Whether your goals in Dereth are to obtain powerful magical items, greater experience, or a glimpse of the strange wonders the lands have to offer, you can achieve these ends more easily within a group.
When joining up with old allies or assembling a new party from passersby in a dungeon, you'll want to create a fellowship to unify your group. In addition to generating strength in numbers, a fellowship makes communication easier and allows both experience and treasure to be shared. There is absolutely no reason not to form one, as you can create, join, or leave a fellowship at any time.
Creating a Fellowship
Up to ten players may join together in fellowship. The player originally creating the fellowship functions as its designated leader, who can recruit new members (up to the limit) or dismiss current ones. When this leader exists the game, the fellowship is automatically disbanded.
To create a fellowship, simply click the Social Systems button (the triangle marked with the outline of several heads), and then the Fellowship tab. Enter a name for your fellowship, and click the Create Fellowship button. You can name your fellowship anything you like, but most fellowships name themselves after their primary objective: for example, "Kill the Olthoi Queen" or "Direlands Exploration Party." This advertises your mission to all prospective members, and helps current ones keep it in mind.
On the Fellowship panel will be a checkbox allowing players to choose between two different types of fellowship: XP Sharing and Non-XP Sharing/No Level Limit. These types will determine how experience points earned by the entire fellowship will be distributed amongst its members (for more details on this, see the Division of Experience Points section further down).
Also on the Fellowship panel is a checkbox allowing players to access the corpses of all creatures slain by any member of the fellowship. (Normally, only the player who defeats a particular creature has access to that creature's corpse for a limited time. After that time, anyone may loot that creature for treasure.)
Once you've created a fellowship, the Fellowship tab will display a Members box, below which are the buttons Recruit, Dismiss, and Disband. Select a character within your compass range, and click Recruit to add him or her to your party. If you are sure they wish to join, but you receive a message back stating that the person is not accepting fellowship requests, inform him or her to click the "Accept Fellowship Requests" check box on the Fellowship tab. Any member can access a list of party members in the Fellowship panel, and can click any name in the list to view that character's sex, race, class, and player-killer status, in addition to Health, Stamina, and Mana. Each of the primary attributes is listed with its current value, a slash, and the normal value.
Follow the Leader
You'll notice that your fellowship members appear as green downward-pointing triangles on your compass, making them easy to keep track of at close range. To avoid separation, appoint one person to guide the others. For simplicity sake, it's often easiest to have the fellowship leader be the one out in front, as the fellowship leader is represented on raider by a green upward-pointing triangle. When you're entering unknown territory, especially in dangerous dungeons, the leader may want to appoint the best runner in the group as a scout, and dispatch that person from time to time to explore ahead and report back. The scout should, of course, be careful not to draw monsters down on the party.
If any member of your fellowship gets killed or otherwise separated from the group, click the "Talk to Fellows" option on the chat menu (located in the lower left corner of the screen). This will send your chat messages to all fellowship members no matter how far apart they are. The leader can then decide how to reunite the group.
Note that you can also address your fellowship by typing "/f" and then a comma before a message, such as: /f, Wait, comrades!
Division of Experience Points
The system works in the following manner:
- 2 players in fellowship earn 75% of normal experience
- 3 players in fellowship earn 60% of normal experience
- 4 players in fellowship earn 55% of normal experience
- 5 players in fellowship earn 50% of normal experience
- 6 players in fellowship earn 45% of normal experience
- 7 players in fellowship earn 40% of normal experience
- 8 players in fellowship earn 35% of normal experience
- 9 players in fellowship earn 31% of normal experience
This bonus occurs only in groups where the players are within 5 levels of the group founder, or if all players in the group are above level 50.
Sharing the Spoils
The leader should distribute all immediately useful items to the players who can benefit from them most. If a character upgrades his or her equipment from fellowship loot, he or she should turn over old equipment to anyone who can benefit from it. A good leader will keep an eye on this. No one should be hauling around armor or weapons that are superior to those in use. Any loot that can't be used by the fellowship should be converted to pyreals at the end of the adventure and divided evenly among members.
