Welcome to the Easy Book of Building, which is by no means a full explanation of all the commands it uses but should be sufficient to give anyone a head start in creating a basic apartment, some doors, and some furniture. You can view pages on the following processes:

You may also escape back to the help files page, or to the FT Homepage if you prefer.

@Digging Your First Room

We'll start with a "floating" room, one that's not connected to the actual surface of the MUCK in any way. (This isn't bad, it's just not as easy for others to find your stuff! We'll talk about getting you linked in a moment.) Stand anywhere on the MUCK you like, and type the following:

  

       @dig <roomname>     (creates a room named [roomname]; 
costs 10 pennies)

> > This will return '<roomname> created with number #(a db#)'. Remember the #!

You can name your room anything you like, and may use spaces in the name. The room you have created is floating in space; there's no 'door' out here to get to it. Now you have to *make* a door, for yourself, that only you can use, that will "follow" you everywhere so you can enter your room no matter where you are. To make this door, type:

  

  @act <exitname>=me  (creates an exit *attached* to you, called <exitname>)


  @link <exitname>=#(db# of your room)  (links the door to that room)

For example: You start out by typing:

  

@dig Bedroom

The MUCK returns: Bedroom created with room number #2176
You then type: 

@act gobedroom=me
@link gobedroom=#2176

Now you have a bedroom, and a link to it!

@Digging Your Second Room (and connecting it to your first room)

We'll assume at this point you have one room, and a way to get to it. We'll also assume, for good measure, that you're standing in your room--your bedroom, to continue the example from the last page. You would like to make a closet to put all your future possessions in, and we're going to make that now by creating a second room, to be the closet, and exits in and out of the closet so that you can get into it and get your stuff. Here goes: Standing in your bedroom, type: @dig Closet (creates a room called Closet).

The MUCK will, again, return a database # as it makes your room: keep it! Then we're going to use the program @backlink to make both the in and the out exits from the closet at once, by typing:

  

   @backlink (C)loset;c;closet;w;west=#1234,(O)ut;o;out;bedroom;b;e;east

(This is in the form '@backlink <"in" exit>=#<db# of other room>=<"out" exit> Note: on some MU*, @open works the same way as @backlink.)

Now you have two rooms. Standing in the bedroom, you can type 'c', 'closet', 'w', or 'west'--any of the "in" exit's names--to get into the closet, and from the closet, you can type 'out', 'o', 'b', or 'bedroom' to escape. (That '(C)loset' name is special, for use with Obvious Exits.) See The Book of Exits for more help on what exits can do.

@Descriptions, @Descriptions, @Descriptions

Of course, now you have two empty rooms, with 'nothing special' in them. This is no fun, especially at parties, and you need to @describe them, so other players can see what they look like! There are several ways to do this.

 

  1. Simply typing '@desc here=A big room with a bed in it and a door to the closet to the west.' will describe the room with whatever text you put after the = sign. This kind of desc can be only a certain length (about ten screen lines long, if your screen is 80 characters wide).
  2. You can type '@desc here=@$desc .....' and then a number of different things. Type '@view $desc' to see what you can do here.
  3. You can use the lseditor to write long descriptions for your rooms, and have the list-descriptions appear with '@desc here={list:<listname>}'. To get help on the lseditor, type 'lsedit here=desc' while standing in your room, and then type .h and hit return. The syntax for lsediting a list on one of your rooms is 'lsedit here=<listname>'. <listname> can be any string you like. 'Here' can be replaced with any object name or number, and "me" if you want to edit a list on yourself.
  4. You can type 'editroom' while standing in your room. It is the second easiest way to describe a room, and it allows you to edit other properties as well. You can only 'editroom' a room that you own.

Customising those dratted exits!

Now we have two described rooms, and exits that take you between them; but the exits don't say anything fun when you move between the rooms. It's almost as if you get teleported from closet to bedroom and back by magic, and you'd rather people thought you were opening the door. So let's edit that "in" exit to the closet, shall we? and make people think we're opening a door. (Remember that the "in" exit was called (C)loset;c;closet;w;west) Standing in your bedroom, type:

  

  @succ c=You open the door to the closet and walk in.
  @osucc c=opens the door to the closet and walks in.
  @odrop c=comes into the closet from the bedroom, closing the door behind %o.

To explain: The 'c' is part of the name of the exit whose properties you are modifying. You could have easily typed '@succ w=<text>', or '@succ west=<text>', etc. The @succ message is what you see when you go into the closet. The @osucc message is what other people in the bedroom see when you go into the closet. The @odrop message is what people in the closet see when you come in from the bedroom.

The '%o' in the @odrop message will stand for 'him, her, or it', depending on the 'sex' property of the user (male or female). You can use these "%subs" in any exit @message (@succ, @osucc, @drop, @odrop, @fail, @ofail).

For the translations of *all* the %subs, type 'help substitutions'.

Adding That Leather Hot Dog Couch You Always Wanted

Yes, furniture, the fruit of the gods...or at least the leather lounge chairs of the gods. You have a bedroom and a closet, and nothing to sit down on or sleep on! Well, here's a crash course in creating objects. You want a huge leather hot dog bun for a couch? Type:

  

    @create Leather hot dog bun couch
    @lock hot dog bun=me
    @link hot dog bun=here

This creates a couch, locks it so that only you can take it or pick it up, and links it to the room so that it will always end up here if it gets swept. (The last two steps are important. Do not leave them out.)

Names of objects can be several lines long; they can have spaces, and punctuation; and the describing of objects is the same as for rooms (and exits! and players, too!)--see @Descriptions, @Descriptions, @Descriptions, and please note that there is now an editobject program, which will allow you to edit object descriptions, @messages, and other properties.

Remember to type 'drop hot dog bun' so you're not carrying your couch around with you, and so people can see it! To customise your bun, see the next page.

Exactly What Colour *IS* a Leather Hot Dog Bun Couch?

To give your hot dog bun couch (or your bed, or your candlestick, or your Led Zepplin CD, or any other object) some personality, you can give it some extra properties to make it seem more real.

Examples for our leather hot dog bun:

  

   @succ hot dog bun=You slowly lift the enormous hot dog bun.
   @osucc hot dog bun=slowly lifts the enormous hot dog bun.
   @drop hot dog bun=You drop the leather hot dog bun on your foot.  OUCH!
   @odrop hot dog bun=drops the leather hot dog bun on %p foot.  OUCH!
   @fail hot dog bun=You utterly fail to lift the leather hot dog bun!
   @ofail hot dog bun=utterly fails to lift the leather hot dog bun!

The @fail and @ofail messages are what you and others see, respectively, when you try, and fail, to pick up the leather hot dog bun. @succ, @osucc, @drop, and @odrop are explained in the Customising those dratted exits! page, or you can type 'help strings', 'help <@message>', 'help success' or 'help failure'.

Another note: To make someone fail to lift the hot dog bun, you must @lock the hot dog bun against being picked up by that person. You did that when you made the bun, when you typed '@lock hot dog bun=me': only you can lift your hot dog bun. To find out how to change the lock, type 'help @lock'.

Correcting Your Little Mistakes

You have many options available to correct those tiny errors in building you might make. If you accidentally gave an object--any type of object--the wrong name when you created it, you can rename it as many times as you like, with:

  

   @name <old name of object> = <new name of object>

If you linked an exit to the wrong room, simply type:

  

   @relink <name of exit> = #<the database number of the 
new destination room>

If you gave an object the wrong description, or want to change the description you put on the object, you can simply describe over the old description with the @desc command ('help @desc').

If you have TinyFugue (a client program which cleans up the information your computer receives from raw Telnet), you can use the 'edit' command to change properties on anything you own quickly and easily. Type 'edit' to see how to set TinyFugue up to do this.

If you've done something so bad you don't want to mess with it anymore, or if you created something you really don't need, see the next page on how to @recycle unwanted possessions.

@Recycling: Keeping Your Environment Clean and Lag-Free

When people create a lot of objects, the MUCK has to work harder to remember them all. This creates lag, which nobody likes. If you have objects that you don't use anymore or don't want, you should @recycle them, so that the MUCK will run faster and you won't fill out your @quota as fast. You can @recycle anything that you own, except yourself.

 

 

The Page of Miscellaneous Hints and Notes

There are a lot of little tricks involved with building that you either have to learn by yourself or just guess at. To help you along, I've listed some of them here and on the following pages; if you have one to add, please send email to fever@netcom.com.