I have been playing face of mankind for a while now (About a year - ob+retail time) and i can tell you how this game functions. Even though there are some who may say im wrong, this is what ive gathered and I believe it to be correct.

Lets start by telling you a bit about the different factions from the player's perspective.

LED(Law Enforcement Department)- The LED are probibly the most common "noob" faction and the "poliece" of the game. I'll tell you one thing, starting in the LED will either really discourage you, or really help you. It all depends on if you leave the LED home base without knowing what to do or whats going on. Once you leave that home base (sometimes even when your in it) you will be constantly attacked by random factions (MotB mostly depending on their status, as well as BoS and EC). This is because Face of Mankind has an ever changing world, and also because the MotB love to own "noobs." The LED can use stun bullets or a tazer to arrest people - EASIER SAID THEN DONE. Tazering an enemy on drugs (drugs are used by pretty much everyone, including the LED but are sometimes refered to as "candy," and biph and poly e make it so your stamina almost never runs out) has to be one of the most challenging things ever. The zanny which you use your stun bullets in sucks too, so its fairly hard for a new player. I'd give you more details but we still have 7 factions to cover.

FDC(Freedom Defence Corps)- The FDC are pretty much the "military" and help the LED out, except (when i was an FDC, it was the best part) when civil wars between the two break out and the FDC own the LED. Guys if you're gona start in a faction START IN THIS ONE. FDC actually hold usefull training classes and teach you of the game (they call them 101 and 102). The 101 is the bookish class and the 102 is weapons and combat. Well anyways the FDC are pretty damn good when it comes to fighting compared to the LED. The FDC are known for zerging (amassing large ORGANIZED forces and overrunning the enemy) and are fairly well at it. The FDC are considered "matched" when it comes to strength when it comes to EC MotB and BoS (well the BoS sometimes get ALOT more users). The same thing might happen to you once you leave your home colony as the LED, but the FDC tend to get owned MUCH less then the LED.

VI(Vortex Inc.)- This faction is kinda so-so. The combatants it contained when i was in it were good but there were DEFINATELY not enough of them to combat huge forces (MotB, BoS, FDC and now EC). Vortex Inc gets a deduct on vortex tickets, but vortex tickets at most cost 100 uc and thats really nothing at all. Vortex is a semi mining/producing and combat faction. If you join Vortex, don't expect to get many missions....

CMG(Colinization and Mining Guild)- This faction is the SMALLEST faction. The people are really nice, but it consists of majority of traders. The CMG pretty much stay neutral on everything, and if you want to mine, the CMG is PERFECT, if you choose trader as your profession. At Rank 2 you get a nice deduct on mining cost, and an even bigger deduct at rank 3. Again dont expect to get many missions from this faction. I was in this faction for the faction-wide meeting, and all the members (about only 8 active) could have fit in one tiny apartment. Again the CMG is perfect if you want to just mine and make cash.

EC(EuroCore)- Ah the eurocore....what a strange faction. This faction maily consists of an organized set of troops (about 5-8 at a time) who farm missions. The EC used to be known as the hackers, but these rumors were mainly made just because 1 EC hacked a while ago, and now due to recent updates was unable to hack again. Alot of people talk behind the EC's back because the EC are lead by people who were low ranks in other factions, but had a better time in EC and stuck with it. If you want to make cash AND fight, EC is considered a great faction There aren't that many traders for EC and im not sure if they get any benefits. Like I said its a corporation faction and was supposed to be more of a producing faction but along the lines it just turned into another fighting group. The EC HC basicly take care of their members and train them. Get rich quick = EC.

BoS(Brotherhood of Savage)- The BoS are very unique and strange. In Face of Mankind they must abide by a certain code, which consists of not undercuting brothers (other BoS), and also the consequences to go with it (a harsh set of consequences actually....). A funny thing about the BoS is that they contain a certain group (these guys arnt friends and prolly dont know each other) who made their names vent de mistral, aura de mistral...ect. The BoS actually recognized the mistrals as a sort of "Elite" family and even have "mistral worlds" or places they took and basicly made mistralfyed. I havn't particularly been in the BoS for a long time, because this faction is SLOW. Unless the BoS are at war, you might go CRAZY because they dont want you to attack ANYONE. They dont even do as much missions as EC so I guess this could be your faction if you found something that I havnt...good luck with that one.

GoM(Guardians of Mankind)- The GoM, or in slang, Gombies are the peacefull people. If you like shooting and killing things, dont even look at this faction's icon in the "create avitar" screen. The gombies are sorta the RPing faction of the game and also refered to as the "tree-huggers" or "hippies" of FoM. These guys are PASSIVE. They have changed their ways a bit and i have never been in this faction (never wanted to). I fought against these guys though, when FDC was somehow at war with them... and they pretty much got pwnt by the zergs. If you want to RP I suggest this faction, if not, leave the gombies alone.

MotB(Mercanaries of the Blood - Forgive my spelling)- The MotB has to be the TOUGHEST faction for a "noob" to go into. The MotB like to sometimes "initiate" new players by....well killing them. This can be very discouraging. If you are new, or are known to suck at fighting, someone will pick a fight with you or ask you to duel just to loot your armor and send you to cloning. The MotB are sometimes real JERKS, but how can you blame them? If I was given factionship with no strict leaders I'd go ganking(killing in FoM) too, which I did. The LED are almost always after these guys, sometimes the FDC too. The mercs just recently got their cell system back, which made the game contrat-land again. The MotB accept contracts (bodyguard, assassination, ect) alone or as a cell. The leaders of this faction will ignor you and any complaints you have of say...a respected rank 4 (a person who the High Cmmand LIKE) ganked you, or even a verterin rank one. This faction is survival of the fittest (survival of the best aiming more like it) and its philosiphy is basicly "If we don't like them, **** them" This is 100% true for most of the MotB leaders. I can really write about this faction because ive been in it the most. I was more respected for my skills to hack security doors at DMC (when the cell system was gone), so that I got respect enough to not get pop shot (randomly shot and they just turn away....). The MotB is the most laid back and they mess around the most. I guess the corrupt leadership is alright if you actually get in good with them (they HATE ass-kissers, and if you say kissed up to one HC, the other HC would pwn you). I guess its all worth it when you're fighting alongside these guys. The mercs have the best "skilled" fighters and can pretty much dominate. Sometimes the farming is real heavy in this faction, sometimes missions dont even  go up because no one of "interest or respect" needs a mission. Again I suggest staying away from this faction unless you have a really good way will dealing with BS constantly as a "noob" or atleast untill you know how to fight and prove yourself.

Tips-

1. BUY SEED OF LIFE CLONE INSURANCE -10,000 uc for a week - unless you buy this, you will have a short life in this game because of all the ganking. If you decide to be a trader, you can just buy vitus clone insurance, which is alot less but only restores 20 hp every time you die.

2.BUY DRUGS ASAP - You need to buy biph or poly e right away, and only "clan" members (GoM, BoS and MotB) can produce them. If you are an LED or FDC buying drugs, you better do it in a LITTLE secrecy ATLEAST. The faction leaders of these two factions mentioned use drugs too, but it IS against their faction's code, so they gota do something if you flash it in their face. Remember that ql3 biph and poly e are about 100 uc each and are much better then ql1, and ql2 is ok i guess.

3.FIND A FRIEND - If you dont find one fast to "mentor" you, you're gona REALLY hate the game.

4.AVOID 1V1 - For "noobs" 1v1 has to be the worst scenario. You will get owned and your dead body will be pretty much danced on. Remember - the veterans only find pleasure in this game by REALLY pissing off "noobs," well atleast some of them.

5. AVOID MotB AND GANKER ALTS - The MotB and other factions have ganker alts, and as a "noob" you gota know that. They will trick you and lure you in any way possible, just get the hell out of this situation and find help. If no help, hide and log (takes 10 seconds) and when you log back in you will be in your apartment.

6.MISSIONS- Missions are pretty much the only way for combatants, commanders and medics to make money. Traders might want to do basic missions aswell. The lowest payout that missions currently have is 5k.

7.Shadows- Shadows in this game generate a HUGE lag for some computers. They're easy to turn off, just by unchecking the box in the game options tab.

8.Tutorial - Complete the tutorial before going out into the rest of the game. Unless you're completely ignorant, you'd do this anyways.

Ganking-

-Ganking, or killing without being attacked first  has a negative, penalty points. The more penalty points you generate, the more chance you'll get on the most wanted list.

-If you gank, the person you gank automaticly get a "murder card," and once a murder card is submited, your name is shown to the person you killed. Once a person has your name screenshot in the chat window, they can submit it to your faction's HC, where they can fine you credits and pp, and even demote you from your rank.

Rank & Missions-

-Your rank will increase from 1-3 automaticly judging on your exp. When you get 10,000 exp you reach rank two. When you get 50,000 exp you reach rank three.

-After rank three you have to have HC promote you to rank four and beyond (the top rank is rank seven, the leader of the faction, who is a game master).

-Rank fours and above are the only ones who can create "player generated missions" which again payout a minimum of 5k, depending on your faction's mission payout. If you do one mission in a campaign, when that campaign ends and is successfull (60% success), you get a low, medium, or high campaign bonus depending on the campaign's "priority." The campaign bonus payout is displayed where the mission payout is, in the faction setting tab. It dosn't matter if you do more then one mission for a campaign, you get the same bonus.

Well this should cover some basics on the game. This isnt everything but it should be enough to get you started. If you have no life you'll point out everything i misspell. Bye~

Originally posted by neuronomad
Sorry but what is a Verterin?

I aggree with what you said although I did not play FoM long due to dial up. Hell of a nightmare, thanks goodness I just got high speed.

But the game was fun when i wasnt disconnecting every 5 minuts. I played LED and enjoyed it for the 3 days I could bear the lag. Perhaps I will give it another try since my internet can run it now.

Originally posted by Snayke
2000UC clone insurance is fine for everyone.  Seed of Life takes too long for you to heal up and thats time wasted instead of fighting during times of war.

You havent played in a while. All forms of cloning take the same time. This means that the seed of life is just as fast.

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Originally posted by Snayke
:O

Still too expensive though. >_> Unless you die that much.

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it CAN be even cheaper then healing on the medical terminal [not taking medikits into account]

and dont underestaminate the bio energy it gives ;)

good post

By the way I made this post before the fly hack / aimbot event. Some new info: Appartly a new company is going to own the game, an American company. Hope it grows past what it used to be. MS 2 was released....but www.faceofmankind.com still is on 2006's updates. They dont like to update their website I guess...A shame.

Ojom pulled the plug so FoMs down for now. They're changing parts of the games and making factions races & attempting to improve upon other things. Hopefully the old aimbots won't be able to work in new FoM.

Long

EC treated me well too, but I wasn't in EC OB. However in retail, I feel it was the easiest faction for a combatant to get rich quick in, even if they were a new player.

I just download Face of Mankind and want to knowmore about it first, thank you in advance.

Originally posted by fluscent

I just download Face of Mankind and want to knowmore about it first, thank you in advance.

First of all, Its in redevelopment so you cant play atm, but it has a release date of 2008. If you read the dev diary it gives you info about some of the changes being made.