Newbie desires advice

[halfwit]

Hello, all.

I plan on beginning play of LDoA soon. But this is my first ever play of a PW, & I crave your advice (like, how not to mess up your enjoyment of the game). Any pointers or URLs appreciated.

Thank you.

[cosper123]

Well first I'd plan out your build so you can optimize your approach. Try the build out on a hero creator mod (sorry can't recall URL atm but Beldar and others are good about that sort of thing and will respond soon I'm sure).

Don't bother with putting points into social skills as I can only think of one situation where they are useful here and it's not really THAT useful.

Do the quests so you can maximize your rewards. All the low level grinding areas are essentially the same difficulty-wise, and they all have quests attached to them. If you're going to be there anyhow...might as well get an item and some extra exp out of it, right?

That's all I can think of atm, but there's lots of folks with lots of good advice here. Welcome to the server and hope you have a good time.

[Loudent2]

My best advice is to, at the very least read the New Player's Guide"

The server description has good info in it as well, but is a longer read and isn't really necessary.

And of course a presence on the boards helps.

[sturm15]

Here's the link to a version of Vordan's hero creator that includes Kaedrin's stuff: nwvault.ign.com/View.php?view=NWN2HakpaksCombined.Detail&id=25

The biggest thing to keep in mind imo is that AC is king. I have a pure level 20 meleer that can reach 45 AC with feats, yet is still unable to defeat the final Orc Boss in the Barrens.

As always Gish and battle clerics provide a fun and relatively easy playthrough of the server.

[mammothtruk]

Battle Bards rule the server!

[shoujo]

My vote goes to the gish, simply because it's second only to the battle cleric in ease of leveling and will have the easiest time farming skelly to twink all your PCs with. You can also afford to gimp one and farm skelly well, so it makes a perfect throwaway PC/crafter. Just don't plan for more than 24 levels in this case because skelly stops dropping loot after 24.

[Loudent2]

In regards to the character you play, it depends on what you goal is. If it's leveling fast then the aforementioned gishes, BB and clerics are good mainstays. Straight STR fighters also do nicely although they peter bit in epic.

However, if leveling fast is not your goal then I say play what insterests you. There should always be a place to hunt, even if you aren't getting full xp.

[halfwit]

Thank you all. While this is not what I meant, there are still plenty of good pointers in there.

No, what I mean is that I've not played online before & I would like to know about the basics of online play as well as etiquette.

See, I know what it is to encounter a noob & I realize it can be a pain in the butt. I want to avoid doing that to anyone.

I see from the website (yes, Loudent2, I read the whole thing!) that there is not PvP. After looking up what that means , I see I can't start bashing on someone just for the heck of it. No problem.

But how do I "shout" & why would I want to? How do I "whisper" & when should I do that? How do I communicate with Bob & not with Joe, standing next to him (well, I suppose that what whispering is, isn't it?). Things like that (any other total noob stuff) are what I'm looking for, although tips on builds are appreciated.

Thank you again,

½wit

[Loudent2]

Well, as you know the only two rules are:

1) PvP by consent only
2) Have fun!

There is also an implied "no cheating" rule.

In regards to shout. There is, sometimes, plenty of OOC banter going on, but it does ruin some people's immersion so I wouldn't use it just to hear my voice

Generally I say, when working out tactics in a party, it's best to use party chat. Use tells for interactions with a specific character. I've never used whisper or DM channel (of course as the only DM, I wouldn't have opportunty to do so

There can be, at times, a queue of sorts hunting a specific target for quests or whatnot, I expect the players to work it out amonst themselves in a fair manner.

There are also instances which lock out other players when you're in them, so don't go AFK in them.

Ask other players for help. There are plenty of players around with crafter characters and such that will be happy to help you out making gear with the materials you supply.

[cosper123]

Jan 1, 2009 17:54:42 GMT -5 Loudent2 said:

There are also instances which lock out other players when you're in them, so don't go AFK in them.

What he means by instances are areas that are set up for a one-shot experience. Soooo...say for example you are tasked with taking out the gnoll cheiftan. When you enter that level nobody can follow you (unless in a group). In these instanced areas the mobs do not respawn (easy way to tell if you are in an instanced area and not aware of it).

If you are in an instanced area and go AFK, then other people cannot complete that quest (usually a couple of quests tied to an instanced area, so can be quite detrimental to other players).

[siegelayer]

Welcome.

If you've never played online, perhaps you mean you don't know how to send tells or use the different chats, etc. I assume?

I know when I first started online someone was sending me a tell and I was steady talking to them in local chat (but they were on the other side of the server) and eventually they wanted to know why I wouldn't respond, lol.

Anyhow, if so, you can shout by typing /s then your message.
You can send messages that only your party members can read by typing /p first. I guess there are buttons on the chat window for all of this, but I never use them. Remember that your chat stays, so if you just sent a message in the local channel, you will continue typing in that channel until you change to another, which causes you to say embarrassing things in shout, lol.

Also note that anyone in a party can invite others and you may be unaware of how many people are in a party that you just joined, or if anyone new has joined without your knowledge. (So, don't join a party and start shouting, "Man, that Wettshoes guy is such a noob punk!" , he may be in the party with you.) (For the record, Wett is not a noob. Though I do think he's a punk )

To send tells you can click on the eye button, bottom-left and then click player chat. Then simply click on the player's name that you want to send a private message to and type your message.

The bosses that drop good loot spawn on a timer (48 minutes, is it?) So when you have several players that want to farm a certain boss you have to be considerate of others. It's a good idea to remember the time that you killed the boss too so that you and/or others waiting will know when the can go for him. (I don't keep up with this good enough either, look, i'm not even sure how long between spawns, lol)

As Loudent mentioned, there are some places in the world that are 'instanced' and only one player or one group is allowed in at the same time. The main ones being the 3rd level of the Abandoned Mines, 3rd level of the Kobold Cave (forgot the name ha) and the 3rd level of the Forest, where the chiefs are located. These areas only allow one player/group of players in at a time, so don't go afk in there.

It's good to check the player list ("P" key) to see if anyone is in a area that you've just entered. For one thing, to make sure that you don't just walk in and start killing stuff when they were already there farming/grinding. I'm guilty of this if I don't hear anyone there, cause I forget to check when I enter. This can be bad when combined with the instanced area, such as an example where a group of us (3) were resting and buffing at the door of the level 3 Mines preparing to enter and take out the Chief for our quest. As we took a step forward, to enter the door, another player runs into the room, right past all 3 of us and into the lvl 3 door, locking us out. Instead we invited the player to our group and have him exit so that all 4 of us can go in, together. That's how it's done.

Have fun!

[ghostguest2a]

Hey Seige, now that is a great newbie intro post!!!
Lou, you oughta sticky that some where.

[halfwit]

Ooh, I think I need a glossary....

OK, I did a search & found most of those words, but what are "tells"?

[nicethugbert]

Get used to not having a pause button.

[cosper123]

Jan 1, 2009 23:32:33 GMT -5 halfwit said:

Ooh, I think I need a glossary....

OK, I did a search & found most of those words, but what are "tells"?

Hehe figured that was the case, which is why I explained what "instanced" was.

A tell is a direct send to someone. So if you want to send a message to me directly in game you'd do so with a "tell".

List any other words or phrases you don't understand and people will be happy to explain them to you. Or, if it's something you're embarassed to ask (been around awhile...everyone else knows what it means, etc.) then feel free to send me a pm (personal mesage), an option here on the forums when you click on someone's name.