New Player Tips

I was a Kickstarter who was never able to get into the game until just the past few months. Here is what helped me.

1. Don't follow the story at first - I kept trying to play SOTA as a single player game which meant seeking out and completing missions. The missions are not presently in a great light with polish and can be boring. Instead, exit from the Solace Bridge Outskirts zone at the start of the game and just explore random zones and cities. You will have much more fun.
2. XP Pool - When you gain experience, it goes into an XP pool first. If you have any skills set to training, the XP will go from the pool to those skills as you use them. If you are not training any skills, the XP pool will continuing growing.
3. Training Skills - Try not to train more than 3 skills at a time. The fewer skills you train at a time, the faster XP will move from the XP pool into those skills. Imagine a water tower. If one person turns on their faucet, the pressure is quite strong. If everyone turns on their faucets at the same time, the water pressure is weak.
4. Train only 2 or 3 skill trees - A lot of people recommend leveling all skills to 80. First, if you try to do this all at once, you won't see much progress. Second, there are many skills that are practically the same as the others. For instance you have Stone Fist, Flame Fist and Ice Fist. If you have one, then you don't really need the other. It is better to pick one and put all that XP into it.
5. Complementary Skills - There are no classes but there are complimentary skills that go together:
   1. Heavy Armor/Blades/Earth Magic (Strength is main attribute)
   2. Heavy Armor/Bludgeon/Earth Magic (Strength is main attribute)
   3. Heavy Armor/Polearm/Earth Magic (Strength is main attribute)
   4. Heavy Armor/Blades/Shield (Strength and Dexterity are main attribute)
   5. Light Armor/Ranged/Air Magic (Dexterity is main attribute)
   6. Light Armor/Pure Magic (Focus is main attribute)
6. Focus - Focus is important for non-magic users as well. It relates to glyph/skill usage.
   1. Focus->Heightened Awareness
   2. Focus->Inner Calm
   3. Focus->Train Intelligence
7. Magic Resistance - Fire, and Water have resistance skills that make you less vulnerable to Air, Fire, and Water magic respectively.
8. Unique Spells - Almost every skill tree has 1 or 2 skills that are worth it, no matter what your build. For instance, the Moon tree has a Shadow Form skill that lets you move while hidden. Earth Magic has innate skills that make you stronger. You want to pick them up, no matter your build.
9. Specialization - At the end of every skill tree, is a Specialization skill. For instance, at the end of the Blades tree, is the Blades Specialization skill. Training in it, will make all your Blade Skills much more potent. You can only train one specialization at a time. You can maintain two specializations at a time. It is important to know which two skill trees you want to really commit two.
10. Exponential XP - Past level 100, skills will start requiring an exponential amount of XP per level. This means that while it is theoretically possible to get a skill to level 200, it isn't likely in our lifetime. That means that at some point you will need to commit to a set of skills to push them past 100. Most people settle on 140 as the realistic max for a skill. The XP required for each level after 140 usually isn't worth the result.
11. Health, Strength, Focus, and Dexterity - These are all skills you have to train up just like the others. Here is where you can find them in the skill trees:
    1. Health - Strategy->Healthy
    2. Strength - Strategy->Strength
    3. Focus - Focus->Heightened Awareness
    4. Dexterity - Subterfuge->Dexterity
12. Town Criers - Visit the town crier for any new city you enter. They will give you 250 gold.
13. Oracle - Visit the Oracle once a day. Ask about test. Answer their question correctly to receive 500 gold and 10k XP. In order to know the correct answer, aske the Oracle about truth, love, and courage. The Oracle will tell you if you are following the path or not. You can use that to answer the test.
14. Artifacts - Artifacts are special lootable items whose name is orange, in your inventory. The temptation is to selling them for money. Save them. You can combine multiples of the same artifact to create a higher version. For instance, 4 common rings can be combined into 1 uncommon. The value is much higher.

Contact me in game, any time you need me.

 

It's not exponential and it's not after 100. The experience required for each level is: (previous level XP + 10) * 1.1 floor(previous_level_exp * 1.1 + 10)

 

Are you saying that this is wrong?

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet...HowOzRbsnpkkAha2_-7kOFLYQ/edit#gid=1990046646

 

If you go through the experience required for each level then you will get this:

Code:

[0,10,21,33,46,60,76,93,112,133,156,181,209,239,272,309,349,393,442,496,555,620,692,771,858,953,1058,1173,1300,1440,1594,1763,1949,2153,2378,2625,2897,3196,3525,3887,4285,4723,5205,5735,6318,6959,7664,8440,9294,10233,11266,12402,13652,15027,16539,18202,20032,22045,24259,26694,29373,32320,35562,39128,43050,47365,52111,57332,63075,69392,76341,83985,92393,101642,111816,123007,135317,148858,163753,180138,198161,217987,239795,263784,290172,319199,351128,386250,424885,467383,514131,565554,622119,684340,752784,828072,910889,1001987,1102195,1212424,1333676,1467053,1613768,1775154,1952679,2147956,2362761,2599047,2858961,3144867,3459363,3805309,4185849,4604443,5064897,5571396,6128545,6741409,7415559,8157124,8972846,9870140,10857164,11942890,13137189,14450917,15896018,17485629,19234201,21157631,23273404,25600754,28160839,30976932,34074635,37482108,41230328,45353370,49888717,54877598,60365367,66401913,73042114,80346335,88380978,97219085,106941003,117635113,129398634,142338507,156572367,172229613,189452584,208397852,229237647,252161421,277377573,305115340,335626884,369189582,406108550,446719415,491391366,540530512,594583573,654041940,719446144,791390768,870529854,957582849,1053341143,1158675267,1274542803,1401997093,1542196812,1696416503,1866058163,2052663989,2257930397,2483723446,2732095800,3005305390,3305835939,3636419542,4000061506,4400067666,4840074442,5324081896,5856490095,6442139114,7086353035,7794988348,8574487192,9431935921,10375129523,11412642485,12553906743,13809297427,15190227179,16709249906]

And it's actually floor(previous_level_exp * 1.1 + 10).

 

For completeness, the adventurer level and producer level are floor(previous_level_exp * 1.1 + 1000).

 

That is probably another extremely old and outdated page.

 

The numbers look correct.

 

Cool guide.
I would add: if you expect the game to feel like an MMO, you may want to join an active guild as early as possible. Guilds are where the fun is for the MMO lovers.