Herne's SMAUG Building Pages -- Introduction


	I am also working on making a PDF Version of this page. This page last updated: Oct 2002

Our story begins way back in the summer of 1996, when a not-so-young Herne the Hunter decided, after months of playing a strange text adventure game called "The Realms of Despair", that he should throw his big floppy hat into the ring and actually contribute something to the MUD. He didn't know at the time what he was getting into — Online building, as it happened, was a huge mystery to just about everyone but the people who coded. So, he sat down and decided to figure this mystery out, and as he continued on his strange journey he wrote these guides for everyone else, so that they might follow behind him.

October 2002

Over the past few months, I have been updating these guides for SMAUG V1.4 and the files you now find here are the result of these efforts.

In order to view the newest incarnation of Herne's SMAUG Building Guides, it is assumed that you are using at least a version 4+ browser or better (IE or Netscape) which supports the standard CSS1 (Cascading Style Sheets) and your screen is at least 800 x 600 pixels.

In addition to the old files regarding Rooms, Objects, Mobiles, Resets, Programs and Resources (all of which have been updated) several new files have been added including a short FAQ, and an essay entitled "The Mechanics of Building." I am also working on PDF versions of these files which will be available for downloading some time soon. The PDFs will contain all the information found in the HTML files along with electronic bookmarks for quick navigation through the files, and an index. The PDF files will also be formatted and optimized for printing on your standard inkjet printer for easy reference, and will be far better than trying to print out the website.

Watch the top of the document pages for the PDFs and when they're available.

Realms of Despair (RoD) is the original SMAUG MUD created by Derek Snider. The SMAUG program provided this new OLC (Online Building Code), but never really explained how to go through the mechanics of building. Help files were weak, confusing or nonexistent, so I set out to change them and Herne's SMAUG Building Guides was born.

Not everything you find in these guides will be supported in the MUD you're building for. Realms of Despair is the testing ground for a lot of the newer code for SMAUG and some items described here may not be released yet. If something I've written about doesn't work for your MUD, chances are it's not supported on your MUD. I have no idea when or where this newer code will be released, so you don't need to ask me.

There are several versions of SMAUG Building Help Files floating around the Internet, and while mine were probably the first (they were distributed with SMAUG at one time), they are not necessarily the best for you. A search of Google, Yahoo! or AltaVista might bring you some other choices if you're not happy with my ideas.

Please be aware that I do not write code! I do not know how to fix the code for your SMAUG MUD, I do not know how to unzip the files so that you can run SMAUG on your PC, and I do not know how to go about setting up SMAUG to run on your PC. Kindly address these sorts of questions to the SMAUG Mailing List, or Thoric. or you might find answers on Nivek's pages.

So you think you want to build for a SMAUG MUD? Great! Your adventure begins when you start reading about how to go about building Rooms. If you're looking for answers to specific questions, you may want to read my FAQ file - Getting Started. And if you're building for the first time, you may want to read The Mechanics of Building, a short article on my building philosophy.

Kindly remember that all of these files presented in this form are mine and that they are protected by Copyright Law. Permission to link to these files is granted to anyone who wishes to use them as long as I receive full credit. Permission to download these files and present them on your own website is denied — You must link back to this site.

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