Enchanter --------- Introduction "Enchanter" is a new adventure game in the Zork tradition, but in a different setting and with a different overall philosophy. The emphasis in Zork was on treasure and fighting, but in Enchanter the emphasis is on magic. This document describes the game as currently envisioned. Comments are welcome; send them to Dave (PDL) and Marc (BLANK). General Comments The viewpoint character is a low-level magician. He has a few abilities represented by spells in his spell book. The goal of the game is two-fold. First, to become a better magician. Second, to defeat an evil magician who is taking over the dungeon, repairing the damage he has done. The Milieu The dungeon is deteriorating, from the point of view of anyone reasonable (such as you, we hope). Rooms are darkening, passages choking off (via magic and rockfalls), monsters are being released to prowl the halls. The Warlock The evil magician is "the Warlock." He just recently moved into the neighborhood and began taking it over, and you were sent by the Council to clear him out. He is much too much of a wizard for you to take on directly until the end of the game, and if you try (which should be possible), you get fried for your trouble. The Warlock is possibly also the priest who sacrifices you in the Temple scene. The Warlock's Tower (which is nonetheless underground) is at the top (bottom?) of the Endless Stair, and guarded by nasty creatures with nasty sharp teeth, etc. They are probably evilly magicked bunny rabbits. The Adventurer The Adventurer may come to your assistance after you magic him over from the other side of the mirror. He is from the Zork world, effectively, and comes equipped with an Elvish sword and various other paraphenalia. He will be turned against you by the Warlock at some point and have to be made friendly again. He will be needed to perform some task which is too physical for a cerebral type such as you. While he is turned against you he is like the thief in Zork, and may even attack you. Monsters There are lots of nasty, sharp-toothed creatures wandering around. Eventually, you can avoid them via "Protection from Evil." If you don't, you will get destroyed pretty quickly, or perhaps captured by the bad guys for sacrifice to their even nastier dieties. Spells Magic plays a big part in this game. There are several magical objects, magic spells (which you learn as you go along), and your spell-book, which is all-important. See "Spells, Detail" below for more on spells. The ultimate action in the game is going to be to say some number of spells sequentially at the Warlock, which will banish him and restore the dungeon. Some spells (English names): *Light (makes a light wherever the caster goes) Open (opens something closed; a passage, a box...) Resurrect (restores something dead to life) Charm (makes someone friendly to you) *Write Magic (allows you to copy a spell into book) Fly (lets you fly around) Haste (makes things go fast) *Talk to Animals (lets you talk to turtle) and others. * marks spells you have at the beginning. Events/Problems Darkness As the game begins, you are in total darkness, having just entered the underground (perhaps you were teleported there by the Council). You have only your spell book. Fortunately, the words written in such books glow in the dark, so if you open the book you can read the spells you have, one of which is "Light". Sacrifice This is probably the only overt reference to the Zork trilogy, as it is based on the Viewing Table scene in Zork 3. You are captured by the followers of the Warlock and dragged to the Temple, where you are sacrificed in a rite horrible and bloody. You are left lying on the altar, the magical sacrificial knife stuck in your chest. If you had the foresight to cast a "cheat death" beforehand, you revive a few moves later. Gordian Knot An ornate box is wrapped securely in a magic rope which you cannot cut or untie. In fact, if you try to untie it, it reties the next move. Like the original, this knot must be cut, but with a magical blade (it's a magical rope, after all). The blade is the sacrificial knife from the Temple scene. The prize here is (naturally enough) the "Open" spell. Endless Stair The entrance to the Warlock's Tower is an infinite stair. It is literally infinite, in that you can go up or down it any number of times (keep a count and a table of objects and locations in case twit drops things). Now, it isn't really infinite, it's only an illusion, and by casting that "Dispel Illusion," you discover it's actually only a round room which you have been marching around in for hours, and has an exit opposite the entrance. Malleable Maze There is an area of about ten rooms in a traditional Zork maze configuration. There is a (magic?) map of this area with none of the connections shown, only the rooms. As you roam about in the maze, the connections appear. Interestingly enough, there is one room you can't get to. Fortunately, there is also a (magic?) pencil which you can use to draw in connections in this area. If you use it to draw the connection to the final room, you can retrieve the scroll contained therein, but also disturb the monster which guards it. The monster chases you and can catch you if you don't erase an appropriate connection or two, trapping him. The map and pencil can be used to vary the maze in any way you choose, erasing and drawing passages. Perhaps the maze should even be generated randomly in each game. It would be represented by ten tables of eight elements (or ten, if we include up and down as directions). You would draw by saying "Connect Red Room to Blue Room," and erase by saying "Disconnect Red Room from Blue Room." Sleep "Sleep" is both a spell and something you must do from time to time. By sleeping, you recover the energy used to cast spells and can rememorize spells. Also, you get a vision in a dream that either gives you a spell or a clue to solving one of the puzzles. This could even be a "Hint" facility if we wanted it to be. Purloined Letter This is the problem the silly adventurer is useful for. There is a huge door, decorated with magical runes and obvious enormously charged with power. It might even say something on it like "Magician, Keep Out!" If you touch it, you get seriously frotzed, and "Open" fizzles against it. This door is warded to the hilt. However, if you ask the adventurer to open it, he has no trouble, not being a magician. In fact, he doesn't even see it as a formidable door, just a random dungeon door. If you ask him, he will tell you. "Dispel Illusion" will reveal this, and waste the spell. Rainbow Turtle This huge, brightly decorated creature wanders around on the beach. See "Gears" for more. Gears Huge grinding gears and pounding machinery fill a certain room. Things are being thrown around in here, all the time, and if you try to get across the room to get the spell scroll clearly visible in an alcove, you are speared or crushed by the pounding machinery. The turtle is impervious to the spears but is crushed by the pounding stuff. But, if you cast "Talk to Animals" on him, you can ask him to retrieve the scroll. If you cast "Haste" on him, he can get across between "Crunch!" and "Crunch!", otherwise he is smushed. Faberge Easter Egg This is an object of great beauty and enormous complexity. It has lots of little twisty handles and knobs and stuff in the filigree (which you see if you examine it). They presumably open it (and in fact they do, if all turned or pushed or whatever). However, if the Egg is opened that way, the stuff these frobs are connected to inside destroy the scroll contained within. You must use the "Open" spell to actually open it safety. Spells, Detail (Theory and Practice of Thaumaturgy) [Much of what follows is adapted from "real" D&D.] Spells are ways of performing magic. They are either general in their effect ("Light!") or specific ("Open!"). Spells have an English name and a one-word nonsense incantation to invoke them. For example, "Light!" might be invoked by "Krebf!" and "Open!" by "Frotz the door!" You may encounter the incantation word without knowing the associated English for a spell! It is therefore possible to invoke a spell without knowing for sure what it will do. You have a spell book. Your spell book records the spells you learn. There is a distinction between learning a spell and memorizing it for use. Only a small number of spells can actually be memorized at one time, and you must rest and rememorize them to use them again. A spell written in your spell book can be memorized again and again. Once you have memorized a spell, you can use it without having the spell book around. When you use a spell you have memorized, you forget it. You might have a spell book containing ten spells, but only be able to memorize five of them at one time. Correct selection of spells to memorize is one aspect of the game. If you lose your spell book, you are in deep trouble. Newly found spells may be written into your spell book using the spell "Write magic!" Sometimes a spell is too powerful to be used more than once, and it appears in the book in a different form. Such spells disappear from the book after being used (the book "forgets" them). Once a spell is written in your spell book, its English name becomes apparent. In fact, reading your book probably would look like: Spell Book Frotz - perpetual light Ozmoo - open a closed object Fweep - charm an unfriendly creature etc. There will be a command ("Spells") which will inventory those spells you have memorized for this day. It is possible to memorize a spell more than once; you get "more than one copy," in some sense. If you try to memorize more spells than you can remember, you will forget the first one memorized. Magic spells usually have a duration, and sometimes a cycle time (meaning that you can't do them many times right in a row). In addition to the Spell Book and Spells, there is going to need to be a sort of crib sheet giving enough detail for the player to get started. The rationale is that having just graduated from Wizard School, you are still a little shakey. Spell Implementation, Details You want syntaxes like: . FROTZ! ("Light!") . FWEEP DOOR! ("Open door!") Cast spell. Cast on . Cast spell on object. SPELL is the main synonym, so: >Cast spell Which spell, the foo spell or the bar spell? You should also be able to >Learn >Frob ;Where "frob" is "write magic" >Memorize >Memorize twice ;Frill? I see a "spell" as being the following; There is also a GLOBAL-FOO-SPELL, which is not put in GLOBAL-OBJECTS until you first encounter/learn "Foo." GLOBAL-FOO-SPELL has its ACTION property the same as FOO-SPELL's, and so all checking is done in the same place. The command to check your memorized spells can just wander down the list of all spells and tell you which have MEMORIZED properties greater than zero. Other Possible Characters Dwarves -- these guys are getting out, and might tell you about the Warlock and about the Terror if you ask. They would be comic figures like those in Steve's book. They might also give you a weapon (which you can't use, being a magician). Cultists -- worshippers of the evil Warlock. They would be the ones to capture you and take you to the Temple. Other Possible Problem Ideas ;;This problem is superceded by the Malleable Maze, but is ;;left here in case we can salvage a smaller problem from ;;it. ;; Maze of Glass ;;This is a large room divided into small rooms by glass ;;partitions, some of which are there, some not, to produce a ;;maze. You must have the "Fly" spell to solve it, because ;;some of the exits are "Up". There is a spell scroll as a ;;prize. Implementation is analogous to that of the Chinese ;;puzzle in Zork 3. Depending on how nasty we want to be, ;;this could be a 3x3x3 up to a 5x5x5 cube. "Coal Chute" - adapt Coal Chute problem from original Zork. Use magic rope? Gist is that you can hang on for a limited time and carry a limited weight, and there is an exit in the middle of the chute. This may be too "Zorkish" for Enchanter. Summary of Problems -Specific Problems- -File- -You Need- Darkness "Light" Sacrifice TEMPLE "Resurrect" Gordian Knot KNOT Magic Knife Malleable Maze TERROR Magic Pencil and Map Adventurer "Summon" and "Charm" Purloined Letter PURLOINED Adventurer or "Dispel Illusion" Faberge Easter Egg EGG "Open" Sleep SLEEP Gears/Turtle GEARS "Talk to Animals" and "Haste" Endless Stair STAIR "Dispel Illusion" Warlock everything -General Problems- -File- -You Need- Protect Self "Protection from Evil" Protect Spell Book "Protection from Evil"? Magic/Learning Spells MAGIC "Write Magic"