DDO Newbie Know-How:

Creating Your Character & Getting in the Game

by Corso

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Good day all! Your friendly neighborhood sorcerer is here to share some tips for that newbie in all of us. Stormreach is a daunting place into which only the most daring adventurers should travel. Are you up to the task? I'm here to make that entry a little easier on you and perhaps share a few tips that other folks (myself included) probably wish they would have known before setting off into the seedy depths of Xen'drik in Dungeons & Dragons Online: Stormreach (DDO).

Let's begin at the beginning with character creation. Much has been said on this already, so I'm not going to get too in depth. (For tons of great information, check out the Guides section of our site.) Some of the creation process is purely cosmetic, but before you pull together your character's look, you'll have to select his race and class.

Your first important choice is your character's race. I'm sure you'll notice that some of the race attributes make that race better suited for some classes than others, with humans being a sort of middle ground. You can make your decision based on statistical advantages, or work purely from a roleplaying perspective--either way, the choice is yours. Classes define your character even further, so it's important to figure out your playing style as you decide what you want to be when you grow up. Do you want to be a spell slinging elf, a healing human cleric, or a mighty halfling barbarian (hey, why not)?

 Next you will customize your character's look and give her a name. Have fun playing with the various customization options. DDO doesn't include any sort of name generator, so if you're stuck for names you can always try out some of the online name generators like the one at Squid.org.

After naming the character you can either enter the world with a pre selected set of stats and skills or choose your own. I don't think any true D&D fan would ever go the randomly generated route; customizing gives you the control to make that character your own. If you want a little more flexibility but you're too unsure about selecting stats on you own you could always try one of Ten Ton Hammer's custom builds. (These are also found in the Guides section or the left sidebar of the site.)

Choosing where to spend your ability points requires a little bit of forethought as to exactly what you want your character to be. Lets take a look at a human fighter: it's a very middle of the road and utilitarian race/class choice, but depending on how the character is customized two different people could create two very different fighters. Human fighters start off with 8 points in each ability across the board and 28 ability points to spend. The human fighter would begin with 29 hit points, 0 spell points, 1 Fortitude, -1 Reflex, and -1 Will. Now, if you wanted a very in-your-face fighter you might change those stats to 17 Strength, 8 Dexterity, 17 Constitution, 10 Intelligence, 8 Wisdom, and 8 Charisma. This would give you 33 Hit points, 0 spell points, 5 fortitude, -1 reflex, and -1 will, effectively creating a fighter more likely to take the brunt of an attack while still dealing good damage.

If you wanted to create a more well rounded fighter you could move those ability points to 16 Strength, 14 Dexterity, 14 Constitution, 12 Intelligence, 10 Wisdom, and 8 Charisma. That gives you 32 hit points, 0 spell points, 4 fortitude, 2 reflex, and you end up with a fighter who can stick and move while being able to deliver and receive damage.

Next you spend your points on skills. Once again, how you spend these points will determine the type of character you will be playing. Try to focus on your existing strengths. For instance, if a certain skill requires high Charisma to be most effective, you won't want to select it if your Charisma ability score is 8. Beyond that, choose skills based on how you want to play. Do you want to be sneaky? Intimidating? A good swimmer? Class skills (the ones your class has a natural affinity for) cost less, but why select them if they don't fit into your vision for your character?

Finally you need to pick the feats that best represent how you wish to play your character. As with skill points, choose the feat or feats that suit your character's purpose. You might choose to further enhance a strength, or buff up a weakness. Once you've made all these decisions, it's time to finalize your character and dive in!

Once through the Smugglers Rest tutorial you will arrive in Stormreach Harbor. This is where you will really begin to see the choices that you made take shape. Here you will also begin to see everything that DDO has to offer. Play through the early quests and get a feel for how your character works for you. If you think you've made some mistakes, you can always start over and adjust your character's abilities accordingly.

If you plan on taking up arms with comrades you may wish to go into you audio options now and turn on the voice chat capabilities. (The default setting for voice chat is OFF, so you'll need to activate it for each character you make.) This feature is great for quickly organizing parties. Even if you don't have access to a mic (or simply don't want to use one), you will be able to hear your party members and respond in text chat.

I've had pretty good luck finding groups, but I will mention that it seems much easier to open your social panel and join an already formed group doing the quests that you need than to just put your Looking for Group (LFG) flag up. If grouping isn't your thing…good luck! Turbine has done a very good job of preserving the feel of pen-and-paper Dungeons & Dragons (D&D) and I think that trying to solo through this game would be very much akin to sitting at your kitchen table playing D&D with your grandfather as the Dungeon Master (DM). Besides, this is a massively multiplayer game...some human interaction never hurt anyone.

I think that I've said all that I have to say about your very first choices in DDO. I hope this guide has helped some of you out there. Hope to see you all in game!

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