0 1000 N 100 100 1 10000 0 P E wooden ashen table furniture~ The table, plain-looking and built of solid ash, is round and can seat up to six people comfortably. ~
By leaving out the long description (but leaving in the tilde(~)), the table will be in the room, but will not add anything to it. In other words, when a player walks into the room, she'll see this:
A Room Filled with Tables Half a dozen tables stand about the noisy room, surrounded by inn patrons and topped with plates, bowls, bottles, and mugs. Chairs also crowd the floor, many of them occupied but a few stand empty and await the next lucky guest. A dart board hangs just off-center on the southern wall; nobody's playing, being too occupied in their beer and cheer to care. The barmaids move deftly in and out between the tables (and the occasional slap on the rear), frequenting the bar off to the north and returning with near-overflowing trays. When customers eventually have had their fill of good meals and good times, they leave west -- sometimes staggering, sometimes not -- through a room of coat-laden racks.
not this:
A Room Filled with Tables
Half a dozen tables stand about the noisy room, surrounded by inn patrons
and topped with plates, bowls, bottles, and mugs. Chairs also crowd the
floor, many of them occupied but a few stand empty and await the next
lucky guest. A dart board hangs just off-center on the southern wall;
nobody's playing, being too occupied in their beer and cheer to care. The
barmaids move deftly in and out between the tables (and the occasional slap
on the rear), frequenting the bar off to the north and returning with
near-overflowing trays. When customers eventually have had their fill of
good meals and good times, they leave west -- sometimes staggering,
sometimes not -- through a room of coat-laden racks.
A plain wooden table awaits a pint or two.
thus leaving off the object's long description "A plain wooden table awaits a pint or two." at the end of the room description. For the player to know there is a table in the room, she will have to look at the room description, and perhaps even try looking at the table itself.
We will do the same thing with the chairs:
#3 wooden chairs furniture~ a chair~ ~ wood~ furniture OR z 10 10000 EHK 100 100 1 10000 0 P E wooden chairs furniture~ The chairs in the room, like the tables, are very plain and built more for strength than beauty. The chair in front of you is practically begging you to sit down and have a beer or two. ~
Again we skip the long description, and when we place the chair in the room, it will not clutter up the room description. We also make the chair usable by more than one player; we can build an object usable by one player and make ten instances of it in the room, or make one object usable by ten players, but desribe it only as "a chair". Either way, when other players enter the room, they will see other players or mobiles sitting in "a chair". It is easier, then, to build one piece of furniture usable by several players than several different instances of the same chair usable by one player at a time.
One can take an object like this one step further, and not even plant its whereabouts in the room description. Here is the room description of the beer cellar:
#11 The Beer Cellar~ The cellar is fairly large, and beer by the barrel-full lay one on top of the other along two walls and the staircase going up. The western wall is home to a few empty casks and a mini-brewery, where the owner prepares his own special brand. Two chairs sit next to the brewery, and midway up the wall above the brewery a large wooden mallet rests on a shelf. The room is dark and cool. Muffled noises from above, shouts, laughter, and the screeching of chairs along the floor make suggestions to the ear of the amusements happening upstairs. ~
Nowhere in the description is the object we will insert into the room, a panel:
#50 panels panelling~ a panel~ ~ wood~ container EH z 25 AC 0 5 100 1 10 0 P E panels panelling~ Many of the panels that adorn the side of the staircase are loose and warped. Hmmm. There's even one that seems to be cracked open slightly. ~
How will the player ever know the panel is there? They won't, unless they bother to look at the room description, and look at the objects in the description, like the extra room description we provided:
E staircase~ The staircase is not well-maintained -- cracks line not a few of the steps and the panelling along the side is warped -- but it isn't likely to break even under the weight of a fat dwarf. ~
Ah, some panelling. Now when a player bother to look at the panelling, the player will see the extra description provided by the object. She will also see "a panel" is closed. When the player tries to open the panel, she find find this inside:
#51 bottle wild turkey whiskey drink~ a bottle of #rw#yil#rd t#yurke#ry#n~ A bottle of high-proof #rw#yhiske#ry#n stands here.~ glass~ drink 0 A0z 24 24 'whiskey' 0 0 1 10 35 P E bottle wild turkey whiskey drink~ It *cough* sure goes down *cough* smooth. Whooooooooeeeeeeyaaah! ~
The reason behind these gimmicks is to force players to look at the room descriptions. Believe it or not players want a challenge, not just in fighting the evil horde of Gkaare or travelling to the realm of Nydoria through the only gate found on the continent of Chrynos, but in discovering objects and rooms only found by reading the clues contained in other objects and rooms. People like riddles, and we, the builders, give them riddles to solve. This is one kind of riddle, where the player must look at the room description, then look at the objects in the room description, and hope there may be something there. Sometimes there will be, other times there won't be. This kind of writing keeps players on their toes, which is what you, as a builder, will want.
Isn't building fun? :-)
Next up, the shortest section of our guide, #RESETS, #SHOPS, and #SPECIALS.