The plan below designs a very simple building, with 3 rooms: Atrium, Triclinium and Cubiculum, and 4 exits: West from Atrium to Triclinium, East from Atrium to Cubiculum, East from Triclinium to Atrium and West from Cubiculum to Atrium.

Note that there is also a room called “Street”, and an exit North from the street to the Atrium and South from the Atrium to the Street. In this example, Street is a pre-existing room, and Atrium is your “start room”, built for you by the praefectus urbi. The exits to and from the street are also pre-existing. Therefore you will actually be building only 2 rooms: Triclinium and Cubiculum, along with the exits that connect them to the Atrium.

In addition to planning the building's plan, you should also write a description for each room, and note any URLs for images or other information that you would like to link to the room or objects that you would like to place in the room.

Your plan may be much more complex than this. The important thing is to know in advance what you will call each of your rooms and the exits both to and from them. When you actually log in to the MOO and start to build, the MOO will prompt you for these names.

                           N
                       W   +   E
                           S
      -----------------------------------------
      |         | |               | |         |
      |         | |               | |         |
      | tricli-	---  Atrium       --- cubicu- |
      | nium    ---               ---  lum    |
      |         | |               | |         |
      ------------------| |--------------------
                       STREET

DESCRIPTIONS (NB: the words in italics indicate objects that you will place in the room):

Atrium: You stand in a large, open atrium with four elegant Corinthian columns surrounding an impluvium which has a fountain in the center. Red, black, and gold wall paintings decorate the walls to the north, east and west of you. You notice the ceiling above, which is lit by the bright sunlight that filters down through the compluvium. The expansive mosaic floor is also of interest to you, if you peer downward. North of the impluvium you see an elaborate cantibulum resting between the two northern-most columns. A fresh breeze drifts in through he front of the atrium and brushes your face. There is an eerie silence in the atrium, broken only by the quiet trickling of the water from the fountain.

Cubiculum: You see a dimly lit room before you with three narrow slits high on the east wall. A bit of sunlight is coming through the slits, but not enough to see clearly by. You can make out a lectus in the south east corner and that is all. If you decide to peer a bit more closly at the wall, you will make out a wall painting that wraps around the room, but it is largely hidden in the shadows.

Triclinium: You enter a brightly lit room that is open at the back and has a gorgeous view of the southeast corner of the hortus. The wall paintings that cover each of its walls are clearly visible. Several couches are placed around a small table in the center of the room. The couches face outward, towards the view of the garden. On the table lies a platter on which you see some food.

CREDITS: The descriptions above were written for a VRoma project by the following students in Prof. Barbette Spaeth's course on Pompeii in Spring, 1997 at Tulane University: Jay Munsch, Jeff Satriano, Lauren Heckler, Christy Tucker and Mindy Mones.