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From: liang@cvl.UUCP (Eli Liang)
Newsgroups: net.games.hack
Subject: Re: Re: Hack comments + questions (SPOILER)
Message-ID: <1644@cvl.UUCP>
Date: Fri, 25-Jan-85 12:51:54 EST
Article-I.D.: cvl.1644
Posted: Fri Jan 25 12:51:54 1985
Date-Received: Tue, 29-Jan-85 05:53:25 EST
References: <181@CS-Mordred> <3@gitpyr.UUCP> <204@masscomp.UUCP> <764@clyde.UUCP>
Organization: Computer Vision Lab, U. of Maryland, College Park
Lines: 44

> > In article <3@gitpyr.UUCP> robert@gitpyr.UUCP (Robert Viduya) writes:
> > >> And once on a deep level I quaffed monster detection and saw a segment
> > >> of the dungeon absolutely congested with monsters 
> > >Monster congestion like that is called a 'zoo'. I think some machine-run
> > >person in the dungeon named 'David' handles all the zoos.
> >
> > Unless your friendly implementor changes the code, only login id's called
> > "david" ever see treasure zoos.
> 
> This is not exactly correct. I know that when playing as wizard
> ( -w option ) there are treasure zoos. 
> 
> It's sort of a pity that normal people don't see treasure zoo's, maybe
> the code should be changed to give a ( very ) small chance of getting
> one -- ...

Well, that's what we thought, until we found out that strcmp IS NOT a
straight boolean function, but returns -x, 0, or x, where x is a random
integer (indicating less than, equal to, and greater than in collating sequence)
Therefore, david ALWAYS gets a zoo when below level 6, and the rest of us
toesuckers have a one in 7 chance each level below level 6 of getting a zoo.
So you see, it already has been changed...even before anybody suggested a
change.

The original code was about
	if (dlevel >6 && (!rn2(7) || !strcmp("david",getlogin())))
					mkzoo();
Of course, if you have a david on your system (as we do), and if you don't
feel he deserves an unfair advantage, making it (dlevel>6 && !rn2(7)) is
equivalent.  And of course, commenting out the 'if' is an easy way to flex
your (feeble) level 1 muscles in a zoo.  If you're so inclined.

- (assorted free radicals munging source code)

Forwarded by:


-- 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Eli Liang  ---
        University of Maryland Computer Vision Lab, (301) 454-4526
        ARPA: liang@cvl, eli@mit-mc, eli@mit-prep  CSNET: liang@cvl
        UUCP: {seismo,allegra,brl-bmd}!umcp-cs!cvl!liang