resources/pod/intro.pod

=head1 CFPlus - a Crossfire+ and Crossfire game client.

=head2 What's Crossfire+ - Basic Game Concepts

In the words of Frank Tore Johansen, the author of the original Crossfire
game:

"Crossfire is a multi-player graphical arcade and adventure game made for
the X Windows systems environment. It has certain flavours from other
games, especially gauntletand the rogue-like games. Any number of players
can move around in their own window, finding and using items and battling
monsters. They can choose to cooperate or compete in the same world."

In the years of development that have followed, Crossfire has grown to
encompass hundreds of monsters, thousands of maps to explore, an elaborate
magic system, over 15 character types, a system of skills, and many, many
artifacts and treasures.

Crossfire+ is freely distributed under the GNU license and the code may be
obtained from L<http://crossfire.schmorp.de/>.

=head1 Getting Started

First of all, don't be daunted by the apparent complexity of Crossfire -
in reality, Crossfire is quite easy to play and character generation is
simple. Later on, when you have some experience playing the game, you may
wish to read the full manual.

=head2 User Interface Basics

# very short description of all ui elements

=head2 How to create a new Character

When you start up Crossfire, you will be asked for a character name and a
password (you may need to open the B<Server Setup> dialog for this using
the button at the top of the screen). If you are playing for the first
time, type any name you like; this will be your character name for the
rest of the life of that character. Next, type in any password. Remember:
you will need to remember the same password again to play that character
again! You can use B<Save Config> to save your settings, including name
and password, but if it gets lost recovery is difficult, so remember your
password or write it down at a safe place.

One more note: it's not a good idea to use "real" passwords to your
computer accounts! Doing so may make your system vulnerable to
unscrupulous Crossfire server administrators.

Your next step will be to generate random (primary) stats for your
character (to see the stats, you might have to open the B<Stats Window>
using the button at the top of the screen). You aren't limited to the
number of times you can roll your stats - so have fun. Notice that the
stats are always arranged that the B<Str> stat has the highest value, the
B<Cha> stat has the lowest. You may rearrange the order of these values
when you decide that you have rolled some decent stats. Two points: you
can never roll a character with better stats than an average of straight
15's, and you can't roll higher than 18 in a stat.

When you roll your character, the stats displayed are the stats you will
get as a human (which are unmodified). When satisfied, you can step
through a number of races, each with special bonuses in stats.

The manual shows how your basic stats will be changed by choosing a
different race. The difference between the natural stat limit and 20
indicates the bonus/penalty assigned to rolled primary stats. For example,
a troll has a maximum strength which is 5 higher than 20-that means he
will begin with an additional 5 points added to his strength roll. On the
other hand, a troll can never get above 15 in intelligence. This means
that your rolled character will have 5 less in intelligence if you choose
that race. You should also note that any bonus to an ability can't raise
the final number above your racial maximum, and no penalty can give you an
ability score less then one; the lowest it can ever get is one.

=head3 Selecting a class

While each class has its particular strengths and weaknesses, in summary
its just a fact that some classes are easier to play than others.

For beginning players, the "simple fighter" characters are the easiest
to play successfully. The B<Dwarf>, B<Human>, and B<Warrior> are among
good earlier choices. As you gain experience with using Crossfire+ you
may wish to branch out into other "fighter" characters such as the
B<Thief> or B<Elf>, or try your hand at playing "spellcaster" characters
like the B<Wizard>, B<Mage>, B<Cleric> or B<Priest>. The "exotic" races
(e.g. B<Fireborn>, B<Quetzalcoatl> and B<Wraith>) and the B<Monk> class
are the hardest classes to master.

One more note: You will probably find any character class that has a low
natural B<Int> (for example, the B<Barbarian> class) will have a fairly
difficult time at higher levels. Skills, and most importantly, spells,
will be more difficult learn. Plan to spend a lot of loot on grimores,
prayer books and skill scrolls.

=head2 Playing the game

#TODO biggers house, binding keys etc.

=head1 Hints for Beginning Players

I'm done with class selection, now there are three ways to go, where
should I go? It is a good idea to take the northern path into the
teleporter leading you to the beginners house. You can learn some basic
skills there before journeying onward. Once you are there, you will get
many things explained to you. Make sure you investigate every place in
that house.

I'm on the starting map, what do I do now? You should be in a city square
with a few sign posts in the middle. Move over the signs and apply them
("A") to read what they say.

For beginners, there are several maps designed for them. Find these areas
and clear them out. All throughout these levels, a player can find signs
and books which they can read by stepping onto them and hitting B<space
bar> to apply the book/sign. These messages will help the player to learn
the system. Probably the first, best area for a beginning player to start
out in is "Beginners." This area is a small house located southwest of
your starting location.

=head2 Flailing about with spells

Some items are perishable. If you shoot a fireball into a room full of
scrolls, you will notice them going up in smoke! So be careful not to
destroy valuable items.

=head2 Tips on surviving

Crossfire+ is populated with a wealth of different monsters. These monsters
can have varying immunities and attacktypes. In addition, some of them can
be quite a bit smarter than others. It will be important for new players
to learn the abilities of different monsters and learn just how much it
will take to kill them.

Most monsters in the game are out to mindlessly kill and destroy the
players. Killing monsters will help boost a player's score. When fighting
a large amount of monsters in a single room, attempt to find a narrower
hallway so that you are not being attacked from all sides. Charging into a
room full of Beholders would not be wise, instead, open the door and fight
them one at a time.

More advice can be found in the Survival Guide
L<http://crossfire.real-time.com/guides/survival_guide/index.html>.

=head2 Priorities for low-level characters

The priority for characters below about 5th level is to gain some basic
items. In this regard, better armour and better spells are best. Look for
a quest among the various islands that will allow you to obtain mithril
mail. Whenever you scrape together ~100-200 platinum pieces go shopping
for armour and weapons (or spells). If you are a fighter type, try to have
at least a +2 weapon, +2 helmet, +2 suit of armour, and +2 shield before
you reach 5th level. For wizards, attempt to recover enough treasure to
be able to buy up good attack spells. For priests, first thing to do is
worship a god! Try to get the holy word prayer as soon as possible. Make
sure your current god allows good potential use of this spell.

For all classes, get access to the detect magic incantation as soon as
possible. This will allow you to sort through the treasure you find while
you're in the dungeon, and will save you time and money at the shops.

=head2 Diseases

Diseases are, well, diseases. They can be contageous or not, and can be
contracted in a number of ways, and they vary greatly in their symptoms
and dangerousness.

Diseases have "levels". If you contract a disease and recover naturally,
you're immune to that disease forever, provided the instance of the
disease is of equal or lower level than your immunity.

For example, you get a case of the flu cast by yourself at level 15. When
you get over it, you're immune to any flu of level less than 16. When you
become level 16 and cast the flu again, you are I<not> immune.

Spells such as B<cure disease> or B<restoration> will remove a disease, but
will not grant immunity.

When cast as a spell, diseases's severity is level dependent. A 30th level
cold is a I<lot> more severe than a level 2 cold.

Undead are I<never> affected by any disease.

Any priest player who isn't denied the path of wounding may learn and B<cast
cause> B<cold>, B<flu>, B<typhoid>, B<anthrax> and B<leprosy> spells.

Any priest with a high enough B<Wis> and with a religion that is attuned
to wounding may learn to B<cast cause> B<smallpox>, B<white death> and
B<red death> by praying at his altar.

The I<damage> caused each round varies between 0 and the maximum listed
for a disease. So you can inflict a I<mild> case of ebola, which would
I<not> kill a monster, or a severe one capable of killing it.

# TODO: disease table, but needs heavy reformatting

=head1 Authors

Parts of this document were originally compiled, edited, and written by
Brian Thomas, Klaus Elsbernd, and John W. Klar. Additional information
compiled by Maciej Kalisiak, Gorlin, Anton Oussik and Gene Alexander.

Adapted for use by I<cfplus>, enhanced and corrected by Pippijn van
Steenhoven and Marc A. Lehmann.

Revision:	1.6
Committed:	Fri May 26 10:34:26 2006 UTC (18 years, 1 month ago) by pippijn
Branch:	MAIN
Changes since 1.5:	+7 -1 lines
Log Message:	Added intro to the beginners house.
#	User	Rev	Content
1	root	1.3	=head1 CFPlus - a Crossfire+ and Crossfire game client.
2	root	1.1
3	root	1.2	=head2 What's Crossfire+ - Basic Game Concepts
4	root	1.1
5	root	1.3	In the words of Frank Tore Johansen, the author of the original Crossfire
6			game:
7
8			"Crossfire is a multi-player graphical arcade and adventure game made for
9			the X Windows systems environment. It has certain flavours from other
10			games, especially gauntletand the rogue-like games. Any number of players
11			can move around in their own window, finding and using items and battling
12			monsters. They can choose to cooperate or compete in the same world."
13
14			In the years of development that have followed, Crossfire has grown to
15			encompass hundreds of monsters, thousands of maps to explore, an elaborate
16			magic system, over 15 character types, a system of skills, and many, many
17			artifacts and treasures.
18
19			Crossfire+ is freely distributed under the GNU license and the code may be
20			obtained from L<http://crossfire.schmorp.de/>.
21
22	root	1.4	=head1 Getting Started
23	root	1.3
24			First of all, don't be daunted by the apparent complexity of Crossfire -
25			in reality, Crossfire is quite easy to play and character generation is
26			simple. Later on, when you have some experience playing the game, you may
27			wish to read the full manual.
28	root	1.1
29	root	1.2	=head2 User Interface Basics
30	root	1.1
31	root	1.2	# very short description of all ui elements
32	root	1.1
33	root	1.3	=head2 How to create a new Character
34
35			When you start up Crossfire, you will be asked for a character name and a
36			password (you may need to open the B<Server Setup> dialog for this using
37			the button at the top of the screen). If you are playing for the first
38			time, type any name you like; this will be your character name for the
39			rest of the life of that character. Next, type in any password. Remember:
40			you will need to remember the same password again to play that character
41			again! You can use B<Save Config> to save your settings, including name
42			and password, but if it gets lost recovery is difficult, so remember your
43			password or write it down at a safe place.
44
45			One more note: it's not a good idea to use "real" passwords to your
46			computer accounts! Doing so may make your system vulnerable to
47			unscrupulous Crossfire server administrators.
48
49			Your next step will be to generate random (primary) stats for your
50			character (to see the stats, you might have to open the B<Stats Window>
51			using the button at the top of the screen). You aren't limited to the
52			number of times you can roll your stats - so have fun. Notice that the
53			stats are always arranged that the B<Str> stat has the highest value, the
54			B<Cha> stat has the lowest. You may rearrange the order of these values
55			when you decide that you have rolled some decent stats. Two points: you
56			can never roll a character with better stats than an average of straight
57			15's, and you can't roll higher than 18 in a stat.
58
59			When you roll your character, the stats displayed are the stats you will
60			get as a human (which are unmodified). When satisfied, you can step
61			through a number of races, each with special bonuses in stats.
62
63			The manual shows how your basic stats will be changed by choosing a
64			different race. The difference between the natural stat limit and 20
65			indicates the bonus/penalty assigned to rolled primary stats. For example,
66			a troll has a maximum strength which is 5 higher than 20-that means he
67			will begin with an additional 5 points added to his strength roll. On the
68			other hand, a troll can never get above 15 in intelligence. This means
69			that your rolled character will have 5 less in intelligence if you choose
70			that race. You should also note that any bonus to an ability can't raise
71			the final number above your racial maximum, and no penalty can give you an
72			ability score less then one; the lowest it can ever get is one.
73
74			=head3 Selecting a class
75
76			While each class has its particular strengths and weaknesses, in summary
77			its just a fact that some classes are easier to play than others.
78
79			For beginning players, the "simple fighter" characters are the easiest
80			to play successfully. The B<Dwarf>, B<Human>, and B<Warrior> are among
81			good earlier choices. As you gain experience with using Crossfire+ you
82			may wish to branch out into other "fighter" characters such as the
83			B<Thief> or B<Elf>, or try your hand at playing "spellcaster" characters
84			like the B<Wizard>, B<Mage>, B<Cleric> or B<Priest>. The "exotic" races
85			(e.g. B<Fireborn>, B<Quetzalcoatl> and B<Wraith>) and the B<Monk> class
86			are the hardest classes to master.
87
88			One more note: You will probably find any character class that has a low
89			natural B<Int> (for example, the B<Barbarian> class) will have a fairly
90			difficult time at higher levels. Skills, and most importantly, spells,
91			will be more difficult learn. Plan to spend a lot of loot on grimores,
92			prayer books and skill scrolls.
93
94			=head2 Playing the game
95
96			#TODO biggers house, binding keys etc.
97
98	root	1.4	=head1 Hints for Beginning Players
99
100	pippijn	1.6	I'm done with class selection, now there are three ways to go, where
101			should I go? It is a good idea to take the northern path into the
102			teleporter leading you to the beginners house. You can learn some basic
103			skills there before journeying onward. Once you are there, you will get
104			many things explained to you. Make sure you investigate every place in
105			that house.
106
107	root	1.4	I'm on the starting map, what do I do now? You should be in a city square
108			with a few sign posts in the middle. Move over the signs and apply them
109			("A") to read what they say.
110
111			For beginners, there are several maps designed for them. Find these areas
112			and clear them out. All throughout these levels, a player can find signs
113			and books which they can read by stepping onto them and hitting B<space
114			bar> to apply the book/sign. These messages will help the player to learn
115			the system. Probably the first, best area for a beginning player to start
116			out in is "Beginners." This area is a small house located southwest of
117			your starting location.
118
119			=head2 Flailing about with spells
120
121			Some items are perishable. If you shoot a fireball into a room full of
122			scrolls, you will notice them going up in smoke! So be careful not to
123			destroy valuable items.
124
125			=head2 Tips on surviving
126
127			Crossfire+ is populated with a wealth of different monsters. These monsters
128			can have varying immunities and attacktypes. In addition, some of them can
129			be quite a bit smarter than others. It will be important for new players
130			to learn the abilities of different monsters and learn just how much it
131			will take to kill them.
132
133			Most monsters in the game are out to mindlessly kill and destroy the
134			players. Killing monsters will help boost a player's score. When fighting
135			a large amount of monsters in a single room, attempt to find a narrower
136			hallway so that you are not being attacked from all sides. Charging into a
137			room full of Beholders would not be wise, instead, open the door and fight
138			them one at a time.
139
140			More advice can be found in the Survival Guide
141			L<http://crossfire.real-time.com/guides/survival_guide/index.html>.
142
143			=head2 Priorities for low-level characters
144
145			The priority for characters below about 5th level is to gain some basic
146			items. In this regard, better armour and better spells are best. Look for
147			a quest among the various islands that will allow you to obtain mithril
148			mail. Whenever you scrape together ~100-200 platinum pieces go shopping
149			for armour and weapons (or spells). If you are a fighter type, try to have
150			at least a +2 weapon, +2 helmet, +2 suit of armour, and +2 shield before
151			you reach 5th level. For wizards, attempt to recover enough treasure to
152			be able to buy up good attack spells. For priests, first thing to do is
153			worship a god! Try to get the holy word prayer as soon as possible. Make
154			sure your current god allows good potential use of this spell.
155
156			For all classes, get access to the detect magic incantation as soon as
157			possible. This will allow you to sort through the treasure you find while
158			you're in the dungeon, and will save you time and money at the shops.
159
160			=head2 Diseases
161
162			Diseases are, well, diseases. They can be contageous or not, and can be
163			contracted in a number of ways, and they vary greatly in their symptoms
164			and dangerousness.
165
166			Diseases have "levels". If you contract a disease and recover naturally,
167			you're immune to that disease forever, provided the instance of the
168			disease is of equal or lower level than your immunity.
169
170			For example, you get a case of the flu cast by yourself at level 15. When
171			you get over it, you're immune to any flu of level less than 16. When you
172	root	1.5	become level 16 and cast the flu again, you are I<not> immune.
173	root	1.4
174			Spells such as B<cure disease> or B<restoration> will remove a disease, but
175			will not grant immunity.
176
177			When cast as a spell, diseases's severity is level dependent. A 30th level
178			cold is a I<lot> more severe than a level 2 cold.
179
180			Undead are I<never> affected by any disease.
181
182			Any priest player who isn't denied the path of wounding may learn and B<cast
183			cause> B<cold>, B<flu>, B<typhoid>, B<anthrax> and B<leprosy> spells.
184
185			Any priest with a high enough B<Wis> and with a religion that is attuned
186			to wounding may learn to B<cast cause> B<smallpox>, B<white death> and
187			B<red death> by praying at his altar.
188
189			The I<damage> caused each round varies between 0 and the maximum listed
190			for a disease. So you can inflict a I<mild> case of ebola, which would
191			I<not> kill a monster, or a severe one capable of killing it.
192
193			# TODO: disease table, but needs heavy reformatting
194
195	root	1.3	=head1 Authors
196
197			Parts of this document were originally compiled, edited, and written by
198			Brian Thomas, Klaus Elsbernd, and John W. Klar. Additional information
199			compiled by Maciej Kalisiak, Gorlin, Anton Oussik and Gene Alexander.
200	root	1.1
201	root	1.3	Adapted for use by I<cfplus>, enhanced and corrected by Pippijn van
202			Steenhoven and Marc A. Lehmann.
203	root	1.1