Elder Scrolls Online‘s first adventure zone Craglorn comes tomorrow, and with it a host of changes, additions, features and new content for players to explore. Since Craglorn will be the first time players can experience delves, trials, and other interesting content I thought it might be useful to post a brief overview of what’s new. This guide will cover only the basics and won’t include any particular strategies or tactics to help your groups clear the content, but if there’s any interest I’ll be sure to wrote guides on that as well so be sure to let me know.

What is Craglorn?

Craglorn is ESO’s first adventure zone, located between Bangkorai and Cyrodiil. Adventure zone(s) are designed as group content, so you will need to bring 3 of your friends with you for most of the content in Craglorn. To enter the zone simply pick up a quest in Mournhold, Wayrest, or Elden Root towns. Some of the content in Craglorn (Trials) are also designed for raids of 12 players, and this is the most challenging content as of yet for players to explore and conquer.

Below we’ll take a look at few main aspects of the game and how this adventure zone changes them. If you’re looking for a full list of changes in patch 1.1.2, read the full patch notes.

Quests

Most of the 1-50 and Veteran 1-10 content is easily soloable, but as mentioned Craglorn is different. Zenimax designed it with 4 players in mind, so you will need a full group if you want to have a smooth experience. You will almost always want to bring a dedicated healer and if possible a tank to make sure you can clear the content at respectable speed. While some encounters are very much possible to complete with less than 4 players and various party roles, repair costs, soul gems and potions aren’t overly easy to come by, and wipes are never fun.

Be sure to bring a group of experienced Veterans. You can enter Craglorn as soon as you hit Veteran Rank 1 however it’s aimed at players with VR10, therefore don’t expect to easily clear it if your group is slacking in levels and equipment.  Most quests are out in the open where multiple groups can participate and even help one another, however a lot of quests are still in private instances only accessible to your party members. Craglorn also adds daily quests, something which was previously only available in Cyrodiil (PvP zone).

Leveling

Craglorn raises the level cap from Veteran Rank 10 to 12, and nearly everything you do in this area awards your group with decent experience. Though not necessarily required, if you are V10 you can still get experience from completing map objectives and quests outside of Craglorn, so if you have incomplete zones you might want to go back to them first. Despite being able to enter Crag once you’re Veteran 1 it’s highly recommended you don’t attempt it before V8: you will have a hard time finding a group who wants to “carry” you, and you will have a much harder time completing objectives with sub-par equipment.

That being said, most players will enter Craglorn at Veteran level 10, possibly with decent item sets completed from group dungeons which will certainly make it much easier. You will be farming Craglorn for quite awhile until a new Adventure Zone is added, so you will eventually reach V12 even if you don’t move away from this new zone. If you’re not VR10 yet, be sure to take a look at Killerguides leveling guide for ESO, it will help you gain experience much faster with tips and tricks from experienced players.

Crafting

Craglorn doesn’t bring too much to the table in terms of crafting and professions. Though some new item sets have been added in Craglorn patch (1.1.2), crafting still uses the same materials as VR8+ zones do: Nightwood for Woodworking, Void Bloom for Clothing and Voidsteel for Blacksmithing. The good news though is that you won’t have to spend any extra skill points to be able to craft more powerful items.

There is one new world crafting station located in Craglorn, Lanista’s Waystation. If you have 8 traits researched you will be able to craft the Arena set there.

Points of Interest

In previous zones, you often encountered Dark Anchors: special places on the map from which Daedra spawned. Craglorn doesn’t have any Anchors, instead they are replaced by Burial Sites and Magical Anomalies, which are also a great source of experience.

Burial Sites

Burial Sites are events where your group is required to defend an NPC from an onslaught of monsters. Needless to say, if the NPC dies during the process your quest will fail. Burial Sites are mostly found in the western part of the zone and you will encounter them very early in your adventures.

Burial Sites can be quite challenging for groups where players aren’t VR10 with decent equipment. You need to quickly kill the monsters which spawn to make sure they can’t kill the NPC you need to protect. There’s a total of 5 waves of monsters: the first and third are a bunch of regular mobs you can often mow down with AoE, but the second and fourth wave spawns two Gargoyles which goes straight for the NPC — unless you kill them quickly you will fail the event. It’s basically a DPS race, so be sure to save your Ultimates and potion cooldowns for when it happens. Fifth and final wave spawns a boss with AoE spells which often hit the squishy NPC, once again a DPS race so make sure your party is prepared.

Magical Anomalies

Craglorn has a total of 5 Magical Anomalies, and they are all located in the eastern part of the zone (see map above, marked in red). Once you enter the Anomaly you will interact with a Focus Crystal, which will spawn multiple groups of monsters you need to defeat. Once you dispose of the monsters, an Air Atronach boss will appear, and if you manage to defeat him your group will be rewarded with a treasure chest. Anomalies are fairly short encounters but they will still require a coordinated and geared group to complete without needlessly dying.

Trials

ESO’s version of raids are Trials, difficult 12-player encounters with limited resurrects/respawns. Once you enter a Trial your entire group can resurrect a total of 36 times, meaning you need to be extra careful not to die or you might not even be able to complete the encounter. You can restart a Trial at any time, but make sure you pay attention to tactics and do your best to complete it regardless — your groups will be thankful.

Craglorn brings us two different Trials: Aetherian Archive and He Ra Citadel. Trials also have “Leaderboards”, additionally rewarding players who complete it in record time. Dying not only expends a resurrect “slot”, but also slows down your group. Unless you’re in a serious PvE guild aiming to top the leaderboards don’t worry too much about being quick, but take the time and learn the encounters properly.

Closing Thoughts

Craglorn really expands the current Elder Scrolls Online endgame, and this much-anticipated patch finally adds more challenging and substantial endgame content for players with empty quest logs. The addition of Burial Sites, Magical Anomalies, mini-dungeons (delves) with 12 new Skyshards and most importantly Trials, ESO definitely will retain many players who are already tired of the same old. Since content like this is supposed to be added consistently on a 6-week schedule, I hope this is only a taste of what’s to come.

If you have any questions about Craglorn and wish to know more about it or other content in Elder Scrolls Online, be sure to ask in the comments just below!

The Elder Scrolls Online allows players to adventure and quest across the entire continent of Tamriel 1000 years before the events of The Elder Scrolls V (Skyrim), which includes the provinces of Cyrodiil and Skyrim. It features three playable factions and four classes: Dragonknight, Sorcerer, Nightblade and Templar. Don’t be fooled by the relatively small number of classes available though as ESO gives you the ability to customize your class greatly. Guilds from previous Elder Scrolls titles will also be present, including Fighters, Mages, Thieves and the mysterious and deadly Dark Brotherhood.

Due to ESO’s extreme popularity there will be a lot of questions about the game from players who didn’t get the chance to participate in beta testing, and the competition will be as fierce as ever. Having a detailed leveling or strategy guide will be immensely helpful for new players who don’t want to fall behind in the game, so take a look at what’s available and our short guide reviews below.

1. Killerguides ESO Leveling Guide

Rating: ★★★★★ 

Killerguides is a well-known guide publisher who brought together some of the most famous names in Elder Scrolls Online to combine their knowledge and effort to write an efficient and rewarding full leveling guide for the game. If there’s anything you’re struggling with in ESO chances are this guide will give you all the answers.

It includes the following information:

• Optimized leveling guide to help you reach level cap in under a week. Provides full quest details with maps and waypoints, marked locations and NPC hubs to make sure you never waste any time going from quest to quest.
• Quest rewards breakdown will also help you gain experience and items faster and more efficiently by telling you which quests are quickly done and have substantially better rewards.
• Also includes strong and proven class builds to help you level up faster, or dominate other players in PvP combat.
• Skill rotations chapter will additionally further ensure you maximize your damage output at any stage of the game.
• Crafting is also covered in a comprehensive way to ensure you not only have the best equipment available for your level but also make quite a lot of gold by reselling crafted equipment to others.
• Making gold is a valuable resource as well and will provide you with all the steps necessary to gain wealth in Elder Scrolls Online. Top farming and grinding spots are revealed and you will be amazed by the amount of gold you can obtain in a short time.

And that’s just the tip of the iceberg. This strategy guide is not even fully published yet and more and more awesome content is being added on a weekly basis. It’s already the most comprehensive resource for The Elder Scrolls Online leveling with a ton of other tips and strategies included as well. The guide is so far only available for preorder and due to extreme demand already you may want to order your copy as early as possible: chances are it may not be available for very long. The forums are already buzzing with players complaining how the author is revealing the top leveling and gold secrets and everyone is trying to take advantage of them before they get nerfed. I highly recommend you check the guide out and see for yourself how incredibly helpful it is.

• Download Killerguides Elder Scrolls Online Leveling Guide

So far Killerguides is the only guide available for ESO. If you know of any other ones be sure to post in the comment below or contact me directly for a review.

Contents:

• 1. Tips for New Players
  • List of Acronyms/Glossary
  • General Tips
  • Build Tips
  • Vendor & Economy Tips
  • Gameplay Tips
• 2. Game Mechanics
  • Difficulty Levels
  • Skills
  • Gems
  • Flasks
  • Classes
  • Attributes
  • Charges
  • Additional vs. Increased vs. More
  • Defenses
• 3. Links and Other Resources

1. Tips for New Players

List of Acronyms/Glossary

• Adds – Enemies that spawn during a boss encounter
• AoE – Area Of Effect
• BM – Blood Magic
• B/O – Buy Out
• CI – Chaos Inoculation
• C/O – Current Offer
• DOT – Damage Over Time
• DPS – Damage Per Second
• EA – Explosive Arrow
• EB – Eldritch Battery
• EK – Ethereal Knives
• ES – Energy Shield
• Eva – Evasion
• GCP – Gemcutter’s Prism
• GS – Ground Slam
• GM – Game Moderator – GMs can affect the game to resolve issues; synonymous with administrator
• GMP – Greater Multiple Projectiles
• IIQ – Increased Item Quantity
• IIR – Increased Item Rarity
• IR – Iron Reflexes
• LA – Lightning Arrow
• LMP – Lesser Multiple Projectiles
• LS – Lightning Strike
• Mob – “Mobile”, from old MUD games, but it means “Monster”
• Ninja – A player who takes drops that aren’t theirs (hard to determine in this game because of the loot timers)
• OBO – Or Best Offer
• Reroll – To make a new character or randomize the attributes/stats on an item (depending on context)
• RoE – Radius of Effect
• RT – Resolute Technique
• Toon – A character
• TP – Town portal
• WP – WayPoint
• WTB – Want To Buy
• WTS – Want To Sell
• WTT – Want To Trade

General Tips

• There are three acts and three difficulty types (normal, cruel, and merciless). Completing all three acts on one difficulty advances your character to the next difficulty. Each increase in difficulty and act makes the game noticeably more difficult. In Cruel your resistances are reduced by 20% and in Merciless your resistances are reduced by 60%. Note that this includes Chaos Resistance.
• If you die in hardcore your character will be moved to the regular (softcore) league and you can continue playing them there.
• AOE skills are very important for farming and killing large groups of mobs. (Almost) Every build should have an AOE skill worked in somewhere.
• You can use any gem as any class, so long as you meet the stat requirements.
• There are some reasons to not level up a skill gem – the mana cost of the upgraded skill may be prohibitive or you may not have the stats required to use the upgraded skill gem. If you don’t want to level up your gem, you can right click on the notification that it is ready to level up to hide it. You may later level the gem from your inventory screen.
• Two of the same type of support gem do not stack when linked together. However, you may link any number of different support gems.
• Dual wielding grants +10% more attack speed and a +15% block chance.
• There is a minimap. You can turn it on from the UI options menu. You can also turn on “items always visible” and “hold alt to pick up items” from here.
• To highlight items on the ground, hold down the ALT key. Alternatively, you can toggle the option of highlighting items on ground by pressing the Z key.
• There are no full respecs in this game. You can get respec points from quests and orbs of regret to “unspend” passive points, but in doing this you cannot break any dependencies. It is often better just to roll a new character if you need to make large changes.
• Instances reset between 8-15 minutes. Don’t loiter in town if you have a portal open, as it will disappear when the instance is reset.
• Control + Clicking on the entrance to an area allows you to reset an instance as you enter it.
• To link an item in chat hold control + alt and then click the item.

Build Tips

• When making new builds plan for about 80-85 skill points. You will reach this point around the time you complete Act III on Merciless and begin endgame content. No need to get all crazy with a 120 point build. By the time you have 80-85 points you’ll have a much better understanding of where the skill points should be going. Also, this keeps your head from exploding.
• Path of Exile can be unforgiving for those who neglect defenses (like elemental resistances). Sure you could make a full glass cannon build. But, would I advise that? Absolutely not.
• As a rule of thumb, try to get at least +100% life or energy shield from your passive skill tree into your build (To clarify, that is cumulative from +8%, etc., nodes. There are no gigantic +100% nodes.).
• You need elemental resistances. An easy way to build up resists is through rings. It’s a good idea to carry around different sets of resist rings and swap them out depending on the mobs you encounter.
• Keystones are major, large passives that lie on the outside of the passive skill web. They have the ability to completely change the way a character plays, and builds are usually planned around which keystones will be taken.
• Don’t know how to build your character? Check out the official path of exile forums and /r/pathofexilebuilds for ideas.

Vendor and Economy

• Control + Click quickly moves items between your inventory and a vendor/your stash.
• Shift + Click allows you to split stacks of items.
• Eternal Orbs, Exalted Orbs, Divine Orbs, Gem Cutters Prisms, and Chaos Orbs are the most valuable currencies. Your best bet is to hoard everything until you get a good understanding of values in this game.
• Pick up: all currency items, quality skill gems (hover over the gem, if it has a quality bonus, no matter how small, pick it up), unique items, items with three color links (a red, blue, and green socket linked together), superior-quality flasks, and any item with 5 or 6 links.
• White items can be insanely valuable. This is because some of the best items in the game can be crafted from a white item using the aforementioned currencies. Example: Find a white weapon with good sockets. Increase its quality by +20% using Blacksmith’s Whetstones, then use an Orb of Alchemy on the item to make it a rare with +20% quality!
• Superior items (items with bonus quality) can be hoarded and sold for Blacksmith Whetstones, Armorer Scraps and Glassblower Baubles. Any item with 20% quality can be vendored for a whetstone/scrap/bauble, and any combination of weapons/armor/flasks totaling 40% quality can be vendored for a whetstone/scrap/bauble, respectively
• Items with at least one of each color socket, all linked together, can be vendored for a Chromatic Orb.
• If you don’t have any resistance rings but really need some, you can vendor a skill gem and iron ring to get a resistance ring. Red skill gems give fire resistance rings, Blue skill gems give cold resistance rings, and Green skill gems give lightning resistance rings.
• You can vendor Orbs of Transmutation for four Scrolls of Wisdom each.
• Vendoring white items yields Scrolls of Wisdom, vendoring unidentified magical and rare items yields Transmutation Shards, and vendoring identified magical and rare items yields Alteration Shards.

Gameplay Tips

• Look out for Puncture. This is a skill enemies use that does five times more damage while you are moving. You are effected by puncture if you’re leaving a giant trail of blood behind you, and you HP is dropping like a rock.
• Look out for Viper Strike. This is a skill enemies use that does chaos damage over time to you, and it stacks. Four stacks can kill you very quickly. Run away and wait for the stacks to dissipate if your flasks and lifesteal can’t keep up with your HP loss.
• You don’t have to have an aura on your skill bar to keep it up. It only turns off if you enter town, you remove the gem, or you manually turn it off.
• Weapons/shields equipped in your secondary weapon/shield set (you can swap between two sets) can be used to level up skill gems, though you can’t cast them when those weapons aren’t equipped. You can swap between primary and secondary weapon sets with the “x” key, or from your inventory menu.

2. Game Mechanics

Difficulty Levels

• There are three difficulty levels: Normal, Cruel, and Merciless. You must complete Normal difficulty before you can move to Cruel, and you must complete Cruel before you can move to Merciless. The higher difficulties have death penalties, causing you to lose experience when you die. They are 0% for Normal (no penalty), 7.5% for Cruel and 15% for Merciless difficulty. This is a percentage of the experience needed to gain the next level, not your total experience.
• Losing experience in this way cannot cause you to drop down a level. For instance if you have 11% progress to your next level and die in merciless difficulty, your progress will be reset to 0%. There are also penalties to resistances in higher difficulty levels. In Cruel difficulty, there is a -20% penalty to player resistances, and this increases to -60% in Merciless.

Skills

• Skills currently come in two main varieties: spells, and attack skills. Any skill that uses your weapon damage counts as an attack skill, and everything else counts as a spell.
• Attack skills are dependent on your weapon, and so are affected by attack speed, accuracy, etc.. Bonus damage from rings and other gear is applied when using an attack skill.
• Spells do not draw their damage from your weapon in any way. They are affected by % cast speed, %fire/cold/lightning damage, %spell damage, and critical strikes. Integer damage bonuses on gear are not added to spells.
• Traps are very similar to spells, but are not affected by cast speed or spell damage mods. They are affected by % trap laying speed, and relevant damage mods. Integer damage bonuses on gear are not added to trap damage.
• The only exception to this is Town Portal, which is not affected by attack speed, cast speed, or anything else.

Gems

• Support gems only affects skills where it makes sense. For instance, skills that do not already do damage (such as Temporal Chains) will not benefit from Added Cold Damage. Skills that do not already have an area of effect will not benefit from Increased Area of Effect, etc.
• Gems get experience equal to 10% of the experience you earn.
• The number of gems you have equipped has no effect on the rate of XP gain. So having less gems equipped does not cause them to gain XP faster than if you had many gems equipped.
• Gems are not affected by the experience penalty when facing enemies below your level.
• Gems do not lose experience when you die.
• Gems can grant auras which need to be cast outside of town. Once cast, the mana pool is reduced by a certain amount for the aura and this shows up as “Mana Reserved”. This amount can be modified by items.
• When a gem is ready to level up, it shows up on the right side of the screen with a plus sign. Next to the plus sign are the new attributes of the gem. Before leveling the gem, mana pool of the player should be taken into consideration.

Flasks

• Flasks come in four main varieties: life flasks, mana flasks, hybrid flasks, and utility flasks.
• Life, Mana, and Hybrid flasks – These flasks cause you to regenerate life and/or mana when used. The amount recovered is shown on the flask as Life Recovery and Mana Recovery. The time it takes to recover the full amount is shown on the flask as Recovery Time. If you reach your maximum life and/or mana amount before the end of the recovery time, the flask effect will end prematurely. For example: You are at 100/300 life, and 150/200 mana. You use a hybrid flask that has 400 Life Recovery, 200 Mana Recovery, and Recovery Time of 8 seconds. After 2 seconds, you will be at 200/300 life, and 200/200 mana, and the mana recovery effects ends. The life recovery continues, and at 4 seconds, you have reached maximum life, and the life recovery effect also ends. *Flasks can have magic modifiers that provide bonuses while the flask effect is active, for example increased movement speed or resistances. These bonuses end when the life/mana recovery effect ends. *When multiple flasks are used at the same time, the effects are queued. The effect with the highest regeneration rate is always applied first. For example: You have two flasks, one that gives 500 life recovery over 10 seconds and has a 20% increased movement speed modifier, and a second that gives 500 life recovery of 5 seconds with no additional modifiers. You use the first flask and gain the movement speed while recovering life. After one second, you use the second flask. At this point the remaining 9 seconds from the first flask is queued, and the second flask begins its effect. Once the second flask has expired, the first flask resumes its effect for the remaining duration.
• Utility Flasks – These flasks give a temporary bonus for a set duration. Unlike the other flasks, the effects are not queued, each effect has its own timer that can overlap with other effects. The default effects of the flasks will not stack. For example: You have a magic Granite Flask with +25% movement speed, and a regular Granite Flask, both giving +4000 armour for 4 seconds. You drink the first flask, and one second later you drink the second second flask. The result will be that for the first four seconds you will have +4000 armour and +25% movement speed. At the four second mark the first flask ends, but the second flask still has 1 second left. So you will have +4000 armour (but not the movement speed) for another 1 second.
• Flask Charges – Drinking a flask consumes flask charges. Each flask shows how many charges are used per drink in its description, and each flask has a maximum number of charges it can hold. Whenever you or one of your minions kills an enemy, all of your flasks gain charges.
• By default regular monsters grant 1 charge each, magic (blue) monsters grant 3.5 charges each, and rare (yellow) monsters grant 6 charges each. So killing a rare monster causes all of your flasks to gain 6 charges.

Classes

The main difference between the classes is their stating location on the passive skill tree. Classes also start with different amounts of attributes at level 1:

• Marauder: 30 STR, 14 DEX, 14 INT
• Ranger: 14 STR, 30 DEX, 14 INT
• Witch: 14 STR, 14 DEX, 30 INT
• Duelist: 22 STR, 22 DEX, 14 INT
• Templar: 22 STR, 14 DEX, 22 INT
• Shadow: 14 STR, 22 DEX, 22 INT

Scion is the class added at the game’s release and starts in the middle of the passive skill tree.

Attributes

All classes begin with the same base life, mana, and evasion, and gain the same amount per level. These are still affected by the classes’ base stats. For example, a Marauder will start with 50+(30/2) = 65 life.

• 50 life, +6 per level
• 40 mana, +4 per level
• 50 evasion, +3 per level (including level 1)

Attributes are required to equip gear and skills. The three attributes also grant some passive bonuses:

• Strength grants +0.5 life and +0.2% melee physical damage per point
• Dexterity grants +2 accuracy and +0.2% evasion per point
• Intelligence grants +0.5 mana and +0.2% energy shield per point

Therefore the +10 attribute passive skills effectively grant:

• +10 Strength: +5 life, +2% melee physical damage
• +10 Dexterity: +20 accuracy, +2% evasion
• +10 Intelligence: +5 mana, +2% energy shield

Life and mana regeneration – All classes have a base mana regeneration rate of 105% of their maximum mana per minute. For example, a character with 100 maximum mana will regenerate 105 mana per minute, or 1.75 mana per second.

• “Increased Mana regeneration rate” modifiers modify the base rate. For example, 20% Increased Mana regeneration rate would result in 105 * 1.2 = 126% per minute.
• Characters do not begin with any life regeneration, but it is available from gear and passive skills.
• The rate at which you gain life from life leech is 20% of maximum life per second. If you have 1000 maximum life, and leech 600 life with a single attack, it will take three seconds for that life to be applied to your current life. You always get the full amount of life leeched, although it may take time to be applied – if you leech a large amount of life during a battle, you may find that the life gain continues long after the battle is over. Similar to flasks, the life gain from leech will end if you reach maximum life.
• The same is true for mana leech, although the rate is 12.5% of maximum mana per second.

Charges

Charges are glowing orbs that represent temporary buffs with different benefits:

• Endurance Charge (strength) – +5% Physical Damage reduction & +5% additional Elemental Resistances per Charge
• Frenzy Charge (dexterity) – +5% increased Attack Speed & +5% increased Cast Speed per Charge
• Power Charge (intelligence) – 50% increased Critical Strike Chance per Charge

Charges are accumulated by the use of certain skills and equipment, and last a short duration—nine seconds by default. Gaining a charge resets the duration of all accumulated charges. Each type of charge grants different bonuses. A charge bonus increases proportional to the number of accumulated charges of that type. By default, characters can have a maximum of three charges of each type active. This limit can be raised by certain passives and equipment.

Additional vs. Increased vs. More

When you are reading the Tool Tip of a node, pay attention to the percentages and the word that comes directly after it. It will determine how that percentage modifies your current stat. In short:

• Additional – adds directly to the base value.
• Increased/Decreased – an additive multiplicative increase in percentage.
• More/Less – a multiplicative increase in percentage.

What this means is that additive increases add directly to your current percentage. Whereas multiplicative increases, increase your current percentage multiplied by that amount.

There are two types of multiplicative modifiers. There are your increases, which are added together, then multiplied, and then there are your mores, which are all multiplied separately. For example, let’s give a character a bunch of additional damage effects from weapons:

a1, a2, a3, ... , aj.

He/She also has a bunch of passives that give you % increased damage. We will call these percentages:

i1, i2, i3, ... , ik.

You also have a few gems/items/etc that give you a certain % more damage. We’ll call these:

m1, m2, m3, ... , ml. 

They all multiply together in the following way:

(Base damage + a1 + a2 + a3 + ... + aj) * (1 + i1 + i2 + i3 + ... + ik) * (1 + m1) * (1 + m2) * (1 + m3) * ... * (1 + ml).

So there is additional, which is added directly to the base value, there is increased, which is an additive multiplier, and then there is more, which is just a regular multiplier.

Defenses

There are a wide variety of defenses in the game, and it is important that you learn what they are and how they work if you want to survive. They are:

• Life
• Energy Shield
• Armor
• Evasion
• Block
• Elemental Resistances
• Chaos Resistance
• Dodge

Life – Run out of this and you die. Your character begins at level 1 with 50 base health, and gains 4 health for each level thereafter and 1 health for every two strength you have. Your other defenses mitigate the impact enemy attacks have on your life pool. More is better, unless you focus on…

Energy Shield – ES works similarly to life, only you don’t get any bonus ES per level, you get it from gear. You cannot replenish it through flasks, and instead it regenerates itself after a short period during which you are not hit. Every 5 points of intelligence increase your maximum ES pool by 1%. Characters that choose to focus this exclusively end up taking the Chaos Inoculation keystone. Some notes: Chaos damage goes directly through ES to your health pool (which is why Chaos Inoculation is so useful), and having any ES at all confers a 50% chance to resist being stunned.

Armor – Armor provides damage reduction from physical attacks. It reduces incoming physical damage by a percentage according to the following formula:

Reduction = Armor / (Armor + 12 * Damage)

So, attacks that do more damage penetrate your armor better. It is capped at a 90% reduction. Armor is excellent for tanking large groups of weak mobs, but is somewhat lackluster against enemies that hit very hard.

Evasion – This is your chance to simply avoid being hit by physical attacks. It rolls against your attacker’s accuracy like so:

Evasion Chance = 1 - Attacker's Accuracy / ( Attacker's Accuracy + ( Defender's Evasion / 4 ) ^( 0.8 ) )

Evasion also reduces the odds that you will be hit by a critical attack, since your opponent must succeed on a second attack roll as a critical-hit check. Technically, PoE doesn’t use an RNG to determine when you do/don’t get hit with Eva, but they have a weird system in place that gives the same results as an RNG with a little more reliability for the end-user (this is buried somewhere in the Mechanics Thread, I’ll find it later). High Eva is great, but focusing only on Eva can be very dangerous as you will be 1-shot by more powerful enemies later in the game. It is capped at a 90% chance to evade.

Block – If you have a shield or are dual wielding, you will block a certain percentage of incoming enemy physical attacks. Against all physical attacks, if the attack hits you get to roll against your block chance. If you succeed, the attack is mitigated. If the attack would have stunned you had it hit, you go through a 350 millisecond block animation, otherwise the damage is just mitigated with no effects. Block chance is capped at 75%.

Elemental Resistances – Comes in three flavors – Fire, Cold and Lightning. Up until now, there has been no mention of spells. Spells (usually) do elemental damage, hit automatically, and generally can’t be blocked or dodged. However, their damage is reduced by whatever percentage your resistances are. If you have 50% resistance to that element, then you take half damage from that attack. Elemental resistances are capped at 75% without certain skills.

Chaos Resistance – Works like elemental resistances, except it’s much harder to get. Chaos damage always does DOT and bypasses ES. Chaos Inoculation provides immunity to Chaos damage.

Dodge – A special defense that only characters with the Acrobatics keystone can get. It provides an additional chance to negate attacks and even spells. It is calculated independently of Eva.

3. Links and Other Resources

• Even more tips and good explanation of controls
• List of Acronyms
• Common questions and their answers
• In-depth Mechanics of PoE
• Path of Exile Wiki
• Quest Reward List
• Accuracy Table
• Mods Compendium Thread
• Direct Link to the Mods Compendium
• Crafting Guide
• Worth Exalting?
• Life Leech vs. Life Gain On Hit calcuator
• Path of Exile currency exchange rates
• Monster Levels per Area and Difficulty

Source: Reddit

If you have any resources of your own to add to our list post them in the comments below.

Since Darkfall is so much different than other games on the market, many players are worried they it takes a lot of time to learn even the basics of this game. Fortunately, that’s not necessarily the case. You’re about to read everything a new Darkfall Online player needs to know to get started, and for those of you looking for more detailed and advanced strategies I sincerely recommend checking out this guide!

Starting out

After creating your character you start out in one of the three starting villages of your race. You should familiarize yourself with the controls first. Then you can talk to the village counselor and take the quests he offers you. The first few quests have to do with killing goblins. This is a good way to make some gold and to get some starting equipment. After killing a goblin, you can loot and skin him. Remember to bank your gold often. It’s better to bank a few times too often then just one time too few.

In the beginning you will need to hunt monsters using your starting weapons, but after killing a few goblins you should be able to pick up better weapons and maybe even a bow and a staff. Goblin Shamans drop staffs, and you need on in order to cast magic. Your starting spells are rather weak but they’re useful. The heal-self spell will cut down on your down-time, and the mana missile spell is useful to finish off fleeing monsters. Don’t worry too much about raising your magic ability in the very beginning. Becoming a good mage in Darkfall is a long and expensive process.

After killing a few goblins and solving some quests, you should have a decent amount of gold in your bank. Investing some on better armor is a good idea. You may want to consider not buying something that you can’t easily replace. Investing all your money in armor you could lose is not a good idea. Always make sure you keep a healthy stash of backup funds in your bank so that you can recover from possible setbacks.

Does it sound all a bit too much to learn? It’s actually quite easy once you get used to it. Let’s bring all this information together with a short walkthrough.

Step 1 – Initial preparations

You have just created your character, and have appeared just outside the gate of the village that you chose as starter location. You will see a clanstone (i.e. bindpoint) and the NPC that gives the starter quests.

Under the System messagebox there is a ‘Chat’ button. Click on it to open the public chat bar. If you want to type a message to all, type /say_global then your message. If you want to start a private conversation, type /msg then the player’s name and last name followed by your message. You can read a bit more about chatting below.

You don’t see your character yet (since you aren’t in combat mode). Right click. This brings up the utility windows, such as paperdoll, backpack, etc. A links menu on the top left allows you to access options, journal, minimap, etc. Click now on minimap to open it, if it’s not open already in the top right corner. Leave it there, it will be handy shortly to find where the monsters are.

Click on Skills, and under general skills find ‘Rest’. Drag it to the ’0′ (zero) slot of the hotbar (you’ll see how to use it in a moment). Equip one of the 3 starter weapons by dragging it from the backpack to your paperdoll.

Right click again – the utility windows will disappear. Press R to unsheathe your weapon. Now you can see your character!

Step 2 – Moving around

Time to familiarize yourself with the basic movement keys:

• W,S,A,D move you forward, back, left, right
• Space – Jump
• Left shift – Sprint (it consumes stamina but you run much faster)
• C – crouch (npcs have more trouble spotting you)

Remember that you can remap these and all other keys in Options, which is an item of the menu that you can see when you right click.

Step 3 – Get the starter quests

1. Run up to the NPC. To interact with him, you must first sheathe your weapon, if you are in combat mode (press R to sheathe/unsheathe).
2. Press F to interact with the guy. You will see a window where the last tab is Quests. Go to that tab and take the two quests available.
3. You will now see on the minimap (that you opened in step 1) the locations of the nearest goblins. Start running there.

Step 4 -Combat

Unsheathe your weapon (press R – you’ll now be in 3rd person view) and left click to hit your target. Note that you do NOT autotarget or lock target. You have to actually be facing towards your enemy and be aiming at it/her/him in order to hit. Keep an eye on your stamina bar so that you always have enough to sprint away if you are in too much trouble.

Step 5 – Loot

Let’s assume that you defeated your enemy. After a few moments, a tombstone will appear instead of its body. Sheathe your weapon (press R), then target the tombstone and press F to use it. Drag its contents to your backpack.

Step 6 – Rest

Walk out of the way of the spawn to avoid surprises, then sheathe your weapon if you were in combat mode (press R). Press 0 (we had dragged the Rest skill to this slot in step 1). Rest is now loaded, as you can see by the small campfire icon under the hotbar. To start resting, left click. You will see your character sitting down. When your life and stamina bars are full, press space to jump up.

Congratulations, you’ve learned the ropes of getting by in Darkfall, and are now ready to discover more by yourself, such as how to use magic, crafting, archery, and so on. If you are ever in doubt on how to do something, don’t forget to ask in general chat. People are happy to help and there’s usually a Dev at hand to answer most questions.

Basic Controls

Darkfall is very different than other Massive Multiplayer Games since it’s real-time with fast-action combat. Some of the controls may seem foreign to players with a previous MMO background. First Person Shooter players will find them easier to get accustomed to. The main controls for a starting player follow:

• W, A, S, D Movement Keys: W-key to move forward, A-key to strafe left, S-key to move backwards, D-key to strafe right. This is a standard control method in most videogames where you can control every aspect of the movement of your character.
• Mouse Look and Aim: You can choose the direction your character is facing by moving your mouse. This works whether you’re standing still or you’re moving. You also aim this way by putting the crosshairs on your target.
• RIGHT MOUSECLICK – this will take you back and forth between action mode and interface mode.
  • Action mode allows you to interact with the world, so you want to be in action mode in order to fight, use objects, banks, mounts, ships and non-player characters etc.
  • Interface mode allows you to gain access to various menus and options that have to do with your character and the world around him. Here you will find your backpack, skills and spells, paperdoll, boards, etc.
• F-Key, the USE key: The F-key is the default ‘use’ key. If you need to talk to a non-player character you run up to him and press the F-key. The F-key is very versatile, it’s the key you use to interact with a bank, to get on a mount, to loot a corpse etc.
• G-Key, the other USE key: The G-key is the ‘alternate use’ key. Some interactive objects have more than one uses. The G-key will open up a menu with more options than the default use ones. An example of this is when you use the G-key on a mount, it will allow you to unsummon it and make it go back to being a figurine in your backpack. The G-key also opens your clan vault when interacting with a bank, it’s how you trade with a player, or how you invite someone to your party, and has many more uses.
• The R-key sheath/unsheathe: The R-key is the sheath and unsheathe key. If you have a weapon or a magic staff equipped, they are considered sheathed. By pressing the R-key your character will unsheathe his weapon and it’s ready for combat. Pressing the R-key again will put the weapon away. If you have a melee weapon equipped then by unsheathing a weapon your character moves to the third person perspective to make it easier to keep full awareness during combat. You will need to sheathe your weapon before you can interact with any object in the game, so after you kill a monster, you have to press R before you can use the F key to loot it.
• Space-Key Jump: Using the space key you make your character jump. Jumping uses up stamina so you want to be careful not to run out.
• C-Key Crouching, Diving: Use the C-key to crouch. You can use crouching to hide, make less sound, duck from an attack, and to get into tight spaces. When swimming, the C-key makes your character dive.
• Left Shift + Movement Key, Sprint: By pressing down on the left shift-key while running your character sprints. Sprinting also uses up stamina, so you should keep an eye on it.
• Ctrl + Movement Key, Walk: By pressing the Ctrl key while moving, your character walks.
• 0-9, Hotbar: You can move spells and items to your hotbar for fast access. You move them by dragging the icon and placing it into the hotbar slot you want to use.
• Shift 0-9, Hotbar Selection: You can select the appropriate hotbar by holding down shift and cycle between 0 and 9.

Special Controls:

• To revive the character needs to have its weapon sheathed.
• Z Revive (LMB/Attack bind to use)
• X Gank (Press LMB/Attack bind to use)
• SPACE Release(die) when incapacitated before the timer runs out.

Swimming Controls:

• W,A,S,D Forward, left, backwards, right
• C Dive
• left shift and movement key crawl-stroke swimming (faster)
• Space Swim Upwards

Starting Weapons

When you start out in Darkfall you have a starting weapon that you can never lose. There are several types of starting weapons including a staff, a shield, a bow, a pole arm, and many more. You can switch the type of starting weapon you spawn with by talking to an NPC in the starter towns. You can also purchase more weapon slots and carry up to three starting weapons with you.

Surviving in Darkfall

Agon, the world of Darkfall, is a brutal and unforgiving world, where enemies hide behind every bush and lurk around every corner. Here is a collection of tips on how to best survive Darkfall:

• Bank often. Items in your bank can’t be looted by anyone, unlike items you carry around with you. Make sure you go back to town as often as possible and try not to carry more than you need.
• Only carry what you can afford to lose. It’s tempting to dress up in full plate as soon as you can afford it, but lower quality armor often offers similar protection at a fraction of the cost.
• Avoid going below half stamina. Its’ tempting to kill the entire goblin spawn in one go but that may leave you low on health and stamina, making you an easy target to enemies passing by. It’s recommended to kill a few monsters at a time, retreat and rest up before you finish the rest. This way you’re always prepared for any eventuality.
• Sounds carry further in Darkfall that in most games and sounds of combat can be heard far away. Finish killing monsters as fast as you can to minimize your exposure time to enemies passing by.
• Live to fight another day. There’s no shame in retreat. If your health or stamina are critically low, try to run to safety.
• Always keep food in your backpack and eat before every encounter. Eating food will improve your regeneration.
• Try to always keep potions in your backpack. They could save you in a sticky situation.
• When fighting try to take the high ground. It’s easier to aim and hit an enemy lower than you than it is hitting one that’s higher up.
• When resting, use cover like rocks, trees, bushes etc. This will make you harder to spot.
• Just because a player is blue to you, doesn’t necessarily mean that he’s well intentioned. Stay alert and always expect the unexpected. A healthy dose of paranoia can save you in uncertain situations.
• Some players may try to scam you or trap you. If a trade deal seems too good to be true, it probably is. Always be careful when trading with other players and make sure you do it in a reasonably safe location. Always double-check the items in the trade window before you accept a trade to avoid being tricked.
• Some players may try to trick you into attacking them. A common practice is to run into your attacks while you’re fighting monsters. The purpose is to make you turn rogue so that they can kill you without losing alignment. Always pay attention to the people around you, and always expect the worst.
• Treat other players with respect. Making friends and allies is one of the keys to a successful life in Darkfall.
• Join a clan. If you’re going into Darkfall without a clan, joining one may be a good idea. In a clan you instantly gain friends and allies that you can learn from and hunt with. There’s safety in numbers.

Invulnerability

When your character dies and is resurrected, there’s invulnerability for five minutes. This is meant to give you time to run away and escape if your spawning location is camped by enemies. If you perform ANY actions other than running away, including opening your bank or unsheathing your weapon, you will become vulnerable again.

Alignment

Alignment in Darkfall is a numerical value used to say something about how good or evil you’re regarded by other characters and by guard towers. You gain alignment by killing evil characters, and lose alignment by killing good ones. Your alignment is always displayed on the health window, on the lowest bar. You can mouse over it to see your current alignment status.

Players of opposing factions will always be considered evil to you no matter what their alignment is. To see if a player is considered good or evil, just target him. If his name appears in blue, he’s considered good and you will take an alignment hit for killing him. If his name is in red, then you gain alignment by killing him.

If you attack a blue character, you will go rogue for a few minutes. This means that in that time, other players can kill you freely no matter what your alignment is. Hitting players in your party or your clan will not carry any alignment penalties, or turn you rogue. If your clan has declared war on another clan, you won’t take an alignment hit for killing these players, nor will you turn rogue.

If you turn evil (red) you will respawn at a chaos stone when you die. There are no guard towers at chaos stones. To become good (blue) again, you have to kill evil (red) players.

The alignment system is the main mechanic that determines if you are in good standing or bad standing (red) with members of your own racial pairing. The basic theory is that killing someone who in your racial pairing (who isn’t red) will result in a loss of alignment and bring you closer to being red, while killing the natural enemies of your race and red players will increase your standing. The value of a negative hit is much higher than that of a positive one, so it will take several enemy kills to negate the effects of a single friendly kill. If you only hit another player, will be rogue flagged for a short period of time, in which case you can be killed by friendly targets as a means of self-defense. Your alignment is displayed as the bottom meter in the window where your life, stamina, and mana are located.

Having a bad alignment and going red does have some consequences. Besides the obvious of being a target to everyone in the game, your own racial towns will not welcome you and you will be attacked by the guard towers. You will also not be allowed to bind at the same bindstone as normal players, which makes sense because since the bindstones are in town, you would be attacked immediately. Upon going red, you will be automatically bound to remote bindstones in the wilderness where there is little in the ways of merchants and banks in many cases.

The alignment system has its flaws. For starters, it can be easy to flag other players as rogue status by deliberately trying to place yourself in front of their attacks. This can lead to you getting attacked by what would be otherwise friendly players, who then try to capitalize on your rogue status. This means that when you are in a crowded PvE area with strangers, you need to be very careful about your surroundings. Another personal beef I have is that players of an enemy race have their names colored blue, even though they are technically your enemy. The game displays them as blue because their alignment is good in the context of their race. This can lead to confusion if you see another player at a distance and can’t quite make out what race they may be. I think it would make more sense to display their names in red naturally since you will be rewarded for killing them.

Quests

You get quests by talking to non-player characters. Walk up to an NPC, make sure your weapon is sheathed, then press F while you target him. This will bring up a dialogue window and depending on what services this NPC offers, you can buy and sell items, train skills and spells, or get quests.

Completing quests for NPCs may unlock new quests.Some quests are repeatable, and can be done as many times as you want. These are usually kill-quests and some of these may have random rewards, with a small chance for elite rewards.

Questing in Darkfall at this point doesn’t seem to play as much a role than it does in some of the other more recent MMOs. Considering that there are no experience points, quests seem to be a way to get your hands on some items or cash. Finding the quest givers is not as easy also from recent games. There are no floating icons over NPCs like in WoW, WAR, and AoC. Some vendor NPCs simply will have a quest tab on their menu, but you won’t know until you talk to them.

The quests themselves are really nothing special in all honesty. Most of them consist of the same basic stuff we have seen the last few years where you are sent to either kill a certain amount of a monster, or collect some items from monsters, or kill the monsters in a certain time frame. It isn’t to say they aren’t rewarding to do, but they are just as uninspiring as any other MMO, unless I just haven’t found the good ones yet.

Combat

There are 3 major different combat types in Darkfall; Melee, Archery, and Magic. This will most likely be one of the more hotly-contested aspects of the game, where most people will either love it or hate it. Unlike other MMOs, Darkfall’s combat plays out more like a first-person shooter than a traditional MMO. This means there is no tab targeting, your attacks need to be manually aimed, and your attacks can also be dodged. It is also worth mentioning that the different races all vary in size, which means that certain larger races (Ork / Mahirim) may have a larger hitbox than some of the shorter races (Alfar / Dwarf). I have heard some people freak out about this issue making different races having advantages, but as someone who plays a Mahirim, it was not much of an issue for me personally. I am sure others will disagree on this point, but I would just suggest people play what they like and you will adapt.

Stamina also plays a very critical role in combat because when your stamina is depleted, you will not be able to attack or put up much of a defense. Stamina management will be vital to most of your fights, and in most cases, running out of stamina can be as equally devastating as running out of life. Darkfall also seems to recognize back attacks, and rewards them with doing an increased amount of damage. This can make turning your back and fleeing from someone have some risk if the other person is able to hit your back, especially with arrows. To combine these points, some people will find that melee combat will often have some people sprinting the entire time trying to get behind behind their targets or to make themselves harder to hit. While it can be annoying sometimes to fight someone doing this, these people tend to burn themselves out faster, but the use of this tactic will no doubt frustrate some players.

Each of the 3 combat types have skills associated with using them. When that skill reaches 25, new attacks will open up to be purchased. These new attacks initially after purchase do not seem to show a noticeable increase in damage, but after skilling them up a bit, they start to show more of a return. Some players might be disappointed to find that there are not many “special” attacks compared other MMOs for the melee and archery types where you may be used to having a hotbar full of different abilities. As a fan of Asheron’s Call which had literally no abilities, it doesn’t bother me as much because the combat has more freedom than other MMOs by combat having no autolocking hits, but it definitely will be an issue to some players. Hopefully as the game progresses, they will introduce a some more skills down the road to beef up the amount of tools non-magic players have at their disposal.

Melee Combat

To attack someone, you first need to have a weapon equipped. You can equip a weapon by double-clicking it in your backpack, or by dragging it onto your paperdoll. Once you have a weapon equipped you can use the R-key to unsheathe it. This wil take you into a third person view, and it becomes a little easier to react to enemies and allies in your immediate area. To attack an enemy, run up to him and try to keep him in your crosshair while you press the left mouse button to swing against him.

Wearing heavy armor will give you a penalty to your attacks, on the other hand attacking someone while in heavy armor will increase your Armored Combat skill. As this rises, the penalty for fighting in heavy armor is reduced. Try to maneuver yourself behind an enemy. Both players and monsters gain a significant damage bonus by hitting someone from behind. You want to attack players from behind and avoid being hit from behind.

When your melee weapon is drawn, you will be pulled out into a 3rd-person viewpoint. Even if this view, your visibility behind your character is minimal. This means sneaking up behind people is a legitimate tactic as opposed to other MMOs where you can spin the camera to see behind you. I can testify first hand that this works quite well, which is good because this game has no “stealth” skills like other MMOs that can make you go invisible. The only time in Darkfall where you can spin the camera at your whim is while resting.

Pressing “T” will toggle your attacks between a horizontal slash and a vertical chop. While both of these do exactly the same damage, certain situations may find one over the other as more practical. The horizontal slash makes it easier to connect with your targets due to the wide cone of damage, but in crowded combat, this could also have you striking your allies for damage because the game has friendly fire. A vertical chop while having a narrow cone of damage, works better in crowded situations because it minimizes the chance of striking nearby allies in a frantic battle.

Magic

To cast a spell, first drag its icon onto the hotbar located by default on the top left of your screen. You also need to have a staff equipped. Press R to ready your staff. If your desired spell is in slot position 1 you press the 1-key on your keyboard to ready your spell. You can see your spell is selected as the active spell at the bottom of the hotbar. Now you’re ready to cast the spell. Press and hold the left mouse button to cast. When you have your target in sight, release the mouse button to fire your spell.

If you’re wearing a lot of armor, or very heavy armor, you’ll have a penalty to your damage output with magic. Your chance of misfiring your spell is also increased. However this can be offset by raising your Armored Magic skill which goes up while casting spells in armor.

As you raise your skill in Lesser magic, new spells and new schools start becoming available to you. Visit the Mage NPC to buy new spells and new schools of magic. More advanced spells require reagents to cast. In order to become good at magic, you need a lot of time and a lot of reagents. However the rewards are worth it as a powerful mage can influence a battle in an impressive way, healing and buffing allies, damaging and debuffing enemies etc.

Magic is broken up into many schools, each with their own spells. In addition to skilling up each school of magic, each spell acts as its own skill. The more you cast a spell, the better you will become with it. Higher skilled spells will evolve and start to travel faster through the air, do more damage, or even shoot multiple projectiles.

Like archery, firing spells at your enemy will require some degree of coordination because they need to be manually aimed. The good news is that magic is a lot easier to aim than your bow because your spells will travel in a straight line exactly to where your crosshair is pointed without arcing. In addition to the ease of aiming and obvious range advantages, many of Darkfall spells have splash damage that can hit a target if your shot is close enough, or even hit multiple targets.

Magic does come with its disadvantages as well. Most of the spells in the game require a reagent or component to cast with the exception of the starter spells. This means the life of a mage can be costly, and skilling up spells and school with components can be a hard road. As such, starting the game as a pure mage right out of the gate will come off as extremely difficult. Spells are also easier to dodge than arrows at range because they are easier to spot and generally travel slower through the air. Magic also has a tendency to fizzle more when you are wearing heavier armor, but there is an armored magic casting skill that helps offset it a little if you are able to skill it up.

Those who delve deep into magic will also be forced later on to make decisions about which schools to pursue. New spells and schools of magic are unlocked as you progress through prerequisite school, but some restrictions start to show up down the road. Darkfall does not let you specialize in schools of magic that are polar opposites, such as Fire and Water, Earth and Air. You can have 2 out of the 4 elements, as long as they don’t clash with each other, but your end game plans will need to be thought out to avoid training in the wrong areas.

Archery

To use archery you need a bow equipped and arrows in the ammunition slot of your paperdoll. Press R to ready your bow, then press and hold your left mouse button to draw. Once you have the target in your sights, release the mouse button to fire. Archery takes a little practice to use, but once you get good at it, it can be very deadly, especially in PvP.

If you’re wearing a lot of armor, or very heavy armor, you’ll get a penalty to your damage output with the bow. This can be offset somewhat by raising your Armored Archery skill which goes up as you use archery while wearing armor. Hitting someone in the back adds a significant amount of damage inflicted to the target.

Firing a bow in Darkfall requires some degree of skill when it comes to aiming your shot. When you fire an arrow, it will arc through the air as opposed to traveling in a straight line like a bullet. This means that the archer will have to compensate for this by aiming the crosshair above his target depending on how far away it is. Pressing and holding your left mouse button will make your character load an arrow, which can be held as long as you continue to hold down the button. This allows you to wait for the moment of your choosing to take your shot.

The upside to archery, besides the range advantage, is that arrows can be very hard to dodge if the shooter has good aim because of the speed they travel towards through the air. The downside to archery is that you can only hit one target at a time, and that arrows are not free. This can make it hard for new and financially struggling players to keep up with the price of obtaining arrows on a regular basis, although many of the starting mobs are known to drop small quantities. Archery only skills up when you shoot an arrow, and since they are not recoverable once fired, raising this skill can end up costing you.

Gathering

All players start out with several gathering skills by default. Gathering resources can provide a nice income and it’s needed both in crafting and city building for clans. Please not that all resource nodes have a maximum amount of resources that can be depleted. Once depleted, they’ll regenerate new resources very slowly.

Mining

There are two main resources that can be mined: Rock and metal nodes. Rock nodes will yield stone that’s used primarily in city building, and gems that are used in crafting. Normal metal nodes will yield iron ore that can be smelted in iron ingots, or sulfur that’s a reagent used in spell casting.

To mine any of these nodes you need to wield a pickaxe. Walk up to the node, unsheathe the pickaxe using R, and left-click you mouse while aiming at the node. Any yield will go directly to your backpack.

In some clan cities and hamlets you can build stone mines and metal mines. The yield from these nodes is significantly higher than normal nodes. You may also find rare resources that are used to craft some of the premier items in Darkfall. Your mining skill affects your yield potential.

Logging

Lumber can be harvested from almost every tree in Agon and can be turned into wood at the workbench. Trees will primarily yield lumber, but also resin that can be used in spell casting. Wood is needed in many forms of crafting, as well as being an important resource for city building.

To gather lumber, you need to wield a wood axe. Walk up to the tree, unsheathe the axe pressing R, and swing at the tree. In some clan cities and hamlets you may be able to construct a Grove, which gives significantly higher yields than regular trees. Your skill in logging affects your yield potential.

Fishing

Fish is used in cooking, and it’s a good way to make sure you always have food in your backpack. Eating will speed up your regeneration rates significantly. In addition to fish, you may also catch nacre while fishing. Nacre is a reagent used in spellcasting.

To fish, you need to wield a fishing pole. Walk to the water’s edge, unsheathe the fishing pole pressing R and left click while aiming at the water.

Herb Gathering

Herb gathering will allow you to find herbs that can be used in Herbalism to make various useful potions. You can gather herbs from a variety of bushes around Agon. There’s a good chance you’ll gather berries used for food. If you’re lucky you may find the elusive Steedgrass, used when crafting mount figurines.

You need to wield a sickle to gather herbs. Walk up to the bush you want to gather from, unsheathe the sickle and left click while aiming at the bush. In some clan cities and hamlets you may be able to build a farm which gives a higher yield than the bushes. Your skill in gathering affects your yield.

Skinning

All monsters in Agon can be skinned after they’re killed. Most of the resources you get from skinning a monster may be used in various forms of crafting or enchanting. You could also get reagents used in spellcasting. To skin a monster you need a skinning knife. Walk up to the grave of a slain monster, unsheathe the skinning knife and left click while aiming at the grave.

Crafting

Almost every item in Darkfall can be crafted by the players. Player crafted items are on average much better than identical items found on monsters or NPC vendors, especially if the crafter has a high crafting skill rating. All crafted items will be tagged with the name of the player that made them.

• Woodworking
• Cooking
• Armorsmithing
• Weaponsmithing
• Enchanting
• Alchemy
• Tailoring
• Tinkering

Monsters

Monsters in Darkfall range from the very easy to kill, to deadly dragons and demons that may take several entire clans to kill. As a general rule, weaker monsters are usually closer to the starting areas, while tougher monsters are found towards the central areas of Agon and on the sub-continents.

Try to fight one monster at a time if possible, and always watch your stamina and hitpoints. If you are in trouble, RUN.

Mounts

Mounts can either be bought or taken from other players, or you can create one yourself. To create a mount, you first need to find Steedgrass. This is a rare drop in herb gathering, and depending on your luck, it can take a while to get. Once you have the Steedgrass, you need to buy the Taming skill and a taming whistle. You can find these at NPC vendors.

Once you’ve created a mount figurine, it will appear in your backpack. To summon the mount, aim at the ground ahead of you where you want your mount to appear. Double-click the mount figurine in your backpack. Please keep in mind that anyone can run up to your mount and steal it unless you are riding it, so make sure you spawn it away from other players, and don’t leave it unattended.

If you leave a your mount spawned and unattended, it will slowly start deteriorating until it dies. If you lose connection, crash, or log out of the game while on a mount, the mount will stay behind in the world. Remember to quickly log back on to try to reclaim it. To de-spawn a mount, walk up to it while aiming at it, and press alternate use (default G) to make it into a figurine again. The figurine will appear in your backpack.

If you die, you will drop your mount figurine for others to loot, so carry it with you only if you need it, or if you can afford to lose it. It’s recommended you keep it safely in your bank if you’re not using it.

Mount controls:

• F to mount/dismount
• R Sheathe/Unsheathe a weapon on mounts
• W,A,S,D move forward, turn left, move backwards, turn right
• Mouse Mouseloook
• Q,E Lean left, right
• Space Jump
• Movement +Ctrl Mount walks
• Numlock Autorun
• Left Mouse when mount is standing still Mount attacks Forward
• Left Mouse + S when mount is standing still Mount attacks Backwards
• Left Mouse + S when mount is standing still Mount attacks Backwards
• Left Mouse+ W,A,D Weapon attack when mount is in motion

Ships

Ships in Darkfall range from tiny simple rafts, to huge 50-cannon warships. Building all but the most simple rafts requires significant amounts of resources, and a harbor. There are only a handful of harbors capable of building ships in Darkfall, and they only exist in clan cities.

Once you have built a ship, it will appear in your backpack as a figurine. To spawn the ship, aim at a spot on the water and double-click the figurine in your backpack. Keep in mind that once the ship is spawned, anyone can climb aboard and steer it, so make sure you only spawn it in a safe area. You can climb up onto the ship on either side of it. To steer the ship, walk up to the helm of the ship, and while looking at it, press F. To de-spawn your ship and make it into a figurine again, press alternate use (default G).

Ship controls:

• WASD move forward, turn left, move backwards, turn right
• Mouse Mouseloook
• Numlock Autorun

Warhulks

Warhulks are impressive and devestating magical mobile siege units, that can give attackers an edge when laying siege to an enemy city. There are several different types of Warhulks, ranging from smaller and quicker units to large personnel carriers. To build a Warhulk, you need a significant amount of resources, and access to a Siege Workshop. Siege Workshops are rare, and only exists in clan cities.

Once you have built a Warhulk, it will appear in your backpack as a figurine. To spawn the Warhulk, aim at the ground where you want it to appear, and double-click the figurine in your backpack. Please remember that once the Warhulk is spawned, anyone can run up and take control of it, so make sure you spawn it in a reasonably safe area. To de-spawn the Warhulk, walk up to it while aiming at it, and press alternate use (default G). Once de-spawned, it will appear in your backpack as a figurine.

Warhulk controls:

• F12 Change Camera Mode
• WASD move forward, turn left, move backwards, turn right
• Left Mouse If warhulk has a cannon for the driver: Fire Cannon
• Mouse Rotates camera in secondary camera mode. If driver has a cannon, it rotates the cannon.

Cannons

In Darkfall there are several different types of cannons, ranging from fixed positions on ships, on warhulks, and on clan city towers, to deployable cannons that you spawn with a figurine in your backpack.
To deploy a cannon from a figurine in your backpack, aim at the ground where you want to place the cannon and double click the figurine in your backpack. Once a deployable cannon has been placed, it can never be un-summoned, so take great care when placing it.

To use a cannon, walk up close to it while aiming at it, and press F to use it. Once you have control of it, you aim it by using your mouse, and fire by left-clicking your mouse.

Going Rogue

When you target/look at another player, if his name is in blue, he has a positive alignment to you. Attacking him will make you a Rogue. When you are in Rogue-mode, your name will appear in brown to other players, and they can kill you with no penalties. If you kill a blue player, your alignment will drop, and if it drops enough you will turn red to other players, and they will be rewarded with positive alignment for killing you. Red players will be auto-attacked by guard towers.

Death & Looting

Death

Probably one of my favorite aspects of PvP combat that makes Darkfall unique is the incapacitation of a player when they reach zero life (excluding the rare and freakish decapitation). This starts a 60 second or so window where you get to decide the fate of the fallen player, or have some choice words with them. There are no revive spells in Darkfall, but when someone is in this state, anyone can help them back up without need of any spell or item. If the person lays there for too long, they will bleed to death and expire. The option is also your to deliver the final blow to send the fallen player back to their bind point naked, and ironically this is called the “Gank” skill by the game. Incapacitated players will yell out “HELP ME!” when reaching zero life, which can be heard from quite a distance away.

Looting

This is one aspect of the game that I think tends to scare away or concern players who have never played in this type of environment, but may be considering it. I’m sure most people following the game know and understand that Darkfall has full loot upon death, which means that everything on your body is lootable with the exception of your starter weapons, but does not include what you may have banked. Every player starts with a single starter weapon which can always be traded for a different one for a small fee of 20 gold. For the price of 100 gold, you can secure a 2nd weapon, and for 1000 gold you can secure a 3rd. Most players will eventually have 3, which will probably consist of a melee weapon, a wand (needed to cast magic), and a bow (no starter arrows). So you will never be without a weapon no matter what happens.

To loot a grave, sheathe your weapon (press R), target the grave and press use (F) to open it. Items can now be dragged from the grave to your backpack.

Now I am not going to sugar-coat it, catching a beatdown and waking up at the bindstone in your underwear sucks, and everyone is going to have days where it happens. On the flip side, there is definitely something to be said about bending down over a fallen opponent and seeing a pile of treasure. The first time you do this, it will definitely bring a smile to your face. If full loot scares you, consider the nature of the game. This is not an item-based game, and while items do help a good bit, they are expendable and replaceable. Remember that the core of your strength in Darkfall is your skills, and nobody can ever take that from you. I think people who are used to raiding weeks for epic purple gear might have a hard time understanding this, but hopefully this should give you some perspective.

Resting

To rest, sheathe your weapon (press R), then use the Rest skill (which you can drag to the hotbar from the skills list). This does NOT make you rest yet, it simply loads the skill. Left click to start resting. A ‘zzz’ icon will appear at the top of the screen and you will see your character in 3rd person view, sitting down. You can mouselook and arrange your bags etc. without breaking out of rest.
To stop resting, use the Jump key (space by default).

If you have any food, eating before you rest will increase the recovery rate.

Chatting

Here are the basic chat commands in Darkfall Online:

• /say (default) – talk to people in your immediate vicinity
• /say_global – talk to everyone on the server. This is a temporary chat command that will be removed before release
• /msg firstname lastname – sends a private message to another player. The message will show up in its own tab, and by switching to this tab you open a private conversation with each other.

Interface

The UI has a learning curve. If you have played other recent MMOs, you can pretty much just forget everything you have seen. The cookie-cutter interface from WoW, EQ2, WAR, AOC is completely gone. I think people are going to struggle with it the first time they sit down and it could turn some people off. Luckily, there is a small tutorial to help you get your bearings. Right clicking the mouse turns the game into UI/Menu mode, much of what you would expect if you pressed the “ESC” key in any other MMO.

When in this mode, you will see that this is the only time you have a mouse cursor on your screen. This means when you are in play mode, there is no clicking on your hotbar to active abilities, you just press the numerically assigned button on your keyboard. The UI is completely customizable as you can move and resize any window to fit your personal preference. The in-game help pretty much tells you that controls will feel better to FPS players over MMO players. The “F” key is the default use button and works just like it would in Call of Duty, as does spacebar with jumping, and “C” for crouching. The “R” key draws your weapon, and will put you into 3rd person if you have a melee weapon equipped.

One of the first things you might want to do is to arrange the interface to your liking, and maybe try out different video settings. You bring up the GUI-mode by RIGHT-CLICKING your mouse. You close it again with another RIGHT-CLICK. In your backpack you will have three different starting weapons – a club, a sword and an axe. You equip one of them by either double clicking it or dragging it to the weapon slot of your paperdoll. You will always respawn with these three weapons. They can not be sold, destroyed or lost.

Everything else on your character will be left on your grave when you die, and can be looted by anyone. Always make sure to keep your bank vault well stocked with equipment or gold. You will never lose items in your bank vault. To perform any attacks, you need to unsheathe your weapon. This is done by pressing R. Pressing R again will sheathe your weapon. When your weapon is sheathed, you are in 1st person view. When your weapon is unsheathed (i.e. when you are in combat mode), your view changes to 3rd person view if you are holding a melee weapon, and stays in 1st person (but with hands and weapon visible) if you are using a ranged weapon, such as a bow or a magic staff to cast spells.

To cast a spell you need a staff. You can either find a staff on a monster, or buy it from an NPC vendor. Most active skills in Darkfall follow the load and fire principle. You select the skill of spell you want to perform (drag the ones you use more often to the hotbar for convenience), then press the LEFT mouse-button to perform the action.

You can’t loot a target with your weapon drawn. When monster or players die, they leave a tombstone which can be looted by pressing the use key. When the loot box open, this will put you into UI mode, so you will not be able to move or do anything. You also need to open your backpack (Default “B” button) and manually drag and drop the items from their corpse to your bag one at a time. This will definitely be perceived by many as clunky, but at the same time there is a case to be made by others that looting should not be fast to prevent people from cleaning out bodies quickly in the middle of a heated battle. After playing for a while, I think it has grown on me a lot because the time associated with cleaning someone out adds a risk when you are in a heated situation.

My main beef with UI is the chat box. The chat box has multiple tabs that correspond to the different channels, such as group, clan, local, tells, and alliance. The problem with this is that it is becomes easy to miss messages. Let’s say you are in your group chat tab running around looking for trouble, and you run across another player and kill them. Unfortunately, that player asked if he could join you and wanted to provide you with some valuable information, but you missed it because his text was under the local tab that you were not looking at because you were talking in group. Unless you are paying careful attention to the various tabs, you are bound to miss a tell or message in another channel. You can however click and drag those tabs out to create new chat windows for that channel. This also means that having a different chat box for each channel can start to clutter up your screen. I think the chat would be better served with multiple channels in the same tab, and leaving it up to the user to decide which channels they want to see in each tab. Aventurine has stated that further revamping of chat is already in the works and will arrive shortly, so there is a good chance that this will be less of an issue very soon.

Hopefully this article helped explain some of the comprehensive Darkfall Online systems. The game is very deep and complex and many new players have a tough time with its learning curve. You can find out a lot more about this awesome game on the official website, or you can ask your questions below.

Once you’ve loaded the game and chosen your server, the first thing you’ll see is your character selection screen. If you’ve created a Consular already, great! If not, click ‘Create Character’ and have fun customizing. Race and gender give no advantages or disadvantages in game, so pick whatever looks good to you. When you’re satisfied that you have the hottest looking Consular in the galaxy, you’ll be taken to the opening crawl of your story. Enjoy reading it—this is YOUR Star Wars saga!

A shuttle will fly you down to the surface of Tython, which is the origin planet for both Jedi classes. You’ll meet Master Yuon Par, who has taken you as her Padawan. You’ll also get instruction on how to move in game, find your quest log, locate taxis, and equip items. This is a good spot to click the ‘Options’ button on your top bar, and check out your preferences. If your game is running slowly, the graphics are usually the culprit. Turn shadows, anisotropy, and grass down or off. Lowering ‘ground clutter’ can help, too. Under ‘social’, check ‘allow access to same class stories’ if you plan on grouping a lot. This will let you join other JCs in their class stories. Note—only one of you will get credit if you’re grouped with someone who has the same class quest. There is a choice to auto-loot the area on right click—this is very handy. Add more hotbars, especially the bottom two. You’ll need them as you gain skills. I enabled all four bars and put the skills I used infrequently on the right bar. I set my left bar for crew member skills. There’s a tab at the bottom of the preference window for keybinds. Adjust them as you desire—there are a lot of options you can hotkey or rebind to keys you prefer. Click ‘apply’ to save all your options, and then ‘OK’ to close the window.

You’ll also notice tips on the right side of your screen from time to time–click those to open the tip windows and learn more. These are incredibly helpful, and you want to ignore these about as much as you want to be eaten by a Rancor.

People to See, Places to Go

Once you arrive at the Gnarls taxi stop, make sure to pick up the bind point. Get in the habit of unlocking all your bind points, which are usually located by the taxis and in cantinas. This gives you many more quick travel options. You’ll thank yourself later when you want to hop back somewhere to turn in quests.

You’ll find your first skill trainer and some merchants in this area as well. Visit the trainer as soon as possible after leveling up to get your new skills. You need all your Jedi powers to defeat those enemies!

Skills for Survival
The default hotkey for your skills is ‘p’. Most skills will be automatically added to your hotbars if you have an open space for them. Some are not, however. Also, passive skills do not need to be on your hotbars. They’re always active. The skills are unlocked on your bar by default, so you can move them around freely to suit your particular play style. Click the little padlock icon on the left side of the center skillbar to lock or unlock it.

I usually keep Force Wave in slot one, Project in two, Telekinesis in three, and my melee skills in four and five. Seeing items ripped out of the ground and thrown at your enemy is Very Cool, so I lean more towards using the Force skills. I have those hotkeyed on my number pad. If you prefer more of a melee style, move the lightsaber skills to slots two and three instead. The issue of mousing versus hotkeying the skills has caused many a debate and even a few nasty little flamewars. Do what works best for you and ignore the fruitcakes out there who tell you that you’re wrong for doing it that way.

Quests and Maps

Right near the Gnarls taxi, you’ll notice Master Relnex, who will have your first real quest for you. Quest givers have cut out gold triangles above their heads when they have quests to offer. The triangles will be filled in when you have a completed quest to turn into them. Why BioWare chose triangles, I don’t know. In any case, go find those students before the Flesh Raiders capture them!

Check your map periodically (default hotkey is ‘m’). This is a great way to find more quests and new areas to explore. Accept all the quests you can possibly find, including the bonus objectives that come from taking down your foes. All of those will give you experience points (XP) towards the next level and practice using the different combat and healing skills.

Tempting as it is to move your class storyline along, don’t rush through the Gnarls area. You receive XP for discovering Lore objects, unlocking new areas, and meeting new species. You’ll have your first dialogue option that offers Light Side (LS) or Dark Side (LS) points. You can role-play it the way you want, though there is currently a definite advantage to choosing one side or the other. Some gear is restricted to either LS or DS, and you have to earn a certain level of points to unlock those ranks. Your Jedi can turn to the DS, though it will be a challenging path to play. Dark Side Jedi do not turn into Sith and switch factions to the Empire, just as Light Side Sith do not switch factions to the Republic.

When you receive quest rewards, take the time to mouse over them to find out which attributes they boost. The main attribute for the JC is Willpower, with Endurance coming in a close second. Willpower raises the amount of Force power, while Endurance raises your hit points. Since you can only wear light armor, raising both is essential. Presence is useful for raising your companions’ hit points, but don’t worry about that one too much. At lower levels, you can also put points into Strength if you want to raise the amount of damage you do with your lightsaber. Gear with this stat may arguably useful for Jedi Shadows, but not for Sages, who need the extra Force points more than melee damage. At higher levels, Willpower is always going to be the better option, however. Don’t bother with Aim or Cunning.

After finishing up in the Gnarls area, you’ll be directed to the Jedi Temple. Take the time to explore the area in and around the temple thoroughly. You’ll find class trainers, several quests, a cantina, lore objects, and a variety of vendors, including one for your Tython commendations. Don’t bother buying armor at this stage—you’ll receive a number of armor pieces as quest rewards. The understudy’s foil is useful for killing the bad guys faster than your practice saber, but it’s not essential. Save up the commendations for the Consular robe that you can buy at the Specialty Vendor. That served me well through most of Coruscant, which is the planet you go to when you finish your work on Tython. Pick up a few medpacs and stims that boost your Endurance and Willpower. You can find these at Stim Vendors and Republic Medical Droids.

Health and Welfare

Make sure to use your Force Valor buff as often as it wears off. It lasts an hour. You can buff an entire party or even other players. If you buff other players who aren’t Consulars as you meet or pass them in game, you’ll find that some of them will stop to return the favor. Every bit helps!

What happens if your health drops during battle? Well, when your foes are lying at your feet, take a few moments to use your meditation skill. This will heal you and replenish your Force points. Always go into the battle with a full health bar whenever possible. What happens if your health bar drops to zero? You’ll have a screen pop up saying you were defeated. You will be presented with two options–revive where you’re at, or get revived at the nearest medcenter. If you’ve finished all your objectives and were ready to turn in your completed quests, or are in the middle of a huge mob that you have no hope of defeating, then being transported to the nearest medcenter might be more convenient. Otherwise, revive where you’re at. You’ll have 8 seconds of stealth to get to a safe spot to heal yourself and re-apply any buffs and stims. Then go finish off the bugger who defeated you and pick up those drops he so kindly left behind. Your armor takes damage during battle, but it takes a lot more damage if you are defeated. Make sure to repair your items at a vendor when you sell all those terrific drops you’ve picked up during your adventures.

Explore, Explore, Explore

Once you’re done with the Jedi Temple orientation, you will be directed to Kalikori Village to help the Pilgrims there and to solve some of the mysteries for your class quest chain. Following that, you’ll end up at the Forward Speeder Camp to foray into the ruins of Kaleth. Explore all the areas–you never know when you’ll find lore objects, new quests, security chests and crates, and the fabled datacrons. There are some gorgeous areas on Tython where you have a chance to stop and just simply enjoy.

Sometimes, you’ll receive a mission item when you accept a quest. That item will end up in your inventory (default hotkey ‘i’). Click the ‘mission’ tab. You can drag the item to your hotbar so that you don’t have to open your inventory every time you need to use it.

Enemies of the Republic are Everywhere

The enemies get tougher as you advance through the different zones, and you’ll see more challenging foes and even a few bosses. Generally, if the enemy has a name, it means BioWare cared enough about him to shower him with love, attention, and lots of hitpoints. You’ll have a better chance of surviving a boss encounter if you’re in a group or if you’re the same or higher level compared to the boss. Left-clicking on the boss will give you some of his stats so that you know what you’re up against.

Bosses often have better quality loot drops than the average enemy. Usually the drops will shine with a white light, but if you see green, blue, or especially purple, there’s something special there for you!

A gold shaft of light indicates a drop needed for a mission has fallen. Make sure to grab those up.

Dialogue Options Can Be a Lot of Fun

BioWare has done a terrific job of making the quests varied and fun. I had to laugh at the baby flesh raider quest and the subsequent dialogue choices when turning in the completed quest for the reward.

Heroic Quests

At the Forward Speeder Camp, you’ll also receive your first Heroic quest. Pay attention to the number of people it says you should have in your party before attempting it, usually 2+ or 4. You’ll need at least that many players, and companions don’t count. These aren’t called ‘heroic’ quests for nothing! These quests are also excellent spots for grouping up and earning social points. Don’t miss out on that.

Companions Join You on Your Adventures

Your first companion, Qyzen Fess, will join you on Tython. You’ll receive more companions over the course of the game. Once you have him in your party, your dialogue choices affect you in more complex ways. These choices many times give you not only LS/DS choices, but now also give affection points. If your companion likes the choice you’ve made, you’ll get rewarded with affection points. If he doesn’t like your choice, affection points will be subtracted. The codex entries in your log (default hotkey ‘l’) on your companions will tell you what they like and dislike, so make sure to read those if you’re planning on maximizing affection with them. Sometimes, your companions won’t like your LS or DS choices. This adds a new dimension to your conversation options.

Don’t forget to equip your companion with items, too, though the equipment he has when you first receive him should be sufficient on Tython. He can wear heavy armor, so give him the best you can find or buy. Despite the fact that his main attributes are Aim and Cunning (both ranged attributes), he comes only with a weapon proficiency in techstaff, which is a melee weapon. You can access your companion’s equipment in the character pane (default hotkey is ‘c’). You’ll see the companion tab right next to yours. You don’t have to worry about assigning attribute points or abilities to your companion. He automatically levels up when you do.

First Lightsaber!

Finally, the time will come for you to craft your own lightsaber. This class quest is the toughest on the planet except for maybe the heroic quest. Make sure you’ve reached at least level 8, and preferably higher. Remember to equip the lightsaber as soon as you craft it. You’ll need it! Once you’ve completed this quest, you’ll return to the Jedi Temple and learn some important news that will send you on even greater adventures across the galaxy.

By this time, you should be well past the ‘newbie’ stage and ready to tackle the advanced stuff. May the Force be with you!

Need more detailed Jedi Consular tricks and tactics? Check out this strategy guide here and learn the mistakes every new player makes!

Guide source: Torwars.

1. Introduction
2. Advanced Classes
3. Species
4. Storyline
5. Abilities
6. Khem Val (First Companion)
7. Equipment
8. Conclusion

Introduction

If you are thinking about rolling a Sith Inquisitor, but need a little convincing, I’m here to help. Would you like to shoot lightning from your fingers? Interested in wielding a lightsaber? Want to shock people to get your way? No desire to follow a strict moral code like the goody goody Jedi? Well, this Sith Inquisitor is the class for you.

To start, as an Inquisitor, you have each of the MMO trinity roles open to you. Depending on your Advanced Class, you will have the option to tank, heal, or deal crazy levels of purple lightning powered damage.

Advanced Classes

At level 10, your Inquisitor will journey to the Imperial Fleet and will have to choose an Advanced Class. If you want to tank, the Assassin class is for you. If you want to fulfill a support/healing role in groups, the Sorcerer AC is for you. The decision is a little harder if you want to DPS. The Assassin and Sorcerer have one shared tree called Madness that focuses on dealing damage. In addition, each AC has two skill trees that are dedicated to that class. The Assassin has ‘Darkness’ which is the tank tree, and a damage tree called ‘Deception.’ The Sorcerer’s trees are ‘Lightning’ and ‘Corruption’ which are damage and healing trees respectively. If you want fill a DPS role as an Inquisitor, the decision lies in what type of damage you want to deal.

If you want to shock your enemies from a distance until they are nothing more than smoking, still sparking husks on the ground before you, go with the Sorcerer. If you prefer your enemy a little closer to you so that you can bash them with a lightsaber, the Assassin, with his stealth abilities, is a deadly choice indeed.

Lightsaber types differ with your Inquisitor Advanced Class as well. You will receive a double-bladed lightsaber if you take the Assassin route and a single-bladed one with the Sorcerer. Truthfully, I wasn’t that excited many months ago to learn my future Assassin had to have a double-bladed lightsaber. I loved having two lightsabers in the original Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic. Mostly because I could have each one be a different color, and for some reason it felt like I was doing more damage. Two lightsabers equals twice the damage right? I understand why BioWare did this, and after playing my Beta Assassin close to level 30, it would be strange to have anything but a double-bladed lightsaber. There’s something satisfying about watching both blades ignite, decloaking and backstabbing an enemy, all in one devastatingly smooth motion. It just feels right.

Species

Sith Purebloods, Humans, Twi’lek, Rattataki, and Zabrak are your species choices for the Inquisitor. If you want to take the iconic route, choose the Darth Maul look-a-like Zabrak. I went with a human Assassin and a Pureblood Sorcerer. While species choice has no effect on gameplay, I have to admit, the racial abilities for the Purebloods are just kick ass. Slapping your companion and making them cry is just ruthlessly fun. Humans get a pump up the crowd racial ability where everyone around you hops up and down doing the Arsenio Hall fist pump motion. (I never thought I’d ever mention Arsenio Hall in a TORWars article, but there you go.) Bottom line, if you really want to be evil at all times, the Pureblood is the way to go.

Species, skill rotations, leveling, Datacrons, specializations and lots more are covered in more detail here!

Storyline

The Inquisitor story is dark. Really dark. I played the Consular on the Republic side until level 10. Not surprisingly, the story is very Jedi-tastic. Sure, there are Dark Side decisions, but those decisions, in my opinion, are nothing like the Light/Dark Side decisions the Inquisitor faces. It’s not really fair to compare the two, because they are completely different factions and storylines, but let me give you a spoiler free example of the sinister beauty that is the Inquisitor story.

Within the first few levels, you are faced with several opportunities to inflict pain on others as your quest for power unfolds. A typical Light/Dark Side dilemma will give you the choice to shock an NPC, or to kill him/her. In a word, the Inquisitor storyline is not for the faint-hearted. Granted, I played my Inquisitor as dark as possible, but if I was trying to go the Light Side route, the choices are just not all that light.

*Minor spoiler example incoming: On Balmorra, I walked in on a Sith Lord Force Choking another NPC. The Light Side choice was to interrupt a very powerful Sith Lord (Dark, would allow her to kill the NPC.) I chose not to intervene, but my hunch is that she would have killed him anyway, and probably would have been a little peeved at the interruption. Think about it, would you interrupt Darth Vader mid-Force Choke? I didn’t think so.

Without spoiling any more of a story filled with backstabbing, scheming and power posturing, the Inquisitor story is amazing in its darkness. If you are curious about how the Palpatines of the Star Wars universe got their sinister beginnings, the Inquisitor is for you. If you don’t want to hurt anyone at all, this is not the class for you. A Light Side Inquisitor, is only marginally more forgiving than its Dark Side equivalent. If that sounds like your cup of blue milk, take a big sip, and shock your way to top. And please, don’t be ashamed if an evil cackle escapes your lips from time to time.

It’s no secret that the Sith Inquisitor starts off as a slave. As I’ve mentioned in my Beta Impressions post a while back, within moments of appearing on the screen, your Inquisitor will have a rival, and every person in power is more than happy to see you fail and die. The rival I mentioned is the ‘star pupil’ of the young Inquisitors. He talks a lot of smack, and is looking to undermine you at every turn. Without giving too much away, if you are patient enough, you will see an opportunity to not only defeat him, but discredit his puppeteer as well. After playing through this scenario twice, it’s just as satisfying the second time as it is the first time. Did I mention the whole ordeal earns you a place at Darth Zash’s side? It’s a good day to be a Sith when you can help your master work her way toward the coveted status of Darth and beyond.

Abilities

I’ve mentioned before how satisfying Force Lightning is, but I’ll say it again. Force Lightning never gets old. In conversations it’s just plain fun, but on the battlefield it’s dominating. In the early levels on Korriban, you’ll be facing mobs of three to five enemies at once. It’s essential before you earn your first tanky companion Khem Val, that you learn to use your lighting-powered crowd control abilities to subdue enemies for a few seconds while you dispatch the others. Not surprisingly, the dark, flowing robes of the class don’t do too much in the way of absorbing damage.

When you venture into the first tomb at level one, you are cutting down K’lor’slugs with relative ease. You’re soon asked to take out the tomb looters that are hanging out in mobs of at least three. Aren’t looters supposed to be looting? Anyway, be sure you visit the trainer near the tomb entrance each time you level up. I remember when I died the first time – it came as a complete surprise. I was owning so completely, I just kept fighting, even after I dinged my next level. I realized pretty quickly that when faced with a mob of four looters, I’d need a new strategy. Buying new abilities from the trainer would have been a good start.

In the first five levels, Electrocute and Whirlwind will be your best friends. Whirlwind, which you get at level four, is an ideal way to approach groups of three or more. The ability will not only scoop an enemy up in a vortex for 15 seconds, but it will shock them, (and up to 8 others) every 3 seconds. Be sure you do not cause damage to the enemy you’ve used it on, otherwise it will break the whirlwind, and he’ll join his buddies in pummeling you.

After crowd controlling an enemy with Whirlwind, tab target the next enemy and use Electrocute. That will both stun and damage for five seconds. You’d think 15 seconds isn’t a lot of time, let alone five seconds, but at early levels, this is plenty of time to bash the rest of the mobs with your vibroblade, or use Force Lightning to do heavy damage. By the time the five seconds are up, at least one other enemy will fall, if not two. Then all you have left is the vortex guy. Do what you will with him. He’ll be close to death anyway.

Khem Val (First Companion)

As you progress in your class quests on Korriban, you will free the ancient devourer of thousands of Jedi, Khem Val. Besides combat becoming a lot easier when Khem Val joins you as a companion, he’s actually pretty entertaining and easy to please. That is, if you get right to the point, don’t put up with any crap, and kill everything in your path, Khem Val is easy to please. He’ll act as a meat shield of sorts for your pre-AC Inquisitor. He’ll absorb a ton of damage while you shock fools from a distance.

If you can get past his ugly mug, and partial nudity, he’ll get your back wholeheartedly. Be sure to choose Dark Side options if you want to keep his favor however. He will actually threaten you at times if it appears that you’re going soft. Kill enough, and make dark choices and he’ll happily kill, and protect you while you rack up a ton of Affection Points. Everybody wins.

Equipment

I mentioned before that the Inquisitor can only use Light Armor. It’s really important that you upgrade your gear as often as possible. Granted, if you decide to use Khem Val as a tank while you dish out the damage, you’ll survive. However, mere survival is not enough I’m afraid. Focus on gear which increases Willpower for a greater Force pool, and Endurance to help you survive the early levels.

Don’t forget the meat shield! Khem Val will die, and die often if you do not upgrade his gear. Focus on Endurance and Strength for Val if he’s to tank for you. He won’t last long on Heroic missions, Flashpoints, or later level encounters if you don’t hook him up with better (Heavy Armor) gear. If he goes down, unless you are a tank spec, you’ll be soon to follow. It happens faster than you’d think.

Conclusion

Overall, the early levels of the Inquisitor are a blast to play. You get to be more evil than you think is possible, shoot lightning from your fingers, shock people in conversations, and selfishly aspire to great power at the expense of everyone around you. If this doesn’t sound like your style of gameplay, this isn’t the class for you. As with all classes, you will be faced with many choices, but most of the Inquisitor’s are just plain evil. Would an aspiring Sith Lord have it any other way? That’s for you to decide.

Species, skill rotations, leveling, Datacrons, specializations and lots more are covered in more detail here!