DiMono
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So I got froggy and did the last 4 sections of the website in reverse order, and the Game Info first page. Here are my editing suggestions:

frameset: left frame background image is out of line with the rest of it. Not text, but still relevant. Most easily visible on the Game Info first page

contact page: "fanart" should be "fan-art" or "fan art"

fun stuff page: The Forum: change "...message board. Wait until you see" to "message board; just you wait and see!"

fun stuff page: The Hall of Legendary Smitemasters: remove the "have" in "Dugan's Dungeon and have defeated the 'Neather." or else replace "and have defeated" with "to defeat"

Hall of Legendary Smitemasters: replace "'Neather itself" with "'Neather himself"
HoLS: remove ", if necessary." as it's unnecessary (I slay me)
HoLS: put a comma in "isn't complete since I'm sure"
HoLS: replace "those of you" with "some"
HoLS: remove "they're going" from "...work out how they're going to get back up"...
HoLS: replace "(there being" with "(since there are"

Downloads: put a space between the opening paragraph and the table
Downloads: add some styles to the table to make it more readable
Downloads: change "results are so far positive" with "results so far are positive" or "results are positive so far" or "so far, results are positive"
Downloads: change "really felt like it" to "really feel like it"
Downloads: change "if you wanted" to "if you wanted to"

Download Extras: same table suggestions as the main downloads page
DEs: paragraph 1 rewrite: "These are files that work with DROD to add some variety to the game. What more can I say?"
DEs: why is there a paragraph that says "What?"?
DEs: change "according to what order you want the demo to play." to "according to where in the demo play order you want it to play
DEs: change "until you've reached" to "until you reach"
DEs: rewrite for savefiles.zip info: "For Webfoot DROD: This file contains save files for every floor in DROD. Unzip the file and select the save file for the floor you wish to go to, then put it in your DROD\\dat directory and rename it slotx.sav. (x=Number of the saved game you will replace in DROD.)"
DEs: last paragraph rewrite: "Just click the one you'd like to assign as your AIM Buddy Icon, and show the world you love DROD far too much! I know, it's not possible to love DROD too much, but we can pretend."

Tips: center everything
General Help: change "everything being given away" to "anything being..."
GH: swap the first two sentences
GH: Tight Spots: change "like in the above scenario" to "like this one"
GH: TS: change "take out one of them on your first step out of the passage" to "take one of them out as you exit the passage"
GH: Horde-Management Techniques: paragraph 1 rewrite: "There are many rooms where roaches and other monsters try to gang up on you, swarming you with superior numbers; this can be a little overwhelming. The situation may seem hopeless, but if you pick the right location to make your stand you can survive. Let's look at Beethro's position here:"
GH: HMTs: change "Try never to leave more than two when there are a bunch" to "Try to never leave more than two open squares when there are lots"
GH: HMTs: in the last sentence, replace "destroy" with "kill"

Room Help: remove "the" and "that" from the first sentence
RH: change "if you want" to "if you just want"
RH: Level 3, 3S1W: paragraph 1 rewrite: "First figure out your exit path. There's only one, and if you go there first you'll have an easier time in this room. You could also hide in an arrow, but if you don't choose wisely then you're roachmeat"
RH: Level 8, 7S3E: change "remember them" to "remember where they are"
RH: Level 8, 7S3E: change "if you kill them in this order" to "to kill the tar mothers in this order"
RH: Level 8, 7S3E: change ", although you'll have to go back north to kill that one." to ". NOTE: you will have to retrace your steps to reach the last tar mother."
RH: Level 8, 7S3E: change "safe when it starts to reach 0." to "safe as it approaches 0."

RH: Level 13: I think the first paragraph should include at the end "It should be noted that the famed 'left hand rule' will not work on this level."

RH: Level 23, 1N: change "goblin/s" to "goblin(s)"
RH: Level 23, 1N: change "go first after the trapdoors." to "go after the trapdoors first;"

Game Info: remove the "to know" from "Need to know some information..."

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agaricus5
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DiMono wrote:
DEs: why is there a paragraph that says "What?"?

It's some sort of random humour that I can't understand. It's something to do with the previous statement being unsatisfactory in giving enough details. I asked before about this sort of thing, but I got an answer that it's the style Mattcrampy writes in, so I would really not chase this one up to be edited if I were you.

GH: HMTs: change "Try never to leave more than two when there are a bunch" to "Try to never leave more than two open squares when there are lots"

Or even "Try never to leave more than two when there are a group" because "lots" of monsters does imply a large number, when in fact it could be just a small group of 5 or 6.

RH: Level 3, 3S1W: paragraph 1 rewrite: "First figure out your exit path. There's only one, and if you go there first you'll have an easier time in this room. You could also hide in an arrow, but if you don't choose wisely then you're roachmeat"

It should be "hide on an arrow" because Beethro technically doesn't go on arrows, but steps on them.

But yes, overall, these are pretty good improvements.

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DiMono
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agaricus5 wrote:
It should be "hide on an arrow" because Beethro technically doesn't go on arrows, but steps on them.

That's what I thought too, but "hide in an arrow" is what's up there currently

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Mattcrampy
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agaricus5 wrote:

DiMono wrote:
DEs: why is there a paragraph that says "What?"?

It's some sort of random humour that I can't understand.

That's because it's not funny. I'm sure it was when I wrote it but it just doesn't work.

Overall, there's a lot of stuff here I shouldn't have done. Some of your suggestions, however, leave me at a bit of a loss because I can't work out how I'm supposed to fix them and at the same time have the same effect - for some of them, such as the Hall page "(there being no children in that version)", the odd grammar's quite deliberate. Often I've just given up and removed the sentence entirely, which is probably the job of all good editors.

One thing, though: Any specific suggestions as to what I should do with the tables?

(I'm playing with the Hall at the moment, putting it into a table. I'm going to have to get other people's feedback for what I've done with it.)

Oh, and you can pick apart the Eighth article soon as well. It's done, but I think I want to edit it first.

Matt

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Oneiromancer
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Oh, I think that kind of humor can be funny, and I did think it was vaguely amusing when I read it, but it really only works in a real-life situation, like in a Monty Python sketch or something like that. If you can imagine Matt giving a John Cleeseian monologue then it becomes funnier.

Game on,

____________________________
"He who is certain he knows the ending of things when he is only beginning them is either extremely wise or extremely foolish; no matter which is true, he is certainly an unhappy man, for he has put a knife in the heart of wonder." -- Tad Williams

Mattcrampy
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Oneiromancer wrote:
If you can imagine Matt giving a John Cleeseian monologue then it becomes funnier.

Isn't that like a given? Most things are funnier when given in a John Cleeseian monologue.

Matt

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Oneiromancer
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No they aren't.

<Insert rest of Argument Sketch here>

Game on,

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"He who is certain he knows the ending of things when he is only beginning them is either extremely wise or extremely foolish; no matter which is true, he is certainly an unhappy man, for he has put a knife in the heart of wonder." -- Tad Williams

DiMono
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Well, here's the code for a small sample table that includes most (all?) of what I think should be there. Obviously, the colours can be changed as you see fit. Incidentally, it'll validate xhtml 1.0 transitional

<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Transitional//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-transitional.dtd">
<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml" lang="en">
<head><title>Table Demo</title><style type="text/css">

.row1 {background: #9cf;}
.row2 {background: #9f9;}
table {margin-left: auto;margin-right: auto;margin-top: 20px;margin-bottom: 20px;text-align: left;border: 1px solid red;}
th {padding: 0px 10px 0px 10px;font-family: Comic Sans MS, Sans-Serif;border-bottom: 2px solid black;}
td {border-left: 1px solid black;border-right: 1px solid black;font-weight: bold;}

</style></head><body background="http://drod.net/Images/mainbackground.jpg"><table cellspacing="0">

<tr class="row1"><th>Dummy Heading 1</th><th>Dummy Heading 2</th></tr>
<tr class="row2"><td>Dummy Entry 1.1</td><td>Dummy Entry 1.2</td></tr>
<tr class="row1"><td>Dummy Entry 2.1</td><td>Dummy Entry 2.2</td></tr>
<tr class="row2"><td>Dummy Entry 3.1</td><td>Dummy Entry 3.2</td></tr>
<tr class="row1"><td>Dummy Entry 4.1</td><td>Dummy Entry 4.2</td></tr>

</table></body></html>

Note to self: don't do html pages in code blocks. Trying ctrl-ving in tab stops now... Alright, let's settle for putting the leading spaces in code blocks... man this is tedious.

Alright, I'll just make it lots of long lines then. Note to self: start thread in the "the forum" board

[Edited by DiMono on 11-30-2003 at 09:13 PM GMT]

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DiMono
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Matt: This upcoming week is exam crunch time, so I won't have a real chance to look over the rest of the site until friday, when I'll look at everything else. What've you already gotten to?

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Mattcrampy
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I've done most of the changes you've suggested already. Most of what I've done isn't so much going with your changes (somehow I see it as cheating) but instead using your suggestions as red flags to fix. Some of the web-site's character has been lost a little, but on the other hand while I'm at it I've found plenty of great things to add.

They're sitting on my master copy (which I haven't updated because I'm doing re-design and haven't sat down and fixed my continuing transparent gif problems). So far, I've decided to set aside a section for Caravel DROD (as opposed to Webfoot, AE or Journey) called "Hints & Info". It's mostly an amalgam of the Tips section and the Game Info section, with some things I felt were better there.

I've also got two new sections, one called "Architects" and one called "Development". "Architects" is for the Toolkit regular feature, which I expect I'm going to have to nominate people to do, and "Development" is for news on anything DROD-related being made.

What I'll most likely do in the interim is FTP over and change the website text.

I've also got the hold download in an incomplete state.

Matt

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DiMono
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This is more a code thing than anything, Oneiromancer's bar in the Statistics section of the forum is 5 pixels too long, making the start- and end-bar images appear above and below it instead of at either end. This just involves changing the number used to calculate bar length in the script that generates the page.

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Schik
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DiMono wrote:
This is more a code thing than anything, Oneiromancer's bar in the Statistics section of the forum is 5 pixels too long, making the start- and end-bar images appear above and below it instead of at either end. This just involves changing the number used to calculate bar length in the script that generates the page.

Hmmm... No matter how small I make my browser window, the three images all appear as they should. The column widths are percentages and not absolute, so the "5 pixel" thing seems specific to your browser window.

I suppose I could put the three images into a table to ensure that they don't get placed on different lines. I wonder why it doesn't split lines on IE? I guess that's why I use IE (see your poll thread) - I'm not saying it's rendering of the page is the "correct" one, but you can be pretty sure that any page you visit has been tested on IE, so you should be seeing it as it's intended.

I'll put it on my list of things to fix.

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Oneiromancer
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I'm just a troublemaker, aren't I?

Game on,

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"He who is certain he knows the ending of things when he is only beginning them is either extremely wise or extremely foolish; no matter which is true, he is certainly an unhappy man, for he has put a knife in the heart of wonder." -- Tad Williams

DiMono
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Oneiromancer wrote:
I'm just a troublemaker, aren't I?

Game on,

I knew that as soon as I entered this forum. Anyone whose name is a word I have to ask the meaning of can't be good.

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Oneiromancer
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Well, I have no idea what DiMono means so I guess we're in the same boat.

Game on,

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"He who is certain he knows the ending of things when he is only beginning them is either extremely wise or extremely foolish; no matter which is true, he is certainly an unhappy man, for he has put a knife in the heart of wonder." -- Tad Williams

DiMono
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When I was at the University of Waterloo I played a Mage in the White Wolf game Mage: The Ascention named Leonardo DiMono. I happened to not tell anyone there my last name, and roleplayed this mage so well that people just started calling me DiMono on a regular basis. It just kinda stuck with me.

Now, if you're looking for a translation/interpretation:

DiMono = The Man
DiMono = The One
DiMono = Two of(Di) One(Mono)
DiMono = unintelligent(dim) on(on) nothing(o)

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DiMono
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Schick: It's a % of 300, right? What about changing it to a % of 295, and making the right-most column of fixed width? Though you could always just leave the % of 300 and set the column to fixed width 305... anyway, just my $.02

[Edited by DiMono on 12-08-2003 at 04:13 AM GMT]

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Schik
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Instead of futzing with the size, I gave the <td> it's in a nowrap flag - does that fix it for you? I can't really test it, but it at least looks the same to me.

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Mattcrampy
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That works. Good work, Schik!

Matt

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DiMono
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Yup, all good. I'm almost at 3.2 posts per day now

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DiMono
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I just took a quick browse through the site, and I noticed something:

The screenshots mention in the Caravel blurb that we're all hyped about the snazzy new editor we get, but there aren't any screenshots of said editor. Can we stick a few in?

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Mattcrampy
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Yeah, I'm on it. I haven't gotten around to it yet.

Matt

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DiMono
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File: banner7.png (19.7 KB)
Downloaded 51 times.
License: Other
From: Unspecified

Not really a proofreading update, but I devoted my meager pixel manipulation skills to fixing the transparency issues with that DROD:AE is live! Get it! image on the front page. I also figured out why the pipe wasn't quite lining up and fixed it (the image was 80 pixels tall and being stretched to 81), and I filled in what looked like missing pixels from the letters AE and separated the bottom dot in the colon from the A. I've attached it as banner7.png (I saved separate files for each step I did, this is just what I got up to), if you like it feel free to use it on the front page.

[Edited by DiMono on 12-22-2003 at 10:01 AM GMT]

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DiMono
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File: banner1.gif (32.8 KB)
Downloaded 50 times.
License: Other
From: Unspecified

In my editing of banner2.png I discovered that banner1.gif had to be edited as well because it had a vertical line at the right edge. Here's my corrected banner1.gif

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DiMono
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I've taken a look at the frames on the front page, and noticing that the background images don't quite line up right, here is my suggestion:

Change all the 'Bgproperties="fixed"' to CSS background-attachment: fixed;
(because the main frame background scrolls with the page under my browser)

Also, there's no background-position for the left frame. This needs to be set to 147px 0px for the image to line up right with the other frames
This was probably just overlooked, and is simple enough to add in.

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Mattcrampy
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Er...

Thanks for that, but I've also fixed this on the master copy independently of you.

I still haven't fixed my transparancy woes with the Gimp, but it has no problem taking transparancy I've already got. So I just took the old images and copied the prepared blank spaces in.

I actually fiddled with the pipe so it lined up properly, making it larger in Paint. How I got the transparancy to stay is a state secret (I can't remember).

The banner will change every update or so, as I use it to highlight recent changes to the site/forum/what have you.

And CityDesk will randomly delete the body tag I'm using to keep the left border lined up. So when it happens I have to fix it.

I guess my problem is I got too ambitious for this update, so I'm doing nearly everything I wanted to, and it's taking more time than it should have.

Matt, who's really fouling things up

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DiMono
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Another night with nothing to do, another round of DROD.net proofreading. I went over every page except the stories, and here's what I found (even with some new content from budding explorer Dimthro Budkin):

In general: I think the background image for the top frame is one pixel too low.

Upcoming Features:

"The adder will grow in length until they are led into a trap, as exterminators currently do for, at which point they will shrink as usual." How about "The adder will grow in length until it is led in to a trap, as exterminators currently do for regular serpents, at which point it will shrink as expected."


Downloads: "You'll need a DROD Forumaccount" should have a space between Forum and account


Room hints, 23 1 North: "make sure go you first" Nice one.


Roach Queen page: Is it worth mentioning that they can't lay eggs on doors, arrows, or trapdoors?


Wraithwing page: There's a lot of redundant redundancy on this page. Dimthro Budkin has some words of wisdom:

"So Gunthro doesn't have anything to say about Wraithwings. Hah! Who needs him? When Wraithwings are together, they're brave enough to attack you. When they're alone, they're almost as cowardly as a Roach Queen. If you line some of them up, the farthest one will be trying to reach you, preventing the others from escaping, and you can kill them by simply walking forward."


Evil Eyes page: "When the nesting area is found," Could we change this to "When they find one,"? It's less redundant, as nesting areas are mentioned four words earlier too.

"such a way that an explorer entering that area will fall into their line of sight and wake them from sleep." Could we change this to "such a way that any explorer entering will fall in to their line of sight, waking them up."?


Dimthro Budkin has the following words of wisdom on Serpents:

"Don't be scared of large groups of serpents, as you can play them against each other. Serpents can't move through each other."


Living Tar page: "around its perimeter. Corners withstand..." I think that should be "around its perimeter; corners withstand..."

"It is difficult to explain the rules for tar reshaping in words," I think "in words" is unnecessary... what else are you going to explain it in?

"Tar babies will attack on the turn following their formation and in the same manner as dungeon roaches." I think the and should just be a comma


Goblin page: "or you'll soon have to play "find the internal organ"." I think it would be funny if an "again" was tacked on to the end of that. "or you'll soon have to play "find the internal organ" again."

Dimthro Budkin has the following words of wisdom on Goblins:

"Goblins are smart, but they're not smart enough. If youre back is to a wall, you're safe."
"If you leave a goblin no choice, he'll attack, even if it's not in his own best interest."


Brain page: "When an explorer enters the room" I think, in light of new logic between invisibility potions and brains, this should say "If it knows an explorer is in the room"

"to prevent monsters from finding Beethro" monsters should be changed to them, as it's already known we're talking about monsters.


'Neather page: "was never found again" shouldn't that found be a "seen" or a "heard from"?

"he learned all of the secrets" I think the of should be removed.

Dimthro Budkin has the following words of wisdom on the 'Neather:

"Stupid 'Neather... he's not to be trusted. You have to make him think that what's best for you is actually best for him, and he's very selfish. To defeat him, you must be as mean as he is."


News page: there's no background image


Erik's Bio: second last paragraph: "If he did that, he'd probably also need to ask help from his parents" I think that should be "ask for help from his parents"


And that's all I've got.

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The_Red_Hawk
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DiMono wrote:
"So Gunthro doesn't have anything to say about Wraithwings. Hah! Who needs him? When Wraithwings are together, they're brave enough to attack you. When they're alone, they're almost as cowardly as a Roach Queen. If you line some of them up, the farthest one will be trying to reach you, preventing the others from escaping, and you can kill them by simply walking forward."

I wonder why brains never change the cowardly behaviour. Surely brains should know that three squares is enough to be away from Beethro's sword?

I don't really think roach queens are cowardly though - they just show common sense by getting away because they cannot harm Beethro.

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Snapping, turning, rising, swirling,
Screeching, flipping, gliding, sliding,
The red hawk's dance of death.

.....the king of the skies.....

DiMono
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It's all perspective, my friend. Dimthro is cocky.

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Mattcrampy
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You just want to be up on the monsters pages, don't you?

I don't think there's enough of Claythro's advice on there as I wanted, so maybe someone to argue with Moorteo would be good. Or maybe the whole point of those pages is to present information in a clear and concise manner.



Matt

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