Lair of the Wolf Dragon

I’m new to Wurm Online…what do I do?

Today PC Gamer wrote an article about Wurm Online officially launching next week, and then Notch and a whole ton of other people retweeted it. So us current players saw a large influx of new players who are very confused as to what’s going on. And their numbers will only increase as the launch gets closer

Now I know that there are better information sources out there (such as the Wurm wiki), but on the off chance that Google picks this post up, I thought it couldn’t hurt to have more info out there.

So onto the common questions I’ve seen:

So seriously, what do I do?

Wurm Online is a sandbox game. What that means is the game does not give you a goal to work towards. There are no quests and no end game. You are the one who gets to choose what you do. Whether it’s hunting, building ships, starting a merchantile empire, smithing tools, or digging up the landside.

There are some great tips on how to get started on the wiki.

How do I teleport/get to another server?

Once out of the tutorial, you can switch between the Freedom servers and the Epic servers via an epic portal. There’s usually one near the spawn town of a server.

If you’re trying to go from one Freedom server to another (say Independence to Celebration), you’ll need to build a boat, which is one of the hardest things to build in the game. It will most likely take you many days to build one. You also may be able to pay for passage if you have in-game currency.

Either way, it can be a difficult thing to do. Which is why you should be careful on what server you teleport to after you finish the tutorial.

How do I get/eat food?

For your first 24 hours of game play, there’s an NPC in or near the spawn towns that will feed you for free. After those 24 hours, you’re on your own though. Don’t worry though, you will never die from lack of food or water. It will just make doing anything take a really long time (because your stamina bar will take forever to recover).

Your best bet in the beginning is to make a fishing pole (after getting some string or cotton from a kind player), and catching some fish. You can then cook them in a casserole with some items you foraged/botanized from grass tiles. (There are other recipes you can cook depending on what you have available.)

To eat some food, just right-click it to bring up the menu and then select Eat.

How do I open the map?

There is no in-game map. However there are player-made maps. Using your compass and the deeds you enter, you can figure out where you are and how to get somewhere. Highways, the roads marked on the maps, are generally two or more tiles wide and made of cobblestone, or one tile wide of cobblestone bordered by sand or gravel on both sides. If you lose your compass, the top of any settlement token shows the cardinal directions.

Just think of it as a world without GPS capabilities, and a chance to exercise your navigation skills. 😉

So where can I start out?

The general advise for newbies is to find a village to join. They’ll have food, materials, housing, and possibly even tools so you don’t have to make all your own. They’ll also help you learn how to play. Having said that, there’s also nothing wrong with setting off on your own if that’s what you like. It’ll be harder but definitely not impossible. It’s what I did after all. If you’re playing with your friends, it’s also a lot easier for a group of people to live on their own in the wilderness.

On the Independence server, there is also the Inner City Orphanage, which is not a village you have to join but more of a safe area where new players can learn. If you’re looking to start in a more secluded area but are afraid of dying and respawning back in the center of the map, you can head up to my village Ravenstone (at 48x, 13y in the northeast corner of Independence). I’m happy to provide things such as crops to plant, cotton, pelts, and other basic materials needed to start out. I can also invite you to my village so you won’t have to spawn back at Freedom Market if you don’t want to.

There are so many houses and deeds everywhere, there’s no place for me to build!

The area around the spawn town on each server gets populated quickly and stays that way because some folks don’t like straying far from it. To find more open room to build, you need to get away from it. Look at the map for your server and find a spot far away that looks less populated. Head towards it.

It can be kind of scary to walk that far but if you keep your wits about you and watch for hostile mobs, you’ll probably be fine. Sticking to highways and keeping note of where guardtowers are located will also be helpful (you can call the guards by getting close to the tower and typing “help” in local chat). Any hostile mob that’s not a rat or possibly a wild cat will most likely kill you, so don’t be afraid to run.

You can also ask in your kingdom/server chat (marked as “Freedom” on the Freedom servers) if anyone has suggestions as to places to settle.

But I want to build on pristine land, untouched by any other player.

This game has been in open beta for 6.5 years. The chances of you finding any land that has not been changed or built upon by a player before you is slim to none.

However Rolf, the creator of the game, mentioned in a blog post that he is planning to open at least one new server with the official launch. So if you want brand new land to settle on, wait until the new server(s) opens on December 12.

How do I do…? How do I build…? How do I make…? What is…?

Wurmpedia is the wiki for Wurm Online. This will be the single most useful tool you can have while playing Wurm. Love it, bookmark it, make it your go-to site for information. It describes in great detail just about anything you’d need to know in the game. There is absolutely no shame in using it, even veterans use it because of the complexity of the game.

There is also an in-game wiki. It can be accessed by hitting H to pull up the search, or through the “What’s this?” choice on the right-click menu of just about anything in the game.

If all of those options fail you, ask in the CA-help channel and some kind people will help you out.

Everything is hard and complicated and takes so long to do.

Wurm Online is not a game for the impatient. It’s quite realistic and like real life, things can take a lot of time and effort. The beginning is also the hardest part because your skills are low so you will fail a lot. It does get a little easier over time though.

Joining a village or partnering up for someone could make things easier and allow you to focus on the aspects of the game you can enjoy. If you’re open to the possibility of PvP, the Epic servers have increased skill gains so leveling your skills would be easier there.

If it’s still not to your liking, that’s okay. It just means Wurm is not the game for you. I’d suggest giving it a couple days of trying before you quit however. There’s so much to see and do that you might not find the things you enjoy if you only try playing it for an hour.

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If there are any more general questions you have about Wurm, please feel free to post them below and I will do by best to answer them.

If you end up on the Independence server and want to come check my place out, my deed Ravenstone is located at 48x, 13y on the map. You can also say hi to me on any one of my characters (Faeldray, Nysandra, and Thorun).

So welcome to Wurm Online and I hope you enjoy your stay! 🙂