FurToonian Building Code

This code is not meant to be an absolutely rigid law; there are, no doubt, reasons for the lack of ObvExits, short or nonexistent descs, and/or blank exits--on some rooms. However, public building is, on the whole, an almost formal affair. People new to the MUCK, who are considering characters, walk through our public areas to get a feel of how good our MUCK is, and if they want to be there. Good building in those areas is imperative if we want new players! If you walked into a MUCK where no public rooms were desced beyond "This is a street. There are two exits.", would you want to stay and get a character? For this reason, public building must follow a few simple rules. These are the same rules that will be used in making decisions in terms of granting public exits, and new public-room areas.

[Note: People who already have public areas linked to the MUCK who have already had them approved need not worry about this code. You have built up to standard or we would not have given you the @quota in the first place. If you add new areas, however, you are expected to keep the code in mind while you build.]

The Basic Rules o' Building (tm):

1. The use of Obvious Exits (@succ here=@393 or @succ here=@1393), or some similar exit-marking program. You can also put a list of the exits in the room description or on a sign, but there must be some easy way for people who've never seen your areas before to find their way around, and especially into and out of your work. If you want people to see the wonderful things you've built, you have to make it easy for them to get into and through! Mazes, and places where the point is that the explorer have a hard time getting through, don't need to do this, but for apartment complexes, forests, and the like, it's a definite necessity.

    

2. A complete description. We've all seen the private homes whose owners have desced them "This is the bedroom. There's a bed and a TV." Does this impress? No. A complete description does not have to be a long one, but it does have to answer some questions about the room you are in. The MUCK is a world made completely of text; the less text you use, the smaller and more dull your world is going to be. What colour are the curtains, the carpet? What's on the tv? Is there a pet? A door? What's the layout of the room? Is there a window? What's the atmosphere like?--is it cosy, scary, neat, messy? A complete description aims to create a picture of the room in the mind of the explorer--the more decorative, and descriptive, the better, and the more your explorer will like your work.

    

3. Described, @succed, @failed, @osucced, and @odropped exits. I'm sure you hate going through these messages on every exit you make, just like I do. However, remember the cardinal rule of building--you are making an area for others to see, understand, and enjoy. If you want to make an area for yourself and no-one else, then you can put it in an apartment building--but you're selling yourself short. If you have a public area, you're building so that people will walk through your stuff and go "Oooooh! That's NEAT!" People will have a much easier time exploring if you describe your exits so that they can tell where they are without having to look at the room eight times. In case you haven't noticed yet, exit descriptions are good places to add clues to mysteries, little details in the building, and even the occasional bad joke. :) They also make your building look thorough--like you took actual time to do it, rather than just plowing through six rooms and quitting. The @succ, @fail, and @odrop messages are there to add to the atmosphere of the MUCK. It makes more sense to see "Ginger walks in from the street outside." than to see just "Ginger has arrived." It looks better, and helps you envision the room you're in. The MUCK is a world of imagination--give it the help it needs to become real, and add those little details. They make a world (pardon the pun) of difference.

    

4. The proper environment room. Most people get this one right, but occasionally you'll get a down description of "You look further down into the water." in a street room, and occasionally you'll get some wierder things. Remember to make all things in an environment room that you create just as complex as you would in a "real" room: make an "up" and a "down" exit, and describe, @lock, and @fail them, and make those "n;s;e;w;ne;se;sw;nw" exits unique, or at least interesting to encounter. And use all the names! People do type "north&qu ot; once in a while. :)

    

5. LINKED exits. I've ranted about this before, and I will do it again: "blank" exits used for "actions" in a room must be linked to $nothing. Anyone, not just the owner of the action, controls an unlinked exit. Other people can, and will, steal these exits, and you will never know, and your details, and all your work, will be lost. It takes one command--"@link <exit>=$nothing", and @succ messages can still be used on the exit--when you successfully use it, nothing happens, and only the @messages are displayed. (@succ, @osucc, @fail, @ofail, etc.) For more information on this, look at the "help" under @succ, @lock, @link, @fail, and exits.

    

6. The proper flags. Unless you are planning to give your entire area to another player, setting your rooms, or indeed anything "c" (chown_ok) is not a good idea. You will wake up one morning with a lot more @quota, and one land mass missing from your @owned list, after someone walks through and @chowns all your stuff. And, unless it's your bedroom or something, or a very common area, you will be unable to prove that it's your stuff, and not that of the person who @chowned it. Don't set anything you want to keep, and especially not public building, chown_ok.

    

Some notes on other building-related subjects:

1. Obtaining exits to public places. If you want to link your dream area to a public place, be sure to have something finished before you ask your friendly builder wizard for an exit. Unless we can see that your building holds to the standards we've set up (to keep your MUCK a clean and beautiful place we can all be proud of), we will not give you the link. Even just one room is enough for us to see; it will save a lot of time and trouble if you build that one room first, and trust me, the exit will not be given away while you build. Just page or page #mail a builderwizard (Calico, Ginger or Tabyathe) with the database number of your sample room, and, most likely, the minute we hear of it you'll have your exit, all linked and ready for business. Be sure to describe it! :)
   1. [A note: You can build without having an exit linking you to the rest of the MUCK. Just type "@dig <roomname>", and then @link an action from yourself to the room by "@act myroom=me", & quot;@link myroom=<db# of new room>". Rooms created in this way are called floating rooms until they get an exit to the MUCK in general, and are permissible for building-in-progress.]

    

2. Apartment complexes or large buildings. I'm sure you've realised by now that we're a small MUCK. We have about 2200 players, and most of them live Inside the Base of the Tree. When building your huge, sprawling dream apartment complex, please remember that there will, most likely, not be 200 people to fill your vast edifice, and what you will end up with is 180 unlinked exits, which will drive your friendly neighborhood builderwizards frantic, and take up database space, increasing bloat (and lag!). This doesn't mean you can't eventually have 38 billion rooms. Just wait till, say, the first 20-30 are filled up, and then add a couple more floors.

    

3. Places which are "not public". Anything in those aforementioned apartment complexes; anything which is labelled "'s Bedroom", anything not meant for Guests to walk through and explorers to examine is "not public". These places should be either in the apartment complexes or somehow @locked off from the outside world, so that Guests don't get in and wonder why there's no desc. (Not that I think you'd want Guest in your bedrooms! :) Non-public places do not need to follow the building code, and can be as intricate or as sloppy as your little heart desires. Floating rooms, until they are linked, are considered non-public, no matter what their eventual use. (So you don't have to panic and finish all your building before you can link it, just because it's going to be public.) A note: Public spaces that have already received their link but have yet to be completed should be @locked at their entrance until their completion and grand opening, to prevent Guests/explorers becoming disgusted and also to keep the secret properly.

    

4. Geographic continuity. Most of the MUCK has managed to maintain this; some parts have not, however. Anyplace public, like South or any of its connecting Streets, is expected to be, on the whole, geographically correct, in north-south/east-west orientation at the very least. Since so many people have requested huge areas of land for forests, great plains, and the like, South Park has been made into a preserve for such people; South Park is magical, and is not geographically correct, so that everyone may have their public forests. Cartographers beware.

    

5. Train linkage; public accessibility; KahzKab links. To get these, your area must be a major point of interest, a major intersection, or somehow worthy of the time and trouble it takes to set up such a link. Train stations in particular are very difficult and time-consuming to set up (and, as the programs involved use ownership protocol/commissions, can only be done by Tabyathe), and should not be considered an infinite/free commodity. KahzKab exits are easier to make, but are not frivolous. We will not link bedrooms, private residences, or apartments to the KahzKab, no matter how popular they are to visit. Set these areas Link_ok, and let your friends make exits to them.

    

6. Links to public areas. The Town Square is completely full of exits out, and that counts for exits in as well. There are no exits being given out directly to Town Square, the Tree House, anywhere along South, Cairn, Bates, Aris, or any other public Street, or any of the public wizard-owned places. It is not fair for you to have such an advantage in getting to these places, via mirrors/portals in your own homes, or personal actions, while others walk. Exits off of these areas are allowed as space permits. We are not putting in any unexpected lakes, mysterious portals or trapdoors, or hovering doorways in the streets. Don't even ask. We will not be putting in "nne", "sse", "nnw", or "ssw" exits along the streets until ALL the street exits are filled up; this is in no danger of happening.

    

7. The "building police". Just so you know that we builderwizzes are just as fallible as you are, you do have an opportunity or two to show us up. If you spot any problems in public building (such as mysterious unlinked exits in South Street, or descriptions in the rooms of buildings that aren't there) that belongs to a wiz, it's your duty to page/page #mail yon wizard and tell them to clean it up. It's also your treat, too, because this is your way to get back at us. :) Besides, we hate to be hypocritical, and it's only right that we follow our own advice.

    

8. The future. We have, at last count in February 98, 712 unlinked, unused exits. We have several unlinked, floating, undesced rooms, and about 8,000 old, unused objects. Typing "@find =EU=" will locate your unlinked exits, and if you ask the wizards can find your unlinked rooms. @recycle these, and make the world a better place. If they continue to exist, and multiply, unchecked, the builderwizards will take it upon themselves to @recycle them with at least one warning, of course--and will not be responsible for whatever personal plans they ruin with their @recycling. Exits that look useable and/or important will be linked to $nothing; rooms with descs will be attached to apartments in a complex of the wizards' choice; anything else will be removed. Some of these exits have been around for months, and unused, and the practice of stealing unlinked exits has been around just as long. You've had plenty of time to @link them yourselves, and lots of warning.