First Steps

Your first hour: getting equipped, finding the Training Grounds, learning to fight, and reaching level 10.

New characters arrive by ship at Aurin's drydock and are taken to the Explorer's Guild. A run of introductory chapters covers equipment, combat, the town's services and joining a guild.

Type quest to see the current chapter, what is left to do and the commands that do it. A bare ? gives guidance for the stage you have reached.

The Tideglass Compass finds the way. compass destinations lists the places it knows; compass set bank picks the bank, and compass alone gives the next direction along the route. The browser client has a compass panel where you pick a destination and press Travel to walk there.

Getting equipped#

Two rooms west of the guild entrance is the Explorer's Guild Armory, where Orla Wavering keeps the stores. Type ask orla about equipment and she fits you out with a weapon and armor for nothing. Ask her about free if you want to know why.

One room further west is the Outfitters Nook. Type ask sella about clothing and Sella Threadtide hands you a shirt, trousers, boots and a cloak cut for your race.

Put it all on. wear all and wield <weapon> do it, or equip <item> works out whether a thing is worn or wielded. gear shows what you have on and in which slot. inventory numbers everything you carry, and the numbers work in commands, so wear 3 is valid.

Many service rooms have a sign. look sign reads it.

Down to the Training Grounds#

West again from the Outfitters Nook is the Proving Antechamber. Go down onto the Proving Stair, and down again at the foot of it.

You arrive in the Main Hall of the Explorer's Training Grounds, the first of fifty six practice rooms that run south and east from it: archery ranges, climbing walls, lockpicking benches, a swimming pool, a dark room for fighting blind, and a graduation challenge in the far corner. up from the Main Hall takes you back to the guild.

If something kills you down here, Master Toren's protection catches you before the Underworld does. You wake in the Main Hall with half your health, whatever was fighting you stops, and Toren tells you how close that was. The protection has no level limit, and since you never actually die, you keep the experience you had gathered towards your next level.

Outside the grounds, death sends you to the Gates of the Underworld and leaves your equipment in your corpse. See Death.

Master Toren#

Master Toren stands in the Main Hall. He is the Explorer trainer, and he does two things.

The first is leveling. When you have enough experience, come back to him and type advance. level shows how close you are, from anywhere. Once you join a guild, you advance with your guild's trainer instead.

The second is the story. The first chapter, Finding Your Feet, comes from Marek Halloway at the drydock the moment you arrive, and you hand it in to Toren. After that Toren gives you each chapter as you finish the last:

quest shows the chapter you are carrying and the commands still to do. quest complete, in front of whoever set the task, hands it in and pays you. The last chapter is handed in to your new guild's trainer, who then starts a story of their own.

Your first fights#

Five kinds of creature live in the training rooms: phantom rats, animated training dummies, practice goblins, shadow wolves and sparring constructs, from level 0 to level 4. None of them attacks first. You can walk the whole area reading descriptions before you swing at anything.

attack <target> starts a fight, and kill <target> does the same. Combat then runs on its own in rounds, and hits, misses and damage scroll past. attack stop stops your own swings only; anything fighting you carries on, so it is no escape. hp gives your health, spell points and endurance in one line, and consider <target> tells you how a fight is likely to go.

Every swing costs endurance, and so does every step on foot. An Explorer pays 1 endurance a swing. When it runs out you cannot swing, so watch it on hp and rest between fights.

If a fight is going badly, flee breaks off and runs you through an open exit. Nothing runs for you on its own, so keep it somewhere you can reach in a hurry, and expect what you were fighting to chase you.

skills (or powers) shows your class abilities laid out by level, from 1 to 100. Explorers have none; they come with a guild. race lists your racial abilities, including an attack you can use from level 1.

A training creature pays 100 to 300 experience, more for the higher levels, before any bonuses. get all from corpse empties a corpse. loot does the same and takes the coins too, and lootall loots every corpse in the room.

Reaching level 10#

Explorer runs to level 10 and no further. Each level costs a flat 100 experience, so the whole path is 900. Kills and the introductory chapters both pay toward it.

Each time you have enough, go back to the Main Hall and type advance. The game tells you when you are due.

Along the way:

• ooc <item> shows a piece of gear's real numbers. Use it on anything that drops: world gear is made with random quality and can beat what Orla gave you. See World Drops.
• compass set training points you back here from anywhere in Aurin, and compass destinations lists everywhere else it knows: the bank, the inn, the shops, the post office and the guild halls among them.
• rest sits you down and restores 1 percent of your health, spell points and endurance every second until you are full, or 2 percent where a healer has laid out a bedroll. It stops when you are healed or a fight starts, and stand gets you up sooner.
• tips says whether tips are on, tips now gives you one at once, and tips off stops them. They stop coming on their own after level 30, though tips now still works.

Choosing a class#

At Explorer level 10 you can join a guild. A guild is chosen once: after that, the only way into another class is to remort at level 100.

Five guilds take walk-in members: warrior, healer, rogue, mage and psion. The Merchant's Guild takes only those its guildmaster admits; Hollis Pell at the guild explains. A healer can later be ordained as a cleric by a temple of their faith. Thief, bard, ranger, assassin, paladin and necromancer are reached only by remorting, and diplomat and templar cannot be joined.

To join, go to the guild and type join <class> there. The compass knows the way to the warrior, mage, healer, merchant, rogue and psion guilds. The rogues meet out at the Mistwood Crossroads on Mistwood Road, north of the city. The psions are in the lighthouse south of the city, through the Psion's Door near the top. The Thieves Guild is not on the compass.

Joining changes your class, your trainer and the abilities that open as you level. Your level goes back to 1 and any experience you had left is cleared, so spend it on a level first. The new class brings its own health, spell point and endurance totals.

help joining guild covers it in the game, and Classes covers each class. After the introductory chapters, Areas lists where to go next by level, and Combat explains attacks, defense and endurance.