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Now you know how to do all these neat things, but you don't know
how to get anywhere to do them! Within the following paragraphs
is all you need to know to discover the ancient evils of Bacchus
deep in the bowels of the earth, to stroll through wild gardens
of exotic flowers perfuming the air with the essence of life, to
travel far abroad to Egypt and Norway aboard tossing ships through
storms on the high seas, fraught with pirates. Discover hidden
tombs and climb the highest mountains. Search for Atlantis
and flee from fearsome hydras. Hop along stones in the center
of the Styx and sneak past Cerberus to hitch a ride on Charon's
ferry. All that and more once you learn these few basic things
which will open up a huge ancient world for you to explore.
Movement is another time when all of the rules we learned about
commands may not apply.
There are two kinds of movement in the game. There is directional
movement, and there is movement through portals. To see the difference,
we need to look at a room description.
How to Tell Where You Can Go
Any time you move to a new room, the system automatically sends
you a description of the new room. However, it is likely that the
room description will scroll off the screen sooner or later. To
look at the room again, simply type LOOK.
The following is a typical room description:
[Athens, Rhea Road West]
Rhea Road touches Metis Circle, the center point of Athens. Roads
also head toward the theaters and tavernas in the northwest corner
of the city. A trio of young men discussing sports jostles past
you, intent only upon their conversation. You also see a gate
leading south.
Also here: Ganamal, Troius.
Obvious paths: north, east, west, northwest.
The room description is divided into five distinct parts:
- The room name: [Athens, Rhea Road West]
- The description: Rhea Road touches Metis Circle,
the centerpoint of Athens. Roads also head toward the theaters
and tavernas in the northwest corner of the city. A trio of young
men discussing sports jostles past you, intent only upon their
conversation.
- A list of objects: You also see a gate leading south.
- A list of people: Also here: Ganamal, Troius.
- A list of directions: Obvious paths: north, east,
west, northwest.
Directional Movement
At the bottom of the room description is a list of directions that
are valid exits from the room. These will always be one of the eight
compass directions, up, down, or out. In order to travel in one
of the directions, just type the direction name. Again, uppercase
or lowercase does not matter, and you can abbreviate using the standard
abbreviations for compass directions.
Up = U |
Northwest = NW
|
North
= N |
Northeast = NE
|
|
West = W |
Out = O |
East = E |
Down = D |
Southwest = SW |
South = S |
Southeast = SE |
An even easier way to move in directions is to use the keypad
on your keyboard. Only the Wizard FE and eScape support this,
Java will not. When using the Wizard make sure NumLock is
OFF and when using eScape make sure NumLock is ON. You just
use the keypad as a compass with the 0/Ins key being DOWN
and the ./Del key being UP.
Using Portals
Directional movement is simple enough, but there may be other ways
to move from one room to another. If you look at the room description
above, in the list of objects you will see "a gate leading south."
This is known as a portal.
A portal is any method of travel that leads from one room to another
that is not a direction. Does that sound confusing? Okay,
let's try to simplify it. A portal could be a door, because
a door can lead from one room to another. However, it might
also be a gate, an opening, an archway, an entrance, etc. Portals
can also be named other things like, a path, a road, a walkway,
a hole, a stair, a ladder, etc.
To move through most portals, use the GO command. For example,
GO DOOR, GO ENTRANCE, GO CAVE, etc. Notice
we said most.
Some portals like stairs will need to be climbed. CLIMB
STAIR, CLIMB HILL, CLIMB STEPS, etc. And
there are even some special cases were a portal has a special use
determined by a GameMaster. For example, you might see a ledge
in a room, but GO LEDGE and CLIMB LEDGE won't
work. It's possible you may need to JUMP LEDGE. You
may also run across portals that you need to get on your knees and
CRAWL through, but these latter examples are usually prompted
by a message when you attempt to GO through them as a normal
portal. Like: "You can't reach the ledge, maybe you should
jump for it?"
It can be tricky to identify portals sometimes. For example, if
you see a room description that says: "There is a steep hill
to the east." it is hard to tell if movement should use the
direction east, or a portal called "a hill." It is also possible
that the hill is an obstacle that blocks movement, and you can't
really go there at all. The only way to figure it out is to try
it.
Not all portals will show up in the list of room objects either.
A room might mention an archway but say nothing about an archway
in the object list. It's likely that the archway is a portal,
so try GO ARCHWAY, the only way to know is to try.
Using DIRections
When you are on the streets of Athens, you will have access to a
command called DIRECTIONS. This is usually referred
to as DIR, so don't be confused if someone whispers for
you to use DIR. If you type DIR you will
get a list of places in that area of Athens that you can go. What
you do is simply choose a destination from that list, let's say
the ARMORY, and type DIR ARMORY. This will
give you a list of steps on how to find the armory.
Note, you must be OUTSIDE to use this command, it will not work
in any buildings or shops. Also note, not everything in Athens
is on the DIR list, so explore. There's a lot
more out there to be seen.
Get Maps
Maps are a good resource to be had and really a godsend in terms
of finding your way around. With a good map in your hands
you will be able to find most anything, and it will really make
your stay in the game much more enjoyable. If you are feeling
especially frustrated with the game, try to find some maps and you'll
begin seeing things in a new light.
We don't supply many maps with the documentation, and the ones
we do supply are liable to become incomplete before we even post
them. This is because we really don't have the time to keep
them updated and because the GameMasters are always adding to our
world. We suggest you peruse the player
web sites to get a hold of any maps you may need.
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