Once you reach level 10, you'll need to know if potential enemies are playing the game and keep tabs on where your enemy is. The following commands form the basis of most awareness.

• who - Lists online players. Pay particular attention to those marked with PK, as those players may pose a threat.
• where - This shows you players in your nearby vicinity. Frequent use is crucial when monitoring for potential attackers.
• alias - Creates shortcuts for frequently used or important commands, reducing typing time, reaction speed and minimizing the risk of errors. If a command is long but important, alias it. If you typo your alias, alias that typo too.
• target - this lets you specify a player (or mob) name so that they will show up in YELLOW when you type WHERE. Targets can be incorporated in your aliases with the $$ wildcard.
• track - this scans the ground, checking for recent player activity.
• affects - Lists active buffs and/or debuffs.

Remember, using these commands can also slow you down, so use them judiciously.

The Prompt

At level 1, your prompt will show you the bare essentials - HP, mana and movement points. Put any essential variables on it that you need to track. You can even turn colors on for your prompt. When your hp is red, it's time to run! Look at some PK logs and see what prompt customizations other players are using.

See the prompt helpfile for all your options.

In addition to the prompt, the game offers additional options for colors and sounds which can help you identify important events that are occurring in mid-battle such as weapons being disarmed and important buffs wearing off. Given the constant stream of text in a text-based game, these visual and auditory cues are invaluable tools for maintaining situational awareness. You can also use your mud client to add more colors and sounds for things that are important. You can use the mud client to tailor the game interface to your preference and playstyle.

Resting and sleeping

Resting and sleeping are important commands because they help your character to recover health and hp faster. These mechanics can be strategically employed to both survive challenging encounters and gain an advantage in combat.

If you are resting you will regen hp and mana faster on each tick, but it also prevents movement, making you a static target. If you are sleeping you will regenerate faster, but unable to use your WHERE command which makes you vulnerable to a surprise attack. Sleeping has an additional negative impact on your character's armor class, which is why thief backstabs are legendary. Always consider the safety of sacrificing situational awareness, and only use these commands when the risk is worth the rewards.

Pro tip. Sleeping in town is not safe just because you see a JUSTICE cabal member online. They provide security but they don't have to stay in town when it's not busy.
(Turn over)

Pro tip: You only have to be asleep when the tick occurs to get its full benefit.

Stealth

What playerkilling game would be complete without stealth? Available to thieves, shadows and rangers, this provides another dimension of fun to the situational awareness game. The main commands for stealth are:

• hide - conceal yourself from other player's view (unless they can detect hidden, in which case, look out!)
• sneak- while active, other players cannot see your movements, allowing you to enter and exit their room unnoticed, pick up items unnoticed, and more.

(n.b. Both of the above abilities are affected by adrenaline, the light level of the room, terrain types and other factors. See the helpfiles.)

Please note that invisibility and detect invis are both abundantly available in this game, so invis is not a reliable form of stealth, but it might work well on unsuspectinng players. (That includes low level players, newbies who don't know about detect invis, and high level players who don't expect that a berserker to be carrying invis potions).

Only a few classes can sneak and hide. This gives them an edge in situational awareness, as well as an ability to dictate the terms of engagement. If you are new to the game, that alone makes these classes feel much safer than the others, and more in control of what happens to your character. In addition to classes, the elven races (Elf and drow) can always sneak in any environment, which is very reliable for disengaging from combat.

Additional pointers for situational awareness

It is very easy to get a permanent light source, make sure you have one.

Hunger and thirst severely impact your regeneration, distract you, and damage you. Try not to let your character go hungry during PK. It may even kill you and cause you to lose exp.

It is essential to always have a boat as a river may cut off an avenue of escape or get you trapped by a summon spell

Deposit excess gold into the town bank. Gold is a strong motive for pk'ers because other players are known to carry. Don't make a reputation for being full of gold.

Having a big hoarded sack of heavy items makes it difficult for other players to loot your corpse.

Some big mouth shopkeepers can announce the arrival of a sneaking thief.

Daytime - Mainly for high levels. A vampire attacks at night, so if your enemy is a vampire watch the time of day.

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Last but not least, if you are caught by surprise, don't try to stand your ground. pk'ing is about preparation.

Setting up ambush (aka "ganks")

Now that mostly all situational awareness has been disclosed, and you can be prepared for any ambush, its time to become the hunter rather than the hunted. Ask yourself, how can I exploit situational awareness to catch another player off-guard? Here are some ideas for ways to catch unsuspecting players off-guard:

Mouse over the list below to reveal additional tips.

• A thief can simply lurk in wait for someone to visit the meat store. Don't wait for them at their guild entrances, you likely won't be quick enough (1/5)
• If you intend to stalk Seringale and attack someone, wait outside the gates first. Walk in, type WHERE, and out, quickly, quaff your purple potion and storm them before they have a chance to notice. (2/5)
• Fighting someone who is training on the scarecrow is a time-honored tradition. Their screen will be full of bodyguard parry spam, so they won't see you coming. (3/5)
• Attack them while they're doing something very difficult - fighting an overlord, another player, the red dragon, etc. Now you have a mob to assist you. (4/5)
• Attack while they are resting. But be careful you don't end up fighting all their groupmates. (5/5)

As you gain experience you will be yourself caught off guard. Don't take it hard - instead, add that to your repertoire of ambush tricks. And post your fails on the logboard so we can tell you how horrible you are at pk'ing.

Making a getaway

The command to exit from a battle is flee. However, situational awareness again applies. If you are dirt kicked, fleeing makes that last longer. If you are hobbled, fleeing can make you fall over. Sometimes it is better to wait and flee a little later. You can set a wimpy to define a HP threshold your character will make flee attempts at.

By mastering the above techniques, you'll be well-prepared to thrive in the world of playerkilling.

Knowledge Check

Answer the following question to confirm you understood and didn't blindly scroll through everything quickly.

This section covers various methods used to run away from and give chase to your enemy. This is an absolutely enormous and vital aspect of pk'ing that will help determine your success or failure, so if you feel you are not as good at it as you need to be, please review this section carefully.

The recall potion

No tutorial on survival would be complete without mentioning the recall potion. This magical elixir can instantly transport you to your home temple, providing a swift escape from danger. However, it's important to note that recall potions have a 5-second activation time and consume half of your remaining movement points. Therefore, it's crucial to create some distance from your pursuers before using the potion to maximize your chances of escape.

While some classes can learn recall as a spell, these classes often have lower defensive capabilities, making them more vulnerable to attacks. So, while recall can be a powerful tool, it's essential to use it judiciously and in conjunction with other stealth and combat strategies.

One weakness of the recall spell is it does not work while overburdened (i.e. carrying too much weight). So make sure you can spare extra weight in case you get poisoned and lose strength. (turn over..)

A riskier alternative to the recall potion is a purple spotted pill, which will cause you to instantly teleport to a random room. However, you may end up in an even worse predicament.

Guild sitting

Good up until about level 35, so-called "guild sitting" is the art of remaining in your guildhall completely shielded by your guild guardian. As a newbie, who is unable to win a fight at all, you might set a goal in low ranks of just running around a bit and managing to do that for long enough until you shake the bloody adrenaline and are allowed in the guildhall. Then, you will have the protection of your guild guardian.

Guilds provide a temporary safe haven, but it isn't a long-term solution. Relying solely on the protection of the guildhall can hinder your development as a player.

Ultimately, the goal is to become skilled enough to defend yourself and navigate the game world independently. While guildhalls can provide a valuable starting point, true mastery of the game requires venturing beyond their protective walls.

Tracking speed

Understanding the game world's layout is crucial for both offensive and defensive maneuvers. A seasoned player can quickly navigate the terrain, giving them a significant advantage in combat and escape scenarios.

Tracking speed can only be increased by thoroughly memorizing areas - layout, and room names. You can take it for granted that the commonly used levelling areas and the main town (Seringale) will have been memorized by every other player. It may seem the best players have memorized the entire game over many years of playing, but it is less difficult than you might think to learn everything.

Key tips for mastering navigation:

• Knowing area layout is needed to both retreat AND pursue - it's a must to learn it all and learn it like the back of your hand.
• Smacking into the walls is an indicator of room for improvement, especially if you over-spam and smack repeatedly into the same wall.
• Knowing room names well (especially ambiguous ones) will help you both to hunt in areas and hide in them. Except to learn a LOT of room names.
• The AREA LIST command highlights which area you are currently in, which helps explore the MUD. The directions to areas relative to the main town of Seringale can be found in their helpfile, e.g. "help gnome village". You can find these names from the AREA LIST command.
• Also in the AREA LIST Command (and helpfiles), you can see which secrets you have discovered. Exploring an area well enough to find all the secrets is a way to ensure you learned it well.
• Once you can afford to get one, ride mounts to ensure you are capably getting around the realms.
• When you are levelling as a newcomer to the game, offer to lead the group. That will help you with memorization and other players will be happy to teach you anything you need to lead better. Don't just be passive in your group. Everybody in your group would much rather someone else do it, also.

The surest way to earn a very proficient tracking speed is to just play the game and practice - leave your comfort zone, join Knights, Keepers, or anything that will get you out of your guild and either running for your life or chasing after somebody.

No-exits, door traps, and other underhanded tricks

An easy way to die (and also, to PK somebody) is to end up stuck in a no-exit or get yourself shut behind a door you cannot get out of because your enemy is holding the key. As you explore the game make sure you take note of these places so that you can both use them and avoid them. To avoid being summoned and accidentally landing in one, via the summon spell, you will need to equip save vs mental (wear when necessary). Also, carry some escape tools. There are pass door potions to evade the door trapping in particular. (misty potions) Failing that, you may have to resort to trying to recall or teleport out.

Standard doors are only locked on one side, with a latching mechanism on the inside that will unlock when you try to open it. Look out for situations that are not standard.

If you have a level advantage then you may be able to take advantage of it by standing with aggressive mobs and summoning your enemy into them. Also depending on your level, some mobs might assist you e.g. ofcol cityguards.

This all said, you may ask why on earth would a trick like this work on anybody? Players can become over eager, especially if you are taunting them... they'll accept calculated risks because they want the victory, but their enthusiasm may cloud their judgement.

Advanced evasion techniques

• Constant motion: If you are trying to get away, keep on moving. If people can't catch you, they can't kill you. Run circles around the area to tire out your opponent and waste his consumables (potions, scrolls, food). If he persists in chasing, you can even run across the world. Eventually, they will lose the trail, and you will be able to return to your guildhall.
• Misdirection: There is a tactic of "juking" which is where you run in circles a little bit, get your opponent thinking you are going one way then double back and take another. You can also step into areas, and then leave them the way you came as soon as your opponent runs in. The idea here is to create some distance between you and the pursuer. Also, after you have done lots of exploring, pick some pre-planned hiding places that you can run away to hide in, so it doesn't take much thought to get away, and cycle through them unpredictably.
• Exploit invisibility: Invis works great against newbie or unsuspecting low level players (sometimes even high level veterans)
• Leverage terrain: An area that is not usually well-known is ironically the Sewers, right underneath Seringale. It is a large area with lots of twists and turns, secret rooms, samey room names, and multiple exits - an easy area to get lost in - but since it has little to offer in terms of equipment and exp, it doesn't get much traffic. Memorizing this area is easy and a great return on investment, as it will help enable an easier escape.
• Blankets of darkness - Very few of these exist in the game, but these are rooms where the WHERE command does not show where you are. If your opponent doesn't know them, then you will be very safe if you hide in one
• Tire them out: You can do everything right and still fail to get away (or fail to get the kill) because you ended up running out of movement points. Or, for the same reason, you can escape. Either use flying scrolls or potions, or play an avian, and do it to your opponent.
• Recall potions: If you have a spell that either heals or helps escape (like word of recall, or teleport), and intend to use it for pk'ing, then you need to either make it reliable by getting it to 100% or leave leeway for failed efforts to try it again.
• Mind games: A persistent and well-practiced chaser will be difficult to shake. That does not mean you are fighting a grand master pk'er and cannot possibly beat them. Any player would have difficulty getting away from them. When you are being chased by seasoned trackers (like a Justice), you need to be much more judicial with your use of recall potions. Run deep into areas, check "where pk", and if you see they are too far to reach you in time, quaff a recall potion. Then try to run out of a city gate before they can get back to town and see you leaving. This is very effective. At this point, you might even get away with just hiding in the goblin village.

Advanced pursuit techniques

• The summon spell: This spell brings a person to your location. The catch is you must be in the same area as they are, and will be lagged from casting it. Experienced players can easily counter it. However, it is still a deadly spell especially when fighting in groups
• The track command: This comamnd allows you to inspect the ground and see if the fleeing enemy left a trail. Works everywhere except water rooms.
• Anticipating the flee: When you sense a flee is imminent, have your next command pre-emptively typed in (i.e. east|murder bob) so that you're right on top of them while they're dealing with extra flee commands they didn't need to input. This tactic can cause someone to panic into a flee spam death spiral.
• Most people tend to run right back into the room after fleeing so you can stand there attacking and end up hitting them, even with slippery races
• a person who just moved is delayed from their action so if someone walks into your room, you can always attack first (unless they dashed in)
• Exploit environmental factors: It is harder to flee from rooms with fewer exits, and some classes are better at fleeing than others. use this to your advantage (or watch out!)
• Learn the places where recall doesn't work, and if you want to kill a pesky mage, see if you can lure them. There are only a few places like this.
• Avoid greed: Do not let someone bait you into a trap or ambush.
• Adapt to your opponent's playstyle: As you fight the same opponent for a while you can get a sense of their behavior and adjust your tactics.

Remember, practice makes perfect, so don't be afraid to experiment and learn from your mistakes.

Knowledge Check

Answer the following question to confirm you understood and didn't blindly scroll through everything quickly.

The amount of damage you deal out, as well as receive, can be categorized by the following damage verbs, ranging from least to most.

[Click Here] to reveal all damage verbs.

Damage is categorized into two fields - physical and magical.

Physical damage:

• Pierce - (stab, peck, charge, pierce, etc)
• Blunt - (beating, crush, smash, pound, etc)
• Slash - (cleave, slice, slash, etc)
• Negative - (pain, life drain)

Magical damage: (everything else)

• Fire - (flaming bite, flames)
• Cold - (freezing bite, chill)
• Water - (drowning, typhoon, torrent)
• Lightning - (shocking bites, shock)
• Energy - (rays)
• Divine - (wrath, divine power, holy fire)
• Mental - (dreams, illusionary spectres)

Each race's helpfile lists any resistances and vulnerabilities they must deal with. For example, illithids are vulnerable to slashing attacks.

How does melee damage work?

Play with the slider below to see how weapon damage is calculated.

Begin by rolling your weapon dice. e.g. if you have a sword that says it is 2d4, that means it does 2 rolls of 4-sided dice, meaning from 2-8 damage

Weapon skill proficiency will help with damage. (Learn your weapons to mastery)

If you have "enhanced damage", it next tries to increase the rolled damage, much like a DND critical hit.

Add your damroll (from your equipment and your strength) to the total.

Multipliers and reductions (like the sanctuary spell, or slash vulnerability) apply last. This includes armor.

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What about spell damage?

• Begin by rolling spells base damage. Note that increases by gaining more levels, at a varying rate depending which spell.
• If the spell has a dependency listed for gain of function, apply your afflictive savebreak modifier.
• The enemy then gets a chance to save vs afflictive. This chance begins around 40% for a naked character, and if they were equipment to help, can get up to 95% chance to save. If the spell is saved, it deals only half damage.
• Resistance and vulnerability to spell damage is a huge factor after saves, increasing or decreasing damage anywhere between roughly 25%-50% depending on severity. If you see a weakness, exploit it with your spells.
• Proficiency in a spell only helps stop you from losing concentration.

You can use savebreak to reduce the enemy's chance to save, by up to 15% for a 15 savebreak item. To avoid that, your opponent would have to equip enough saves to be over the save cap, which is bound to have opportunity cost. If you are playing a class that relies on spells for damage, these items are essential. A good source of afflictive savebreak items is the Darkhaven jeweler.

Hitroll and Damroll

• Hitroll increases your damage by lowering the likelihood that your attacks miss or get parried or dodged. It does not affect shield block.
• Damroll increases your damage by simple addition.

Unsure which to prioritize? In low-to-mid levels, hitroll helps you to stop "missing" attacks and is (by far) king in low levels, but this happens a lot less after about level 36. It would be up to you to decide how to balance hitroll and damroll for your opponent, so here are some questions to ask.

1. Does your enemy have an easily exploited, nasty vulnerability, which a ton of damroll would punish even more?
2. Does your enemy have a naturally high avoidance (e.g. parry, dual parry, dodge) which would make hitroll very necessary
3. Does your class have skills or procs that depend on connecting your hits successfully (e.g. an envenomed weapon)?

It is not always an easy decision to choose which is best for pk'ing somebody, but a higher total (hitroll + damroll) is generally the right answer.

Strength and Dexterity

When choosing what race to play, which strength and dexterity maximums to take is one of the most important decisions you will make. These two attributes govern your damroll and hitroll directly, which means they directly increase how much damage you can do. Dexterity also provides some armor class benefits. Both of these stats matter in almost every offensive skill - the skill helpfiles will tell you which one counts, but typically strength is needed for impact while dex is for hitting the target.

Luck

Ranging from "Lady Luck is going your way" to "You have hit rock bottom on your luck", this mysterious attribute is fickle and changeable. Luck has been confirmed by the implementors to play a role in battles. If your character is currently very unlucky, it may be wise to avoid combat for a while. The opposite, and it might be worth taking on that badass and see if you can send them packing.

Where can I get this stuff?

There is a separate explorer's guide on the website, here we just show the non-spoiler-free way to do it.

To help look for equipment, search the codex for the stats you need, then use the world map page to help navigate to where it came from.

These are community contributed resources, so any shortcomings that you find here can be addressed via request.

Links: codex world map

Additional Damage modifiers

This is a list of more ways to increase damage, either directly or by influencing how often you hit. These are ordered from most to least importance.

• Vulnerability - the opposite of resistance. HIGHLY worth it to use someone's vulns against them as this can increase damage anywhere from roughly 25% to 50%. Resists and vulns are listed in race helpfiles.
• Blindness / Dirt Kicking - unless they have blind fighting, the offense benefits and defensive disadvantages do a number on anyone, double dipping on advantages. Note that the key is being unable to see the opponent.
• Foreign weapon penalty - reduces your opponent's parry chance, e.g. if you are fighting a necromancer, use a mace and they will have severe difficulty parrying that because their class does not get the mace skill. This is an unquestionably important edge in combat. The consider command, covered in the next section, also shows you what weapons skills a player might be missing or poorly trained in.
• Weapon advantage - daggers (blade weapons) are harder to parry if the enemy has a mace (shaft weapon), the same goes for mace on whip, and whip on dagger.
• Combat style superiority - this is key with warriors, as the skill "concentrate" adds a TON of damage. If you have that skill, it's essential to use it.
• Wild attacks - chaotic characters can use "wild weapons" that have a chance to do "double or nothing" damage. These are effective weapons for killing players because they could potentially get a lucky streak of big hits that total your opponent (i.e. "burst potential").
• Get the best merc you can buy and equip it with a decent weapon that is helpful against your opponent.

For a table of weapon parry ratings, [Click Here]

To check which weapons an opponent has available, you can either "Consider" them or use "class skills".

Dirt kicking is much more difficult while flying, and is also a bit trickier to dirt kick (and impossible to trip) flying opponents.

Make sure you are aware of any potential anti-air counters you or your opponents might have - air thrash, dispel magic, etc.

Additional damage tips

• You can hit a scarecrow to see how much damage you do per round.
• "veteran" players rarely properly train their skills in low levels (min-maxing, so they try to get by with spending just 1 practice), so they won't want to fight. Their lack of commitment is your time to shine. If you are truly a new player to the game, don't be shy about attacking other lowbies for practice.
• There is a saying, a good defense is a strong offense. If you manage to get your damage so great that it overwhelms your enemy's ability to heal, the losing position they are in forces them to adapt. It's always going to be safer to fight somebody who is just running away than someone who is throwing maledictions and hellstreams back at you.
• Use the codex and provided maps to identify where to get hit/dam gear.
• kick - if you have the skill, it's worth using. This skill isn't subject to a defense check, and that can really hurt a high avoidance target like elves, who rely on dodge to compensate for a lower hp. A lot of small kicks getting through can add up.
• Magic weapons are effective in a PK because players typically have a much lower armor class vs magic.
• Attack favors aggression - every time you "murder" your opponent, you do a whole round of damage while they do nothing. If they flee, you get to do it to them again. This can turn the tides completely in your favor. However, beware of the player who is fleeing just to return and attack you (it's very effective on mages). Attack them before they can attack you!
• If you open combat with a non-damaging spell such as blindness or curse, your opponent will get to hit you in response. This could cause you to lose the fight.

Brains over brawn

Neglect of the above can lead to your death. Some examples that are often seen causing a player to lose their fight (mouseover to see them):

• You had purple potions in your inventory, but you didn't use them. Or you failed to keep track the affect and got nuked when sanctuary wore off mid-combat. (1/5)
• You had a water cube (dwarf killing weapon) in your inventory, but you never wielded it. (2/5)
• You were playing a necromancer and someone got smart and just used a mace on you (necro does not get to learn maces). (3/5)
• You got dirt kicked and/or missed your dirt kick (4/5)
• You did not recognize a disadvantage taking its toll and over-commited. (5/5)

The moral of this story is to practice and experiment. The more you practice, the better you'll understand the nuances of damage dealing. If you combine everything together, you can deal devastating damage to your opponents and emerge victorious.

Knowledge Check

Answer the following question to confirm you understood and didn't blindly scroll through everything quickly.

This section will cover all the major defenses for both melee and magic. That includes shield block, parry, dodge, saves vs spell and so on. Here are some crucial pointers.

• consider - before you attack anything, use this command to check the opponent's level, armor and saves and see if you stand a chance or if they have any obvious weaknesses.
• Dirt kick - this ability causes blindness which has a dramatic effect on most character's ability to attack and defend. It's an extraordinary ability. If you have it, use it.
• Gain convert - this command lets you trade in 10 leftover practices for trains. Spend these trains on extra HP or to restore lost con points.

Weapon type

Weapon type affects parry, and some weapons parry much better than others. If your situation calls for the best possible defense, because you have to tank multiple players at once, then a mace would be the best possible weapon to wield for that situation, regardless of any other factors.

Shields, axes, dodge, spears

Shields are very useful defensively because they cannot be affected by hitroll. Also, even though shields force the wearer to use a one-handed weapon, the number of attacks they block will more than make up for the additional damage of two-handed weapons. It is not possible to stomp anyone who is wearing a shield. Axes have a better chance of beating shield block than other weapons.

Dodge is maybe the best defense in the game as there is no trivial way to stop anyone from dodging. Spears are more difficult to dodge than other weapons.

Defensive modifiers

Turn over the cards to learn about each modifier.

Sanctuary

An EXTREMELY important buff that reduces all damage taken by 50%. If you like the idea of taking half the damage, invest in sanctuary.

protection

This spell reduces damage vs others of the opposite alignment by 25%

Resistances

Some races have resistance to certain damage types, e.g. fire damage. Take care not to mess up and hit a resistance. It will be a deciding factor.

Armor class

Armor rating can provide a significant amount of damage reduction. It's an often neglected stat, and that can give you an edge in battle.

Armor Class

In the early to mid levels of the game, armor class increases the chance for a melee attack to miss you completely. Hitroll and armor class are in this way alike and opposite. Low level characters that would ordinarily be very wimpy, such as mages, can hold their own reasonably well if they have a high armor class. As armor class is increased by dexterity, elves and other high dex races have a high avoidance in this level range. As levels progress towards the end-game, this "missing" attacks component diminishes significantly, and the player's natural defenses (parry, dodge, etc) take over the job of avoidance.

However, even though misses matter less, it would be wrong to underestimate armor class in high levels. Armor class still has an important damage reduction role, which you can read more about in the provided helpfile. It is reasonably possible to attain enough armor class for 20% or better damage reduction. Since certain equipment slots get their armor bonus multiplied, it pays to consider their armor rating and when trying to upgrade equipment, address those slots first.

Note: Armor class does NOT affect spell damage in the slightest.

Save vs Spell

This attribute grants a chance to fully resist the effects of magic spells. Maledictive and mental spells (debuffs, forced actions, and other loss of control) can be prevented completely by saves. Those spells that deal damage are afflictive spells, and in that case, the impact of save vs spell is to take half damage instead of full damage.

Because mobs are dumb, saves are something you can generally ignore vs mobs, but in a PK your weakness will be noticed and definitely kill you.

There are three different saves you can equip - save vs afflictive, save vs mental, and save vs maledictive. This section will list a few lethal spells, why, and what save you need. Be sure to look at class skills and spells helpfiles to learn what matters in more detail.

• Summon (mental) - this spell transfers you to the caster's location. It can get you split off from your group or make you accidentally walk yourself into a no-exit. Nasty.
• Dispel magic (mental) - this removes all of your spell affects. Your sanc, your protection, your fly. In the best case, you will be overspending mana to re-apply those spells. An illusionist or necromancer can rely on this spell to nuke with their minions.
• Blindness (maledictive) - Being unable to see where you are going makes escape very difficult unless you memorize the map AND manage to figure out where you are!
• Curse (maledictive) - this one prevents the recall spell.
• Poison (maledictive) - reduces strength and dexterity by a LOT (this can cause "overburdened" preventing your ability to recall).

If you are up against any of the above tools, saves are strongly worth considering. Complacency kills.

Checklist for saves:

• Level advantage or disadvantage will affect how easy it is to land spells. Beware the human shaman with 8 level advantage.
• Some races may have an innate spell level bonus. Look at their helpfiles to confirm.
• Every spell has a different level penalty for save, which is why it is much easier to land faerie fire than blindness. You may not need save maxed to avoid the worst.
The consider command shows how high an opponent's saves are. Opponents will find gaps if you leave them anything.

Interlude: A log of an experienced player managing to run away while blinded. Great escape!

[View Log]

Additional defense tips

• Consumables play a huge role in self-defence, especially attrition, which will be covered in the next section.
• Once you hit about level 14 be sure to master your defenses on the hobgoblin soldiers before ranking into a higher PK range. Use the Juggernaut in Seringale to buy a scarecrow and some training boosts to make it go by quickly, and employ all the lessons taught in the "situational awareness" section to stay safe while you train.
• A more defensive character can be built by leaving stats at baseline when you create it, and instead rely on rare items to prop stats to their maximums. This will allow you to use the stats you would've spent to instead train HP. The itemization is more than adequate to do this. However, needing the stats brings your damage potential down a bit, so that is a trade-off.
• Consider fighting on water to avoid dirt kicks
• Power-levelling is fun but make sure critical skills are taken care of. Spells require at least 85% before they begin to feel dependable, and defenses should be 95%+ to limit failures.

Plan the counter-attack

Your ability to defend yourself will save your life in battle. Once you have escaped, however, you have choices. You can either sit around and wait for the next attack - or you can plot how to crush your attacker completely with a cunning plan. For example, most players would think someone who had just barely escaped would flee to lick their wounds. Nobody expects that survivor to go to a temple priest, pay 50k gold for healing, and jump straight back into the battle, axe swinging.

Knowledge Check

Answer the following question to confirm you understood and didn't blindly scroll through everything quickly.

Suppose you have a good grip on everything discussed until now. Yet, try as you might, you still cannot close the deal. Why not? It just may be your class. In this section, we discuss the two sure ways to end a fight once and for all - stunning, and nuking.

Stunning

With the ability to stun opponents, you can get a kill playing from Antarctica. Stunning skills are typically unreliable and low damage, usually found in the skill lists of classes that excel at melee. Here are some examples:

• Bash - found on warriors, this will do little more than one hit worth of damage. However, if it hits, the opponent can expect to be pinned for up to 2 rounds.
• Bodyslam - found only on berserkers, more lag than bash but even less consistent.
• Trip - very consistent, however, trip damage is pitiful and it does not lag nearly as much as bash.
• Hobble - causes a chance for the enemy to collapse on fleeing (i.e. stuns them).

Before you try using these skills on your opponent, consider if you can win the fight. If you are a thief with 700 hp tripping a warrior with 1000 hp, and you are both doing the same damage to each other, you can't win that fight. The overall result is just lagging yourself to death. Consider opening the fight with a dual backstab first, so you have a nice head start, and consider just bailing instead of tripping if the warrior fights back well with dirt kick and their other skills. Similarly, if you are a warrior who's trying to bash a paladin and they're all missing, while you are taking heavenly wraths, you might be losing the fight and helping the paladin to kill you. These skills require you to be able to stand toe-to-toe and outlive your opponent in a melee-only exchange. So the best time to stun is either to clinch the deal (as a finisher) or if you have a huge level and/or equipment advantage.

Mages can use protective shield to make themselves completely invulnerable to skills that stun, and every class has access to the flight potion to prevent trips. If you have set a wimpy, there is still a slim chance to flee even if you are stunned.

In the following link, you will see a pinnacled Warlord monk battling a ranger in a high-stakes fight to the death. Pay attention to how the monk is using bandage to heal, is very judicious with their chii bolt stun (like bash, but takes careful preparation), and how the ranger is able to use wounding shot (like hobble, but requires several conditions met) to pin the monk down.

[Watch a Duel to the Death]

Nuking

Skills or spells that deal VERY high damage are considered "nukes" for their ability to finish a fight outright by devouring a huge chunk of HP. These abilities can have significant drawbacks, such as costing more mana than alternatives, having long cooldowns or self-imposing a lot of lag. Here are some examples:

• Hellstream - the hardest-hitting invoker spell and most definitely the first thing anyone would think of or remember experiencing (high mana cost)
• Harm - a shaman finisher, once used the shaman cannot cast it again for a very long time (long cooldown). Dark-knights get a milder version of this spell.
• Sidestep - a thief ability that deals so much damage it will kill you if you leave yourself wide open. Otherwise, it lags the thief too much to be effective damage.
• Honorable mention to dispel magic - essentially a nuking ability with it being able to remove sanctuary. Time it well to score a load of unmitigated minion damage (or groupmate damage if you brought a team). Follow with a high damage spell while they're vulnerable.

With few exceptions, nukes are only found on mage classes. Be very cautious if your opponent has either stuns available or nukes at their disposal. Both of these tools give them a very good chance of killing you.

Spells that deal enormous damage can be protected against with save vs afflictive. Or just being a dwarf. Dwarves enjoy a natural resistance to afflictive spells.

What if I have neither of these?

Since not every class has the above tools (at least presented in an obvious manner), here are some suggestions for how you might finish opponents without them.

• Illusionist - terrain/misdirection together make it much harder for opponents to run away. Chase them down with colour spray.
• Necromancer - blindness/summon together would be ideal. They won't know where they are or were, making it easier to trap them.
• Healer - You will be chasing. Have a large damroll and make sure you dispel magic straight after they attack or use an ability, so you have a chance to get some good hits.
• Shaman - dysentery and enfeeblement can run your opponent out of movement. A sitting duck doesn't need to be stunned or nuked.
• Ranger - This class has the damage needed to chase and attack with lethality, but if you can manage a wounding shot, they'll be collapsing on flees.
• Bard - the song "devils dance" will hinder their ability to input commands, which is favorable when chasing them.
• Paladin - similar to ranger, except you also have the option of using charge for significant damage as well.

What about group vs group?

The rules of engagement for groups are a bit different in that the group is a larger entity than each individual, with wider access to abilities. Assuming groups are the same size, your rule of thumb should be to focus your attacks (stuns, nukes, etc) upon the highest threat in the opponent party. Mages that deal high damage and dispel magic create a lot of danger, but even more so, a healer can summon your groupmates apart and just cure the damage up. Be judicious with which you go after first.

In closing, stuns and nukes are simple and effective strategies to kill players without too much creativity. It is wise to be cautious of opponents that have them and take protective measures.

When both players have decent access to healing (cure serious, herb skill, etc), lots of room to run around in (i.e. Ford duels), and no ability to stun or nuke each other, it can lead to a temporary stalemate where neither side can overpower the other decisively. This sets the stage for a long and drawn-out battle of attrition. Here are things you need to know if you end up in such a battle:

• Catching the tick to recover mana will be a decisive factor.
• Pay attention to your mana and especially movement points. Conserve your mana for the long haul as much as possible.
• Shamans will need to look at what their opponent is wearing. Instead of wasting opportunity and mana on expensive maledictions against a target with high saves, just kick them for damage.
• Avoid falling into a "critical HP" death spiral of having to flee to spam heals and getting caught and attacked while in cast lag. Every time you take a "murder" (free damage) you fall further behind.
• In a long fight, you have to be patient and careful. Do not allow yourself to get frustrated and tilt into making mistakes.
• Conversely, a very tired opponent will make mistakes. Roleplay with your opponent, i.e. send messages and taunts. That distracts them with more things to process, slows them down as they try to read or reply, and prevents them from getting mental rest so that they tire. Then capitalize on their mistakes.
• A stalemate can be ended by recruiting groupmates or using underhanded tricks.

Fight Resetting

A "Reset" means you abandon the fight and just run to Narnia and sleep for full HP. You will be in the same predicament but out the gold and potions you had previously used - but don't let yourself get killed because of a "sunk cost" fallacy, sometimes it's just better to reset. Here are some good reasons to try to reset:

• Someone unfriendly or unknown enters your immediate area, potentially looking to jump in.
• You were attacked by surprise. Unless you are truly confident this always means run and reset.
• You let your sanctuary drop and got mangled with a few bad rounds by accident. Expect zero chance of a comeback if you were grossly behind right from the get-go.
• The random mess of melee strikes and parries goes badly for you at a very early stage in the fight. (Say you lose 30% hp without hitting your opponent or something like that). Like poker, when you've been dealt a bad hand, it's better to fold and play the next hand.

Keep in mind that caballed characters have obligations and may not always be able to reset the fight.

Consumables

There is a list of helpful consumables provided in the newbie forum thread [here]

• Take advantage of brewing as it enables gathering stronger versions of common supplies, especially gyvel potions.
• Carry multiple gyvel potions incase the first one fails.
• Don't keep gyvel potions in sacks if you intend to use them. If you end up blinded you will lose access to them.
• Playing overly conservative (i.e. excessive "Resetting") wastes your resources and ultimately your time. However, be careful not to fall into the trap of "sunk cost" and lose everything just because you have used a couple of potions. If you need to run, do so.
• The priests in Seringale offer healing services, including removing blindness, so if you get caught without gyvels, there is your last resort.
• The purple potions are crucial for sanctuary and the route is worth memorizing. Also take the time to learn the way to alternative sources e.g. ravens north of Darkhaven, tentacles north of Valour.
• If you have the summon spell, you can use it to gather purple potions (large hobgoblin) and misty potions (swirling mist) without having to walk there.
• Stealing (a thief-only skill) is a very effective way to toast someone's supplies. This can be prevented by wearing your sack.

Learning the strengths and weaknesses of each class is essential for becoming a better pk'er. Here is a summary of some of the resources available and important things to understand.

• class "class name" skills (or spells) - shows what abilities each class can learn. Use that, then scope out the helpfiles for opponent's abilities to see whether saves are needed.
• help "Race" (e.g. help gnome) - shows stat maximums, resistances and vulnerabilities, which have a huge impact on damage.
• hobble - similar to dirt kick but used by warriors and berserkers. It requires combat style advantage. Make sure you know how this one works!
• Monks have resistances, vulnerabilities and combat styles that depend on which of their fighting styles they adopt in combat.
• A paladin's aura bolstering presence boosts mental saves for the entire team, making the entire group harder to summon and making the paladin a key target.

Which class should I play to learn?

There have been many conversations about what class is best to play for a beginner to pk'ing. You will have to look for yourself and decide. Here we consider a chaotic evil ranger against factors mentioned in this guide:

Pros (mouseover to see 7 more):

1. It will have camouflage allowing stealth in forests. Most of the game world is covered in trees. This gives lots of potential for ambushing, especially in emerald forest, and can also help with a getaway from a fight going terribly. (Situational Awareness)
2. It has dirt kick, a simple way to blind your opponent and quickly take them down. (Applying damage)
3. Bows, not covered in our guide, if applied properly will feed even a warrior their lunch (Applying damage)
4. It has the concentrate ability which, make no mistake, is one of the hardest-hitting skills in the game. (Applying Damage)
5. Being chaotic allows access to wild weapons for great burst damage. (Applying Damage)
6. The barkskin ability allows the ranger class to take more punishment. (Defense wins fights)
7. The herb skill allows the ranger to self-heal significantly and even cure diseases. (Attrition warfare)
8. Pathfinding allows a ranger to conserve a lot of movement points without blowing through flight potions. (Attrition warfare)

Cons:

1. Not having detect invis introduces a burden of gathering supplies for that, and can lead to being ganked with no knowledge of an enemy around. (Situational Awareness)
2. Rangers do not have any stun skills. They do have wounding shot, but this is situational and only happens when opponents flee. This means they will struggle to finish off their opponents. (Stunning and Nuking)

Based on the above considerations, you might decide that a ranger is not the ideal class to learn to PK with, as that class is very difficult to finish other players off with. Getting detect invis potions is work. However, their rogue-like stealth, high durability and healing with herbs will help them cope with making a few mistakes, and the stealth keeps them pretty safe!

If we are talking pure, minimal effort, you just want to get your first kill on this game of any sort, then the fire giant warrior will probably get you there. Many suggestions will be thrown your way, but the bash skill combined with the enhanced size of a fire giant is a proven killing tool. Many players have fallen to it. However, this character will most certainly fall to ice weapons.

If we are talking pure survival, not wanting to die and hoarding equipment as thoroughly as possible, a pinnacle levelled healer is very difficult to take down - but this is a playerkilling guide, not a surviving guide, and we cannot recommend a healer for killing anything easily (unless it's not a moving target).

To read an entire thread where this subject was discussed at length: [Click Here]

The importance of logging

Abandoned Realms has a popular logboard where various players share transcripts of their playing sessions. The logboard is a wide mix of roleplaying, ganks, duels, excitement, game balance discussion, tedious drama, and goofing around. Participating in the logboard will undoubtedly improve your playerkilling ability, and any logs posted will surely be considered ripe for analysis by the veterans.

If you have a MUD client that is capable of doing it, it is wise to log all of your fights. Defeats are where you can learn the most. For every death there will be a logical answer of what went wrong - a mistake made, a bad judgement. Look at the logs of your losses and try to understand why you lost it. If you can answer that question, you have earned improvement.

The bottom line is this - to be able to launch an effective offense, you need to know information about your opponents - race/class strengths and weaknesses, their playstyle, things they are unfamiliar with. Sometimes that means trying their class out to experience its limitations, some of it will be recognizing the habits they keep. For defense, you need to know your own capabilities and knowledge gaps. Keeping and reviewing logs can help you develop that. Survival lies in your own hands. Stay ignorant of yourself and your opponent, and you're going to have to get used to losing.

Common mistakes

• Be active, not a spectator. Don't just watch the fight doing nothing. This separates new players from those with experience. There is always something you can do. Even checking your affects to see how long left on sanctuary is more useful than nothing.
• Don't spam skills in. Spamming skills is a rookie mistake. There is a "clear" command to empty the queue if you've done that.
• Don't panic-spam "flee" in, unless you want to see 12x "nah you feel too relaxed.." at your temple after dying.
• Don't use area of effect spells next to level 60 mobs trying to kill someone or flush them from hiding. Not worth it.
• Look out for players who are overly aggressive. That makes them easier to lure into an ambush or trap them. It also means they are probably going to prove stronger than you in a battle of brute force.
• Angry players are the most reckless and easily killed players in the entire game. Don't be intimidated by them. If you stay cool and remain nerdy, you'll eventually surpass their skill level and get your turn whooping these punch bags.
• This game promises brains-over-brawn, but keep your expectations reasonable. Level 50 mages in goblin equipment will likely not mow through level 50 warriors which are optimally equipped, and when two warriors are fighting, a gear advantage is going to matter.
• Stay accountable - blaming deaths on latency, game balance and/or the "RNG" can stunts growth and causes players to get stuck at plateaus.

And now for some... ahem, bullshit.

Below are some of the most frustrating pk'ing tactics you will see, the kind that gets people complaining. We will add more as we get complaints.

• Unghost kill - A dark-knight is exceptionally good at this. You narrowly beat them, and then they sleep 1 tick and unghost to try to kill you with a fireball.
• Turtling - Instead of hit/dam you just get loads of HP gear and AC gear and then guild sit (or join Heralds and tavern sit) on a character that is incredibly difficult to kill. Now the roleplayer community is fun and all, we all have respect for them, but sometimes the PK'ers deliberately do it as a troll.
• Ultra conservative / harassment - If you are being cautious to the point that you don't stay beyond 2 rounds of combat if you feel "opening rounds" RNG wasn't favorable enough early on, it IS effective but causes other players to experience nuisance. Eventually they won't want to play (with you) anymore, especially when they know you can already beat them without harassing until the stars align. Its lame.
• Abusing bugs - A veteran player with a feel for the game will know the difference between a feature and something broken.
• Betraying groupmates - Leading your groupmate into a no-exit is a total loser move. Seriously! If that happens, write that name down and get revenge.

Conclusion

Now that your journey through learning the fundamentals of playerkilling is complete, remember to pay it forward. Share this guide and your knowledge generously, while also getting out there and kicking the dog out of somebody. Remember to always make sure you have a valid roleplaying reason for your attacks.

The Final

Take the quiz below to see if you are ready for pk'ing. This quiz does not reward anything for correct answers.