~/vaf
what's a vaf
3Scapes has never charged anyone to play, has no subscription, and keeps every playable feature open to everyone regardless of who's paid anything. A Voluntary Access Fee, or VAF, is money a player sends in purely by choice — nothing on the game asks for it, and nothing on the game is locked behind it. What VAFs actually fund is the unglamorous stuff: the servers 3Scapes runs on. The people behind the game describe the arrangement better than we can: "It's kind of like PBS, but with monsters."
where it goes
The Marble Group Inc., the non-salaried outfit that runs 3Scapes and its sibling game, publishes exactly how a VAF dollar gets split. It's reproduced below verbatim, joke included:
| Where a VAF dollar goes | Share |
|---|---|
| ISP Hosting & Related Costs | 25¢ |
| Hardware/Software Upgrades | 25¢ |
| Taxes, Legal & Accounting | 20¢ |
| Operations, Savings, Charity | 20¢ |
| World Domination Initiative | 10¢ |
buying credits
Credits are priced one-to-one with the dollar, sold in five fixed bundles: 25, 50, 100, 125 or 400 credits at a time. Pick whichever checkout route below suits you — both land in the same place.
Square storefront
RecommendedThe primary route. Head to The Marble Group's Square store and pick 3Scapes when it asks which game the purchase is for. That choice is locked in — credits bought this way stay tied to 3Scapes and can't later be shifted to the operators' other title, so double-check before you confirm. Once the payment clears, send an in-game mail VAFS with your transaction ID; the balance normally lands within 24 hours.
Visit the Square store →PayPal
Prefer PayPal? This form is the operators' own hosted checkout, already scoped to 3Scapes. Choose a bundle, drop in the character you want the credits on, and the character-name field lets it land automatically — no separate mail needed.
By post
Old-fashioned but it works: a cheque or money order, US funds, made out and mailed to the address below. Write your character's name in the memo line, and round to whole dollars — anything after the decimal point gets dropped.
Two more things worth knowing up front: none of this is tax-deductible, and unspent credits sit on your account forever — there's no clock counting down on them.
what they buy
74 enhancements are currently available, split into two families. Reselectable entries are consumable — buy the same one again the next time you need it. Permanent entries are one-time upgrades to a character that stick for good. Costs shown here are current as of this writing; type vaf list <keyword> in-game for the live price and a fuller explanation of any single entry.
Reselectable (32)
| Keyword | What it does | Cost |
|---|---|---|
| scar | Remove one scar | 10 VAFs |
| ident | Three usages of remote identify | 15 VAFs |
| neutral | Reset your current alignment to true neutral | 15 VAFs |
| bestk | Reset your Best Kill | 20 VAFs |
| untrain | Fully untrain one mud skill | 20 VAFs |
| rlevel | Reduce your level by 5 without other penalties | 20 VAFs |
| sellall | Remote sellall to the main shop until reboot | 20 VAFs |
| noscar | Receive no scars upon death until reboot | 20 VAFs |
| uncurse | Three usages of remote uncurse | 25 VAFs |
| weapon | Three usages to make a weapon unbreakable | 25 VAFs |
| unquest | Undo one quest from your quest list | 30 VAFs |
| portal | Three usages to teleport to Center of Town | 30 VAFs |
| archf | Reset your Arch Foe | 35 VAFs |
| unbind | Three usages to unbind something from yourself | 40 VAFs |
| newbie | Single-use Newbieland pass | 40 VAFs |
| sever | Three usages to quit during combat | 40 VAFs |
| cswap | Transfer crafting skills between your characters | 50 VAFs |
| xrlevel | Reduce your level down to any level above level 1 | 60 VAFs |
| kreset | Free mud skills reset (no coins cost) | 70 VAFs |
| sever2 | Three usages to quit during combat w/equipment! | 80 VAFs |
| allscar | Remove all your scars | 100 VAFs |
| house | Receive 4 million house credits for a character | 100 VAFs |
| sreset | Full stat reset (with no experience loss) | 125 VAFs |
| item | Autoloading unique item, description only | 150 VAFs |
| xchar | Grant yourself an additional legal character | 150 VAFs |
| nchange | Change your character's name | 200 VAFs |
| marble | Personalized quest marble | 200 VAFs |
| gswap | Multi-guild one of your characters | 200 VAFs |
| restore | Restore a previous character in partial or full | 400 VAFs |
| linkd | Unlimited linkdead time to reboot | Variable |
| ldlogin | Login another character while others are linkdead | Variable |
| numbers | View real-time combat damage numbers | Variable |
Permanent (42)
| Keyword | What it does | Cost |
|---|---|---|
| ktrig1 | Automatic, server-side kill trigger | 10 VAFs |
| mywho | +10 names to mywho (max of 10 enhancements) | 10 VAFs |
| tellb | Ability to tellb (tellblock) all | 10 VAFs |
| lt | +1 name to linktell (max of 5 enhancements) | 10 VAFs |
| ktrig2 | Full ktrig ability (10 total commands and more) | 15 VAFs |
| alias | +25 max aliases (max of 4 enhancements) | 20 VAFs |
| afk | Triple-length afk message | 20 VAFs |
| coffin1 | Add 5 slots to your base coffin size | 20 VAFs |
| rating | Open up full capability of the 'rating' command | 25 VAFs |
| scaler2 | Allows scaling from 50% to +10 (requires scaler) | 25 VAFs |
| desc | Ability to color-ansi your personal description | 30 VAFs |
| muffs1 | Earmuffs level 1 (740) | 30 VAFs |
| light | Personal, instantaneous light source | 30 VAFs |
| idle | Add 1 hour to idle limit (max of 6 enhancements) | 33 VAFs |
| muffs2 | Earmuffs level 2 (940, must have level 1 first) | 40 VAFs |
| pretit | Increase pretitle length to 20 characters | 40 VAFs |
| tellhis | Quadruple-sized tell history (64 tells) | 40 VAFs |
| mbox | +100 capacity to your mailbox (max of 5) | 40 VAFs |
| pretit2 | Colorized ansi pretitle (must have 'pretit' first) | 40 VAFs |
| coffin2 | Add a further 10 slots to your base coffin size | 40 VAFs |
| wname | Colorized ansi name on who list and finger info | 50 VAFs |
| align2 | Colorized ansi alignment (must have 'align' first) | 50 VAFs |
| vscan2 | Coming soon! | 50 VAFs |
| light2 | Personal supernova (requires 'light')New! | 50 VAFs |
| xpgain | Increase xp rate by 5% (max of 5, up to level 100)New! | 50 VAFs |
| align | Custom alignment description (up to 20 chars) | 54 VAFs |
| title | Custom title description (up to 80 chars) | 60 VAFs |
| title2 | Colorized ansi title (must have 'title' first) | 60 VAFs |
| plan | Ability to attach a colored plan to your finger | 75 VAFs |
| yadda | Double shout length | 75 VAFs |
| pose | Customized pose message | 100 VAFs |
| mailer | Full access to the Premium Mail System | 100 VAFs |
| showac | View actual AC values on items and yourself | 100 VAFs |
| showwc | View actual WC values on weapons | 100 VAFs |
| coffdon | Remote donate corpses from your coffin | 100 VAFs |
| stimer | Remove your personal shout delay timer | 125 VAFs |
| refswap | Retains reflex setups over gswap | 125 VAFs |
| keepal | Prevents your alignment from changing | 125 VAFs |
| checker | Remote board reader/writer | 200 VAFs |
| vscan1 | View mob stats and info in a numerical format | 200 VAFs |
| sswap | Add one additional full-stat swap block (max of 4) | 200 VAFs |
| proswap | Gswap for professions | 250 VAFs |
spending them
Redemption happens at the Vault of Ancient Fables. Kneel down in Center of Town to reach it, and Guardian Atriel will walk you through the options and make the selections you ask for. Your balance is attached to you as a person rather than to one character — every character you own draws from the same pool — but the second you spend on something, that pick belongs permanently to whichever character was standing there when you bought it.
That covers VAFs end to end. For everything else 3Scapes offers away from the game itself, head back to ~/community.