Mythbusting Siege, a guide for new players - also shard FAQ

Below is a copy from the original thread:


I'm making this post here because I think it would be good to have on the Siege boards. Sometimes reading around the boards and UHall there are some misinterpretations on what Siege is. While Siege is not for everyone, I'd like to give the oppurtunity for people who are curious to be better informed about Siege more than the UO website can explain.

I'd like everyone in the thread to seriously put in their information bits about Siege's ruleset, how the environment is, where the people are, whatever beneficial information you can provide to those who are interested in playing Siege. It can be even just ONE thing. I would like to make this a Siege community effort moreso than just me representing Siege.

When I have enough random information, I will compile them into a coherent guide about Siege, have it confirmed and proofread by the community of Siege, and submit it to Stratics to update their Siege page with.

Please correct me if I provide any mistaken information.

7/23/06
Wrote this Guide.

7/24/06
Added more info about RoT, updated article about collecting info and final draft. Added this news thing and some bold headlines. Added a tidbits about RP and the importance of crafters.
At 5pm EST: Rewrote the whole article into something with order. This is currently the first rough draft of sorts. Still have yet to add the two last sections.
At 5:15pm EST: Fixed tidbit on PBDs and CBDs. Added a line about the economy in the basics section. Changed "Crafting and Gear" section to the "Crafting, Gear, and Economy" section.
At 9:38pm EST: Fixed info about rot gain times.

7/26/06
Began work on the "Crafting and Economy Section" as well as the "Random Player Tips and Watching Your Own Back". Both still need some work. Changed 'article' to 'guide'. Added tidbit about recalling and SJ in the basics section. Added some underlines under titles.

7/27/06
Added bit in the introduction that you can't see Siege unless you renounce your young player status.

8/7/06
Fixed some RoT info.

8/14/06
Added image title. Soon I will add more information to the last few sections.

9/13/06
Been busy with college lately. Added missing tibit on that you cannot buy skills from NPCs in the skill section. Still working on the last section and more.


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MYTHBUSTING SIEGE
Debunking the myths and rumors about Siege
An informative guide on what Siege is all about

Compiled by Masuo Kenji
Information given and added upon by the community of Siege

Thanks goes to ALL the players of Siege. I wouldn't be playing here or writing this guide if it wasn't for you.


~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
I. Introduction
II. The Bare Basics
III. Community and Interaction
IV. The RoT system and Training Skills
V. Crafting, and Economy
VI. Random Player Tips and Watching Your Own Back
VII. Hotspots and places
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I. Introduction

I decided to write this guide after reading some misinterpretations on the UO Stratics boards by other players on what Siege is. The purpose of this guide is to "bust" the very myths and rumors circulating about Siege, and inform either a new or production shard player with more current information than the UO website or Stratics pages can explain. I intend to show people that Siege isn't an "Empty Shard" nor "That place full of PKs". I have broken down this guide into segments, detailing different aspects of Siege in enough detail so somone willing to give Siege a try knows what to expect out of it. It is highly reccomended you read through everything in this guide, nothing should be missed.

Please note, if you are playing on a new account, you will not see Siege on the UO shard list. You must log onto a production shard and first say "I renounce my young player status".

II. The Bare Basics

You might have read on the UO website, Stratics pages or boards that Siege is the "Veteran" or "PvP" shard. While some aspects of these two titles are true, Siege isn't clearly defined as either anymore. Because of many major patches and changes on the production shards, there has been some "trickle down" coming from the production shards to Siege. With that, Siege is now considered to be an "Alternative" shard-- a different ruleset that gives a whole different playstyle alltogether. This ruleset isn't for everyone, especially for people who enjoy the extreme safety of Trammel, but it can be more alive, engaging, and rewarding for a lot of people. Some are quoted saying that Siege is the "Best form of UO you can play today".

Let's get down to basics.

Siege is an all Feluccan ruleset shard. What does that mean? It means that on whatever facet you're on (even Ilshenar, Malas, and Tokuno), you are attackable on sight by anyone. There is no Trammel facet here. In Siege's alternate history, the citizens and soldiers of Britannia defeated the forces of Minax at the battle of Trinsic, however with heavy casualties. This is different from what happened on the production shards, where the forces of Britain lost and were forced to retreat into Trammel. If you actually visit Trinsic on Siege, the whole city is littered with debris with some ruined buildings.

Where can you be safe? The only places where you are guaranteed a large degree of safety is in guard zones. Most of these guard zones encompass most towns and cities. While a red character can enter the guard zone, if they commit any crime of any sort they are prone to being guardwhacked on the spot, or having guards called upon them. Remember though, if you attack a red as a blue character in a guard zone first, there will be a two minute window where the red can fight in self defense, and guards will not come to your aid.

Due to the Siege ruleset, NPC vendor prices vary and is three times the normal production shard rate. You cannot sell wares or items to NPCs either. This is to encourage player-based economy. Because of this, the economy here is much more stable than the production shards.
The flexible price/500 stock vendor system does not operate on Siege, since you would never be able to reduce the price. All items sell on the 'stock building' method. 20 items starting point, doubling at each restock to a maximum of 999.

Also remember, you cannot recall or sacred journey here. Have magery or get a mage friend if you want to travel around, using the gate travel spell. You could also take the scenic route as well, on mount or foot.

Unlike the production shards, Siege does not have insurance. However, it has something called a "Siege blessing". With your Siege blessing, you can bless ONE item. You may change this at any time, but be aware of what item you're going to bless. This is the closest you'll probably get to insurance, without any cost. So when you die you can still have that cool hat or special pitchfork in your backpack. You might have read some outdated information on PBDs (Personal Bless Deeds) being given to new players, but this was changed with a patch and replaced with the Siege bless. You can however get CBDs as BOD rewards, and can be only used on items without magical properties or high resists than the norm. The latter can be attempted currently, but there is a great chance you be paged on by another player and have it's blessing removed by a GM without any forewarning. If you heard any rumors about people running with fully blessed items, this is completely false. While there are a few people wearing some 7th Anniversary items like the Samurai helm and Ember leggings, you don't need them to compete. There are many people without these items and fight well without them. Some actually fight near naked as well! You will commonly see players running around with 1-2 powerful items but the majority will be GM armor pieces made by crafters. Most people wear something that they can afford to replace quickly without hassle. If you die several times the cost of replacing your armor is actually CHEAPER than paying the full total insurance fee on production shards. Especially if you're in a guild.

III. Community and Interaction

Like I mentioned earlier, Siege is sometimes affiliated as the "PvP or Veteran" shard. It is instead an alternative ruleset shard. Siege does and can actually apply to the many flavors of players. Siege at it's core is geared towards people who want a challenge, connect with others to achieve common goals, and want to be in a place that feels more "dynamic" with more risk, reward, and conseqences. If you PvM, PvP, Craft, Treasure hunt, RP, etc., there are many likeminded folks and well-rounded to specialty guilds on Siege that can apply to you. While PvP is and can be encountered on a basis, you are not forced to PvP. Remember, over here not all Blues are good and Reds are evil. Some reds can actually be the most helpful or interesting people you'll meet.

For PvM/PvPers, there are many guilds that are willing to back you up and fight alongside you. Most guilds do some sort of PvM, in the form of spawns, peerless, or just farming supplies. For PvP, a majority of the guilds here are also into some form of PvP, either directly (large field battles, Factions) or indirectly (Champ spawns). Champ spawns are raided 30-50% of the time, unlike the production shards where they are always raided.

If you're a crafter you should seriously consider Siege as the shard to play on. There's plenty worth making and selling here on Siege, because the PvP community is in continuous need of new armor, potions, scrolls, etc. Player vendors are highly valued here. Since people are limited to single characters (some have multiple accounts though), and you cannot sell to NPC vendors, you must make use of players buying your wares to obtain gold. Other players will be in great need of your skills.

If you RP, there are many guilds that are heavily into roleplaying and interact with each other on a daily basis. The Citizens of Wispwood Shire, Knights of the Silver Serpent, and even Vampiric Embrace do some form of RPing to some extent. There are also Orc and Savage guilds around Siege if you're looking for something completely different.

If you're looking for people, most are living or wandering around player towns (I'll get into more detail later on). While the popluation of Siege isn't as large as some of the production shards, you'll find people here commonly in these areas. What Siege can lack in it's population, it makes up for it tenfold with it's community. Stonehaven and Iantown are around Umbra, the vampire nest in Homare (advised you stay away from unless you either want to be 'purified' or embrace the disease and join the forces of evil), Wakatown near Makoto, the Shire around Yew, the Town of Shadowmire near Luna, Myth Village and Wintermoor way far east of the map from Luna near the mountains. There are many other playertowns, and I'm sure a lot of the Siege population would be happy to tell you about these places on Siege and their location. Please, if you decide to visit any of them, proceed with caution. Strangers are either greeted with open arms or with an arrow in the back.

It is heavily advised to stay away from Luna. While a popular spot on production shards, this place is a death zone on Siege. Step outside the guardzone and you're fresh meat for anyone.

With the tight community of Siege, there are some things you should follow. It is suggested you treat everyone you meet with respect but a wary eye. The response you receive can be quite random. The reason why this is suggested, is not only because it's the "nice thing to do", but it will help you in the long term. If you make many friends, it will be in your benefit. A lot of people know "Who's who" here. If you create a bad name for yourself, you'll be branded with such a reputation for the rest of your life on Siege. That is, untill you change your name or make a new character, but people eventually will find out anyways. It is up to you who you will eventually plege allegiance to, as well as your actions, but always keep in mind of your goals and what kind of name you want to make of yourself.

Also, when you join a guild of your choice, you will obtain whatever reputation that is branded by the community onto yourself. Be aware of that.

Lastly, if you are interested in trying out or playing on Siege, the best place to start is with the NEW guild. They are a neutral guild that's here to help familiarize yourself with the shard for 30 days of membership. Their website is at: http://www.siegeperilous.net , and put a post on the their forums that you want to join NEW. A lot of guilds honor and donate to NEW and are willing to help. You are however not fully safe from everyone that can attack you. It is a great learning tool and jump start here. Make use of it.


IV. The RoT System and Training Skills

Please note: You cannot buy skills from NPCs on Siege.

"I hear on Siege, it takes FOREVER to train up skills! How long till I have a complete character?"

On Siege, we have the RoT (Rate over time) system for gaining skills. Unlike production shards where you can reach a GM skill under a few hours, skills are valued here and require some amount of patience and effort to gain. You must have good foresight into your future character template.

Rate over Time system On Siege Perilous and Mugen, the RoT (Rate over time) system applies for gaining skill points above 70.

• Skill points for skills less than 70 points will gain as normal shards.
• Skill points for skills between 70 and 79.9 points have a time limit of 5 minutes between points gained. (250 minutes min to gain 5.0 skill)
• Skill points for skills between 80 and 89.9 have a time limit of 8 minutes between points gained. (320 minutes min to gain 4.0 skill)
• Skill points for skills between 90 and 99.9 have a time limit of 12 minutes between points gained. (360 minutes min to gain 3.0 skill points)
• Skill points for skills between 100 and 120 have a time limit of 15 minutes between points gained. (750 minutes min to gain 5.0 skill points)
• Players will be allowed to gain 15 stat points a day. For stats only RoT resets once per day, at 8pm EST/1am GMT.

The RoT system actually helps slower skills have better chances at guaranteed gains. With slower skills like poisioning, training it in RoT saves you a lot of time and gold.

V. Crafting and Economy

"If you want to be a merchant or just enjoy a working economy siege is the only shard to play. Little to no pvp necessary." - Lady Ikichet, Siege Perilous

Siege has the most stable economy out of all the shards. Due to it's independent state, ruleset, and heavy player interaction, the economy of Siege is very stable and attractive to crafters, traders, and even normal players. Mentioned in the basics section, players cannot sell any items or wares to NPC vendors. NPC vendors also sell their items and wares at around three times the amount, so newer characters are faced with the dillema of higher gold costs. While more combat oriented characters can obtain gold from creatures, pure crafters are faced with a large problem. With the way tool decay works (pretty fast), crafters would have to spend a lot of gold on tools unless they can make them themselves. For new crafters starting out on Siege it is highly reccomended you either join NEW (mentioned in the community section) or a crafter guild like the Ianstorm Alliance [I^A]. Crafters though, are an asset in ANY guild. On siege you can pretty much instantly and continuously be an active part of the economy buying and selling goods. Cloth, arrows, Gm armor and other things that are worthless on most shards are highly bought, sold, and traded on a daily basis here, while higher level things such as tailor bod rewards artifacts rares and uber weapons are also delt with much frequency.

You can make a lot of gold either gathering resources or making common things that everyone needs. Two basic things, for example, are leather and wood. Leather is highly desired and makes up 90% of the armor players wear. Wood can be turned into bolts and arrows, which are in great demand by PvP archers all over the shard. There are many opportunities to make gold here, make use of it! Make sure you communicate to people that you're selling wares and people will come to you to buy them.

Armslore grants a bonus to exceptionally crafted weapons and armor at a rate of 1% per 12.5 points. Maximum 8%

On weapons this bonus is applied to the damage increase property, meaning at GM armslore an exceptionally crafted weapon will have a damage increase of (43%)
On armor the bonus is applied to resists and is spread randomly: eg at GM armslore the bonus to resists is (8%), these could be applied all to one resist or split between several.

VI. Random Player Tips and Watching Your Own Back

Even though this guide mentions a lot of positive things about Siege, remember that Siege is far from a perfect utopia of any sort. Siege was created in mind to be a dynamic and challenging world. Sometimes Siege can feel very harsh and unforgiving to a newer character. If you are willing to give Siege a try, remember to:

-Be communicative and interact!

If you act solo or don't interact with people, you won't be able to enjoy the most out of Siege. If you are lost, don't know what to do, the NEW guild is a good choice. You get to meet a lot of similar folks and make connections with them. Either that or lookup the many guilds of Siege and ask to join. With a good guild behind you, the world of Siege will really open up. Participate in shard/guild events, do a spawn, peerless, or pvp field fight. It's up to you to jump in.

-Have the ability to self insure, and learn how to survivie!

While you cannot insure items like on the production shards, make sure you can "self insure" yourself with spare armor, weapons, throwaway jewels and items. Don't waste anything, it might become of use sometime and save you gold. If you are a combat character, farm some gold for yourself so you can buy items to replace in case you ever lose your stuff or get dry looted. GM armor is good enough to get you going. Become a better player without relying on gear. Also, think of how you can survive. Hiding and Stealth, smoke bombs if you have Ninjitsu, invisibility mage spell, and invisibility potions are great aids to keep you out of danger. You could also fight your way out if you're capable enough.

-Make friends, treat people with respect.

While this is entirely up to you, like mentioned before the people of Siege know each other pretty well. If you make many friends and allies, it will be in your great benefit. Treat people with disrespect, and some will turn away from you. It all depends what your goals are. If you wish to become a servant of evil and misery, there are some groups here that might be attractive to you. As a new character, though, it's best to remain neutral in all matters until you gain a good grasp of Siege's atmosphere.

Player Tips
more to be added...

When I started Siege, I started with the template I was most comfortable with. A tamer. Another reason I chose a tamer is that she would be my money-maker. Siege has a very healthy economy and because of that, there is a very healthy buy/sell/trade market here between players.

The key to equipping yourself is to 1. Make enough gold to self insure and replace the nice items you eventually WILL lose and 2. Don't be afraid to spend your gold. It isn't much good to you just sitting in the bank, so you might as well spend it to help you enjoy your game. Using your gold to purchase items from other players is comparable to having insurance. Once you can accept that, life on Siege becomes easier and it takes the "sting" out of losing nice items. I hoard the items my character's need. So what if I just lost 150k worth of equipment? I've got my replacement's at home and it's just a matter of taking a few minutes to go put it together and get back to having more fun. "Play like there is no tomorrow."

Almost everything has value on Siege. I often collect things that I don't need, because I know there is a market for the items. On regular shards, players simply overlook 0/2's and 0/3's because they aren't worth anything there. On Siege, these item's are good "throw away" items that other's are willing to buy. There are lots of items that fall into this "throw away item" category and players who need them are often willing to buy them in bulk. Minor artifact's are another example of this as are SCNP weapons and many other items.

I highly recommend these strategies for making your gold, so you can equip yourself with nicer items, without insurance.

~Kat



Thief avoidance:

Unlike most shards, thieves actually are active and fun on siege. Almost nothing is insured or blessed, so there's actually stuff to steal. This is particularly true because many Siege members migrated here from other shards and have never learned how to avoid thieves.

There's a number of methods:

1. keep all your deathrobes, dye them black, keep your stuff in a black dyed bag in your pack, keep the pack open. Easy for you to get to, tough for a thief to find - particularly if you put the drobes on top of the pack.
2. stacking. put all your stuff in a small pouch, keep it open, but drop all your runebooks and spell books on top of it. Again, hard to find.
3. clutter. never throw away anything. thieves hate a cluttered pack.
4. trapped chests. These are awesome. Use a GM explosion tinkered chest, when locked correctly any attempt to open them causes explosion damage to the thief (or you if you aren't careful). Put your stuff in the chest, keep it open, and set it to explode (there's an essay about this on stratics, or just experiment). A GM tinkered explosion trapped chest will almost always kill a thief.

That said, if you are a thief, you'll find that very few siege players use any of these methods and, thus, are ripe for the pickings.

~Newt



I would echo Kat's comments... and only add this;

There are a good portion of people who play Siege who have a "treat people like you are treated" mentality when it comes to looting. Meaning that if you want to be looted less, or light looted.... then you should not loot, or only light loot.

If you are someone who enjoys dry-looting every kill... then you can certainly expect to eventually be dry-looted almost every time.

Personally, I rarely loot... in fact I can remember every time I did. Some might say that's because I never get the chance... and while it's true that I lose more than I win... looting is not really part of my game. I think a lot of players from production shards would be surprised how often they will not be dry-looted here if they come here and become known as someone who doesn't dryloot. Of course there are people here that dryloot every time, cut up your armor, and dance a jig on your dead mount's corpse... but you can decrease the number of times
this happens by not acting like that yourself when you get the chance.

~Ginsu



Even playing uo for years on Chesapeake pre tram, I had forgotten about DECAY and breakage my own self. Also over years of time ya get so much gp and so established you do forget what it is also like to be nearly penniless and newbie again like restarting here on Siege.

Everything was breaking faster than my crafter skills were upping. The shovels, the sewing kits, the tinker tools all broke, tinker was still too low to remake what I needed. In the end my 1k of gp given to new chrs. was gone, toss in being pkd newbie drylooted of some tools and one day I found NO gp left nor skill to even remake me a stupid shovel. I was about ready to quit this shard feeling downtrodden and broke and how is a crafter to UP skill tool less ? I had really forgotten how fast things decay or become broken and they seemed to do so even faster on Siege and of course even a simple shovel no blacksmithing skill so no bods to get more shovels, tink not high enough to make the darn shovel, broke..............ready to quit. I wanted to GM the mining for the carpenter I was to become *not for smithing*. Out of tools, out of gp was not aware yet to even think to sell cloth, even so my daggar broke, scissors broke, every tool broke. I probably should have made the tinker skill higher to begin with but I did not. So I was ready to quit Siege broke and no tools. I really did forget how fast stuff breaks here. Twas then I ran into a lady named Shalimar of NEW. She said "What do ye need ? " I said " I would be able to stay here, if I can just get me a shovel, tinker tools, and a sewing kit or two again to at least get my skill up to MAKE the darn tools myself. "

She took me to NEW guild. The rest is history. I was able to STAY HERE cuz someone was kind enough to give me more tools to go on. I really forgot how fast things break here..and so ye might want to add that in ye info too, stuff decays stuff breaks, yet find someone kind here and ya may be given a shovel or something to keep on keeping on ..that in the end will enable you to stay here and to then go gm or better all ye skills, to STAY !

~Queen Zen aka Miranda/Hughes of Gray



A few important things to let people know....There is no Trammel here...I have met plenty of people that come here trying to find Trammel. The other thing is recall and sacred journey are not alternative modes of transportation. Also bracelets of binding do not work here. You can only gate, walk, run or stealth! Also there are places on Seige that you cannot gate in and out of that you can on a production shard. If you do not wish to walk your character template will want to have some magery.

And even though for the most part you cannot be attacked in towns be aware that it an be done...if a group chooses to take you down a group may sacrifice one or two for the benefit of taking you down and use someone not attacking you as a looter. Just be aware what you wear or have in your pack it is always possible to lose...it is a part of the suspense.

~Princess Doom

One thing I have to mention about the above skill times. The time in minutes, is if you are doing one skill only. You can train, all your skills, or some at the same time.

Example, as I was doing a mule, I would do 5 skills at a time. When I was between 70 and 80, I could do each skill every 5 mins, for a total of 1.0 each, and a time of 50mins in the game.

Now from a purely non pvping female perspective....AHEM.... !!! Ya see there are these critters in the world and they have to DO what they instinctively feel they have to do..........they CROW a lot.

There be those that sit in faction compounds and ....they have to crow....



Then there be those that can only crow in guard zones...



Some of em just crow sitting in da houses ....



Some of em crow out there in the field somewhere...



Some of em endlessly fence sit, indecisive lots but they also crow...



Some of em gotta crow even if they always only in a gank squad never alone...



Some of em are just hot air.............



There be one or two that may never quite have their act together...but they think they do so...they will crow anyways...........



It is Siege...and they apparently are males...soooooo there no way to silence em they be roosters..so it ain't gonna happen that they ever stop crowin' unless..............



*exits off to her old folks home to the sound of roosters crowin in the dark*

i found that the best way to look at siege is 5 laws of hardship
(1) Be ready to die lots. its not how you die its how you get back on your feet that counts. remember being looted should not be the end of the world it should be just an inconvenience.

(2)anything you take out in the world should be replaceable. any thing that is worth good gold and is stealable or lootable should stay in your bank/house. ps leaving things on the ground in a bag hid somewhare is a good way to mine and gold hunt so many times before i got a bag of sending it saved me from dry loots. in hot zones.

(3)remember this is pvp country. if you see a red dont think that his an ass. this is his country your a stranger to him he can or will kill you.that is what siege was built for same as bing killed by a monster or anything else.

(4)evrything in this games worth something from 10 arrows in a chest to a potion on a etton.gold is hard to come by and nothings cheep keep evrything fing a good guy with a vender spot can help.

(5)find a good guild to play with. even a red guilds can train you how to pvp and monster hunt with skill. and on siege its not like other shard guilds. thay probly know the guys thay kill and are frends and spown together on the weekdays. and kill each other on weekends

* * *

The Thief Forum FAQ
Section 7: A Thief's Guide to Siege Perilous
UO Thief | The Thief Forum FAQ

* * *

UO Thief | 7.1: Choosing to be a thief on Siege is a big commitment, isn't it?
UO Thief | 7.2: When I create my thief, which skills should I choose?
UO Thief | 7.3: What do I need to know about training skill between 0.0 to 30.0?
UO Thief | 7.4: What do I need to know about training skill between 30.0 to 70.0?
UO Thief | 7.5: What do I need to know about training skill in RoT (70.0+)?
UO Thief | 7.6: Why do I need to plan out my template from the start?
UO Thief | 7.7: How much Magery should I have on my template?
UO Thief | 7.8: Are Disarm Thieves worth making on Siege?
UO Thief | 7.9: Playing a thief on Siege is hard, isn't it?
UO Thief | 7.10: Which items should I horde? Which daily items are the most important on Siege?
UO Thief | 7.11: Which item should I use my Siege Bless on? Shadow Dancer Leggings?
UO Thief | 7.12: Are there any items that are more valuable on Siege than they are on other shards?
UO Thief | 7.13: I logged on and only found a couple people in Luna. Where is everyone?
UO Thief | 7.14: I logged on and didn't find anyone at Yew Gate. Where does everyone PvP?
UO Thief | 7.15: How do I make an explosion trapped crate?

Someone really needs to update the RoT info and remove the time gain system cap being mentioned.