Really want to like this game but...

Thresdend

I really like the sci-fi atmosphere of this game. When I play, I feel like I am in a Robert A. Heinlein novel. It's a nice feeling. And from the description on the website, it looks like there is a lot of interesting lore, a vibrant economy, and other features.

However, I've played up to level six and just can't get through the tutorial. It's mindnumbingly boring. The quests are all completely linear. There are no "quest hubs" like you get in most questing games. Instead, you just do one quest after another until you get to a point where you have to gain some levels. At that point, you walk around trying to kill space rats. If you pull more than one rat, you die, lose exp, and have to spend even more time bored to death killing space rats.

I was trying to make progress by playing for 30 minutes a day. But eventually, I found that I couldn't stomach even that much. Still, I don't want to give up on the game.

Should I just wait for the beta to finish, then come back, hoping that there will be a better low-level experience in the game? Or is there something I can do to start enjoying it now?

Slander

A lot of what there is to enjoy is player driven. While there is a 'main story' questline, that's by far not the majority of content in the game. A lot of people find bashing mind-numbingly boring (I'm not one of them) and choose to get into other activities like hacking, ship combat, economy stuff (which, note, will be getting a major overhaul at an unspecified future point). And, of course, there's RP with other characters which is what I spend probably 80% of my time online involved in.

Thresdend

Suppose that I wanted to get into hacking, ship combat, and economy stuff, how would I go about doing that?

Aurelius

Thresdend said:

Suppose that I wanted to get into hacking, ship combat, and economy stuff, how would I go about doing that?

Well, unfortunately, you do have to currently get a bit past level 6 before you can really get involved in that. We definitely need to do a better job of providing a low-level experience for people who aren't that (or at all) interested in NPC bashing.

Thresdend

OK. Thanks, Aurelius. I'll just check back later.

I know in Achaea I had to get to level 10 before I could do much as well. But for some reason, that tutorial seemed far more compelling. I think the area was smaller? I remember being in a cave with spiders.

It seemed like it was over very quickly. And then I was able to move on and do other things...get into a city and guild...read news posts with politicians criticizing each other...I even got invited to a storytelling event where some players were telling stories to each other. I ended up not continuing with the game, but at least I had a pretty good idea what the game would have been like had I chosen to continue.

In this case, I feel like I still don't have any idea what it would be like to log into Starmourn each day and be a part of the world. And yet I'm really struggling to continue. I just wondered if there was some way to skip the tutorial and go wander off and do something else. But I'm sure you guys are still working on it, so maybe it will be better later. Or maybe I'll try again and be able to get through it.

Anyway, thanks for the quick response.

Slander

After a certain point (I wanna say level 10 but it's been forever since I created my character) the story continues and it's not as much a tutorial. Like every 5 or 10 levels you'll get a quest that continues it, but I think after the 10 story quest most things are unlocked, bounty hunting and tradeskills being the only exceptions I can think of right now.

Cubey

I feel like there's some strange assumption going on here that needs to be addressed.

Thresdend said:

It seemed like it was over very quickly. And then I was able to move on and do other things...get into a city and guild...read news posts with politicians criticizing each other...I even got invited to a storytelling event where some players were telling stories to each other. I ended up not continuing with the game, but at least I had a pretty good idea what the game would have been like had I chosen to continue.

In this case, I feel like I still don't have any idea what it would be like to log into Starmourn each day and be a part of the world. And yet I'm really struggling to continue. I just wondered if there was some way to skip the tutorial and go wander off and do something else.

You see, you already can do all these things. Nobody's forcing you to go through the main story quests, and though they serve as tutorials in that they introduce concepts such as hacking or spaceship combat, these concepts aren't gated behind the main story. Nothing is. So if you'd rather go and do something else - well, you can go and do something else.

As for grinding levels: yeah, IRE games are grindy. Most MUDs are, and unlike modern MMOs where most of your experience comes from questing here it's killing the same mobs over and over and quests are just a (usually relatively insignificant) bonus. It's just how these games are and it's definitely not for everyone. Compared to other IRE games, Starmourn's early levels go somewhat slower, but in exchange late levels go much, much faster. The curve is smoothed out and thanks to it Starmourn is the first IRE game where I've hit the level cap (and once it gets higher than 75, I will probably hit it soon again).

Beaux

Starmourn is not engaging enough for level gain at low levels to be slow and tedious. While other IRE games are grindy they are not so initially. There is a sense of accomplishment that is (mostly in gaining levels) earned early on. The idea may permeate that all these activities a player can participate in are present but in practice they are not. What you may think is possible and what players are experiencing are two totally different things. 

Cubey

The tedium isn't much different from other IRE games though. Earliest levels are slower, yes - but they still rise up pretty quickly in my experience, you will just spend more than an hour in the game's Minia/Lodi equivalent. And once you're past level 20 the smoothed out level curve really shows. I'd say reaching level 50 in Starmourn is significantly faster than 70 in other IRE games (the current level cap is 75 hence the differing numbers).

And even so, I saw many low level players engage with others meaningfully in ways that aren't just pve hunting. The only content that's really locked from them is pvp because you need level 60+ to meaningfully contribute to that. However, at the moment factional pvp is mostly dead anyway, so they're not missing out on much.

Oromoru

The main draw of these games and MUDs in general is not necessarily the PvE, or even the PvP, but the community and the fun you have being around other players.

I try not to take a WoW approach or one where I need to achieve certain goals to feel complete in Starmourn, I just hang out with the other funny and brilliant players and occasionally get up to being productive in some capacity.