The Greystone Chronicles: Book One: Io Online

by Dave Willmarth

  When a player logs into the game for the first time, they must create an avatar (also called characters, or toons). If you’ve seen the movie “Avatar” then you get the general idea. Only instead of growing a body for a player to inhabit, taking several months or years, the avatars in the game are created virtually in minutes. Players control their avatar through the manipulation of a User Interface, or UI. This displays everything from a location map, or the name of a player in front of them, to quest logs, and detailed descriptions of their avatars.

  Avatars have what are called statistics (stats) that determine almost everything about them. The most basic are Health, Mana, and Stamina. Health is the number of health points (hp) they have. In this game, it is measured by a sliding bar at the top of the UI. An avatar may start with 100 health points, as an example. If they are bitten by a wolf, or shot with an arrow, they take damage, which costs them hp. If their hp bar drops to zero, their avatar dies.

  Mana is a measure of a player’s magical battery, so to speak. Mana is also measured in a bar, just like health. Mana is for spell casters. Each spell they cast costs a certain number of mana points. So to follow my previous example, a mage might have 100 mana points. He casts a fireball spell at an angry goblin, and that spell costs 20 mana. The mage is now down to 80 mana points. When their mana reaches zero, they can no longer cast magic.

  Lastly, Stamina is similar to mana, only it is a measure of physical energy. Every avatar has a stamina bar located at the top of their UI along with health and mana bars. When a player exerts themselves in a strenuous manner (running, swinging a heavy sword, climbing a steep mountain) they use up stamina points. If they drain their stamina to zero, they can no longer move about, and must sit and wait for it to recharge.

  All three major stats (health, mana, stamina) recharge naturally if a player ceases to use them. Just like in real life, when you sprint until you can’t breathe. If you sit and chill for a few minutes, you can get up and do it again. The three main stats can also be instantly recharged via the consumption of health, mana, or stamina potions. Think 5-Hour Energy shots that tempt you at every gas station checkout. There are also potions, and magically cast ‘buffs’, that temporarily increase the other attributes. Like +5 to strength for 2 hours.

  In addition to the basic three stats, there are several primary stats or ‘attributes’ that affect an avatar’s ‘build’. In this book, those are Strength, Agility, Dexterity, Luck, Charisma, Intelligence, and Wisdom. These terms are pretty self-explanatory. What you need to know is that as players level up, they receive attribute points, which they can assign to one of the stats above, increasing their avatar’s performance accordingly. So for example, an increase to strength would allow them to lift heavier objects, carry more weight, or more easily muscle around a sword and shield to overpower an enemy. Increases to intelligence would mean an increase in their available mana, or allow them to learn more difficult spells, etc.

  Players must first select a race. There are several to choose from. Human, Elf, Dwarf, Orc, Ogre, Goblin, the list goes on. And there are options to play hybrids. Like a half-orc, half-ogre. If you do not know what elves, orcs or goblins are, I really don’t think this book is for you.

  The choosing of race is important, as it impacts the available playing style for the avatar. For example, a player who wants to swing a large club and bash smaller players into the ground might choose an ogre for their size and strength. However, if they later decide they’d like to focus on magic casting, which is based on intelligence and wisdom, their poor, slightly smarter than a rock, ogre is just out of luck.

  Which brings me to the general classes. While there are lots of different subclasses of avatars in the game, they all boil down to a basic few.

  Tanks: Tanks are pretty much what they sound like. They are considered a melee class, dependent mostly on stamina to power their abilities (though some, like paladins, also use magic). They typically focus on strength and stamina. These are players wearing heavy armor, normally carrying big shields, that can take a lot of damage without dying. The role of the tank is to get, and hold, the attention (aggro) of the enemy, and absorb abuse while they, or their allies, do as much damage as possible, as quickly as they can, to the enemy. This is commonly referred to as damage per second, or dps. Some of my favorite people play tanks.

  Melee DPS: Again, just what it sounds like. These are physical fighters who prefer to do their damage up close and personal. This could be warriors with massive two-handed swords, or a sword/shield combination. It could be monks, who punch and kick their foes into submission. Or rogues, who sneak up behind enemies to stab them in the back, then run away. This is a mixed bag, with some focusing on strength and stamina, and others on agility and stamina. They wear varying types and weights of armor, from heavy plate or chainmail for warriors, to light leather for rogues and monks.

  Casters: This is one of two divisions of what’s called “ranged dps”. These are your mages, sorcerers, wizards, and such. They use magic as their primary offensive and defensive tool. Their focus is on intelligence and wisdom. As a result, they have low strength and stamina (which means a smaller health bar). Dangerous at a distance, they generally hover near the back of any battle and do their damage from there. They are often easily killed if an enemy gets in close, or they run out of mana. Due to their lack of strength, they most often wear cloth armor (robes) and carry lightweight weapons (staves or wands).

  Ranged: The other division of ranged dps are your long distance physical damage dealers. This includes archers, hunters, rangers (who all shoot bows or crossbows), as well as some rogue types who throw knives or axes. This class’ main stats are normally agility and/or dexterity. With some strength thrown in to add power to their hits, or to allow them to draw larger bows. They most often wear leather armor, and can be found near the back of a battle near the casters. Able to take more damage than casters, they are still somewhat ‘squishy’ compared to warriors and tanks.

  Healers: This last category is, in my opinion, the most critical. Healers keep everyone else alive. They are almost always casters, and have the ability to magically regenerate a player’s health points. They cast a variety of spells to accomplish this, using several different schools of magic. Druids use nature magic to heal. Priests and paladins use holy magic. And there are different types of heals. Direct heals are targeted at a single player. Area of effect (AOE) heals blanket a specific area of ground, and heal all allies within that area. Some heals instantly restore large amounts of hp. Others, called heal-over-time spells (HoTs) provide smaller amounts of hp in regular increments over a period of time.

  Again, in this book, in the game world of Io, there are an almost unlimited combinations of race, class, and attributes that players are able to mix and match. Making each experience unique.

  Once a player has completed their character creation, they are dropped into a “noob” area, or starter zone. This is typically a town or city, where players can pick up beginner quests like “Find my lost dog” or “Kill ten rats in the cellar”. These quests are low difficulty and generally bring small rewards. Their purpose is to teach the player how to better interact with the game. As they gain experience and level up, their attributes increase, and they are better able to handle progressively harder quests. With higher level mobs. Players can also team up, allowing them to take on tougher challenges. A level one noob would not be able to kill a level 10 wolf by themselves. But a group of four level one noobs might pull it off, if they work well together.

  These starter zones are also ‘safe zones’ meaning players cannot attack each other within these zones. Or, if they do, they suffer harsh penalties. Usually this means being quickly killed by town guardsmen. Attacking and killing another player gets a player marked with a red “PK” skull above their heads for 48 hours. Being tagged with a PK mark means other players can kill you with impunity. However, if player A is attacked by player B, player A can kill in self-defense with no penalty whatsoe
ver.

  The game world is populated by computer-generated characters that interact with players. Most often referred to as non-player characters, or NPC’s. In Io, we call them citizens. Citizens are all the butchers, bakers, and candlestick makers that make up a town. They give out quests, rewards, and experience. They tell stories, and provide history that helps put quests in context. They buy the loot collected by players from dead mobs, and sell weapons and armor to players who need upgrades. They are the glue that holds the game world together. They refer to players as “adventurers”, whom they believe have journeyed from a faraway land in search of… well, adventure. They are not aware that their world is a game, and keeping this information from them is vital. After all, if you were told you weren’t real, that the world was just a game, would you show up for work every day?

  Hopefully, this is enough information to get you non-gamers through the book without too much frustration. Luckily, RPG’s have been around long enough, and been played by enough geeks, that nearly any term you don’t understand can quickly be googled with helpful results.

  Unfortunately, there are some references in this story to very specific happenings in other books or games, that while funny for gamers, won’t be amusing to you. Even googling may not help. It’s sort of a “you had to be there” thing. Like “Gnomes Rule!”

  Good luck! And I hope you enjoy reading The Greystone Chronicles.