Possible New Player Seeking Guidance

Hello,

I'm considering starting up here and having not played since 2001 I have a few game questions for anyone so kind to answer

I'm sure many before me have asked these questions so I thank you in advance for your attention.

1) First, which character/realm to main? Daoc is the game that got me into stealth gameplay and I would like to start up either a SB or NS. I'm only interested in Mid/Hib - I mained Albion way back when and wish to try a different setting. Could anyone just give me some direction as to the pros/cons of either? ie. If one bursts more than the other, if one is more sustained dps etc. Also, does one class or the other have easier matchups against opposing realm's class spread? Is one realm overpopped?

2) I'm no stranger to mmos and freeshards and know that even before maining a class, as a newbie with no support I'll need a farm character. What are good classes for solo farming in either realm? I'm sure Animist is still primary from Hib but if there is a decent second choice what would it be?

3) And this question I want an honest response, however bleak. I'm sure by now the population is top heavy when it comes to RR and I accept having to eat my share of dirt starting out handicapped on the RR - that I'm more or less prepared for. What I'm wondering is how long it would take to level a farming toon, assassin main, and templating that said main out using the farming toon as a revenue generator. My playtime varies but lets set a weekly low-end average of 24hrs/week (likely be more if i get into binge mode lol)

Also, if this has any relevance, my time slot is usually mid-morning to late afternoon NA (Euro Primeish) and late night NA.

Thanks!

Tue 14 Jan 2020 7:39 PM by Scoobz

Hibernia is underpopulated, so I'd say make a Nightshade because you'll never have to look far for action.
That being said you may get zerged down a lot more than other realms and will have a fair share of unfair fights.

Also Hibernia is relatively easy to farm because of Animist so you may not need to invest as much time into farming/pve
compared to other realms. Close 2nd and 3rd farm characters? ...I'd say a mana enchanter or a mana mentalist, the chanter
needs a little help with buffs/hots if you are focus pulling, the mana ment can aoe dot kite but it's a lot more effort finding a
camp with tons of mobs to dot then kiting them off till death. Animist is fairly easy going and little work.

Play time? If you get shown the ropes or trade PLs or just come along friendly people getting 50 is no effort at all. Casual
solo play, incorporating a few exp items here and there, task completions and going to camps with a decent xp bonus getting 50
shouldn't take you any longer than 2 day playtime. Getting PL'd and maximizing xp turn ins people are doing it in 8 or so hours.
Darkspire and HoH are instances that grant feathers and 1% global account xp gain. People have farmed it to the 100s. That'll speed things up even more.

The feathers and acquiring the plat for a template is the most time investment. Most templates run 2 20k feather items minimum, you can easily tack
on 5-8 more items for certain /use charges defensive or offensive as well as weapon procs. Darkspire / HoH runs take about 1-2 hours iirc, good groups
do them in 45min now? I don't follow DS/HoH knews tbh. They generate roughly 10-20k feathers a run last I heard. So rough math on that is there, add in a half hour - hour to form a group easily. Population is low and I'd watch forum for certain Raids so you get account credit to buy Galla/Cidi/TG Phoenix Feather items. (Most popular items used in templates) ( Raids generate 10-15k feathers and take 1-3hours depending on population of raid... and how the /random 1000s turn out )

Sooo yeaaaa hope this helps.

Tue 14 Jan 2020 7:42 PM by vxr

1 - Mid has the most pop, but it depends on when you play. Hib is least pop, but I recently saw Hibs with the highest pop couple days ago. Overall though the pop is Mid > Alb (close behind) > Hib
I and many other people prefer NS over SB in isolation, but you might want to consider how often raids are run, how easy to find groups, how many enemies there are and what kind of enemies you will fight. Mid has stronger 1v1 classes. That could be a reason why you might want to roll an SB. All things considered I still prefer NS over SB.

2 - Solo farming Hib - animist and I guess Ment.
Solo farming Mid - Shaman > BD > SM

3 - 24h/week is plenty of time to get lvled and geared. Your biggest issue is likely to be getting credit for SI dungeon.
Lots of high RR but getting to R5 is easy and should help equalize it. Good luck. Hope you find a good home here.

Tue 14 Jan 2020 7:59 PM by thirian24

Welcome back!

I have a high rank NS. They are a blast to play, and are very tough to fight against if specced and played properly.

The down side to running a sneak as your main RvR toon , is the stealth groups that you will face and people just plain out running you down. If you don't let any of that get to you, you will have a good time here.

Animist for farming is awesome. The good thing is, Phoenix made crafting way better with in game macros and some changes to crafting itself. So I recommend leveling up your sub skills for salavging early on. This will help you tremendously in your income intake.

On my NS, I ran about 10 feather items. So you're looking at almost 200k feathers. If you can get in on same Galla raids, this will help you grab some feathers. If not, you can buy these items from other people that do have feathers/credit. This may be your toughest struggle starting out.

Once you're fairly established, I recommend leveling up alchemy as well. As a NS, you're going to be going through pots like CRAZY if you play much at all.

One last thing, please do not go Mid. They do not need any new population.

Good luck

Cheers,
Hwwaatt

Wed 15 Jan 2020 11:48 PM by alphaonezero10

Thanks for the responses guys. Got some thinking to do

Thu 16 Jan 2020 3:13 AM by MacPrior

New player? It is very nice! This server needs more active players! Welcome!

As you wrote, you start a stealther, it's doesn't matter which realm you join. Stealthers are no point which take an influence on Realm RvR. They doesn't make the realm stronger or weaker.

I tried to play in all 3 realms and in Alb was easier to find a level group with each class, second best - Midgard. Hibernia is worst in that question, As you decided play Hib or Mid, I would say, start an SB.

In Midgard is the best Farm Char - a Cave /Buff Shaman. Perhaps also a simplest one to play too.

But you don't need actually a farm class on this server very much. It is quite easy to level over here and thanks to ROGs and Feather system it is easy to template each class.

You can buy any Epic Dungeon or any Dragon Drop for Feathers, your will just need an encounter one for account. And raids will be offered in all 3 Realms, More often in Alb, then Mid, and worst in that question - again Hib.

Thu 16 Jan 2020 3:28 AM by gotwqqd

MacPrior wrote: ↑
Thu 16 Jan 2020 3:13 AM
New player? It is very nice! This server needs more active players! Welcome!

As you wrote, you start a stealther, it's doesn't matter which realm you join. Stealthers are no point which take an influence on Realm RvR. They doesn't make the realm stronger or weaker.

I tried to play in all 3 realms and in Alb was easier to find a level group with each class, second best - Midgard. Hibernia is worst in that question, As you decided play Hib or Mid, I would say, start an SB.

In Midgard is the best Farm Char - a Cave /Buff Shaman. Perhaps also a simplest one to play too.

But you don't need actually a farm class on this server very much. It is quite easy to level over here and thanks to ROGs and Feather system it is easy to template each class.

You can buy any Epic Dungeon or any Dragon Drop for Feathers, your will just need an encounter one for account. And raids will be offered in all 3 Realms, More often in Alb, then Mid, and worst in that question - again Hib.

I found Midgard to be easiest to find a leveling group almost any class, though some classes had tough or no groups some days.
Hibs was close behind finding groups, though any class seem to be invited equally(aside from the bomb/heal/animist)

Albs are worse by far
Even with my ice wizard they were hard to come by, healer harder still and a shield tank very few invites
The other classes? Almost never....also if you want to get a group in rvr at low levels forget about any sympathetic groups people . All I’d be looking for was speed to keep up so I can get some rp’s to help leveling... usually was accused of being a spy from another realm because I needed to ask where they were headed and try to make my way alone

Thu 16 Jan 2020 1:00 PM by Lipsi

As a new player, you'll probably find it a bit easier to get started on Hib than on Mid.

To my opinion, Hib raids will be a bit easier to find, farm will be easier, your farming toon -animist- will also grant you access to DS for feathers. You'll get a good amount of platin to gear up and boost xp of your desired stealther, making it much faster to get to 50 and templated.

48 hours (2 weeks by your playtime reference) will be well enough to get your farming toon ready (level 50, templated, some RR3-4 to make it more effective in PVE), capitalize coins and some feathers, get your salvage skills to legendary, and possibly stack some piles of potions or even have legendary alchemy done (best potions will considerably boost your NS while leveling and is compulsory for starting rvr later).

There is also the possibility to have toons and different realms, and you can transfer platin from one realm to the other. You could have your animist to farm and a SB on mid as long as you respec a 4hours delay between realm switching.

another 24 hours should do it to get the stealther to 50 and templated.

There are new players / alt rerolls everyday, most of the time about half the population is level 50 and the other half is leveling, so you won't really feel so bad starting at a low rank. There are many low ranks around there at any time, some joining the zerg, some in small groups, solos, etc.
Also gaining RR is quite fast in the low ranks and if you stick to one main character, you will get to RR5 pretty fast.

Sat 18 Jan 2020 1:27 AM by Quik

So I recently came back and tried Hib for a week before I finally threw in the towel and moved back to Mid.

I really wanted to play on Hib but the thing that bothers me over there is they have a very specific leveling group build and very few people veer from it. Yes, there are the exceptions, but generally if you aren't of the optimal class, they only take 1-2 others and they are usually held for friends/guildies, which is fine since they made the group, but it just frustrates people trying to level.

I switched back to Mid and immediately got groups for the 3 classes I switched around on in the last 2 days, only 1 of them was a good group class (Supp SM), but I had no issues getting a group with my hunter or my zerker. Mid just seems to have more of the attitude they can make anything work, while Hib just wants optimal period and would rather wait around for hours to get that last druid/bard/warden to group instead of just going with a little suboptimal and starting.

Play where you want, just be aware that if you are on Hib you might want to make your first character an Ani/Ench/Druid/Bard to get groups easier. If you want to be a stealthier or even tank, Mid is much easier to get groups with.

Can't speak for Albion as I haven't played there for ages.

Sat 18 Jan 2020 2:09 AM by gotwqqd

Quik wrote: ↑
Sat 18 Jan 2020 1:27 AM
So I recently came back and tried Hib for a week before I finally threw in the towel and moved back to Mid.

I really wanted to play on Hib but the thing that bothers me over there is they have a very specific leveling group build and very few people veer from it. Yes, there are the exceptions, but generally if you aren't of the optimal class, they only take 1-2 others and they are usually held for friends/guildies, which is fine since they made the group, but it just frustrates people trying to level.

I switched back to Mid and immediately got groups for the 3 classes I switched around on in the last 2 days, only 1 of them was a good group class (Supp SM), but I had no issues getting a group with my hunter or my zerker. Mid just seems to have more of the attitude they can make anything work, while Hib just wants optimal period and would rather wait around for hours to get that last druid/bard/warden to group instead of just going with a little suboptimal and starting.

Play where you want, just be aware that if you are on Hib you might want to make your first character an Ani/Ench/Druid/Bard to get groups easier. If you want to be a stealthier or even tank, Mid is much easier to get groups with.

Can't speak for Albion as I haven't played there for ages.

You can throw mentalist in there too
HoT Crack is good

Sat 18 Jan 2020 4:14 PM by Quik

gotwqqd wrote: ↑
Sat 18 Jan 2020 2:09 AM
Quik wrote: ↑
Sat 18 Jan 2020 1:27 AM
So I recently came back and tried Hib for a week before I finally threw in the towel and moved back to Mid.

I really wanted to play on Hib but the thing that bothers me over there is they have a very specific leveling group build and very few people veer from it. Yes, there are the exceptions, but generally if you aren't of the optimal class, they only take 1-2 others and they are usually held for friends/guildies, which is fine since they made the group, but it just frustrates people trying to level.

I switched back to Mid and immediately got groups for the 3 classes I switched around on in the last 2 days, only 1 of them was a good group class (Supp SM), but I had no issues getting a group with my hunter or my zerker. Mid just seems to have more of the attitude they can make anything work, while Hib just wants optimal period and would rather wait around for hours to get that last druid/bard/warden to group instead of just going with a little suboptimal and starting.

Play where you want, just be aware that if you are on Hib you might want to make your first character an Ani/Ench/Druid/Bard to get groups easier. If you want to be a stealthier or even tank, Mid is much easier to get groups with.

Can't speak for Albion as I haven't played there for ages.
You can throw mentalist in there too
HoT Crack is good

Menty is great, but also a very popular class so can be tough to compete with other's when trying to get a group with them.

Sat 18 Jan 2020 7:51 PM by Lipsi

I guess each have had their own personal experience but it's hardly valid to generalize from it.

On the total opposite from Quik, i started in Mid and stayed there for one month, where i leveled a savage to 50 and RR4, 99% of the time solo because no group would take. Other toons didn't make it past 30 because i was unable to find groups, except for a healer that i was asked to respec to full paci for optimized bomb group everytime i was offered a group. When i was answered for joining a group the question was often which RR am i, and after i tell them, they stop answering. If i wanted to rvr, i had to log healer exclusively, or go solo. In a month i couldn't really gear properly and fast enough , due to difficulty to get feathers, lack of money, farm class. I had so much downtimes waiting in Mid that i could level all crafts to LGM during that 1 month there - tho it didn't really pay out - and i am still broke on midgard.

After moving to Hib, i had no hard time to get groups and raids and feathers. I was lucky probably because classes that i leveled where Bard (sought after), Champion (the "social" spot), Menta (sought after). Everytime i log, i can play whatever i want. If i want to raid HOH or DS i will not wait AFK for long in capital, if iwant to rvr / smallman / duo / zerg, i will not wait AFK for long in frontier, if i want to reroll an alt and level, i always find groups. I was never asked to be of a specific build, or RR, to join a group. I wasn't ignored when i was low rank. It's been 3 months now and i didn't even find time to level crafting skills, while money flows without any farm class (bard, champion, menta light, as i stated^^) allowing me to even get the nice "reskin" touch i wanted for my toons, to have them all templated and to pride myself not wearing anything under masterpiece quality.

May be there is a learning curve to Phoenix server, to figure out how to find groups, help, xp, gear, etc and if i started on Hib, i'd have had the same experience as Quik. Who knows?

Since all personal experiences are different, may be just try for yourself and find where you belong to ^^