MayLith: This is the "parchment" that everyone starts off the game with. It has spoilers and other not-so-good things in it, so, here's a place to hash it over.

Contents

  1. book20.txt
  2. Chatter

book20.txt

Summary: *****/abook-20.txt*1[(a) The towns] *****/bbook-20.txt*2[(b) Other strange and frightening places] *****/cbook-20.txt*3[(c) Equipment issues] *****/dbook-20.txt*4[(d) Macros] *****/dbook-20.txt*4[(e) Quests]

Introduction:

Middle-earth is vast and mysterious, full of dangers but also full of rewards for the brave.

New adventurers should know that pressing < and > can switch the wilderness view between a normal scale and a larger map. This map makes travelling safer and faster, but you can't enter wilderness dungeons from it.

~~~~~1

You start in a small village named Bree in the western part of the Middle-earth. Here you will also find the entrance to the Barrow-Downs, a fairly safe and simple dungeon.

When the Barrow-Downs become too easy for you, and Bree too small, you might consider going to Lothlorien, the land of Galadriel. [[[[[BNote that] [[[[[Byou should take a lot of food with you, for it is a long journey.] You'll have to head south-east following the Moria mountain's chain, then walk around the forest of Fangorn to head north to finally find your destination. The Forest of Mirkwood (another dungeon) can be found to the northeast of Lothlorien.

Other towns await. Look for maps as your travels progress.

~~~~~2

The Old Forest to the west of Bree is the last remains of the big forests of the First Age, but it has been corrupted. It is said it is guarded by a living tree.

You may also wish to investigate the Orc Caves north of Bree; they are another place suitable for those who have travelled through the Barrow-Downs. They also are rumored to hold great mysteries.

To the south of Bree there is a magical Maze. Many adventurers that ventured there never came back... It is rumored that a Minotaur is lurking down there, guarding an ancient and powerful artifact. Bring along digging equipment and some means to recall.

Durin's Bane, the Balrog of Moria, guards the Mines of Moria, to the southeast of Bree.

During the Second Age of the world there was a great island called Numenor. The people who dwelt there were wise and powerful, but as time passed their last kings fell under the power of Sauron. Under Sauron's orders, they tried to attack Valinor, the blessed land, and for this Numenor was destroyed, swallowed by the sea. The treacherous ruins are still accessible, far out to sea to the west of Bree.

Many other strange places wait to be explored by the valiant adventurer, but their locations are secret. You will have to find them yourself!

~~~~~3

Beware adventurer! If you plan to go down into the dungeons, be prepared. You will need some items badly:

First, think of some light to see by; maybe a lantern is better than torches.

Second, consider your combat equipment. Sometimes the weapon and armor you got from your mentor are not enough for the nasties inside the dungeons.

Third and most important, [[[[[Balways carry a shovel or other digger with you] when you leave the town level of Bree, because there is much rubble in Middle-earth which you cannot clear with your hands.

~~~~~4

Spellcasters might find that pressing 4 keys (at least) to cast a spell is a lot, they are right. That is why there are macros. You can access the macro screen by pressing @. You can find help on the *****macrofaq.txt*0[macros] in the docs.

Now you either have the hard way or the easy way.

**The Hard Way**

What the fellow adventurer should know is how to create a basic spell macro:

  1. Press @ to enter the macro screen.
  2. Press 4 to create a new macro.
  3. Press the key to bind the macro to, usually one uses the F* keys (you can

combine them with the ctrl, shift, ... keys too)

  1. Enter the key sequence to be done for the macro.
  2. Press 2 to save the macro.

Now, a problem might arise. Imagine your macro looks like: mcaa*t to cast a Manathrust spell ('m' to use skill, 'c' for cast a spell skill, 'a' for first book, 'a' for first spell, *t to… target the first monster). This macro will break if 1) you gain a new skill so that "Cast a spell" is no more the skill 'c', or 2) if you get a new book. There is a way around that. When the game asks for a skill or a spell it allows you to press @ to enter the skill/spell name directly, so your macro would become:

m@Cast a spell\r@Manathrust\r*t

Now this will always work as long as one of your books has the spell in it.

**The Easy Way**

This time you will only use the macro recorder. To do that:

  1. Press $ to start it.
  2. Now, each key you press will be recorded, so press all keys you want.

It is recommended to start your macro by pressing Escape key a few time, so if there are messages when you use the macro it will first erase them instead of swallowing the first few keystrokes of your macro.

  1. It is also recommended to take advantage of the @ key when selecting skills or

objects whenever the possibility is offered to you. It will make sure you always use the good object/skill even if it moves in your inventory.

  1. Once all keys are pressed, press $ again to stop the recorder. If you are

satisfied with your macro, now press the key to bind it to.

As in the Hard Way, you must use the macro screen if you want to permanently save your macros.

Either way you choose, to edit your macros you must save them, exit ToME, then edit the file you saved them into.

~~~~~5

While adventuring in Middle-earth, you will have the opportunity to undertake many quests. To see a list of your current quests, type 'control + q'. (Be very careful not to type 'shift + q' instead, as doing so and answering yes will kill your character.)

Chatter

NeilStevens: I just removed these two paragraphs:

Perhaps Galadriel should give this advice when the time is right. Perhaps the player should be on his own about these. Either way, I say none of this belongs in the parchment.

MayLith: I agree that the information you deleted does not belong.

Part of me thinks nothing should be said, as there's no reason why you might do one dungeon before another (IF you are of sufficient CL.) OTOH, maybe Galadriel could tell you the next dungeon to go to after you clear the last one. E.G.:

Huh, that makes it a quest, doesn't it.... And there's nothing says you can't enter Mirkwood before you've finished the Barrow Downs, and nothing that says you *have* to do either dungeon, for that matter. So I guess that's out....

Angband is the only important one, as you say. Maybe once you get above a certain Character Level (whichever the minimum one for Angband is, I forget), she could appear to you in a vision??

MayLith: Should the macro info stay on this page, or just a reference to the in-game help? Also, there's a reference to Moria's mountain chain in this thing. Do we eliminate the word "Moria", or no?

MayLith: One last thing: The "other strange and frightening places" section. Do we leave all those dungeons there, even including Numenor and the references to Sauron and the Balrog?

MayLith/scratch-book20.txt (last edited 2004-09-25 01:11:30 by MayLith)