10 A Guide to the Dungeons of Doom
13 Computer Systems Research Group
14 Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science
15 University of California
16 Berkeley, California 94720
22 Rogue is a visual CRT based fantasy game
23 which runs under the UNIX timesharing system.
24 This paper describes how to play rogue and gives a
25 few hints for those who might otherwise get lost
26 in the Dungeons of Doom.
76 A Guide to the Dungeons of Doom
79 Computer Systems Research Group
80 Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science
81 University of California
82 Berkeley, California 94720
87 You have just finished your years as a student at the
88 local fighter's guild. After much practice and sweat you
89 have finally completed your training and are ready to embark
90 upon a perilous adventure. As a test of your skills, the
91 local guildmasters have sent you into the Dungeons of Doom.
92 Your task is to return with the Amulet of Yendor. Your
93 reward for the completion of this task will be a full mem-
94 bership in the local guild. In addition, you are allowed to
95 keep all the loot you bring back from the dungeons.
97 In preparation for your journey, you are given an
98 enchanted sword, taken from a dragon's hoard in the far off
99 Dark Mountains. You are also outfitted with elf-crafted
100 armor and given enough food to reach the dungeons. You say
101 goodbye to family and friends for what may be the last time
102 and head up the road.
104 You set out on your way to the dungeons and after sev-
105 eral days of uneventful travel, you see the ancient ruins
106 that mark the entrance to the Dungeons of Doom. It is late
107 at night so you make camp at the entrance and spend the
108 night sleeping under the open skies. In the morning you
109 gather your sword, put on your armor, eat what is almost
110 your last food and enter the dungeons.
112 2. What is going on here?
114 You have just begun a game of rogue. Your goal is to
115 grab as much treasure as you can, find the Amulet of Yendor,
116 and get out of the Dungeons of Doom alive. On the screen, a
117 map of where you have been and what you have seen on the
118 current dungeon level is kept. As you explore more of the
119 level, it appears on the screen in front of you.
121 Rogue differs from most computer fantasy games in that
122 it is screen oriented. Commands are all one or two
123 keystrokes and the results of your commands are displayed
124 graphically on the screen rather than being explained in
126 As opposed to pseudo English sentences.
136 A Guide to the Dungeons of Doom
141 Another major difference between rogue and other com-
142 puter fantasy games is that once you have solved all the
143 puzzles in a standard fantasy game, it has lost most of its
144 excitement and it ceases to be fun. Rogue on the other hand
145 generates a new dungeon every time you play it and even the
146 author finds it an entertaining and exciting game.
148 3. What do all those things on the screen mean?
150 In order to understand what is going on in rogue you
151 have to first get some grasp of what rogue is doing with the
152 screen. The rogue screen is intended to replace the "You
153 can see ..." descriptions of standard fantasy games. Here
154 is a sample of what a rogue screen might look like.
155 ---------------------
156 |...................+
157 |...@...........[...|
158 |........B..........|
159 |...................|
160 --------+------------
163 Level: 1 Gold: 0 Hp: 12(12) Str: 16 Ac: 6 Exp: 1/0
167 At the bottom line of the screen is a few pieces of
168 cryptic information, describing your current status. Here
169 is an explanation of what these things mean:
171 Level This number indicates how deep you have gone in the
172 dungeon. It starts at one and goes up forever.
174 Gold The number of gold pieces you have managed to find
175 and keep with you so far.
177 Hp Your current and maximum hit points. Hit points
178 indicate how much damage you can take before you
179 die. The more you get hit in a fight, the lower
180 they get. You can regain hit points by resting. The
181 number in parentheses is the maximum number your hit
184 Str Your current strength. This can be any integer less
185 than or equal to eighteen. The higher the number,
186 the stronger you are.
188 Ac Your current armor class. This number indicates how
189 effective your armor is in stopping blows from
190 unfriendly creatures. The lower this number is, the
192 Or until you get killed or decide to quit.
202 A Guide to the Dungeons of Doom
205 more effective the armor.
207 Exp These two numbers give your current experience level
208 and experience points. As you do things, you gain
209 experience points. At certain experience point
210 totals, you gain an experience level. The more
211 experienced you are, the better you are able to
212 fight and to withstand magical attacks.
216 The top line of the screen is reserved for printing
217 messages that describe things that are impossible to repre-
218 sent visually. If you see a "--More--" on the top line,
219 this means that rogue wants to print another message on the
220 screen, but it wants to make certain that you have read the
221 one that is there first. To read the next message, just
224 3.3. The rest of the screen
226 The rest of the screen is the map of the level as you
227 have explored it so far. Each symbol on the screen repre-
228 sents something. Here is a list of what the various symbols
231 @ This symbol represents you, the adventurer.
233 -| These symbols represent the walls of rooms.
235 + A door to/from a room.
237 . The floor of a room.
239 # The floor of a passage between rooms.
241 * A pile or pot of gold.
243 ) A weapon of some sort.
247 ! A flask containing a magic potion.
249 ? A piece of paper, usually a magic scroll.
251 ^ A trap, watch out for these.
253 % The passage leading down to the next level.
257 A-Z The uppercase letters represent the various inhabi-
258 tants of the Dungeons of Doom. Watch out, they can be
268 A Guide to the Dungeons of Doom
275 Commands are given to rogue by pressing single letters.
276 Most commands can be preceded by a count to repeat them
277 (e.g. typing "10s" will do ten searches) The list of com-
278 mands is rather long, but it can be read at any time during
279 the game with the ? command. Here it is for reference, with
280 a short explanation of each command.
282 ? The help command. Asks for a character to give help
283 on. If you type a "*", it will list all the commands,
284 otherwise it will explain what the character you typed
287 / This is the "What is that on the screen?" command. A
288 "/" followed by any character that you see on the
289 level, will tell you what that character is. For
290 instance, typing "/@" will tell you that the @ symbol
291 represents you, the player.
293 h , H Move left. You move one space to the left. If you
294 use upper case h, you will continue to move left until
295 you run into something. This works for all movement
296 commands (e.g. "L" means run in direction "l")
304 y Move diagonally up and left.
306 u Move diagonally up and right.
308 b Move diagonally down and left.
310 n Move diagonally down and right.
312 f Find prefix. When followed by a direction it means to
313 continue moving in the specified direction until you
314 pass something interesting or run into a wall.
316 t Throw an object. This is a prefix command. Follow it
317 with a direction and you throw an object in the speci-
318 fied direction. (e.g. type "th" to throw something
321 > If you are standing over the passage down to the next
322 level, this command means to climb down.
334 A Guide to the Dungeons of Doom
337 s Search for traps and secret doors. Examine each space
338 immediately adjacent to you for the existence of a
339 trap or secret door. There is a large chance that
340 even if there is something there, you won't find it so
341 you might have to search a while before you find some-
344 (space) Rest. This is the "do nothing" command. This
345 is good for waiting and healing.
347 i Inventory. List what you are carrying in your pack.
349 I Selective inventory. Tells you what a single item in
352 q Quaff. Drink one of the potions you are carrying.
354 r Read. Read one of the scrolls in your pack.
356 e Eat food. Take some food out of your pack and eat it.
358 w Wield a weapon. Take a weapon out of your pack and
359 carry it. You must be wielding weapon to use it
360 (except to throw things). To fire an arrow, you must
361 wield the bow. You can only wield one weapon at a
364 W Wear armor. Take a piece of armor out of your pack
365 and put it on. You can only wear one suit of armor at
368 T Take armor off. You can't remove armor that is
369 cursed. This takes extra time.
371 d Drop an object. Take something out of your pack and
372 leave it lying on the floor. Only one object can
375 o Examine and set options. This command is further
376 explained in the section on options.
378 ^L REdraws the screen. Useful if spurious messages or
379 transmission errors have messed up the display.
381 v Prints the program version number.
383 Q Quit. Leave the game.
385 R Repeat last message. Useful when a message disappears
386 before you can read it.
388 S Save the current game in a file. Caveat: Rogue won't
389 let you start up a copy of a saved game, and it
390 removes the save file as soon as you start up a
400 A Guide to the Dungeons of Doom
403 restored game. This is to prevent people from saving
404 a game just before a dangerous position and then
405 restarting it if they die. To restore a saved game,
406 give the file name as an argument to rogue. As in
409 5. Dealing with objects
411 When you find something in the dungeon, it is common to
412 want to pick the object up. This is accomplished in rogue
413 by walking over the object. If you are carrying too many
414 things, the program will tell you and it won't pick up the
415 object, otherwise it will add it to your pack and if the
416 notify option is set, tell you what you just picked up.
418 Many of the commands that operate on objects must
419 prompt you to find out which object you want to use. If you
420 change your mind and don't want to do that command after
421 all, just press an escape and the command will be aborted.
425 Rooms in the dungeons are either lit or dark. If you
426 walk into a lit room, the entire room will be drawn on the
427 screen as soon as you enter. If you walk into a dark room,
428 it will only be displayed as you explore it. Upon leaving a
429 dark room, all objects inside the room which might move are
430 removed from the screen. In the darkness you can only see
431 one space in all directions around you.
435 If you see a monster and you wish to fight it, just
436 attempt to run into it. Many times a monster you find will
437 mind its own business unless you attack it. It is often the
438 case that discretion is the better part of valor.
442 There are various sorts of armor lying around in the
443 dungeon. Some of it is enchanted, some is cursed and some
444 is just normal. Different armor types have different armor
445 classes. The lower the armor class, the more protection the
446 armor affords against the blows of monsters. If a piece of
447 armor is enchanted or cursed, its armor class will be higher
448 or lower than normal. Here is a list of the various armor
449 types and their normal armor class.
466 A Guide to the Dungeons of Doom
469 +------------------------------------+
471 +----------------------------+-------+
473 |Studded leather / Ring mail | 7 |
476 |Banded mail / Splint mail | 4 |
478 +----------------------------+-------+
482 Due to variations in personal tastes and conceptions of
483 the way rogue should do things, there are a set of options
484 you can set that cause rogue to behave in various different
487 9.1. Setting the options
489 There are basically two ways to set the options. The
490 first is with the "o" command of rogue, the second is with
491 the ROGUEOPTS environment variable. On Version 6 systems,
492 there is no equivalent of the ROGUEOPTS feature.
494 9.1.1. Using the "o" command
496 When you press "o" in rogue, it clears the screen and
497 displays the current settings for all the options. It then
498 places the cursor by the value of the first option and waits
499 for you to type. You can type a RETURN which means to go to
500 the next option, a "-" which means to go to the previous
501 option, an escape which means to return to the game, or you
502 can give the option a value. For boolean options this
503 merely involves pressing "t" for true or "f" for false. For
504 string options, type the new value followed by a return.
506 9.1.2. Using the ROGUEOPTS variable
508 The ROGUEOPTS variable is a string containing a comma
509 separated list of initial values for the various options.
510 Boolean variables can be turned on by listing their name and
511 turned off by putting a "no" in front of the name. Thus to
512 set up an environment variable so that jump is on, terse is
513 off, the name is set to "Conan the Barbarian" and the fruit
514 is "mango", use the command
515 % setenv ROGUEOPTS "jump,noterse,name=Conan the Barbarian,fruit=mango"
516 % setenv ROGUEOPTS "jump,noterse,name=Conan the Barbar-
520 For those of you who use the bourne shell, the
522 $ ROGUEOPTS="jump,noterse,name=Conan the Barbarian,fruit=mango"
532 A Guide to the Dungeons of Doom
537 Here is a list of the options and an explanation of
538 what each one is for. The default value for each is
539 enclosed in square brackets.
541 terse [noterse] Useful for those who are tired of
542 the sometimes lengthy messages of
543 rogue. This is a useful option for
544 those on slow terminals. This
545 option defaults to on if your are
546 on a slow (under 1200 baud) termi-
549 jump [nojump] If this option is set, running
550 moves will not be displayed until
551 you reach the end of the move.
552 This saves considerable cpu time
553 and display time. This option
554 defaults to on if you are using a
557 step [nostep] When step is set, lists of things,
558 like inventories or "*" responses
559 to "Which item do you wish to xxxx?
560 " questions, are displayed one item
561 at a time on the top of the screen,
562 rather than clearing the screen,
563 displaying the list, then re-dis-
564 playing the dungeon level.
566 flush [noflush] If flush is set, all typeahead is
567 thrown away after each round of
568 battle. This is useful for those
569 who type way ahead and watch to
570 their dismay as a Kobold kills
573 askme [noaskme] Upon reading a scroll or quaffing a
574 potion which does not automatically
575 identify it upon use, rogue will
576 ask you what to name it so you can
577 recognize it in the future.
579 name [account name] This is the name of your character.
580 It is used if you get on the top
581 ten scorer's list. It should be
582 less than eighty characters long.
584 fruit [slime-mold] This should hold the name of a
585 fruit that you enjoy eating. It is
586 basically a whimsy that the program
598 A Guide to the Dungeons of Doom
601 uses in a couple of places.
603 file [rogue.save] The default file name for saving
604 the game. If your phone is hung up
605 by accident, rogue will automati-
606 cally save the game in this file.
607 The file name may contain the spe-
608 cial character "~" which expands to
609 be your home directory.
613 Rogue was originally conceived of by Glenn Wichman and
614 Michael Toy. The help of Ken Arnold in making the program
615 easier to use and putting the finishing touches on is
616 greatly appreciated. I would also like to thank Marty
617 McNary, Scott Nelson, Daniel Jensen, Kipp Hickman, Joe
618 Kalash, Steve Maurer, Bill Joy, Mark Horton and Jan Miller
619 for their ideas and assistance.