It needs to be something that is compatible with the BaseX command-line client. I don't think your proposed approach currently is.
Just to let you know: this is how you can change the db path on the command-line (the other options should be irrelevant in your context unless you use the GUI or the client/server architecture):
java BaseX62.jar org.basex.BaseX -c "set dbpath /....; create ..."
Also, I don't want to have to learn the meaning of individual parameters in .basex, so perhaps specifying the location of this file in an initialization call might be good?
Yes, I got your point… Let's see what we'll go for.
Related to .basex, the file says it's "overwritten every time" - but it's not clear which point in time "every time" refers to.
This note is obsolete and will be changed in the upcoming version; you shouldn't encounter any problems changing the options.
Christian