Bindstone
========
A Dark Age of Camelot On-Demand Freeshard - by Athena's Avatars

1. Install the official Dark Age of Camelot client (from Electronic Arts / Broadsword).
   This download does not include the game; Bindstone starts the client you installed.

2. Unzip anywhere: your Desktop, a folder of your own, or straight into your
   Dark Age of Camelot folder (then the client is found at once).

3. Double-click Bindstone.exe. Type the account name and password you chose at
   athenasavatars.com/bindstone and press Enter Realm: Bindstone checks the server,
   applies its current update and starts the game signed in. Tick "Remember me on this
   computer" and next time the fields are already filled; "Forget me" clears them.
   The remembered password is encrypted for your Windows user (it cannot be read by
   another user or on another computer) and is never written anywhere else.

4. Forgot your password? Sign in at athenasavatars.com/bindstone and change it there
   ("Forgot your password?" in the window takes you to the page).

5. While the game runs, the window stays as a small companion strip in the corner of
   your screen (tick "Keep on top" to keep it above the game). Its buttons are the
   hearth's command sheet, for your own character only: summon your group, pull,
   grind, defensive, aggressive, jump to crew, the safe teleports and the rest. The
   reply line shows what the server said; a fight has to end first. Esc closes the
   strip and the game keeps running; when the game closes, the full window is back.

A key file still works: a bindstone-key-<your name>.txt from the site's "Other ways in",
put next to Bindstone.exe, signs you in without typing. Keep it private: it holds your
account password.

First time only, if Bindstone cannot find your client, it asks
"Where is your Dark Age of Camelot?": choose the folder that holds game.dll and
connect.exe. It remembers the folder (bindstone-settings.json) and never changes
the client's files.

When Bindstone publishes a client update (new models or effects), the stone lights up
and the window shows "Updating your game..." the first time: it checks the update's
signature and checksums and keeps your original game.dll as game.dll.stock. Enter Realm
wakes when it is done. To undo every change it made: "Restore stock client" in the
window, or run "Bindstone.exe --restore-stock".

Bindstone keeps itself up to date. When it starts it asks the athenasavatars.com download
store (not the realm, so this works while the realm sleeps) whether a newer Bindstone is
out. If one is, the window shows "Update available - installing", downloads only the new
Bindstone.exe, checks its signature and checksum and restarts itself; your key file,
settings and remembered login stay as they are. If the new one does not start, the old
one is put back. Offline, or in a folder Bindstone cannot write to (such as Program
Files), it simply starts as it is. To keep this copy as it is, start it with --no-update,
or put "AutoUpdate": false into bindstone-settings.json (an update the realm requires
still installs).

If something goes wrong, Bindstone shows one message saying why and writes a line to
bindstone-play.log next to it (never your password).

Windows SmartScreen may warn about an unrecognised app the first time; choose
"More info" and "Run anyway" if you downloaded it from athenasavatars.com.

Bindstone is an unofficial, non-commercial fan server. Dark Age of Camelot is a
trademark of its owners; Bindstone is not affiliated with or endorsed by Broadsword
or Electronic Arts.
