Returning from long ago, and a Mage question.

[elianydd]

Hi all. Wow, it's been about 10 years or so, and I'm back. Been playing around on a new account (since I have yet to be able to reactivate my old one, and besides it's good to re-familiarize with the game) and was finding less info on the web than I'd hoped to about UO. (But then there wasn't much of a web back when I was first playing UO!)

I'm pretty self-sufficient in that I like to do all the skills and gather stuff, make stuff, fight solo (and thus die a lot, not that I like THAT part.) Anyway, playing a mage at the moment, and was wondering if it's PRACTICAL to try and get the fifth circle and higher magery spells in any way OTHER than saving up to buy a pre-filled spellbook from a player vendor. (Which does seem like a bit of a cop-out.) So far the only info I can find online, though, is that the spells drop as scrolls from certain types of (caster) mobs, but it seems that the odds of my taking down those (tough, caster) mobs is slim without well... the higher level spells.

I'm not looking for anyone to "give" me anything; just suggestions as to whether there's any practicality to my pursuing trying to get spells myself, or just give in and buy a pre-made 64-spell spellbook and be done with it. (After going out and harvesting mobs for all that gold to buy it, of course.)

It's good to be back in UO. (On 14-day trial at the moment, but pretty certain I'll be sub'bing for a bit.) I tell you though, as someone who's forgotten much about this game, it is NOT new-user friendly once you get out of New Haven. It's awesome that it's just a wild, dangerous, unknown (to a new player) world, but there is NO guidance whatsoever and it is far too easy to just take two steps in the wrong direction and die. (And lose all your stuff. Or get hit with a bill to keep it.) And die. And die. (Which I'm okay with since I know how to minimize the pain of that, but it would totally turn off many really new players.)

Plus what's up with the disconnects?!? Is that something with the Enhanced Client itself, or does that happen with the old client too? Died an extra time or two from disconnects. Not good.

Ah, I'm blabbing on. Anyway, as I said, good to be back. Have only GOOD memories of my prior time in UO. (Did not leave out of unhappiness with the game or anything like that.)

Oh, and these smilies... ... are awesome!!!

 

[Woodsman]

Hi all. Wow, it's been about 10 years or so, and I'm back. Been playing around on a new account (since I have yet to be able to reactivate my old one, and besides it's good to re-familiarize with the game)

You should try and reactivate your old one if you can. It can be a pain, but your characters and everything they were carrying/wearing as well as had in their bankbox would still be intact. Some of the weapons and armor would obviously be useless thanks to AOS, but you might find some rares collectors or museums that would like them.

Anyway, playing a mage at the moment, and was wondering if it's PRACTICAL to try and get the fifth circle and higher magery spells in any way OTHER than saving up to buy a pre-filled spellbook from a player vendor.

Easier to get a pre-filled.

Since you maybe using the EC from what it sounds like, get Pinco's UI - he's been doing a lot of work on the various books/spells, and they are now a lot more self-explanatory than the defaults. These are some of his graphics updates - wait for them to load, and you may have to click on the images to see them displayed properly:

it is NOT new-user friendly once you get out of New Haven. It's awesome that it's just a wild, dangerous, unknown (to a new player) world, but there is NO guidance whatsoever and it is far too easy to just take two steps in the wrong direction and die.

Ironically, they are supposed to be working on a new player system and a new quest system in addition to the high resolution graphics update for the EC. I expect those two systems won't be worked on until the graphics update is well underway.

I would spend a few hours browsing through UO Guide

Plus what's up with the disconnects?!? Is that something with the Enhanced Client itself, or does that happen with the old client too? Died an extra time or two from disconnects. Not good.

If you are disconnecting and not crashing, then it maybe your ISP or it maybe your location.

 

[Larisa]

I recently came back as well after an almost 5 year hiatus.

This statement you made:

it is NOT new-user friendly once you get out of New Haven. It's awesome that it's just a wild, dangerous, unknown (to a new player) world, but there is NO guidance whatsoever and it is far too easy to just take two steps in the wrong direction and die.

THAT is one of the many reasons I love UO. When I first started, I was alone, died alot, managed to find my way to a town eventually where I ran into some helpful people, but it's not SUPPOSED to be easy.

New Haven is GREAT for new players to gain skill, but it doesn't teach them about the *real world* So you gain all your skills to 50...then what? There's no direction..so you have this really cool noobie blessed gear, you think you're all big and bad, manage to find a moongate, step through and get owned by a mongbat, realizing that you're not as good as you thought you were lol.

As a real new player back then...it was the best challenge for me figuring out stuff on my own, I loved it. I think I ran around as a ghost for almost an hour before I found a healer and realized what they were and what they did.

Welcome back, I hope you find the *new and improved* UO to be enjoyable. I know I have...alot of trial and error, alot of deaths due to the revamped monsters and gear that used to be good but now not so much lol but it's been SO fun.

As far as a spellbook? Depending on the shard, they aren't that expensive...I'd suggest buying a full one because the higher circle spells drop off higher end mobs.

 

[Basara]

Farming liches or daemons, or doing level 1-2 T-maps, are good for level 4-7 scrolls (and their 6 necro equivalents). Imps are good for level 1-3 (and all but one of the remaining necro spells).

Level 8s (and the last necro spell) can be gotten from Meer Eternals at Ilshenar Sacrifice, without having to go to Doom, but watch out for your karma dropping. OR, you can have someone bring you back the level 8 scrolls from the Stygian Abyss, off of the Slasher of Veils (someplace you can't get to on a trial account, but once you have SA, you can go there, maybe even help someone fight it, and just loot after the corpse goes public).

When I would occasionally make spellbooks for people, I'd buy the level 1-3s, used my collection of level 8s brought back from hunts, and just walk a few screens from my house in Yew to the liches to fill the rest (or do t-maps & SOS if the friend wasn't picking up the book till the next day). The only time I scribed a scroll is if I was currently out of a level 8 (I tend to use my resurrection, earth ele and EV scrolls to get 100% success on my Bard/Tamer and Crafter Mule, as they have less than 120 magery due to their crowded templates).

 

[elianydd]

Thanks for the replies. Various responses:

- As for reactivating my old account, I wish I could, despite whether I go on with a new one or not, just for old time's sake, and for no other reason than that I could MAKE myself a spellbook, since my old main char was a mage with inscription, etc. Unfortunately, I have yet to find the right combination of account name and password that I used from 10 years ago, and Support hasn't been able to help me with what meager info I've been able to dig up so far, although they did have suggestions (such as digging up the "game code" i used originally, etc.) My fault; not theirs. Have changed email and forgotten lots of stuff since way back then.

- UO Guide. Yes, thank goodness for that website or I'd be even LESS informed than I am!

- As for spells, I guess I'll end up farming gold for buying one pre-made. Liches (and presumably daemons) still kick my butt with spells, even if they don't touch me. (I'm good at running around and keeping things from hitting me. ) I assume that other than getting my "resist spells" up (which I'm working on) it's mostly a matter of equipment with resists...? Regardless, if I'm going to have to resort to buying one, there's little point in trying to farm a few scrolls in the mean time.

- Pinco's UI, I assume is all "approved" to use with UO? I saw something about "Custom UI" when launching the client, and I like the looks of those spell icons, etc. from that Pinco's thing, so I'll definitely look into it. Thanks.

- And I agree with the part about "New Haven is GREAT for new players to gain skill, but it doesn't teach them about the *real world* ".

****

Having a lot of fun back in UO. As an aside, where's more info on the changes they're planning? Would love to see what they've mentioned about the future of UO, enhancements in the works, etc.

P.S. Any websites with good maps? I've tried googling, but not much luck for finding what I'm looking for. The reason I ask is 10 years ago I'd managed to piece together and print out a homemade giant map of the world (i..e, Trammel facet, which is where I spent most of my time, having started playing right after the Felucca/Trammel split -- UO:R iirc -- which, to me, was a good thing, since I am not a PvPer at all) which I put on the wall , with all the little vendor symbols, etc. marked so I could find things. It was really awesome, and I still have it someplace, but I figure things have changed a lot (plus now there's 2-3 MORE facets I need maps for!) and was considering trying to make a new one. Just need a decent "map" website (mostly for getting pic of where things are in each of the cities.)

 

[Lady Storm]

There are many ways to find your old account by the CS staff. If you have your Account Name, Password, old CC# you used, E-mail address, these in any combonation can help them find your account. Also if you have the old CD KEY CODE that too would be of great assistance as well. All this information will go far to identify you as the accounts owner as well. Btw: Welcome back!

*Warning*
As many gave away or sold their accounts before the required transfer system went in your account may belong to another party. If you sold or gave it to another you are not elegble to recover the account as another players information and CC# would have been registered for a greater length of time. You said you have not played for 10 years, that would place your account closed sometime in 1999 0r 2000... if you did ether of the above retreving the account may not be an option.

 

[elianydd]

There are many ways to find your old account by the CS staff. If you have your Account Name, Password, old CC# you used, E-mail address....

Well I tried my old email address, and the UO Acct Mgmt system SEEMS to recognize it, but apparently I've forgotten the old password I used, since none make it happy. Unfortunately, Support's system did NOT recognize that same email address. :-/ I DEFINITELY did NOT sell, transfer, or in any way give anyone access to my account; so unless it got hacked into at some point (which I have had happen on a game or two over the years) it should still be there. At this point, I figure my best bet is to dig up the CD KEY. (Or guess my old password successfully ) I know I *have* the original game materials.... SOMEPLACE. Fortunately, as I said, I'm not waiting to play; I'm just going ahead with a new account. But it sure would be AWESOME to have the ancient stuff from my original acct! (Not that I had anything THAT amazing to begin with...)

Again, no blame aimed at CS. Nothing bad to say about the game itself. CS did what they could with the limited info I had; now it's up to ME to dig up some more info. And as for the game... all it needs is more new-player friendliness and some polish to try and entice more new blood, maybe some better web presence and info, advertising, etc.

 

[Capn Kranky]

The EC is allowed to be modded - especially the UI. I believe there is a sticky in the EC Forum that has the URL for Modders Exchange.

As for maps, search in here for Hawkeye Pike as a poster. His site has maps I believe ... also good yarns of Britannian travels.

 

[Woodsman]

- Pinco's UI, I assume is all "approved" to use with UO? I saw something about "Custom UI" when launching the client, and I like the looks of those spell icons, etc. from that Pinco's thing, so I'll definitely look into it. Thanks.

Yeah, there is a thread in the EC Forum about Pinco's UI, which I linked to, but you should check through the EC forum anyways. Pinco's UI is not a program like UO Assist or anything, it's an actual interface that overlays the EC. One advantage of the EC is that like other clients from modern MMOs, you can do quite a bit of customization. A lot of people who play other MMOs are used to being able to do a lot of customization to the UI and thankfully Pinco has done it for us.

- And I agree with the part about "New Haven is GREAT for new players to gain skill, but it doesn't teach them about the *real world* ".

A few months ago, the devs mentioned that they wanted to move the new player stuff out of New Haven and move it to the mainland and work to have new players more fully interact with the actual game world from the start.

I would hit up the Enhancing New Player Experience thread and contribute your observations there. There are supposed to be some GMs who read the forums.

 

[popps]

Welcome back !!

As I Mage, if I were you I'd also consider picking up Spellweaving as a complementary mage skill. Several spells can come handy there especially if you get a level 6 Circle up.......

 

[Lady CaT]

Welcome Back fellow Mage! A wonderful new world awaits. If you like the challenge of finding your own spells, rather than giving your heart earned gold to the greedy merchants of Luna, I can offer some suggestions!

My old trick for finding scrolls without ever fighting a creature.. somewhat forgotten by alot of adventurers. You will need at least 2 low level spells from the local magery in New Haven. Magic Unlock and Telekinesis.

You can get spell scrolls from various dungeon crates. You unlock a crate using the magic unlock spell and then use telekinesis from a distance to trigger any trap on the chest. You may need to do this several times as crates sometimes have more than one nasty trap on them. Now open the crate! What!? Its EMPTY? Fear not!

Now the forgotten secret part! Alot of dungeons, if you come back to the same crate in about 15-20 minutes, it will have relocked itself. Now repeat your unlocking and telekinesis to trigger traps. And reopen crates! Wow! Eukeka! This time the chest has filled with equipment and maybe even some gems or spell scrolls! You can even find up to 8th circle scrolls this way. I have not tried this in every dungeon, but it does work in Ice Dungeon. Also works in some towns like Serpents Hold. What you are looking for is dungeons/town with stacks of wooden crates.

This tip also works on some locked treasure chests, but usually only the kind that are static in a dungeon (ie always in the same spot). Not the treasure chests that randomly appear in different spots.

Safe Journeys!

 

[Lyconis]

Now the forgotten secret part! Alot of dungeons, if you come back to the same crate in about 15-20 minutes, it will have relocked itself. Now repeat your unlocking and telekinesis to trigger traps. And reopen crates! Wow! Eukeka! This time the chest has filled with equipment and maybe even some gems or spell scrolls! You can even find up to 8th circle scrolls this way. I have not tried this in every dungeon, but it does work in Ice Dungeon. Also works in some towns like Serpents Hold. What you are looking for is dungeons/town with stacks of wooden crates.

You don't need to go for locked/trapped containers in the dungeons. If you want 8th circle scrolls simply open a container in a dungeon. If it's empty it just means no one has opened it since server up. When you open the container it will "prime it," come back in 20 minutes and the container will be full of stuff. If the container is already full of junk pull the junk out and come back in 20 minutes. When you empty the container your chances of getting the scrolls will increase as you won't get a random item in place of the scroll you already pulled out. I tend to hit Deciet, Despise and Shame as they have the most barrels that are easily accessible. There is a daily and stealable thread that has some vague info on the chest priming http://vboards.stratics.com/uo-thief/117789-daily-stealable-rares-info.html. Outside of the chests champion's in Felucca give the scrolls, never tried the other monsters mentioned in the above posts.

Shame is also a great place to get 1st-7th circle scrolls from the "evil mages" Evil Mage - Hunter's Guide - UO Stratics and air elementals are a feasible hunt for all "levels."

 

[Silverbird]

Has anyone mentioned, that a 'plain' filled spellbook usually costs around 3500 - 5000 gp? If you cant find someone selling one, ask in the general chat. Most of the time you will get it as a gift. The needed gold for that can be earned really fast by doing escorts in New Haven. (500 gp an escort with a delay of maybe 5 minutes between two.) If you start as a scribe, you can buy reags and scrolls to scribe your first spells when you wait for your next escort. Dont forget to sell your scrolls afterwards back to the npcs, to get gold to buy more reags. Not to mention, that starting with 49 inscription and doing the New Haven quest for it, will reward you with an undead slayer spellbook. Every third of fourth mage NPC is selling circle 4 spells. (At 49 inscription, crcle 4 would do some time.) That way you can build up int and mana reg (meditation + focus). If you end up with spare time (mana reg, waiting for npcs to restock scrolls + reags, waiting for your next escort) you can even use the evaluate int skill directly to evaluate the int of an npc.

 

[elianydd]

Thanks again for info, all.

I ended up buying a spellbook, which, by the way, the cheapest I could find was 15k gold (but it has a nice skill buff on it.) Unfortunately, most of the player vendors I saw were hawking their "BOD" and "SOT" things, and of course "rares" -- which, while profitable, are all in the big-number range and likely not something for new players. Had to really look just to find spellbooks at all, and then ended up in the Luna "mega-mall". (The only other vendor there that had "normal" spellbooks wanted FIFTY thousand for them... 8-o)

Anyway, I have my filled spellbook now. I did try out the dungeon chest thing anyway, because, well... did I mention that I have Lockpicking skill I'm working on, too? Did not get the crates to spawn anything, though. They stayed empty. Will investigate more over time, as I'll be back to dungeons many times in the coming days.

I also have since found and fought some caster mobs (gargoyles, in this case) that I was able to kill and they dropped scrolls, so I guess it IS doable. Although the gargoyles would likely make quick work of someone really new to the game and just out of New Haven with only 4th circle spells and skills in their 50s-ish. (Being familiar with UO from years gone by, and also 'cause I'm just like that, I had spent some EXTRA time in New Haven grinding skills above and beyond 50s, but I can certainly see most people ready to leave New Haven and try out the world as soon as they have their skills at 50 and equipped with their "reward" equipment. Plus, they'd be looking all over to find a VENDOR that had the scrolls since all the previous scrolls were on vendor. Anyway, I know, I should be posting this in another thread for suggestion instead. I just got blabbing again.)

Anyway, thanks all. Don't mind chatting here, but certainly the original question was well-answered, and I appreciate all the help and suggestions. Silly rhetorical question, but WHY DON'T THE NPCs GIVE ALL THIS KIND OF info/ADVISE?!? They've been doing little other than standing around for 10+ years; surely they've heard adventurers talking about all this, and would love to share their knowledge with others.....

Ah, well. Going back to the REAL WORLD (Ultima Online, of course) for now!

CORP POR! .....>fizzle<..... <sigh>

 

[Miri of Sonoma]

Welcome back!! I am glad you are enjoying yourself despite some minor setbacks!