91 lines
4.0 KiB
Plaintext
91 lines
4.0 KiB
Plaintext
Building Towns
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The Nightmare IV LPC Library
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written by Descartes of Borg 950429
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The Nightmare IV LPC Library contains support for towns, which is in
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fact very minimal from the mudlib level. If, however, you wish to
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structure your MUD to be centered around the concept as Nightmare LPMud
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is, then you need to understand how to build a town. This document
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describes the building of towns using the Nightmare IV LPC Library.
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I. What Is a Town?
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A town is simply a collection of rooms which have the same value set
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for Town. If done poorly, this is all it is. If done right, however,
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a town becomes the center of the games' social structure. If you
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decide to build a town in your area, the first thing you need to do is
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isolate it. All towns should be surrounded by vast, vast areas of
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wilderness of some sort. This may mean desert, forest, jungle, or
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whatever. You may or may not want to have a road which links it to
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the rest of civilization.
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Rooms are considered "wilderness" by default. That is, if you never
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set the town in them, they are considered wilderness. To make a room
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part of a town, you need to call SetTown() from create() of the room:
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SetTown("Praxis");
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Capitalize your town name properly.
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Next you need to decide how many estates may be built in the room.
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Ideally, towns are expanding and changing things. Upper level players
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have the ability to build estates in their home towns. Of course, ten
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estates in one room is crowded. Generally you should limit the number
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of estates to what would logically fit in a given room. For example,
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if you are on a road at the edge of town with nothing about, then
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allowing two estates makes sense. On the other hand, in the middle of
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an intersection of two roads, there is hardly any room for an estate
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to be built. To allow estates to be built in a room:
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SetProperty("estates", 2);
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This allows two estates to be built off of this room.
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As stated above, towns are expanding. This is why they should be
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situated far apart. Too close together it is hard for them to expand
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without changing the overall map of the game. Therefore, when your
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town has gotten as full as can be handled, then you simply move to
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outlying rooms and make them part of the town by setting their town.
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In addition, give them the capacity for estates. Do not forget to
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change room descriptions and allow for needed roads!
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II. What do I put in towns?
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The first section described what is minimally needed for a town from a
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code point of view. This section describes what sorts of things you
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should put in your towns. Most are optional, however, you do need to
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add something called an adventurer's hall. An adventurer's hall is
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the default start room for the town for anyone who chooses the town as
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their home town. In order to make it their home town, they go to the
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adventurer's hall and pay a fee (generally determined by approval) to
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move to this town. Until that person builds an estate in the town,
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the adventurer's hall is their default starting point.
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Beyond that, the only other thing required is a real estate office for
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selling estates. This is an inheritable from /lib/sales.c
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(LIB_SALES). Approval determines what your local land value is, and
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you fill in the descriptions. For information on advanced coding of
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sales offices, see the document /doc/build/Sales.
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Nothing else is required. Of course, your land value (the amount
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people pay to live and build in your town) is determined by the sorts
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of services your town offers. No town should offer all services. And
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certainly, the services your town offers should reflect the nature of
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the region in which you are building. Are you an isolated, small
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town? Then few services will be available. Are you a central, large
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town? Then a majority of services should be available.
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Services include:
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shops of different types
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bars and pubs
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restaurants
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libraries for learning languages
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class halls
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town council rooms
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This list will probably expand over time, but it provides a good
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starting point for common services.
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Descartes of Borg
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borg@imaginary.com
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