Never played, where should I start?

[Darkshadow74]

Hi, I have never played, I wanted to back along time ago. Now I am able to, what should I know, what should I do? Any help would be great!!!

[DougGraves]

The character creation walks you through choosing a character.  For a starting character try Sentinel if you like ranged attacks and Scrapper if you like melee attacks.  They are both fairly simple to play for new characters.

 

Go through a tutorial after you make your character to learn the basics.

 

You will get a contact when you  enter that gives you some simple missions to get started.

 

At level 5 you get introduced to a contact named Twinshot that acts like another tutorial introducing you to other aspects of the game.

 

Welcome

[Skyhawke]

Welcome to the City!

 

This thread has a lot of good info for beginners and should give you quite a few tips to start out with.

 

[Techwright]

First off, WELCOME!

 

The game does a reasonably good job of walking you through startup.   Obviously, you'll need to pick a character with all the details that includes.  In my opinion, that suggests two ways to play it:

1. Make a rushed character, get into the game and begin learning by experience (failure is not truly failure if you're learning from the experience).  If you like the character, keep it, and visit the ICON store to improve the character's costume. (You'll need INF or vouchers to pay for the changes)  You can even rename the character at the loading screen.  If you don't like the character, set it aside and start a new character.  This is what I did way back in 2004-05 when I started in the game.  The experience with a few "failed" characters paid off later in successful characters.

2. Make as best a character as possible before getting into the action.  Many players spend a lot of time choosing the right components for the character, especially in the costume designer.  It's quite robust and one of the selling points of the game.  At any part of the character design, you can go back to previous screens and change your decisions, so feel free to experiment.   NOTE: on one screen you'll be given two buttons to select which of the three sides of the game you start in:  One button for blue/red (hero/villain) another for gold side (Going Rogue, aka Praetoria).  I highly recommend newbies stay away from Going Rogue until they're very comfortable in the game.  Going Rogue can be run by new players, but there are elements of it that could be confusing and isolating for an untrained player.  Don't worry, you can visit it later, or create new characters once you're skilled.

 

Next you'll be given the option of going through tutorial zones or skip them and jump right into the fray.  For first time players I recommend the tutorial zones.  Galaxy City tutorial zone gets you into the experience quickly, while still providing plenty of opportunity to learn and even chances to improve the character at a trainer.  It also allows you within the zone event to choose your alignment (blue/hero, vigilante, red/villain, rogue).  (Don't worry, you can later change your alignment fairly easily in the zone called Pocket D.) You move past the trainer to enter the endgame of the zone (click on the destruction behind him to change screens) where you face your first "big bad".  I definitely recommend this zone for newcomers.  Regardless of the starting zone, seek out the P2W vendor.

 

P2W vendors have a wealth of both free and purchasable items.  I strongly recommend taking the time to go through and claim every free item from their list.  P2W vendors have both free weapons and free starter enhancements for your character, among other goodies.  Enhancements are like the armor with stats in other games.  We use these instead of armor, freeing up our avatar forms for costumes.  Note that some enhancements (not those at P2W vendors) are specific to your character's origin, so keep that in mind when trying to use enhancements that are rewards that drop into the tray.  Not all can be used.  Most can be sold to vendors for INF, though.  Note that some of the P2W vendor weapons have bonuses based on your character's origin, so choose carefully.  I definitely recommend accessing the P2W vendor next to the trainer in the Galaxy City tutorial.  Getting those weapons and inserting those free enhancements will aid you with the "big bad" and it's minions, though they're not critical.  By the way, once you acquire the weapons, click on "Powers" in your tray to get the full list and drag the weapons from the right-hand column down to open slots on your tray so that you can use them.

 

When you finally enter Atlas Park (blue side) or Mercy Island (red side), the first zones each side that are not tutorials, you'll be offered a chance to flag yourself as a new player, one needing help.  I highly recommend doing so.  Our community is by and large very friendly and many will want to aid you in your understanding of the game.  Some have a habit of gifting you generous amounts of INF.

 

INF is the primary currency in the game.  While it has a different name in each of the three sides of the game (red, blue, gold), each name begins "INF": influence, infamy, information.   Use INF to trade with various vendor types, with other players, or with the auction houses (AH for short) that appear in game: Wentworths for blue side, Black Market for red side, and I forget the name for gold side, but you get the idea.

 

In Atlas Park, you'll start down the steps from Ms Liberty the first trainer in the non-tutorial parts of the game.  You'll usually see a crowd around her.  To her left and right, by the edges of the fountains, are vendors selling Dual Origin (aka "DO", can be used by two origins, weaker) and Single Origin (aka "SO") enhancements.  Behind Ms Liberty is the statue of Atlas, and to his left, next to the fountain is a P2W vendor.  Should you wish a faster rise in the ranks, visit her and look under "Boosts".  In exchange for a loss of collecting INF you can bolster your experience gains (XP).  I recommend caution with this starting out as you'll need to make money to buy enhancements every few levels. 

 

You'll see in chat several abbreviations used in Atlas Park for recruiting.  If you see "DFB", this is "Death From Below" an instanced dungeon, if you will, where a team of new characters work their way together, earning fast experience gains including a bonus at the end of the instance.  If you wish to join a team, just click on the recruiter's name and ask to team.  They'll send you an invite if the team hasn't filled up.  You may run DFB as often as you can get on a team, but the XP earned is diminishing with each level.  Another abbreviation is "DIB" which confuses players at time due to its similarity.  This is "Drowning In Blood" another teamed instance, but you'll need several levels earned before you can run it with them.   Of course, there's other ways to earn XP: street fighting, and taking missions from contacts.  Matthew Habashy is usually the first of these, and he's not many paces past the P2W vendor.  Matthew's story overlaps with the Galaxy City tutorial zone story, making it the perfect next step. 

 

Never fear to ask questions.  Best to ask in the Help chat, General chat, or Broadcast chat, though.  Some of the other chats, like Looking for Group chat are considered exclusive to their task. 

 

I wish you all the best in the game!

[Oubliette_Red]

Welcome to CoH!

 

Long before you get into the tutorial (which I think everyone new to CoH should run through at least once just to get a feel for how the controls work and how your character's play) there is the character creator. Depending on what you have in mind and how much you want to work towards the 'perfect look' you could easily spend 2 hours just creating your character's look and the colours of your chosen powersets. You can actually do this while the game is still installing. While you are in the CC (character/costume creator) the tutorials will be installed, and after that the game itself is installed. If you want an idea of how varied the costumes can get, head down to Post your best costume here to see what others have created. One of the things I love about CoH is that unlike other MMO's, your costume has zero impact on your character's abilities. Your powers are enhanced directly with your 'gear' in the form of, wait for it... enhancements.

 

@DougGraves gave pretty good suggestions on character archetypes to start with depending on if you want to play melee or ranged and @Techwright gave a pretty comprehensive list of things to be aware of.

 

I just like to add, once you get in the game proper don't be afraid to ask questions. Oh and another thing, you can play on 1 server or all the servers and your limit on characters is basically your own imagination. While Excelsior is the highest pop server that also comes with it's own drawbacks. Heck, make a character on every server and check out the community on all of them to find one to your liking.

 

Once again, welcome!

 

 

[Snarky]

Yomo will give you start up cash.  Look for his thread

[biostem]

4 hours ago, Darkshadow74 said:

Hi, I have never played, I wanted to back along time ago. Now I am able to, what should I know, what should I do? Any help would be great!!!

Welcome aboard!  I would suggest telling us about the kind of character you want to play;  Mainly, do you want to use a particular element?  A weapon?  Ranged or melee?  Any special considerations?

[palateswap]

My main piece of advice is make use of the costume saver in character creation in case youre like me and recreate a dozen times to get everything just right.

[Greycat]

8 minutes ago, palateswap said:

My main piece of advice is make use of the costume saver in character creation in case youre like me and recreate a dozen times to get everything just right.

 

... also until level 10, your costume changes are free. Take advantage.

[DougGraves]

1 hour ago, Greycat said:

... also until level 10, your costume changes are free. Take advantage.

 

I am curious how long it takes a new player to get to level 10.

 

I recall it taking days of play to get to level 10 when I started. 

[DukeGude]

9 minutes ago, DougGraves said:

 

I am curious how long it takes a new player to get to level 10.

 

I recall it taking days of play to get to level 10 when I started. 

By the time OP visits this page again, they should be well into their 20s after a few DFB and posi runs! That's the way cookie crumbles with exp buffs nowadays. Still the level 10 costume deals are appreciated - you can really see how your outfits looks in different light settings in the early mission runs.

[Greycat]

39 minutes ago, DougGraves said:

 

I am curious how long it takes a new player to get to level 10.

 

I recall it taking days of play to get to level 10 when I started. 

 

If they're running DFBs? Probably under an hour. Especially on the servers with the temporary XP boost... which, honestly, I think is probably a disservice to new players, but at least they make some INF on those, versus using the 2xp booster.

[Grouchybeast]

7 hours ago, Darkshadow74 said:

Hi, I have never played, I wanted to back along time ago. Now I am able to, what should I know, what should I do? Any help would be great!!!

 

My main advice would be not to stress about things.  CoH encourages making multiple characters and levelling is pretty easy even without the current double XP on some shards.  Take your time to poke around in character creation.  Try whatever characters seem appealing to you, and don't be afraid to reroll or shelve a character and try something else.  And feel free to ask for help in-game, or let people know you're a newbie if you're having trouble with something.  Welcome to the game!

[biostem]

5 hours ago, DougGraves said:

I am curious how long it takes a new player to get to level 10.

Without the double XP buff and just doing some street-sweeping around AP, you can get to 6-7 in about an hour. After reaching 6 or so, one can wander around in AP and do a bit more - picking groups carefully, you can then probably get to 10 via another hour or so.  If you want a safer option, going to SC can probably achieve the same result, give or take another 30 mins - 1 hr.  It may be quicker to do the early story arcs, but there is also a lot of travel between instances which may take more time, (though the mini-arc and mission completion XP may more than make up for that added downtime). 

[Clave Dark 5]

Jump into the game, get on a team, ask questions of any and all sorts.  Don't be afraid to die sometimes, it'll probably happen fairly often until you learn some things like "always stick to the center of the streets".  Chat has a "HELP" channel, you can ask questions there too.  Might not be bad to hang out a bit and just watch the Help channel scroll by to pick up tips there.  Be sure and use these forums a lot!

[MoonSheep]

8 hours ago, Greycat said:

 

If they're running DFBs? Probably under an hour. Especially on the servers with the temporary XP boost... which, honestly, I think is probably a disservice to new players, but at least they make some INF on those, versus using the 2xp booster.

 

100%
 

people recommending newbies join DFBs/DiBs is a really poor thing to do, “welcome to the game, here’s how to make sure you experience none of it and learn very little”