| Chapter 8: Change |

| 8.13. Calling names

Conditions like "if somebody is in an adjacent room" allow complicated tests to be performed with a minimum of fuss, but it's rare that we want to know only whether they are true: more likely we also want to know which person, and which room.

For this purpose, we are allowed to supply a name for any such vaguely-described object which comes up, and then to use that name thereafter.

> if somebody is in an adjacent room (called the Hiding Place), say "You hear distant breathing from [the Hiding Place]."

We can even name more than one of the things discovered:

> Instead of waiting when a woman (called the kidnapper) is holding an animal (called the pet), say "How can you think of rest when, somewhere out there, [pet] has been cruelly kidnapped by [the kidnapper]?"

Note the brackets, which are essential. The result of typing "wait" is then

> How can you think of rest when, somewhere out there, a lapdog has been cruelly kidnapped by Baroness Orczy?

Of course, that might be just one of many animals held by women in the game. We shall later see ways to go through all of the possibilities found, performing some action with each in turn.

A calling, if we can use that word, should be made immediately after the noun it refers to, and not left to hang back after any relative clauses. For instance,

> if something (called the penitential object) held by the player is hot

is allowed, but not

> if something held by the player (called the penitential object) is hot

because there is too much potential ambiguity - are we trying to call the player something?

105
| Example Higher Calling All doors in the game automatically attempt to open if the player approaches them when they are closed.

"Called" is quite useful in the context of rules about going, since go rules often refer to things other than the noun the player typed. For instance, suppose we want to have doors which politely open when the player tries to pass through them: "Higher Calling" Before going through a closed door (called the blocking door): say "(first opening [the blocking door])[line break]"; silently try opening the blocking door; if the blocking door is closed, stop the action. Dome is a room. North of Dome is North Chapel. South of the Dome is South Chapel. West of the Dome is Western End. Quiet Corner is northwest of the Dome, north of Western End, and west of North Chapel. Loud Corner is east of North Chapel, northeast of Dome, and north of Eastern End. Eastern End is north of Dim Corner and east of Dome. Dim Corner is southeast of Dome and east of South Chapel. Ruined Corner is southwest of Dome, west of South Chapel, and south of Western End. The church door is east of Eastern End and west of the Courtyard. The church door is a door. Test me with "e / e". A fuller set of such rules is included in the Locksmith extension.

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