1. When you start playing, you're standing in a special place for new players. It's a good idea to type autoloot and autosac right away, so that you'll loot the corpses of your enemies and clean up after yourself by sacrificing their corpses. Go north to begin your journey. Read all the signs in the newbie school. Take it slow and pay attention. Follow directions. 

2. To get back to where you started, type recall and then up.

Here are some good commands to know as you familiarize yourself with your own character:

eq shows you the equipment you are wearing.
sc gives you some helpful information on your situation.
worth keeps track of your money and points.
att reminds you of just your statistics.
info tells you what spell groups you have.
skills tells you what skills you have now and in the future.
spells tells you what spells you have now and in the future.
prac tells you what skills/spells you're working on mastering.

3. Every time you level, you get one train and a few practices. Trains can be used to improve your statistics (strength, dexterity, intelligence, wisdom, and constitution) and practices can be used to improve your skills and spells. 

Having high wisdom gets you more practices when you gain a level. Having high constitution gets you more hit points when you gain a level. Having high intelligence gets you more mana when you gain a level. Having high dexterity gets you more moves when you gain a level. Having more strength gets you more... chicks? Anyway, we recommend you train wisdom as high as you can first, then train constitution, then intelligence, then dexterity, then strength. You can also find equipment that will boost your statistics. Read help attributes and help gear.

4. If you are fighting and you get hurt, sleep to heal yourself faster. A healer is a NPC who casts beneficial spells. If you sleep at the healer in Bree, you will heal faster, because certain rooms have faster regeneration rates. So if you're going to sleep to heal, recall, then go east, then go north, and sleep in the room with Strider. 

5. Your first set of equipment will come from the mobs in the newbie school. When you get an item from a mob that looks like clothes, type wear (object) and you'll put it on. To see your equipment type eq. You can also check in the donation bin (recall, e, n) to find helpful equipment for your level. Type look in bin to look in the bin, and take (object) bin to take something out. If the item is too high for you, you won't be able to get it out. Read about the items you're looking for here.

5. Until you are level 5, we recommend you stay in the newbie school to fight, and take the time to explore the city of Bree and get familiar with it. This will be helpful later! There is a map of Bree on the wall in the recall room, outside the prancing pony. 

6. After level five, you can no longer go in the newbie school to fight or to train your stats and practice your skills. You will need to find your guild in Bree for practicing, and find the Lyceum at the east end of Stonecrop Avenue for training. 

7. If you die, you are immediately reborn in the Common Room of the Prancing Pony. However, your corpse, with all your stuff still on it, is lying exactly where you died. You'll have to go and find it. Remember to buy a light (recall; ne; e; s; buy lamp; hold lamp) first so you can see where you're going! If you were killed by an aggressive mob and feel nervous about going back in the room, ask on the chat channel if someone can help you get your corpse back. When you see your corpse, type take all corpse and then wear all and you're back in business.

1. On this MUD, you can only wear items your level or below. You can hold items in your inventory up to two levels above you. Items over two levels higher will disappear if you log off.

2. Customization at character creation is not your last chance to add skills and spells to your repertoire. After you max your stats, you can use trains to gain new skills and spells. Go to your guild in New Thalos and type 'gain list' to see what's possible and how many trains it will take. You can also convert unused practices to trains for extra gaining. For this reason, lots of people wait if possible until their intelligence is maxed before they practice skills/spells so they get the most out of each practice. Hoard your practices. You'll like having them later.

3. If you see an exit like 'gate' and typing gate doesn't work when you want to use it, that's because you have to type go gate on this MUD. Most of the funky exits have a directional keyword also.

4. Ride the carriage that picks up passengers at recall! It'll take you all kinds of cool places. However, when you're a newbie, we recommend staying on the carriage except at New Thalos. 

5. If you're thinking ahead to joining a tribe, type tribe to see a list. You can type 'who vamps' (or any other tribe abbreviation) to see who's online from that tribe. You can also type 'who giant' or 'who cleric' to get a sense of the distribution of different races and classes. All the tribes on the mud are important and good for the people who join them. If vamps isn't the right tribe for you, we wish you well in the group you choose. 

6. Your alignment is important. If you're satanic and you're fighting an evil mob, you're not going to get very much XP. If you're angelic and fighting an evil mob, you'll get lots. There is much debate over which alignment is easier or better, but the indisputable fact is that fighting mobs of the opposite alignment is the way to go. If you want to switch alignments, fight mobs that are the same alignment and watch yours change before your eyes.

2. To get water: recall; e; e. Find a container you can fill with water and fill (container) at the fountain, or drink straight from the fountain.

3. Ask for help. Mirkwood is extremely newbie-friendly and if you type chat I am new and I have no money and I'm poisoned and I'm lost and I need help! you will probably get a swarm of aid so thick you can't see your own sword.

4. Don't worry. If you get to level ten (for example) and you realize you didn't add an important spell group, or you messed up your training and haven' t gotten all the practices you might have, or you've only just discovered what leveling gear is and you feel like you missed a lot at the beginning, you can start over. Lots of people start a character, play it for a while to get a feel for the MUD and learn its ticks and eccentricities, then delete the character and recreate under the same name once they know what they're doing. It'll probably take you 1/4 the time to get to level ten the second time that it did the first time.