Tutorial 1: Getting Started (as a single page)
From FiranMUX
| This page includes all the text of the "Getting Started" Basic Firan Survival Guide tutorial. It's on one page for ease of searching, reading, or printing. |
So now you have a character on FiranMUX. What do you do?
| Learn about your new character and things in their life. | |
| Figure out what code you need to get around. | |
| Roleplaying -- it's why everyone is here! |
There are a number of useful help files accessible through the game that give good advice about how to learn about your character. In particular, you want to look at help getting started and news getting started on firanmux. Much of the advice is reiterated and augmented below.
Don't Panic at the size of this list! It's meant to be fairly detailed and exhaustive and you certainly don't have to do everything all at once.
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Things You Really Ought To Do Before Roleplaying
These are the things you really ought to do before you start roleplaying the first time. It shouldn't take more than a few minutes, but it'll help you get acclimated to the basics of your character and the state of the game.
Know thy own self
FiranMUX is different from most games in that it uses pregenerated characters. Instead of making up your own creation you're an actor, filling a role. It's important to know a little about the character you're playing so you can roleplay appropriately.
Use the look command to see what you look like, and the inventory command to see what you're currently carrying. The majority of the information about your character, including such important things like your personality and relationships to other characters, is accessible through the @sheet commands. See @sheet/help for a summary of this command. In general, if you want to see everything at once you can type @sheet/all, though this will display a lot of information. Other variations will display all this information in more manageable chunks.
Of potentially crucial importance are sworn oaths. These are things that can potentially get you in trouble with gods (or other characters) if you break them. The @oaths command will list any oaths you've sworn. See help ritual/oath for their general importance.
Current events
Before you venture IC, it's advisable to get an idea of the current events on the game. Your roleplay will be different based on whether the city is in, say, the midst of a glorious festival or the midst of a brutal civil war.
There are several sources of information. One way is to read up on the bulletin boards on the game as well as the web-accesible invisionboard. This, however, can be a daunting task given the sheer number of boards. Your best sources of information will be found on boards 10 (General Updates), 19 (Current Events), 27 (Speeches), or your appropriate clan board. The other source of information is from other players. The easiest way to ask is on your clan's comsys channel about what the current situation in the game is, and if there's anything you should be aware of before venturing IC. Most anyone can tell you about the gamewide status of things, and some can even give you insight into your character specifically.
Things You Should Do Reasonably Soon
These next few items aren't crucial before you jump into the game, but at some point in time you'll want to sort out where you live, what you own, etc.
Home sweet home
Every character on FiranMUX has a home, be it a communal living area, a private apartment, or a room in a private home. To find out where your character lives you can either move through the policy rooms and go IC, or you can use the @home command.
There are a number of different cities on FiranMUX. However, all characters on the game currently reside within the main city of Anarinuell (or the immediately surrounding region), with the other cities accessible in the event of certain plots or other needs. However, traveling to other cities is a relatively rare occurrence and always for a specific reason. Anarinuell itself is divided into a number of districts corresponding to the eight different clans.
If you find that your home is located in one of the "Old City -- Sailor's Nook" rooms, such as the boarding house or hostelery, you are living in a communal living area. The Old City is "the bad side of the tracks" in Firan, and though the Sailor's Nook room is reasonably safe, moving further in the Old City can lead to trouble (injury, muggings, or in extreme cases, death) if you're not part of that community. To find out if you are, look at your character's background or simply look to see if their name is on the Old City list by using the @oldcity command. Characters who are part of the Old City can continue living where they are, or else seek residence deeper within the Old City. Other characters can, in theory, remain living where they are, but will likely feel more comfortable moving elsewhere away from the riffraff.
Anyone can move if and when they choose, for a cost. There are apartments to rent, and private residences can even be arranged. Traditionally, Firan families live together as an extended family. If you're looking for a new apartment to move into, see help housing for pointers. If you are a Republic soldier (type @rank <your name> to see if you have a military rank) then you can live in the barracks within the Palace District for free.
Stuff you own
All characters own something, even if it's just the clothes on their back. Here's how to find your stuff:
- Type i (or inventory) to see items currently in your possession. If you have many huge and unwieldy items you're carrying about, like wardrobes and pantries, that means your character was recently evicted from an apartment and all their items shipped to them. You'll want to find a new residence to put them. Also, money you are currently holding (stenis) will be listed in your inventory. (If the number of stenis you currently possess is negative, you are in debt. See the section on debt for more information on what to do about this.)
- Go to your home and look at what's there. Because extended families tend to live together you might not own all of the things there, so ask around to be sure.
- Use the @deed/list command to see if you own any property, and where it is. Typically nobles will own property, and commoners will only rarely own land.
- Look and see if you have a keyring in your possession (look keyring). If you do, you'll see a number of keys on it, with potentially cryptic names. Though not all those keys may currently work, some may. If it's not obvious from the name where the key leads, or if you can't find the building, you can try asking on the Help Channel. Also, you can use the key/identify command to identify what certain keys unlock.
- Go to the city bank and use the @bank/balance all command to see if you have any money. Note that you might not personally "own" the money in all the accounts you see. Some may be family accounts. Others may be sponsor accounts, representing fees paid to a sponsor; if you're a noble sponsor then this money is yours, otherwise, it belongs to the noble who sponsors you. Other funds might be clan-related or work-related. If in doubt ask around.
Know thy own self (Part II)
There's other information about yourself that isn't simply found on your character sheet. To learn more about yourself, try the following:
- Use the mail system to read past mails sent to your character. There could be clues! Or people may be expecting responses to questions. Check the dates, though, as some mail may be outdated.
- Go to the Unity Building (it's at @coords -1.-2) and use the @record/search <your name> command. This will list any legal records pertaining to you. Also, you can use the @fine/list <your name> command to see if you have any outstanding fines to pay.
Employment
You can check to see if you're hired by someone through the use of the @sheet/employment command. You may be employed to another character -- in which case you should likely contact them about being new -- or to an entity, such as a Republic Bank Account for those in the military or guards. If you're employed through the code you'll lose a certain amount of energy each day in return for pay.
If you're not employed through code, that doesn't necessarily mean you're jobless! It may mean that you need to contact someone about getting hired; this will be indicated on your @sheet, usually in the background section, if such is the case. Or it may mean that you're a craftsman who works on commission, or that you simply work odd jobs for money. The advanced tutorial on jobs has more detailed information.
Things You Can Procastinate On
Here are some more advanced tricks you can use to find different information about the character you're playing.
Know thy own self (Part III)
Finally, here's even more things you can do to find information about yourself:
- Use the watch command to see who's on your watch list. These are characters that may ICly be related to you in some fashion. Or it could just be that a past player put them on their for OOC reasons. Either way, it could bear looking into.
- See what other characters think about yourself. If a character is on the roster you can review their relationships, which includes ones pertaining to yourself. A tedious way to go about this is to look through the entire roster of characters, using the @family <name> command to see if they have a relationship to you. If they do, you cand use the @relationship/view <other person>/<your name> command to see the relationship. You're better advised to narrow down the search, though. If you do an @family on yourself, look for names with a '(r)' after them; this means that character is on the roster. Then proceed from there. Another idea is to filter the roster based on your clan and go from there.
- If you have the literacy/firan skill and can read, go to the library in the Palace District and see if any scrolls have your name in them. This is unlikely unless you're playing a feature level character.
- If you have the gossip skill, you can use the gossip <your name> command to see if there's any juicy gossip out there on you. Take slight care in that if you fumble this roll, you'll create a new bit of gossip about how you were looking for dirt on yourself. Trying this multiple times can get different rumors. Sometimes, however, the rumors tend to be pretty old or mundane.
- If you have the espionage skill, you can check up on yourself with the spy on <your name> command. As with the gossip command if you fumble this roll, you'll create some new gossip out there about how you were spying on yourself. Using this multiple times can generate different information. Typically espionage returns more recent information than gossip.
- You can call up witnesses against yourself with the @witness/call <your name> command. Note that this will cost social points (see help social system) and may leave evidence behind that you were asking about yourself.
- Check to see if there are any roleplaying logs with your character featured in them. One source can be found elsewhere on this site. Others can possibly be found by asking other characters related to your own.
Code Concerns
FiranMUX has a lot of code, and that's an understatement. This web site is an attempt to put a little order to it all, and to draw attention to the important pieces of code so it's not as overwhelming. What's described under the basic tutorials is easily enough to get a person started on Firan.
Even that, however, is a lot of code. For the truly impatient, the super critical commands and concepts are referenced below. People who have MUSHed before, on games based on TinyMUX or even TinyMUSH, will already be familiar with a number of the basic commands. The list is therefore divided into two sections.
| New to MUSHing | New to FiranMUX |
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Roleplaying
New to the game? New to the character? Not sure how to get into the swing of RP? Not sure where to go? Well, this top ten (plus a bonus one) list should give you plenty of ideas of where you can start.
- Look within your family. The @sheet/social command will list who's in your family, and from there you can see what the existing relationships are.
- Look within your circle of friends (or enemies). The @sheet/relationships command will list people that you know, and in what capacity.
- Roleplay with your sponsors or sponsorees. It may be that your character has existing sponsors or sponsorees, which will be listed through the @sheet/social command. Sponsorship is part of the social system on Firan. You can see help sponsor for some details.
- Roleplay out your employment. If you're employed to someone, see if there's any roleplay that can be done around it. If you're a crafter, see if there are others in your vocation you could roleplay with. If you're a servant that's unemployed, check bulletin board 13 (Classifieds) or the @republic command to see if anyone is hiring, or make a post of your own seeking work. Guards and military people sometimes hang out at the Glass Works or the Training Center, both in the Palace District.
- Roleplay with clan members. If your character isn't an outcast or involved with the Old City crew, chances are they interact a lot with their clan. There might be hangouts in your clan's district where you could bump into others. Or you could ask about on your clan's channel. Remember, people don't mind if you ask, but they might grow annoyed if you pester or hound.
- Roleplay within your social class. Though there's some fluidity with people roleplaying across social classes, nobles tend to keep their close friendships with other nobles, and commoners (that is, anyone who isn't noble) with other commoners. There are certain hangouts that different social classes congregate to, and these can vary from month to month. The Barnacle Inn, for example, is popular with the lowest of the social classes, while the Diplomat Inn is favored by the highest. Ask around. If you're a member of the Old City (that is, your name is on the @oldcity list) you can find kindred spirits to roleplay with that way.
- Roleplay along a religious theme. Some characters aren't much into religion, but some are. If yours is one that is (or even if they're just one that pretends to be), you can sometimes find roleplay at the temples, or by sending a message to a priest or priestess if there's something you might want to discuss with them. Priests can act like Firan's version of a counselor or psychiatrist, on spiritual and other matters.
- Find a social event to attend. The @cal command will list all social events during the current month. Some are specific to a particular group of persons, but a lot of them are open to all -- and even if they're not, your character might be just the type to crash an event. Just be prepared to accept the consequences. Not any social events happening that you can attend? Think up an idea and throw one of your own, possibly with the help of others.
- Roleplay learning or teaching things. Once you start to gather some XP, you'll likely want to spend it. It's cheaper to purchase or raise skills if you have a teacher to instruct you. There's a number of ways to look for teachers. Some people advertise that they can instruct, and some people advertise that they need instruction. You can respond to either type of post or make one of your own. This is done on bulletin board 13 (Classifieds) or via the @republic command primarily. Once you find a mutual arrangement roleplay out the instruction.
- Hang out at an active area of the grid. Some places, such as the central Forum or the baths, attract people who are looking to mix and mingle in roleplay. These are also places where different social classes are more likely to interact. Be aware, however, that they're also busy places, and people may hurry through without specifically posing if they don't have time to roleplay. It's nothing personal, honest.
- Roleplay any old event in your character's life. As you roleplay your character for a while you'll find you get to a point where you log in and know you 'need' to talk to Person X or Person Y about some thing or another. You'll discover your own small plotlines to pursue through the course of roleplaying your character's life. If nothing in particular is happening, just roleplay any event that would come up in the course of your character's life. Suggestions are listed below (not all of them suited to all characters), but obviously it's not an exhaustive list, just something to get ideas flowing...
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