As the next chapter of my adventures in Istaria begins, I find myself at a crossroads.

On the one hand, my Dragon, Kaeliss, has reached level 66 in adventure, 71 in crafting, and 31 in lairshaping. I am currently taking on monsters in the 70-75 range for my teachers and elders, making spells, armor, and cargo disks for younger Dragons, and every once in a blue moon I add a bit more to my Tier2 lair chamber.

I’m quite happy it seems at this current level as I’ve stopped actively looking for the next quest or the next set of trophies to advance. I think this is mostly due to my being a Dragon, and as a Dragon the only folks I can really help out are other Dragons - of which 90% in the guild are lower levels than I. Perhaps when a few more get closer to my level and I have others to do things with, I’ll be more enthusiastic about continuing my trek towards ‘Ancient’ status.

Which brings us to the other hand: Bipeds.

As a Dragon, you’re fairly limited in what you can do as far as assisting the bipeds of Istaria – yours is a completely different civilization with different ways and methods of doing, well, everything. The bipeds live in buildings, you live in a cave, they make and have need for 20-something different tools, you use your wits, they have dozens of various armors and weapons, and you have scales and claws… A Dragon’s interaction with bipeds essentially boils down to two things: Hauling stuff and combat…

Hauling stuff can be rewarding for a big project – being a giant winged quadruped has its advantages; Dragons can carry a lot and can bypass difficult terrain… Much like a cargo helicopter, it is often more efficient to simply fly construction materials to a remote location.

The combat side of the Dragon/Biped equation is a bit more delicate… A biped can really do anything given enough time and typically you’ll find them being tank, healer, buffer, crowd control, and DPS all rolled up into a bite-sized package. Dragons are really pigeon-holed into a sort of flying main battle tank – we’re tough as nails, never dodge anything, and have an absolutely devastating attack on a fairly long cool down. Our heals are weak, we don’t do crowd control, we can really gimp ourselves and pick up some ‘meh’ AOE damage – but in single target combat, we can push a single button and halve the thing we are fighting’s hit points, if not kill it outright.

This makes Dragons useful for boss fights and world events, but for day-to-day life, the average biped just doesn’t really need a Dragon for anything.

Which is par for the lore of the game; the Dragons, historically, just don’t have a lot of truck with the other Living Races and are about as ‘alien’ as a sentient race gets in Istaria.

So, as a Dragon, this has led me to be fairly interested in these little creatures I share the world with… I guess I’m sort of bi-ped-curious. (groan)

So, about a week ago I created my own little biped, a Sslik (lizardman sort of thingy) named Kiraz who has great aspirations of being a monk – but is currently busily building all sorts of useful biped architecture just outside of Kaeliss’ lair for the Dragon’s amusement.

What follows are the lessons I’ve learned in my short week of being a biped:

• Look at all of the classes available, but don’t get hung up on figuring out what you want to do – it’ll change within an hour or two of actually being in the game.
• Get a level or two as a healer to get a heal spell, then work on whatever class you want. This will shorten your down time.
• Keep a set of level 1 cloth armor in the bank at all times, and if possible make it speed teched. Every time you change classes, there’s a very good chance you won’t be able to wear everything you have on for a few levels and running faster always equates to faster leveling.
• Being a builder is great fun – level one building class at a time though. While you won’t be able to build a complete structure with just one of the several building classes, each class adds to your overall crafter level. So if you’re a level 24 fitter (metal worker), it’s the same as being a level 13 carpenter, fitter, mason, and weaver. This means that the work you do to get level 14 in fitter is applied as if you are 24th level, and it *really* slows things down. (This is one reason I plan to create a different biped, as I leveled everything to 10+ so I could build complete silos, and now it takes a huge amount of work to get a level past 15 in anything because my overall crafting level is nearing 30. It’s confusing; I will write more on this if anyone is curious.)
• Don’t sweat your skill point allocation: No matter what you do as a biped, you will have put your points in the wrong place. You wanted to be a monk, so you put points in strength, unarmed, and evasion just like that level 150 storm disciple suggested. But you’re now tired of bumming buffs and decide a few levels of Druid won’t hurt – and all of your points are instantly in the wrong place. Don’t worry; you can move points around over time.
• You may want to skip the tutorial island's adventure classes: When you show up, take a stroll past the three NPCs and just down the hill to see what level the pigs are. If they are all level three, go back and either do the crafting quests or just talk to Ryson Stormbringer (the guy in the middle) and tell him you’re ready to go to New Trismus.
  • I suggest this to save a lot of frustration… The first quest you will be given by the adventure class trainer, no matter which adventure class you choose, will be to kill those little pigs just down the road. In the dozen times I’ve attempted this quest, eleven times the pigs have been level 3… At level 1 with a couple skill points and a weapon someone found and gave to you, you simply can’t kill them. The pigs will hit you for a third to a half of your health, and you normally can’t hit them at all.
  • Once you get to New Trismus, the same basic crafting and combat quests are available (with level 1 pigs!), though without all the popup help – so just ask around for help, lots of people will be more than happy to explain the inner workings of Istaria. (This issue has been mentioned on the official forums a few times and I’m fairly certain it is being looked at. I’ll amend this in the future as soon as it is fixed.)
• Bind in New Trismus... Do it! It'll really save you time if you don't recall back to the starter island and have to run around to get back to New Trismus.

The rest of these are general knowledge that applies to both Dragons and bipeds:

• Ask for help: No, really, ask for help. Istaria is not easy-mode and there is no manual; as a biped you can play any class – often simultaneously, there is no hand holding, no quest helper arrow telling you where to go, no 100% accurate indication that an NPC has a quest for you, no welfare epics, no workable power leveling, and right now a lot of what you’ll find on the internet is wrong due to sweeping changes being deployed in the game. So, if you don’t ask for help, you’ll wind up standing around in New Trismus. A lot. Bored.
  • A corollary to the above: Install the map mod. It’s under mods in the official forums.
    • A corollary to the above corollary: Do not trust the map mod, it wants to kill you. Consult it prior to heading out on your adventure, but do not expect it to tell you about the level 100+ Kwellian demon on the road you decided to take.
• Some of the crystals that the Withered Aegis drop can be consumed for adventure / crafter experience and short term buffs. (Right click the crystal, ‘use’) Be sure you examine each though as it might be more useful intact and placed in a weapon, tool, armor, or jewelry.
• Some bags can be placed inside of other bags. It may not look like it right now, but soon you’ll really want to organize your inventory (tools, weapons, collectables, etc). Bags can also be titled to make identification easier.

That’s about it for this post. Overall I’m having a great deal of fun with the biped side of the game as there is a lot more that they can do compared to a Dragon, but the choices and complexity can be overwhelming. They are both excellent experiences though, just different. :)

I'll post more from the point of view of my next biped, which will be more adventure over crafting.

 I'd just like to say that your journal-esque posts in this forum are what made me decide to give Istaria a try, and boy, I'm glad I did!

Thanks so much for such a great introduction! I look forward to reading more, and of course, meeting up with ya in game!

Originally posted by Riceman

 I'd just like to say that your journal-esque posts in this forum are what made me decide to give Istaria a try, and boy, I'm glad I did!

Thanks so much for such a great introduction! I look forward to reading more, and of course, meeting up with ya in game!

Well then, hopefully I'm not the fist to say "Welcome to Istaria!"

I'm glad my posts here were useful in some way - I enjoy writing and if I can do some little bit to promote Istaria, all the better. :)

If you happen to be on the 'Chaos' server, you can find me on most evenings (mountain time) as Kaeliss. Alternately you can just stop anyone with an "Eyes of Istaria" guild tag if you have any questions or need help - of late several of us seem to be in one or more resource fields near New Trismus every evening.

 I've noticed a lot of Eyes of Istaria folks running around New Trismus, and Aamer has been a kind of unofficial mentor to me since my first day.

I remember seeing "Kaeliss" in the New Player Assistance player list a few times. I go by Junjie; I'll say hi when I'm next in game.

I, too, am Bi-Ped curious. At first, bi-peds confused the heck out of me... I was much more used to the simple and direct ways of Dragons. I had to laugh aloud at your comment about always putting training points in the wrong place. That sounds so like me! I currently have two bi-peds sitting at level 20... but I'm reluctant to move them forward until the new T2 content comes out. I really want to experience that part of the game with an on-level character.

I'm also very curious about bi-ped building and crafting. IMHO, a bi-ped plot seems far more flexible than a lair. Seems like so much more you can do with it in the terms of decorating and style, which appeals to me greatly. I mean, you can't just flop a Christmas tree or a jack-o-lantern up in a lair. *sigh*

Oh -- about that first quest on the starter island. There's a fix coming for it with the next big patch. It's a known frustration, has been confirmed by devs and will be changed. :)

And hello to you, Junjie! Welcome to Istaria! 

 Regardless of all the linearity of dragons, I still know for a fact that I'll have a dragon alt. =P