SWATJester_os
October 21st, 2008, 02:58 AM
Before I get to the description of why this is easily one of the best games of all time, let me throw out a warning.
This game is a text based MMORPG, and it has a monthly subscription (though there is a free trial). If either of those two things are a complete turn-off, then GTFO.
Now, on to why this is the best game of all time.
Intro:
Two words: Depth, and Mechanics.
Very few other games let you tackle a goblin, headbutt it unconscious, take a claymore and slice it's arm off, and then let you throw the severed limb so hard through the goblin's chest that it explodes into a pink mist and shards of bone.
Dragonrealms has been around since the early 1990's, and continued uninterrupted since then. It's from Simutronics, the people who created Gemstone IV, one of the first true MMORPGs. The game has literally been developed for over a decade, constantly expanding history, lore, game mechanics, new areas, enemies, weapons, etc. The game is heavily based on interaction with a professional GM staff: literally almost anything you want in the game, you can get it done. They've had years of player feedback to learn what works, what doesn't, and make the game a truly fun experience.
I'll cover the most major points, and a slight bit of the lore below.
Races, Classes, Guilds, Provinces, and skill training/levelling.
Races
[spoiler]
Players can choose any of the 11 races in the game. Originally there were 7, the remaining 4 were added in a major in-game event (I was part of it, and it was awesome, I got to be one of the tribal leaders of the Kaldar).
Different races get different racial verbs, (for instance, elves shake hands differently than dwarves), and some have special abilities (for instance, haflings can teach other classes how to blow dozens of kinds of smoke rings when you smoke a cigar) Also, different races have different starting statistics and raise certain statistics faster (i.e., an Elothean will always raise mental abilities more easily than a Gor'tog, no matter what guild/class you are, making them better suited for intelligence based classes, but that doesn't stop you from choosing something completely counter to your strengths. There are very successful Gnome barbarians out there).
Races:
(Original 7)
Human
Dwarf
Elf
Halfling
Skra'Mur (kind of like lizard men. Has special tail abilities)
Gor'tog (Big, green, dumb. Has special racial abilities based on being green, or being dumb).
Elothean (Even more frail than Elves, very mentally focused.)
(4 more added)
Gnome
Kaldar (somewhat in between human and Gor'Tog. Tall and strong, but not especially dumb. More like tribals from Fallout.)
Rakash (dog-men. Depending on moon cycles, you turn into a sort of were wolf, gaining certain combat abilities, but losing others. I've never played as one, but I know you gain sharp claws you can rend people with.)
Prydaen (obligatory cat-person race. Fucking irritating, especially when web-slut females play it).
Elves, and Elotheans tend to do more mental based classes, whereas gor'togs and kaldar tend to do the physical classes. Halflings, gnomes, Rakash, skra mur, and prydaens tend towards the more dexterity based classes.
More on the classes next.
Classes/Guilds
Classes and Guilds in DR are the same thing. You don't have one at start, and then you go to the guild's office, and join one. From there on, you begin levelling in that guild. Theoretically you could leave and join another one, but that almost never happens.
The guilds are as follows:
Barbarians, Paladins, Warrior Mages, Moon Mages, Clerics, Traders, Thieves, Empaths, Rangers, Bards.
Barbarians are a weapon based guild. They gain roars and dances over time, and have proficiency in a large number of weapons and armor (by that, I mean, your leveling requirements for skills are going to include several weapons and armor types, and you'll learn them quickly). You can stun and explode people's heads with your roars, or dance around like a schizophrenic badger to distract enemies making incoming attacks. In addition, Barbarians make the best forged weapons. They're also one of the two classes that can multi-fire arrows. Have a unique system called "inner fire" that determines how often they can use their intrinsic abilities.
Paladins are your standard religious warrior class. They gain holy magic spells (different list than clerics), as well as some smiting weapon abilities, and some unique mount abilities. Have a unique system called "Soul" that determines how often they can use their intrinsic abilities. Paladins also have to abide by a moral code that the game enforces; i.e. if you attack a person from hiding, or an innocent, you'll lose all your soul, have to quest to get back in good standing with the guild, and lose your abilities for the meantime.
Warrior Mages are the elemental magic class. They're really mostly casters, though they do have to keep a weapon skill relatively trained. Warmages get spells from the various elemental schools (air, water, fire, "aether", and earth), as well as some useful minor cantrips, and can summon a familiar to run tasks for them, send messages over long distances, etc. Their spells are based off of elemental magic. War mages are the masters of targetted magic, meaning they can specifically target certain limbs of enemies, and can make even less effective spells brutally fatal.
Moon mages are the traditional mage class. Their magic is dependent primarily on the alignments and strengths of the three moons, and to a lesser extent, the planets and the stars. They can also tell fortunes, which can either make your skills significantly better or worse for a period of time, teleport people, summon temporary familiars, tell the weather, and do a lot of utilitarian stuff, including enchanting magic items and making gems worth more. Moon mages have extensive history in the game, and often get knowledge of in game events before anyone else does. The problem with them is that if the moons are in shitty positions, you are completely weak, and much of your magic won't work indoors. Moon mages are the masters of the "primary magic" skill, meaning small amounts of mana are necessary, but have great effects (as compared to War Mages or Clerics). Use lunar magic.
Clerics are traditional priests of the gods, although it makes no distinction between like or dark; you can be an "evil cleric" and some spells that require a prayer to a specific god, can be done to a dark god and get evil effects. (curses, dark malevolent features, etc.). Clerics can raise the dead without the dead person losing experience, though it's a significant task to do so. Clerics are also the masters of harnessing mana; they can harness ridiculous amounts of mana for their spells. Clerics use holy mana.
Traders are one of the two largely non-combat classes in the game. Traders make money. They do commodities trading and speculation, move caravans from city to city, sell people's gems at a markup, host auctions for people, and other things to generate large ass amounts of cash. Consequently they learn combat skills much more slowly. Traders can often be largely automated for money gatherings. No magic.
Thieves are not "rogues". They're badass bandits in this game. First of all, the guild is a secret that you have to quest to even find. If you talk about the guild openly, and people hear you, the guild leader will assassinate you. If you start getting too "hot", you might get beat down by the guild thugs. Thieves get a bonus to their skills the longer they remain in city walls (the opposite of the one that Rangers get). Thieves have requisite backstabbing abilities that can completely 1-shot an enemy; they can also hamstring, and blunt-object bludgeon people from hiding, as well as snipe without leaving stealth. They can use internal discipline powers to make extremely powerful single shot attacks, self buffs, go invisible, or the like, but can only use one or two of these powers at a time. Thieves can hire people to find a target, or pass a message, are really good at lockpicking and pickpocketing, can specially rob museums and stores for fun and profit, and then pawn the goods later. Also, thieves get special hidden passages that help them go from point A to point B in hiding. Oh, and they can make poisons for weapons too. My thief is one of my absolute favorites (he's relatively high level, in his 70's). No magic (khri abilities are internal, instant, and recharge quite quickly.)
Empaths are the healers of the game, but they do things uniquely. In order to heal wounds from others, empaths must first transfer the wound to themselves, and then heal it from themselves. Empaths uniquely CANNOT do harmful actions against others, to the extent that they can't even fish. If they do, they lose their powers. Empaths can completely save your life in a fight you would not otherwise win, assuming they don't kill themselves. There are tools that can semi-automate empaths. Typically they make money off of tips from healing people, and are largely (by honor code) untouched by thieves. They use Life magic.
Rangers are kind of the opposite of thieves. They mainly operate outside of cities. Rangers are combat skilled in both ranged and melee, and can use life magic (different spell list from empaths). Rangers are really good and hiding, like thieves, but only get benefits in wilderness to that. Rangers are also (along with barbarians) able to multi-shoot arrows, and (along with barbarians) are the best fletchers of bows and arrows. Rangers can run trails to quickly cross long stretches of terrain, and have some cool spells like, web an opponent, poison him with the spider's bite, and then clobber him on the head with a massive tree branch. Oh, as mentioned, they get a bonus similar to thieves, except the longer they remain outdoors (it goes away gradually when they enter cities). Rangers get familiars too that they have to train, and can catch wild horses and train them for others to use as mounts (make some decent money that way).
Bards I'm not super familiar with, having never played one. They can sing enchantes (spells) that are buffs or debuffs, but don't really have any decent direct attacks as far as I know. They're really good at lore skills and make decent thieves as well, and generally serve to enhance other classes.
Grouping is not largely important in the game, though it helps. For instance in a combat group, you might have a war mage killing things, an empath healing him, and a bard buffing and attacking things, but because experience in skills is based on your use of the skills, you end up grouping less.
Skills/Leveling (Here is why the game is fucking awesome).
First of all: no level cap. You keep leveling until you decide to stop, and the GM's keep adding new content and higher level mobs (some mobs will flex up to your level too) and the loot will match. Not to mention, you'll want to keep levelling and training to out PVP the other players.
Leveling is based on skill. For each guild, to go up to the next level, you will need a certain number of ranks in a particular skill. The required numbers and skills vary from guild to guild, and from level to level (once you clear 20 and then 40 etc. you'll start having to do less skills per level, but each skill takes longer). To advance a skill, you have to use it. So, swinging a scimitar will raise your medium edged skill, a dagger your light edged skill, etc. So in a fight against a goblin, you might be training evasion, armor (maybe 6 different kinds of armor if you're wearing different kinds) your weapon skill (for instance, heavy edged), your parry skill, and if you're a mage your primary magic, harnessing, and targeted magic skills as well.
As you use skills you gain experience that goes into a pool. As that pool fills up, your mind state goes from clear to murky, to mind locked, at which point you cannot gain any more experience until you rest a bit and let it drain. Over time, your mind will drain as the collected experience in the "pool" drains down into actual improvement to your ranks. (You can also use undrained experience to fill special orbs that are used in resurrections when you die). You can increase the rate of this by training your mental stats and abilities. So intelligence for instance increases the size of the exp pool, while wisdom increases the rate that it translates into actual experience. The result is a system that facilitates you being able to quickly train a skill up to mind locked, then move onto something else and continue to learn in the first skill, allowing for an effective training cycle even for people who aren't actively trying to grind experience.
With a handful of exceptions, everyone can do any skill equally well, regardless of race, level, or guild. A level 1 barbarian with 100 ranks of medium edged weapons, will swing a sword equally well as a level 1 trader with 100 ranks of medium edged weapons, or a level 100 barbarian with the same 100 ranks. All skill successes are largely determined by your number of ranks in the skill.
So, for instance, no matter what, at rank 1 in a weapon I simply won't be able to hit targets most times and when I do, the damage won't be anything but a scratch. At 10 ranks of weapon, I can hit rats reliably but a goblin might parry me easily. At 300 ranks of weapon, I can one-shot smash a goblin, quickly dispatch most trolls and death spirits, but I need a buff to even hit an a'danf shadow mage, etc.
Also, it leads to interesting experiences where I might be level 70, have hundreds of ranks in evasion or armor skills, but decide to level up some random weapon skill I ignored (for instance, light thrown, or halberds) and go back to smacking rats with it, but my evasion is so high the rats can't hope to hit me. What that does is it allows people with high levels to backtrain their other skills relatively safely.
Once you meet the requirements your guild leader has set to level up, you go to him and advance a rank. By doing so, you gain TDP's, points you can spend to improve your stats (strength, reflexes etc.), as well as gain access to new spells (you may only pick a limited number of spells, though some classes have more spell slots than available spells). You also get guild specific quests, and abilities, as well as new titles for your character at certain ranks (not every single one, and their all guild specific).
Provinces
There are 5 provinces in the game (I haven't played since before the 5th province was released): Zoluren, Therengia, Shard, an island province that I forget the name cause I didn't go there much, and Forfedhar or something like that which is the new one.
Each province has various hunting areas, towns, and provincial leadership. Players can get citizenship with the various areas, and take part in the player-run leadership roles, for instance in the militia, and royal court. (For instance, I used to be a militia commander).
You also get a vault you can rent for storage, and banks and stuff. Travel between provinces usually involves a short ferry ride or you can have a MoonMage transport you.
Combat, and PvP.
I'll start off with a brief clip of a PVP tournament I was involved with in 2001. It was a War Mages only tournament, but Devoar, my thief, was hiding around watching. Commentary in bold.
Darthiel points at you, ruining your hiding place. (Didn't your mom teach you that pointing at people is rude?)
>shoot darth
* Darthiel was just struck down!
>
Darkboon comes out of hiding.
Darkboon gestures at Darthiel.
A sheet of slippery ice forms under Darthiel!
Darthiel loses his footing on the ice, falling and painfully spraining his right ankle!
You turn to face Darthiel.
< You fire a broad-tip head arrow at Darthiel. Darthiel attempts to dodge. The arrow lands an awesome strike that explodes the chest in a shower of blood and splintered ribs.
The broad-tip head arrow lodges itself shallowly into Darthiel!
* Darthiel is slain before your eyes!
Darthiel's broadsword falls to the ground.
The soft silver glow fades from around Darthiel. (No more glow for you, MOTHERFUCKER!)
[You're nimbly balanced]
[Roundtime 1 sec.]
All that was in the span of about 2 seconds. Darkboon casts ice patch on Darthiel, which knocks him down, usually breaks a leg, and causes some moderate bleeding, and usually causes some internal leg wounds (but most importantly knocks you down, meaning you are super easy to hit), while the author (Poshly, a very high level barbarian fucking around in this tournament) snapshoots him.
Combat is numberless. You don't know what your hitpoints are, you physically examine yourself and see where you're wounded and guess about your health depending on how bad you feel.
Combat is based by a number of things, your offensive skills against your enemies defensive skills, combined with positioning issues, balance, and all sorts of other shit.
You determine the damage you do based on the combat message you get. So, this is an example of an average, non-critical, non-severe hit:
"Quillak fires a triple-fluted arrow at Pablin. The arrow lands a
grazing blow to his chest!
The triple-fluted arrow falls to the ground!"
The blow was only grazing, which might leave a light laceration, and the arrow didn't stick.
A more serious hit would be like this:
"Molark step backward and then slice at Quillak. The scimitar lands a
solid hit that etches a light cut into the right side of the chest!"
This indicates a light bleeding wound, but still isn't all that serious.
">Quillak fires a triple-fluted arrow at Pablin. The arrow lands a
strong hit that painfully mashes several toes of the left foot!
The triple-fluted arrow lodges itself shallowly into Pablin!"
This indicate a relatively minor crit, definitely a bleeder, probably some internal wounds as well, and the arrow lodged, which will cuase more injuries over time.
"Moving in with powerful grace, Quillak fires a triple-fluted arrow at
Molark. Molark fails to evade, leaning wrong and blundering into the
blow. The arrow lands a massive strike that cuts deeply into his groin,
severely stunning him!
The triple-fluted arrow lodges itself firmly into Molark!"
This one indicates a lot of things. Moving in with powerful grace is an indication that his skills are significantly higher than yours. Fails to evade, leaning wrong and blundering into the blow means that your evasion skill is significantly lower than his. Massive strike indicates the base level of the damage was very high, and cuts deeply into his groin indicates a crit to the abdomen, and severely stunning him indicates that he's going to get owned shortly. The firm lodging means that you're going to rip huge parts of your flesh out removing that arrow probably.
So that's ranged combat. You load your weapon, aim (or don't and snapshot), and fire. Magic works similarly, you prep the spell as a specified mana level (higher levels are more effective, but drain your mana pool more) and either cast it or target the mob specifically (for targeted magic spells), and then cast it. For both ranged and magic, if you wait long enough, your attack will reach max effectiveness, and that's when you want to cast, earlier or later and it goes down. However with enough skill you can "snapcast" spells. Melee combat works a little differently -- you advance on a mob, and close from missile range, to pole range, to melee range. Depending on the weapon you use you can shoot at different ranges. How likely you are to hurt a mob depends on your balance, his balance, who is dominating the fight, their stance, buffs and debuffs, etc.
Ok, now to PvP. PvP is open, meaning you can attack anyone at any time, but it is governed by an honor code. In the base game, you can only kill someone if you've got "consent", meaning they stole from you, or harassed you, or you guys agree to it, or if they do certain hostile actions first.
What this means in actuality is that you get quite a few PvP chances, especially as a thief, or any other class that does stealing a lot. There's also always tourneys of some sort going around. Plus, you can challenge people to a duel, which means that when you win, even on a killing blow, they won't die, but rather go unconscious for about 2 or 3 minutes, and if you can get them to an empath in that time, they'll live.
So that's dragonrealms in a nutshell. The game is humongous, and extremely detailed and well designed. I'm willing to help new players learn the ropes. For a text based game from the 90's, it still gets me excited to play, especially when there are GM-run events (daily) like invasions, or even massive wars that resolve over weeks at a time. Anyway, let me know if you're interested in playing, or have a specific mechanic you want to know more about.
This game is a text based MMORPG, and it has a monthly subscription (though there is a free trial). If either of those two things are a complete turn-off, then GTFO.
Now, on to why this is the best game of all time.
Intro:
Two words: Depth, and Mechanics.
Very few other games let you tackle a goblin, headbutt it unconscious, take a claymore and slice it's arm off, and then let you throw the severed limb so hard through the goblin's chest that it explodes into a pink mist and shards of bone.
Dragonrealms has been around since the early 1990's, and continued uninterrupted since then. It's from Simutronics, the people who created Gemstone IV, one of the first true MMORPGs. The game has literally been developed for over a decade, constantly expanding history, lore, game mechanics, new areas, enemies, weapons, etc. The game is heavily based on interaction with a professional GM staff: literally almost anything you want in the game, you can get it done. They've had years of player feedback to learn what works, what doesn't, and make the game a truly fun experience.
I'll cover the most major points, and a slight bit of the lore below.
Races, Classes, Guilds, Provinces, and skill training/levelling.
Races
[spoiler]
Players can choose any of the 11 races in the game. Originally there were 7, the remaining 4 were added in a major in-game event (I was part of it, and it was awesome, I got to be one of the tribal leaders of the Kaldar).
Different races get different racial verbs, (for instance, elves shake hands differently than dwarves), and some have special abilities (for instance, haflings can teach other classes how to blow dozens of kinds of smoke rings when you smoke a cigar) Also, different races have different starting statistics and raise certain statistics faster (i.e., an Elothean will always raise mental abilities more easily than a Gor'tog, no matter what guild/class you are, making them better suited for intelligence based classes, but that doesn't stop you from choosing something completely counter to your strengths. There are very successful Gnome barbarians out there).
Races:
(Original 7)
Human
Dwarf
Elf
Halfling
Skra'Mur (kind of like lizard men. Has special tail abilities)
Gor'tog (Big, green, dumb. Has special racial abilities based on being green, or being dumb).
Elothean (Even more frail than Elves, very mentally focused.)
(4 more added)
Gnome
Kaldar (somewhat in between human and Gor'Tog. Tall and strong, but not especially dumb. More like tribals from Fallout.)
Rakash (dog-men. Depending on moon cycles, you turn into a sort of were wolf, gaining certain combat abilities, but losing others. I've never played as one, but I know you gain sharp claws you can rend people with.)
Prydaen (obligatory cat-person race. Fucking irritating, especially when web-slut females play it).
Elves, and Elotheans tend to do more mental based classes, whereas gor'togs and kaldar tend to do the physical classes. Halflings, gnomes, Rakash, skra mur, and prydaens tend towards the more dexterity based classes.
More on the classes next.
Classes/Guilds
Classes and Guilds in DR are the same thing. You don't have one at start, and then you go to the guild's office, and join one. From there on, you begin levelling in that guild. Theoretically you could leave and join another one, but that almost never happens.
The guilds are as follows:
Barbarians, Paladins, Warrior Mages, Moon Mages, Clerics, Traders, Thieves, Empaths, Rangers, Bards.
Barbarians are a weapon based guild. They gain roars and dances over time, and have proficiency in a large number of weapons and armor (by that, I mean, your leveling requirements for skills are going to include several weapons and armor types, and you'll learn them quickly). You can stun and explode people's heads with your roars, or dance around like a schizophrenic badger to distract enemies making incoming attacks. In addition, Barbarians make the best forged weapons. They're also one of the two classes that can multi-fire arrows. Have a unique system called "inner fire" that determines how often they can use their intrinsic abilities.
Paladins are your standard religious warrior class. They gain holy magic spells (different list than clerics), as well as some smiting weapon abilities, and some unique mount abilities. Have a unique system called "Soul" that determines how often they can use their intrinsic abilities. Paladins also have to abide by a moral code that the game enforces; i.e. if you attack a person from hiding, or an innocent, you'll lose all your soul, have to quest to get back in good standing with the guild, and lose your abilities for the meantime.
Warrior Mages are the elemental magic class. They're really mostly casters, though they do have to keep a weapon skill relatively trained. Warmages get spells from the various elemental schools (air, water, fire, "aether", and earth), as well as some useful minor cantrips, and can summon a familiar to run tasks for them, send messages over long distances, etc. Their spells are based off of elemental magic. War mages are the masters of targetted magic, meaning they can specifically target certain limbs of enemies, and can make even less effective spells brutally fatal.
Moon mages are the traditional mage class. Their magic is dependent primarily on the alignments and strengths of the three moons, and to a lesser extent, the planets and the stars. They can also tell fortunes, which can either make your skills significantly better or worse for a period of time, teleport people, summon temporary familiars, tell the weather, and do a lot of utilitarian stuff, including enchanting magic items and making gems worth more. Moon mages have extensive history in the game, and often get knowledge of in game events before anyone else does. The problem with them is that if the moons are in shitty positions, you are completely weak, and much of your magic won't work indoors. Moon mages are the masters of the "primary magic" skill, meaning small amounts of mana are necessary, but have great effects (as compared to War Mages or Clerics). Use lunar magic.
Clerics are traditional priests of the gods, although it makes no distinction between like or dark; you can be an "evil cleric" and some spells that require a prayer to a specific god, can be done to a dark god and get evil effects. (curses, dark malevolent features, etc.). Clerics can raise the dead without the dead person losing experience, though it's a significant task to do so. Clerics are also the masters of harnessing mana; they can harness ridiculous amounts of mana for their spells. Clerics use holy mana.
Traders are one of the two largely non-combat classes in the game. Traders make money. They do commodities trading and speculation, move caravans from city to city, sell people's gems at a markup, host auctions for people, and other things to generate large ass amounts of cash. Consequently they learn combat skills much more slowly. Traders can often be largely automated for money gatherings. No magic.
Thieves are not "rogues". They're badass bandits in this game. First of all, the guild is a secret that you have to quest to even find. If you talk about the guild openly, and people hear you, the guild leader will assassinate you. If you start getting too "hot", you might get beat down by the guild thugs. Thieves get a bonus to their skills the longer they remain in city walls (the opposite of the one that Rangers get). Thieves have requisite backstabbing abilities that can completely 1-shot an enemy; they can also hamstring, and blunt-object bludgeon people from hiding, as well as snipe without leaving stealth. They can use internal discipline powers to make extremely powerful single shot attacks, self buffs, go invisible, or the like, but can only use one or two of these powers at a time. Thieves can hire people to find a target, or pass a message, are really good at lockpicking and pickpocketing, can specially rob museums and stores for fun and profit, and then pawn the goods later. Also, thieves get special hidden passages that help them go from point A to point B in hiding. Oh, and they can make poisons for weapons too. My thief is one of my absolute favorites (he's relatively high level, in his 70's). No magic (khri abilities are internal, instant, and recharge quite quickly.)
Empaths are the healers of the game, but they do things uniquely. In order to heal wounds from others, empaths must first transfer the wound to themselves, and then heal it from themselves. Empaths uniquely CANNOT do harmful actions against others, to the extent that they can't even fish. If they do, they lose their powers. Empaths can completely save your life in a fight you would not otherwise win, assuming they don't kill themselves. There are tools that can semi-automate empaths. Typically they make money off of tips from healing people, and are largely (by honor code) untouched by thieves. They use Life magic.
Rangers are kind of the opposite of thieves. They mainly operate outside of cities. Rangers are combat skilled in both ranged and melee, and can use life magic (different spell list from empaths). Rangers are really good and hiding, like thieves, but only get benefits in wilderness to that. Rangers are also (along with barbarians) able to multi-shoot arrows, and (along with barbarians) are the best fletchers of bows and arrows. Rangers can run trails to quickly cross long stretches of terrain, and have some cool spells like, web an opponent, poison him with the spider's bite, and then clobber him on the head with a massive tree branch. Oh, as mentioned, they get a bonus similar to thieves, except the longer they remain outdoors (it goes away gradually when they enter cities). Rangers get familiars too that they have to train, and can catch wild horses and train them for others to use as mounts (make some decent money that way).
Bards I'm not super familiar with, having never played one. They can sing enchantes (spells) that are buffs or debuffs, but don't really have any decent direct attacks as far as I know. They're really good at lore skills and make decent thieves as well, and generally serve to enhance other classes.
Grouping is not largely important in the game, though it helps. For instance in a combat group, you might have a war mage killing things, an empath healing him, and a bard buffing and attacking things, but because experience in skills is based on your use of the skills, you end up grouping less.
Skills/Leveling (Here is why the game is fucking awesome).
First of all: no level cap. You keep leveling until you decide to stop, and the GM's keep adding new content and higher level mobs (some mobs will flex up to your level too) and the loot will match. Not to mention, you'll want to keep levelling and training to out PVP the other players.
Leveling is based on skill. For each guild, to go up to the next level, you will need a certain number of ranks in a particular skill. The required numbers and skills vary from guild to guild, and from level to level (once you clear 20 and then 40 etc. you'll start having to do less skills per level, but each skill takes longer). To advance a skill, you have to use it. So, swinging a scimitar will raise your medium edged skill, a dagger your light edged skill, etc. So in a fight against a goblin, you might be training evasion, armor (maybe 6 different kinds of armor if you're wearing different kinds) your weapon skill (for instance, heavy edged), your parry skill, and if you're a mage your primary magic, harnessing, and targeted magic skills as well.
As you use skills you gain experience that goes into a pool. As that pool fills up, your mind state goes from clear to murky, to mind locked, at which point you cannot gain any more experience until you rest a bit and let it drain. Over time, your mind will drain as the collected experience in the "pool" drains down into actual improvement to your ranks. (You can also use undrained experience to fill special orbs that are used in resurrections when you die). You can increase the rate of this by training your mental stats and abilities. So intelligence for instance increases the size of the exp pool, while wisdom increases the rate that it translates into actual experience. The result is a system that facilitates you being able to quickly train a skill up to mind locked, then move onto something else and continue to learn in the first skill, allowing for an effective training cycle even for people who aren't actively trying to grind experience.
With a handful of exceptions, everyone can do any skill equally well, regardless of race, level, or guild. A level 1 barbarian with 100 ranks of medium edged weapons, will swing a sword equally well as a level 1 trader with 100 ranks of medium edged weapons, or a level 100 barbarian with the same 100 ranks. All skill successes are largely determined by your number of ranks in the skill.
So, for instance, no matter what, at rank 1 in a weapon I simply won't be able to hit targets most times and when I do, the damage won't be anything but a scratch. At 10 ranks of weapon, I can hit rats reliably but a goblin might parry me easily. At 300 ranks of weapon, I can one-shot smash a goblin, quickly dispatch most trolls and death spirits, but I need a buff to even hit an a'danf shadow mage, etc.
Also, it leads to interesting experiences where I might be level 70, have hundreds of ranks in evasion or armor skills, but decide to level up some random weapon skill I ignored (for instance, light thrown, or halberds) and go back to smacking rats with it, but my evasion is so high the rats can't hope to hit me. What that does is it allows people with high levels to backtrain their other skills relatively safely.
Once you meet the requirements your guild leader has set to level up, you go to him and advance a rank. By doing so, you gain TDP's, points you can spend to improve your stats (strength, reflexes etc.), as well as gain access to new spells (you may only pick a limited number of spells, though some classes have more spell slots than available spells). You also get guild specific quests, and abilities, as well as new titles for your character at certain ranks (not every single one, and their all guild specific).
Provinces
There are 5 provinces in the game (I haven't played since before the 5th province was released): Zoluren, Therengia, Shard, an island province that I forget the name cause I didn't go there much, and Forfedhar or something like that which is the new one.
Each province has various hunting areas, towns, and provincial leadership. Players can get citizenship with the various areas, and take part in the player-run leadership roles, for instance in the militia, and royal court. (For instance, I used to be a militia commander).
You also get a vault you can rent for storage, and banks and stuff. Travel between provinces usually involves a short ferry ride or you can have a MoonMage transport you.
Combat, and PvP.
I'll start off with a brief clip of a PVP tournament I was involved with in 2001. It was a War Mages only tournament, but Devoar, my thief, was hiding around watching. Commentary in bold.
Darthiel points at you, ruining your hiding place. (Didn't your mom teach you that pointing at people is rude?)
>shoot darth
* Darthiel was just struck down!
>
Darkboon comes out of hiding.
Darkboon gestures at Darthiel.
A sheet of slippery ice forms under Darthiel!
Darthiel loses his footing on the ice, falling and painfully spraining his right ankle!
You turn to face Darthiel.
< You fire a broad-tip head arrow at Darthiel. Darthiel attempts to dodge. The arrow lands an awesome strike that explodes the chest in a shower of blood and splintered ribs.
The broad-tip head arrow lodges itself shallowly into Darthiel!
* Darthiel is slain before your eyes!
Darthiel's broadsword falls to the ground.
The soft silver glow fades from around Darthiel. (No more glow for you, MOTHERFUCKER!)
[You're nimbly balanced]
[Roundtime 1 sec.]
All that was in the span of about 2 seconds. Darkboon casts ice patch on Darthiel, which knocks him down, usually breaks a leg, and causes some moderate bleeding, and usually causes some internal leg wounds (but most importantly knocks you down, meaning you are super easy to hit), while the author (Poshly, a very high level barbarian fucking around in this tournament) snapshoots him.
Combat is numberless. You don't know what your hitpoints are, you physically examine yourself and see where you're wounded and guess about your health depending on how bad you feel.
Combat is based by a number of things, your offensive skills against your enemies defensive skills, combined with positioning issues, balance, and all sorts of other shit.
You determine the damage you do based on the combat message you get. So, this is an example of an average, non-critical, non-severe hit:
"Quillak fires a triple-fluted arrow at Pablin. The arrow lands a
grazing blow to his chest!
The triple-fluted arrow falls to the ground!"
The blow was only grazing, which might leave a light laceration, and the arrow didn't stick.
A more serious hit would be like this:
"Molark step backward and then slice at Quillak. The scimitar lands a
solid hit that etches a light cut into the right side of the chest!"
This indicates a light bleeding wound, but still isn't all that serious.
">Quillak fires a triple-fluted arrow at Pablin. The arrow lands a
strong hit that painfully mashes several toes of the left foot!
The triple-fluted arrow lodges itself shallowly into Pablin!"
This indicate a relatively minor crit, definitely a bleeder, probably some internal wounds as well, and the arrow lodged, which will cuase more injuries over time.
"Moving in with powerful grace, Quillak fires a triple-fluted arrow at
Molark. Molark fails to evade, leaning wrong and blundering into the
blow. The arrow lands a massive strike that cuts deeply into his groin,
severely stunning him!
The triple-fluted arrow lodges itself firmly into Molark!"
This one indicates a lot of things. Moving in with powerful grace is an indication that his skills are significantly higher than yours. Fails to evade, leaning wrong and blundering into the blow means that your evasion skill is significantly lower than his. Massive strike indicates the base level of the damage was very high, and cuts deeply into his groin indicates a crit to the abdomen, and severely stunning him indicates that he's going to get owned shortly. The firm lodging means that you're going to rip huge parts of your flesh out removing that arrow probably.
So that's ranged combat. You load your weapon, aim (or don't and snapshot), and fire. Magic works similarly, you prep the spell as a specified mana level (higher levels are more effective, but drain your mana pool more) and either cast it or target the mob specifically (for targeted magic spells), and then cast it. For both ranged and magic, if you wait long enough, your attack will reach max effectiveness, and that's when you want to cast, earlier or later and it goes down. However with enough skill you can "snapcast" spells. Melee combat works a little differently -- you advance on a mob, and close from missile range, to pole range, to melee range. Depending on the weapon you use you can shoot at different ranges. How likely you are to hurt a mob depends on your balance, his balance, who is dominating the fight, their stance, buffs and debuffs, etc.
Ok, now to PvP. PvP is open, meaning you can attack anyone at any time, but it is governed by an honor code. In the base game, you can only kill someone if you've got "consent", meaning they stole from you, or harassed you, or you guys agree to it, or if they do certain hostile actions first.
What this means in actuality is that you get quite a few PvP chances, especially as a thief, or any other class that does stealing a lot. There's also always tourneys of some sort going around. Plus, you can challenge people to a duel, which means that when you win, even on a killing blow, they won't die, but rather go unconscious for about 2 or 3 minutes, and if you can get them to an empath in that time, they'll live.
So that's dragonrealms in a nutshell. The game is humongous, and extremely detailed and well designed. I'm willing to help new players learn the ropes. For a text based game from the 90's, it still gets me excited to play, especially when there are GM-run events (daily) like invasions, or even massive wars that resolve over weeks at a time. Anyway, let me know if you're interested in playing, or have a specific mechanic you want to know more about.