New to Project 1999 -- and EverQuest in general

[Ransurian]

Hello! After installing and initially running / playing the game to see if and how it performed on my PC (thankfully, it doesn't appear to be running too slow or fast), I decided to return to the forums seeking answers to a number of questions I have.

1. Sound effects and music. Are zones accompanied by music, or are they all silent with the exception of ambience (i.e. wind howling through mountain passes, et cetera)? Thus far, the only music I've encountered is during combat and in the main screen, and while interacting with vendors / entering buildings. While walking around outside on my Barbarian in Everfrost, it would appear as though there's no music.

2. "You are hungry." Am I required to eat to ensure that my regeneration rates remain normal, or is that disabled on this server? I've read that the "you are hungry" status message is a relic, so I'm assuming it's applicable here.

3. Fatigue. My fatigue is jumping up to 31%, then jumping back down to 0% in a constant cycle. It wouldn't appear as though my fatigue bar can reach 100%; is food or water relevant to this?

4. Hotkeys / keybindings. Aside from WASD, what would be some suggested keybindings to help make life a little easier and more straightforward? For example, I haven't quite figured out how to bind my tab key so that it functions in a manner similar to WoW (in WoW, the tab key can be used to select and cycle through enemies in front of the PC).

5. Water. Silly question, but how do I actually jump out of water? The space key doesn't appear to function while in water. While swimming, my character virtually came to a standstill while messing around in a lake -- I could only barely move at all, and eventually had to drown myself.

[Sorn]

1. Sound effects and music. Are zones accompanied by music, or are they all silent with the exception of ambience (i.e. wind howling through mountain passes, et cetera)?

Some parts of a zone will trigger music, or entire zones may have music. Most have ambient sounds - rarely is a zone dead quiet the entire time. Everfrost Peaks just has ambient sounds. Cities have the most music. The halfling city of Rivervale has annoyingly bouncy music, while the wood elf town of Kelethin has one of the nicest themes in the game. Forests like Greater Faydark have things like crickets and eerie forest sound effects going on. The combine spires have triumphant music (the same music as the gate to Felwithe) and several dungeons have creepy themes. Lavastorm Mountains has random explosions that go off when you get near the giant lava-filled cauldron in the zone.

2. "You are hungry." Am I required to eat to ensure that my regeneration rates remain normal, or is that disabled on this server?

Food lets you recover stamina, water lets you recover mana. You can force feed yourself by right clicking on a food item that's in a general inventory slot, or you can let the character passively eat on their own (provided you have stacks of food in a bag somewhere).

3. Fatigue. My fatigue is jumping up to 31%, then jumping back down to 0% in a constant cycle. It wouldn't appear as though my fatigue bar can reach 100%; is food or water relevant to this?

You need to get yourself some food.

4. Hotkeys / keybindings. Aside from WASD, what would be some suggested keybindings to help make life a little easier and more straightforward?

In the game, hit alt+O and go to the Keys tab to see all the possibilities. Under the Target category, you can bind one of your keys to cycle through NPCs. There are lots of things you can do. I personally have a key that lets me target myself (I play on a laptop so f1-f12 require an extra key press), another to switch between my last two targets, and keys to cycle through nearest NPCs and PCs.

My main recommendation is to reassign your autoattack button to anything other than A.

5. Water. Silly question, but how do I actually jump out of water? The space key doesn't appear to function while in water.

In first or third person, press page up and swim to the edge of the water. Won't work if the wall is too high, but if that is not the case then you should be able to hop out of water.

(PS: Most of us have had to drown ourselves to escape water when we first started this game. Classic!)

[Ransurian]

Thanks for the helpful reply. :) I'll consult the wiki and some other resources to help myself get a better idea of what I'm doing.

[Issar]

Adding onto Sorn's response,

4. I use Hot Bar 3, (accessed through the options menu) and bind Keys 1 and 2, to my left and right A key and D keys. Then I put Sense Heading into both slots. I don't recall if it is necessary, but I always spend 1pt in Sense Heading and let the hotkeys take it from there.

5. To swim up and/or get out of the water, use Page Up. To Swim down, use Page Down.

6. Turn combat music off... To answer a question you will have in the future, there is not a toggle switch for Thunder sound. I'm not sure if there is a workaround for that though.

[Voland]

I thought food was needed to recover health, not stamina...

[Sorn]

I thought food was needed to recover health, not stamina...

Actually, it does several things! Sta is just the most notable and also the only one I knew about before I bothered to research it in response to your post.

http://wiki.project1999.com/Food_and_drink#Stages_of_Hunger_and_Thirst

Stage 3 begins after 30 more minutes of no food and/or drink. If you reach this stage, it means you’ve gone one-and-a-half Norrathian days without food and/or drink (see the table below). Sometime during this stage (usually in about 15 to 20 minutes), hit-points and mana will no longer regenerate and your fatigue bar will slowly drop to zero, taking about 10 minutes (regardless of race) to bottom-out unless you help it along by jumping or engaging in other vigorous activities. When there is only about 1 bubble of fatigue showing, your Strength, Agility, and Dexterity will all start dropping and eventually each face a 10 point reduction.

Eat your vittles, kids!