Avendar:Basics

What is Avendar?

Avendar is a MUD, or Multi-User Dungeon, based on the DikuMUD game engine. A MUD is a persistent text-based online multiplayer RPG; imagine a tabletop roleplaying game that players can drop into whenever they like, where the mechanics and rules are adjudicated by the game automatically and GameMasters exist to facilitate interaction and tell stories.

In the parlance of MUDs, Avendar is a RP+/PvP+ MUD. That means we encourage and enforce rules that support both roleplaying and player vs player combat. For more information on how those specific things work, please see those pages.

Syntax

Commands and actions in Avendar will generally be constructed in the order of verb/action -> object -> target. Avendar does not use bridging words or prepositions like 'to', 'from', 'with', 'my', or 'at' in our commands, and those may be omitted. Interaction with objects will default to your own inventory first, then the room. Single quotation marks are used by default to group words together in a single phrase; at times these will be double quotation marks if the phrase in question already has single quotations. Here are some common examples to give you an idea of proper syntax.

give guide jolinn
You give a copy of Ateghu's Guide to Demonology to Jolinn.

cast armor
You feel someone protecting you.

cast 'giant growth' jolinn
Jolinn looks stronger and heartier.

esay "pats Jolinn's hand, saying" Cheer up buddy, you'll get there.
Elanthe pats Jolinn's hand, saying, 'Cheer up buddy, you'll get there.'

Lag

Some MUDs have a countdown timer, commonly called roundtime, before you can enter your next command. Avendar instead has lag. When you enter and execute a command in Avendar, such as casting a spell, there will be a delay before the next command you enter will be executed. You may queue up multiple commands while lagged which will be executed in the order you enter them in once you are no longer lagged. To clear all the commands from your queue, enter clear.

Many abilities inflict additional lag on targets, and inflicting lag is especially powerful in PvP situations. NPCs do not experience lag, but abilities which cause lag will debuff NPCs in other ways instead.

Characters

We do not put restrictions on the types of in-setting roles an individual can pursue or be connected to. If you wish to play the member of a royal family, an Earendamian noble, the relative of a famous person or NPC, an aspiring priest of a god, etc-- do it! Player characters are free to be of any origin or be exceptional or not as you wish, within reason. Please see the roleplay page for detailed information about interaction and our approach to characters and storylines.

Player characters in Avendar have a finite lifespan. It is intended that no player character remain in active play for longer than about a year and a half of real-life time, either due to running out of deaths or reaching their maximum age. Please see those articles for more details about those systems.

We are aware that permanent death or character loss can be scary for those who have not played a MUD that incorporates it as we do, but we have many reasons for its inclusion that all relate to the long-term health of the game. Ensuring there is regular character churn means there is never a character or group of characters that perpetually dominates everyone else, and new or returning players coming into the game are not perpetually unable to catch up. New characters mean new storytelling elements as well, instead of the same stale personalities lingering forever.

Equipment and Inventory

Equipment is the primary means by which you gain power for your character once you have reached hero and reached maximum % in all of your skills. As such, exceptional items are often limited, which means that only so many copies of the item may exist in the game world at a time. Particularly exceptional or legendary items will typically be limit 1, while powerful but less rare items may have higher limits.

The more powerful an item is, the more difficult it will generally be to acquire, requiring luck, skill, a large group, or all three of these. PvP and looting is a legitimate and encouraged tactic for acquiring rare items already in the possession of another player character.

Most items can be sold to various merchants in the game for currency, and there are various ways to modify how much money you are able to get from selling items.