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| Character Creation - Being a Warrior - Art of Magic - Dereth Portal Maps |
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Greetings! Welcome to the great adventure that is Asheron's Call and the land of Dereth. This guide is meant to aid you in getting started. Other guides may detail specific recommendations for playing specific types of characters. Choosing a World Dereth is currently duplicated as eight different server worlds: Solclaim, Wintersebb, Thistledown, Harvestgain, Morningthaw, Leafcull, Frostfell and Darktide. All worlds are exactly identical in terms of current point in the story, geography, location of non-player characters (NPCs), and all other physical realities. Each world is unique in terms of players. Solclaim, Wintersebb and Darktide have additional things that set them apart from the other worlds. In Darktide your character is always set to being player killer (PK) - capable of killing other players and being killed by other player killers. Additionally, the code of conduct is less strictly enforced in Darktide, making is a rougher land and not as suitable for children. Solclaim and Wintersebb are like the other five servers in that all players start as non-player killer (NPK). However, while the other six servers began allowing players to enter them in November 1999, Solclaim opened in June 2000 and Wintersebb opened in January 2001. Hence, both lack some of the items that were available only in previous events. Wintersebb is currently the youngest world in terms of average character level. Solclaim is the world The Circle of Seekers call home. The Nature of Dereth Dereth is the largest of several islands and is roughly the size of Rhode Island. You can go anywhere on the island simply by running there, though it will take time. You can also use portals to travel large distances where such portals exist. We Isparians (all players) were summoned to Dereth via portals from the world called Ispar, along with many other creatures similarly summoned. We have not found a way back to Ispar. The mage Asheron did something that caused these portals from other worlds to appear and draw us and others into Dereth. Dereth has a variety of climates and terrain including rivers, lakes, deserts, rolling hills, forests, mountains, and bleak wastelands. Players start at one of the outposts of the three starting towns with practice weapons and the basic requirements for our chosen skills. Choosing your Race You have three options here - Aluvian, Sho, and Gharu'ndim. Aluvian All Aluvians get the dagger skill and assess person trained for free during character creation. Assess person makes you better at assessing other humans and you gain experience for successfully doing so. The dagger skill allows you to gain experience for using a dagger in combat. Recently the dagger skill has been enhanced by the addition of weapons that can double and triple strike in one hit. Such daggers will be difficult to obtain initially, but will greatly increase a dagger master's ability to fight when they reach higher levels. Sho All Sho get the unarmed weapon skill trained for free during character creation. If you want unarmed weapons as your primary weapon, becoming Sho is a very good idea. The unarmed weapon skill allows you to gain experience for using your gloved fist, feet, or an unarmed weapon in combat. Gharu'ndim All Gharu'ndim get the staff skill and item tinkering trained for free during character creation. The staff skill allows you to gain experience for using weapon staves (not to be confused with magical casting staves). The item tinkering skill aids you in salvaging materials and applying various effects to items. Gharu'ndim is a good choice if you plan to use a staff in battle. Beyond these basic free skills, the only difference between races are the choices of facial features, skin color, and starting clothing. If one of the free skills is not in your plans, simply choose the race you like best. Choosing a template There are several pre-built templates to choose from that are good for getting you started and allowing you to learn about Dereth. Choosing a template only affects which skills are automatically chosen for you - all of which you can then change. While the current default templates are excellent for learning and beginner play, most players start with the custom adventurer template and design themselves completely. Setting your Attributes As attributes are the basis of all your skills, it is vital that they be set carefully at the time of character creation. During creation you are given 270 points to spend on your six attributes. All attributes must be at least 10 and none can exceed 100 during creation. Strength Strength determines how much you can carry. All weapon skills, except dagger, involve strength in their formulas - typically (Strength+Coordination)/3. Strength of more than 100 also impacts the damage bonuses you get for using all melee weapons - except dagger (bonus based on coordination) and unarmed (bonus based on unarmed skill). Coordination Coordination impacts all weapon skills, especially ranged weapon skills. Coordination is also vital to melee and missile defense skills. Coordination is half the determination for the various trade skills - alchemy, fletching, and cooking - as well as the healing and lockpick skills. Endurance Your starting health and stamina are based on endurance - health = endurance/2, stamina = endurance. Health is the measure of how much damage you can take before you die and are returned to your lifestone (minus a few items, some pyreals, and with a vitae penalty that reduces your skills until you earn enough experience to eliminate it). Stamina is the measure of how long you can continue to attack and defend yourself before you are too tired to move. Running out of stamina usually results in death. Thoughts on the necessity of endurance are split. Some argue that it is unnecessary and set endurance at 10 initially. Others enjoy having lots of health and stamina and set endurance at a higher level initially. Quickness Quickness factors into melee and missile defense, directly into run skill, and affects how fast you can swing a weapon. Again thoughts on quickness are split. Those who set endurance at 10 initially typically set quickness to 100 on the theory that they won't get hit due to high defensive skills. Those who enjoy having high endurance typically make a tradeoff for lower quickness. Focus Focus impacts appraisal skills, trade skills (alchemy, fletching, and cooking) and all magical skills. Mages are advised to put focus at 100 initially. Anyone planning to use trade skills should consider some focus and/or coordination. A dedicated professional alchemist, fletcher or chef would start with 100 focus. Self Self impacts magical skills, available mana for spell casting, leadership and loyalty. Leadership impacts how much experience you earn from your followers and how much of your followers' experience you pass up to your patron. Loyalty impacts how much of your experience you pass up to your patron. Generally, only mages or characters that will use significant magic skills set self at anything over 10 initially - mages being advised to start with 100 self. Specializing and Training Skills Your success in Dereth will be directly tied to your skills and your ability (as a player) to use them. Many who come from other lands to Dereth find this a most difficult concept initially. Levels do not matter - they are a calculation based on your total experience, nothing more. Only your skills matter. Hence, your choice of skills is vital to your success. You will get several skills automatically trained, including loyalty, magic defense, run, jump, and any free ones for your chosen race. All of these skills should generally be left trained, except for a race based weapon if it is your chosen weapon. Each skill requires a number of skill credits to train and more to specialize. Make sure you spend all 50 skill credits available to you during character creation as it is the only time you will be able to use them. If you want a skill specialized, you must do so during character creation. Additionally, the specialized skills bonus of 10 points and trained bonus of 5 points are only available for skills trained and specialized during character creation. Advancing your Attributes and Skills while in Dereth As you adventure in Dereth, you will gain experience and skill credits to use to improve yourself. You can and should improve yourself at any time you have experience available in the needed quantities (no need to wait for your next level). Using Experience You are granted experience for successfully using your skills and for killing enemy creatures. The majority of your experience from successful skill use will be applied directly to the skill used. Experience from killing creatures is given to you in the form of spendable experience that can be used to improve your attributes, health, stamina, mana, specialized and trained skills. Note that all experience listed as being passed up to your patron when you are in an allegiance is in addition to your normally earned experience. You do not lose experience by joining an allegiance. Using Skill Credits You are granted skill credits as you gain levels at the following levels: 2-10, 12, 14, 16, 18, 20, 23, 26, 29, 32, 35, 40, and every 5th level thereafter. This means that between level 1 and level 26 you will earn 16 skill credits that you can then use to train new skills. As the cheapest skills cost you 2 credits and the most expensive costs 16, you will not be able to train many more skills than those you started with - making your starting skill selection even more important. As the experience needed to reach the next level increases with each level gained, the average person may reach level 26 in a month or two of play - and may reach level 40 or 50 after 6 months. To illustrate:
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