Printworks

A book you wrote only becomes a stack of real copies at the printworks. Each copy is a numbered book with the author on the cover, and the numbers are never reused. You do not click once and print. You run the press.

The printworks has an order desk, an assembly board for each book, a press, a finishing counter and a labeled tray for each book. Everything is done by right-clicking the blocks of the room, and only the people on your crew can see your board.

Before you print

Write your book in a book and quill, then publish it. Books are written, styled and published on the Books page. Pick a cover design when you publish; each design has its own materials list. A copy always costs at least as much as making a writable book by hand, so printing is never a shortcut.

For the plain design you need paper, leather and an ink sac for every copy, carried in your bag as ordinary items. A named, enchanted or renamed item is never used up as stock.

A round

1. Right-click the order desk and choose one or two of your published books and how many copies you want, up to eight in all. Nothing is taken from your bag yet.
2. Each book has an assembly board of five page groups. They are shuffled and some are turned the wrong way. Right-click a group to pick it up, then right-click another place to swap them; sneak and right-click a group to turn it. Put them in order A, B, C, D, E with none turned.
3. Click the proof block. It names the wrong places and changes nothing.
4. Click the lock block. Only a right board is accepted.
5. Click the press. It takes one load at a time, up to four copies, and runs for about five seconds, then a chime sounds. A finished load waits on the counter, which has two places: right-click it to pick it up, then right-click the tray for its book. A wrong tray sends it back, and nothing is lost.
6. Right-click the order desk and choose Collect the books. The copies reach your bag and the stock for exactly those copies is used up. If your bag is full or you are short of stock, nothing happens and you can fix it and close again.

A mistake never destroys stock. If you stop or leave the server, nothing was taken and no number is spent.

Working together

An author prints alone, or invites others. An editor can print a book of yours but can never change its text, author or price. Helpers can move pages, load the press and sort trays, but they cannot collect the books or touch the finished copies. The author adds a helper from the order desk (any player standing nearby who is not already in a round), and can stop the round there too.

Pay

Running the press pays money for the numbered copies that reach their trays. Right now that is 2.50 money a copy, up to eight copies a round, so 20.00 for a full one. The rate may change. Pay arrives only after your copies are in your bag.

What a copy is

A copy is a signed book marked as a copy, so the crafting grid cannot duplicate it. It wears the cover you chose: one of eight colours, ten emblems, six trims and eight bindings, from calfskin and morocco to linen, velvet, marbled boards, vellum and tooled leather. Put it on a chiseled bookshelf and its cover faces out of the slot; put it on a lectern and the cover stands on the front of the stand. Hold a copy and type /book about to see its title page. If you wrote the book, /book sign signs the copy in your hand, with a short dedication if you like (/book sign For Bo, who found the map); a copy is signed once, and its title page shows the signature as verified. Take your copies to a library to share them: readers can read them, take free copies or buy them at your price.