I can't remember which of these came first, but both of my first experiences involved incredibly noobish deaths.
Well, that's not quite true. My absolute first encounter with Everquest was just watching my friend play it for about 15 minutes when I went over to his place after school one day. After seeing his level 6-8ish mage kill some random mobs in Qeynos hills, I was enthralled. I HAD to play this game. So I went home and ordered Ruins of Kunark off of Amazon.com immediately. But when it finally arrived, I learned (to my endless chagrin) that our computer's graphics card was not up to the task of playing Everquest. (This was odd; I later found that I <i>could</i> play that shitty offline tutorial that came with the game back then. So desperate was my longing to play that I actually completed that tutorial <i>twice.</I>
Anyway, while I saved up money to buy a new video card, I got to play the game on two separate occasions at friends' places; they each let me make a character on their accounts since they knew how badly I was jonesing.
The encounter I <i>THINK</i> came first involved me making a human ranger. After struggling for probably upwards of an hour, I finally found the guildmaster in Surefall glade. I remember having trouble maneuvering in the tunnels there without night vision. Anyway, I eventually fell into a small body of water somewhere within Surefall, and started to drown. I didn't know how to pan up! I panicked, fearing that all I had gained through my hour of hard work, a newbie weapon and my guild tunic, would be lost!
I searched the shelf above my friend's desk for the Everquest box, hoping to find a manual. No luck. My friend was in his living room, playing Majora's Mask, so I ran out to ask him what to do. His gracious and helpful response: "AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA! Uh... Ah... Ahahahahaha! Page up. Just press page up."
I sprinted back to his room, but it was too late; I had drowned.
My other "first" experience was less exciting; at a different friend's apartment, I made a Human Monk in Qeynos. Running around the yard killing rats, I was frustrated to see that they had a tendency to run away when they were almost dead. "Whatever," I thought. "I don't feel like chasing them." So after waiting a little while to regain some health, I ran off, probably halfway across the yard, and started a fight with another rat. The same damned thing happened! At this point, my health was pretty low. I sat down, waited to heal up for all of like 2 ticks, then picked a fight with <i>another</i> rat that walked right across my path. Almost as soon as I did, the first rat, which had gained enough health to resume the fight, then chased me across the zone, returned. I switched my attention to that initial rat, and I think I actually managed to kill him. But by then, the 2nd rat had regained enough health to come back after me, and he didn't have very far to walk. The 2nd and 3rd rats owned me.
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