WorldBuildingGuide

CoffeeMUD
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=CoffeeMUD Builder Information=
Basics	Praetor     Player Support     Commands     Zapper Masks	Advanced	Races     Classes     Abilities     Socials     Scripting
Building	Behaviors     Properties     Areas     Rooms     Exits     Items     Mobs	Systems	Achievements     Crafting     Help Info     Ships     Planes of Existence     Quests     Triumphs

World Building

Area Design

• The main thoroughfares of cities should be lit if the normal inhabitants don`t have dark vision. This is especially important for starter areas so nighttime does not unfairly impede game play for Newbies.
• Put up some sort of warning of entering a new area, especially if greater than 5 levels difference. This should generally be a sign or an emoter.
• For areas with significant level differences, consider adding prop_reqnomob to the first room in the new higher-level area to give players a safe place to notice they are in a different (and possibly too-high) level area.

Low Level Areas (level 15 or less)

• Should generally be well lit, or provide light sources.
• Should generally provide food and drink in some fashion (or be close to a town).

Room Design

• Rooms should generally describe the state of the room. They should be non-directional and give noticeable exits from the room. By non-directional, rooms should not, in general, assume that you have entered from a specific direction. The exits should be listed as part of the description, not as an afterthought.
• If you list furnishings in the room description, do not create items for those furnishings. Eventually, a player will take them, destroy them, or otherwise mangle their description so that it won`t make sense. It is far better to actually create the furniture, and keep the description of the furniture in the item description. This allows our players to be as greedy and evil as they want to be, without ruining the rooms description.

Mob Design

Mob Names

• Proper Names of mobs should be capitalized.
  • Mobs without a proper name should have NO capitalization (it may appear capitalized in the CL, but verify it is not capitalized when you enter the name).
  • Mobs without a proper name should include an article (the assassin or a kaleidoscope of butterflies).
  • Avoid using a plural name, such as crickets. Instead, consider using the singular of a group of crickets. This will avoid noun-verb mismatches in mudchat and other behaviors.
  • Do not start the name with a number. For example instead of "1st SGT Smith" use "First Sergeant Smith" or "a first sergeant"
• If you give the name a color code, be sure to properly close off that color code so it doesn't bleed into other text.
• Female Barbarians can also be called Amazons.

Aggressive Mobs

• MOBs have a variety of behaviors that they can become dangerous to players. The list below is in increasing order of difficulty for players to overcome:
  • Wimpy-Mob will attempt to Flee
  • No special behavior-Baseline difficulty
  • WimpyAggressive-Will attack sleeping players
  • BrotherHelper-Will group up on players attacking a specified brother mob (same name or same start room)
  • RaceHelper-Will group up on players attacking creatures of the same race...will come to defense of players if the players are the same race and mob is different race.
  • Aggressive-Will attack players upon entry of the room.
  • Aggressive with the Mobile Behavior as well-Will attack players upon entry of room (by MOB or by Player)
  • MobileAggressive-Will seek out combat. If player is in a fight in an adjacent room, will come to that room and attack the player. Very dangerous behavior.
• Consider making high-level aggressive mobs ignore ultra-low level players by adding a zapper mask in their aggression behavior.
• In general, areas should be designed where the highest level mobs in the area are not Aggressive (or more) so that players may hunt the lower level mobs in the area. If there are higher level predatory mobs, there should be some indication that they are coming for the player, and should NOT be more than 5 levels higher than the anticipated adventuring level of the area.

Guildmasters

• Guildmasters is a term which generally refers to a MOBTeacher who trains one or more classes.
  • To ensure full functionality, you may need to also add Prop_Trainer to the mob.
• Aside from the capitol cities, Guildmasters should generally know one class only.
  • A guildmaster that has multiple classes will divide his level amongst all classes he can train. So a MOBTeacher(Mage Abjurer Alterer Conjurer) would divide his levels by 4 to determine the maximum level of spells he could train.
• All guildmasters except commoner guildmasters should not teach common skills. Players may learn common skills for a price from specialist mobs who teach those skills. (This is currently being waived, but I would like to encourage it for any new guildmasters).
• It is ok to withhold skills from guildmasters so that those skills can be sought after by special quest mobs.
• A city does not NEED to have a guildmaster of each type.
• Guildmasters should be given immunity to charm-type spells, teleportation/summoning type spells and possibly other resistances.
  • Guildmasters should be given at least 20 bonus hit points per level.
  • If a Guildmaster is exceedingly high level for the area (to properly train skills), consider granting him Prop_SafePet. This will prevent the Guildmaster's level from showing up in the WHERE command and skewing the possible adventuring level.
  • If an area is conquerable, consider providing the Guildmaster with Prop_NoOrdering.
• If you wish to modify a Guildmaster's stats, use Prop_StatTrainer.

Shopkeepers

• Shopkeepers who aren`t supposed to leave their shop should be given teleportation and summoning immunity.
• A nice thing to do with shopkeepers is to give them prop_closeddaynight. If you want to make it really realistic, give them a home for them to walk to at the end of their work day using prop_closeddaynight.
• Items in shopkeepers inventory CAN be modified by buying the item, modifying it, dropping it, modifying the shopkeeper, removing the item from his shopkeeper inventory, adding it back to his shopkeeper inventory, and then saving the MOB.
• If you don`t want a shopkeeper destroyed, give him prop_safepet and prop_noorder. This will also remove his levels from being considered in the WHERE command, but will also make him immune from thiefly abilities. Use with care. In general, shopkeepers should be susceptible to attack.
• It is a good idea to grant your shopkeepers senses to see in the dark if you want them to interact with DROW.
• Shopkeepers should generally have 30 bonus hit points per level, and have half the attack and damage of a normal mob their level. This will effectively draw out their fights so that any local city guards can come to their defense.
• It is generally best if shopkeepers are not affected by Inebriation, as they may hand items and money out to the wrong people mistakenly.

Item Design

Item Names

The name field is the short name of the item. It should fit inside the sentence "You pick up (item name)."

• When you name an item, the NAME field should be in lower case, unless it is a proper name.
• Use an article before the name whenever possible (a/an, the, some, etc) so that the language parser has an easier time of identifying sentence tense (a pair of pants, vs pants).
• The NAME field should be a very brief name. If the NAME field is too long, items will not be properly displayed in shop inventories. Try to keep item NAMEs to under 20 characters in length.
• Do not start the name with a number. Spell out the number if you need to instead of using the digit version...or better yet, start it with an article.
• If you give the name a color code, be sure to properly close off that color code so it doesn't bleed into other text.

Other Item Notes

• The DISPLAY field should start in uppercase, and should be a complete sentence describing how the item is at rest.
• The DESCRIPTION field should start in uppercase, and should be complete sentences.
• All items from Quest Point (QP) vendors need prop_nocraftability.

Achievement Design

• When providing a title for an achievement, use Title Case for the title. It looks better on the WHO list.

Quest Design

• When providing a title for a quest, use Title Case for the title. It looks better on the WHO list.

Alramidgaardian conversions

• Anything Changeling should refer to Charlatans.
• Anything Anti-Paladin should refer to Templars or can be an evil Paladin.
• Anything Nightwalker should refer to Assassin.