Alright well first off this is my first post and I have not started playing CF yet, I have however surfed the forums so to speak using the Search feature. Instead of just jumping in(im a planner) I have first decided to ask a few questions beforehand so I may have a better idea as to which role I play once I do start.

I have narrowed my quest in which Classes to choose to 3 classes, Assassin, Ranger and Thief.

This is where my questions come in, since I have not been able to find a good explanation of Each class in more depth than here on the forums I have assumed some of the stuff is IC-find-out-yourself stuff which I can understand.

I am however wondering if someone who knows one or all of the Classes to help me in this hard decision.(As well as explaining the differences between the Thief Paths.)

I would like to know if possible what the advantage is to each class over the others and what the disadvantages are.

The kind of character class I am looking for is good at hunting, good at PK which I wish to do eventually, with a Rogue side to it which is why I can't decide between the three I am assuming they all have their own terrain advantages and excel in their own areas but I am looking for the over all one. A nicely balanced one so to speak in both PvP and PvE.

Also which races are best for each.

Thanks for your time.(Sorry for the bad spelling and grammar.)

Welcome to the game!

I'm also a planner. Probably to a fault. And I've played moderately successful characters in each of those three classes.

For a new player I would not recommend thief, for these reasons:

1. Thieves benefit greatly from scrolls, IMO, so not knowing those items may hamstring you to a certain degree.

2. Picking thief skills is sort of complicated, especially if you decide to mix paths. Some of them "sound good" from the help files but are, IMO, not worthwhile.

3. If you plan to rank all the way to level 51, which I recommend, then your thief will have serious difficulty killing most opponents. They're also fairly fragile. You can mitigate that fragility by taking shield block and acrobatics, but both of those cost thief points, meaning you're giving up other skills that are much more useful from a "PK offense" point of view.

4. Thief skills cost thief points. Generally speaking, the more skills you have the more deadly you are. One way to get more thief points is through the devious versatility edge, which is expensive in terms of "edge points". Edge points are earned from immortal given xp, exploration xp and observation xp. As a new player, you may have a tougher time accumulating edge points, which may mean you'll end up working with fewer thief points than other thieves.

As for races, if you choose to do a thief, then I'd recommend human or arial. Arial mostly for the perma-flight.

Assassin and ranger are both decent choices for a first-time player, in my opinion. Note, however, that the different ranger paths play very differently.

Ranger disadvantages:

1. They are pretty gimped when fighting outside the wilderness, and many people will flee immediately when they encounter you in the wilderness. The ones that don't flee are the ones who are buff enough to actually beat you there.

2. They greatly benefit from certain talismans, so if you don't know these or will have a hard time keeping them on hand (because its time consuming for you to accumulate gold) then your ranger may have a tougher time with PK than other rangers.

Ranger advantages:

1. When you're camo'd in the woods typically the only people who can see you are people who aren't your enemies. This isn't always the case, but most of the time it is. So its usually possible for you to rest or go AFK in reasonable safety.

2. Wilderness familarity, ranger weapon, camp, and herbs make ranking relatively easy.

3. Depending on your build, PK has the potential to be really, really, really straightforward. So in that sense its a good way to "get your feet wet" without becoming utterly frustrated by the PK aspect of the game.

With regard to specializations, I'd recommend Survivalist or Savage, and either Forester or Mountaineer for terrain. Each specialization and home terrain choice adds and subtracts certain skills/spells. With respect to race, I'd recommend felar or cloud giant. Felar gives you claw attacks while wielding a ranger weapon. Cloud giant gives you the best possible bearcharge, and the ability to take edges that juice your ambush damage. Cloud giants have the disadvantage of occasionally stepping out of cover when creeping, though, due to their size.

Assassin advantages:

1. With "assassin detect hidden" and built-in detect invis, you can see a lot of people. You also don't have to buy detect invis preps.

2. With "assassin hide" you can hide from a lot of people. When you hide in the woods, duergar and thieves can't see you. (But rangers can).

3. Generally less fragile than a thief, especially when you get martial trance.

4. Assassinate gives you the possibility of killing characters who would otherwise be nigh-unkillable. (That is, if they give you the opportunity to stalk them.)

5. You can't zap, brandish or recite, so the range of preps you have to keep on hand is slightly smaller than for a thief/ranger.

Assassin disadvantages:

1. You have to spam up each kick, in order, to get the next one. This isn't a big deal, but some people find it annoying.

2. When you lose the advantage of stealth, e.g. against duergar warriors and thieves, you are often at a disadvantage. Especially pre-martial-trance.

3. You don't have any skill that can perma-lag someone. You do have lots of skills that render melee characters mostly useless in combat. So you may find it frustrating when they just "leave" after you break all their bones.

With respect to race, I'd recommend arial, human or felar. Arial gives you the best dexterity and perma-flight. Felar lets you wield spears and staffs and still get claw attacks, which can be useful when fighting classes that don't learn one of those weapons (e.g. anti-paladin, thief, bard, shaman, orc). Human has the lowest exp-penalty and no vulnerabilities, so your PK range will generally be more favorable.

Thieves are complicated and their paths are complicated. If you DO decide to play a thief, take one path all the way to the end before you start branching out. Dio's has a link to a page on the diku that helps enormously for planning out thieves. I highly recommend writing down every single skill you plan to take as a thief and how much they cost to be certain that you can afford it all.

Ranger PK in the low ranks is easy, at the mid ranks it's easy, at the high ranks it's weird. However, he failed to mention that rangers have pathfinding which is HUGE for new guys learning the areas. It means they almost never run out of moves. I highly recommend rangers until you know all the wilderness areas.

Also, unlike him, I recommend human (focus on strength) for the first ranger you play. No vulns, low xp penalty. If you go assassin or thief, I will echo human or arial (for permafly).

Some are not accurate. Some of the paths' skills cost less now than what is posted on there. I'm not sure of any offhand that cost more but my last thief only focused on two paths.

The thief page is old and outdated. The FAQ on the DIKU has a copy of what you see when you type study at all the guildmasters. It would be one of those things that would be nice to have on the official pages when they get up and running.

Ranger gives you a great advantage as a new player because of pathfinding, which is a skill that reduce movement cost to a very low level. As a ranger chances are you rarely if ever have to rest after level 20, since the natural regen while standing/walking is greater than what you expend while moving. The hiding from everyone aspect of this class is also great.

Assassins fall into this category aswell, and they are a fairly easy class to grasp. Their PK tactics dont have to be to complicated so its very newbie friendly. However, they lack the movement advantage of a ranger.

Welcome to CF new one, prepare to be killed a fair bit in the beginning.. especially if you dont have any previous experience when it comes to muds. Stick with it and you will learn how to give payback fairly quickly.

In case you haven't seen it this guide may help you out. It has a lot of the information you will find in the in game help files.

http://www.carrionfields.com/assets/CFGameGuide.pdf

Hope it helps. And welcome to CF!

I would suggest you go with an Assassin.

Rangers generally meet all your requirements, but can only hide in the wilderness.

Thieves are fragile, and unless you have a few more hours under your belt, you're probably going to run into trouble in PK (PVP).

Rangers and thieves both involve some level of customization in the form of terrain/expertise and thief points respectively.

Unlike rangers, assassins can hide in (almost all) civilized rooms. They're also a little less fragile and far more self-reliant than a thief.

An assassin can naturally detect hidden and invisible, and they can also mark (HELP MARK OF THE PREY) rangers, for example, and see them too. This means you're less likely to get surprised. They're excellent in combat and have some self-healing, so you're naturally desirable to groups and capable of accomplishing most things on your own too.

Dioxide's unofficial CF Wiki has some FAQs on the individual classes here:
http://diku.qhcf.net/cgi-bin/wiki.pl?FAQspage

Ultimately though, just roll whatever you think will satisfy your interest. You'll learn plenty with any of the three.