Chapter 1 - Introduction
1.1 What is Crossfire?
In the words of its original author Frank Tore Johansen :
"Crossfireis a multi-player graphical arcade and adventure game made for the X Windows systems environment. It has certain flavours from other games, especially gauntletand the rogue-like games. Any number of players can move around in their own window, finding and using items and battling monsters. They can choose to cooperate or compete in the same world."
In the years of development that have followed, Crossfire has grown to encompass over 150 monsters, ~3000 maps to explore, an elaborate magic system, over 15 character types, a system of skills, and many, many artifacts and treasures.
Crossfire is freely distributed under the GNU license and the code may be obtained from a number of FTP sites (Obtaining crossfire.) Take note: you will need at least an ANSI C compiler (i.e. gcc ) and UNIX to build the game.
Crossfire is currently being maintained by Mark Wedel and is awaiting the "great leap forward" to a true client-server status (Look for version 1.0+). Not to fear, Crossfire is certainly playable in its present form! But the game is in flux and new releases of Crossfire occur on a quasi-monthly schedule. You may want to subscribe to the announcement mailing list (see section mailing lists) to get notified of updates.
1.1.1. What is included in this document?
This document is a guide intended to focus on the game-play aspects of Crossfire. The original intention of this text was to help aspiring players create and play a character and more quickly initiate them into the intricacies of Crossfire. But, as things went along, many of the older docs began to be incorporated and lots of good reference material slipped in; this document may also be a good resource for more experienced players.
Having said all of that, lets point out that each release contains a fair amount of documentation and the Crossfire Player's Handbook is definitely not the last word! Certainly, every player will want to obtain the spoiler, and while this may sound flippant, its still true - a good place to start tracking down much of the information you may want is the README document in the top directory of your release.
1.1.2 Getting started:
Beginning players and first-time players may want to skim over sections character attributes, generating a character, Basics, and Beginning players before playing the game. Don't be daunted by the apparent complexity of Crossfire- in reality Crossfire is quite easy to play and character generation is simple. Later on, when you have some experience playing the game, you may wish to go back and reread skimmed material and expand your knowledge of the unread sections.
If you just want to damn the torpedoes and "roll" up a character quickly then proceed to section generating a character, in this text. You may still find section Beginning players helpful reading.
1.2 Crossfire Mailing Lists
Crossfire is under development and new versions are released regularly. To subscribe to the Crossfire Mailing Lists, visit the following:
Crossfire Administrators List
This list is used for discussion of issues for running a Crossfire server.
https://mailman.real-time.com/mailman/listinfo/crossfire-admin
Crossfire Announcement List
This list is used to announce new versions of Crossfire.
https://mailman.real-time.com/mailman/listinfo/crossfire-announce
Crossfire Discussion List
This list is used for general discussion and questions.
https://mailman.real-time.com/mailman/listinfo/crossfire-list
Crossfire Development List
This list is used for development questions, answers, and latest changes and
updates.
https://mailman.real-time.com/mailman/listinfo/crossfire-devel
Crossfire CVS List
This list is used to announce CVS check-ins.
http://lists.sourceforge.net/mailman/listinfo/crossfire-cvs
Crossfire Map List
This list is for discussing issues related specifically to crossfire maps.
http://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/crossfire-maps
1.3 Obtaining Crossfire
Crossfire is available to download from various websites and/or servers around the world.
1.3.1 Via FTP
The most common method is to use anonymous ftp from one of the following sites, choose the closest one to you for a faster transfer rate:
Primary:
http://sourceforge.net/project/showfiles.php?group_id=13833
Secondary:
ftp://ftp.real-time.com/pub/games/crossfire
ftp://ftp.cs.city.ac.uk:/pub/games/crossfire/
Please note that ALL linux users must have GTK-dev installed as well as xpmlib!!!.
1.3.2 Via WWW
See the FTP section, above.
1.4 Document Credits (prior version)
B.T. provided the bulk of the written material; K.E. and (to a lesser extent) J.K provided expert editing and typesetting advice. The Crossfire Player's Handbook uses material borrowed from older documentation written by the following people (in rough order of borrowing magnitude):
Sam Mackrill (lots of bits from the old FAQ)
Laurent Wacrenier
Kjetil T. Homme
Lars H. B. Olafsen
Peter Mardal
Rupert G. Goldie
Frank T. Johansen
Brian Thomas
Everything you see on the site now was copied over, reformatted, and updated by Rick Tanner
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