Preferred Starting Location

I would like to hear some opinions on what starting locations people prefer.

Of late, I'm a G Fay man, myself, because I tend to play a lot of wood elves but my heart will forever be in Qeynos.

For me, it's more about the long term factors like the race/class combo, where origin sticks you, and where the PoK books will eventually be than the starting area itself. I know classic EQ like the back of my hand so relocating at whatever point isn't really an issue for me, personally.

Nostalgia aside, my favorite levelling areas for starting are Gfay/BB, Misty, and Qeynos area. FP is great too but then you have to deal with new FP. Really, most are solid and have everything you need, although Erudin might be a little weak, but it's very easy to pop over to Qeynos. People swear by Feerott and innothule, too, but I've never been able to figure out the deal down there so I tend to avoid them.

It's a fairly subjective thing, I would say, as opposed to any places being truly "best."

Either freeport or Neriak. Origin puts you near CL, and both cities have most of the resources you will ever need. A DE can literally level to 50 without traveling more than 2 outdoor zones away from their city.

Dwarf could too, technically

Sir sir, you dropped your Rusty Dagger.

I don't understand the question, everyone with a brain surely is already next to steamfont!!! Otherwise I guess GF might be good, as it's close to Ak'anon.

If I was starting alone I'd definitely start on Faydwer for the sole reason that it has the least amount of revamped zones.

Qeynos area has a special place in my heart as well. Your best origin is probably west freeport, which is also strong for where the PoK book is as well. Qeynos has some of the fastest leveling pre10 if you start with nothing (gnoll fangs are really huge), as well as good money at level 1 and really good level 1 starting location (lots of mobs, merchants are right there, guards are right there, lots of 1-2 gold loot)

Freeport is really good at level 1-2 (like Qeynos) but actually really sucks from 3-10, at least until the tunnel becomes full of buffers.

Erudin is a really nice city in terms of aesthetics, it's very peaceful and for int casters you spawn right above the bank and it's a relaxing place to origin to. The starting area sucks, but thats fine u can just go to Qeynos.

Neriak sucks, most of the origin points take an hour and a half to walk out of the city, the starting zone is pretty lame as well, and CL is lame, overall lame. Lavastorm might be nice but you can just go there as any race if that's where you want to level. Like WFP the proximity to CL is nice.

Rivervale has some solid quests actually, tons of amazing early money opportunities (save your honeycomb sell em for 2p each once enchanters start doing moggok, also buy em on every merchant you see, you'll make a killing selling em, you can also turn em in for the enchanter, getting the exp and selling the honey jum for 10p, not sure how well that would actually work out though), easy access to HPH for mid game (and to resell spells). Beyond that its a pretty lame actual location, smack dab middle of nowhere, Kithicor can be a pain to go through, and karanas are lame as well. Runnyeye is nice especially if you're a melee though, but again anyone can just go there by that level

Halas has some okay quests, the starting area is full of mobs but there's a fair amount of travel in and out of the city, blackburrow leveling is solid though, basically a slightly worse version of starting in qeynos.

Grobb is sort of terrible, the origin points are sorta far back, everything is super expensive (for charisma reasons), the entrance mobs are very social and you can get swarmed and die, and theres water and stuff everywhere, there's no easy druid ring (feerott), the early money is alright, and guk is really great to level in from level 3+ if you can get a group going.

Oggok is similar to grobb but the entrance mobs are a bit better, decent amount of good quests as well and an easy access druid ring as well as close to plane of fear and guk, not bad.

Gfay is crowded, lots of good quests, but very crowded, Crushbone is sort of terrible other than the good quests, the loot is okay too but its trainy, crowded and social. Some of the earliest "loot" such as dwarven ringmail and what have you. Also its a huge run to zone out of gfay, and not a ton around, and no druid ring.

Dwarves are okay, the entrance area is sorta meh, the distance to entrance isn't terrible, it's fairly close to freeport, easy access druid ring, can easily connect to other faydwer starters or go to antonica, meh.

Akanon sucks balls. It's aesthetically sort of nice if you're into that sorta thing but it's one long endless path to the exit. Certain religions don't even get a parcel vendor, its the most isolated city other than arguably erudin/halas. Easy access druid ring and decent early camps though, but it's not near anything useful.

Freeport, you will never find a more wretched hive of scum and villainy!

Freeport has the advantage of being able to level from 1 to 50 with only zoning out of the city once.

Neriak has its flaws as a city, but it's hard to argue with the location of lavastorm, sola, solb, najena.

After playing my Barb Shaman I will have a love for Halas forever. I enjoyed Everfrost and being so close to BB to exp. Although I had to traverse the world to go any higher then that. Being able to Origin across the world to Halas for Vox runs was always nice.

This time im thinking either High Elf Cleric or Dwarf Cleric, mainly to play around Gfay when its cray busy at launch.

My favorite newby area is Steamfont mountains so I when I started on Ragefire (before we moved to Lockjaw) I moved my wood elf warrior there to go play with my gnome cleric.

Even though it's in a pretty out of the way location, the swamp actually has some nice advantages. First of all, even though the water is annoying, you will get your swimming skilled up a bit early on. Plus, it's a nice in-between spot for folks like me who love doing Guk and Cazic at lower levels. Oasis is only a zone away now, as well.

P.S. old Cazic is the best dungeon of classic EQ. Though, healers are kind of a nightmare now.

That said, Qeynos area was always my favorite.

Long live Qeynos....

Gfay, Neriak, FP are the best for all the same reasons.
Neriak is best of the three simply because it scares off most of the lazy folks. Its an easy city if one takes the time to learn it.
All the rest are fine with one exception.
Tox is so bad it makes whatever is next look great.

Its all subjective. I have always started in Misty. Since early 2000.

This time considering GF. Simply for ease of access to UR. Then it is not bad getting to FP, CL, Ro, Guk, etc. from then on. I have never really spent a lot of time in GF starting. So spending the next few days getting familiar with starting there.

It boils down to where you are familiar and will have the most enjoyment. Good luck!

Wow, so many great responses, thank you!

Personally I am at a toss up between Qeynos and Steamfont for starting areas.

Qeynos seems to have the highest potential initial money to be made from merchant junk. It's newbie area can and has accommodated very large groups of people, with fast respawn even when the zone is at capacity you can still get a good number of kills. Qeynos also has Blackburrow, which is one of the better initial dungeons for low level players. After that you have Kerra then splitpaw. I've enjoyed the flow of this leveling path in the past.

Steamfont is likely one of the best newbie areas in the game. While it may be hard to get to level 2 with the low amount of roaming level 1 mobs, beyond that the zone opens up better than any other i've seen. It is also easily the second best for initial merchant junk money. Close proximity to Crushbone, Mistmoore, and Unrest gives you three of (arguably) the best starter and mid dungeons in the game.

Any race around the Kelethin area. Probably going with High Elf Mage this time.

Kill stuff near Felwithe ZL till about 4. Then head to Orc Hill till around 7. Then Crushbone till 14, Unrest till 30. Then I shall finally leave the continent q_q

Don't forget Mistmoore, you can jump into MM after Crushbone. MM is usually less crowded that Unrest and getting to 20 before Unrest will allow you to skip the yard trash and jump right into a first level mansion group.

I always start in GFay with a HE or WE.. But this time around I'm thinking the centrality of Neriak or Freeport will be worth a shot. So many dungeons nearby and I am pretty burnt out on the Orc Hill>CB>Unrest route. Think I may try the CL>Befallen>Najena>SolA/B route this time (maybe 12-18ish at Crocs in Ro, it was pretty awesome xp too). Guk will be the ending area to 50, I just love that zone and I can run there (instead of getting a port from Faydwer everytime) if I must from either starting area.