At one point in my game, you must ask another NPC for help using 'ask for about', 'ask about help', 'ask blerk for help'... I altered the built in Quest command 'help' to better fit my game. The built in command is universal, the NPC help is only when the NPC is present.

Problem is, I cannot type anything - even afghan fdcbbc eggs help fishy - without the universal cmd script running. How do I change that so I can ask NPC for help AND just type help for help script?

Probably an easy fix, yes?

EDIT: I'll piggy back this with another question... Is it possible to make a command obsolete after you have an item in your inventory? Example, I want to make the command "smell the odor" only work if the player does not have a certain object. It has to be a command NOT placed a verb.

Why don't you ask your NPC FOR assistance instead of help. You could add a clue for the player earlier
IE. " You wonder if Pilkington Smythe could be of assistance."

I thought about that but there's this whole thing where the NPC (who isn't quite human) can't pronounce his "L"'s or "th"'s...Long story, but it's kind of the first little puzzle in the game and I can't switch it now.

I noticed that the universal built-in help command was a 'regular expression' and the all of my commands were a 'command pattern', so I switched it and it appears both commands work fine now, although I'm not totally sure the difference between the two. I would like to know the answer to that as I use commands a lot.

I still need help on how to make a command obsolete, however, so any help there is appreciated.

There are two ways of defining the pattern a command is matched against. Set HELP to be a regular expression, then put this in:

^help$

The ^ has to match the beginning of the command, and $ the end, so that will not match the word in the middle of a sentence.
http://docs.textadventures.co.uk/quest/ ... ching.html

I have never made a command obsolete beyond have an if/else inside it to check if it applies. Can you move it into a room the player cannot access?

Make a command obsolete maybe can be done using an if for simplicity
so (GUI) If =》player is not carrying object =》object =》(object to be considered)
Then: put a script of what "smell the odor" will do
Else: put a message that say you need to drop the object first
(Well, that's the only way, i think)