=== The Town and Wilderness ===


After you have created your character, you will begin your Zangband
adventure in the town. Symbols appearing on your screen will represent
the walls, floor, objects, features, and creatures lurking about. In
order to direct your character through his adventure, you will enter
single character commands (see command.txt [1]).


***** <MapSymbols>
=== Town and Wilderness Symbols ===

Symbols on your map can be broken down into three categories: terrain
features such as walls, floor and doors, and trees, water and lava;
objects which can be picked up such as treasure, weapons, magical
devices, etc; and creatures which may or may not move about, but are
mostly harmful to your character's well being. Symbols specific to the
town and wilderness are shown below. Note that many creatures and
objects from the dungeon may also appear in town and you should also
review the comprehensive listing of all the various symbols which can
be found in the dungeon section (see dungeon.txt#MapSymbols [2]).

  Terrains
  -------
  %     Trees and shrubs
  ~     Water/Lava terrains
  :     Rubble/Stone terrains
  ;     Grasses and swamps
  .     Floor terrains (road, dirt, sand, mud, etc)
  ^     Mountains
  >     Dungeon entrance
  #     Town walls
  +     Town gates
  [0-9] Shops and buildings


Note that some of these terrains may also appear in the dungeon.


***** <TownLevel>
=== The Town Level ===

The town level is where you will begin your adventure. The first time
you are in town it will be daytime (unless you are playing an undead
race who start at night), but note that the sun rises and falls as time
passes and if you enter the town at night, the town will be dark.
Fortunately, the various shops and the other special buildings are open
on a 24-hour basis.

Later versions of Zangband have introduced a dramatically extended town
level to the game. In addition to the basic town and the standard nine
shops, new buildings and multiple towns separated by a wilderness were
added. 

While most people welcome these new additions, they are not for
everyone and consequently, there are two possible town options in
Zangband - the 'Standard' town(s) and the 'Vanilla' town. The default
is the standard town. The vanilla town option can be selected during
character generation. (see option.txt#StartUp [3])

Your choice of town is fixed for the duration of your character's
life and will be the new default for future characters created with
that savefile. This of course may be changed during the creation of
your next character.

***** <StandardTown>
--- The 'Standard' Town ---

The 'standard' town consists of a large world which contains themed
wilderness terrain (mountainous areas, oceans, plains, etc). There are
several towns located in various parts of the world. The wilderness is
not uninhabited and can be dangerous indeed for the unwary. As a
general rule, the further your character gets from civilization the
more cautious he or she should be.  Your character will start in a
relatively harmless area of the wilderness.

Towns vary in size and will contain a differing selection of shops.
The starting town will contain an entrance to the dungeon and a
Dungeon Supplies store which carries all the basic items you need to
get through the first few levels of the game.  As your character gains
levels, you will need to journey into the wilderness seeking other
towns and cities to purchase and sell higher-level objects.

Zangband contains more than 100 different kinds of shops each with
different themes. Specialist stores may stock powerful items but
usually at steep premiums.  Note that some shops offer services, rather
than products. You should also note that the largere towns, do not
contain entrances to the dungeon.  You must be within a certain
proximity to a dungeon entrance for spells and scrolls which teleport
you to the dungeon to work.


***** <VanillaTown>
--- The 'Vanilla' Town ---

The vanilla town consists of nine shops (including a home) and an
impenetrable wall which surrounds the town. There are no other
embellishments. The nine shops available are similar to those in
standard Angband (withth addition of a book store) and are designed to
be sufficient for an entire game of Zangband.


***** <Townspeople>
=== Townspeople ===

The town contains many different kinds of people. There are the street
urchins, young children who will mob an adventurer for money, and seem
to come out of the woodwork when excited. Blubbering idiots are a
constant annoyance, but not harmful. Public drunks wander about the
town singing, and are of no threat to anyone. Sneaky rogues who work
for the black market are always greedily eyeing your backpack for
potential new 'purchases'. . . And finally, what town would be complete
without a swarm of half drunk warriors, who take offense or become
annoyed just for the fun of it.

Most of the townspeople should be avoided by the largest possible
distance when you wander from store to store. Fights will break out,
though, so be prepared. Since your character grew up in this world of
intrigue, no experience is awarded for killing the town inhabitants,
though you may acquire treasure.

One word of warning however, occasionally a creature who normally
would inhabit only the wilderness and dungeons may wander into the
town. These should generally be handled with much more caution
than the ordinary townspeople.


***** <Shopping>
=== Shopping in Town ===

Your character will begin his adventure with some basic supplies, and
some extra gold with which to purchase more supplies at the town
stores. You may enter any open store and barter with the owner for
items you can afford by simply moving onto the entrance, which is
represented by a number from 0 to 9.

Once inside a store, you will see the name and race of the store owner,
the name of the store, the maximum amount of cash that the store owner
will pay for any one item, and the store inventory, listed along with
tentative prices, which will become "fixed" (at the "final offer")
should you ever manage to haggle a store owner down to his final offer
(see below [4]).

You will also see an (incomplete) list of available commands. Note that
many of the commands which work in the dungeon work in the stores as
well, but some do not, especially those which involve "using" objects.

Stores do not always have everything in stock. As the game progresses,
they may get new items so check from time to time. Also, if you sell
them an item, it may get sold to a customer while you are adventuring,
so don't always expect to be able to get back everything you have sold.
Note that the inventory of a store will not change while you are in
town, even if you save the game and return. You must spend time in the
dungeon if you wish the store owner to clear out his stock and acquire
new items. If you have a lot of spare gold, you can purchase every item
in a store, which will induce the store owner to bring out new stock,
and perhaps even retire.

Store owners will not buy harmful or useless items. If an object is
unidentified, they will pay you some base price for it. Once they have
bought it they will immediately identify the object. If it is a good
object, they will add it to their inventory. If it was a bad bargain,
they simply throw the item away. In any case, you may receive some
knowledge of the item if another is encountered.

Note that in Zangband, store owners will buy more items than they sell.
Consequently, it is possible to sell an item to a shopkeeper and not
to have it appear in the store's inventory of things to sell.  If you
plan to buy somehting back at a later date, make sure you sell the item
in a store that stocks such items.


***** <Bartering>
--- Bartering ---

When bartering, you enter prices you will pay (or accept) for some
object. You can either enter the absolute amount, or precede a number
with a plus or minus sign to give a positive or negative increment on
your previous offer. But be warned that the owners can easily be
insulted, and may even throw you out for a while if you insult them too
often.

If you consistently bargain well in a store, that is, you reach the
final offer much more often than not, then the store owner will
eventually recognize that you are a superb haggler, and will go
directly to the final offer instead of haggling with you. Items which
cost less than 10 gold pieces do not count, as haggling well with these
items is usually either very easy or almost impossible. The more
expensive the item is, the less likely the store owner is to assume
that you are a good haggler.

Note that you may disable haggling with a software option, though this
will inflict a 10% "sales tax" on all purchases for which the store
owner would have required you to haggle. (See option.txt for details).


***** <ObjectPricing>
---- Object Pricing ---

Each store owner has three primary attributes: the maximum amount they
will pay for an object, their race and how greedy they are. Each of
these affects how much a store owner will charge for an object and how
much they are prepared to pay for something. Only the first two
attributes can be known by the player. The final factors affecting
pricing are the race and charisma of the player.

Each object has a base value which is contained in the game's source
code. This value is modified based on the store owner's greed (greedy
store owners charge more and will pay less), your charisma (charismatic
players pay less and can charge more) and whether or not the shopkeeper
is friendly to your race (dwarves dislike elves so a dwarf shopkeeper
will charge an elf player more and pay less for items the player is
selling).

Finally, when selling objects, the cap on the store owner's purse is
applied so that even a favored race with a high charisma can not sell
an item for more than that amount. This cap applies only to single
items so it is possible to sell a stack of similar items for more than
the cap on the store owner's purse.


***** <TheShops>
=== List of Shops ===

Junk Stores ("0")
     Junk stores stock, lets face it, junk.  But you may occasionally
     find smoething of use within them.

General Suplies Stores ("1")
     General stores typically stock basic necessities for entering the
     dungeon such as food, drink, some clothing, torches, lamps, oil,
     shovels, picks, and spikes. Some general stores (notably the
     "Dungeon Supplies" store) may also sell basic magical items.

Armour Stores ("2")
     Armour stores are where the town's armor is fashioned. All sorts
     of protective gear may be bought and sold here.

Weapons Stores ("3")
     Weapons stores are where the town's weapons are fashioned.
     Hand and missile weapons may be purchased and sold here, along
     with arrows, bolts, and shots.


Alchemy Stores ("5")
     Alchemy Stores deal in all types of potions and scrolls and
     magical books.

Magic User's Stores ("6")
     Magic User's Stores deal in all sorts of rings, wands, amulets,
     and staves, as well as some magic books.

Your Home ("8")
     This is your house where you can store objects that you cannot
     carry on your travels, or will need at a later date.

Special Buildings ("7" and "9")
     Special buildings provide services at a price.



--
Original   : (??)
Updated    : (??)
Updated    : Zangband DevTeam
Last update: May 25, 2001


***** Begin Hyperlinks
***** [1] command.txt
***** [2] dungeon.txt#MapSymbols
***** [3] option.txt#StartUp
***** [4] town.txt#Bartering
