FluffMUCK Frequently Asked Questions by Inkypaws the Ferret Q. How did Fluff come about in the furst place? A. In April, 1995, Zorin was a raw newbie to Furry and MUCKs, although not to computers or the net. Discovering FurryMUCK and Furtoonia was like stumbling upon entire new worlds with limitless potential for creativity, new friends, fun, and... spam. Predictably, he jumped in with all four feet and a tail. Once he learned how to build, and then to code mpi, chaos followed. While his boundless enthusiasm, energy and friendliness made him popular with a certain crowd of furs, his passion for weird toys and objects, most of which exploded and/or generated endless spam, caused some seasoned furry heads to shake. When his magic teleporting crystal was disabled by the administration on FurryMUCK on the grounds that it may permit unauthorized teleporting to unwary furs' homes, Zorin felt restricted, constrained, and unappreciated. Awwwwwwww... ;) Fiddling around with his free account on a Linux box one day, he wondered how hard it would be to get the then-current release of Fuzzball TinyMUCK (5.43) to compile on it. He installed the codebase and tried. When the server came up, he thought, "This is the coolest thing that has ever happened to me." };) His original intent was to run the server as a restriction-free environment in which to test the muf and mpi code he was learning. He would code programs and objects there, and then port them to FurryMUCK. However, padding around an empty MUCK with unlimited ability to wreak havoc was a feeling too fun not to share. On a whim, he directed a port and shouted the telnet address on FurryMUCK. Furs began popping onto the little muck, at furst just for a party, and then they began to build things. The terrain expanded rapidly. There were no restrictions and no rules except to have fun. Zorin suddenly needed a name for this place; since he was fluffy, he called it the Land of Fluff. Although he had started the server without the slightest intent of actually creating a real muck, Fluff's overnight popularity made him cast about for a way to keep it. Incredibly, due both to good luck and to the generosity of furs who came out of the woodwork in Fluff's times of need, the new muck has remained online since those furst days and is now approaching 2 1/2 years of continuous service. Q. How'd Inkypaws get to be a Founder? A. Well, let's ask. Inkypaws? Inkypaws: "When I came onto FurryMUCK one night in late July 1995, I got a page from Zorin telling me to telnet to this weird address. I had no idea what he was talking about, but I went over there. He greeted me with, 'Hello, Inky, welcome to Fluff. You're a Wiz.' I said, 'I'm--????' After I realized he intended to keep the muck going, several things became clear. I advised him to put a check on the rampant, chaotic construction that was spreading out of control; to draw up some basic policies for the muck; and to carefully select a staff to help based on how well he knew them, and his ability to trust in their friendship and loyalty. I like to think he asked me to be co-administrator with him because he realized that our personalities were a good balance with each other: he had the enthusiasm, funloving nature, and technical knowhow; I was more cautious and tuned in to the basic fundamentals that needed to be planned out in order for the muck to succeed. Thank you, Zorin, for your trust." Okay, and Zorin? What were your thoughts on Inkypaws joining the Fluff wizstaff? Zorin: "I thought, Ooooooh, ky00000000000t fewwet!!!!" Q. Who is Rieshal and how'd he get to be a wiz? A. Let's ask Rieshal...Riesh? Rieshal: "Huh? What? I didn't do it! Um... I dunno. I just work here." Q. How come Fluff only has like 6 wizzes on it when most of the other mucks have much more? A. Fluff as a real muck was the dream of a small nucleus of RL friends. Zorin decided that loyalty, trust and friendship among the staff were more essential to the muck's continued success than an army of coders or politicking administrators. Keeping the number of wizzes down lessens the potential for conflict among them. Zorin and Inkypaws have their own strong opinions about the way Fluff should be run; it has never been intended to be a democracy. To assist players, Inkypaws created the Mediators, who handle disciplinary situations that arise. Q. Hey, I emailed for a character weeks ago and Zorin's ignoring me. A. Your mail was lost. Character requests are handled within 24 to 48 hours; you should receive a reply email at the address from which you sent yours. If you do not, resend the mail. If the problem persists, log on to Fluff as a guest and send a page #mail to Zorin and Inkypaws explaining the situation. Q. Why does Zorin sometimes not respond when I page him with questions or even just to say hello? A. Between the hours of 9 and 6 each weekday, Zorin is logged in from work. He is often not free at these times to respond to pages; and in fact is away from the keyboard for long periods. He responds to as many contacts as he can. During other hours, Zorin may be Offduty. If he is on-duty, and you feel he has not responded sufficiently to a question you have, please page another wizard. In particular, if Inkypaws is on, she can often get your question dealt with promptly. ;) Q. Can the wizzes create a character for me online? A. No. Characters are created only through email registration. The email must not be from a free email account. The reason for this is that such accounts may be created without limitation on number, and therefore a single individual may have several from which to request characters and get around the four character per person limit. While the administration does not need to know your identity, we do need some means of tracking the number of characters associated with a particular email. (See, info character, info lost password.) Q. How do I get a home on Fluff? A. Start by reading the FluffHomesGuide which is located in Fluff Park and in the Crossroads Hostelry (park, n, n, sw). Read the bulletin boards, as furs often post announcements of residence areas they have created. Ask your friends where they live, and see if they can arrange a link from their area to your home as well. Q. I want to @toad my character from Fluff, RIGHT NOW. Is there any way I can @toad without having to come back and ask again? A. No. (See, info toading) If you do not return to reconfirm your @toad request, your character and its possessions will idle out after 12 to 14 weeks of inactivity. They will be recycled. Q. Why is there so much Sonic stuff around here? Is Fluff a Sonic muck? A. No. Fluff is a loosely themed furry muck. Furry encompasses a wide variety of animorph-related characters, including those in the Sonic games, shows, and fanfic. Sonic roleplay; in fact, all roleplay that is related to a particular theme such as a show, book series, comic series, movie, or TinyPlot, is restricted from public areas such as the Park. Therefore, if you don't want to see Sonic gameplay, simply avoid Sonic areas. Q. I'd like to join a TinyPlot or maybe start one up. How do I find other characters to join? A. Post on the bulletin board in Fluff Park and also on the Board in the Tiny Plot Garden (park, d, mp, tpg). Read posts in those areas left by other furs. Look over the destinations in the Convergence of Worlds (park, down, mp), the Transporter Room (tr) and the Hovercabs (taxi). Many of them lead to TinyPlot and Roleplaying worlds for you to explore and join. Q. How do I make a weapon? A. Weapons are not needed on Fluff except as part of battle roleplay or TinyPlots. Their use is prohibited in public areas of the muck. (Except for joking around. };) ) Ask the person in charge of your TinyPlot about what weapons are used and how to program them. Q. How do I make a vehicle? A. There are several different kinds of vehicles, and each uses a different kind of programming. Spaceships are restricted to space areas; they can scan their surroundings, and may be equipped with weaponry for battles. Ground vehicles travel in areas which are approved for them (not the Park). You may make a simple vehicle without using muf at all by creating an ordinary zombie and having it carry you around. Q. How do I make a zombie? A. See info zombies and info zomcont. Q. Fluff is in color now? How does that work? A. Fluff now supports ANSI color. You must have a MUCKing client that also supports ANSI (check the client's documentation and/or its settings for ANSI color options). If your client supports it, turn color on on Fluff by typing ansi on. You can get further help on how to see and create custom colors with ansi #help. Remember, many people do not have clients that support color, and many others prefer not to see color and keep the feature turned off. Therefore, be cautious about building areas or descs that are confusing to people who don't see color. Q. Can I use Pueblo on Fluff? A. Pueblo is a freeware MU*ing client that allows html links, sounds, and images to be transmitted as well as plain text. Players are permitted to use Pueblo codes only if they ensure that non-Pueblo players will not see these codes. See helpstaff for assistance in writing a simple program that will check for a pueblo?:yes prop on characters before displaying the codes. Q. What public programs are available on Fluff? A. Type plib online for a listing. Q. How do I figure out how to use these? A. The best way is to look at the program itself to see if it contains instructions. Try @list #dbref=1-10. This will show you the first ten lines of the program. If you see helpful comments, you can view additional lines by @list #dbref=11-whatever number. The wizards do not have particular knowledge about mufs ported to Fluff. Programs are written by various people and installed on Fluff for everyone to use. If a wizard or helpstaff member has experience with a particular muf, they may assist you in setting it up and using it. Q. How can I learn muf myself? A. Begin by viewing the online MUF documentation (info mucker, info muf-tutorial, and info muf-cheat). Confused? Probably. There are a few web sources; you can do a search if you want to find them. The best way is to find a friend who's an accomplished muf coder, and get them to help you learn. Q. What about mpi? Is it easier than muf? A. MPI requires no special permissions to be set on your character (no M bit setting) because MPI code does not interact with the muck at the server level. It is however a powerful language that can be used to move objects and create special effects.