Map Maker's Guide to Runes and Traps	(by peterm@soda.berkeley.edu)

In this document, 'rune' and 'trap' are interchangeable terms.

A rune is a magical inscription on the dungeon floor.  Traps are just like runes except they are not magical in nature, and generally have a physical attack.

Runes hit any monster or person who steps on them for dam damage in 'attacktype' attacktype.  In addition, there is a generalized rune which can contain any spell at all, and will cast this spell when it detonates.  

Many traps and runes are already defined in the archetypes.

Here's a guide the the fields in a Rune:  (archetype)

| level | level the rune will cast the spell it contains at, if applicable.   A level 99 rune casts a very, very mean spell of whatever.  (Warning: level 0 runes won't detonate at all!)  Also effects how easily a trap may be found and disarmed |
| Cha | determines what fraction of the time the rune is visible: randomly visible 1/Cha of the time.  Also effects how easily the trap may be found |
| sp | spell in the rune, if any (the index of the spell) FIXME still true? or using inventory? |
| slaying | name of the spell in the rune, if any. Optional, but if present, overrides sp. Recommended for use by mapmakers to ensure portability |
| other_arch | spell archetype of the spell in the rune, if any. Optional, but if present, overrides sp and slaying |
| hp | how many times the rune detonates before disappearing FIXME handle 0? |
| attacktype | if there isn't any spell, what attacktype to use when the rune detonates |
| face | face the rune has |
| msg | what the rune says to the victim when it detonates |
| dam | how much damage is done by the rune, if it does not cast a spell |
| anim \\ face1 \\ face2 \\ mina | face1 is the default face of the rune. face2 is the face of a rune detonation. A detonating rune inserts a dummy object with face2 on the square |
| direction | direction to cast the spell the rune contains |
| maxhp | number of spells to cast |

Predefined runes for your convenience:  See the Runes pickmap on the editor

IMPORTANT:  When making rune archetypes for spells, name the rune Object rune_[spell-name].  This convention makes it possible for someone who does 'cast magic rune <spell>' to create a rune that looks like your archetype.  Examples:
  * Object rune_large_fireball
  * Object rune_invisibility
  * Object rune_improved_invisibility

If they're not named this way, someone can write a rune of < > which looks nothing like the one in the archetypes, even though it does exactly the same thing.

All runes should be editable.  For example you might want to call up a rune of fire, and set its slaying so that it casts large fireball instead of simply burning its victim.

Ideas:  you could blanket a floor with 1pt dam runes of fire, but with many hp.  Anyone walking across this blanket will be badly hurt if he's slow or sits on them for a long time, but could cross more or less unhurt if he's quick.  You could encourage a player to do something rash this way.

You could place Runes of Healing behind altar-controlled doors in temples.  Dump enough money on the altar, and you get access to the Rune of Healing.  (Or restoration.)

Also, you could implement a magic bank with runes of transferrence in the same way.  (Roscoe's energy emporium!)

A rune of Polymorph with the beam directed down a long passageway of monsters could REALLY cause chaos.  Oohhhhh, fun, fun fun!! (except polymorph is disabled)

Runes of lightning oriented down long passageways could be lots of fun as well!