help1

                          THE WORLD OF CONQUER

The Conquer world is very bloody, and a player needs skills at war gaming,
diplomacy, and building an economy to succeed.  Rival races are constantly
at war, and the world starts filled with player nations, random peoples
(lizard men in their cities of gold, savages, nomads, pirates, brigands),
and both hostile and friendly computer controlled non player countries.
Conquer can be played solitaire.  The computer uses a highly intelligent
movement algorithm to run the armies and navies of these non player
countries (NPC), and has intelligent algorithms built in that control these
nations diplomacy, construction, and economies.  You can find NPCs allied with
you against a common enemy,  but can also suddenly be stabbed in the
back and find hostile NPC armies at your doorstep.
END
                       WHAT IS WHAT IN THE WORLD

The world is composed of a 2 dimensional map of sectors, created by the
computer at the beginning of the game.  Each sector has about 10 unique
characteristics (altitude, gold, vegetation...).

SECTOR ELEVATIONS include:
        MOUNTAIN (^)       HILL (%)        CLEAR (-)
        WATER (~)          PEAK (#)
SECTOR VEGETATION
Uninhabitable Areas (do not produce food and people simply do not like)
        VOLCANO (v)        DESERT (d)      JUNGLE (j)
        TUNDRA (t)         ICE (i)         SWAMP (s)
Inhabitable (people like, number is relative value of food production)
        GOOD (g)...9       FOREST (f)...3 (4 ELF)       LIGHT VEG (l)...6
        WOOD (w)...7       BARREN (b)...4 (3 ELF)

CONQUER is designed so each race likes their appropriate terrain.  Elves like
woods & forests,  Humans like good & light vegetation, and Orcs and Dwarves
like hills and mountains.  You can only redesignate inhabitable sector types.
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                             RACES OF THE WORLD

ORC       'O'   See next page.
ELF       'E'   Great at defense and quick, but few in numbers.  They start
                with VOID power, which is perhaps the most potent power in the
                game, but which costs them an extra distribution point.
DWARF     'D'   Dwarves are good at combat, but slow and few in numbers.  They
                start with MINER power, which allows them to quickly mine
                metal/jewels, and thus improve their combat skills and powers.
HUMAN     'H'   Humans start average at everything -- with reasonable numbers,
                of people, and WARRIOR power, which gives them +10% in combat.
                They have OK reproduction and good movement.
LIZARD    'L'   (NPC only)  An ancient race bound to their cities of gold
PIRATE    'P'   (NPC only)  Wandering pirates/brigands intent on plunder
NOMAD     'N'   (NPC only)  Will the wandering nomads tribes leave you alone?
SAVAGES   'S'   (NPC only)  Indigenous natives and monsters
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                          ORC NATIONS IN CONQUER

Orc nations are very special in Conquer.  The only thing an orc is good at is 
making other orcs.  They are slow, poor at combat, & bad in special abilities.
They can get reproduction of up to 14% per year (the normal limit is 10%) & 
can start with a large number of people as initial reproduction costs are less
than normal.  Orcs are led by monsters (they start with MINOR MONSTER power),
and are always evil (the only good orc is a dead orc...).  They are so nasty,
EVERYBODY they meet start out hostile (50%) or at war (50%) with them.
Player nations get an option here, but they usually start out hostile to you.

In combat, orc & goblin units types flee just like mercenaries (a random
chance, modified by odds...), and orcs are charged 2x normal cost for raising
their combat bonus at game start and 3x during play, so they usually need
2:1 odds or better to win (expect heavy losses).  

Finally, Orcs are slow, as they require tremendous leader incentive to move
and not kill each other.  Large orc nations do have the ability to take over
other Orc nations (The Sauron Syndrome).  There is no Orc CAVALRY.
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                       POSSIBLE NATION ALIGNMENTS

Nations in conquer can be good, neutral, or evil.  Alignment impacts how
non player nations will react to your nation ( good nations like good
nations, but hate evil nations.  Nobody is mean to neutral nations,
but nobody likes them either ).  Player nations choose an alignment
when they get created (no limitations) which can not change.  Players
actions are not restricted by their alignments, but players should
play "in character".  There are more evil non player nations than there
are good non player nations, so it is more fun/challenging to play the
good guys.
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                       SECTOR DESIGNATIONS

The following is the list of possible sector designations:

       TOWN      (t)       FORT      (!)       MILL      (*)
       CITY      (c)       STOCKADE  (s)       GRANARY   (g)
       CAPITOL   (C)       UNIVERSITY(u)       CHURCH    (=)
       MINE      (m)       LUMBERYARD(l)       SPECIAL   (?)
       GOLD MINE ($)       BLACKSMITH(b)       RUIN      (&)
       FARM      (f)       ROAD      (+)       DEVASTATED(x)

For more information on each, see the helpfile on 'Designations'
END
                            METAL, FOOD, AND GOLD

FOOD:      You MUST have enough food to feed your people... One civilian eats
        your national eatrate units of food.  Soldiers eat double.  If you
        run out of food, you run the risk of famine.  Food will spoil based
        on the spoilrate percentage for each nation.
METAL:     You need to have metal to draft new military, as per the unit types
        section.  One person produces one metal per point of mineral in
        the sector per turn.  An amount of Metal (based on how many troops
        you have) can be used to buy +1% in your nations attack or defense.
JEWELS:    You can have a maximum of 10 talons debt for every jewel
        point that you mined.  After that point, you undergo a TAX REVOLT,
        which has not yet been implemented. Thus gold can be negative to
        a certain level.  Jewels are also useful to obtain magic, spending
        Jewels will buy you one random new power (command M).  The cost for
        the magic power is dependent on your race and how many other powers
        you have.  See the helpfile on magic for more information.  You can
        have 10 talons in the treasury for each jewel (gold based economy).
        After that, your gold talons will be converted to jewels at a 10:1
        ratio.
END
                           CIVILIAN MOVEMENT

The game offers users the capability to forcibly move civilians around
the map (via the 'Z' command).  Civilians will, however, move of their
own volition.  Below are how civilians of different races think about "good"
sectors of various types.  The program is intelligent enough to appropriately
handle poor or low value sectors.  Sum the numbers found below.  The result
is the relative "attractiveness" of a sector.

General Modifiers:   Goldmine: 9 * jewels   Farm: 7 * food value  Other: 50
  Trade Good: 10     Mine: 9 * metals       Town: 150             City: 300

                                Racial Modifiers
Race        Mtn    Hill   Clear  Forest    Wood    City    Mine Gldmine
Dwarf        40      20       0     -20     -10     -20      40      40
Elf         -40     -20       0      40      40     -50       0       0
Human       -10       0      30     -20       0      50      10      10
Orc          30      20       0     -40     -20      50      20      20
END
                            VIEWING THE WORLD

When you first log in, you will notice that you can only see a portion of the
entire world.  Your range of vision is determined by the magic powers you
possess and the location of your sectors and armies.  Scouts are useful to
expand the amount of land you can view.

The 'd' command allows you to change what you see on the map.  You can
alter the information in the sector and can  change the type of sectors that
are highlighted.  See the next two sections for the list of possible display
and hightlight options.

Normally, the conquer display shows your chosen display option with blank
spaces to the right to space out the map nicely.  But, you may also use the
area thus provided to show a secondary display.  This secondary display may
be turned on and off using the '/' display selection.  Also, you may
distinguish between what to display in the primary or secondary display by
prefacing your selection with either a '1' or '2'.   If neither is chosen,
then the primary display is set to the selected option, while the secondary
display is turned off.
END
                            DISPLAY OPTIONS

This section describes the possible display options proceeded by their
associated keystroke:

 (d)  designation:  show your designations and other nation's marks.
 (r)  race:  show race of owned sectors (Human, Orc, Elf, Dwarf, Lizard, etc.)
 (M)  move cost:  show the cost in movement points to move into a sector.
 (p)  people:  show how many people live in a sector; arabic numbers indicate
        the amount in hundreds, while 'I', 'V' and 'X' are used to indicate
        at least one thousand, five thousand, and ten thousand respectively.
 (D)  defense:  show the relative defensive strength of a sector.  Both sector
        terrain and sector fortifications are taken into account.
 (f)  food:  display relative food production ability of a sector.
 (c)  contour:  display the elevation symbol of each sector.
 (v)  vegetation:  display the vegetation symbol of each sector.
 (m)  metal:  show the relative metal production ability of a sector.
 (n)  nation mark:  display the national mark for all owned sectors.
 (j)  jewels:  show the relative jewel production ability of a sector.
 (i)  items:  display the designation neccesary to take advantage of the
        special item in a sector.
END
                         HIGHLIGHT OPTIONS

This section describes the possible modes of highlighting proceeded by the
keystroke used to select each:

 (o)  owned:  highlight all sectors owned by your country.
 (a)  army:  highlight all sectors containing army units.
 (y)  your army:  hightlight all sectors containing at least on of your
        army units.
 (l)  moves left:  hightlight any sectors containing one of your armies with
        movement points remaining.
 (s)  special:  highlight any sector containing a special item visable to
        your nation.
 (x)  none:  do not highlight any sectors.

   In general, the most useful displays are the production displays (food,
metal, and jewels), and the most useful highlights are the army highlight
(to show where your enemies are), and the moves left highlight (to indicate
those units which may still be moved onto your enemies).
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                        COMMERCE AND TRADING

Trading makes it be possible to exchange items between nations.

There are seven types of items available for trade:  gold, food, metal,
jewels, land, soldiers, and ships.  To place an item up for trade,
the player need only select the sell option on the commerce board.  The
player will then enter the type and amount of his product followed by the
type and minimum amount of what he wants in return.  The product will
remain on the commerce board until it is purchased or removed by the
owner of the product.  To purchase an item, a player can just select the
item number to purchase and then enter a bid amount.  You may only trade
mercenary, siege engine, catapult, (summoned) monster, or elephant units.
Certain Items will be available for "instant purchase" from the game
itself, these are indicated by the nation name of "Conquer".

During every update, bids will be resolved and the highest bid for a
product will receive the product.  There is a 20% administration fee
for a trade (i.e. 20% of the traded goods on each side disappear)
NOTE: the trading code is buggy and trading should be used with caution.
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                         DIPLOMACY IN CONQUER

Diplomacy is very important in conquer.  You maintain a diplomatic status with
each nation in the game.  This is adjusted via the 'S' (diplomacy) command.
Possible status' are TREATY, ALLIED, FRIENDLY, NEUTRAL, HOSTILE,
WAR, and JIHAD.  Be very careful with TREATY and JIHAD.  Once chosen,
it will take 200000 gold talons to change your mind (and might ruin
your reputation).  You can only take land from a nation that you are at
WAR or JIHAD with.  TREATY implies that you AUTOMATICALLY declare war on
nations who ATTACK your ally - but not on nations whom they attack.

Diplomacy with non player nations is important as it determines if you get
attacked or not.
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                           BRIBING NPC NATIONS

Conquer allows you a chance to bribe non player nations for the paltry sum
of 50000 per 1000 troops in the bribee's nation.  A nation with 10000 troops
can be bribed for only 10x50000 gold talons (a bargain). This has a 
percentage chance of working, but you wont know if it worked until the update.

                 same allignment:                50%
                 1 level allignment difference:  30%
                 2 level allignment difference:  20%
                 They are isolationist:          15%
                 same race:                     +20%

Bribing NPCs is a good way to get some breathing room.
You waste your money if you are at war with them that turn.
You can not bribe player nations, savages, nomads, lizards, or pirates.
END
                              SEASONS
                (only food production is implemented)

winter: army units must end turn in town or suffer 10% attrition.
        farms produce no food.  movement is at half ability.
spring: produce 1/2x food.
summer: produce 1x food. units get 50% movement bonus.
fall:   produce 2.5x food.

you must have a sector spring,summer,and fall or it will produce no food
global events should be good too; typhoon season, famine times, etc.
Perhaps the climate of a region should also effect the events. ie,
more typhoons in the equatorial belt. Typhoon should be calculated
with a starting point and an ending point and then it walks in
between causing devastation.
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                        FINAL HINTS & OTHER COSTS

It is important to initially have a reproduction of 9-10% and a move of ~8-9.
You need about 1000 military to start - to take enough new land.
Take as much land as possible in the beginning.
Make sure your combat bonus stays respectable.

                             OTHER COSTS

            Designation Costs:              $2000
            Designation to Fort or Town:    10x$2000+$2000 METAL
            Designation to City:            20x$2000+5*$2000 METAL
            Fortification:                  $1000*(2**Fort Level)
            Bribe Nation:                   $50000/level
            Move Civilians:                 $50/civilian
END
                            OTHER NOTES

   The computer can move for players if they don't enter a turn and the
CMOVE variable is set before the program is compiled.  This works well...
for a time.  The Computer will NOT redesignate captured sectors for you.

Mercenaries must be paid a fee equal to enlistment fee when disbanded.

If you have too many people in a given non Town, non capitol sector,
reproduction and production is halved for them.  If you have a large
number of people in a sector, they will not reproduce.

WARNING: The Naval and Trade Code has been known to be buggy.  Please
pay attention and send the author notes on discrepancies in the code.
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                        OPTIONS OF YOUR VERSION

        Maximum Number of Armies Per Nation....50
        Maximum Number of Navies Per Nation....10
        Absolute Maximum Number of Nations.....35
        Starting Points to buy your nation.....65
        Percentage of land that is mountains...40
        Storm Percentage.......................3
        Cost for Orc Npc Takeover..............100000
        Average Number of Random Events........15
        Chance of Volcano Eruption.............20

        Mail Checker  (True )       System V      (False:BSD)
        Monsters      (True )       Npc Cheat     (True )
        Storms        (True )       Volcanos      (True )
        Npc Nations   (True )       PC Automove   (True )
        Random Events (True )       Orc Takeovers (True )
        Super God     (True )       Hidden News   (True )
        Trading       (True )
END
                        ADDITIONAL OPTIONS

        Land Vision Range is..................2
        Navy Vision Range is..................1
        Army Vision Range is..................2

        Taxation Rates:
        Food tax per value point per person...5
        Jewel tax per jewel point per person..8
        Metal tax per metal point per person..8
        Town tax per person...................80
        City tax per person...................100

        100% chance per 50000 metal mined of deplete metal mines.
        100% chance per 50000 jewels mined of deplete gold mines.
        1% chance that new materials are found in a sector.
        Sector overpopulation occurs with 4000 people.
        Maximum Sector Population is 50000 people.
        Ships may carry 100 items per holding unit.
END
DONE