Pendulum MUD

Please check out the codebase.

Fri, 10 Sep 2004 19:03:30 GMT

driver: MudOS
lib: Lima

mud host: pendulum.priorlakebrewing.com:7878
mud www: pendulum.priorlakebrewing.com:7881
PhpBBS: pendulum.priorlakebrewing.com

I know this is a hobby for everyone involved, but I would appreciate it if you would take a look at this Mud codebase I've set up and provide your feedback on it. I would like us to be able to make a determination with regard to code base sooner than later so we can get to work on the items we need and on the content we'd like to see.

Here are the pros and cons to MudOS/Lima as I see them so far:
Pro:
1. MudOS is the fastest Mud driver available.
2. Lima is a feature rich lib with core development still taking place (and developers who are actually accessible: lima.mudlib.org:7881)
3. Lima/MudOS contains the following (that I've found, so far):
a basic guild system, a basic skills system, a basic stats engine, a communication system with many channels already built (newbie, wiz, etc), a spell system, a race system, a fully-featured soul (about 3000+ emotes, some which are incredibly stupid), the 2.4.5 mudlib, a prebuilt example area, a prebuilt example domain, prebuilt example quests, and a basic combat system (limb-based and non-limb-based). Lima also includes an in game permissions and security system, admin hierarchies, assignable/creatable domains, in-game daemon configuration, a good deal of admin tools, UNIX-like commands (globbing works ls *.[ch]), and a nicely developed help system which can be rebuilt on the fly from the admtool much like a system admin would use catman to rebuild man pages. The driver/lib also features web-accessible services such as http and ftp as well as webed, a utility to edit files via a web browser window. The driver/lib also features intermud support.
4. The driver/mudlib work well together and are very easy to install
5. The driver/mudlib are rather well documented.
6. The lib is laid out in with a very nice hierarchy.
7. It is much easier to edit code and navigate the directory structure.

Cons:
1. The combat system needs work
2. The code already written for Pendulum hosted by Lem would need to be rewritten (at least in part, I think) to work on the Pendulum I host.

Todo:
1. I would like to make you each into wizards and then create system shell accounts for you to allow you to directly edit your code via vi/vim.
2. Apply the numerous bug fixes available. I have applied 2 so far, there are about 20-30 in total.

Please take a look around - I really appreciate your feedback.

Thanks.

Standards are great: There are so many to choose from

Thu, 09 Sep 2004 13:50:37 GMT

After much clenching of fists and gnashing of code we might be best staying with the code base we have (DGD/2.4.5) with the possible exception that if we move to *nix we might be able to update the lib to 3.x.x

I've compiled the genesis driver/lib from the genesis site only to have the driver not recognize half of the lib. The install took well over an hour as I spent an enormous time adding #defines and other structural crap to the code to get it to compile on my c libs. This could've been cool, had I got it to work.

I attempted to find and compile Amylaar's code, but that was a bust. All of the sites I found were dead links.

I successfully compiled the MudOS driver with the Lima mudlib (which is still, albeit very slowly) being developed. The mud-lib has quite a lot, but not enough to drop in and start playing the mud immediately.

Bottomline: There are many better libs than 2.4.5 and faster drivers than DGD, but no other alternative exists for a person/persons that want to simply compile and login to a MUD with enough code to start gaming immediately.

I'm going to try and get Genesis working again - maybe that'll be better.

Otherwise, I'd suggest moving the current (Lem hosted) MUD to a *nix box and create system logins for everyone so they can edit code with 'vi' on the system and not worry about MUD-enforced permissions.

If you want to check out MudOS/Lima, it's still running here: pendulum.priorlakebrewing.com:7878

We should be able to pillage code from the Lima mudlib...

Pendulum Alternative

Thu, 09 Sep 2004 02:24:37 GMT

I've opened another Pendulum which runs on the MudOS base and Lima mudlib. It's got quite a lot to it. Login and create a character and I will wiz you and let you play around.

Pendulum PHPBB forum:
http://pendulum.priorlakebrewing.com

Pendulum MUD-based www (this has lots of neat stuff, including a web-based documentation and a file editor!):
http://pendulum.priorlakebrewing.com:7881

Pendulum MUD: telnet://pendulum.priorlakebrewing.com:7878

Once made into a wizard try the admtool command. It's pretty nifty. This is still LPC, but it's a little different. add_action has been replaced with the superior 'verb' functionality.

If it's something we want to use, let's go for it, if not, that's all right.

With regard to hosting a mud right-out-of-the-box, the DGD/2.4.5 combo Lem is running might be more baked and ready-to-go.

Hop on and let me know what you think. I think we should go with whatever will allow us to start coding content right away.

send me an email (root@priorlakebrewing.com) when you setup an account on the MUD and I'll wiz you.

Pendulum MUD Message Board Available

Tue, 07 Sep 2004 13:42:15 GMT

Heya, everybody.
I know we've got this community, but for the purposes of posting code, general chit-chat, or whatever, I've setup a forum on my webserver for this MUD.

Feel free to stop on over and sign-up. If you do, please reply to this thread and let me know what username you are using (if it is different from that of your wizard).

http://pendulum.priorlakebrewing.com

Update: The server came back on it's own from it's extended gnashing.

Pendulum Mud: life3's Current Todo:

Sat, 04 Sep 2004 23:16:54 GMT

First some feedback: Our current codebase is really sparse. It's complete enough to do some basic areas/monsters, but we're without a lot of support code. To that end, Genesis, another LPCMUD has it's driver and mud lib available for download. After playing around with it for a bit, I strongly suggest that we consider moving to the Genesis code base. There is a lot of support code already created and they have some neat code development and support tools. Additionally, basic tools like cat don't suck and they've fixed the file_path issue, which is something that annoys the hell out of me in our current code base. The genesis code is also structured very, very well.

Download it here: http://genesis.cs.chalmers.se/wizards_frame.html
You'll need to scroll down the page a bit.

If there's interest, I'll host it on my FreeBSD server for us to play around with.

With that being said, here's what I'm currently working on:

1. Wiztools: fixing all file manipulation tools. This involves manipulating core code (file.c, possibly player.c, and a handful of includes/resource files). Specific fixes I'm attempting to make: all tools should be mindful of the current directory in which one is currently working.
a. Specifically, if pwd is /room and I say cat room.c it should look in my present working directory (pwd) first, and then default to my home directory.
b. cd allows changing to non-existent directories. It should check to see whether the directories exist or not. Also cd .. works, but cd ../ does not. I want to ensure that cd ../../ and cd - work.
c. I want cat to work more like *nix cat. Specifically, I want it to cat the entirety of a file, not 40 lines and then *TRUNCATE*. This can be fixed by editing core code and raising CAT-LINES to something much greater than 40. Or, I can use my head and have the code determine the file length and then cat that many lines. I also want to try and introduce herefile capability into cat. Specifically, I want to be able to perform operations such as: cat my_file.c > my_file.c.bak, and cat >> newcode.c and to end. This would make it *much* easier to copy paste code from an external editor into a new file.
d. ed: Ed sucks. This needs to be more intuitive. I don't know if I have the ability to code this into something more like vi/vim.

2. Game objects: Base, inheritable game objects. Verified good weapon.c, monster.c, etc.

3. Object examples: fully documented example objects which use all of the functions associated with the base object.

This work will take me quite some time and requires access rights to core code. Almost all of this work is nullified if we switch to the genesis base.

My first two major game content areas will be the following:
my castle and the castle grounds: This will span quite a distance and contain a newbie area, an intermediate area, and a high-level expert area. Which reminds me that we need to talk about alignment and whether or not we're using it.

The second major content area is the 'expert' area of my grounds: The truly adventurous may eventually come across an abandoned temple. Exploration of the temple will reveal a entrance into an area filled with unimaginable peril and riches Think of a MUD version of Tomb of Horrors...

That's all for now.
P.S.: I'm jlangh0ff AT yahoo DOT com for those of you with instant messengers.

Sat, 04 Sep 2004 05:57:00 GMT

Well, since I'm not going to be there for super tuesday and I came up with a couple thoughts on the plane, here goes.

Whether we implement a guild system as is known to nanny or a different sort of customizable class system, or both, I thought of something that would be cool to have.

I'll start from the beginning. Well crafting's a cool idea, and I had the idle thought of how it would be cool if a certain guild got the ability to craft things out of monster partsl; more specifically, it would be neat to have a monster who only drops a certain component if the person who killed it was good enough to take it as a crafting component, for example, a guy kills a dragon to make (or at least assemble a list of ingredients to make) a dragonhide armor.

This led me to the idea of Skills.. since it's kind of pointless to have a guild dedicated to just that, and also assuming we might not even use a guild system... I thought that crafting could be a skill that any player can raise if he chooses. Skills could advance much like guilds (complete a number of objectives to raise a rank), but hopefully a bit faster. Of course, characters might want to be high level to get the higher skills, if gettijng to craft skill 16 meant making dragonhide armor and a kraken-tooth sword, they mnight want to be level 16 before trying (but don't necessarily need to).

I thought about it and two other skills that could be neat:

repair/gadgets: since we;'re working with a clockwork/automaton genre it would be sweet if players could fix broken bots, or loot them for parts or even build their own minor cohorts. this might lead us to create a new corpse object for any golem/robot/construct/automaton .. once again, as in craft, certain quality components would be recoverable (i.e. would be created at all) for players with high enough skill.

orienteering/survival. one ability players who raise this skill could get would be a know direction (lem and i talked about this once), as if they were always using a compass.. really they could get a set of auto-load adventuring equipment (more different tools as they advance in level) like a torch, then a rope, and eventually a pack, a lantern, a compass, chalk to mark the way in mazes, who knows.

Another simple skill could be spot/investigation, which would merely allow characters to notice with the "look" command room details a lesser player would have to find through multiple strings of examines. i.e. exa wall, the wall is covered in thick red paint, exa paint, the paint is coming loose in a corner, exa corner, behind the loose strip of paint seems to be a scrawled message, exa message "go north fifty paces then ten west, from the statue". the player with a high spot might notice the paint coming loose as they "look" around the room (because the wizard coded it that way)

of course, all of this requires lots of support code,.. but it would also be really fun to design an area that gives players with some of these higher skills room to use them.. more monsters which will drop components for players with 15 craft, or an area that any player could get across, (perhaps a gap you need to swing across or combine two objects somehow) but that a well equipped "explorer" could navigate without a trip to the shop.

And the good news is...

Fri, 03 Sep 2004 12:53:13 GMT

I won't be posting public code examples here any longer.

the directory /open is all-accessible (hopefully,) in terms of read-write access. I've added workroom.c to it and invite anyone with code they wish to share to do the same.

Furthermore, I know I post too much here.

What I lack for in talent and enthusiasm, I make up for in baseless ambition.

Thu, 02 Sep 2004 23:53:52 GMT

In no particular order:

Studying soul.c for the feasibility of creating a base soul object. If there's anything that you want emote commands to do (in general, such as take an adverb as an argument, or create some roleplay driven permanent effect,) e-mail, mudmail or comment.

Studying room.c. Currently I'm looking at adding aliasing functionality to the items handling code (so you can have multiple strings attached to the same description,) which should be useful. If you have any opinions on this or other room related subjects, I'm guessing that you can guess the drill.

Making a basic wiztool. This would be the hardest, but also most pressing thing on my docket. I personally want the ability to run a simple piece of code in a test environment without having a circus involved. I bet you know what to do if you want to discuss that with me.

Planning on cranking these out and posting them to the community:

Newbie area. Replete with monsters and weapons based in the room calls. I have it laid out, I'll probably code it, bugcheck it and post it tonight, barring computer fire.

A monster based on monster.c kinda like the workroom based on workroom.c. The monster in question will probably be really simple, but monster objects should actually be called and created from rooms for memory reasons.

Similar stuff with weapon.c and armour.c and container.c...

So yeah.

Setting standards

Thu, 02 Sep 2004 18:15:36 GMT

Mike and I were talking yesterday, and I think we should have a big ol' sit down and talk about what Pendulum is, where we want it to go, and what each of us would like to see in it. This isn't a discussion about exclusion, but rather inclusion. We should hear what everybody would like, and see if we can work it all in.

As with most MUDs I've encountered, this game will have a dramatic amount of variety, simply because all the people writing for it have their own special herbs and spices to cook with. It'd be nice to hear what people want to see this MUD have down the road.

Lastly, I'd like to note that the last week of Pendulum stuff has me scared shitless. I thought I was just turning on a little jobber to fuck around with while I was bored, and other folks were welcome to join in. But now things are getting serious, and the scope of the game is growing deeper. I'm feeling less like like a chump who's got DGD running on his desktop for shits and giggles, and more like a server admin who's catering to an elite cadre of coders.

I don't mind this at all, it's just got me nervous. I don't want someone getting mad at me because Pendulum goes down, because one of my cats bit my computer's power cord or something equally lame, like Doom 3 crashing my computer (this does run on my gaming rig, you know). This is currently an unstable environment, and you should be keeping local copies of your code.

If you guys are serious about Pendulum, and once the growing pains have subsided, I will consider putting a server together and moving it over to a full time, remote access computer that all you guys can help code and maintain. FTP and the whole shebang.

Chuck and Mike sound especially down with the sickness. It's not really like my life needed yet another hobby-turned-priority, but I'm starting to learn that as an adult, when you decide to go, go all out. So I guess, bring it on. Let's code a MUD.

Thu, 02 Sep 2004 17:39:40 GMT

Anyone know where the feelings (emotes) reside? I imagine it's in the player soul object, or something. It would be nice if there was a way to inherit simple emote command to add specific emotes to objects .. And it's quite possible there is already that capability, so I'm wondering if anyone knows where it is.

If it's too difficult to constantly update the player soul, are we instead planning on having silly collectibles like Nanny had (the t-shirt, the love locket) that give you a number of extra emotes?

Fun with workrooms and room.c

Wed, 01 Sep 2004 17:21:54 GMT

For those of you without workrooms yet, I've coded the following generic room. It's been bugchecked and commented, blah blah blah.

inherit "room/room";

reset(arg) {

if (arg) return; /* Don't worry about this for now */

set_light(1); /* Put the light at a visible level, 0 would be dark */

short_desc =

"Wizard's Workroom"; /* Short description for the room, your name here */

no_castle_flag = 1; /* Can't drop a castle (an entrance to a new wizard's area) here */

long_desc =

"This is the workroom of a new Wizard, although it\n" + /* The room's long description */
"seems unused; dust has settled between the \n" + /* What a character sees when */
"floorboards and there are cobwebs in the corners.\n"; /* They 'look' */

items =

({"dust", "It is rather thick is some places", /* descriptions of features */
"cobwebs", "One contains a spider, busily weaving", /* characters can 'exa'mine */
"spider", "Tiny and trasnlucent, clearly harmless", /* these */
"floorboards", "Somewhat worn and very dusty"});

dest_dir = /* Places the character can go and the commands they use to do so */

({"room/church", "church",
"room/vill_green", "north"});

}

Mostly to be used as an example. I'll save the code to /room/workroom.c as soon as Lem gives me unlimited write access to all of the directories... *mwa haa haaa*

Let me know if this crashes the MUD or sets fire to your computer.

Posting

Wed, 01 Sep 2004 14:50:53 GMT

Those of you having trouble posting in the community, you need to look at the email LJ sent to you and accept the invitation to the community. Then I confirm it on my side. So far, only EP, Chuck and Josh have done this.

About Wizarding

Tue, 31 Aug 2004 18:01:50 GMT

Since this game is essentially a playground, I invite people I know and trust to be wizards on the game. As a wizard, you have pretty much all the options the game has to offer.

There is a known bug with wizards, in that new wizards cannot create their home directory. I don't know why this is, but if I create the directory for you, the problem seems to go away. I'll remember from here out to make your folder when I make you a wizard. That should eliminate this problem.

Also, Jesse says he's been getting booted from the MUD if he goes idle. If anybody else has been experiencing this, let me know, and I'll look into it.

I'm sorry the game has poor documentation. I highly suggest scouring Google for 'LPMUD' and finding help resources elsewhere (I've been doing this, and it's helped a ton). Once we start writing our own functions for the game, we'll document them as we go, and hopefully have a pretty nice help system of our own. This is a work in progress.

I'll eventually be setting up FTP accounts for all wizards to your wizard folder, with read and write, so you can upload and edit your code straight on the server. This will be handy for those of you who rely on editors like I do (TextPad is excellent if you use Windows). I've got FileZilla installed, I just have not set up the accounts or folders yet. I'll do this sometime soon.

Welcome to Pendulum!

Tue, 31 Aug 2004 17:53:07 GMT

Welcome to the Pendulum MUD. Lemme go down a few quick things.

This MUD is officially classified as a 'hobby MUD'. Meaning, I am not actively trying to turn Pendulum into a playable public game. I created Pendulum because I like to code for fun, and I love to write up little games and objects and scenarios. You are all free to do what you wish on Pendulum.

Don't bitch to me if Pendulum is missing core functionality. It is a bare version of LPMUD version 2.4.5. It has known bugs, and few features. If you think something should be on the MUD, it's only gonna get there if you bother to code it. Since I am not building a public game, I am not focusing on coding things I don't care about. This is essentially a box of legos for me, not another chore or commitment.

If somewhere down the road, Pendulum does begin to look like a public game, I will more than gladly shave off the rough edges and make it more friendly to users, but only with the help of others who wish to run it. If it were to become a game, I want you to keep this general motif in mind:

Pendulum's setting is basically high fantasy, meaning it takes most of it's roots from European legend and history. Knights in armor, faeries, goblins, dragons, wizards... the whole bag. Additionally, Pendulum has technology, but in the form of clockwork and steamwork based themes. You might have a flying automaton that works by gears, or a steam based locomotive, or an airship. If you can't explain something using steam or gears, try magic... the world has plenty. Meaning magic wands and portals are abundant.

I certainly did not create this motif to restrict your imagination, rather it's purpose is to keep a sense of continuity between creative minds. In fact, I'd say that this setting is much more freeform than some MUDs, allowing for both technology, magic and the unknown. If you can respect the general 'feel' of the game, we all can respect your infinite creativity.

Speaking of setting, one more thing about Pendulum is that the world's continents are divided by giant chasms, and the core of the planet is missing. This means we're basically on giant floating rocks. Travel between continents will be done by portals or airships or something feasable as such. There will be bodies of water, mind you, they'll just be on the continents. The continents are sometimes referred to as 'planes'. Don't let this impede your creativity, either. You may accept or ignore the chasms when building your area. We have not developed a world map yet, so nothing is set in stone.

Lastly, if Pendulum does take off, and people want more freedom to develop, I would strongly suggest helping me put together a spare computer from which to run the game. Right now it's an application on my desktop, on my home PC. Which means it may unexpectedly go down from time to time (rare, but possible). I don't want to ruin your fun, but I don't really have another computer to devote to a MUD. If we get one, we could even run Linux and use a more recent LPMUD build. Just some food for thought.

I'll make another post about Wizardry and known bugs. Welcome to Pendulum!