In the very beginning, the first NPC you are likely to encounter is Arcos the wanderer. This person tells you you should go north. Now, having played the game enough to somawhat understand the map, going north is the LAST thing you want to do in this game, I spent countless hours of frustration in the beggining becose I kept trying to go north. This text really needs to be removed, you should take the map step by step and stay where you belong at your lvl, and this means staying the eff away from the north until you are ready.
This may seem like a worthless issue to many of you; specially folk like me that have survived the Exiled Lands long enough to grab a Falcata (lvl 38) at lvl 8 or so, then go straight to the savana and get me a hardened steel sword, and then go straight to the mounds of the dead and get me a starmetal sword. Then it’s off the the Unnamed City, effectively ignoring entirely the flow of the game. But for a new player, like me when I started, “…hah! you should head north, there are cities of…” this direction, given at the very start, for someone who does not understand the game, is a recipe for many, many hours of frustration. At least have the guy say something like “At some point, when you are ready, you should go north…” or something akin those lines. What I was told pissed me off, DO NOT GO NORTH!, for the sake of your sanity!
it’s quite possible, maybe in early development ,New Asgard may not have intended to be a hostile settlement (of course we may never know for sure) When you look at its location on the map,the Mounds of the Dead is west of it, the Black Keep and Volcano north of it and the Den south of it, its surrounded by aesthetically “malevolent” forces, those areas just look like “hostile” areas and they are. However New Asgard is a green, flourishing settlement of Norsemen that dont really seem villianous, and would have been a welcome respite for player exiles as they venture further north. So maybe Arcos’s words at one time did mean well, but changes were made and his dialogue was never corrected. It also puzzled me as well that the vast grasslands where New Asgard is located doesn’t have an obelisk, like it was intended for players to build a base with a maproom near Asgard and travel to the other areas of the map from there.
He doesn’t direct you to go north from a gameplay point of view. He says, “You didn’t think you were the only one did you?” It’s fluff dialogue for color. He’s most likely the first person people find from being alone out in the desert. He’s just letting you know that there’s whole cities of exiles up there.
It is irrelevant to conjecture about why the text was written so, in the end it is really, really bad advise and they should change the script; it confuses folk. Don’t expect them to, but at least I’ve had my say, heh.
Going north is the easy way to survival
You just have to follow the river if you are afraid of hyenas from the point of view of a new player in the north you dont have to care about sandstorm and you can easy find food , passive animals to kill , easy farm wood , stone and iron.
Strongly disagree. Wolves, for one, Vanir, gangs of black hand and Darfari camps on the way. Killing a bear or a demonic wolf al low levels is not viable, and one does not simply walk into New Asgard when you are new, so you cannot raid the camps without being thoughroughly skewered. In short, I believe you are mistaken; the game flow is obviously designed for the player to start at the shores, then move up to Black Hand, from there is al-Merayah, then up to Vanir territory, and finally the Mounds.
If you are not an experienced player and do not understand the mechanics, and do not know the map, going north is going to be death after death, loss of bodies, thralls and equipment… ugly, frustrating exercise, there is no way in hell a fresh player is going to survive Arco’s advice, I think they should change it.
Your argument entails knowledge I stated the new player will not have, so, again: no.
Good to know, but that is peripheral information that doesn’t directly relate to my point: Arcos advice will get you killed fast, and it should be removed, it makes absolutly no sense to send a new player north, very ill advice, and an unnecessary source of frustration and confusion.
You can disagree more it wont chnage the fact in the north anyone can advance much more easy.
Going north will make you survival best wolfs are slow and they atack almost all time miss you hyenas im the south are 100% more dangerous over a wolf in the north , dafari are easy killed by any new player and in the north you find huge resourses like iron , coal , wood , food and MANY easy chests to open , most enemys in the north are easy avoided too.
Its much more easy a new player dying in the south for sandstorm and for sandstorm beast s in the south temple or for the big root boss in the south island.
Any no-brainless new player will advanced much more easy in the north.
Funcom wont will waste they time changing Arco advice just because you died to hyenas and it is a huge advice for new players know how to play survival games.
At the end of the argument, going north is bad advice for a new player; if you dispute that, then say hi to the hyenas for me.
You actually imply I am afraid of hyenas. Having a pre-frontal lobe is a good thing, it allows you to discern between an example of the perils you will face, how frustrating it would be, and what an irresponsable thing to do is to send a NEW player, who is not even versed on how the combat system works, hasn’t even the gotten the dodge timing well, does not know how the creatures behave and attack or when to attack or when to dodge, and in which direction; let alone how to deal with a camp of Black Hand, and when the person is speaking about a speccific creature or NPC ( Just so you understand, I am not terrified neither by hyenas nor Black Hand, these are generalizations of the kind of threats you will face having zero idea when to set off a combo, when to light strike, or even when to heavy-strike and dodge.)
I shall leave you to your preacious last word, have at it, I shall discreetly exit this senseless argument. You have yourself a good day.
Going north is an “advice” that new players can decide to take or ignore, and if they take it, they get to decide how they want to do it.
There’s nothing wrong with the game telling you to head in a direction where things are difficult for you. If you head there without proper preparation, you’ll get your ass handed to you and that will, hopefully, make you think about how to do it differently.
True, you might decide to take the words of an NPC as gospel and keep trying to go farther than you can without any preparation and get frustrated with the game because you didn’t want to stop and think, but that’s not really a problem with the game itself.
If you know the map well enough, you can make your way all the way up and be level 15 by the time you get there. (Hint: Avoid combat).
It’ll be cold as hell, but building even a sandstone shelter will give you the insulation you’ll need to survive.
Just don’t try to do it with the attitude that says: “I’m coming, so get out of my way”.
Gospel? Heh, this is the first NPC that speaks to you in one of the most cryptic games out there. Players can always do what they wish; this is of no import to the fact that the first sense of direction in this riddle of a game sends you to a zone where you should not be.
This is my position in the matter; go ahead and express yours and lets get this over with.
Certainly, if you have played long enough. New players have no way of expecting what you sugest, and if the fist NPC tells tou you should head north, gererally speaking, most folk would, ostensively, head north, which, I hope you agree, is not at all a good idea
