HPAVC/HPAVC CD-ROM.iso/pc/ADV350.ZIP/wizard.how

Text File | 1990-11-27 | 12.5 KB | 328 lines

WIZARD STUFF--HOW AND WHAT


Introduction

This document is for qualified wizards only.  You are forbidden to distribute
this information or any part thereof to lay persons, on pain of having your
wizard certificate revoked.  As a wizard you are authorized to schedule the
hours during which the cave is opened on weekdays, Saturdays and Sundays, and
holidays.  You can specify the next forthcoming holiday, which can last for
more than one day if you like.  You can specify the length, in moves, of the
demonstration game that is permitted non-wizards during those hours when the
cave is closed, and the latency time, in minutes, that a player must wait
after saving a game until restarting it.  (For wizards, this value is cut
to one third the normal value.)  You can alter the magic word and the magic
number, which are used to validate claims to being a wizard, and you can
alter the message of the day, which is displayed at the beginning of the
game.  Note that all entries that you make are case insensitive.  You may
use either upper or lower case letters at your pleasure.


Wizards and Non-Wizards

During hours when the cave is closed, only wizards are permitted to play
unrestricted, although ordinary players may be offered a short demonstration
game.  If you start the program when the cave is open, and continue on into
a period when the cave is closed, the wizard will appear and abruptly terminate
your game.  If you start the program when the cave is closed, you are
immediately (after the initialisation is complete) greeted with a message that
looks something like the following, with hours reflecting how your cave hours
are set:

I'M TERRIBLY SORRY, BUT COLOSSAL CAVE IS CLOSED.  OUR HOURS ARE:

         MON-FRI:   0:00 TO  8:00
                   12:00 TO 13:00
                   17:00 TO 24:00
         SAT-SUN:  OPEN ALL DAY
         HOLIDAYS  OPEN ALL DAY

ONLY WIZARDS ARE PERMITTED WITHIN THE CAVE RIGHT NOW.

ARE YOU A WIZARD?

If you answer "no", the following appears (provided it is permitted by your
local wizard):

WE DO ALLOW VISITORS TO MAKE SHORT EXPLORATIONS DURING OUR OFF HOURS.
WOULD YOU LIKE TO DO THAT?

If you answer "yes", you are permitted to play a short game.  The maximum
number of turns is determined by your local wizard.  At the end of this
number of turns, the wizard appears and unceremoniously ends the game.  If
you answer "no", the program terminates.

If you answer "yes" to the question "ARE YOU A WIZARD?", you will be required
to demonstrate some wizard skills to prove that you are.  If you successfully
do so, you will be permitted to play as though the cave were open.  You also
may elect to perform some maintenance chores, such as adjusting the cave hours,
specifying the next holiday, etc.  Choosing this path causes the program to
terminate upon completion of the maintenance chores.

During hours when the cave is open, wizards and non-wizards alike may play
the game normally.  Wizards have no advantages during normal play.


Proving That You Are a Wizard

In order to perform wizard maintenance chores, you must enter the maintenance
mode as the first play of the game after you have accepted or declined the
offered instructions.  If you play so much as one turn, you cannot enter the
maintenance mode.  To enter the maintenance mode, therefore, you must, as your
first turn, enter the words "magic mode".  If you have already qualified as a
wizard (on entering the game during hours when the cave is closed), you will
see the first of the maintenance mode prompts.  If you entered during hours
when the cave is open, you will be challenged with the words:

ARE YOU A WIZARD?

Answering "no" takes you back to the game as an ordinary player, with no
penalty.  Answering "yes" brings on a series of challenges.  Failing any one
challenge gets you the message:

FOO, YOU ARE NOTHING BUT A CHARLATAN!

and you are taken back to the game as an ordinary player.  The challenges,
in order, and the correct responses, are as follows:

PROVE IT!  SAY THE MAGIC WORD!

You must respond with the current magic word.  The default magic word, which
can be changed by your local wizard, is "dwarf".

THAT'S NOT WHAT I THOUGHT IT WAS.  DO YOU KNOW WHAT I THOUGHT IT WAS?

If you answer "yes", you fail.  You must answer "no".  You will then be
presented with a challenge that consists of a four-letter "word", with the
letters chosen at random.  For example:

RVGI

You must enter the correct four-letter response, based on the challenge and on
the current time of day.  Since this is the difficult part (which must *never*
be revealed to other than authorized wizards), it will be explained in painful
detail.  First, write down a sequence of four numbers, each representing the
ordinal value of a letter of the challenge (A = 1).  Thus RVGI becomes the
number sequence:

18  22   7   9

Transform this into a new four-number sequence by taking the absolute value of
the difference between each number and its predecessor number.  (The predecessor
of the first number is the last number.)  Your result, for this example, should
look like:

 9   4  15   2

Multiply each of these numbers by the corresponding digit in the magic number.
The default magic number is 1111, so the result will still be:

 9   4  15   2

Using the 24-hour clock (2:00 pm = 1400), write under the above numbers the
time of day, truncated to the nearest 10 minutes.  For example, 10:33 am becomes
1 0 3 0.  So far your work should look like this:

 9   4  15   2
 1   0   3   0

Under each of the four columns, enter a 1, so that your work looks like:

 9   4  15   2
 1   0   3   0
 1   1   1   1

Now add each of the four columns independently.  Do not carry from one column
to the next.  You result should be:

 9   4  15   2
 1   0   3   0
 1   1   1   1
--------------
11   5  19   3

If any of the sums exceeds 26, simply subtract 26 (i.e., do the column addition
modulo 26).  These four numbers are the ordinal numbers of the four letters of
your required response which, in this case, is:

KERC

Enter this response.  If you did the arithmetic correctly, you will now be a
validated wizard, as indicated by the appearance of the message:

OH DEAR, YOU REALLY *ARE* A WIZARD!  SORRY TO HAVE BOTHERED YOU . . .

If you entered the game during hours when the cave is closed you are permitted
to play the game normally.  If you wish to perform maintenance chores, you must
enter the words "magic mode" as your first turn after accepting or declining the
offered instructions.  If you entered during hours when the cave is open, you
already entered the words "magic mode" and you are now automatically in
maintenance mode.


Maintenance Chores

Now that you are in the maintenance mode as a demonstrated wizard, you are
offered a series of prompts for the various chores available to you.  Your
answers may change a number of things, including the magic word and the magic
number, so remember these changes if you make them!  Here are the prompts:

DO YOU WISH TO SEE THE HOURS?

Answering "no" takes you to the next prompt.  Answering "yes" displays the
hours, and either a statement that today is a holiday (with its name), or
an indication of how long it is to the next holiday, if any, and the name
of that holiday.  For example, today is Friday, November 23, 1990, which is
the second day of a two day holiday on our system, so the hours appear as:

         MON-FRI    0:00 TO  8:00
                   12:00 TO 13:00
                   17:00 TO 24:00
         SAT-SUN:  OPEN ALL DAY
         HOLIDAYS  OPEN ALL DAY

TODAY IS A HOLIDAY, NAMELY THANKSGIVING

The next prompt is:

DO YOU WISH TO CHANGE THE HOURS?

Answering "no" takes you to the next prompt.  Answering "yes" brings up a
series of prompts for setting the hours, first on weekdays, then on weekends,
and finally on holidays.  Note that the hours are specified by entering the
"prime time" hours, which are hours when the cave is closed.  There can be
more than one set of prime time hours for each category, as the following
example dialogue demonstrates:

NEW HOURS SPECIFIED BY DEFINING "PRIME TIME".  GIVE ONLY THE HOUR
(E.G., 14, NOT 14:00 OR 2PM).  ENTER A NEGATIVE NUMBER AFTER LAST PAIR.
PRIME TIME ON WEEKDAYS
FROM:
8     [entered from keyboard]
TILL:
12    [entered from keyboard]
FROM:
13    [entered from keyboard]
TILL:
17    [entered from keyboard]
FROM:
-1    [entered from keyboard]
PRIME TIME ON WEEKENDS
FROM:
0     [entered from keyboard]
TILL:
0     [entered from keyboard]
PRIME TIME ON HOLIDAYS
FROM:
0     [entered from keyboard]
TILL:
0     [entered from keyboard]
NEW HOURS FOR COLOSSAL CAVE:

         MON-FRI:   0:00 TO  8:00
                   12:00 TO 13:00
                   17:00 TO 24:00
         SAT-SUN:  OPEN ALL DAY
         HOLIDAYS  OPEN ALL DAY

TODAY IS A HOLIDAY, NAMELY THANKSGIVING

Notice that weekend and holidays we want the cave to be open all day, so we
specify starting and ending prime time hours both to be 0, in which case
there is no need to enter a negative number to end the series, since the
entire day has been covered.

You are now offered a chance to schedule the next holiday.  The prompt is:

DO YOU WISH TO (RE)SCHEDULE THE NEXT HOLIDAY?

Entering "no" takes you to the next prompt.  Entering "yes" results in a dialog
something like the following:

TO BEGIN HOW MANY DAYS FROM TODAY?
29    [entered from keyboard]
TO LAST HOW MANY DAYS (ZERO IF NO HOLIDAY)?
10    [entered from keyboard]
TO BE CALLED WHAT (UP TO 20 CHARACTERS)?
CHRISTMAS    [entered from keyboard]

Note that only one holiday can be specified.  If today is a holiday, and
you schedule the next one, today will revert to a non-holiday status, so
schedule the next holiday after the current one has ended.

Next, you may permit a short demonstration game to ordinary players during
prime time.  The length is specified in moves, in response to the following
prompt:

LENGTH OF SHORT GAME (ZERO TO LEAVE AT 45):
30    [entered from keyboard]

Entering a value of zero prohibits demonstration games during prime time.

Now you are offered a chance to change the magic word used to verify
wizard status.  If you change this, be sure to remember what you change it to.

NEW MAGIC WORD (NULL TO LEAVE UNCHANGED):
BOZO    [entered from keyboard]

Only the first four letters are significant.  If you wish to leave the current
magic word unchanged, simply press the "enter" key.

You may next change the magic number.  You cannot enter a zero with the idea
of bypassing this step in the algorithm, since entering a zero leaves the
old value unchanged.

NEW MAGIC NUMBER (ZERO TO LEAVE UNCHANGED):
1111    [entered from keyboard]

At least one if the four digits must be non-zero to change the value.

You may now enter the required time, in minutes, that a player must wait after
saving a game until he can restart that game.  (Wizards may restart after a
third of this time.)

LATENCY FOR RESTART (ZERO TO LEAVE AT 90):
30    [entered from keyboard]
TOO SMALL!  ASSUMING MINIMUM VALUE (45 MINUTES).

If you enter a value less than the minimum of 45, as was done above, you will
get the message showing that a value of 45 is assumed.  Otherwise, the value
you enter will be accepted without further comment.

DO YOU WISH TO CHANGE THE MESSAGE OF THE DAY?

Answering "no" takes you to the next prompt.  Answering "yes" permits you to
enter a new message of the day, which may consist of up to 20 lines of not more
than 80 characters each.  To terminate, simply press carriage return at the
beginning of a line.

LIMIT LINES TO 80 CHARS.  END WITH NULL LINE.

If you enter a line that exceeds 80 characters, you will see the message:

LINE TOO LONG, RETYPE:

If you enter 20 lines, you will see the message:

NOT ENOUGH ROOM FOR ANOTHER LINE.  ENDING MESSAGE HERE.

This ends the maintenance chores.  Presently one more message is presented.
There is an entry in the data file that states:

BREAK OUT OF THIS AND SAVE YOUR CORE-IMAGE.

or

BE SURE TO SAVE YOUR CORE-IMAGE...

depending on how the subroutine ciao.for was compiled.  These messages are left
over from the DEC-10 implementation and one of them will appear now, but it is
of no significance.  These messages are not otherwise used in this MS-DOS
version.

At this point when you enter another carriage return, the program terminates.

That's all there is to being a wizard.  Simple, isn't it?  Sort of like being
a system administrator with root privileges.