Dvorax

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)

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 loadcard 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.

• 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

• loadcard <name>/<type>/<text>

Load a new card into the deck. This card immediately goes to the top of the draw pile, so it is a good idea to shuffle after adding any new cards.

• 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.

Limitations

Due to the way Dvorax has been built, there are a few mechanics and styles of play it doesn't support:-

• Multi-deck/CCG Dvorak. The current version of Dvorax has been written to run with one shared deck only, although, it may be in the future to create a separate room for a special CCG Dvorax.
• Face-down cards. The current version doesn't support face-down cards, although it is entirely possible to add in the future. (A temporary workaround among trusted players would be to just declare you were playing a card face down, creating and playing a blank 'face down' card if you liked, but keeping the actual card in your hand until it became needed.)
• 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.