Dvorax
From Dvorak - A Blank-Card Game
Dvorax is a derivative of Kevan's Dvorak Engine which allows playing of Dvorak on the DvorakMUSH. It supports several features that the Dvorak Engine does not, such as colors, draw pile ordering, and turn management. To mess around with it, type "@tel #46" from any room in the MUSH. You will be instantly teleported to the Dvorax lounge. To get back to the ordinary lounge, type "@tel #6".
(The following format is largely copied from the original Dvorak Engine page)
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Engine usage
If you are already familiar when the original Dvorak engine, using Dvorax is not much different. To start a new creative game, use the cleardeck command to clear Dvorax of any cards that might be there, and newcard (see below) to begin creating cards.
If you want to play a deck from the archives, you can use the "Generate MUSHcode" link on that deck's page to get a list of generated loadcard commands which can be copied-and-pasted into your telnet client to create the deck. Although these commands are meant for the standard Dvorak Engine, they should work fine with Dvorax. However, to take advantage of extended card types and colors, you'll have to wait for someone to make a specialized export script for Dvorax.
Commands
In general, most of the commands are the same as for the Dvorak Engine. However, some have changed names (made shorter, quicker to type), some have been added, and some have been removed (readcard is useless now that the full card text is displayed everywhere the card is).
A quick summary of these commands can be seen in-game by typing "commands".
Key
When you use the commands below...
Everyone sees what you've done, and the results it had.
Everyone sees that you've done what you've done, but only you see the actual results of it.
Only you see what you've done, and its results.
Playing the Game
- draw
- Draw a card from the draw pile.
- play <num>
- Play a specific card from your hand - if it's an Action, it goes to the discard pile; if it's a Thing, it is put into play under your control.
- play <num> on <player>
- Play a specific card from your hand on a specified player - if it's an Action, it goes to the discard pile; if it's a Thing, it is put into play under that player's control.
- play <num> oncard <num>
- The same as playing a Thing from your hand, except that it's played "onto" another Thing. This Thing becomes the "parent" of the new Thing, and the new Thing is shown indented below it.
- play <num> facedown
- Play a specific card face down in front of you. This card will be assigned a random 3 digit number, which you will need in order to flip it over.
- flipcard <num>
- Flip a specific (face down) card face up and show it to everybody.
- givecard <num> to <player>
- Take a specific card, no matter where it is, and put it into a specific Player's hand.
- takecard <num>
- Take a specific card, no matter where it is, and put it into your hand.
- discard <num>
- Discard a specific card from your hand, to the discard pile.
- destroy <num>
- Destroy a specific card in play, moving it to the discard pile.
- done
- Tells everyone that you are done with your turn.
Viewing the Game
- hand
- List the cards you have in your hand.
- viewhand <player>
- List the cards a specific opponent has in their hand.
- viewplay
- List the cards currently in play, and who controls them.
- viewdisc
- List the contents of the discard pile.
- viewdraw
- List the contents of the draw pile.
- viewall
- List information about all the cards in the game. This command basically prints out the entire state of the game, so it's more or less cheating if used in a real game.
- count <player>
- Count the cards in a specific player's hand.
- countdraw
- Count the cards in the draw pile.
- cardlist
- Does what the old 'viewall' command did; lists every card in the game, but without any information as to where they are.
Starting/Ending the Game
- newgame
- Shuffle all the cards together, no matter where they are, to form a new draw pile.
- shuffle
- Shuffle the discard pile into the draw pile.
- shufdraw <num>
- Shuffle the draw pile only.
- shufcard <num>
- Shuffle a specific card, no matter where it is, into the draw pile.
- neworder
- This command can be used to decide who goes first, second, etc. It takes the names all the players in the room at the moment and arranges them in a random order.
- turnorder
- Shows the current turn order, if one has been set with 'neworder'.
- clearorder
- Clears the current turn order.
- setnotes <text>
- Sets the global game notes (printed as part of viewplay) to whatever text you like - useful for keeping score in games that require it.
- clearnotes
- Clears the global game notes.
Card Creation and Amendment
- newcard <color>/<name>/<type>/<text>
- Load a new card into the deck. The color field generally takes one letter; possible colors are x,r,g,b,y,m,c,w. This card immediately goes to the top of the draw pile, so it is a good idea to shuffle after adding any new cards.
- loadcard <name>/<type>/<text>
- Deprecated version of newcard. The type can be a simplified 'A' for Action or 'T' for Thing; default colors will be applied for these types.
- editcard <num>= <name>/<type>/<text>
- Edit an existing card, using similar syntax to creating a new one. This takes effect immediately, but before-and-after versions are displayed to all Players to allow them to check the edit.
- rename <num>=<name>
- A quick way to adjust a card's name, leaving its type and text intact.
- status <num>=<text>
- Set the 'status' of a card to any text you like - a card's status is displayed in 'viewplay', and can be used to keep track of tokens on the card, its position in play, or some arbitrary, adjustable status ('Undead', 'Wounded', 'Tapped', etc)..
- cleardeck
- Clears out all the cards in the current deck.
CCG Mode
The CCG version of Dvorax is located in the room directly to the east of the normal Dvorax. The CCG capabilities are probably not so stable yet (I made the changes in a half hour), but it should work well enough for testing. All the commands have the same syntax, and most work exactly the same, with the single difference that any commands meant to affect a draw or discard pile will only affect YOUR personal draw or discard pile.
In CCG mode, every player has his own deck. Any "loadcard/newcard" commands only load cards into YOUR deck. The "cleardeck" command will wipe out EVERYONE'S cards, so only use it once, before everyone starts loading stuff in! The "newgame" command will sort all the cards back into their respective owners' draw piles, but EACH player must "shuffle" their cards afterwards as this is not done automatically yet.
Limitations
Dvorax has been built to overcome several limitations seen in the original Dvorak Engine, but there still remains one notable flaw that no amount of MUSHcode can fix.
- Card limit. Dvorax will crash if it tries to shuffle or display a deck with more than a certain number of cards in it. This limit will need to be clarified with testing, but it appears to be related to an internal function invocation limit in TinyMUSH. Whoever has the power to increase it, doing so would help tremendously.
Troubleshooting
If you're getting a "Huh? (Type "help" for help.)" message when you enter the Dvorax commands, then you're either standing in the wrong room, or Dvorax has crashed. Type "look" to make sure that you're in the room with Dvorax2. If you are, check the room description to make sure it's not on fire. If it is, type "use fire" to use the fire extinguisher and Dvorax should start working again. If all else fails, you can tell the creator that it's crashed. Hopefully he's still here when/if you need him.
Dvorax currently seems to have a problem with halting when too many cards are loaded in at once. To counter this for now, only copy and paste 'loadcard' commands 10 at a time. If you don't, Dvorax may burst into flames, and you'll need to use the fire extinguisher to get it working again.
See Also
- The predecessor of Dvorax, the Dvorak Engine.
