It's happened to me before...the blue world gets a little
boring, and I decide to see if I would like one of the PVP servers. Unfortunately,
last time I tried it I went to Sullon Zek, where I was immediately ganked
non stop by level 50's slumming it in my newbie area...thus I never made
it past level 8 or 9--or Qeynos Hills.
Recently though, I thought it would be fun to try one of the more forgiving
PVP servers, Vallon Zek. Why more forgiving? Becasue PVP combat is restricted
within an 8 level range, so the folks that would gank you are not too
far above you in level, so you at least have a shot. I guess. Also, the
tems are less enforced, and frankly not everyone is in PVP mode all the
time.
I decided to write this guide because it was the sort of thing I looked
for when I started my blue server monk, and frankly I would have liked
something like this when I started playing EQ in general.
Core assumptions and drives:
This is a guide about starting on a new server with
no friends, i.e. no starting money, no twinking, no one to help except
for kind strangers. All you have are your wits, your charm and dual wield
at level one.
Furthermore, this is a guide about the above taking place on a PVP server,
where the world becomes a lot more dangerous to you after level 6, because
other players can attack you. I'll try to point out what I can about the
differences between so-called "blue" (non-PVP) servers and the various
rulesets of the PVP servers.
The general drive of this guide is to help you hit the ground running
on an old server. On an old server there are lots of folks who are already
60+, many more who are in their mid-fifties and (in my experience) most
of the folks you meet lower than that are the alts/twinks of the higher
level chars. Generally this is just annoying, becasue you have 4 gold
pieces and you meet level 4 warriors in full crusty or other gear that
used to be reserved for much higher level characters.
In a PVP environment, it's even more of a problem because given 2 equal
characters, the one in velious or luclin gear will smear the one wearing
cloth pants. So, this guide is written with survival and hopefully prosperity
in mind.
One thing I won't discuss is fighting other players. For that look at
Monks
and PvP by Searyx for monk info and general PVP tips.
Lastly, this is written for a human monk. Other races and classes may
be able to use this info, or at least some of it. Iksar monks specifically
may find much of this info worthless, because of initial faction.
Before the Beginning
So this guide will be useful to new players and/or players
that want to play something other than a human monk, I thought it would
be helpful to spell out the considerations and research I did before beginning
my monk.
First, my experiences on Sullon Zek made me overly paranoid about being
ganked, so i was interested in a character that can kick some ass. Going
over my options, I chose a monk because they tend to be valued by other
players, can dish out serious damage and aren't known for carrying a lot
with them. The last two factors in my mind make the risk/reward ratio
less favorable for griefers (monks are risky to attack and probably aren't
carrying much on them). Of course later I could run into some sort of
"monk hunter," but it's a risk I'll live with.
Second, I misunderstood a key rule on Vallon Zek. I was under the impression
that when killed by another player, they got all the money you had on
you, plus one equipped item. For that reason I started off being overly
concerned about aquiring NO DROP equipment. It turns out that on Vallon
Zek loot off of players is coin only, so I wasted a little time there.
Important Note: if you play on a PVP server, you should be very clear
on all the rules of that server.
Third, although I started an iksar monk I abandoned him at level 3 and
rerolled a human monk. The reson is that human monks unlike iksar monks
have a set of quests for newbie armor [freeport
/ qeynos
] that is attainable by level 8 or so. The armor is of some value at least
into your mid-30s and it is free/very cheap to attain. Given that we are
working in a no friends/no twinking milieu this armor seemed too important
to pass up. As a note to people who don't want to play a monk but want
a nice set of newb armor, eqtraders.com maintains a list of the newbie
armor quests sorted by starting city (you'll have to scroll down the
page). Not all cities have them, and in general if your starting city
doesn't have the quests, they aren't available to you.
With the above in mind, lets begin our monk.
Choose Create Your Partner
The first step is to create your monk, and I assume
you know how to do that. If you want some advice, eq.crgaming.com
has a nice
monk creation guide that I used for mine. I've heard the opinion that
stamina is more important for agility, but I've made two monks by the
crgaming guide and they've both turned out fine--with one exception, and
this applies to almost every crgaming creation guide thatI've read.
Religion is important, and since sometime between the Velious and Luclin
expansions those who choose agnostic get a little left out in terms of
equipment. There is now a lot of deity specific items now in game that
don't matter when you're starting out non-twinked, but later you might
kick yourself over. For example, monks of quellious can use a Golden
Idol of Quellious, whereas there is no similar item for agnostics.
Of course, there's other items out there, but in general I think that
now it is better to choose a religion.--with one other caveat (no one
has ever called Everquest a game of simple choices).
The other race that has monks are the iksar, who hate everybody and worship
Cazic-Thule. Starting out, you can not enter the iksar city of Cabilis
withouut being attacked by the guard. It is possible to build your faction
as a human monk and do some quests for nice monk equipment (e.g. the Shackle
of Tynnonium) in Cabilis. Apparently, it is much easier to become
non-kos if you are agnostic rather than a follower of Quellious. In my
mind, this does not make it worth being agnostic, but other people may
not agree.
If you follow Quellious, your human monk will start in Freeport, while
Agnostics will spawn in Qeynos. This guide will advise heading to Qeynos
before level 4, but don't worry about that now. With the Planes of Power
expansion, it is easy and almost without danger to get from Freeport to
Qeynos, if you travel via the Plane of Knowledge. The manual that comes
with the expansion has maps in the back detailing the locations of all
the portals between the cities.
Begin the Beguine (Levels 1-5)
Here we go. I probably shouldn't have to mention this,
but you will spawn in your starting city naked and penniless. Woot! Check
your inventory and right click on the note that you have. This will tell
you who your guildmaster (And your first trainer) is. Find that person
first...it's usually not that hard. If you are a human monk it will be
either Puab Closk in Freeport or Velan Torresk in Qeynos. Hand the guildmaster
your note, and you will be rewarded with faction, XP and a shirt. Put
it on.
Now right click on the master. You have five points to train with,
and you should train all five in either 1 Hand Blunt or Hand-to-Hand
(whichever you choose next level you should train your next five points
in the other). I recommend starting with hand-to-hand, since you have
dual wield from level one, which means you will be dealing max possible
damage immediately. This is not to say that that's a lot of damage,
but every little bit helps at level one.
With this completed, make sure your shirt is equipped, and if you chose
to start with 1HB, equip your club. When everything is set, head to the
newbie yard and get ready to kill.
If you are a first time player, see your Everquest manual for more information
on starting a new character.
For the first level, don't worry about anything except killing and getting
to second level.
Some tips:
If fighting in the North Qeynos newbie yard, do NOT buy/sell from Tubal Weaver... he overchrges and underpays. Instead, spend the extra 10 seconds and go to Shenro Kazpur, the merchant in the monk guild. Since he is on the guild faction, he will be amiable to you before the generic Qeynos merchants are. If you are not in Qeynos, make sure to check the prices on a few common items with whatever merchant you plan to be selling to. In the beginning every gold piece helps, so no sense in selling short to save a few steps.
Did you really read all of that? Sheesh.