Information on the LORD IGMs and Utility programs I'm working on:

=================== Project #1 notes: Pawn Shop revamp
I'm working on rebuilding The Pawn Shop LORD IGM for Chris MacPherson, and
need to ask if any of the guys here -- who know how the IGM works
-- can provide assistance with the update process.  Charlie Wardick
has handled the initial hurdle of rebuilding the IGM, by removing  the
RTE200 accursed DLL files for IGMDrive, and replacing IGMDrive-related code
with functions/procedures he's written personally, and it is being remade
using the A.N.G.E.L Toolkit.  

I'm not at the point where the actual IGM is running again, but  hopefully
will be there soon.  So what I need to know, is (a) does anyone know of
problems with Pawn Shop 1.0 that need fixing?  And (b) who would be willing
to do personal, and BBS, testing of the IGM as I work on it.  The IGM still
belongs to Chris, who retains full ownership.    The IGM's setup program
did not use IGMDrive
material so remains fully usable, but I'm having to tweak the actual IGM
into running reliably.    My first attempt on pawnshop.exe led
to a Windows-forced DOS session shut-down.  Still some things to learn in
this programming business, but I have a very good teacher in Charlie, when
things go cuckoo.

I also have to figure out if the IGM's maintenance program component  is
stable with LORD 4.07 beta.  I have periodic player.dat corruption 
messages, but am not sure if they are coming from Pawn Shop's maintenance 
program or from the work being done on LPEdit and my LORD IGM, The Gem
Trader.  So Pawn Shop is not available in v2.01 beta for testing at  this
time, but will be sometime soon.

================== Project #2 Notes: Gem Trader IGM.
What is Gem Trader?  I took Gem Trader v1.13 and Gem Fairy Trade v1.00 LADY
Scripts, and converted them into an ANGEL Toolkit based IGM.  Had to invert
everything since LADY scripts work top-downward.  But IGMs have to work
bottom-upward.

I've recently enabled the beta IGM to allow repeat purchases as long as
user has Gems to buy things with.  And all of the potion trade code
sections are fully re-tested in IGM format.  Still working on the
Horse/Fairy trade Special Deals material to be sure it works right.  Will
later on add support for purchase of Children, but will not allow sale to
anyone beyond probably 200 Kids total.  I just don't see why LORD has a
32,000 limit for Kids.  Even 200 kids seems too much, but seems to be a
workable idea to code from. It is in fine-tuning phase, and may be released
publicly by Christmas.


======================== Project #3 Notes: Outhouse update.
My work on recompiling and updating Robert Fogt's Outhouse IGM is on
stand-by, while I concentrate on GemTrade.exe, Pawnshop.exe, and the Lord
Player Editor utility, LPEdit.   I have a working and
fully tested LADY script version of Outhouse, that those using LORD
v4.05pb+ can use.  The original IGM was based on code created by Joseph
Masters, some of which is lost.  I revamped the initial, current 2.00 beta,
using DDPlus code from The Gateway and LORD Cavern IGMs.  But have not
gotten into testing the compiled program to see how it actually does.     

====================== Project #4 Notes: LPEdit 1.00.36 beta
My main priority, programming-wise, since mid-October, has been finishing
up the Chasware LORD Player Editor utility.  LPEdit for short.  Everything
that Lordcfg does in player editor mode, is fully enabled and working in
Lpedit already.  I was not able to duplicate the Bank Transfer material,
since that info was not released to the public by either Seth Robinson or
Michael Preslar.

Just for the challenge, Lpedit will eventually have a Bank Funds Transfer
option.  User will select player number to send money to, from the
currently displayed player's record.  Then they will specify the amount to
be transferred.  Whether or not an BBS sysop would need such an option is
debate-able.  But individuals playing LORD with multiple characters will
find it handy for transferring money between characters easily.

There are two Clean Slate events in LPEDIT.  One is fully coded, tested,
and working.  It resets the selected player, after the user/sysop verifies
that they really want to proceed, to Level 1 first-time player settings. 
This is a punishment to be used for those who violate a BBS's rules on
cheating in LORD, or being a bully.  Up to the individual user/sysop to
decide whether to use Setting #1 or Setting #2.  Setting #2 will drop the
punished player down to Level 1.  They will retain skill points, and other
material that they normally keep after killing the dragon.  That part is
not coded yet.

Marriage handling.  Including player-only settings, current player-Violet,
current player-Seth Able settings, Lpedit is very complicated to achieve
the desired goals of fully covering LORD divorces and marriages.  There are
24 different scenarios identified so far, 25 counting a normal divorce
between two players.  28 if one includes fixes for glitch situations which
I found can and do occur in all versions of Lord.  Glitch #1:  Player can
end up married to both Seth and Violet at same time, usually due to IGM
screwup when handling marrage.dat and marbard.dat files. Lord itself does
not allow you to marry one NPC, change sex, then attempt to marry the other
NPC.  But if you do so manually Lord does nothing about that situation.

Glitch #2 and #3:  Player can be married to another player and to an NPC at
same time.  Lord does not handle this situation very well either. 
Conjugality List shows both marriages as valid.  View Stats only shows one
spouse, and Lord doesn't apparently notice that there is a problem.  
Glitch #2 is for Violet-player interaction, and #3 covers the player-Seth
Able interaction.  All three glitches are handled by LPEDIT in a reliable
fashion at this time.

There are at this time, in LPEDIT 1.00.36 beta, 20 actual  marriage/divorce
scenarios that are fully operational. The ones that don't work yet, are as
follows:  
-- Single - Married_ToViolet  - Current player is Single,
       and wishes to marry guy who is married to Violet.
-- Single - Married_ToSeth.  Same story, but for the Bard.
-- Single - Violet_IsMarried - Player is single and wants
      to marry Violet.  Who's already hitched.  Sysop/user
      can break up the existing marriage, and marry new
     player to Violet.  Up to the user to use option or not.
-- Single - Seth_IsMarried.  Same story, for the Bard.

All I can say about breaking up existing marriages of players in a BBS game
to Violet and Seth Able, is that the sysop should have a very good reason
to do so.  Lpedit didn't want to work right in some situations without
trying to code for all possible scenarios, so I chose to provide the user
with full control over the Violet/Seth marriages.  Which they already had,
via manual file editing, of marrage.dat and marbard.dat.  Lpedit just makes
the process easier and automatically handles notifying all players of
marriage changes, and the specific players involved via mail messages.  

Once I have those 4 settings fully coded and tested, and have the
post-Dragon Kill settings Clean Slate material working, Lpedit will be
released to the public. Anyone who wishes to use betas may contact me at
ktidmore{at}bellsouth.net, and join the Lpedit Beta Team.

There is no way for a Lord utility to be written so that it only saves
player record data when Lord is registered. That is because the info.x data
files are only available while Lord is running, and an IGM is being
launched.

Lpedit is not designed for usage at same time LORD is in operation, but has
lock/unlock coding for all access of mail*.dat, lognow.txt, marrage.dat,
marbard.dat, and player.dat files.  So it should possibly work on a BBS, if
the sysop wanted to fix problems with their LORD game, while it was
running.  But I will only provide support for Lpedit being used when Lord
is not running, as I have no way to do personal testing under BBS settings.
============================

Concluded in next message. Donald.


--- BBBS/LiI v4.01 Flag-4