Tips for New Players

[Saint_Jimmy]

So, one of the things we're working on for NC is improving the new player experience. And one of the problems with NC is that it's got a fairly steep learning curve and you're thrown in the deep end, armed with... actually we might've removed the carving knife, so armed with a couple of books, some FAKs and maybe a weapon if you for whatever reason didn't start with search.


This is something we need to improve on - one of the things we want to do is implement a tutorial of sorts, but why stop there? We can create tips for new characters, both based off of actions they take (I see you're level 1 and trying to kill that big ward) and just a random piece of advice from time to time, for example when they die.

Which is where you guys come in. What tips and tricks do you wish someone had told you when you started? What did you not really get? Got suggestions for when we should display tips? Lets hear them!

[Azure]

Step one for the big future_is_now tutorial is probably to set up a small zone (or maybe something similar to how large alpha is) for newbies to work out searching and finding stuff with a couple basic skills.
Maybe give them 60cp for a attack basic tree, repair item and engineering? A linear path of tiles which allow them to find resource buildings along the way might be a good idea also.
And throw a in dummy/admin char they can ~~practice talking to~~ -smack around with various mundane weapons that they find.
Toss in a portal to laurentia for them to use once they get the hang of it and BOOM done. (maybe at this point the character can get wiped back to level 1 or maybe cap tutorial level at 2 or 3?)

Also it should be more obvious how much cp you need to spend before being able to reach T2 or T3, (maybe just a counter on the skills page showing 'current CP', 'total CP spent'< and 'CP required to advance to next tier'

p.s. is there a term for 'advancing to T2/3' cause I'm just going to call it advancing a tier unless we have a better term.
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[nikko]

I think a good idea would be to have a discord channel strictly dedicated to new players. A readily offered link when they sign up or make their account. Give them an easy opening to ask whatever questions they may have, and it'd give vetrean players a chance to offer whatever advise they feel to be pertinent. I know I've had a few "well geeze, nobody ever told me about that" incidents over the course of my nexal experience. And of course this would also get new players involved in the community and not just the game. Making players feel welcome and amongst friends would likely increase the number of people who stick with it.

[Badziew]

Not everyone has a Discord account, and "oh gawd, yet another registration screen!" can put them away, so I think it is better to put any tips or tutorial directly in game.

About tips that I would really appreciate as a beginner: a summary of what classes actually exist, and why picking X as combat skill is not a good idea if your planned class is Y.

In fact, even adding tips "this skilll is useful for classes X,Y,Z" to skill purchase screen would be a good step. Or maybe even short summaries what each skill actually do.

[Kandarin]

What sort of specific tips do you think players need to hear? Put another way, what do you wish you knew when you started playing that was unclear at the time?

[nikko]

Well, definately the search results in relation to power supply and the day/night cycle. I seriously didn't know about that for the longest time.

[Trialist]

I'm not sure if a post is relevant here, two years later, but I'd assume so given that it's still stickied.

I think that, to a new player, there are going to be four major questions that should be answered.

How To Hit Stuff

This is where you'd point out the initial 25% hit rate, the HtH/Melee/Ranged skills, how it takes to Lv.6 to even get a full tree and how you should expect to miss a lot until maxed. It might be good to point out that targets aren't always available, so many characters might have another way to get XP during this time. I'll probably be a good place to mention soak and evasion as well (and weapon quality) to give people an idea of why their weapons aren't working as well as hoped.

How To Heal Stuff

One big thing I remember when I started was not really understanding the idea of healing. Sure, there is "expect to die, a lot" but that doesn't really cover dying constantly. It might be best to cover where to find FAKs, how much they heal, and most importantly what they're generally used for - healing others, healing in factions, or for an emergency. Note that most characters, especially low-level, aren't going to last very long regardless. And with respawning cheap, it's generally easier to just expect to be dead some days rather than spending a week trying to search up FAKs.

How To Find Stuff

This is a general "where stuff is and where you'd expect to find it." We can stick with the mortal/Laurentia stuff and just specify that there are more exotic locations outside there. But things like looking for a hospital or pharmacy for FAKs, look for a library for books, and look for a gun shop for ammo can come in handy. Might be worth mentioning factories for repairing most equipment, and where to put together a Portable Toolkit for those power tweakers/bow users.

How To Get Around

This was the other big one I remember when starting out. Everywhere just kind of looks similar to everywhere else, unless you've been in areas frequently enough to notice some building patterns. It might be best to mention the different districts in Laurentia, and what's frequent in each one. At least give players an idea of how to use the train stations, just so they aren't randomly jumping from station to station until they happen upon a decent looking one. Mentioning that the Sunrise station is next to a bunch of factories and the Cimmeria nearby a library can be useful to direct new players to places they want to be.

Other than that, I don't think I would recommend a "newbie" starting area. For one, the big draw of the game is interacting with other players, and giving players an enclosed spot to start will just drive the wrong impression to people that there are "safe" spots in the game. Also, there are a lot of interactions which are not lethal, and losing the chance of getting a faction invite/being handed off some clothing or weapon/getting talked to before murdered doesn't leave that good of an impression on the game. Especially if they haven't found how to leave the starting area, or forgot.

[Tathers]

Is there a point to doing this even if the UI changes in the next breath?

[Kandarin]