Q: How do levels work? A: There are two primary statistics regarding level: ch->level, and the psuedo-level o a char. Ch->level equal to the highest mortal level a character has, out of the 5 classes ( war, thi, cle, mag, psi). For imms, it is from 81 to 85, and the highest for players is 80. Psuedo level takes into account the levels of the player’s 2/5 remort classes. Since on the whole, it is harder to get mort levels than remort levels, each remort level counts as ¼ of a level for the calculation of psuedo level: Here is the formula: psuedo level = ch->level + ¼( total remort levels). As you can see, this ranges from 1 ( newbie ) to 120 ( adept, meaning level 80 in each mort class, level 80 in two remort classes). Ch->level ( and indirectly, psuedo level ) only takes into account the HIGHEST mortal level of the 5, so a war 10, cle 15, psi 8, mag 2, thi 20 would be considered both ch->level = 20, and psuedo level = 20, while a char with all 80s in the mort classes, level 70 in Sorceror, and level 10 in Assassin would be a ch->level 80, but a psuedo level of 100. Q: Okay, how can a player tell what level items they can use? A: There are two ways to restrict an item from use: the actual level of the item (2 to 120 ), and the remort extra flag. Basically, items not flagged as remort require the player to have a psuedo level >= the level of the item, but if the item is set to extra: remort, then they must have a REMORT CLASS at least as high as the level of the item. Here are some examples: sword: level 100, not flagged as remort—and player with a mortal class at least level 80, and total remort class levels of 80 ( either 1 class, or 70 in one, and 10 in another) can use it. Lantern: level 20, flagged as remort: Only remorts that have at least one remort class at level 20 can wear this item, regardless of anything else. Gauntlets, level 100, flagged remort—this is NOT GOOD…no one can ever have a remort class with a level of 100, so no one can ever use this item. Bracers, level 120 , not flagged as remort. Basically, these are adept only eq, since a psuedo level of 120 means that they have two remort classes at level 80 (meaning that all mort classes are also level 80, or they couldn’t be a dual remort in the first place), hence they are an adept. Q: So how can mobs be set to level 140? A: Mobs don’t have remort classes, so their psuedo level is the same as their ch->level, which is NOT restricted to 80 as players are, but allowed to go up to 140. Q: Why can mobs have a level of 140? A: This is a bit involved, but logical once you understand it. Players can only get good experience from killing mobs close (within about 20 levels) of their own psuedo level. This was coded to keep people from fighting a super high level mob, killing it (with help from others) , and gaining mucho, mucho exp. Therefore, for adepts ( psuedo level 120 ) to get decent exp, you need to have mobs roughly 20 levels greater than that. Q: Why are some mobs with a level of 140 worth LESS experience than mobs of say level 120? A: Experience for a mob is calculated when the mob is loaded into the game, based not only of the level of the mob, but also the flags set, the abilities of the mob, the spells they can cast, and some other factors. This is to make mobs that are harder to kill because of their spells worth more experience. Q: How do I balance mobs in an area to the players I want to explore there? A: This is one of the most difficult things to do with Ack!Mud code, because mobs can do so many things in battle. A mob with sanc and a flaming cloak is actuallly EASIER to kill than a mob with a flaming cloak only, because the players do less damage to the mob due to the sanc, and therefore don’t take as much damage from the flaming cloak. However, a mob with a fire shield, sanc, and the defensive spell heal can be near impossible to kill for some players, while easy as pie for others, roughly of the same power. Here’s an even trickier one: if you load say 4 sentinel mobs in a room, the more that are there, the harder they are to kill, since mobs will assist each other. When there is only one mob in the room, a player can most likely solo them with no problem. BUT, if there are 3 or more in the room, they will all gang up on the player if he tries to kill one of the mobs, making the battle much more difficult. The short answer is that once you make an area, test it completely with actual players, over and over again, twekaing your mobs incrementally until you have the desired effect. Q: Howcome when I oload an item, it loads at level 85, but when my head builder oloads the same item, it loads at 84? A: Originally, the code always loaded items at the level of the mob they were given to. We overrode that by allowing you to set the individual level of the item within the olc, forcing it to load at that level. However, for backwards compatibility, a level of 1 on an item in the olc tells the code to go ahead and load the item at the loader’s level (either a reset to a mob, or oload from an imm). In this case, the item you two are loading is set to level 1, hence the code is loading it at the level of the loader, 85 in your case, 84 for your Head builder (Hypothetical). Q: How to I tweak the fight code? We want to have a very low magic game, with not very powerful objects, but the mobs are slaughtering the players. A: Since players are real people, the fight code can’t really overcome the player’s intelligence, so mobs get extra advantages. Within one_hit, in fight.c, is the actual fight equation, to determine a hit, and how much damage is done. One thing that we have done is to change the hit/miss system to a “power of hit” system..players can have a glancing blow, a partial hit, a severe hit, or even a critical hit in some cases. You will need to really understand the fight code, and set a SOLID standard ( and enforce it ) for the max power of items in your game as set by the builders. SoE had the same inflation of items problem that many muds have…each item placed in a new area was slightly more powerful than equiv items in the game at the moment, so that players would want to get it….this causes a run-away effect in your items, your mobs, and ultimately gets idiotic with the item affects. If I have ONE suggestion for new starting muds, it’s to set a bonus system for ALL items from the start, and STICK TO IT J Q: Okay, I see that races are pretty cool and all, but are they really all that different? A: Yes, in many ways. First, cosmetic: each race has a default enter/exit message, which is changable in comm.c. Second, and more importantly, in const.c in the race_table, each race has base stats, racial mods, and starting skills. The mods are pretty important: a race that has RACE_MOD_NO_MAGIC just plain won’t be able to cast spells well, and players that want to roleplay a spell caster shouldn’t be a Titan. All the races are configurable at any time, once the code has been recompiled, and horebooted. Racial mods will apply to all chars of the race that was changed after the reboot. Stats are even more important: During char generation, after a race is selected, you can only have +-3 from that stat. In Ack!Mud code, stats have a LOT of effects—a low str will limit the amount of weight you can carry, and more importantly, can even keep you from wielding certain items in the game, if they are set in the olc as having a high weight. Int controlls spell success, mana regen, and in some cases spell power. Wis controls practices, and spell saving, while dex affects your naked ac, speed of your attacks (how many out of your max attacks per round you actually get to use), and a few others. Finally, Con controls how many hitpoints you can ever have, and in a hack slash mud we all know this is important! Q:What’s up with werewolves and Vampires? A: Hehee..well, I don’t want to give all the secrets away, since the existence of them is really secret—in fact, do they really exist at all? I don’t know:P Maybe if you email me, I might be able to find something out… Q: How do I make other immortal characters? A: Use the setclass command to raise one of their classes to levels 81-85. Q: Players—hate having to type cast ‘dispel magic’ somereallyannoyingandhardtotypemobkeyword? A: We have several generic keywords that you can use: tank, which is either yourself, or whomever in your group that the mob you are in combat with is actually hitting, enemy, which is the person that your tank is currently damaging, and self, which is rather obvious. Therefore, once your tank is hitting something, ust typing c ‘dispel m’ enemy will hit the bad guy every time J Q: Why can’t my players use some of the doors that I know are there, because I see them in REDIT mode? A: Named/keyworded doors must be entered, using the keyword set in olc. For example: enter stairs, enter pit, etc. For builders, you must not only make the room exit type door, by typing door type door in REDIT mode, but also give it the keyword name with door keyword . Q: How do I save areas in the olc? A: They autosave when edited, and are placed in the save queue. Type mon area_save to see the periodic saving of the areas. Q: My players say they can’t practice any skills..how come? A: I changed the standard mercism of seeing unknown but practicable skills in the prac list, mostly to hide certain skills that the player’s don’t really know about, but also because the slist command lists them all, nicely color coordinated. Q: A few builder tips: the @@! And @@. Color codes are handy..they stand for highlighted and dimmed, which is configurable by the players with the colour command…meaning that the text after these color codes will be different colors to different players.. Q: Builders? Hate the fact that players can type get a* get b* get c* etc. to find that super-secret invis thingy in the room? A: Any keyword can have a ^ in front of it, which will override the expand string capability of the * operator. For example, if you want to hide a named door in a room, set it’s keyword to ^trapdoor. Enter t*, enter tr* even enter trap* won’t work for the player, they must type enter trapdoor to use the trapdoor. More to come……..