For those who are new to RPGs or those who consider themselves casual gamers Lords of Xulima will seem like an unforgiving experience at first. Old-School Veteran (the suggested difficulty setting) requires careful party management in the first few areas, therefore, at times, you can feel as though you have made the wrong choices or perhaps that this game is not for you.

I firmly believe that this is not the case and for this reason I have written this guide to help you overcome the things that challenged me, highlight things the game briefly mentioned, and to give you first hand experience of how I survived in those first encounters.

This is not (by any stretch of the imagination) a comprehensive list of everything you will ever need to know about Lords of Xulima- but (hopefully) it should help.

The first thing you'll want to do before you take a step further into the massive adventure that awaits you is to configure your Combat Formation. You can access this by pressing G on your keyboard or clicking the helmet icon above the minimap.

This is, simply put, the placement of your characters during a battle.

You'll want any characters using close range weapons (such as swords, axes, maces) in the front row as they cannot attack with those weapons from the back row. Likewise, you'll want any of your lightly armoured classes (such as the Mage) in the back row.

The front row is essentially the (up to four) characters who will soak the majority of damage received in battle. They protect the back row from close range attacks, however, magical attacks and ranged attacks can still reach the back row, so the back row can still receive damage to an extent.

It's a good idea to play around with the Combat Formation screen and try different approaches in battle. Some might work better, some might not work so well- but you can easily switch them around until you're happy with the layout.

You can also change the formation during battle to move characters to any free space, or swap them with another character, if the need arises. This can be particularly useful if someone is heavily wounded or taking damage over time and you need to move them away from danger.

Velegarn is one of the first places you'll travel to and houses some unique merchants who offer different, but equally invaluable, services.

Galvan the Trainer provides the quests that give you a sense of direction early on. He also has a unique benefit of providing one extra skill point at level up, starting at 100 g.c., increasing by 100 g.c. per point purchased, allowing you to acquire skill points much faster than you naturally would.

I would suggest that you always try to purchase at least one extra point per level, if not more, when there is cash available to do so. Even if you don't use all of the points this level they persist to the next level. At such time there might be a rush of skills you really want but would usually fall short of having enough points for.

To the left of him is the main merchant of the town who sells equipment, potions, and the like. He also identifies any unidentified equipment you find (for a fee) and is a good place to get additional Torches, Lockpicks, and Shurikens.

Behind him is a delightful lady who will sell you additional food supplies. I always aimed to have at least two days of food supplies (mostly found and topped up with gold) when setting out. This meant, if nothing else, should I recieve no fatal wounds, I had at least four rest periods (including travelling).

Terry the Innkeeper will allow you to rest for a small fee. I suggest that, if you're doing the rat cave quest, or are in easy reach of Velegarn, then pop by and visit him to rest for 8 hours. This cures all of your non-fatal wounds and is cheaper and more efficient than consuming food.

To the far right of Velegarn is a Priestess of Febret who is probably your new best friend once you realise how useful (and powerful) she is.

The first, and quite useful, thing she does is cures any number of status ailments. Basically if you have something that can't be healed by resting either in the wild or in an Inn- she might be able to fix that for you. This includes: Cursed, Nausea, and the like. She can also heal Fatal Wounds but she tends not to be as cost effective as resting a full day in the Inn.

However, her strongest asset is blessing your party.

She can, for a cost of 50 g.c. per blessing, bless your party with a number of useful short term bonuses. Multiple different blessings can be applied at once which make this an exceptionally useful way to build up your strength against particularly difficult opponents.

While this may seem expensive remember that there are a number of respawning Cereal Plants in the lower section of town. You can easily make 100 g.c. every time these respawn just by selling them to the farmer nearby. Allowing, at the very least, if no other funds are available, two blessings.

First of all- F5. F5 'til your finger bleeds!

The quick save function is incredibly useful when exploring a new area or attempting to take on an enemy that is possibly too strong for you. It can also save hours of exploration when you're on a high and suddenly run into an enemy you can't evade.

Early on you'll want to enter most combat with a blessing, and, ideally, you'll want your characters at around half their HP/PP at all times. If they fall below that it's a good idea to rest for 8 hours.

Items like the Spider Egg and Braptor Egg are also really useful in long fights against any opponents who bleed or poison you. Other items that remove status effects are also really useful if a key member is hurt or nearly dead.

Equally you should aim to always have a few Healing Salves on hand. They can either restore health to the character that uses them or can be used to restore health to a character near them. This means practically any character can throw a light heal to keep someone away from death.

Any scrolls you find, either offensive or defensive, are also incredibly potent in overcoming the first few hurdles against tough enemies. You can find plenty of these or buy more if you need them.

Before engaging any enemies you can also hold down your right click button to see the number of enemies, the suggested level of difficulty, and the radius around them that initiates combat. The radius is particularly useful if you want to skirt around encounters. If any enemy is coming up Troublesome or Difficult you're probably likely to die.

When you first enter Velegarn you'll be confonted by some guards who want you to pay a 100 g.c. toll which resets every few days in game.

However- the town people don't really care for the guards.

So, you know, if you're around Lvl 4-5, and you're feeling confident... why not just murder them? Of course that's a terribly bad thing to do. But imagine how much money you'll save not having to pay the toll!

It pays for itself!

If you're going to attempt this then I would suggest the guards by the southern exit (towards the beach with the Dimensional Portal) is the safest for the early encounters. If they're of no difficulty to you, or, hey, murder- then feel free to murder the rest.

They drop fairly standard loot and experience but at least they won't tax you every few days.

There's a big ol' world out there and it's your job to explore it!

One of the more punishing things about exploration in Lords of Xulima is that often there are encounters, or areas, which can be fairly impossible at your current level, which you run into where you're currently questing or foraging.

Exploring is good for two things: herbs and food.

You need herbs to increase certain attributes or to earn certain bonuses. Food is the lifeblood of all that you do- without it you will literally die of starvation if you're playing at a high enough difficulty level.

However, right click and mouse over all enemies before engaging.

Stroke that F5 key ever so softly.

Be prepared to make good use of Gaulen's escape skills.

Always be ready to encounter something that is impossible to do. If an encounter comes back as Titanic then you're likely not supposed to do it. Same goes for quests. There are some early quests which are actually given far too early for you to realistically stand any chance of surviving the encounters.

All of that taken into account- do explore! One of the greater parts of any RPG experience is sitting there being murdered by an enemy repeatedly only to come back later and melt their face. Or their equivalent thing they have instead of a face. It's also a good learning experience to see where your team falls short, what other supplies you might need to bring, or what other areas you might need to work on.

I hope that, in some small way, or perhaps a life changing way, what I have written above has been useful to you. If it has then I have nothing left to say but "enjoy your adventures!"

Below are some comments from previous readers.

"Once again I fell into a deep sleep, and once again Golot invaded my mind, I could feel my being and his becoming more intertwined. He told me of the divine pears. A fruit so delicious, so succulent, so irresistible that to eat one would be to gaze upon madness itself. Yet it is my mission to find and eat these divine pears." -Gaulen

"Nengorth wasn't kind to my husband but at least he didn't kill him like Gaulen and his band of thugs did." -Guard's widow

"*Raptor noises*" -Braptor B

"You cleansed the Temple of Febret?! Amazing! Did you also clear out all of the corpses, bones, eerie statues, The Rolling Stones albums, and any possessed artifacts? No? You call that cleansing?" -Priestess of Febret