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Welcome Midkemians: Advice, tips, and comparisons for your new life in Aetolia
We're sorry to see that your time in Midkemia had to come to a close. It can be a little confusing trying another Iron Realms game, but we hope you'll give Aetolia a try! Sapience is a significantly different land from Triagia, and here are a few of the most important discrepancies you'll want to be aware of.
ARTIFACTS
- Artifacts must be purchased in credits or iron coins (with few notable exceptions), and cannot be rented. Otherwise, they work similarly to how you're used to.
- Iron Coins are our equivalent of Ishapian tokens.
CITIES
Which city will become your home? Aetolia has four city-states to choose from, with many striking similarities to your old Triagian haunts.
- Bloodloch, the city of Undeath, strength, and grisly might. This city of Shadow will remind you of Sar-Sargoth, with its scheming vampiric houses, slaves to torture or drink from, and emphasis on conquest and power.
- Duiran, the untamed commune of the wild Heartwood. Fans of Elvandar might find much familiar in the Spirit-aligned Duiran, though rather than a monarchy, Duiran Council boasts a diplomatic structure similar to the rest of the cities.
- Enorian, coastal jewel of the east, foundation of the Church. Former residents of Krondor will most likely flock to this city of Spirit, though be warned - this is a city of justice and purity, and the citizens do not often suffer corruption or darkness.
- Spinesreach, the fierce Republic of the savage north. Though this city is Shadow-aligned, it does not have much of an analogue to Midkemia. Spinesreach is only loosely aligned with the nefarious aims of its fairweather ally, Bloodloch, and espouses the pursuits of research, trade, and prosperity.
RACES
- Unlike Midkemia, races in Aetolia aren't tied to a specific city, and any race can join any city.
- That said, some cities may be less welcoming of certain races. For example, a Nazetu probably won't be very welcome in Enorian.
CULTS
- There are no Cults in Aetolia - rather, we have Divine Orders (HELP ORDERS)!
- Divine Orders are formal organizations of worship managed by the Gods Themselves. Though the associated God may change, there is only ever one Order for one God.
- Each God tends to associate with a certain alignment (also called a tether), and though Their tenets can be open to interpretation, it is typically frowned on for, say, an Enorianite to worship Chakrasul (HELP GODS).
- To gain access to an Order, you must first join the God's Congregation (HELP CONGREGATION). How you advance from there is up to Them!
CURING
- Curing is much more complex in Aetolia, being focused on several different balances, such as herbs/organ slices, pipe smoking, and the application of salves. Read HELP CURING, as there's a lot to learn!
- Most notably, the element of randomness is not as present. Many afflictions are cured by a specific curative, and will cure in the exact same order each time. Your offense must be planned around this order!
- Although you are free to use your own solution, Aetolia comes with a free, built-in curing system called First Aid that is VERY powerful, and includes a lot of customization. HELP FIRSTAID will tell you everything you need to know!
ESTATES
- Referred to as houses, or sometimes castles, player houses are purchased with an initial credit investment (HELP CASTLES), then expanded with the stone commodity. Gold is used to rename/redescribe rooms of your house.
- There is no common hub to access houses from. All houses, whether inside the walls of a city, village, or out in the wilderness, are placed like any other building, so plan where you want yours accordingly!
HUNGER, THIRST, & WEARINESS
- Your character will hunger and tire, though you will find you can go for far longer periods between meals and rest.
- At level 80, your need to eat or sleep will vanish entirely, save for certain skills that inflict these conditions on you.
- Aetolians are very well hydrated and never need to drink!
MOVEMENT, NAVIGATION, & EXPLORATION
- Finding your way around a new world can be confusing! Luckily Aetolia has a landmark system (which has useful destinations such as shops) and built-in pathfinding.
- You can PATH FIND to find a route to where you want to go and then PATH GO.
- Valid destinations include a room number, landmark, area name, CITY, GUILD and more! Check HELP PATHFINDING.
- LANDMARKS will show you a list of global landmarks. If you're standing inside a city, it'll show you some city-specific landmarks as well.
- The endurance cost to move from place to place is practically negligible.
- Travel tends to be very speedy - skilled or well-equipped characters can move across entire continents in mere seconds!
- Numerous skills exist to jump between rooms instantly, such as Portals, Wormholes, and Deliverance.
- Exploration does not grant you experience in Aetolia.
PVP/PK
Aetolia's rules on PVP engagements with other players is somewhat more strict. Most notably:
- There is no "open PVP" at all times - certain conditions (ylem harvesting, Hunting Grounds, etc.) do open players up for free PK, but in general, combat is expected to be a necessary, in-character action.
- Repeatedly killing someone without good reason is frowned upon. The rule of thumb is that one death is acceptable; any more and you need another reason!
- Killing your enemy because he insulted you is good; killing him just because he's your enemy is bad.
- You should always read HELP PK and ensure that you understand it.
SPECIALIZATION
- There is no class specialization in Aetolia, although some skillsets do allow for degrees of customization, such as choosing a Mastery in Battlefury.
STATS
- Your character's stats are not as integral to the performance of your skills, though they are still important!
- More often than not, the effectiveness of your abilities is determined by the relevant skill rank (see HELP SKILLRANKS).
- Stats are independent of what race you pick, and we use a statpack system instead that determines your stats. You can pick any statpack for any race.
- Stats are changed by switching statpacks (HELP STATPACKS), reaching a given level as certain races, or gaining enhancements (HELP ENHANCEMENTS). You do not gain stats with each level.
- See HELP STATS for more information.
STEALTH & DETECTION
- Many skills and defences allow you to discern the location of other characters, such as Farsight or Scent, or the Thirdeye defence. These are commonly available, so don't be surprised that your foes can hunt you down!
- Normal stealth might be far weaker than what you are used to, and can be defeated by numerous vision-based defences (Heatsight, Lifevision, etc.).
- However, the Phasing skill, available to the Syssin class, is an extremely powerful means of hiding from other players, similar to Deepshroud.
THEFT
- Theft is very difficult to do in Aetolia, and is very uncommon. That doesn't mean you shouldn't secure your belongings!
- As with any Iron Realms MUD, leaving your goods around a house or stockroom can still be a liability, and you should always ensure you are not being followed.
- It is impossible to have your gold stolen, and is safe to leave out in your inventory.
TIME
- Aetolia uses a slower time scale, just like Midkemia, with one day being equivalent to four real life hours, and one week equaling one real life day.
TATTOOS
- Tattoos in Aetolia function almost identical to how they do in Midkemia, although with different names/functions. Here's some of the Tattoos you'll probably want on your character.
Mindseye: Allows you to see and hear while blind and deaf. Very useful!
Cloak: This tattoo prevents people from summoning you with the Brazier tattoo, and is considered a staple defence for combat.
Moss: Passively clots your bleeding damage.
Boar: Passively regenerates your health.
Shield: Will prevent most attacks against you, but can be bypassed. Drops if you move or make a hostile action.
- Most players will be able to assist you with obtaining them if you ask over your guild or city channel, but failing that you can PATH FIND TATTOOS to locate a NPC who can ink them for you - for a cost!
VAMPIRISM
- Vampirism in Aetolia is very common-place and is not at all rare like it is in Midkemia.
- Becoming a vampire tends to be a permanent choice - a cure is possible, but lengthy.
- Vampires are shadow-aligned, and are very much unwelcome in Duiran and Enorian.
- Vampires may be feared and reviled, but not everywhere! Vampires enjoy power and prestige in the city of Bloodloch, and do not hide their identities.
CRAFTING & MERCANTILE SKILLS
- There are three tiers in our crafting system, which offer opportunities for merchantry and further customizing your world and character.
Mercantile skills: There are presently four Mercantile skills. You can only have one at a time. These are Concoctions (cures for the living), Reanimation (cures for the Undead), Forging (creation and customization of armour, weapons, and shields), and Toxicology (venoms).
Tradeskills: These cost 100 credits and an additional lesson investment. These include: Tailoring, Jewelcraft, Furniture, Woodcraft, Cooking, Brewing.
Talents: These have a credit cost and no lesson investment. These include: Linguistics, Barding, Taxidermy, Pyrotechnics, Fletching, and more! (HELP TALENTS).
Remember, for any questions you might have, you can always ask on the Newbie channel, or ask here on the forums!
ARTIFACTS
- Artifacts must be purchased in credits or iron coins (with few notable exceptions), and cannot be rented. Otherwise, they work similarly to how you're used to.
- Iron Coins are our equivalent of Ishapian tokens.
CITIES
Which city will become your home? Aetolia has four city-states to choose from, with many striking similarities to your old Triagian haunts.
- Bloodloch, the city of Undeath, strength, and grisly might. This city of Shadow will remind you of Sar-Sargoth, with its scheming vampiric houses, slaves to torture or drink from, and emphasis on conquest and power.
- Duiran, the untamed commune of the wild Heartwood. Fans of Elvandar might find much familiar in the Spirit-aligned Duiran, though rather than a monarchy, Duiran Council boasts a diplomatic structure similar to the rest of the cities.
- Enorian, coastal jewel of the east, foundation of the Church. Former residents of Krondor will most likely flock to this city of Spirit, though be warned - this is a city of justice and purity, and the citizens do not often suffer corruption or darkness.
- Spinesreach, the fierce Republic of the savage north. Though this city is Shadow-aligned, it does not have much of an analogue to Midkemia. Spinesreach is only loosely aligned with the nefarious aims of its fairweather ally, Bloodloch, and espouses the pursuits of research, trade, and prosperity.
RACES
- Unlike Midkemia, races in Aetolia aren't tied to a specific city, and any race can join any city.
- That said, some cities may be less welcoming of certain races. For example, a Nazetu probably won't be very welcome in Enorian.
CULTS
- There are no Cults in Aetolia - rather, we have Divine Orders (HELP ORDERS)!
- Divine Orders are formal organizations of worship managed by the Gods Themselves. Though the associated God may change, there is only ever one Order for one God.
- Each God tends to associate with a certain alignment (also called a tether), and though Their tenets can be open to interpretation, it is typically frowned on for, say, an Enorianite to worship Chakrasul (HELP GODS).
- To gain access to an Order, you must first join the God's Congregation (HELP CONGREGATION). How you advance from there is up to Them!
CURING
- Curing is much more complex in Aetolia, being focused on several different balances, such as herbs/organ slices, pipe smoking, and the application of salves. Read HELP CURING, as there's a lot to learn!
- Most notably, the element of randomness is not as present. Many afflictions are cured by a specific curative, and will cure in the exact same order each time. Your offense must be planned around this order!
- Although you are free to use your own solution, Aetolia comes with a free, built-in curing system called First Aid that is VERY powerful, and includes a lot of customization. HELP FIRSTAID will tell you everything you need to know!
ESTATES
- Referred to as houses, or sometimes castles, player houses are purchased with an initial credit investment (HELP CASTLES), then expanded with the stone commodity. Gold is used to rename/redescribe rooms of your house.
- There is no common hub to access houses from. All houses, whether inside the walls of a city, village, or out in the wilderness, are placed like any other building, so plan where you want yours accordingly!
HUNGER, THIRST, & WEARINESS
- Your character will hunger and tire, though you will find you can go for far longer periods between meals and rest.
- At level 80, your need to eat or sleep will vanish entirely, save for certain skills that inflict these conditions on you.
- Aetolians are very well hydrated and never need to drink!
MOVEMENT, NAVIGATION, & EXPLORATION
- Finding your way around a new world can be confusing! Luckily Aetolia has a landmark system (which has useful destinations such as shops) and built-in pathfinding.
- You can PATH FIND to find a route to where you want to go and then PATH GO.
- Valid destinations include a room number, landmark, area name, CITY, GUILD and more! Check HELP PATHFINDING.
- LANDMARKS will show you a list of global landmarks. If you're standing inside a city, it'll show you some city-specific landmarks as well.
- The endurance cost to move from place to place is practically negligible.
- Travel tends to be very speedy - skilled or well-equipped characters can move across entire continents in mere seconds!
- Numerous skills exist to jump between rooms instantly, such as Portals, Wormholes, and Deliverance.
- Exploration does not grant you experience in Aetolia.
PVP/PK
Aetolia's rules on PVP engagements with other players is somewhat more strict. Most notably:
- There is no "open PVP" at all times - certain conditions (ylem harvesting, Hunting Grounds, etc.) do open players up for free PK, but in general, combat is expected to be a necessary, in-character action.
- Repeatedly killing someone without good reason is frowned upon. The rule of thumb is that one death is acceptable; any more and you need another reason!
- Killing your enemy because he insulted you is good; killing him just because he's your enemy is bad.
- You should always read HELP PK and ensure that you understand it.
SPECIALIZATION
- There is no class specialization in Aetolia, although some skillsets do allow for degrees of customization, such as choosing a Mastery in Battlefury.
STATS
- Your character's stats are not as integral to the performance of your skills, though they are still important!
- More often than not, the effectiveness of your abilities is determined by the relevant skill rank (see HELP SKILLRANKS).
- Stats are independent of what race you pick, and we use a statpack system instead that determines your stats. You can pick any statpack for any race.
- Stats are changed by switching statpacks (HELP STATPACKS), reaching a given level as certain races, or gaining enhancements (HELP ENHANCEMENTS). You do not gain stats with each level.
- See HELP STATS for more information.
STEALTH & DETECTION
- Many skills and defences allow you to discern the location of other characters, such as Farsight or Scent, or the Thirdeye defence. These are commonly available, so don't be surprised that your foes can hunt you down!
- Normal stealth might be far weaker than what you are used to, and can be defeated by numerous vision-based defences (Heatsight, Lifevision, etc.).
- However, the Phasing skill, available to the Syssin class, is an extremely powerful means of hiding from other players, similar to Deepshroud.
THEFT
- Theft is very difficult to do in Aetolia, and is very uncommon. That doesn't mean you shouldn't secure your belongings!
- As with any Iron Realms MUD, leaving your goods around a house or stockroom can still be a liability, and you should always ensure you are not being followed.
- It is impossible to have your gold stolen, and is safe to leave out in your inventory.
TIME
- Aetolia uses a slower time scale, just like Midkemia, with one day being equivalent to four real life hours, and one week equaling one real life day.
TATTOOS
- Tattoos in Aetolia function almost identical to how they do in Midkemia, although with different names/functions. Here's some of the Tattoos you'll probably want on your character.
Mindseye: Allows you to see and hear while blind and deaf. Very useful!
Cloak: This tattoo prevents people from summoning you with the Brazier tattoo, and is considered a staple defence for combat.
Moss: Passively clots your bleeding damage.
Boar: Passively regenerates your health.
Shield: Will prevent most attacks against you, but can be bypassed. Drops if you move or make a hostile action.
- Most players will be able to assist you with obtaining them if you ask over your guild or city channel, but failing that you can PATH FIND TATTOOS to locate a NPC who can ink them for you - for a cost!
VAMPIRISM
- Vampirism in Aetolia is very common-place and is not at all rare like it is in Midkemia.
- Becoming a vampire tends to be a permanent choice - a cure is possible, but lengthy.
- Vampires are shadow-aligned, and are very much unwelcome in Duiran and Enorian.
- Vampires may be feared and reviled, but not everywhere! Vampires enjoy power and prestige in the city of Bloodloch, and do not hide their identities.
CRAFTING & MERCANTILE SKILLS
- There are three tiers in our crafting system, which offer opportunities for merchantry and further customizing your world and character.
Mercantile skills: There are presently four Mercantile skills. You can only have one at a time. These are Concoctions (cures for the living), Reanimation (cures for the Undead), Forging (creation and customization of armour, weapons, and shields), and Toxicology (venoms).
Tradeskills: These cost 100 credits and an additional lesson investment. These include: Tailoring, Jewelcraft, Furniture, Woodcraft, Cooking, Brewing.
Talents: These have a credit cost and no lesson investment. These include: Linguistics, Barding, Taxidermy, Pyrotechnics, Fletching, and more! (HELP TALENTS).
Remember, for any questions you might have, you can always ask on the Newbie channel, or ask here on the forums!
24
Comments
A lot of people use First Aid in 1v1 as well, but at higher levels it tends to be heavily tweaked as far as curing priorities go. They'll usually supplement First Aid with their own system too, in order to do things such as switch affliction priorities mid-combat as the situation arises.
The in-built first aid system is what most people use these days for bashing, exploring and even PvP.
In regards to PvP, a lot of the top tier combatants will still run a curing system (mostly alias') that changes the priority lists you're running with first aid - depending on the encounter or class you're up against. Not many use a solo curing systems anymore due to first aid being faster (it doesn't need to run through the code of a client since it's in built) and neater!
It's a great tool that is constantly being worked on to ensure smooth use.
Hope that helps!
----------------------------
And then I see @Razmael beats me to it mid-post.
Too quick for me.
I'd say the playerbase is helpful when people ask questions, whether they are about combat, lore, RP or general mechanics.
There's an OOC clan in the game for those who are seeking RP opportunities. If you're into RP, it might be a good idea to seek someone out for an invite to help get you started on establishing yourself. Sometimes people call out there if they're bored only to start something up. There are some groupings and cliques, but some people tend to shift between them without problems.
We have some idlers around, but generally those people are also very helpful when they have time. If someone doesn't respond right away, it could simply be that at the moment they've gone to sleep/watch netflix/clean the house, but for the most part, people respond when they see they've been approached. And if you really want to get in touch with someone, messages work like a charm.
The Admin is working fairly well on removing toxic environments, but as in all games, there are bound to be some discontent being muttered in the corners.
All in all, I can honestly say I've gotten so many friends through this player base over the years I've been on Aetolia. And I keep making new ones all the time.
Hope that helps some!
The worst I can say about Aetolia's playerbase is that spirit and shadow can often be at each other's throats when it comes to the discussion of balance or anything remotely combat/conflict related and it can/has gotten to the point in the past where it can be pretty toxic in comparison to other places. HOWEVER, Aetolia's roleplay environment is top notch. If you're a roleplayer from MKO, the best place to migrate in my opinion would be Aetolia. Roleplay is active, vivid, detailed, and all around great. You're not really going to find anything on its level across IRE. At best, you'll find small pockets of roleplay in the other games. It's kind of everywhere in Aetolia.
"The smell of dusty fur, sweet smoke, waiting and patience, a thing that time cannot kill. The moth that candles won't burn."
As much as I wish we had something akin to the Nighthawks, we do not. For those who may not know, Nighthawks were a secret society within MKO (that required an invite by the Nighthawk GM). You'd have someone pray to the Night Mother for someone else to die (sounds familiar) and a Nighthawk would get contracted to kill that person. The Nighthawk would then assume the identity of a novice for that organization and try to find the individual. They had a number of abilities suited for assassination and could USUALLY dispatch you pretty quickly. More interestingly, Nighthawks could get contracted to kill someone in their own city and if they were killed by a Nighthawk, they wouldn't know who the Nighthawk really was. However, if it was discovered that your character WAS a Nighthawk, you'd get removed from your city pretty right quick. While the system had its own share of flaws, I found it to be really neat and way more creative than any other "assassin group" in IRE. Edit: Actually, now that I think about it, if we had something like that for the individuals that consistently run and elude responsibility for their actions (like constantly raiding but avoiding any sort of fights) as an advanced "bounty" system, it'd probably work really well.
I feel like Nighthawks had an unintended side effect in that people paid much more attention to novices when they were teaching them or hanging out near them in the event that one of them happened to be a Nighthawk.
Edit: Worth noting that Nighthawks had a tool kit that revolved around very quickly dispatching your target. They were overpowered in that respect, but they had a very limited window to act and could ONLY use their skills on a writ target. Example: like being able to instantly kill you straight out of the gate.
When the nighthawks were first released and no one knew what to expect, many of the nighthawks would try to RP with their victims to make assassinations cool. E.g.: we had a 'kiss of death' skill that would allow you to coat your lips with poison and afflict someone with incurable slow death if they use the kiss emote on you; we could poison food/drinks; we could make people get instantly tired and fall asleep; we could alter our blood alcohol to make ourselves look drunk (and then instantly cure it); we could lock people in a room to kill them. All of this had a lot of potential. On one occasion, I even had someone take me on as a mentor before revealing myself as a nighthawk upon having poisoned their food.
Sadly, later on, players wised up and got more wary, which made things less fun and more predictable. Most nighthawks were so exasperated by all the metagaming that they stopped bothering trying to RP with victims and would then just walk into a room with their target, stab with an instant-kill venom and then walk out without a further word. It became an unfortunate necessity and killed the potential they had.
tl;dr: this is why we can't have nice things.
You need someone killed, but you can't do it, so you turn to the Nighthawks? And they can intsa gib them?
The one making the contract has no reason to get better at PK now.
The target of the contract has no reason to get better at PK either.
I'm vehemently against any type of system like this coming to Aetolia.
@Draiman: Also, not everyone plays the game for PK. Not everyone wants to spend the time coding to reach the top tier either to get vengeance on someone who wronged them or killed them repeatedly. I'm completely fine with killing by proxy. PK'ers don't just magically get free reign to do as they please to non-coms with zero chance of retaliation.
It's a very simple system that people continuously, day in and day out, complicate.
If your character is not a fighter, do not put yourself into a position to where you will be PK'd unless you are willing to accept those consequences.
If your character is a fighter, then you have a responsibility to know when to restrain yourself and to know that PK ability is not the only deciding factor in every situation, nor should you turn to it every time your feelings are hurt.
If your character wants vengeance on someone, there are already existing methods available. Become a better fighter and kill them yourself. Hire Trikal. Get a group of friends. Your characters inability to beat someone better than them is, guess what, part of your characters RP! I'm sorry if someone feels that sucks. You know what else sucks? I can't be some suave political scheming type character without putting in the effort to do that because it doesn't come naturally to me nor am I inclined to put in the effort to be that guy.
I will not endorse any system that will threaten the already dying scene of 1v1, and this system, or a similar, will do just that.
I should expect no less, you clearly all have good taste.
Here's what those people do: Go talk to somebody like Trikal and tell them that you want somebody dead. Pay their price. They will go out and murder this person for you. This is killing by proxy in a way that works with the PK system instead of devaluing it.
I cared less about the PK aspect, per se, or even the cheesy insta-kill, and was floored by the ability to assume new identities on a main char repeatedly. Think about that for a second.