Hey, I'm new.

I've played a few muds here and there. And really stuck to one for a few years.

But I've come to this one and it's completely different, and I love it.

I have so many questions though!

I made myself a Trill Celestine and I really don't know what I'm supposed to be doing exactly.
I've ranked myself up a bit (to level 5) and gone exploring, done some minor gold-rewarding quests...but I don't know what I'm doing in the big-picture. Or rather...what I CAN do.

A little explanation would be awesome.

Also the whole skill gaining method in this game is different to me, so if someone could explain it to me I would like that very much.

Thank you!

Let me be the first to say, welcome! We all love getting new players. RIght? We love them. Don't we? DON'T we? Ahem. Yes, IRE games are very different from all other MUDs, and Lusternia in particular is highly unique, which is also the great thing about it. Just remember the guides and older players are there for you. And have fun.

As for what you can do in the Grand Scheme Of Things, I'm afraid you'll have to wait until you're about level 40 (The first 30 levels zoom by, I promise) and reasonably good in your guild skills. Then you can start helping your guild, or fighting, or even joining a city-independent org, like certain clans (The Tirita, the Mirh Barosi, and a couple of others) or Divine Orders. You can help in village influences; if you're feeling like mindless violence, you can raid/defend against raids.

Goals come in so many forms I won't even try to approach that question.

Skills, though...unlike many MUDs you may have played before, skills are 1) not based on level, and 2) fully practiced the moment you learn them.

Lessons are invested in skillsets. When you invest lessons, you get closer to the next skillrank and may pick up a skill. Skills generally require more lessons to get as you move up in the skillset.

At the master skillrank, some (not all, not even most--just some) skills specialize into another skill. You'll know when you have one of these skills, trust me. As a Celestine, cosmic specializes into celestialism and rituals into sacraments. You continue to learn the specialization like any other skill. You cannot continue to learn in the base skill.

Ignore Verithrax, he tends to imbibe too much of my products. Although that does result in some interesting clothing items. There are a few things you need to know.
1. Don't bother Arix.
2. Don't judge people based on what city or commune they are from.
3. Trader Bob is the spawn of Kethuru and you should get your potions from other people
4. Scholars and pilgrims are a reliable source of income and karma, as are the supplicants
5. Don't bother Arix.
6.Don't poke Munsia, or refer to her as a cow, unless you have a deathwish, or can run really fast.
7.Verithrax is a reliable sources of clothing, greatrobes, and mostly intelligent conversation.
8.Don't bother Arix, unless you are starving, you need booze, or you know a dirty joke, limerick, or haiku that I haven't heard yet.
9.Trill kick ass. And now we can PREEN
10.Fluffy kittens are evil. Evil, I tells ya.
If I think of more to add, I'll do it later.

Welcome! Yay another person to get mistells from

Awww poor Athy, and everyone giving her mistells

Bold: Gods thats funny
Italics: Glad I suggested it. Its posable as well Admin

Welcome, Celestines are a good guild to start off in. Theyre interesting, their skills are fairly nice PK-wise as you go up, word of warning. Hunting with Cosmicfire sucks, you will hear that from anyone who has been a Guardian. Just sucks. You will be outpaced by the other archtypes, except for maybe a warrior archtype but theyre tankier so they make up for it. You will have very useful and interesting skills available to you right off such as Deathsight and waterwalk in Cosmic and Acquisitio and Puella in Rituals. Do get Sacraments as soon as possible, Sacrament users that can revive the dead will love you for that as it costs less power. The poeple who put this game together did an overall wonderfully amazing job that made it indepth and complex. Though be prepared for good hunting grounds being empty it happens often enough and does annoy some people a lot.

Hunting alone? lol. I'm used to it. It does happen a lot in the other mud I played.
How does the grouping option work anyone here? Are there experience benefits?etc..

I'm not sure if I understood it correctly, but to get sacraments, i just have to keep adding lessons into rituals?

Grouping here involves people following one person. The experience is shared among everyone. The benefit from group hunting isn't that large. Two people would get something around 51% of the experience each.

And yes, to get to Sacraments, you must keep putting lessons into Rituals. Once you reach "Master" rank you can SKILLCHOICE SELECT SACRAMENTS and begin learning. You can't reach Master rank while you are a novice though, so do not learn past "Adept" rank until you graduate.

If you mean group hunting then theres supposedly a small boost, though you need to ally the people following you and they cant have Innocence.

And yes, just go to a tutor or ask a player in your guild to teach you, most will be more than willing to help if theyre available. It works the same with every skill.

You can be helpful to your city just by completing your city power quest (for Celest it's very easy, all you need is to be able to swim, and dig, and run around the city. *cough* and not have the gorgog quest done, which it is at the moment unless it's changed in the last 24 hours)

You can also run around doing comm quests in your cities villages (then again Celest doesn't have any at the moment, so I guess that's no help either)

You can pick a Trade skill(depending on what people want at the time you don't need to be trans with an arti to compete in the market, though it might cut into your profits a bit), and offer your services to city/guild members at reduced cost (while still making a bit of profit for yourself) I know for a fact Enchanters are always in high demand.

Celest is very picky about it's politics, so I would say, stay out of them for awhile, because people will yell at you and threaten to kick you out of the city for minor things

Other then that, there's role-playing (always enjoyable in lusternia)

...and lastly, yes, learning to fight (working on triggers and stuff so you can defend Celestia from Daevos/Murphy/Kaervas/ect without dieing in 1 hit or 1 combo)

I've tickled her lots, and poked her sometimes, and she hasn't killed me yet

She's just biding her time. Or she might snub you so you can't emote on her, she did that to me for awhile

thanks a lot everyone!

i'm starting to get a hold on things...i think

Or can kill her.

1. keep up the good work
2. stay away from the taint

What is that 'taint' you speak of?

Everything you need to know is linked to in my sig.

On the contrary, as a character feel free to judge other characters based on their city/commune/etc. The game has foundations set in ways different areas/affiliations are opposed to one another, fundamental things that are unable to be resolved, though other things have potential to be worked around. That's part of it.

As a player, remember that the others you encounter are players as well, and no better or worse for chosing to play what they are as we're all making up different parts of the same game. But as a character, don't feel obligated to bring in real-life concepts (i.e., if someone tells you viscanti are tainted and thus bad, don't feel the need to equate that to racism/segregation IRL and automatically oppose it). The area you're affiliated with has values and goals and certain stances on those of other areas for good reason. If you don't throw yourself into the role by accepting them as realistic, why bother playing?

Do yourself a big favour and read up on the histories, get the perspectives, and immerse yourself.

*nod* so... stay away from the taint