Dicey, A Dice Game of Skill and Luck User Manual Monday, February 21, 2000 Dicey is a game played by one to six persons. Rolling the dice, each person tries to score in thirteen different categories. The object of the game is to achieve the highest score. The computer program will keep track of the scores, rolls, whose turn it is, etc, on a game board on the screen. How to Start The program maintains two kinds of data files: 1) A Name File, containing the names of all Dicey players 2) A Score File for each player. When the program starts, it first checks for a Name File. If it does not find one, it will display a dialogue box, asking you to add players to the Name File. Every player must have a unique name (or nickname), from one to 10 positions long. Do not use special characters in the name, but spaces are allowed. If you would like a picture to display when it is your turn, you may wish at this time to copy some jpeg pictures (using Windows Explorer, for example) to the program's current directory The program will now ask you who is going to play this game. Pick from one to six players from the Name File (using the menu at the top of the screen). If you wish to play more than one game of the six available, you may add your own name more than once. When you are done picking the names of the players, the computer will automatically roll the dice for the first player. If a jpeg file that matches the name of the player is found in the current directory, it will display during the player's turn. How to Play These instructions refer to categories on the game board (following this topic). During the player's turn, he looks at his dice, and based on the values that are showing, tries to decide which game board category to shoot for. During his turn, he can "pick up" (by clicking) any or all of the dice, and toss them again (by hitting the "Roll Dice" button). The player can pick up and toss the dice one more time. At this time, he must decide which category to score. The player's turn then ends. The dice automatically roll for the next player. Instead of clicking on the dice, the player can press the 1, 2, 3, 4, or 5 keys, respectively. The ENTER key will simulate pressing the "Roll Dice" button. This makes the game less mouse- intensive. Scoring, however, must be done with the mouse. At the end of the game, a stat board will appear. It will display some really neat information, such as your average before this game, your average after this game, your high and low score, et cetera. If you scored over average, the computer will greet you with applause. Conversely, if you scored under average, the computer will console you with an "awww". The Game Board Menu Options are discussed below. Only the first six characters of the player name are displayed. The board is tight; that's all there is room for unless I made the character font smaller. The doubler button is used to double the value of any one score. It can be used only once per game, so use it wisely! The scoring categories are listed below. Category Combination needed Category Score Name Aces Aces Total of all dice that show a "one" Twos Twos Total of all dice that show a "two" Threes Threes Total of all dice that show a "three" Fours Fours Total of all dice that show a "four" Fives Fives Total of all dice that show a "five" Sixes Sixes Total of all dice that show a "six" Three of a At least three of the Total of all dice Kind same value Four of a Four of the five of the Total of all dice Kind same value Full House Three of a kind and a 1-1/2 times the total of pair the dice Flush All dice are the same 25. If it is also a color straight, an extra 40 will score. Straight one-two-three-four-five 40. If it is also a flush, or an extra 25 will score. two-three-four-five-six Dicey All five dice show the 50 points, plus 100 for same value all subsequent Diceys scored in other categories. Dumper Anything Total of all dice. The player can score in this category three times. Menu Options Game|New- This option will start a new game. All current games will be aborted. All personal scoreboards will be updated. Game|Exit- This option will end the game. All current games will be aborted. All personal scoreboards will be updated. Players|Add to PlayerFile This option will allow you to add new players to the master Dicey players file. All people who play this game must be in the players file. Players|Pick for Play This optiuon will let you tell Dicey who (from the master players file) will be playing this game of Dicey. Sounds You have the option of turning sound effects on and off (See Sound Effcets below).Turning sounds off will speed up the game, but it will make the game less fun to play. Help|Help This option will display this file. Help|About This option will tell you about Dicey. Pictures The program will display a picture of the player when it is his turn, if there is a jpeg picture in the current directory whose name matches that of the player, e.g. Jane.JPG. Sound Effects Sound effects are played at certain times during the play of the game. You may replace any pf the sound files with your own, but you must name them the same as the original. For example, if you are not happy with the "Bummer" sound, simply copy one of your own wave (.WAV) files to the current directory as "bummer.wav". If you hear a bell, the chances are that one of the sound files is missing, misspelled, or corrupted. Make sure you keep the original sound files in a safe place, in case you ever want to restore it. The sound files are listed below. Filename Sound effect When it plays AWWW Awwwww Under average BIGCHEER Cheering Score a straight BUMMER "Bummer" Score a zero CLAP Applause Over average DOH "Doh!" Tried to score a box that was already scored DOUBLED "Your score was The doubler feature was used doubled" DUMMY "Dummy" Scored Dicey, but did NOT mark it as such NICEG "Nice going!" When an extra 25 is scored in the upper bonus OOH "Oooooooh" More than 20 in Dumper ROLLDICE Dice rolling Rolling the dice TYFPD "Thank you for End of game: "Thank you for playing Dicey" playing Dicey" YES "Yes!" Scored Dicey, and marked it as such YFTUYD "You forgot to use At the end of the game, if the your doubler" player did not use his doubler at all during the game YOUMISS "You missed your Missed the upper bonus bonus" Player Name File The Player Name File (PLAYERNM.DAT) is a file containing the names of the Dicey players that you added at the beginning of one of the games. For your convenience, it was written as a simple text file. Scores File The Scores File (playername.DAT) is used to calculate averages, and all of the other statistics that appear on the stat board. Again, for your convenience, it was written as a text file. This way, you can easily (using your favorite text editor) merge the scores from games played in two different locations. End of Dicey User Manual