The entire gamespace of Nilgiri is made of areas. From the very first room to the very last object, each one is defined in an area. Each area has its own group of rooms (also called world), creatures (also called mobiles), and objects. They also have a list of instructions for how the rooms, creatures and objects are supposed to load into the game. This list is called a zone. Some areas also have places where players can buy and sell objects. These are called shops and an area with one or more shops will need a single list of instructions called the shop.
(from old introduction) Areas on Nilgiri, as well as many other MUDs, are series of connected rooms that contain monsters and objects. The placing of the monsters and objects in relation to the rooms as well as some properties of the area itself are defined by the zone. Each of these four sections, WORLD (rooms), MOB (monsters), OBJECT and ZONE are all defined in separate sections in the game. The game itself pulls all of these sections together to build an area at runtime. Typicaly one develops their rooms first, followed by the monsters, then the objects and finally the zone to wrap them all up in. This primer will go through each section and describe what a creator needs to do in order to create an area and provide the syntax for all the commands used to create.
Also explain level ranges...
In a nutshell, for those familiar with Advanced Dungeons and Dragons (AD&D) an area is like a module. An area is a geographical location in the fantasy world where an adventure or quest is to be played.
Online area creation allows an immortal with the ability to perform online area creation to create new areas while inside the game using a set of commands. Immortals who have been given permission to create will use the commands listed in this primer to create rooms, mobiles, objects, and zone commands.
New areas do not immediately appear in the game for mortals to adventure in. New areas must be reviewed for spelling/grammar, geographical sanity, game play balance, and overall quality before they are openned to the public.
MUDs are obviously a text-based game so you have to know how to read and write. Along with a good idea and planning, a writing style with correct grammar are key to a successful area. Areas flow best when they are geographically sane as well. You don't want have someone go from a jungle to a desert to castle to the ocean in 4 rooms. Be logical. Be consistent. Here are some examples of good and bad style for the different sections:
The Smelly Cellar As you walk down into the cellar the first thing you notice is the horible smell!! Something must have died down here and was left to decay. You see a pantry whose door is partially open and there is nothing of value inside. There is only one exit back up the way you came. The floor is made of dirt. The walls are damp. The cellar is dark. You wish your grandmother hadn't locked you down in the cellar when you were a kid so you wouldn't be as scared as you are now.Can you see what makes this description bad? Let's go step by step. First, the room title has every word in the title capitalized. You only want to capitalize a room title if the words are part of a proper name. For example: "The Green Dragon Inn". Also, be mindful of the use of the word "the" in room titles. This cellar certainly isn't the only smelly cellar in the world. The first sentance of the room description has many problems. First of all it isn't indented. The typical style is be indented three spaces. Never never never EVER use the word "you" in any room, object or monster description! Why? The word "you" assumes too much. In this instance, I might have entered the room by another means other than walking. I could have teleported in, I could be floating, I could be wizard eyeing in. Also in this sentance there are two exclaimation points. Only use one when appropriate. The second sentence has you the creator doing the thinking for the player. A better way to the point of death across might have been to say the smell is reminisant of a decaying corpse. The following sentence is describing an object in the room and makes a value judgement for the player. A better way to present the pantry would be to actually create a pantry object that is a container to be loaded in the room. Perhaps you could even put some non-valuable items to be loaded in there as well such as a moldy piece of cheese and a frayed rope. The player draw their own conclusion about how valuable something is. The next sentence has a "you" in it and makes an assumption about how I could possibly leave the room. I could teleport or recall out. The next two sentences are okay but the third one is another assumption. What if I have a light? What if I cast a fireball in the room.. would it be dark then? If you want a room to be dark, set the room flag for darkness (explained in the WORLD section) and the game will tell a player whether or not the room is dark. The last sentence is totally off-topic and lends little to the room description. As a whole, the description is approaching the maximum length. You typically want your rooms to be no more than 5 or 6 sentences long, 3 to 5 is just right. Use adjectives and adverbs to inspired a mood or feeling you want to portray. For example, a better way to say "sexy" would be "sensious curves".
Here is a better room description:
A smelly cellar
Upon entering the cellar the smell of rotting flesh overtakes the
senses. Sickly damp walls droop down to a coarsely finished dirt floor.
There is a section of floor dirt in the northeast corner that looks
freshly dug up.
A rotting wooden pantry stands against the wall.
The pantry is an object in the room that is flagged NOTAKE. The dug up section of the room along with the smell suggests that something is dead and buried in the room. You could go futher to describe a room object for the dug up section.. or make it another "hidden" exit down. Being creative gives you more options.
First, you need the ability to perform area creation. If you do not have this already, then you need to speak with an implementor to grant you the priviliage. You also need a index block to work within. An implementor will assign these to you as well. More to come....
More to come....