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Quickstart Guide

Quickstart Guide

Installation

  1. Copy Checkers.jar into your Bukkit plugins/ folder.
  2. If you want Economy support, you will also need to install the Vault plugin, if you don't already have it.
  3. Restart or reload your server

Before You Start

To administrate Checkers (create/delete boards, change configuration...), you'll need to either be an op or have the checkers.admin permission node. Ensure you have that before continuing.

If you're reading this as a regular player (not a server admin), then skip the Creating a Board section and go straight to Creating a Game. You will need to have the checkers.player permission node if your server uses a permissions plugin, and this assumes that the admins for your server have already set up one or more boards, and that there's a free board to create a game on.

See Permissions for full details on the permission nodes that Checkers knows.

Creating a Board

To play checkers, you need a board. So the first thing we'll do is create a board to play on:

/checkers create board board1

You can also abbreviate that to /checkers c b board1 - any subcommands can be shortened to their shortest unique spelling to save typing. You can also use /chc as an abbreviation for /checkers, so this works too:

/chc c b board1

And you can also use Tab-completion in any part of the /checkers command, e.g. /checkers c<Tab> will auto-expand to /checkers create (this only works from the Minecraft client, not from the console).

But before you go ahead and create a board, read the following:

  • The board you create will be using the default "greenwood" style. If you look in your Bukkit plugins folder plugins/Checkers/board_styles, you'll see a file called greenwood.yml. Feel free to inspect those files, but I'd advise against modifying them directly - any changes are liable to be overwritten when the plugin is upgraded. Creating and saving custom styles is documented in Board Styles.
  • The board will be 8 blocks high, and 46x46 blocks wide. It will overwrite terrain, but if you have WorldEdit installed, the terrain will be restored if & when the board is deleted. But in any case, I would suggest creating the board away from any developed area! Pick some unvisited wilderness, or maybe build the board over open water, or high in the sky (but if you do that, I'd recommend lighting the ground underneath if monster spawning is enabled in your world...).

After typing the command, you'll be prompted to left-click a block. That block will become the centre block of the board's A1 square, and you'll find yourself standing on an empty checkers board. You'll also see a control panel on the left-hand side of the board (as you face from row 1 towards row 8 ) - this panel includes a clock for each player, a to-play indicator, a halfmove clock (how many moves since a capture), and a ply counter (how many moves since game started). It also includes several "buttons" (signs with text on them) which can be used in place of various /checkers commands.

You'll notice that none of the board's blocks can be destroyed, and no block placement is possible. On top of that, explosions won't break anything, and no blocks will burn.

/checkers tp will teleport you to just outside the board if & when you want to leave, or you can left-click the Teleport Out button on the control panel.

Other useful commands to try:

  • /checkers list board (or /checkers l b) will show all of the boards on the server
  • /checkers list board board1 will show detailed info for the board board1 (You can also click the Board Info button on the control panel)
  • /checkers delete board board1 will delete board1, but don't do that right now...

Also try looking at any square on the board (no matter how far) and left-clicking with an empty hand. You will instantly teleport to that square - useful for moving around the board quickly.

Finally, double-tapping Space should allow you to fly around the board, even if you're not in creative mode! You will find that if you try to fly too far from the board (and are not in creative mode), you'll either get bounced back or have flight disabled - you can choose which with /checkers set flying.captive true (or false).

Creating a Game

Now that you have a board, you probably want to play a game on it:

/checkers create game

...or left-click the Create Game button on the board's control panel. If you would rather play White, then you can use /checkers create game -white, or right-click the Create Game button so that the colour beneath it shows Black, and then left-click to create the game.

This will create a game named after you, on the first free board it can find (if you use the button, it will create a game on that button's board). You'll get a message confirming the game has been created, and assuming you're still on or near the board, you'll see a checkers set appear! (If you're not on the board anymore, you can get back to your game by typing /checkers tp <game-name>, where game-name is the name of the game you just created).

Also try holding Shift and looking at any checkers piece (again, no matter how far) and left-clicking. You will be teleported onto that piece - again, very useful for moving around the board and getting a good view point.

There are game management commands similar to the board commands above:

  • /checkers list game (/checkers l g) will show all of the games on the server
  • /checkers list game desht-1 will show detailed info for the game desht-1 (or you can click the Game Info button on the board's control panel)
  • /checkers delete game desht-1 will delete desht-1, but don't do that just yet

/checkers list game (or clicking the Game Info button) will show the colour you're playing and there is currently no opposing player. So let's invite someone!

Playing Against a Human

If you want to play against the computer, skip to the next section

/checkers invite <player-name>

There is also an Invite Player button - if you click that, you will be prompted for a player name in chat (left or right-click anywhere will cancel).

If you don't have anyone handy to test with, you can always invite yourself (playing both White and Black is fully supported by the plugin, though perhaps only useful for testing...)

The player you invite will get a message, and be asked to type /checkers join to join the game. By default, your game is invite-only, and no one can join unless you send an invitation. If you invite someone else after inviting the first player, the first player's invitation will be withdrawn. If you want to broadcast an open invitation to everyone on the server, just type /checkers invite with no player name. Then whoever types /checkers join <your-game-name> first will join your game.

Once the second player joins, the game will automatically start (by default - you can disable automatic starting with the autostart config setting).

Playing Against the Computer

Checkers has a built-in AI, with multiple difficulty levels. To play a random AI opponent, just type /checkers start or press the Start Game button without inviting a human opponent. The AI opponent picked for you could be fairly weak, or quite challenging (for an average player) !

If you want to play against a specific AI opponent, you can list all the predefined AI opponents with /checkers list ai, and then invite the opponent you want with /checkers invite <ai-name>. See AI for more information.

Let battle commence!

Playing a Game

At the start of the game, it is Black's move. There are two ways to move:

  • With nothing in your hand, wave (left-click) at the piece you want to move (you'll get a confirmation message), and then wave at the square you want to move to or the piece you want to capture. You don't need to be right beside the piece or square - you just need line of sight.

or

Assuming the move is legal, it will be carried out, and it's now White's turn.

Repeat until there's a victor! Other useful commands during play:

  • /checkers offer draw offers a draw to the other player. They will be messaged, and can type either /checkers yes or /checkers no to accept or decline. You can also use the Offer Draw button on the control panel, along with the Yes and No buttons.
  • /checkers resign causes you to resign, immediately ending the game. You can also use the Resign button.

After the Game

Once the game ends, a message is broadcast to the entire server announcing the game result (if you don't want broadcasts, you can change the broadcast_results setting in the configuration file). The game will be automatically deleted 15 seconds (also configurable) after it finishes to free up the board for the next game.

Next Steps

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