Below  is  some of the origional text for the  Eamon  (Ee-Ah-Man) 
dungeon designer by Donald Brown.


A manual for Eamon adventure designers by Donald Brown


     Eamon  is  the computerized role-playing game  developed  by 
Donald  Brown.   This manual has been written for those  stalwart 
people  who  are tired of having their characters killed  in  the 
many  adventures  written  for the system,  and want  revenge  by 
creating  their  own death traps.   It is assumed  that  you  are 
already  familiar  with  the gaming system  and  the  information 
included in the player's manual.

     Most of the adventures that are written for the Eamon system 
have been similar to the "adventure" game that was created by Don 
Woods  and  Willie Crowther of MIT,  such as the begginer's  cave 
included on th master diskette.   This manual will bothe help you 
design  your  own scenarios in that type of game  but  will  also 
permit  you  to meld any other type of game with the system  that 
you wish.


     Hooking Up With Eamon

      or

     Sending Adventurers to Their Death for Fun and Profit


     Under  the  Eamon  rules,   a  relatively  few  numbers  can 
completely describe a character.   Between adventures, all of the 
characters that the local system knows are stored in a file  that 
is called "characters".  It is a random access file with a length 
of  255.   Record 1 holds the number of records used in the file, 
and  all subsequent records may hold a character.   If the  first 
string  in  th  record is null ("") then the  character  in  that 
record  has been deleted and the record may be reused to store  a 
new character.

     The data held in each record is first a string that has  the 
name.  the  next  numbers  stored  are  (in  this  order)  player 
hardiness,  agility,  charisma,  the four spell abilities (blast, 
heal,  speed,  and power).  The five weapon abilities (axe,  bow, 
club,  spear, and sword).  The players armour expertise, sex ("M" 
or  "F"),  gold peices carried,  gold in the bank,  armour  class 
(lether =2,  chain=4 plate=6, with one added for a shield).  Fore 
each  of  a  player's four weapons the name of  the  weapon,  the 
weapon  type,  the weapon complexity,  the weapon dice,  and  the 
weapon's sides per die.   If a player does not have four weapons, 
his  weapons will be first,  and all other weapon names  will  be 
"NONE".   Except  for name,  sex,  and weapon names,  all of  the 
information is stored as an integer number,  with all probability 
numbers stored as percentages (perfect=100).
Š     When  a  player leaves the main hall to go on an  adventure, 
first his character is deleted from the characters file, and then 
the  player is prompted to change diskettes.   The  program  then 
tries  to  read  a program name from the file  EAMON.NAM  on  the 
adventure  disk  and  the  data that was in  the  record  of  the 
characters file is written into a file,  preceeded by  the record 
number  that the character previously resided in.   Finally,  the 
program ginven in the EAMON.NAM file is run.

     Once th adventure is over,  control must be returned to  the 
main  Eamon programs.   If the adventure ended in the character's 
death,   all  that  must  be  done  is  deleting  a  file  called 
"adventurer" from the master diskette.

     If  the character survives your adventure,  you will have to 
recreate him into the characters file.   Normally this is  simply 
writting  in  the new information of the character into  the  old 
record  given  in FRESHMEAT.   However,  if your program has  the 
ability to wuit for a while and come back laater,  it is possible 
for a new character to be sotred in the old record.  In this case 
you should search the characters file for a free record to  store 
the character, and write it there.

     Once you have stored the character into the characters file, 
you  must  recreate  a file called the adventurer which  has  two 
pieces of data in it== the name of the character,  and the record 
he  resides in of the characters file.   Once this is  done,  run 
main hall to finish.



Use of the Dungeon Design Diskette

     The  dungeon design diskette is designed to make the job  of 
entering new adventure-like scenarios much easier.  It includes a 
base to work from for your program,  as well as a simple means of 
entering  the  data  into  the text files  needed  by  that  base 
program.

     The firs step in creating your adventure is initalizing  the 
diskette.   Use  the  FORMAT program to format a blank  diskette. 
Once this is done, the DDD (dungeon design diskette) menu program 
will  allow  you  to  set up your  files  and  prepare  them  for 
editting.











Š     A few general remarks are in order.

1.  YOU  SHOULD ALWAYS HAVE YOUR DUNGEON DESIGNED BEFORE ENTERING 
    IT!!!

2.  You cannot delete an item from your data lists (although  you 
can change it or make it invisible to the dungeon).

3.   You must be careful with cases of letters.  The base dungeon 
program  will  turn  all lowercase  letters  to  uppercase.   Use 
uppercase when giving names of artifacts and monsters!

4.    Do not add blank spaces after the last character in a name!  
Basic treates "LION" different from "LION ".


     For every room,  you will need to give eight pieces of data.  
First  is the room name,  which cannot exceed 32 characters.   In 
the program it will be printed as "You are (room name)",  so  you 
should use names like, "at the cave entrance".  Secondly you will 
need  to  give  a  room description.   It  is  not  preceeded  by 
anything, so it must be a full and complete description.  If your 
description  is  longer than 80 character,  you must pad it  with 
spaces  so that when the description wraps around the  80  column 
screen,  the breaks are between words.  Finally, you will have to 
give  the room numbers that you can get to from that room in each 
direction.   A  special code hase been developed-- If you give  a 
room  of  0,  you  cannot move in that  direction.   I  you  give 
positive  direction,  there  is  an  open  connection.   Negative 
numbers  mean  a special move-- a -999  takes  you  home.   Other 
negative  numbers  can have special meaning be changing the  base 
program.



     Artifacts  are  somewhat similar.   An artifact is any  non-
living  thing that is in the dungeon.   In addition to  what  you 
might  normally  think  of as the artifacts you want  to  include 
(gold,  silver,  statues),  you must also have as an artifact all 
weapons used by your monsters,  as well as a dead body for  every 
monster  (the artifact such as DEAD RAT is automaticly added  for 
each monster, you must give a discription of the dead monster).

     For  each  artifact,  you will again need a name (this  time 
just  the  normal  name,   such  as  "GOLD  COINS")  and  a  full 
description.   You will also need to give the item's room that it 
starts in,   its value in gold pieces,  its type and its  weight.  
The room is usually a positive number,  however if the item isn't 
in the dungeon yet (such as a dead body) you should assign a room 
of  zero,  and if the item starts by being carried by the player, 
its room is -1.




Š     There  are four types of artifacts.   Type 0 is  a  treasure 
with  a  value that will not change with the  player's  charisma, 
such  as gold coins.   Type 1 is a treasure whose value will vary 
with the player's charisma,  such as a persian rug.   Types 2 & 3 
are weapons,  with 2 being a weapon that can be bouth at the main 
hall, and 3 being a special weapon.

     If  your artifact is a weapon (type 2 or  3),  you  willalso 
have to enter the weapons complexity, type (1=axe, 2=bow, 3=club, 
4=spear, 5=sword), then the weapon's damage with the first number 
of 'dice' thrown and how many sides each dice has.

     The  other  major type of data to be put in  your  files  is 
monsters,  which  are  any  living  (or animate)  things  in  the 
dungeon.   Monsters  are similar to characters,  howver they  are 
assumed to have their full armour expertise and know all  weapons 
equally  well.    For  each  monster  you  will  need  the  name, 
description,  hardiness,  agility,  friendlyness (the % chance of 
making friends with a charisma of 10),  courage (will flee from a 
fight  after he has received that percentage of his hardiness  in 
hits,  on the average), room starts in (may be zero if in a chest 
or  other  special thing activates  him),  body  weight,  special 
defence odds (normally 0),  armour (hits absorbed per blow.  This 
may  be things such as a furry skin or magical effects),  an  the 
weapon  number  (a pointer to some aritfact of type 2 or  3.   If 
weapon is 0, it is assumed natural weapons.  If the weapon number 
is -1,  then the monster isn't carrying a weapon).  You will then 
have  to  give for that weapon the monster's  complete  chane  to 
strike a blow with it,  and its sides and dice of damage.   These 
numbers  do  not have to be consistant with the numbers given  in 
the  artifact  list;  a monster may know how to  use  his  weapon 
better than someone whow doesn't know some secret).

     There  is  a  fourth  thing that can be  entered  called  an 
"effect".   It is there for your own special ue-- it permits  you 
to store some string on disk so that it can be called in quickly.  
For examples of this, check out the beggingers cave.



     Once you have put all of your data into your files, you will 
probably want to see what you entered,  to catch errors and get a 
good overview.   There is a program included on the DDD that will 
list   all  of  your  data  in  a  simple,   organized   fashion.  
Unfortunately,  this program will not list out the begginers cave 
information   on  the  main  hall  master  disk  as  this  is   a 
"basterdised" data file created with a large basic file with data 
statements.   It  will list all of your rooms (starting with room 
zero) and the artifacts and monsters in order.  A similar program 
will print this information to the printer.





ŠAdapting the Base Dungeon Program


   All  of  the work above was to put your dungeon ito  a  format 
that  the  computer can use.   It couples with a  program  called 
'Dungeon'.   If your have no sliding dores,  things hidden inside 
of other things,  special moves (except the exit),  you should be 
able to  run your adventure as is.  Rename the dungeon program to 
the name you entered in EAMON.NAM.  

     However,  if  you want special effects such as a sword  that 
teleports  the user to another room at random times (gee,  I  may 
use  that)  check  out the program documention  (on  the  dungeon 
designer disk).



     Once  you have "played-out" other  people's  adventures,  it 
would definitely be a good idea to tear it apart to see how other 
people  have adapted this program to their own use.   Also,  if I 
might give a few suggestions to new Eamon designers--


     1.  Be fair to the adventurer.   Don't try to stack the odds 
totally against him.   A good rule of thumb is that an adventurer 
can  lick about five times his own hardiness in  opponents,  with 
allies subtracting their hardiness from the opposition.   If  you 
continually  design  pure  death  traps  (and  don't  reward  the 
successful  outrageously),  people  aren't goin to want  to  send 
their  carefully-built up characters through your  dungeons.   On 
the  other hand,  if your dungeons are just big give-aways,  they 
will quickly become boring.

     2.  You  can place one or two traps of the  zap-you're  dead 
type (such as book in the beginners cave) so long as they are not 
overdone and are not required to survive them to get out.   Thus, 
if  your  only way out of the tunnels is drinking a  potion  that 
half of the time teleports you away,  the other half poisons you, 
it isn't fair.

     3.   Particularly  to  those who have designed dungeons  for 
non-computerized role-playing games;  Remember that there is only 
one  adventurer going in,  not an army!   No matter how  great  a 
character is, he cannot by himself handle a dozen thugs.

     4.    Last  but not least,  don't be afraid to break any  of 
these  rules.   If  you truly believe that your dungeon  will  be 
better,  do  anything you please.   The worst that will happen is 
that people will  not play in it and you'll have to change a  few 
things.


THE END (of modified origional text)


ŠNotes From the Programmer


     Eamon  was  origionally put onto the Apple (Apple  Computers 
Inc.) computer by Doanld Brown who then openned this system up to 
the  public domain.   You are welcome to give the disks  away  to 
anyone  you wish (except to Woody Allan) and to enjoy its various 
adventures.   If you have any questions,  I will be glad to  help 
during  my store hours (10am-5pm central) and would like everyone 
to respect these times.   My number is 715-387-1813,  and I  will 
eventually  set  up a BBS for helping,  and distributing  various 
programs & adventures.


The Dungeon Designer

     Given the limitations of time and field testing,  I  release 
my  Dungeon  Design  Diskette "As Is" since I find I can  use  it 
without running into errors ("yet") and need a break.   This will 
be  version  1.0 and do not look for a version  2.0  for  several 
months  so  that I can get some reasonalbe user  input.   I  have 
tried to make it as menu driven as reasonably possible.

     The  reason I did not use the origional dungeon designer was 
that I did not like it!   I also did it on a dare.   So far, I've 
had no complaints, but I'm sure that won't last long!


The Utilities disk

     This  has been a real problem to make and I am releasing  it 
late (Feb. 85).  I hope this will not cause any problems.




Jon Walker
Video Shop
139 S. Central Ave.
Marshfield, WI  54449



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