Thinking of joining

E

Etris

Dalayan Beginner
Hey SoD,

My buddy and I are considering this server but are worried about a few things.

We're pretty casual gamers looking for a not so sluggish leveling game like P99 Blue. We don't have 60 hours a week to dedicate to leveling anymore like the old days - how's the experience rate on this server? Would we be able to duo our way to 60+ within a month? Are all classes much different than live? wouldn't want to gimp our duo. Any guilds welcoming casual players? Are there corpse runs on this server? I've read the wiki and notice there's xp debt which is cool - but do we lose our items? Any classes that the server lacks and needs? I'm thinking one of us will go druid for support / ports for our first run through - but if there's a billion druids...what's the point. I also love necromancers for the solo play but if they're useless in raids or groups compared to other classes....

Looking forward to meeting some new faces.

Regards,
Etris
 
Hello and welcome.
This would be a good spot to start. http://wiki.shardsofdalaya.com/index.php/Differences_between_SoD
We have a great wiki with lots of useful information. It seems like you have read the wiki and that's good. The page I added is sort of a one stop shop for all the differences.
Getting to 60 in a month is definitely doable, especially if you both 2 box at the same time. 2 characters per real life person at a time is the max you can play. All classes are equally important and most will tell you play what you like and worry about the raid game later. It seems that there is a demand for enchanters, but that's mostly at the very high end game, and if you are a casual player, you won't be worrying about that for a while.
Keep in mind there is a "billion" of everything to be honest. The server has been around for a long time and there are lots of characters that have long since retired and are played by other people. At the high end these toons are used and they are used when farming for xp or plat at the high end. This is why I say play what you like. It's far better to have a person in the group that likes playing his/her druid and knows how to play them, then to have a druid that doesn't know what they are doing and picked the class because someone said they should.
The key thing is to play the game the way you like. Don't rush anything if you can help it. Many people rush to the high end game and find out that suddenly they find the game is different and they no longer want to play. It becomes a very heavy grind at that point.
Have a good time.
 
no corpse runs, and no you do not loose your items.

Leveling here is significantly faster than on p99 blue.
 
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Leveling here is about as fast, or even a little faster than P99 Red server (which is about 3x as fast as blue last time I checked). It actually feels almost identical though p99 red scales from +100% down to 1% bonus from 1-50 so the early levels are a little faster there. Here there are an abundance of quests though including bounties throughout many zones which supplements your xp considerably if you choose to do them.

Depending on how casual is your casual, you might not quite make it to 65 in a month (65 is cap). The last 5 levels are a little slower than the previous. Playing semi hardcore took me about a month to hit 65 with 30 AAs, but I also stopped to do the main quest and quite a few other quests along the way.

As stated above, read the wiki for sure about what is different on SoD. This server rebalances all the classes far beyond what you'd find on p99 (classic) and even beyond live servers (as of the last time I played). Many very intelligent and interesting changes have been made to just about every class. The necro seems pretty much in line with that of classic if thats what you're interested in (thats what I recently rolled), though feign death works considerably different.
 
If there are two of you, take your time. There are a lot of things to do at low levels and there are a lot of fun areas and quests to play in. It is true that you can't really swing a dead gnome without hitting a druid on this server, but that should probably be more of a testament to their versatility and usefulness. I would suggest everyone box. I started with 2 RL friends and I went Clr/War and they went Mnk and Rogue respectively. It was about lvl 20 that they both decided they wanted a box as well so one did bard for an afk tag along and the other went Ench for sweet buffs.

If you asking in /ooc everyone will tell you that Cleric is never a bad choice (Like every guild and their momma wants an abundance of these) and that a mained and talented enchanter is worth more than the rest of your guild combined. If you aren't raiding that enchanter will be less celebrated, but not less useful and if you are just grouping any healer will do.

Really, it is honestly best to play a class that fits your play style. Guilds care more about warm bodies and skill at the end of the day. The one exception to that is maybe tanks. It is hard to back gear tanks, but it happens all the time (look at my sig below at Daggin, I've made Dragonkin drag my ass through everything).
 
1. I am not saying you have to box, but you have to box.
2. Boxing will be a good thing since everyone has a druid box that nobody wants so that'll fit with your OP.
3. Classes in demand roughly = good enchanter > cleric >>> ranger/wizard > okay enchanter >other dps >>> tanks > druid [shaman=wildcard]
4. This server is not particularly casual friendly. There are numerous huge ass quests that will require days of your life chipping away at to complete. Some depend on rare drops or grinding faction in zones that will melt your face without a full group or raid gear.
5. This server is not particularly casual friendly. Acquiring endgame spells is anything from a raid drop to multiple quests which will be difficult without gear/tomes.
6. This server is not particularly casual friendly. Raiding is by far the best and often times only way to improve gear. 6 mans are punishingly difficult for the gear though you can find ringers and whatnot to run them sometimes. Sometimes.
7. This server is not particularly casual friendly. Tomes are a monumental grind. The xp grind isn't a particularly difficult slope to climb, but the top is long long ass ways away. Less like climbing a mountain, and more like walking across a gradual ramp state like Nebraska. Good xp opportunities will mostly go to noncasuals who will be discussed next.
4-7. Someone will probably argue that all of that stuff is optional. This is true in a way, but who logs onto a game to be dwarfed in power by their peers? Compare a 65 whatever with a few hundred AAs and no endgame spells to a 65 whatever with t10+ gear, all their spells, and a few dozen tomes and it ain't the same ballpark, it ain't even the same league. Bringing one Kedrin is better than bringing 3 doe-eyed 65 Rangers in and of itself, plus you get two spots to fill. The difference between bringing your new 65 tank and someone boxing Sema are like spear fishing in open ocean versus fish in a barrel. Lleoc could singlehan... actually lets skip monks. One Zurrka is better than some guilds.
8. For every casual success story there are a dozen people who got tired of playing the sitting in Athica lfg simulator and left for greener pastures.

SoD can be a great mmorpg server, but it is also a huge time devouring beast which isn't for everyone.
 
Man that post is the most accurate description I've read of SoD since Cinn's "God Tier Classes" post
 
Unfortunately that is largely true. If you want a fun game to duo with your friend and progress at your own rate, SoD actually has fairly fast leveling 0-65, and a lot of cool content and quests for low tier players like yourselves. The problem is that the server population is already low, and most of the players left have been here for years, and will be unfathomably more powerful than you, and require months or even years of serious play on your part to catch up.

If you are happy with going at your own rate and just playing with your friend and the occasional other, go for it, but if you want a more interactive community of grouping and raiding and stuff, unfortunately, this game just doesn't have that anymore =(
 
If you two are looking to do things together and pick up people when you can, this server offers a lot of fun and practically inexhaustible content. Leveling is not arduous and some areas are so fun you wish the xp would slow down but Donfolstar is spot on. A t12 with max AA and tomes/all spells compared to a fresh 65 is going to look like a lvl 1 vs a lvl 65. Leveling to 65 is a lot like climbing up a mountain to its peek and once you're above the clouds you find you weren't on the big mountain yet.

I play mostly solo, unless a guildmate or friend needs help with something or one of my RL friends logs on the very few times that happens anymore. I like going at my own pace, trying every zone, doing quests and judging my power growth based on things that used to rock me and are now practically blank brain farm status. I love it, but it isn't for everyone.
 
Donfolstar's list is only symptoms of a bigger problem, that being one of population. As I said before, all the things on the list should be embraced as what normal games would consider content and challenges to be enjoyed, but they become more problematic due to a general lack of players.

If we're not sugar coating anything, know that the server peaks at 150, with a large portion boxing. We'd be lucky to have 100 actual players on most nights. Thats the current drawback here, and what causes me to log prematurely most nights.
 
Vitali said:
Man that post is the most accurate description I've read of SoD since Cinn's "God Tier Classes" post
Click to expand...

This is probably the greatest praise I have ever received or can even conceive of receiving. I wish years ago I had had the foresight to save Cinn's post or print it out or hire a sky writing company to share it with others. Reading and rereading that post was more enjoyable than at least half my experiences actually playing mmos.
 
Vitali said:
I had sent it to my email with the thought it would be deleted. Apparently it's not there either. Sad times.
Click to expand...

5KFt7lQh.jpg
 
If both you and your friend box (I'd suggest one boxing a tank/dps duo and the other a healer/utility duo, but there's a whole thread dedicated to boxing combinations so you could consult that - my wife and I play paladin, enchanter, cleric, druid ... we lack some dps, but are happy with that foursome), you should not have much trouble getting through the levels and doing several quests together. A lot can be accomplished casually, but some things may require some binge playing and/or outside help to complete. There are lots of options in SoD so you shouldn't run out of things to do anytime soo. We have been playing SoD for roughly 8 years and there are a few things we have not yet seen in the game. Good luck and have fun!
 
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