A Beginner's Survival Guide to Monsters & Memories

INTRODUCTION

The aim of this guide is to provide prospective players the needed basic information about the game and its systems, so that their first couple of hours in the game do not feel frustrating. Basically, by the end of the guide you will be around level two and hopefully capable of continuing on from there on your own.

A list of beginner tips & tricks can be found [here].

CLASS

There are 18 classes in Monsters & Memories, filling four different roles: Tanks, healers, damage dealers and supports. Before picking your role/class, there are a few things worth considering:

Do you prefer classes with basic or advanced mechanics?

Archers, Fighters and Rogues are pretty basic mechanically, while Wizards, Necromancers, Spellblades have more involved mechanics.

Does having a spellbook matter?

Monsters & Memories does not allow classes to innately cast spells. Spells first need to be “inscribed” in a spellbook, the “memorized” onto your action bar. That means that when you die, since all equipped items and inventory stay on your corpse, you will lose access to spells until you either:

• Recover your spellbook from your corpse
• Memorize new spells from a backup spellbook you’ve stored in a bank
• Purchase a new spellbook and fill it with new spell scrolls that you’ve purchased

Are you going to be playing alone a lot?

Certain classes perform much better than others while solo. Druids, Bards, Necromancer, Elementalists, Enchanters and Beastmasters are the top solo classes in the game. Playing one of them will make sure you are not stranded in town or forced into the life of a fisherman while you wait for other players to log on. Inquisitors, Rogues and Fighters are among the weakest solo when solo.

Are you going to be playing with a partner?

If you’re going to be regularly playing with another person, there are several powerful team-ups that you can make use of, some of which also cover two of the major roles: Tank and healer.

Shadow Knight + Shaman: Will perform very well, due to the Shaman’s strong buffs for physical players, debuffs for enemies and crowd control. The Shadow Knight will be able to churn out excellent damage while tanking with a two-handed weapon.

Fighter + Shaman: Same as the above except unlike Shadow Knights, Fighters to do need to worry about mana and, as they progress, will get access to double and even triple attacks.

Inquisitor + Shaman: Starts out slower than the others due to the Inquisitor’s lower damage compared to other tanks but comes with a large set of tools for dealing with the more dangerous spell-caster enemies that you encounter in the later game.

Paladin + Shaman: The safest option. Paladins are incredibly defensive overall, capable of healing and curing, and even resurrecting their partner should things go awry. Slow but steady.

Druid + Enchanter: The Druid will bring healing and damage, while the Enchanter brings overwhelming control, which allows you to manage fights extremely well. A lot more dynamic and rewarding than pairings with a tank, but also more risky.

Beastmaster + Druid: The Beastmaster can bring a tank pet, like a bear, beetle or crocodile, while providing their own damage. The Druid brings the healing, damage and crowd control.

Necromancer + Druid: Probably the strongest solo class in the game, now with a well-rounded back-up, providing strong healing, damage, crowd control and utility.

These are just some options, of which you are free to mix and match a bit. If you want to play Beastmaster but your partner doesn’t want to play Druid, then a Shaman or Cleric is fine too.

TANK

• Fighter
• Inquisitor
• Paladin
• Shadow Knight

You draw the enemy’s attention and protect your group.

Fighter

The most straight-forward with no extra mechanics to worry about. You found an old shield one day and that’s all you need to do your duty.

Inquisitor

The anti-mage. Your spells and abilities are focused on hampering, countering and shutting down enemy spell-casters.

Paladin

The extra defensive option, loaded with heals, cures, utility and even a resurrection spell for when you clutch it out as the last man standing and have to bring your party back.

Shadow Knight

The offensive option, capable of draining life from the enemy, stealing their strength and adding it to your own, while the lost souls of fallen adventurers back you up.

HEALER

• Cleric
• Druid
• Shaman

You keep your adventuring party in the fight through heals, cures and protection spells.

Cleric

The premier healer in the game, with a wide variety of healing spells as well as weapon blessings, summon-able hammers and tools for dealing with the undead.

Druid

The most well-rounded healer, with access to both healing and damaging spells, as well as a unique mechanic to play around with their aligned Seasons increasing their potential in either direction.

Shaman

A healer with a focus on reactive healing, as well as strong buffs for physical characters, a wide variety of debuffs and damage-over-time spells.

DAMAGE DEALER

• Archer
• Beastmaster
• Elementalist
• Monk
• Necromancer
• Ranger
• Rogue
• Spellblade
• Wizard

With axe and sword you bring any who would threaten your fellows low.

Archer

The ranged specialist. Unlike the Ranger, Archers do not gain access to any melee attacks outside of simply auto-attacking. Their arrows are the lifeblood of their damaging potential and you will go through several thousands in a typical session, making picking up the Fletching tradeskill a worthwhile investment if you do not want to buy arrows.

Beastmaster

The pet specialist. Unlike the Elementalist or Necromancer, Beastmasters have a single persistent pet which levels up alongside them and gains access to unique abilities depending on its type. For instance, bears gain access to Mighty Roar, which increases the maximum health of anyone nearby by 10%. Wasps gain Lethargic Sting which reduces enemy attack speed and Bats can detect invisible enemies with their Sonic Pulse. Beastmasters use a wide variety of weapons, primarily two-handed weapons and dual-wielding.

Elementalist

A pet-focused spell-caster with huge support potential and access to a large repertoire of summoning skills, including bandages, weapons and utility items. They can summon pets of each of the four elements, each of which brings its own unique buff.

Water pets: Increases party mana regeneration

Earth pets: Increases party stamina

Fire pets: Grants a party-wide damage reflecting shield

Air pets: Grants party members a chance to strike twice with each attack

Monk

Eschewing weapons for mastery over body and mind, Monks are among the strongest candidates for pulling enemies in the game, a role with considerable responsibility. As they level up, they become able to suppress hunger and thirst, fall from greater distances unharmed and breathe underwater for longer.

Necromancer

Lords of bones who walk the balance between life and death, Necromancers are a pet-focused spell-caster that use their own life as a battery to increase their mana as fights drag on. Should they feel generous, they can even transfer their own life to their party members.

Ranger

The tracker that stalks their prey, wounds them from afar and kills them up close. Rangers, unlike Archers, do not become helpless should enemies come within arms reach. With access to stances that increase their ranged or melee potential, Rangers are a dynamic class with the weaknesses of the Archer shored up.

Rogue

The dagger in the shadows. Rogues are masters of backstabs, providing supreme melee damage, as long as someone is kind enough to distract the enemies and keep them facing away. When not taking lives, they are capable of picking both locks and pockets.

Spellblade

The arcane warrior who channels electricity and kinetic force through their swords. A damage dealer that turns the battlefield into a dance, launching attacks from afar before teleporting into the fray to deliver magic-infused deadly strikes with grace before bowing out a flash to continue the assault from safety.

Wizard

Wizards are the supreme masters of the arcane, capable of launching devastating attacks with lightning, frost and fire, as well as securing quick access through teleportation for their party to a wide variety of places across Eth-ur.

SUPPORT

• Bard
• Enchanter

You weave order from chaos and prevent your party from being overwhelmed.

Bard

Musicians who travel the land learning the epics and dirges of disparate peoples in order to inspire their party, no matter the composition. Bards are masters of supportive buffs in the form of songs capable of increasing physical abilities, movement speed, health regeneration and much, much more. All while their blades whistle a merry tune and their screams pierce their enemies’ skulls.

Enchanter

Puppet-masters that decide the flow of battle through a supreme selection of crowd control spells, including mesmerization, stun, root and more. They are the playmakers and showstoppers of your group, capable of turning a bad pull into a more manageable situation through clever target selection and the application of the right spell.

RACE

There are currently nine races available, with the remaining four planned racesbeing released periodically during early access.

The currently available races are:

• Deep Elf
• Deep Gnome
• Dwarf
• Gnome
• Goblin
• Halfling
• Human
• Ogre
• Wood Elf

The four races yet to be released, and the expected order of their release, are:

• Troll
• High Elf
• Var’nai
• Deep Dwarf

Each race has access to a limited selection of classes, with the exception of Humans who can be every class in the game.

STAT ALLOCATION

Each character starts with 10 stat points that can be freely distributed among the seven stats in the game. Depending on your race/class combination, you will start with different baseline stats and different maximums that you can reach with your 10 starting points.

The header contains a link my overview of starting stats, what they do and their distributions, if you want to see what is generally accepted as the priority for how you should spend your points. Ultimately however, 10 points spread across 3-4 stats won’t make or break your character and can easily be compensated for with gear. It only makes a difference for the very early game.

TRAITS

Traits are currently in the process of being reworked and when the reworked traits are released, you will be able to re-select your traits.

Each class can select four starting traits, two major and two minor, split between Combat traits and Non-Combat traits. These can provide some small advantage to you when you first start out, but if you simply wish to pick them based on adding some backstory to your character then that is okay too.

Some generally agreed upon good traits are:

Infravision/Ultravision (Major Non-Combat) if your race has access to either

Medic (Minor Non-Combat) for starting bandages and an extra six slot satchel (other traits also start with a pouch/satchel)

Magic Resistant (Major Combat) because it allows you to remove all harmful magic effects on you, including enemy crowd control.

DEITY

The deity system is not currently fully implemented. It currently only restricts the starting cities available to you. Once the system is fully implemented, you will be able to switch religion via in-game quests.

The currently available deities are:

• Agnostic
• Bulibyre, God of Decay
• Eltindra, Goddess of Travellers
• Erythar, God of Thievery
• Haradrel, God of War
• Krivea, Goddess of Harvests
• Maelsin Thrys, Goddess of Envy
• The Matswar, God of Death
• Relle, Goddess of Fertility
• Shalla, Goddess of Night
• Sorophal, God of Inspiration
• Tilustra, Goddess of Knowledge
• Trem, God of Commerce
• Trimminax, God of Plague
• Urzebol, God of Hatred
• Vespyra, Goddess of Magic
• Ygorath, God of Fear
• Yuum, God of Sanctuary

Other deities are mentioned in-game but are not currently able to be selected as a starting faith. They are:

• Estaire, God of Time
• Gyffre, God of Portals
• Illune
• Kravvin, God of Slaughter
• Nunavoth, God of Gluttony
• Porbor, God of Pots
• Velthorar
  
  

STARTING CITY

There are currently four starting cities available to you, depending on your combination of race, class and deity.

The four cities are:

• Night Harbor, Crown Jewel of the West
  • Most races can start here, depending on their deity selection.
• The Underdocks, Night Harbor’s Underbelly
  • All Goblins and Deep Gnomes start here, other races can start here depending on their deity selection.
• Faelindral, City of the Faelewyn
  • Only Wood Elves and Halflings can start here.
    • Note that not all races who travel to Faelindral will be accepted within the city and will need to improve their faction standing to be allowed in.
• Ail’vorith, Dark Capital of the Ail’trist
  • Only Deep Elves can start here.
    • Note that starting in Ail’vorith will make you kill-on-sight to all other city guards and will need to improve their faction standing to be allowed in.

Night Harbor and Faelindral can be found on the surface of the continent of Aêthoril, while Ail’vorith and the Underdocks are below, in the Deep.

Night Harbor is currently the most feature-complete starting city, so if your selection of race/class/deity allows it, I would recommend starting there for the best possible first experience in the game. Faelindral is a close second, with Ail’vorith and the Underdocks a somewhat distant shared third.

STARTING OUT

When you’ve finished creating your character and first load into the game, you should first open your inventory (default key: I). Each class starts out with a note of some sort, a stack of 20 bread rolls, a 20 waterskin and one or more scrolls.

The scrolls are your abilities. Right-click them to begin inscribing your spells and abilities into either your spellbook, if you are a class that relies on one, or your list of innate abilities. Once you have inscribed them, you will need to memorize them onto your ability bar (not your horizontal hot bar at the bottom middle of the screen, they can only be placed there after you have memorized them).

The bread rolls and waterskins will be automatically used to ensure you do not begin to suffer from hunger or thirst. Suffering from hunger will drastically reduce your passive health regeneration and suffering from thirst will drastically reduce your passive mana regeneration. You cannot die from hunger or thirst.

STARTER QUEST

A full list of beginner guides covering each class’ starter quest in each city can be found [here].

The note in your inventory will direct you to an NPC, who will begin your starting quest. It will typically list a name and a location.

For instance, a Human Bard starting out in Night Harbor will begin with a Fanciful Note. The Fanciful Note will invite them to come see Jamee Langris at Glimmermoon Hall. It will also mention that Glimmermoon Hall is “the Night Market’s premiere entertainment venue.”

As a new player, you will naturally not know where this is, but fret not! There are many ways to acquire information in Monsters & Memories, the most obvious of which is by simply wandering around until you find some kind of sign directing you towards the location mentioned in the note.

In the case of Night Harbor, entering the city through the gate in front of where you started will immediately present you with a signpost pointing towards Shaded Bloom Inn, Western Gate, Night Market and Twilight Harbor. The Night Market was mentioned in the note, so you would of course head in that direction and continue from there.

Alternatively, you can find a guard, hail them (default key: H) to politely begin a conversation and then ask them for directions by simple targeting them and writing “Where can I find [x]?”

In the case of the Human Bard, you would be asking “Where can I find Glimmermon Hall?” to which the guards nearest our starting location will reply something akin to “Glimmermoon Hall is in the Night Market. Look for the stage. It’s not too far southeast of here.”

You already knew it was near the Night Market, so that is nothing new, but you now have a direction: Southeast.

You can also inquire further:

Q: “Where is the Night Market?”

A: “The Night Market is near the Western Gate. It’s not too far to the east of here.”

Q: “Where is Jamee Langris?”

A: “Jamee Langris? He leads the Azure Veils over at Glimmermoon Hall. That’s not too far to the southeast of here.”

There is no compass in Monsters & Memories but there is a Sense Heading ability that all classes have. Open your abilities book (default key: B) and press the “Skills” button. You will see several abilities here, including “Crafting: Survival”, “Make Campfire” and “Sense Heading.”

Press Sense Heading and place it on your hot bar. The first time you use it, it will probably fail to work and you will be prompted with “You have no idea which direction you are heading.” Not very useful but it is a skill which you can level up, so keep pressing Sense Heading until you get an idea of which way you are facing. The more you use the ability, the better you will become at determining your direction, so keep pressing it regularly, even when just travelling.

Once you arrive at the location mentioned in your note, find the person mentioned within and hand them the note by simply left-clicking it to pick it up and then left-clicking on top of the NPC to open the “Hand In” window. Click the “Hand In” button to advance your quest.

For a Human Bard, you will be given Jamee’s List of Names, along with six items that you will be asked to deliver. Other classes will also have to make deliveries, such as Enchanters also starting out in Night Harbor but some will be asked to head out and gather items from enemies.

If you were asked to kill enemies in order to gather items, make sure to read the [FIGHTING] section of this guide.

If the NPC does not tell you where to find what they ask of you, you can always ask them or inquire with a guard.

In the case of the Human Bard, you can right-click Jamee’s List of Names to see who is to receive which item. It does not include any information about how to locate these NPCs but Jamee does tell you that you can ask him, should you wish to know more and that is exactly what you are going to do. Simple target Jamee and write “Where can I find [x]?”

For instance, if you ask “Where can I find Guard Jeskal?” Jamee will tell you a bit about Guard Jeskal and conclude with “[…] so you’ll find him at the Northern Gate.”

Jamee will not tell you where the Northern Gate is if you ask but a guard will. A wandering Watchman might tell you “The Northern Gate can be found quite a ways to the northeast of here. It leads out towards Sungreet Strand.”

If you saw the sign earlier pointing towards the Western Gate, you know which way west is and can deduce where northeast is from there. You should also continue to use and train your Sense Heading skill for when there are no signposts available.

Find your target hand in the item and continue until you are done.

FIGHTING

Monsters & Memories is by no means a high APM game like Guild Wars 2 or World of Warcraft. Combat is designed to be slow and methodical, and punishing of mistakes. The game will not directly tell you how strong enemies are, for this you will have to “consider” them. Target an NPC and consider them to see a description of their disposition towards you, as well as the most likely outcome of if you were to engage them in combat, all in a coloured text.

Level & Disposition

Green text indicates that the target is far below your level.

Blue text indicates that the target is slightly below your level.

White text indicates that the target is equal to your level.

Yellow text indicates that the target is slightly above your level.

Red text indicates that the target is far above your level.

Their dispositions can be either: Seething, Disdainful, Uneasy, Indifferent, Amicable, Kindly, Warmly and Comrade.

NPCs who seethe at the sight of you, will attack you on sight.

NPCs who disdain you will not attack you on sight but may refuse to talk to you.

NPCs who are uneasy towards you will allow you to use their services.

NPCs who indifferent towards you do not provide anything special.

NPCs who are amicable (or higher) towards you will sell you special rewards from their faction’s quartermaster.

It is important to choose your target well. There can be enemies who will attack you on sight sprinkled in among enemies who will not, so keep your eyes open and consider every type of enemy nearby. Yellow enemies can easy be deadly in a one-on-one fight, so start by fighting enemies whose consideration text is white, even if it they are not required for your starting quest. Levelling up even just once can make a huge difference.

To engage enemies, you can open with your abilities or simply walk up to enemies and begin auto attacking (default key: Q) if your abilities are currently on cooldown. It may be wise to rebind your auto attack key to something else. I use the Tilde (~) key to the left of 1.

Note that it is possible to attack every NPC in this game, even the guards and merchants in towns, so be mindful of not pressing your auto attack or any of your offensive abilities while targeting a NPC you do not intend to fight.

Looting

Right-click an NPCs corpse to begin looting them. You can right-click to automatically transfer their drops to a free slot in your inventory. You start with limited inventory and not everything in the game stacks, so keep an eye on your inventory.

If you were previously tasked with killing enemies for your starter quest, you were probably asked to gather some items, which you were asked to put inside a special container. In order to advance your quest, you will need to have only the items you were asked to gather inside the special container you were given before it will allow you to press “Combine” in order to create the item that you need to deliver back to your quest NPC. Typically this will turn an item called a “Satchel for Skeleton Parts” into a similar item called a “Full Satchel for Skeleton Parts.”

SELLING

Unlike in most MMORPGs, vendors in Monsters & Memories will not happily accept your boar entrails or mismatched set of goblin socks. A butcher might take the entrails and a tailor might take the socks however. You will be required to explore around a bit and find appropriate vendors for the items you pick up from enemies in order to maximize your profits.

This can be quite tedious at first but once you know a vendor’s location, you will able to quickly sell your items in the future. The added time to sell wares from travelling around will not be more than a minute or two, even less if you have access to movement speed buffs.

There are so-called “greedy” vendors who will buy every item in your inventory. The downside being that they will only give you a fraction of what a more specialized vendor would. For the various cities, these vendors are:

• Night Harbor: A Shift Gnome, found outside the Western Gate.
• Night Harbor: A Shady Peddler, found in an alley of the Night Market.
• Night Harbor: A Greedy Halfling, found in the Sojourner’s Camp.
• Night Harbor: A Suspicious Salesman, found in an alley near the Northern Gate.
• Night Harbor: Clint the Innocent, found outside the Northern Gate.
• Faelindral: A Shade Trader, found near the stables.
• Faelindral: A Shifty Elf, found near the fallen elderspire tree.
• Ail’vorith: Supplier Jul, found in the Foreign Quarter.
• The Underdocks: Gaden Shale, found near the Citadel.

POINTS-OF-INTEREST

Night Harbor’s Bathhouse

Found just inside the Western Gate. Bathing will give you a 30 minute +10 buff to your Charisma score.

Night Harbor’s Black Feather Bazaar

Found behind the Concourse of Souls necropolis. Home to several merchants that you might not ordinarily find.