Setting up an account and character on DH can seem daunting. There are prompts in the game which will help you along with this, but if you wish a bit more help, here's a first-timer friendly guide.

Account and Character Creation

a beginners guide in 22 easy steps

STEP 1: Think up your character.

Before one even begins the process, it is very wise to have an idea of your character already in your head. Is it a man or a woman? Are they a brash, easily angered sailor with fiery red hair and freckles? Perhaps you wish to play a quiet Aiian merchant, trafficking freshly baked sweet-pies down by the docks, short in stature, weak, but wise. No matter what you plan to play, it is good to ponder a fair bit on your character first, so that you are better able to fill out the necessary information when it comes to create them.

If you can come up with a basic look, history, personality, and vocation for your character, then you’re more than ready to start the character creation process.

STEP 2: Signing On

To play Dark Horizon, you’ll need a mud client. This can be GMUD, ZMUD, or any telnet program. You can find links to mud client programs, and information on connecting at the SIGNING ON help page.

Once you’ve downloaded your mud client, you’re going to want to make a new connection, and enter in the following information at the prompts.

Address: darkh.com
Port: 7000

Sign on. If the login screen comes up, you’re good to move on!

STEP 3: Account Name

If you already have a DH account, skip to step 9. If not, choose your account name now. This IS NOT your character name, but it is the name the admins will know you by as a player. It can be the name of your first pc, it can even be your real name. Type it in and press ‘enter’.

STEP 4: Email

Enter your email address. Keep in mind, we will not share this email address in any way, nor will we spam your inbox. If we ever do use your email (which is unlikely, unless you email us first), then it will be entirely game-related. This is mostly for confirmation, and to make sure no player is playing on two different accounts.

STEP 5: Comment

Tell us a bit about yourself! If you have a past characters on other muds, let us know! We always like to see when our peers come to play our own mud. We’d also love to know how you learned about DH, and what brought you to us. (It helps us tally how well our advertising is doing.)

STEP 6: Color

Type yes or no. If you have downloaded GMUD or ZMUD, either from the links right here, or from above, then ansi color will work on your client. It’s much easier to play the game with color, and you can always turn the color off later from the account menu, so if you don’t know if you client supports color, just hit yes now. It won’t break anything.

STEP 7: Consent

This is VERY IMPORTANT.

The consent indicator indicates to other players whether you wish to participate in role-play of a possibly disturbing nature (such as graphic violence and rape) if it comes up in game-play. If you do not wish to experience such rp situations, type OFF.

If you set your consent indicator 'on' by typing ON, you will be indicating to other players in game, that should the situation come up, they may go right ahead with any sort of violent and/or sexual rp they feel is appropriate to the situation.

Note: When in game, you may toggle your consent indicator on or off at any time. If you see another player toggle their indicator off, YOU MUST HALT ALL OBJECTIONABLE ROLE-PLAY IMMEDIATELY. Failure to do this may get you instantly booted and banned from the game, no questions asked.

If you are playing the game, and you need to avoid some disturbing violent or sexual role-play, type 'consent off'. This will not spare your pc the results of the situation, but it will tell the other players they must resort to simple emotes such as 'so and so cuts out so and so's tongue', and stop any graphic detail.

STEP 8: Submit

Submit and a password will be sent to your email. Log back in using that password.

STEP 9: Create a New Character.

By now you should be on the main menu. You will see an option, ‘New Character Creation’. Choose it by pressing N.

STEP 10: Name

Choose a name for your character. Often this is the most difficult step! If you wish to create an alias or a nickname for your character, you will have the chance to do this at a later time. For now, just enter the first or last name of your pc.

(‘PC’: Player-character - Another word for one’s character).

STEP 11: Sex
Male or female. If you are just beginning, you might find it easier to play a character of the same gender. Keep in mind, though many societies in history experienced an inequality of rights leaning towards the male being in power, in Aiian society, the inequality of rights leans toward the female having greater sway.

STEP 12: Race

There are many different races and bloodlines available for play in DH. More information on them can be found in the LIBRARY on the RACES page. Not all races may be visible to you at first. As the game progresses, and one gains more and more ‘role-play points’ more races become available for play.

If you’re just beginning, it may be easier to choose ‘Aiian’, as that is the most common race, and the one with the least historical baggage.

STEP 13: Age

Choose your character’s age, between 5 and 80. Keep in mind, Aiians age at rates comparable to humans, so expect some severe changes to your abilities should you choose to go very old or very young.

STEP 14: Height and Frame

Enter your height and frame, following the example on the screen. This should be rather easy if you have a picture of your character in your head. Just give them the stature you picture. Keep in mind, if you’ve chosen a race that’s generally shorter or taller, the game will factor that in.

STEP 15: Attributes
Here we get into some mechanics. Described on the screen are your eight attributes. They are: Strength, Dexterity, Agility, Consitution, Willpower, Intelligence, Perception, and Aura. Seem confusing? Don’t worry! All you have to do is put them in order of importance to your character concept. Is your character stronger than they are wise, intelligent, quick, etc? Then put Strength first. Are they very intelligent and extremely weak? Put intelligence first and constitution last.

Here are explanations of each attribute score.

STR - Strength - The physical strength of your character. Simply put, muscles! These may come from being born strong, or from excessive working out! Strength makes a big difference in combat, especially when one is using weapons which depend more on brute force than finesse.

DEX - Dexterity - This reflects how skillful one is with one’s hands. Things that might be affected by dexterity are finesse when using weapons, and tasks which depend on manipulating small objects, such as sewing, picking a lock, or picking someone’s pocket!

AGI - Agility - How quick is your character on their feet? Running, jumping, dodging, all these things depend on agility.

CON - Constitution - Can your character get back up after a whallop? Constitution expresses one’s ability to take punches, get hurt, avoid sickness, and generally embody ‘tough’.

WIL - Willpower - How determined is your character, how hard-headed? Willpower is toughness of the spirit, tenacity of the mind. Though largely a score that affects role-play, willpower can come in pretty handy if one’s mind is intruded upon, whether it be by magic, poison, or some other means. Some also say that one with strong willpower can hold on to their body longer, buying those precious seconds while your comrades speed you to a sawbones…

INT - Intelligence - Another score which has a large affect on role-play, intelligence is one’s smarts, simply put. Intelligence, however, is not wisdom, and the smartest intellectual can still miss noticing the forest while quoting the growth rate of trees. Someone with poor intelligence is expected to reflect such in their play.

PER - Perception - Perception can be likened to wisdom. Simply put, it’s knowing what to look for, and being able to recognize patterns in a more humble, gut way than intelligence. An old codger who’s spent many years at sea may have a high score in perception. This can be a very important score for those who brave the wild, where it pays to notice -everything-.

AUR - Aura - One’s connection with magical energies. While a good aura score does not guarantee use of magic, it does mean that one is magically connected in some way. As a character, one most likely does not know this. In fact, one can play an entire character’s lifetime with a high aura, and never see anything come of it. One thing is for certain, though. Strange things can happen when magic is involved.

So there you have it. Eight scores. Put them in order using the three letter abbreviations and let’s move on!

STEP 16: Description
Here, write a paragraph or so describing your character. Write it entirely in the third person, and do not include any details regarding what the character is wearing, their surroundings, their thoughts, or their feelings. In other words, you know your character, but others don’t. Write this description as if you are observing your character, and only know what you can see. Here’s an example.

Impressively tall, this man looks as though few doors would accept him comfortably, the raised chin and rod-straight posture only exacerbating the issue. Sharp, green eyes carry flecks of rust within the iris, sun and torchlight causing the flecks to glint golden. His cheekbones are high, and his body overly thin, though each limb seems taught, bearing a strength more akin to a branch or reed, than of any apparent muscle. His lips are thin and severe, and his skin pale and clear, showing no sign of stubble.

Remember, when you’re done with the last line, hit return, and then enter a ‘@’ on a line by itself.

STEP 17: Short Description
This one’s easy. You already wrote out the paragraph above. Now select a couple of details about your character, and put them in a half sentence sort of structure. Like this.

a short, grey-eyed girl
a brown-haired youth
a blonde, strapping young man
a tall, buxom lass

Use ‘a’ or ‘an’ to start the term, and make sure all letters are lowercase. This is what other players will see whenever your character speaks or performs an action.

STEP 18: Long Description
This one’s even easier. The long description is just like the short, but it’s a full sentence.

A short girl with grey eyes stands here.
A reed-thin youth with brown hair stands here on one good leg.
A strapping man with flowing blonde hair is here.
A buxom lass of tall stature looks about inquisitively.

Remember to start the sentence with ‘A’ or ‘An’ and make sure the first letter is capitalized. The more alike the short and long description is, the easier it is for other players to recognize you. This is what other character will see when you are standing in a room.

STEP 19: Keywords
Looking at your long and short descriptions, enter in all descriptive words you find there. Also include any aliases or nicknames you wish your character to have. If you character has a first or last name that’s not your character name, feel free to include it.

short girl grey eyes grey-eyed
brown-haired youth reed-thin hair good leg peg-leg Pete
strapping man flowing blonde hair young Fabio
buxom lass tall stature

STEP 20: Skills
You will see a screen with many different skills listed. Skills are basically things your character knows how to do. Skills start out at a certain level, and increase through use in game. Keep in mind, this game is -not- about getting the highest level of skill, or getting the most skills. Any behavior moving towards one of those two aims will meet with the most extreme staff displeasure: See CHEATING .

Think of your character, and then pick the skills that you think he or she would have. If you’ve picked all the ones you think your pc would have, and you still have more picks available, type DONE. Keep in mind, if you’re making a sailor who’s spent their entire life at sea, it might be quite unlikely for them to have the skill ‘butchering’.

STEP 21: Background
Almost done! Now type your background. This should include a basic telling of your character’s history, and how they’ve come to the new island on which the game takes place. Also include any tidbits the staff should know about your character: likes, dislikes, fears, dreams, etc. If you picked some exceedingly specific skills like ‘picklock’ or ‘metalcraft’ or anything you haven’t explained in your history, you’d better tell us how you learned it here!

Lastly, if you want to leave some detail ambiguous, such as who your parents were, or who your brother or sister was, or some other small detail like that, and you wish to leave it to the immortals to possibly include in a plot at a later time, note so here. This will give us license to ‘play with’ your character later by including things from their past.

If you’re having trouble writing a background, feel free to email the staff at staff@darkh.com for help.

Step 22: You’re done!

You’re done! Just hit submit, and then sit back and have a cup of cocoa. The staff of DH will review your application within a few days, and either approve you for play and set you up in-game, or reject your application, sending it back with a note on what needs fixing.

Keep in mind a rejection is not out of the ordinary! No one is expected to know more about the game than the staff does, and if they see something in your character concept that doesn’t fit in the world, they’ll let you know about it. We’re also on the job to try to catch any spelling errors or punctuation errors in your description. We’re not proofreaders by vocation, so don’t get messy! But also don’t be offended if we send something back with a suggestion on correction. We prefer not to correct your writing ourselves, as we want your pc to be created by you.