Û LEGENDS VERSION 4.3 Û Û Sysop documentation Û "Role-playing for the god in all of us!"(tm) Programmed and written by Jeffrey D. Hoffman A PRODUCT OF ADVANCED SYSTEMS RESEARCH 1.0 INTRODUCTION ÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛ Welcome to the newest and finest version of the world's most acclimated role-playing system. LEGENDS 4.3 offers more features, better speed, and better game-play than anything you will have ever seen before, including the previous versions of LEGENDS. This new version has undergone extensive testing and now stands as the most stable and powerful version of LEGENDS ever released. Now, more than ever, players are discovering the potential that LEGENDS offers for wild adventures in the realm that they both create and explore. With the release of this new version, players and sysops have discovered that they have more control and more available options to use within the game than anything they have worked with before. LEGENDS 4.3 features all new source code that knocks CPU usage down from 99% to 16%. The command parser has been extended from eighty-three commands to over one-hundred different verbs for the player to enter. New features also include intelligent monsters of differing alignments (both good and evil), cursed weapons, and a spectacular new spell system that includes powerful new spells like CALM and CHAIN LIGHTNING!! An updated player's handbook is also available online (during play) for both reading and downloading. The game speaks for itself. 1.1 INSTALLATION ÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛ As with any other version of LEGENDS, everything you need to install LEGENDS on your BBS is included with your archive. 1. Create a directory inside your TBBS directory or wherever you would like to run the adventure from. For example, use LEGENDS. 2. Extract the LEGENDS archive into this new directory. 3. Update your .SDL file by adding the following line to the menu on which you would like the users to be able to access the game. Entry: L -> LEGENDS version 4.3 (Multi-user, real-time AD&D role-playing) Priv=0 A1=-------- A2=-------- A3=-------- A4=-------- ANS=- IBM=- KEY=L TYPE=200 Opt Data=c:\tbbs\legends\legends /Q 5. Following that entry, another entry should be added so that players can view the player's handbook for outside LEGENDS. This text file contains valuable information for players, including a complete listing of commands, races, and occupations. Entry: H -> LEGENDS Players Handbook (Information and commands) Priv=0 A1=-------- A2=-------- A3=-------- A4=-------- ANS=- IBM=- KEY=H TYPE=1 Opt Data=c:\tbbs\legends\handbook.txt 6. Following that entry, another entry should be added so that players can view the mage's handbook for outside LEGENDS Entry: M -> LEGENDS Mage's Handbook Priv=0 A1=-------- A2=-------- A3=-------- A4=-------- ANS=- IBM=- KEY=H TYPE=1 Opt Data=c:\tbbs\legends\magic.txt 6. The forth entry to be added is for the high scores listing. Entry: S -> LEGENDS most experience adventurers (High scores) Priv=0 A1=-------- A2=-------- A3=-------- A4=-------- ANS=- IBM=- KEY=S TYPE=1 Opt Data=c:\tbbs\legends\scores.txt 7. Compile the .SDL file. 8. LEGENDS 4.3 includes a new version of the ghost task program that was designed to go through the LEGENDS databases and update them for play each day by moving monsters, changing the shop inventories, and deleting old players. Define your ghost task to run upon startup of your BBS because it only needs to be run once a day (preferably in the morning). It will run for about five to seven minutes and then quit, once it has finished its routine. I suggest that you set it to run at 23:60. This setting instructs TBBS to run the ghost-task whenever the board is run. 9. Run your BBS. 1.2 DEMO VERSUS REGISTERED VERSION ÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛ The demo version of LEGENDS, which is received if you do not purchase a copy of the LEGENDS software through ASR, is automatically set up on your system. The demo version is a working copy of the game with a few minor things turned off. The following paragraphs explain what is missing, and what you get when you purchase the LEGENDS software. If you have already purchased LEGENDS through ASR, simply skip down to section 2.0 for sysop instructions and information. The demo version, which you are running, only allows players to play once a day. If they quit, or they are killed, they are logged out of the software, and are forced to wait until the next day in order to play again. As sysop, you also loose the ability to assign players to be demigods with the demonstration version. You, and your players, do not have the ability to make your own rooms, items, traps, monsters, or zones. This version also limits the number of possible rooms in the game, and restricts you to what comes with the demo version. Once you register LEGENDS through ASR, all you need to do is install the new .TPG file over your existing one. All databases remain intact and you are now able to assign demigods, play repeatedly, and basically do everything that LEGENDS allows a 'god' within the game. 2.0 GOD ÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛ Simple. You are the conroller of the LEGENDS realm, no holds barred. Within the new operating system that LEGENDS offers, as sysop of the board, you receive unlimited power within the game. The LEGENDS EDITOR is no longer in existance, as I have combined the power of the two .TPG files into one program that allows you to distribute power to different players at different levels, plus allows you to access all the commands that the editor allowed from within LEGENDS. As sysop, you have the power to CREATE items, room, monsters, zones, and traps from the beginning. You also have the ability to edit any of those things, including the ones that you did not make. In addition, you can destroy anything that either you or another player made. You also get several other commands that no one else can use. These commands are OFFLINE and EDITPLAYER. The OFFLINE (Player's name) command allows you to tell LEGENDS that a player whom it thinks is online really isn't. I have fixed most of the problems that happened before with LEGENDS leaving a player online, but there are rare occasions when mistakes still happen. Example: Offline ShadowDestroyer The EDITPLAYER (Player's name) command allows you to edit the player who you specify. From the menu that comes up, you can alter the player's alias, alignment, race, occupation, title, level, experience, privilege, and more. (See the section of editing players below.) Example: editplayer ShadowDestroyer LEGENDS distributes power to players in the form of privilege, much like TBBS does. All players start at with a privilege of 0, versus the privilege of 500 that you receive automatically as sysop. This chart displays the different levels of privilege that you can assign to a player to give them different abilities. A higher privilege level can always use a command from a lower privilege level. GUIDE TO PRIVILEGE LEVELS Û 0 Standard player can not make anything, teleport, or summon. Û Û Û Û 1 Player is allowed to have multiple characters. Û Û Û Û 100 Player can use the TELEPORT command and jump to any room. Û Û Player can also use the %E (environment) command, as well Û Û as display the ZONES listing. Û Û Û Û 200 Player can SUMMON any monster anywhere in the realm. Û Û Û Û 300 Player can access the CREATE, EDIT, and DESTROY commands for their own Û Û things only. Û Û Û Û 500 Player can EDIT anything within the game, whether they made it or not. Û Û They have access also to the OFFLINE command. Û You can give a player any privilege level that you would like using the EDITPLAYER command. Alter their privilege to the value you would like and then save your changes. LEGENDS is also, for the most part, self-sustaining. It will clean up after itself, and the Ghost Task does most of the maintenance that is required. By assigning 300 privilege to a selective group of players, you can give the important jobs of keeping LEGENDS active to your DemiGODs. A document, aside from the HANDBOOK.TXT file, has been included with this archive called DEMIGOD.TXT. This document includes all the descriptions and definitions for the screens that LEGENDS displays when you CREATE something. This text file was written to be available to players who have a privilege of 100 or better. It is up to you to determine how they get this file. It is very important to them, as it explains a lot of what their abilities are. 2.1 EDITING PLAYERS ÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛ This is the screen that is drawn when you edit a player. °°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°° [°°°°] (°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°, °°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°) °°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°° Privilege: °°° Level: °° Experience: °°°°°°°°° Hit points: 0 of °°°°°° Spell points: 0 of °°°°°° Armor class: °°° To Weapon: °°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°° Attack verb: °°°°°°°°°° To hit: °°° °°°°°+°°° Attack pause: °°° Spell classes known: °°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°° Maximum spell level: °°° The first input field is the ALIAS that the player has. The second field field, displayed between brackets, is the alignment of the player. With the ability to change this, LEGENDS allows for different alignments within PLAYERS. This can be either GOOD or EVIL. There are several different things that happen to a player based upon their alignment. Players must attack monsters of the opposite alignment in order to gain experience. Monsters will not attack players of their same alignment. The RACE field follow the alignment field and is usually something you won't change unless a player wants to switch to a different race. You must enter an existing race within LEGENDS in order for the player to change to it. The OCCUPATION field follows the race field, and works just like it. If the player would like to switch to a different occupation in the middle of their adventure, you can switch by changing the value in this field. The long, grey get field below the player's alias, alignment, race, and occupation is the player's title. They can alter their own title with the TITLE command, but you can also alter it by changing what is seen in this long field. The PRIVILEGE field holds the amount of privilege that the player has currently. All players are started at 0 and you must change that value if they ever want anything else. See the guide to privilege, above. The LEVEL field holds the player's experience level. The EXPERIENCE field holds the total amount of experience that the player has earned upon all of their travels. The MAXIUM HIT POINTS field stores the total number of hitpoints that the player can have when they are healed. When you edit a player and save your changes, the player's hitpoints are automatically set to their maximum hitpoints also. The MAXIMUM SPELL POINTS field allows you to adjust how many spell points that the player has. This field is of no significance to a player who's occupation can not use magic. The ARMOR CLASS field determines how difficult it is to hit this player. LEGENDS automatically calculates this value based on their natural abilities, plus the armor that they are wearing. I usually do not change this value at all, but just in case you play with it, the lower the number, the harder it is for the player to be hit. The TO WEAPON field defines the player's base weapon. This, normally, is fists, but I have used it creatively to make players into living monsters to make my copy of LEGENDS much, much more exciting. This can be anything you can fit into the alloted space, but realize that this is a weapon name, and the player does not really have any item with this name in their inventory. If the player is wielding a weapon, this field will not be visible to them. The ATTACK VERB field holds a verb which adds a bit of color to the combat descriptions in LEGENDS. This verb stands for the type of attack that the player does against any other player or monster. ÚÄÄ COMMON ATTACK VERBS ÄÄ¿ ³ claws breathes ³ ³ strikes slashes ³ ³ thrusts bites ³ ³ slices spews ³ ³ gazes ³ ÀÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÙ The TO HIT field holds the total adjustment that the player gets to their attack roll. This is also based upon natural ability, occupational adjustments, as well as race adjustments and weapon and armor adjustments. I usually let LEGENDS keep track of this number, but you can alter it. The higher the value, the better the chances the player has of hitting whatever they attack. The adjacent field is the DAMAGE field which holds dice roll that damage is calculated from. This data MUST be entered in a specific format: ÚÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄ¿ ³ (Number of times to roll) d (Maximum value of a single dice roll) ³ ÀÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÙ FOR EXAMPLE: 1d16 will roll a sixteen-sided dice once. OR: 2d12, which would roll a twelve-sided dice twice. This can be any combination, although I recommend that the first number be less than six for fast execution. Other examples: 1d100, 2d5, 4d8, 2d20, etc. Bare in mind that this is the damage rolll that is rolled ONLY if the player is not wielding another weapon. This is the damage roll for their base weapon only. The field directly after DAMAGE is the DAMAGE ADJUSTMENT field. This value is added to the player's total damage done. This value could also be considered the lowest possible damage a player could inflict. This value is added on to either the player's damage roll, or the roll that a weapon they have readied makes. The higher this value, the higher the damage they will do on each attack. The final field two fields pertain to the type of spells that the player can cast. The SPELL CLASSES KNOWN field tells LEGENDS what class of spells the player can cast - either CLERIC or SORCERER, or both. The full name of the spell class must appear within the field for the player to be able to cast it. For instance, if the player can only cast cleric spells, you type: CLERIC but, if they can also cast sorcerer spells, you type: CLERIC SORCERER The MAXIMUM SPELL LEVEL field sets the limit on the highest level of spell from the defined classes that the player can cast. If this value is a 6, and the player can only cast cleric spells, they can only access any spell that is level 6 or LOWER. Once you have pressed return from the last field, LEGENDS will ask if you would like to save your changes. If you answer no, all things will be returned to their original status. 2.2 END-OF-FILE HITS ÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛ LEGENDS 4.3 also give you a simple way to deal with End-of-File Hit errors that occur when the databases are corrupted by either a BBS crash or a power failure. If you get this error, you can now enter your LEGENDS directory and delete all the files with a .NDX extension. With these files missing, LEGENDS is rendered inoperative to players. It is important that you run NDXLGNDS.EXE following the deletion of all the .NDX files in the directory. This executable program will reindex all of the files in record time, restoring LEGENDS to functionality, once again. 3.0 REGISTRATION, TECH SUPPORT ÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛ LEGENDS is distributed by ASR. You can purchase the registered version of LEGENDS via their BBS or VOICE phone. Call Advanced Systems Research at 503-699-8200 BBS or 503-699-TBBS VOICE to register. Logon as TBBS SYSOP with a password of SYSMON to receive instant access to the products section where you will be able to purchase LEGENDS with a credit card. If you are registered with any ASR product you may access the ASR Support Echo using our toll free 800 number at: ÚÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄ¿ ³ ÖÄÄÄ¿ ÖÄÄÄÖÄÄ¿ ÖÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄ ÄÄÄÄÒÄÄÄÄ ÖÄÄÄÄ Ò Â ³ ³ ÇÄÄÄ´ ÓÄÄ¿ÇÄÄÁ¿ ÓÄÄ¿· ÚÖÄÄ¿ÖÄÄ¿ÖÄÄ¿ÒÄ¿º ÇÄÄ ÖÄÄ ÇÄÄ´ÖÄÄ¿ ³ ³ Ð ÁÄÄÄÄÙÐ Á ÄÄÄÄÙÓÄÙÇÄÄÙÇÄÄÙÓÄÄÙÐ \Ð ÓÄÄÄÄÓÄÄ Ð ÁÓÄÄÙ ³ ³ 1-800-ASR-TBBS ³ ÀÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÙ Jeff Hoffman, programmer of LEGENDS, is available on ASR but faster service is available on Safe Harbor BBS. If you have technical questions, comments, or complaints, I can be reached there. Call Safe Harbor BBS at 414-548-8140 for 2400 BAUD or 414-548-8155 for HST & v.32bis 3.1 UPGRADING TO LEGENDS 4.3 ÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛ If you already own a copy of LEGENDS, you can upgrade to the new 4.3 software for FREE! Contact Jeff Hoffman on Safe Harbor BBS for your free upgrade. 3.2 WARRANTY ÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛÛ This software and accompanying materials are distributed "AS IS" without warranty. In no event shall the author, MDH Inc., Safe Harbor Computers, ASR, or anyone involved with the creation and production of this product be liable for any direct, indirect, incidental, or consequential loss or damage caused or alleged to be caused by the use of this program. Your use of this program constitutes your agreement to this disclaimer and your release of the author from any form of liability or litigation. ÛÛ Copyright (C) January, 1993 by Jeffrey D. Hoffman. All Rights Reserved. ÛÛ