Now that we have mastered movement, and we have equipped ourselves, we need to undertake some Combat.

One of the best places for Combat is in the Sewers under the Town Square.

Once in the Town Square, click the [-] button on the compass to go down. You may need to go down again, and walk around a bit before you find a monster to kill...

If you find a monster you will be give the choice to Attack, Retreat or Quick Fight:

There are 2 ways to Attack, as you can see; attack and Quick Fight. If you feel as if you can take this monster on, click "Attack". If you want a quick battle and are not worried about gaining experience, then click "Quick Fight". The "Retreat" option is discussed below.

Clicking on "Attack" will take you through a round of combat, like this:

You can see from this round we took 9 points of damage (bringing our Hitpoints down to 116) while deflecting 18 thanks to our armor and dexterity stat, and dealt 24 to the sewer rat, and 6 points were deflected.

You are now again given the option to attack, retreat, or quick fight. Continue attacking (using the Attack button) until the critter is defeated. The additional combat rounds are shown on the screen, above the round we've already seen. Once the battle is over, you'll see a screen like this:

We were attacked by a Giant Sewer Rat, and WE WON!!!

But what other info can we get from this? Well, at the top we can see that an item fell on the ground after we killed our opponent, in this case it is a Ratskin Hat- just click on the (P) to pick it up, or click on the name for a better description. It is handy picking up spoils as we can sell them on later for cash!

Because we used Attack we gained some XP from this fight (The amount is reported after the fight). Sometimes you will find coins after the battle, in this case we got 20 Silver... no doubt left over from some poor adventurer that fell foul to the beast.

In the top right corner of the screen we can see that we took some damage from this fight... we have been knocked down to 81 HP. Now, we either have to use some HP Potions, or we have to return to town to Heal (with the Help of a Cleric), but that comes in another part of the Guide.

Be carefull with some areas, as they can be too dark for you to see without help. Sometimes you get attacked from these dark areas, and remember it is hard to fight what you cannot see...If you buy and equip a torch, you will no longer be struggling around in the dark.

What if you had pressed "Retreat" instead of "Attack"? Well, you would be taken into the last location you were at, and if it is monster free you will be OK... as long as you can put up with this:

You can carry on fighting, but be careful - if you go too far without healing, you will be killed.

Once you have been killed, your Soul reforms in the area it is tied. This is normally the Life Monument south of Dundee, but this can be changed as you explore the game world. You'll see the following message appear in the chat window:

In the early levels of adventuring deaths are not important, and you can die many times. Once you gain enough experience for Level 4 though you will be restricted to 2 deaths per hour, so use these wisely. Once you reach level 10 there will be another penalty: You cannot move for 3 minutes after your last death. This will be indicated by the following message just above your chat screen:

You'll also see this message below level 10, although it doesn't really do anything until you reach level 10.

Sooner or later though you will need to be Healed, so select Healing from the Navigation Bar and we'll carry on.