A new person question.

I am unable to phrase this correctly. All is well up to getting in, but not
getting out of the pond.
.................................................................................
In the drive is the pond. The pond is fixed and enterable.
The pond can be full, partly drained, or empty.
The pond is empty.
Understand "water" as the pond.

Instead of examining the pond when the pond is empty:
say "The pond is deep with mossy sloping sides. There is no water in the
pond, only slime and the neglected rubbish of years."

Instead of entering the pond when the pond is empty:
say "You slide down the ponds side and squelch to a slimy stop at the
bottom. Icy water seeps into your shoes. Perhaps, you think, this was NOT a
good idea."

( here is the problem section below )

instead of moving when the pond is empty:
say "You try to climb out but the steep slimy sides offer no grip. As you
struggle to escape, the cold mud rises slowly up until you are unable to
move."

I tried exit, n,s,e,w, but ........ unable to figure this one out. I wanted
something less curt than "You cannot do that"
Thanks

--
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Jackdaw wrote:
> I am unable to phrase this correctly. All is well up to getting in, but not
> getting out of the pond.

You probably want to post this kind of thing to rec.arts.int-fiction,
which is more about the coding side of things.

That said:

> ................................................................................
> In the drive is the pond. The pond is fixed and enterable.
> The pond can be full, partly drained, or empty.
> The pond is empty.
> Understand "water" as the pond.

You probably want the pond to be a container, but you don't actually
say that it is, here; if you want the game to talk about the player
being "in" the pond, add

The pond is a container.

> Instead of examining the pond when the pond is empty:
> say "The pond is deep with mossy sloping sides. There is no water in the
> pond, only slime and the neglected rubbish of years."
>
> Instead of entering the pond when the pond is empty:
> say "You slide down the ponds side and squelch to a slimy stop at the
> bottom. Icy water seeps into your shoes. Perhaps, you think, this was NOT a
> good idea."

Because you've written "instead of entering", the player never actually
gets into the pond -- you just print this message, instead. If you want
to print an unusual message after carrying out an action in the normal
way, you want an After rule, as in

After entering the pond when the pond is empty: ...


> instead of moving when the pond is empty:
> say "You try to climb out but the steep slimy sides offer no grip. As you
> struggle to escape, the cold mud rises slowly up until you are unable to
> move."

"moving" isn't an action at all, in that sense. There's an exiting
action for getting out of enterable containers (which is what the
player would do if he typed >OUT while in the pond), and a going action
for going from room to room. Normally if the player types >N (or
another direction) while in an enterable container that isn't a
vehicle, he gets a message that says "You'll have to get out of the
pond first." Which isn't what you want; so you want to add a Before
going... rule to tell the game that, if the player is in the pond, he
should attempt exiting the pond first.

If you put all these recommendations together, here is the code that
results:

<code>
Drive is a room.

In the drive is the pond. The pond is fixed in place and enterable. It
is a container.
The pond can be full, partly drained, or empty.
The pond is empty. "An empty pond lies at your feet."
Understand "water" as the pond.

Instead of examining the pond when the pond is empty:
say "The pond is deep with mossy sloping sides. There is no water in
the
pond, only slime and the neglected rubbish of years."

After entering the pond when the pond is empty:
say "You slide down the ponds side and squelch to a slimy stop at the
bottom. Icy water seeps into your shoes. Perhaps, you think, this was
NOT a
good idea."

instead of exiting when the pond is empty:
say "You try to climb out but the steep slimy sides offer no grip. As
you
struggle to escape, the cold mud rises slowly up until you are unable
to
move."

Before going when the player is in the pond:
try exiting;
if the player is in the pond, stop the action.

Test me with "enter pond / n".
</code>