So just for a lark I started a new Wood Elf Druid on a server that I have no characters on and immediately moved him to GFay to start out in an old school kind of way. It is much quieter than the olden days. I am frequently the only person in the zone. At level 10 I am proudly sporting Leather armor and have 10 plat to my name. Leveling is much slower but figuring out how to pull from Orc Hill poses it's own challenges. I certain others have tried this before but it is a lot more challenging than taking the cakewalk through Crescent Reach. Just a suggestion for people who are looking for new play ideas.
Each time i make a new char I try and take a different route. For example Iksar leveling in only Kunark, Vah Shir only leveling in Luclin, until I run out of content at around level 60
Basically all classic newbie areas are an option. Greater Faydark has a nice atmosphere but can get boring after a while and at about level 7 other (higher) zones do become interesting. Starting on Faydwer (Wood Elf, High Elf, Half Elf, Dwarf, Gnome): Butcherblock Mtns, Steamfont Mountains, Crushbone , Estate of Unrest , Lesser Faydark (carefull about brownie roamers !), Ocean of Tears (Goblins, skeletons) Starting in Rivervale (Halfling): Gorge of King Xorb, West Commonlands; East Karana, Runnyeye, Highpass Hold (Orcs, gnolls) Starting in Neriak (Dark Elf): Lavastorm Mountains, East Commonlands, North Ro, South Ro (Aligators), Befallen , Najena (entrance) Starting in Freeport (Human, Half Elf): East Commonlands, North Ro, South Ro (Aligators), Befallen , Nektulos Forest, Ocean of Tears (Goblins, skeletons), Najena (entrance) Starting in Qeynos, Surefall Glade, Halas (Human, Half Elf, Barbarian): Qeynos Hills, Qeynos Catacombs, Blackburrow, Everfrost Peaks, West Karana, Erud's Crossing Starting on Odus (Erudite): The Warrens , Erud's Crossing, Kerra Isle (Part of Toxxulia Forrest) Starting in Oggok, Grobb, Gukta (Ogre, Troll, Guktan): Upper Guk , South Ro (Aligators), North Ro, Mountains of Rathe Starting in Cabilis (Iksar): Field of Bone, Lake of Ill Omen, Kurn's Tower Starting in Shar Vhal (Vah Shir): Paludal Caverns What does "" mean ? High experience bonus but zone can be tough (aggro range, mobs flee at low health, trains, traps, NPCs cast snare, damage spells, etc.). For Paludal Caverns and Kurn's Tower its only high experience without much risk.
When I was a young troll I had to start out in Neriak as a refugee because of them stupid toads! You could go that route too if you are so inclined.
I chose GFay because my first character was a W.E. Ranger. So I'm quite nostalgic about that zone. I'll eventually head to Crushbone to settle a score with D'Vinn!
Everything is currently down for an update so I thought I would add to this. I managed to grind to level 16 in GFay by camping the Orcs that guard the entrance to Crushbone. I then moved to the Commonlands and slaughtered bandits until about level 19. From there I explored a bit. The Commonlands tunnel is much different than I remember it. Moved on to South Ro and killed Crocs to get to 21. Since the raft kept coming to the docks I decided to go for a ride and discovered the "Fallen Deckhands" in Timourous Deep and have managed to level up to level 30 while attempting to become an "extinction event" for them. It didn't work, they keep coming back and now they are starting to Grey out for me. Still I manged to find a Fishbone earring in the bazaar so now I'm going to go exploring for a bit to see if I can find any other good leveling camps. So my message for the day is that "The old world can still be fun!" BTW I have occasionally encountered players doing the same thing I am plus the random 100+ player wandering through. I suspect these folks are doing the old Epic quests or something to that effect.
I got into the upper 30's killing the Golra's on the southeastern island, and then moved to the Rathe Mountains to level on the Hill Giants. That zone is actually busy! Apparently the hill giants drop a lot of epic quest items. There is a small fortune to be made just from trash picking when that is going on.
Don't say this on the TLP forums, the Hill Giants are a big secret there... The one time I levelled a WE Ranger from 1 in GFay, the thing I remember most wasn't the difficulty in finding levelling camps, it was the major frustration I felt in not being able to complete the newbie bow quest (without using a reference). The guildmaster leads you to believe that you collect all the mats, which is a serious piece of work in itself, and then he'll give you this starter bow (Trueshot Longbow), which happens to itemize just where you'd expect with all the other newbie Trueshot pieces. But nooo... instead you get a Stave (!), which has to be player-crafted with more mats to make the bow. And the trivial is 235!! Like anyone is going to have fletching anywhere near that high at level 10. I won't say publicly how many times I failed that combine before I "cheated" and looked it up. Did I feel stupid. Moral: it isn't just the levelling that can be a challenge, it's dealing with all the little gotchas the Classic designers thought were clever.
Well, way back when I did that quest but I think I was well past Level 10 by the time I finished it. BTW, I failed the first attempt at making the bow. Extra Question. I'm thinking of trying the Emerald Jungle for my next zone. How hard is it to get there?
Use the Zone Guide button on the map, it is your friend! If you're on a server that has PoK, there is a portal stone to Field of Bone, and it's just a short jaunt from there to the zone line for Emerald Jungle. If you're still in Kunark, you have to go into FoB through Cabilis, and it is a longer walk that way.
I'm kind of using this thread to document this particular adventure so here's an update. I managed to milk the Emerald Jungle to level 50. From there I moved to the Skyfire Mountains. It took a while to be able to beat them both but I found that by collecting the Wormfire Earring from the Ancient Wurm and the Wormfire Ring from the Mottled Wyvern that each sell for 228 plat to vendors. So I used Origin to go to CR to sell and bound myself at the Zone line in The Overthere so I could use Gate to return. Thus I managed to accumulate enough plat for spells. The down part of this zone for Druids is that fire based DoTs don't work on most of the mobs. The Mottled Wyvern and the Ancient Wurm are exceptions. At level 56 I moved on to The Maidens Eye in Luclin. The Hominids you meet upon zoning in are mostly light blue at that level, but there are a lot of them. I've gotten to level 57 just hunting around the entrance from Dawnshroud. I've read that Maidens Eye has a lot of traps. I'm now curious where such traps are located. Are they all all at specific locations or can they be randomly encountered outdoors?: I have some trap detection spells and I'm wondering how I should use them. Oddly enough I've always managed to not deal with traps up to now.
I don't remember there being any outdoor traps in ME. The typical problems in that zone are high mob density in certain spots (including near the Dawnshroud zone-in), with a lot of things adding, so easy to pull an unintended train; plus a lot of mobs there have See Invis. You'll need several more levels before you can expect to solo that entire zone as a Druid. I would avoid the small outpost on the N wall until you're at least 65.
These are static mob spawn traps and there are quiet a few of them on the direct way from zone line to zone line (DSP to Akheva/Umbral). Trap detection spells do not work on them I think. They are made for trapped chests like in LDON adventures mostly.
So that's how I kept getting bit by mobs I didn't see whenever I wandered around! Anyway at level 60 I moved to Halls of Honor. The Guardians of Marr are level 61 so I've been kiting them around the courtyard at the entrance. There's nobody else around so no damage there. There is a ridiculous faction hit with them however! -1000 to Battalion of Marr for one kill. After the first one there's no point in stopping. Anyway I saw on a map that there should be a path to the Plane of Hate from the Plane of Tranquility. Since that was one of the top tier zones back in the old days I thought I would pop in to look around but I cannot find a zone or translocator and Find doesn't show anything either. Was that map (Brewall) just wrong or did something change.
I've never done the Cresent Reach path completely and often try to avoid it altogether. It's tempting but there's still so many zones I've never even been to so I try to explore when leveling... problem is I typically out level them too quickly. I don't guess I really ever have a set path until grinding levels much deeper into the game.
