Flight sim, etc.

src/klh/cubwar.doc

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+
+			CUBE WAR
+
+	Cubewar is a computer game played on conventional terminals
+between from two to eight players.  It has been transmitted through
+the ARPANet from its originator, Jim Sulzen at UC-at-Irvine.
+It is a highly interactive program,
+which will be kept quite busy handling all of its
+terminals.  Thus, it will often be a load on the system,
+and a moderately used system may not be able to provide adequate
+response to Cubewar.  According, it should be used during idle
+time whenever possible.
+
+	The game is played within a cube of space, from 6
+to 8 cubes on a side.  Each player is a 'ship' in this cubical
+space, provided with simple means of locating others, and armed
+with a 'blazer' to attack other ships.  The cubes which make up
+cubical space might be thought of as quarants in StarTrek, within
+which a ship may have varying locations.  This is not the case.
+A ship is either in one cube, or it is not; there are no variations
+on the fact of being 'in' a particular cube.  
+
+	A ship has a particular direction in which it is facing,
+one direction which is directly in 'front' of the ship.
+This is one of the six possible directions relative to the cube,
+with no grades in between.  Consider a left-handed Cartesian
+coordinate system.  The direction directly in front of you
+is 'plus-X', while the opposite is 'minus-X.'  To your right
+is the 'plus-Y' direction, to your left is 'minus-Y,'  upward is
+'plus-Z' and downward is 'minus-Z.'  This is the system used in
+defining Cubewar directions.  In addition, a cube has a three-digit
+address, from (1,1,1) to (8,8,8) assuming a size-8 cube.
+
+	In addition to a 'forward' direction, the ship has a definite
+'upward' direction.  The two facings, forward and upward, are used
+to specify what area of space is examined by the Radar commands.
+The two facings, of course, will be 90 degrees apart.
+You have six commands to alter the orientation of your ship:
+Right Turn (RT), Left Turn (LT), UP, Down (DN), Rotate Right
+(RR), and Rotate Left (RL).
+
+	The ships have movement ability, through the Move (MV)
+command.  This causes the ship to take one step in the 'forward'
+direction.  There is no way to order the ship to 'keep moving,'
+you must issue a MV for each step.  The ship will not be permited
+to leave the cube; there is nowhere else to go.
+	Radar: There are two commands available to let you see
+what is outside of your ship.  These are Forward Radar and
+Mobile Radar.  Both of these show you a grid of nine squares,
+giving you the contents of nine cubes in space.  What is shown
+is either an asterisk, a dash, or a number.  An asterisk indicates
+that the cube section is outside the cube, and the dash indicates
+that the cube section is empty.  A one-digit number indicates that the
+cube section is occupied by a ship, and the number shows which
+ship.  By this you may recognize you, your friends, and your enemies.
+
+	The difference between the Forward and Mobile Radars is in
+which cube sections are shown.  The simple one is the Forward radar.
+It takes a parameter, entered like 'FR2', which gives the distance
+between your ship and the start of the display.  For example,
+a 'FR' command alone would produce something like
+
+			- - -
+			- 1 -
+			- - -
+
+which means that you (ship #1) have nothing around you.  With forward
+radar the nine locations shown will be in the same 'plane' as your ship.
+Consider your orientation, with a specific forward and upward direction.
+Forward radar shows you what is in front of you or just on each side of
+you, and never what is above or below you.  For reasonableness it will
+also not show you what is behind you.  This means that the bottom line shown
+is waste; you can make better use of the display by pushing the scan forward
+a few cubes, like 'FR1', which might show
+
+			- - 5
+			- - -
+			- 1 -
+
+which shows your ship one step backwards.  It also shows ship #5 two
+cubes ahead of you and one to the right. Recall the commands given
+above.  Perform a RT, an MV, and a LT. Where are you now?
+Another 'FR1' gives you
+			- 5 -
+			- - -
+			- 1 -
+so you are on the same plane, but one step to your right.
+	You have on the front of your ship a Blazer which will project
+directly in front of your ship until it hits something.  It will enter
+each cube in front of you until it finds a ship, or the edge of the cube.
+Since ship 5 is right in front of you, typing 'FB' will result in the 
+message 'BLAZER HIT ON PHANTOM' or something like it.  This means that you
+hit him.  It also tells you 'his' name, the name he typed what the game
+started up.  Now if you FB again, if he hasn't moved yet, you will get
+another similar message.  A ship can take two blazer hits.  The third
+time it gets hit, it is 'destroyed', and disappears, with the message
+'PLAYER PHANTOM KILLED BY NOVICE' sent to all the players.
+(The name NOVICE was what ever you said you were.)  Your victim got
+recreated someplace else in the cube.
+	Mobile Radar:  This is rather more complicated than Forward
+Radar.  This takes a three-digit number as parameter.  These numbers
+give the location of a cube in space, with the given displacement
+from your ship.  The first digit is the X-displacement, the second Y,
+the last Z.  Thus, 'MR300' refers to the third cube in front of you.
+What does it do with this cube?  It takes a cross-section of the
+cube around that cube section, at right angles to the line between you
+and that section.  That is, it shows what is above and below the given
+cube section.  Consider the previous example with FR.  Given the situation
+
+			- 5 -
+			- - -
+			- 1 -
+
+the command 'MR200' will give the display
+
+			- - -
+			- 5 -
+			- - -
+
+which means that ship 5 is at range 2 (since MR200 found him) and
+directly in front of you (which you knew).  Now do a DN (Down), Move,
+and UP.  Consider where you are now.  FR finds nothing, since the
+enemy is not on your plane, but on the one above you.  But 'MR200' gives
+
+			- 5 -
+			- - -
+			- - -
+
+which means that he is still 2 steps in front of you, but, as you see,
+one level above you.  
+
+	This permits you to examine much more space than FR permits.
+You can use FR to look for ships to shoot at immediately.  Mobile
+Radar will permit you to examine a whole 'tunnel' in front of you
+to find someone who can't see you on Forward Radar.  To give him
+a warning, whenever anybody is shown an a Mobile Radar scan be gets
+the message '***BEING SCANNED' which gives him a chance to move.
+	Scoring:  To give some way of comparing the performances of
+the many players, points are scored for each player.  Two points are
+scored for hitting somebody with a blazer, and ten for killing him.
+The 'Name' command, NM, gives a display of the performances of all
+the players. For instance,
+
+			RATING	HITS	BLZRS	DEATHS
+1) NOVICE		  16	 0	  13	   0
+2) LORD BALTIMORE	  48	 1	  19	   0
+3) AVENGER		   5	 2	   7	   1
+4) PIMPERNEL		- 41	 0	   9	   3
+5) PHANTOM		- 28	 0	   6	   2
+
+Observe the Rating column.  Every time you get two points,
+your opponent loses two points.  The hits column shows how many
+hits the ship has taken, towards the limit of three.  The BLZRS
+column shows how many Blazer fires the ship has left.  Each ship
+starts with 3 times as many blazers as there are players, and
+get 3 as a bonus whenever it kills another ship.  The Deaths column
+shows how many times the player took his three hits and had to be 
+recreated.
+	EtCetera: The Message command permits you to send messages
+to other players, or to all the players at once.  The formats are
+	MS phant:got you!
+or	MS *:everyone after number 5!
+
+where the player's name is given followed by a colon and the message.
+In some versions the first five letters of the name are required, 
+in others the first three.  To send the message to everyone
+the player name is given as an asterisk.
+
+	The Trace command (TR) may be issued when you see somone
+on the Mobile radar.  Thereafter, you can issue Print Trace (PT) and be
+told where in space that ship has gone to.  It is given in cube-relative
+locations, so you must know where you are to make use of the information.
+The Facing command (FA) gives a display like
+	+Z
+	+X => (4,6,1)
+which means that your ship is at X=4, Y=6, Z=1, and that +X is in
+front of you and +Z is above you.
+
+	Due to all sorts of reasons you may be disenchanted with the
+name you gave when you started the game.  To change it type
+	RNnewname
+and it will be announced to everyone to keep things straight.
+
+	The default Cube size is 6X6X6.  If there are 5 or more
+players it goes up to 8X8X8, which is the absolute limit.
+Should you wish to change the size, the player who started the game
+can say
+	CU 7
+for instance, to change the size to 7X7X7.
+
+	The game may be in progress when another player arrives.
+Rather than restarting the game, the person who is running it can issue
+	NP25newplayername
+to define TTY25, for instance, to be player 'newplayername'.
+If he doesn't like his name, after all, he can change it.
+	CubeWar is started by a RUN CUBWAR[A630DK32].
+Answer the question "How Many Players?" with the number 1 through 8,
+no CR required.  Provide the TTY numbers as two digits each, no more
+no less, no delimiters, no carriage return.  If it says you blew it,
+and asks again, retype all the TTY numbers.  CUBWAR is maintained
+and developed by Dave King, KING@CMUA or KING@CMUB.
+ z't