ToME: the Tales of Maj'Eyal

I was wondering if it was necessary or even recommended for a character to complete all the starter dungeons with every character for the exp and items. I tend to do all of them before moving into the next series of dungeons but I find that it's so tedious to do them when I lose a character early on (which is often; most of my characters get to level 10-15 before dying).

So, what do most people do?

Its more for the items than the xp.

Everything, for xp and artifacts

Don't forget the possibility of escorts!

Escort in tier1 always happen in the first 2 or 3 zones

jenx wrote:Everything, for xp and artifacts

This. And not just artifacts -- at that point of the game, even a single ego item could improve your situation, and some of the double ego items are very good.

I clear every monster on every floor of every dungeon, except the Sandworm Lair. There, I may sometimes stick around a little bit longer if I want to look for more chests, but the tedium of waiting for the tunnelers usually prevents a full exploration.

I clear out everything, mostly because it takes 20 extra minutes on just killing the tier 1 bosses, for the most part.

Having said that, it's pretty viable to skip out and just kill the bosses once you start getting the skip option. There's not really much penalty for it.

I don't bother, since I can generally survive the tier 2 dungeons after the first couple of t1 dungeons. On a slow-leveling race, such as dwarves or elves, I might do several, but I usually stick with two. I'll be sure to polish off the bosses before heading East, though; don't want to miss the backup guardians.

A: if you're dying at lvl 10-15, then you night need the help. Alternately, jumping into the deep end of the pool might let you more quickly build up some better habits that would help you survive. You'll die faster, but might learn more.

B: If you're playing a character with the plan of getting that character as far as you can, you should absolutely do all of the early dungeons, for the guaranteed artifacts, if nothing else (though the extra EXP is usually more helpful than harmful, too).

C: If you're planning on going antimagic, it's even more of a good idea, as the spellhunt remnants are awesome throughout the game, but only available as a low-level artifact (ie, if you haven't gotten it by the time you run out of starter dungeons, the chance of getting it is slim indeed).

D: General advice: don't be afraid to use money. Searching through the shops for a particularly potent regen infusion and/or higher tier weapon can do wonders for your overall early game survivability.

E: Try going with the races/classes that have their own starter dungeons. I'll assume that you don't have access to Celestials, undead, Temporals, or Yeeks, but you ought to have archmages and dwarves. Adding on new starter dungeons both lets you switch things up a bit and gives you more early artifacts before things get rough. (Admittedly, "before things get rough" does not necessarily apply to the yeeks quite as much, even if they have nerfed the electric eels.)

My own recommendation is to do whatever you enjoy. Tedium isn't really worth it and will kill your interest in this game if you force yourself to do things you don't enjoy.

For example, I generally don't full-clear all starter dungeons--when it starts skipping to the last floor, I just do that and then leave. You'll probably get like 80-90% of the really worthwhile goodies that way. I'd probably wind up quitting playing the game if I full-cleared every single starter dungeon every single time.

And if even that's too tedious for you, then just skip that. You might still want to clear out the bosses after Dreadfall since new ones pop up later on, but that's considerably further than you've gotten so far.

Actually one of the most astonishing things about this game is that for every class, there is someone who finds it incredibly hard, and someone else who finds it natural and easy to play. So, as far as character classes go, find the one(s) that fit you.

greycat wrote:Actually one of the most astonishing things about this game is that for every class, there is someone who finds it incredibly hard, and someone else who finds it natural and easy to play. So, as far as character classes go, find the one(s) that fit you.

I'll attest for this. I don't 'get' archmages yet, for example.

Yeah it's so very true
(Although I do get archmages, I dont get mayn others ;> but then I designed archmages as my own class anyway )

What would be awesome would be when you skip the first levels of a starter dungeon, that once you kill the boss you get the loot and xp of the first levels you skipped.

Then I could actually skip them.

There is little time needed to clear the starters, and you have the chance at good gear and experience. Why not do it? It's maybe 2 hours total of the ~ 40 hours it takes to reach the endgame.