What Helped The Most When You Were A New Player?

[KyleBooze 451]

I first tried Wurm in 2007 but did not keep playing it. It confused me bigtime. I tried Wurm again in 2008 and using the Wiki in a second window I began to figure things out. I did join a village (won't name it) and was used pretty much as Labor and was kept in the dark about a lot of things. I asked a lot of questions of my Village Mates and many of the Villagers answered of course... like when I began to do BlackSmithing for first time I asked how to do it, I asked our village BS, She told me to transfer the item I was Imping into my inventory to Imp it after it got to "Glowing"... and I found BSing frustrating because the item kept cooling off. She then told me "You won't make a good BS, just help me and keep the Peat coming and I will do the BSing for you". Later I learned she had been lying to me as I opened her Forge once when I was fueling it and noticed she was keeping the items in the Forge as She imped them. Later I tired BSing and keeping the item in the forge to maintain it's heat and saw the great advantage in doing so... and realized why She had lied to me. There was other things other vet Players chose not to explain to us newer Players as they deemed it advantageous to themselves to keep us ignorant as it benefited them in some manner.

[Marlon 303]

This seems like a good time for me to say some things about the Wurm Wiki and it's current situation. This post is not an attempt to derail or troll, until now I saw no other thread involving the Wiki to make my comments.

 

I first tried Wurm in 2007 but did not keep playing it. It confused me bigtime. I tried Wurm again in 2008 and using the Wiki in a second window I began to figure things out. I did join a village (won't name it) and was used pretty much as Labor and was kept in the dark about a lot of things. I asked a lot of questions of my Village Mates and many of the Villagers answered of course... like when I began to do BlackSmithing for first time I asked how to do it, I asked our village BS, She told me to transfer the item I was Imping into my inventory to Imp it after it got to "Glowing"... and I found BSing frustrating because the item kept cooling off. She then told me "You won't make a good BS, just help me and keep the Peat coming and I will do the BSing for you". Later I learned she had been lying to me as I opened her Forge once when I was fueling it and noticed she was keeping the items in the Forge as She imped them. Later I tired BSing and keeping the item in the forge to maintain it's heat and saw the great advantage in doing so... and realized why She had lied to me. There was other things other vet Players chose not to explain to us newer Players as they deemed it advantageous to themselves to keep us ignorant as it benefited them in some manner.

 

That right there taught me never truly trust anyone in this game, no matter how friendly they appeared to be, as there will always be too many reasons other Players might lie, cheat, steal, just to gain an advantage over others, and too few reasons why they should do the right and honorable thing. Players are afraid they will lose an advantage, will lose out to others.

 

So in regards to the OP and the Poll, I can say If not for the Wiki I would have been lost in this game and once I figured out that knowledge is power around here I asked less questions and just looked it up in the Wiki. I stayed playing Wurm because of the Wiki's existance. The Wiki is not always right, but at least it was, until recently, PLAYER maintained and updated, and thus less likely for errors, once written in the Wiki, to stay there as many could see it and had permissions to fix the errors.

 

Now the Wiki is In My Opinion "Staff" updated and controlled, and since I have good reason not trust others in general in this game, the less People that control the Wiki, the more I foresee it and expect it to get filled with information that isn't complete or accurate, that benefits a few at the expense of new Players especially that don't know Wurm like us old Players do. Any time a few control the Knowledge and Information it will be handled in the wrong way, and it will be here as well eventually. History teaches that lesson over and over again.

 

I am NOT in favor of a few People having access to make changes in Wurm's Wiki. IMO we need to return to the Wiki being maintained by the Community as a whole.

 

And of course the Few will tell us not to fear, that they will safeguard the knowledge for us, and that it will be complete.... but with all due respect.... that has always been said before with "safeguarded" knowledge.

 

I am also sorry that you had to go through such a village. But you learnt, your eyes opened up, and you realised that real people play it, so real life things happen.

I have no reason to withhold info, in fact, one friend I convinced to play, started years after me, and he ended up being a much more skilled char... lol

 

As for your very cynical, but understandable, stance on the wiki, I have to disagree. The WHOLE POINT (in caps!) of a wiki is that anyone can edit it. 

Yes, a small price is paid for inaccurate data - But this soon found,spotted, and corrected by others.

A small price is paid for incorrect data - But this is found sooner or later, and reported, corrected.

 

What you get is - WAY MORE articles than would have existed, because staff can not do it alone. Wikipedia would have had 500 articles if only staff added things, instead, engineers, lawyers, fans, enthuasists are all adding info, and later, this is verified by millions of readers who doubt it, check it, report it, verify it... 

 

If the wiki was never opened, I promise you, it would have been bland, empty and extremely out of date.

 

Lastly, nothing stop you, from becoming an editor, and helping too; nothing stops you from having a look at the many nice people who add new articles all the time, which would not have been possible in your strictly controlled "information by a select few" policy

 

Please rethink that. It applies to all information, not just wurm. It even applies to news headlines. 

[sulfurblade 111]

So I wanted to Choose CA Help and a Village mate but I had to choose only 1 so it was the village mate....  But Paradox on Affliction was a great CA for a long time and he was always around to help when there were no village or ally's online!  So Props to Paradox.....

 

As for Wiki:

 

I am very annoyed that we cannot update the data on Wiki as its often times wrong!  As a veteran player I have made attempts to become one of the elite few to be able to update wiki and I have been either ignored without ever recieving a reply or straight up denied...  So while Wiki can be helpful to new players its often times out of date or missing info and yet there are people who would happily update the wiki if they could....

Edited August 28, 2015 by sulfurblade

[geode 292]

That really sucks you had to go through a village like that...

Most of my wurm knowledge came from the wiki as well as the few players I was around (and kchat of course) when I started. At no point was information safeguarded to prevent me from learning too much and gaining an "advantage". We had freedom to do what we wanted so I tried lots of things which meant looking at the wiki every time I wanted to make something (which I still do).

 

If you are the same Kylebooze (same Player) that played on the old original JKH server (before Indy), then you "lived" right by that village at one point. I won't name it, for the actions of one Player does not define a whole Village.... but now you know for your own benefit.

 

I am also sorry that you had to go through such a village. But you learnt, your eyes opened up, and you realised that real people play it, so real life things happen.

I have no reason to withhold info, in fact, one friend I convinced to play, started years after me, and he ended up being a much more skilled char... lol

 

As for your very cynical, but understandable, stance on the wiki, I have to disagree. The WHOLE POINT (in caps!) of a wiki is that anyone can edit it. 

Yes, a small price is paid for inaccurate data - But this soon found,spotted, and corrected by others.

A small price is paid for incorrect data - But this is found sooner or later, and reported, corrected.

 

What you get is - WAY MORE articles than would have existed, because staff can not do it alone. Wikipedia would have had 500 articles if only staff added things, instead, engineers, lawyers, fans, enthuasists are all adding info, and later, this is verified by millions of readers who doubt it, check it, report it, verify it... 

 

If the wiki was never opened, I promise you, it would have been bland, empty and extremely out of date.

 

Lastly, nothing stop you, from becoming an editor, and helping too; nothing stops you from having a look at the many nice people who add new articles all the time, which would not have been possible in your strictly controlled "information by a select few" policy

 

Please rethink that. It applies to all information, not just wurm. It even applies to news headlines. 

 

I do agree that the community is better at maintaining the Wiki than to have just a few do it.... but I do have trouble with language sometimes, so I may have miscommunicated my thoughts when I made my post. That is also why I will never request to edit the Wiki, my problems with language... what makes sense in my brain does not always make sense to others. There is a real life reason for this I will not get into here. I am the last person that should be involved with a Wiki, not because I don't care, but because others would always have to be checking everything I wrote and often times rewriting it.

 

 

Sorry for getting off topic...

Edited August 29, 2015 by geode

[Malena 2,854]

Being a lone wolf kind of player, Wurmpedia and CA Help channel became my best friends. Thanks again to everyone who takes care of those!

[Karthannar 130]

The wiki was always up on my second screen. The folks in CA were as helpful as ever.

Other than that, trial and error! I enjoy a good survival challenge.

(It took me nearly a week to realize you activate > burn logs rather than just putting them in the campfire )

[Knightstar 49]

People I knew outside the game who played helped a lot never had to worry about some random troll if I asked a question lol

[Killroth 352]

Wouldnt have made it without the old tutorial. the one that actually made u do stuff. Wouldnt have known how to interface with the world (like most people who leave tutorial)

 

after that wiki for sure.

 

 

 

started about 4 years ago

Edited September 1, 2015 by Killroth

[Tipper 260]

Wurm taught me a long-lasting lesson about patience, and getting that internalized helped a lot

 

Also full-screen windowed mode and alt-tab

[kolgrim 3]

Had an unprem'd character before Epic existed but he's long gone now. First real premium long term character was a little over two years ago on Serenity, Epic.

 

Eldurian (not to be confused with Eldarian), recruited me within an hour of logging in on the new character. He invited me to my first real village with multiple helpful and friendly people constantly active. Yes the wiki and help files helped a lot, but I couldn't have lasted this long without Eldurian, Knightwolf, Eyesgood, Revan, and Mostlystarving's help. They gave me experiences and memories that I'll never forget. 

[HexD 214]

Wurm documentation has always been terrible for the entire 10 years that I've played. More players would have stuck around if the games mechanics weren't such a mystery. With that said the only things that helped me in times of need were other players who already learned the secrets of whatever it was I wanted to know about or actually hopping on test and figuring it out myself. Most of the information freely available is false, inaccurate or very vague depending on the nature of the subject. If this thread is intended for research into how to get new players to stick around, then the only thing you need to do is provide the relevant information about game mechanics and not leave it up to the community and then let new players know where the information is. Wiki is ok for just checking how many much skill is needed to analyse 4 tiles or whatever but utterly useless when it comes to important stuff that gives an advantage over others.

[Ascorbic 265]

Elwood and Warrior.  They kept me interested with their tips and assistance.

[Zenity 728]

I started just over 4 years ago on Independence, to be exact 1549 days ago, when we were stiff green puppets standing on horses like circus performers.

 

Well, I wasn't standing on horseback of course, but I digress.

 

I went through the Tutorial of course, back then it was mandatory, and not too bad really, I learned enough of the basics to survive at least a few hours.

 

I picked up a lot through chat and watching CA.

 

But most of what I learned was through players who became friends when I stumbled, unfittingly and unintended into the area, and set up a small noob shack and enclosure.

 

I don't think there is any one particular thing I can point to really, the basic skill tutorial gave me the ability to survive, but not everything was covered, I had much to learn, and still do.

 

CA is invaluable, so many of my questions were answered before I even knew they needed answering, by those selfless and dedicated players who learned everything they knew from experience and wiki.

 

The wider community in server and kingdom chat are also a helpful bunch, usually, tho asking questions there sometimes leads to mild trolling, such is the fun and games of the community, not that I'd have it any other way, it's what makes the game in so many ways.

 

Wiki is invaluable, though it may be inaccurate for some details, it's broadly accurate enough to answer questions, if you know where to look.

 

Wurm is probably too complex to have a single solution to help ease players into the game, not just the complexity of Wurm itself, but the different reasons and playstyles of the people who play it too, from the hermit in the woods types, who want to, or have to, do everything themselves, and get uneasy at names in local, (me), to the gregarious and social types who need villagers and friends around to give meaning to their gameplay, the stomp your head in the mud and fill you with arrows pvp types, and the carebears in their dirtwalled fortresses on Epic and Chaos.

[Timoca 154]

I tried the game before when there was no tutorial, had no idea what to do, didn't know that everything you wanted to do required a right mouse click

Then  later they added that first tutorial zone which at least explained me the basics of the game so I could go on and find out the rest by myself/wiki.