Age of Reptiles MUD

Newbie Guide

Pangaea, the world of Age of Reptiles, is deadly. Without using the tools one has available, there is a *very* good chance that a new player will die within the first twenty minutes of play. That being said, AoR also has something to offer to RPers, PVPers and general mudders. In many ways, AoR is something like a MUSH with MUD elements.

Over the past incarnations of the AoR mud, I have seen some of the best and most creative instances of roleplaying. When it comes down to it, the mud can be entertaining and exciting but the interaction of the players is what really makes AoR special.

The following is a guide to assist new players in adapting to the world of Pangaea. To those newcomers to the game, welcome and thank you for giving AoR an opportunity to entertain you.

Character Generation

The most important choice during the game's brief character generation is one's name. Inappropriately named characters will likely have an elemental (immortal) offer to change one's name. Such names as Bob, Mike, Sally, or Broadsword, Sixgun, Volkswagen, are not acceptable.

Examples of appropriate names are typically descriptive of one's physical body (Longsnout, Brokenclaw, Bluestripe), basic fantasy names that one might call "caveman" or "barbarian" oriented (Zala, Grok, Rolk) or, possibly, something a little more creative.

Another interesting thing about characters is their age. Players will discover their character's age will seem very "human" oriented. Age is done in this manner to enable players to better relate to how old their personalities are. Mud time is also very fast - a game year passes in about two weeks of real time - so I think this helps to balance things out some. A character's size is also modified by their age and characters actually grow as they age to maturity.

Starting Area (Newbie Zone)

As one enters the actual game, they are presented with a *very* short newbie zone that serves as a basic course in some of the features of AoR. The initial room has a stopgap to prevent players from rushing through it to the next room. This is done for a reason!

Take your time here and throughout the orientation area, as a whole. It is short and painless, I promise, and you will likely learn something about how to survive and play in the game.

The first room talks about AoR's website and forum, it mentions help rules and talks about character bios and descriptions. It also mentions a few of what I would call "mud basics," like help move, help combat, socials, etc. I would also familiarize myself with the who and whois commands. There is a final note here about making sure one has an *appropriate* name before continuing on. If you have a questionable or unacceptable name at this point, use the suicide command and remake.

If a player comes to AoR for the purpose of griefing other players or is determined to bend the rules, I can personally guarantee they won't last long. That being said, I can honestly say I have only ever had to ban perhaps three players, ever. Try to fit the mold being presented and you may find the game to be quite fun and refreshing, even if you had concerns to begin with.

Practicing Skills

The next room has a green glowing nature spirit fellow. He will teach you your starting skills. Use the practice command to see what skills you have available. You may or may not have to prac each skill more than once, depending on your int stat score, to max out your current skill percentage. Layeggs is a skill for females only and is assigned by elementals as mating is age-restricted. Lead is also assigned to players when (and if) a character ever becomes a pack alpha or alpha mate.

Other skills may open up for players as they advance in level and at least one teacher is available in-game, though locations for these are somewhat hidden to the naked eye.

Communication

The next room a player enters describes how characters communicate in the game. As one may already know, player characters are not capable of speech and must use predesigned socials (emotes) and the emote command in order to communicate. In addition, the semote command can be used for a slightly different type of emote.

At no time should a player abuse the emote command by using it to communicate as if one were speaking. Such abuse will lead to disciplinary action from the elementals.

While it may seem, at first, that communication being limited in this way might make the game unplayable, I have seen many players RP to prove quite the contrary.

Players may also use the think command to express themselves to the elementals in-game, ask questions or alert admin staff to problems or RP events that might be ensuing. RP points may be awarded to players that use the think command for RP self expression, also.

Two other forms of communication are in place in the game, the call command and the alert command (see help call and help alert for more information).

Death and Dying

Age of Reptiles is a permadeath mud. If your character dies, it is gone, period. This is a strict rule on AoR and is not meant to be a punishment to the player but rather a tool of continuity for *other* players. As this is an RP oriented mud, it makes no sense and can be confusing to another player character if they see someone they know has died as if they were risen from the grave (especially if they had actually witnessed the death).

Help death states:

"Death is permanent in the world of Age of Reptiles, so watch your back and
know who your friends are! In addition, new characters created after a
character's death will NOT be allowed to exact revenge against a killer.
Relatives of a killed character may RP revenge, if circumstances are
applicable.

Also, there is NO remaking of the same character over and over, period!
I do not want to see newly-made characters using memory of their original
characters and attempting to 'hang out' with the original character's pack
unless they are set to be part of it!"

In addition, the reuse of former character names is also not allowed as it will only cause players to have a tendency to essentially do the same as above.

Roleplaying

The final orientation room before entering the main game world gives basic information on roleplaying within the world of Pangaea and lists a number of help files that can assist a player in RPing in general. Roleplaying is enforced in AoR and it is also rewarded, in fact, the only way for a character to improve its stats (str, dex, con, etc.) is through RP point expenditure.

A good way to earn initial RP pts is by writing a decent description and bio. Playing in-character (IC) in an appropriate manner and using the think command can also earn one RP pts. The command RPbuy is used to purchase stat improvements and one's RP point total can be seen on their score sheet. RP points may also be awarded for uploading a game review of AoR on specific mud websites, participation in in-game contests or for contributing to the mud in some fashion (artwork or guides, for example).

A very important feature of the game's forum is uploading RP stories based on one's adventures or posting actual logs of RP sessions one has participated in. These can also earn one RP points. An elemental may be watching you at *anytime* and may award you with RP point for behaving in-character during their observations.

The command help help lists the following files for additional assistance in immersing oneself in AoR:

Help RP
Help Deinonychus
Help PVP
Help Mating
Help Packs
Help Rpbuy
Help Rules
Help (various dinosaur types)
Help Think
Help Layeggs
Help Lead
Help Ranks
Help Semote
Socials
Help Prompt


Prompts

One notable feature in the prompt command is the inclusion of the %A variable. By including this variable in one's prompt, one can automatically see whether they are successfully hidden or sneaking, two very important survival tools. Also, a new variable has been added to the game (%W), which will readily inform the player when it is raining (just for more RP info).

Here is a decent prompt to start off with, courtesy of Gaok:   prompt &WH:&R%h/%H &WM:&B%v/%V &WVIS:&P[&p%A&P] &WTime:&P[&p%T&P]&g %W

PVP

While PvP is technically open at any time with any other player, mindless PvP without reason is greatly frowned upon. A pack's help file (help duskfall or help redclaw, for example) may have some guidelines regarding PvP with enemy packs and PvP without any included RP should normally be avoided. To help counter some abuse of PvP mechanics, the deathblow skill is in place that must be used to "finish off" defeated players. I expect all players to be mature about any PvP actions - be sure to read help pvp.

Mating

Age of Reptiles is an adult mud. Not only does it have a lot of violence (like most all muds) but there is also procreation code, meaning that sex can take place between a male and a female and the female *can* become pregnant and eventually give birth (an egg essentially) to a fully playable hatchling.

Animals are all about the survival of their genes. They eat, sleep, defecate and procreate. Anything else they do is simply to aid in the completion of one or more of those goals. This is just realism, nothing more. Dinosaurs are animals and they do what animals do.

Because AoR is based on a series of stories wherein the characters (the dinosaurs) are slightly anthropomorphic, players do exhibit somewhat basic humanlike behaviour but the list of what animals do is basically the same. Though the game could be deemed somewhat educational in many ways, there is sex still. Birds do it, bees do it...I think the code in place is realistic and in no way tasteless.

News

Help News is regularly updated with information on game expansions and newly added features, current contests and other information. Please use it. You can also go back and read past news entries to see how the game has changed over time.

Entering Pangaea

As you enter the main world, you will be automatically placed into one of the active deinonychus packs and moved to that pack's home area. The most important thing that a new player should be worried about is *survival*. What this means is using your skills to the max. The three most important skills you can use *right away* are hide, sneak and scan. Spam away, get them up to whatever max you can at your current level and use them *constantly*.

There are predators in the game other than the players that will gladly attack and eat you. Surviving also means using the consider command before randomly attacking other mobs. Use help (dinosaur type) to learn more about your target, a little info can go a long way to helping you understand that a brachiosaurus isn't good prey for a level one character.

If your first attempt at tracking down and killing a compsognathus fails and you are hungry, find a river or other source for fish to eat. As you level, your max percentage in a skill will go up. Keep practicing and, if another packmate is around, try to group up for better chances of survival. Try not to run off exploring too far before you get a general idea of how your home area is laid out.

Play it safe!



If you are looking for more helpful sources of information, I highly recommend reading Ricardo Delgado's Age of Reptiles series if you can get ahold of it (getting pricey on Amazon.com, now). Another great book is Raptor Red by Robert T.Bakker and this one can be purchased for practically nothing. The Disney animated movie Dinosaur is also pretty decent even if the characters are a little more humanlike that AoR's.



Welcome to Age of Reptiles!