Avlis Newbie FAQ

Post by **Orleron** » Thu Jul 10, 2003 2:34 pm

This is a copy of the FAQ posted in the Information Forum, which doesn't seem to get the reads I had hoped:

Abbreviations:

AFAIK = as far as I know
AFK = away from keyboard
CE = Chaotic Evil
CG = Chaotic Good
CN = Chaotic Neutral
CRPG = computer roleplaying game
CODI = City of Doors Initiative
CoPaP = Confederation of Planes & Planets
ECL = effective character level
ELC = enforce legal characters
HoTU = Hoardes of The Underdark
IC = in character
IIRC = if I recall correctly
ILR = item level restrictions
IMO = in my opinion
IMHO = in my honest opinion
IRC = Internet Relay Chat
LG = Lawful Good
LN = Lawful Neutral
LE = Lawful Evil
MMORPG = massive multiplayer online roleplaying game
NG = Neutral Good
NE = Neutral Evil
NPC = non-player character
NWN = Neverwinter Nights
NWNX = Neverwinter Nights Extender
OOC = out of character
PC = player character
PM = private message
PrC = prestige class
PW = persistent world
SoU = Shadows of Undrentide expansion pack
TN = True Neutral
XP = Experience point(s)

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Dictionary:

- Camping: The act of spending an inordinate amount of time in a certain location for your own personal benefit. An example might be spending several hours each day in the exact same dungeon, killing monsters repeatedly for experience. While there are no specific rules to prevent this, the Team does frown upon this style of play, and you are likely to be ignored by DMs should you repeatedly camp certain spawns/dungeons.

- Cheesing: The term ‘cheesing’ encompasses pretending to possess an ability, race, skill, power, feat, etc that is NOT represented on your character sheet. If your character doesn’t have wings, you cannot roleplay that you have the ability to fly. Similarly, if your character model is a model of a halfling, not a giant, you can’t tell people ingame that you’re a giant. (barring the fact that you’re playing one delusional halfling)
An example of cheesing we commonly see is someone creating a halfling character and claiming to be a human child. Unless your sheet says “Human” as your race, and you have a child model, you’re NOT a human child. You can play a halfling that is pretending to be a child, but IC, you will never actually be a human child.

- Duping: Duping refers to the illegal duplication of items ingame. The specific mechanics of this are irrelevant, as the Avlis Team works continually to remove the possibility of doing this. However, should you discover your items have been accidentally duplicated somehow, or you’ve found an exploit (see ‘Exploit’ below) that allows you to dupe, you are REQUIRED to place all the duped items in a trashcan or ask a DM to remove them, and report the situation as a bug. Capitalizing on this sort of situation is a bannable offense.

- Exploiting: Exploiting encompasses all ingame actions that essentially exploit flaws in either Avlis’ design, code, scripts, or one of Bioware’s own engine bugs. An example might be a certain spell combination that you’ve found invariably crashes the server and thus let’s you camp a certain ISD. (See above) Other possibilities are methods of making gold illegally via an engine bug, or somehow duping your items. Exploiting of ANY form is a BANNABLE offense on Avlis, as well as all other CoPaP worlds. The Avlis Team reserves the right to define an action as exploiting on a case by case basis.

- Powergaming: Simply put, levelling up far too quickly. On Avlis, the general rule of thumb is that if you think you’re levelling up too fast, you probably are. While ingame, we’d like you all to enjoy the experience of the journey, rather than the culmination of it. There’s no official rule preventing powergaming, however it could garner you negative DM attention. A good rule of thumb is that your character shouldn’t level up more than once in a week after level 3, and shouldn’t hit level 20 in less than 6 months. The average exp gain for the majority of players doesn’t exceed 1000 xp/real life day. Some people level faster, some slower, that’s just a good guideline to keep in mind.

Getting Started

1. I registered an account on the boards, but the servers say I need a password to log in. Shouldn't I get the password when I register on the boards?

No. You must register for the boards and the servers separately. To register to play on the servers, you must fill out an application and get accepted. The application is found at:

http://www.copap.org/portal.php?getpage ... ation_form

If you read the application all the way through, you will note that it can take up to 72 hours to get a response from it.

2. I sent in an application but haven't gotten a response. What do I do?

See this thread: viewtopic.php?t=46252

3. What do I do when I start ?

Three things:

? Look around where you have started, get an idea of where you are and the layout, but don't venture far until you know its safe.
? Make a map and take notes
? Talk to as many PC's and NPC's as possible

The information from this will enable you to work out what your going to do with the character you have created. Most PC's will be very helpful and friendly. Don't forget they were in your position once.

It helps to read the background information for the World of Avlis. It can be found in threads here: viewforum.php?f=98 as well as in the Official Avlis Player’s Guide and starter tips, found here: portal.php?getpage=newplayers

Also be sure to read the server rules here: viewforum.php?f=147
We have a large playerbase and limited staff, and thus ignorance of the rules is not an acceptable excuse for breaking them. You are responsible for your own playtime.

Finally for the various changes in spells, information on how the various systems that are unique to Avlis work and other very useful information check the Avlis Wiki at wiki or from "Interactive Player Library" on the main page.

4. You have many servers. What server do I start on ?

There are seven realistic options for the new player to start on Avlis:
Ferrell
Elysia
Mikona
Le'Or T'Nanshi
Deglos
Northern Deglos / Visimontium
Kuras

From a race perspective Mikona is primarily a human city, Le'Or T''Nanshi an Elven one, Ferrell is a land of halflings, Elysia a mixed race and fairy one, and Deglos a dwarven/gnomish subterranean kingdom. Mikona, Ferrell, and Elysia are connected by a ferry service so the new player can move from one to the other safely and enjoy them all. Le'Or is a landlocked tree city, and thus the ferries don’t go there. Outside the city of Le'Or is the Wilderness, see 'Why dont I start on the Wilderness?' below. Deglos is the kingdom of delvers, Dwarves and Gnomes. It is still in development and has yet to show its full potential, but it is moving in that direction. Though it is possible to start there, you should only really do it if you want to start as a dwarven or gnomish smith.

Ferrell - This land is the beautiful homeland of the halflings. As a server, it is fairly safe and newbie friendly. There are a good amount of 'fed ex' quests to get some starting experience and learn your way around the server. Overall, it is not a large area, and contains good resources for those interested in crafting.

Elysia - This is the largest city area developed and has a number of more interesting 'fed ex' quests. It has a larger 'safe' area to explore and the new characters can roam just outside the city in relative safety. Elysia is also a good starting point for people looking to develop a character with alchemy or brewing as a craft based skill.

Mikona - (This is the oldest area of the project) This used to be the start point for all characters. There are a number of areas in close proximity with a variety of themes. This is more of a 'look first before you leap' approach as some of the areas may contain hostile npc's. It still has fed ex quests, but these are concentrated in a smaller area for the new player to undertake. There are also more dangers to the new player. This gives it a very different feel to Elysia. There are opportunities to develop crafting skills here, though mining iron ore for smithing is not advised at first.

Le'Or T'Nanshi - This is the newest city and is the capital of the elven country of T'Nanshi. There are some 'Fed Ex' quests here too. The one difference with the Le'Or T'Nanshi FedEx quests is that they give a little more experience than the quests in the other cities. There are also a variety of low level areas, such as the Roots. The newly reopened Canopies can be quite dangerous to a beginning player, and players should err on the side of caution when travelling them.

Deglos – This is one of the largest Avlis servers, and still very much under construction. However, the addition of a new starting city geared towards starting characters, Nutzdagezehsple, has made the server a viable location to start your character’s life on Avlis. Keep in mind that the vast majority of Deglos is dangerous – sometimes extremely so, to low level characters. You can, however, find plenty of safe starting areas to mine and craft in the vicinity of Nutzdagezehsple, and there is a sort of Dwarven ‘freeway’ running past it which would allow you to leave Deglos. Bear in mind that player populations on Deglos are still relatively low, especially of newbies, so you might find starting here to be a bit lonely, depending on your timezone.

Northern Deglos / Visimontium - The northern part of Deglos which includes Mount Crescetoria, the location chosen for Visimontium to be built. The city dedicated to Andrinor and his mages. Visimontium is very newbie friendly as well, offering many options in adventuring areas and crafting ingredients for mages and non-mages alike.

Kuras - The capital of the Kurathene Empire, Kuras is a large, well
fortified city located on the bank of the Nomad River in the central part of
Kurathene. Kurathene, once one of the largest and most powerful nations of Avlis is now torn by civil war after the death of the emperor Joral Kuras, 200 years ago.
Kuras is a server heavily influenced by the varius lawful deities, mainly Toran and Senath and has a very different feeling compared to the other Avlis servers. Kuras is far to the north and is very difficult to reach from the rest of Avlis, making the contact minimal at best.

5. Why not start on the Wilderness server ?

Dont, you will die very quickly. The Wilderness is not recommended for anyone under 4th level. Even those of higher level should only go there with a party of adventurers.

6. What is on the Deglos server ?

Deglos is the kingdom of delvers, Dwarves and Gnomes. It is still in development and has yet to show its full potential, but it is moving in that direction. Though it is possible to start there, you should only only really do it if you want to start as a dwarven, or gnomish smith. At present, there is little pc interaction there, though a newbie friendly series of cities is planned.

7. What is a Fed Ex quest ?

These are jobs you can get from NPC's whom you interact with. They normally involve you carrying something to another NPC. They are good for two reasons, firstly you get to understand the local area a bit more and you also gain a reward for doing the task. Most can be performed in complete safety.

8. What does Out Of Character or OOC mean?

This is when you have to say something within the game that has nothing to do with the role you are playing. Examples are:
"OOC I have to go now", "AFK (a phone call)", etc.

They should not be used unless really necessary. If you want to discuss something outside the game then private messages (PMs) can be used or use IRC.

9. What are Private Messages (PM's) ?

These can be used from the player list to directly contact a person or persons. Again this should not be used to transfer game information about your character. They should only be used to talk about things that have nothing to do with the events in the game.

10. How do I try to contact a DM ?

One of the options you can choose by selecting Talk in the bottom left hand corner of the NWN player screen is DM. This is a channel you can use to contact a DM about a problem you are having. This does not guarantee a response as there may not always be a DM on line or he may choose not to intervene.

When you talk in this channel, your words will not appear in the chat window, but they do appear to DM's that are online.

Conversely, you can just preface your text with the tag ‘/dm ‘. We ask that you please not abuse the DM channel to ask for quests, items, or Prestige Classes.

11. My character is stuck and I cannot move him. Help!

Sometimes your character will be stuck in place due to a flaw in the mapping of your character onto the terrain. There are four options to try:
- Select the ` key and type "makesafe" and hit return.
- Going into the radial and creating a tent or campfire while facing the opposite direction of whatever is in your way will cause you to 'slide' through some times.
- Logging out of the game and logging back in again.
- Calling for a DM on the DM Channel.

These should be tried in that order, and if a DM cannot be found, you should post on the forums for assistance or wait for an hour and log into a different server.

12. When can I use someone's name ?

This can only be used in character when you have been formally introduced or a third party has told you it. Until then you have to physically describe that person, such as "a gnome in black clothes who was very nervous, and he had a very big nose".

13. I got myself killed what happens next ?

First, your items will all be put on a corpse in front of you. You will lose 50 exp/level for once you hit 4th level. You will then go naked to your death plane which depends on your alignment. Whilst there you can do either of 2 things, complete a quest or get resurrected/raised by another player or NPC by having them cast the spell on your corpse. The quests are related to recovering your experience points lost in dying. Resurrection/Raise Dead brings you back directly to your corpse so you don't have to run the "naked mile", but you do not recover your lost XP that way.

14. I found a body, what do I do ?

This depends on your character. Some people guard them, some ignore them and some look for useful items to take. The final option is called looting and if caught can have serious negative consequences for your character in the game, though it is not illegal to loot bodies on Avlis.

15. I’m in an IC bind, and don’t want to deal with the negative consequences of my ingame actions. Can I just logout?

In truth, yes you can. There is no way for us to stop you from logging out. However, this practice is EXTREMELY frowned upon by both the players and the staff, and if you are caught doing this in the presence of a DM, there could be dire aftereffects on your character.

16. Why did alignment just change ?

Your character or someone you are partied up with has done something outside your characters alignment. This has caused a shift in your alignment for good, bad, lawful or chaotic. You can either rethink how you are playing your character and either accept the change or try to correct the change. This is part of roleplaying.

Many actions are scripted to automatically incur an alignment shift, however a DM could also shift your alignment should they deem your actions disagree with the alignment on your character sheet.

17. Why is my character moving slowly all of a sudden?

There are 3 possible explanations:
- This is a known bioware bug. It occurs after area transitions or logging in and can be cured by switching your search and hide functions on and off.
- When you die on Avlis and come back to life through a death quest or a ressurection, you are slowed for 2 minutes to simulate your recovery from death.
- You are encumbered and have either just picked up something that puts you over your maximum encumbrence, or your Strength has been decreased, thus lowering your max encumbrence. Open your Invetory Panel and look at the bottom center to see if you’re carrying too much.

18. It says I need a special file, where can I get that ?

Look here: viewtopic.php?t=68396. You should find everything needed there.

All Avlis servers use things called hakpaks, which are files that enhance the functionality of the game. The download link above contains links to the hakpaks you will need. They are in the hakpaks directory.

You can also download from the mirror sites listed on the download page. We recommend you do this, since many of them have higher bandwidth and thus your downloads will go much faster.

You can either download haks individually, or get them all. If you are unsure what to do, we recommend downloading the full installer which will do everything for you.

If the FTP site is not working, give it time. Sometimes it gets overloaded.

Problems with unpacking: Use WinRAR. It can be found here: http://rarsoft.com/

19. It says I can craft somehow, how do I do that ? How can I create a sword ?

All crafting ingredients have to be found in the game, either by becoming an apprentice to a craft, or by experimenting. You can check your crafting levels by going into the radial (under the bioware crafting menu in Special Abilities) and choosing "Review crafting skills".

Sharing crafting recipes anywhere other than ingame is strictly forbidden on Avlis. If you wish to learn, do so IC. The same goes for teaching others.

20. Where can I find information about .... ?

Take a look into the World Information forum, most things are covered here.

21. I think I found a bug. Where do I report it ?

Bug reports go in the Bug Tracker link under the Avlis homepage. Please be sure that your bug is not a Bioware bug before you report it. We do not have control over bugs caused by the company that made NWN. We can only fix bugs in the Avlis scripting. Thank you.

22. I died and the server crashed before I got to my body to retrieve my stuff. Now I log in and it's all GONE!!! I lost everything! HELP!!!!!

All characters on Avlis are backed up at precisely 5am GMT, which is 12am EST. The state of your character at that time is saved every day. So if you are the victim of a situation like the one above, post a "Restore Request" in the Restore Request Thread in the Avlis General Forums.

Your request for restoring a backup copy of your character will be honored if your request is valid. Read the thread carefully for valid reasons before posting there.

Even with the restore request system in place and the persistent corpse backup in place, The Avlis Team does NOT guarantee the safety of your character's belongings. We are not responsible for item loss due to circumstances beyond your control or ours. You play and collect items at your own risk.

Due to the persistance systems used on Avlis in most cases items that exist in the Avlis palette will not be lost if the server crashes or resets before you return to your corpse and you will receive all your items back the next time you log back in. The same is true for situations where you can't get to your body and decide to log off. The next time you log in, if the server has been reset you will receive your items back. Keep in mind that if the items are returned this way you will receive the normal versions of your items back and all dyes and other modifications applied to them will be lost.

23. I stopped playing Avlis for a while, and now that I've come back, all my characters are gone. What happened and what do I do ?

We have a vault purging system that gets rid of characters that have not been played for 90 days. The character files are not destroyed. They are simply stored someplace else. This helps to keep the size of our servervault down.

You can get your character back easily. Simply post a restore request in the Restore Request Thread in the Avlis General Forums.

24. Someone else's character is available for me to log in with. Why did that happen? Can you fix that for me?

****DO NOT play this character. Logging in with someone else's character is a banning offense, and we are able to track it when you do.

25. What do I do if I log in a character and see only a black screen?

This is a known Bioware bug and there is the following work around.

Create a character locally (valid for server), then email the file to orleron@blackdagger.com.
The file then will be inserted into the server vault manually. This will obviously involve delay involvement in the game slightly.

26. I type in the password for the servers and it says the password is in correct. I even pasted it into the space and it's still wrong. Why don't the passwords work?

The passwords DO work. Trust us. If they didn't, we would have 2000 screaming people telling us they don't work.

Some things to try:

Do not paste your password into the space. Type it. Pasting sometimes puts extra spaces in there, causing the password to be denied.

Make sure you type the password ExAcTlY as it is given. It's case sensitive in a big way.

Also, sometimes while the server is rebooting, we change the password briefly so people cannot log on while the server loads. If this happens, just wait about 5 minutes and come back. The password will be changed back to the original.

27. I logged into one of your servers, and then logged out. Now when I try to log into a different server, it tells me I need to wait nearly an hour. What is that?

What you did is called "server hopping": that's when you log out of one server and into another, effectively teleporting your character across vast distances. We want to discourage this, so we have code in place that causes you to be dominated when you log into the wrong server. Effectively, you need to either travel "properly" (i.e. actually go in-game to your destination) or you need to wait one hour to represent your character's travel time.

28. What's up with the server lag? I play on one or more of your servers and I'm getting really choppy gameplay.

The Avlis Team is aware of various problems with lag. For starters, you should be aware of WHICH kind of lag you are dealing with:

1) Your internet connection is one big factor. Our internet connection is 10 Mb down and 1 Mb up, which is considerably faster than what is needed for our traffic. Our internet pipeline is never even close to full. So if you are having internet lag and you already have a good internet connection, do a traceroute to our servers and see where the problem lies. We assure you it is not us.

2) Your graphics settings are the next big factor. Try turning down the amount of sound and detail you have in your client. If your graphics or sound card is not a very good one, you will experience a lot of lag. Our hakpaks use a lot of TGA textures which require a decent graphics card.

3) Your computer is another factor. If you are playing on a slow computer, you will likely lag. If you don't have at least 512 MB of memory on your computer, you will likely lag.

We cannot do anything for you about issue's 1, 2, and 3. You must take the steps to fix it on your own.

Other causes:

1) Avlis is expanding rapidly. We have too many modules running on too few machines with too many people playing. This slows down the game and is the biggest cause of lag. You are probably experiencing this. We are WELL aware of this problem. You don't need to tell us about it. We are already taking steps to correct it. You can help this effort by joining our fanfiction website at http://fanfic.avlis.org or by donating to us on the paypal link on http://www.avlis.org or by buying merchandise from the shop link in my signature. The more money we get, the more computers we can buy. The less lag you will see. If you want to donate with a direct check, PM me and I'll give you information on how to do that.

2) Avlis has a ton of code and systems. Sometimes these systems interact with each other in ways players don't even know about. Sometimes that's not a good thing, and it causes lag. The Avlis Team is CONSTANTLY putting full time effort into quashing these hidden killers and revamping our code so it runs more smoothly. Whatever system you think might be causing lag, we've already thought of it and are working on it.

For both of these causes, we are making a constant unending effort to reduce lag. Your reports are not news to us, but we apologize for the invonvenience.

29. I hear Avlis is part of a group of PW's that are connected to one another. How do I go from one PW to the next? I tried logging into another one after I played on Avlis, and my character was not in their vault.

This system is called CoPaP, or the Confederation of Planes and Planets.

The worlds are connected, yes. You must physically travel from one to the next, especially if it is your first time visiting the new world. This means you must log into Avlis and walk there, going through the portal. The locations of the portals can be found out in game, and people will generally not tell you where they are OOC.

If you try to log into a world before you have visited it with your Avlis character, you will find that your character is not there because it was not transferred over. You must physically walk your character there through a portal in order for your file to be transferred over.

Should you travel to another world, get bored exploring it/die there, and decide to just logout and log back in to Avlis to restore your previously saved character, we WILL know about it, so don’t do it. See the definition for ‘exploiting’ above.

30. I’d like to make a character that’s of a race that is not available to create on Avlis, but is available on another CoPaP world. Can I make the character there and then bring them over to Avlis to play?

Yes and no.

You CAN make a character of that race on whatever world it is that offers it, however you SHOULD NOT immediately bring that character over to Avlis. Your character is, by default, a native to whatever world you create them on. As such, it’s expected that you spend some time on your home world, and not really look into planar travel until you’re at least level 6 or 7. These other worlds have teams just like Avlis, and these teams worked long and hard to make that world an enjoyable place for you to spend your time, so you owe it to them to explore that world and see what it has to offer.

Certain worlds may not take kindly to your abusing their character creation system, and it could have negative reprcussions on your character; so the safe bet is to create your character on the world you intend to play on.

Of particular note are Drow characters. On Avlis, there are no Drow. Avlis has it’s own form of Dark Elf called a Sereg. A Drow character can be easily mistaken for one of these critters. This is not a good thing. Trust us on that. Drow characters may enter Avlis at their own risk, but you have been warned.

31. I’d like to join a Private Discussion group on the forums, how do I do that?

Just below the Website’s titlebar at the top of the page is a link labeled ‘Groups’. From here you can find the group you’d like to join and apply for access. Keep in mind that many Player-run guilds don’t appear on that list, and the majority of guilds require you to actually join their guild ingame before you’re granted access.

32. I’d like to help code/build/model/design/etc. something for Avlis. Can I do that?

Certainly! We’re always looking for anyone with technical skills and the knowledge and free time to help make Avlis that much better. If you’re interested in helping in any sort of technical capacity, be it building areas, scripting quests, or DMing, feel free to email staff@avlis.org and request an application.

33. I want to take levels in a certain Prestige Class that was added in one of the expansion packs, but when I try to level up it won’t let me select the class. What gives?

Avlis locks out all the Prestige Classes by default, including our own custom Holy Warrior ones. To unlock a certain class you need to either find a scripted quest for it, contact a DM with your character background, or find a PC with levels in the class that would be willing to train you and unlock the class for you. We do this to help promote good roleplay, not throw a wrench in your plans for the perfect character. Part of the fun is learning how to access the new class and its abilities. It’s also not impossible to have levels in more than 1 PrC, but it is EXTREMELY difficult to do so. A Character would have to have excellent RP reasons to take levels in two different PrCs.

The last thing to keep in mind is that PrCs aren’t like levels in regular classes. Earning the right to take levels in a PrC is no simple task, and as such, we expect anyone that is serious about RPing that PrC take more than one level in it. A common mistake to make is to unlock Shadowdancer and then only take one level in the PrC for the feat Hide in Plain Sight. DO NOT DO THIS.

34. Alright, I read Question #33, but that still doesn’t explain why I can’t take levels in Red Dragon Disciple, Champion of Torm or Harper Scout. Why is that?

Avlis has its own rich and detailed history. Not appearing in this history are Red Dragons, the Forgotten Realms deity Torm, or the secretive Forgotten Realms group called The Harpers. They simply do not exist on Avlis. As such, you cannot take levels in these 3 PrCs, because they physically do not exist. This does not mean you cannot take levels in any one of them on another CoPaP world, you just cannot START taking levels in them on Avlis.

One thing in particular to keep in mind is that if you create your Sorceror or Bard on Avlis, they are an Avlissian native. As such, it is physically impossible for them to have Red Dragon blood somewhere in their lineage, and thus you CANNOT take levels in Red Dragon Disciple, even if you go to another CoPaP world. We keep tabs on all the RDDs, CoTs and Harper Scouts that come to Avlis, and if you’re an Avlissian native with RDD levels, a DM WILL remove your levels in that class, and you will not get your exp back. There could be other repercussions to taking levels in the class, but they would be assessed on a case by case basis.

35. I’d like to start my own guild. Is this possible, and how would I go about setting it up?

Sure it’s possible, and we encourage players to make their own groups and guilds.

The first step you need to take is to decide whether or not your guild fits into the theme of Avlis. For example, if you’d like to make a Red Dragon Disciple guild on Avlis, that wouldn’t really fit with the world history, as there are no Red Dragons on Avlis.

If you’ve got an idea that does fit with the world history, you can start on the next step, which is contacting the staff at staff@avlis.org and asking for a DM to sponsor your guild. Every guild on Avlis has its own DM sponsor that acts as the guild’s representative to the team. Be sure to include an outline of your guild including its name, a brief synopsis of what it stands for, and how many players are currently interested in joining with their characters. It’s fine to want to start your own guild, but if there’s no one intrested in joining, there’s not much of a point to making one. If a DM likes what they’ve read, they’ll contact you and explain to you how to proceed about getting your guild together and making it official ingame.

36. Does it cost anything to play on Avlis?

Absolutely not. This is a typical NWN server that is free to play. But nevertheless, we appreciate it very much when people who play here try to help us out financially. Avlis costs money to run. Each machine takes up about US$20 per month in electricity costs, and we have nine of them running. Our cable internet bill costs us US$80 per month, and our webhosting (colocation) costs $100/month. That adds up to a lot of money, and then you must realize that all of our machines and replacement parts are purchased with donations. So if we want to expand Avlis to another machine, we need to save up the US$800 or so to do it.

If everyone here who considers themself a regular Avlis player donated even US$5 per month, we would have plenty of money to do all this and more to make Avlis the best possible game. 5 bucks a month is not a killer amount. You pay up to twice that much just to see a movie for 2 hours. How many hours of Avlis do you play per month? At least 24? How much would Ultima Online charge you per month? US$13?

So the point is, that even though we have NO problems with people playing here and giving nothing in return, we greatly appreciate the ones who understand what it is to run this server for people as a service for their entertainment.

Donations can be made by joining World Forge Magazine at http://www.worldforgemagazine.com or by clicking on the paypal link on the front page http://www.avlis.org . If you wish to send checks, PM me for details.

Donations can also be made by assigning your bank account to make an automatic bill pay to us. PM me for details on how to do that.

37. How can I give money to Avlis without spending any of it on my own?

Very easily!

Look at our sponsors page: portal.php?getpage=sponsors
There are tons of banners there. If you sign up for a free trial on any one of them, we get a LOT of money.... for no work on your part. All you have to do is like the banner and click on it, then sign up for a free trial for what's being offered. (You might need a credit card number and a spare email address to do this.)

Post by **Orleron** » Fri Aug 01, 2003 2:25 pm

1. How do I connect to the server if I can't see it on Gamespy ?

The best way to connect is "Direct Connect", i.e.

Play -> Multiplayer -> Join Internet Game -> Direct connect -> or
Play -> Multiplayer -> Join LAN Game -> Direct connect ->

And enter the address...

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avlis.blackdagger.net:xxxx

(Replacing the xxxx by the appropriate Port number for the required server, e.g. 5121 for Mikona, 5122 for Wilderness, etc.)

And enter the password, exactly as given in your application confirmation email (it is cAsE sEnsiTive).

That should connect you straight it.

2. I try to connect like you say, but I get "Connection error, could not translate adress." What have I done wrong ?

Sometimes your ISP (Internet Service Provider) can not translate the address for avlis.blackdagger.net. However, you can provide the translation manually.

At the moment (and it should not change if the server is on a static IP address) the IP address is 67.81.238.240. So use the "Direct Connect" method as shown above but enter the IP address as...

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67.81.238.240:xxxx

(Replacing the xxxx by the appropriate Port number for the required server, e.g. 5121 for Mikona, 5122 for Wilderness, etc.)

3. It still isn't working, maybe the server is down. How can I find out?

There are two ways to find out if the server is down:
a) Use the Server Status web-page http://www.copap.org/portal.php?getpage=serverstatus2

b) "Ping" the server...
Open a DOS command window and type

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ping avlis.blackdagger.net

You should get something like this ...

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Pinging blackdagger.net [67.81.233.237] with 32 bytes of data:

Reply from 67.81.233.237: bytes=32 time=124ms TTL=108
Reply from 67.81.233.237: bytes=32 time=126ms TTL=108
Reply from 67.81.233.237: bytes=32 time=125ms TTL=108
Reply from 67.81.233.237: bytes=32 time=125ms TTL=108

Ping statistics for 67.81.233.237:
    Packets: Sent = 4, Received = 4, Lost = 0 (0% loss),

Approximate round trip times in milli-seconds:
    Minimum = 124ms, Maximum = 126ms, Average = 125ms

If you get this, then that's some good news at least. It means that your PC can see the hardware that the game-server is running on. However, it might be that the actual game-server is offline (e.g. for maintence, or it needs rebooting by one of the team, etc.). Make a cup of tea, and try again in 10 minutes.

However, if you got something like this ...

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Ping request could not find host avlis.blackdagger.net. Please check the name and try again.

... that isn't so good. It may mean the server is down. Try and ping it directly by the IP address like before, i.e.

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ping 67.81.233.237

If it still doesn't work, then somethings wrong

The server might be down, or something wrong with the internet. Make a cup of tea, and try again in 10 minutes.

* tea is the answer to everything