Submitting orders

Olympia: The Age of Gods PBEM (Oct 4 2000)

### 1.3.4: Submitting orders

Orders should be sent to orders@game.pbm.com. The game part of this address will normally be something like "tag7" and will be published in the game newsletter.

The ``Reply-To:`' header on turn reports is set to the correct address, so using the reply feature of your mailer should send orders to the right place.

The orders address is read by an automated daemon which scans the orders for syntax errors and queues them for your units. It will send a reply as soon as it receives mail from you, showing whether or not there were any errors with the orders it received.

Orders must be of the following form:

      begin player-number password
        .
        .  email, password commands
        .

      unit player-number
        .
        .  commands for player entity:  name, format or quit
        .

      unit unit-number
        .
        .  commands for unit
        .

      unit unit-number
        .
        .  commands for unit
        .

      end

The ``Subject:`' line on your message is ignored.

The `begin` keyword tells the order scanner what your player number is. If you have not set a password, you do not need to supply one.

The `unit` command replaces a set of orders for a unit. Any pending orders for the unit will be cleared, and the new orders sent in will queue up. Orders that are still executing for the unit will not be interrupted unless the first order queued is the `stop` order (see stop).

Do not match an `end` for every `unit` command! There should only be one `end`, at the end of all of the `unit` sections. The Olympia order parser will not read beyond the `end`.

For example, here is a set of orders for player Fate [812], who has two nobles, Osswid [5499] and Candide [1269]:

      begin 812
        password sneaky

      unit 5499
        explore
        move east
        explore
        study 1000

      unit 1269
        move north
        stack 5499

      end

The parser tries to be as flexible as possible. It is case insensitive and is not strict about spaces on a line, so you may use indentation to make your orders more readable.

Orders may be commented with the ``#`' character. Everything from a ``#`' to the end of the line will be ignored by the parser:

      move north    # Head to Drassa to meet up with Osswid
      stack 5499    # stack with him

No one will read the comments but you. Neither the GM nor the Olympia engine will try to interpret them for any reason.

Note that arguments must be enclosed in quotes if they are more than one word:

      name "Osswid the Constructor"

The acknowledgement will show any errors that occurred while the orders were being parsed, and list the current pending commands for all of your units.

- Interrupting orders
- Uncontrolled Units
- Order template
- Be careful
- Failed orders
- Player Entity
- Quitting the Game
- More examples
- Order of nobles
- Priority
- Precedence
- At the same time