Tibia

Tibia is one of the oldest PC MMORPGS. Shortcomings are offset by the resulting small download size and modest system requirements.

Tibia's success can also be attributed to the fact that a large portion of the game, which can be downloaded from an official website, is still playable free of charge. This is in contrast to larger, more recent MMORPGs, which must be bought at a store and only provide short trial periods.

For a monthly fee, players can upgrade to a "premium account", unlocking some additional areas and game features such as spells and outfits. These players also have priority login rights on the often congested game servers. Currently, those servers are located in the United States and Germany.

Although servers are located only in Germany and the United States, players arrive from all over the world, with significant groups from the US, Sweden, Mexico, Brazil]] and The Netherlands.

Players mostly spend their online time training their characters' skill levels, hunting a large population of monsters with numerous weapons and magical spells, and scouring the vast continent for treasures and fortune. They interact with other players for conversation, to trade various objects, or to form parties to take on even stronger foes. Guilds are also important for many players and provide a way in which to co-operate as a team. Examples of heavily developed guilds such as The Pirates of Tibia, a recreation of the pirates in the golden days of piracy in real life, based on old code of conduct articles in a mix with the regular guild structure style makes them an impressing long runner known as almost unbeatable in their gameworld. There are many other known roleplaying guilds in Tibia, such as the oldest one; The Mercenaries, an organized and relatively calm guild, yet deadly if someone pays them well.

On most of the game's servers, players are also allowed to attack and kill each other, although there is a system in place to keep hostile actions under control. Some servers do not allow such player versus player combat at all, while others encourage it by rewarding experience for kills.

Before game updates, test servers are run to find and repair bugs and glitches within the update. These servers are first available for testing to players that hold official positions such as tutors, senior tutors and gamemasters. The test server is then usually opened to the general Tibian public. Because no permanent change to a player's character occurs on the test server, it is also an opportunity for players to explore, attack and fight in wars, without their main character on a normal server being affected.

After learning the basics of the game on an introductory island reserved for new players called Rookgaard, players may choose one of four classical roleplaying vocations: The Knight, excelling in close combat, the Paladin, mainly a distance fighter, the Druid a spellcaster specializing in defensive (primarily healing) spells, or the Sorcerer, a more aggressive spellcaster specializing in offensive (primarily attack) spells. The main difference between the classes is the rate at which a character's skill levels increase. For example, a Knight will improve his sword fighting skill faster than any other character class.

Monsters players encounter in the game range from non-aggressive dogs and deer, to easy-to-kill rats, dangerous orcs, fierce dragons, demons and also the aggressive boss monsters such as Orshabaal.

Towns

 * Ab'Dendriel — The elven city, located at the north-east on the main island. This city is known to be sort of a 'social city', where players often gather up to do stuff.
 * Ankrahmun — The Egyptian-themed city, located south on the island Darama. Contains many "Boss Monsters," also known as Pharaohs, which are a difficult challenge and part of a difficult quest.
 * Carlin — It is the second larges city in the world. It is famous because it is ruled only by women characters. It is located in the north-west on the main island.
 * Darashia — The desert city, located to the north of the island of Darama. It is the pearl of Darama.
 * Edron — A large city where special spells can be learned, located on the first premium account island of the same name.
 * Kazordoon - Situated in a huge, extinct volcano, the city of Kazordoon is the pride of the dwarven race, a miracle of science and of craftsmanship. Many generations of dwarven artisans and engineers have contributed to the creation of its beautiful halls and passageways, and countless mine workers have spent their lives extracting ore in order to help amassing the fabulous wealth that is hidden deep in the dwarven city. Kazordoon has many hunting places suitable for Knights.
 * Liberty Bay - Liberty Bay is the jewel of the South Seas. The prospering seaport is located on Vandura, the largest of the Shattered Isles, located west of Tiquanda. In no other Tibian city the poor and the rich live so close together and nowhere else is the difference between the classes so striking. In the southern part of the city, the people live in ramshackle huts and rest their weary heads on straw mats after a hard day's work on the plantations. In contrast, the stately homes of the aristocracy that resides in the North are splendid and luxurious.
 * Port Hope - The colony of Port Hope is one of the newer acquisitions of the Thaian Kingdom. After Port Hope was founded as a small camp on the new continent, it was soon found out that the jungle of Tiquanda was rich on valuable resources. It is one of the last "Pacc Cities" which means that only players with premium account can visit this location. Tiquanda, which is the name of the island where port hope lies, has many hunting places suitable for the Paladin.
 * Rookgaard - Rookgaard is the name of a large island and a town on the island where characters start out. Once they reach level eight, they are allowed to travel to the "mainland" and choose a vocation. Characters cannot attack each other on the island, and there are even people who stay and level up beyond eight, called Rookguardians.
 * Thais - Thais is the oldest city in Tibia. Due to its long history and to the fact that King Tibianus III resides there, the Thaians consider their city to be the capital of the realm, even though this has never been officially confirmed by the king.
 * Venore — It is a bustling merchant city situated deep in the eastern marshlands. Venore lies in the middle of a huge swamp, the smartest free account players knows places somewhere in the swamp where no-one ever hunts.

Villages

 * Cormaya — Cormaya is a small island that can be reached either by boat travel from Edron or by passing through a series of tunnels on the southern tip of Edron. There are simply houses and a large guildhall on Cormaya.  Characters can also reach the sage Eremo from Cormaya.
 * Fibula Village — Located on the island of the same name southwest of Thais, it is famous for the NPC Timur, the only NPC in the game who will buy crossbows and bows, and for the guildhalls of the legendary Red Rose and Mercenarys, two guilds which can still be found on Antica (the oldest gameworld) to this day.
 * Greenshore — A small village located northwest of Thais. Known best for Greenshore Castle, one of the most attractive guildhalls in the game, as well as the Tibianic, the very large boat guildhall.
 * Northport — A small fishing village comprised of mainly player-owned houses, situated northeast of Carlin.
 * Outlaw Encampment — A small village located west of Venore. Famous for H.L., a sexist NPC (will not serve females) who is the only to purchase scale armors in the game.  It is the home of the Wild Warriors, a band of humans banished from the domain of King Tibianus III.
 * Senja Village — Located on an island of the same name northwest of Carlin, it is home to little more than player-owned houses surrounded by the icy setting of the island. A single quest is available in a castle northeast of the village.
 * Stonehome Village — Named for its houses perched atop giant stone formations, this small village lies directly northeast of Edron City.
 * Liberty Bay - Is a pirate community which you must do lots of quests to find hunting grounds.

Monster-Controlled Towns and Places

 * Amazon Camp — Northwest of Venore, a small village populated by Amazons, Valkyries and Witches.
 * Banuta — Located northeast of Port Hope, it is the present home of the Apes, who were prior enslaved by the Lizardmen. In it lowest levels is a civilization of dangerous monsters.
 * Chor — The new home of the Lizardmen. Driven out of Banuta by the their former slaves, the Apes, their present home can be found almost due east from Port Hope.
 * Cyclopolis — The Cyclops call this their central home. The Cyclop's "fathers" are in the deepest and lowest part of Cyclopolis. It is located on Edron Island, north of the city.
 * Demona — Hidden far underground, Below even the Maze of Lost Souls, north of Carlin. A series of chambers used by Warlocks and some mages for magical research purposes.
 * Draconia — Home of the undead and dragons. Dangerous island with a black pyramid built on it found northeast of Ab'Dendriel.
 * Elvenbane — Due west of Ab'Dendriel, a small fort with Minotaurs and Orcs, and other surprises.
 * Mintwallin — The home of the Minotaurs, located far beneath the surface, in the vicinity of Thais.
 * Ulderek's Rock — Also known as "Orc Fort" or "Orc Land", it is the home of the Orcs. Located far to the east of Kazordoon.
 * Shadowthorn — Alternate Elf City southeast of Venore, inhabited by deviant Elves differing from the friendly Elves found in Ab'Dendriel.
 * Drefia - The home of the evil Necromancers and Vampires, is a small land with many caves where live some undeads. Drefia is to the west from Darashia.
 * Mount Sternum - Is a big mountain with many Cyclops. Near the mountain are some elves and hunters.
 * Plains of Havoc - A big land full of Giant Spiders, Dragons, Orcs, Undeads and Hunters. Is very dangerous.
 * Pits of Inferno - Underground area, where the most powerful and dreaded beasts await. Here also dwell the Ruthless Seven. It is the hardest place of Tibia since the Christmas update 2006.
 * Tombs of Ankrahmun - There is almost every monster, with predominance of Undeads. There are also the Pharaohs.
 * Maze of Lost Souls (MoLS) One of the Tibia's secrets, MoLS protect the entrance to Demona, the city of Warlocks. It's a BIG maze with many dangerous monsters.
 * Shattered Isles - The newest area which is habited by pirates and underwater creatures. There are many different islands, many requiring special permission to reach.  Hidden treasures as well as danger awaits the brave players.

Vocations in-depth
In Tibia there are four different vocations to choose from. They are the Knight, the Paladin, the Druid, and the Sorcerer. These vocations each have advantages and disadvantages which are listed below.

Knights
The knight is the master at hand-to-hand melee combat and will advance in melee skills faster than any other vocation. Their shielding skills rise as fast as the Paladins'. Although knights have great melee and health regeneration rate, a knight sacrifices much needed mana for his pure strength. Knights are usually the most expensive vocation to choose as they require expensive armor to block creatures whereas all the other vocations have ranged attacks and can run and fire at the same time. knights were the easiest to level at low levels before the wands and rods update, but now are the slowest to level. At higher levels, knights generally block for the other vocations due to their massive maximum HP, and the fact that they often use shields unless they have powerful two-handed weapons.

Paladins
The Paladin is the well-rounded vocation of Tibia, neither gaining much nor sacrificing much in any area. They are noted for their mastery in the art of distance fighting as evidenced by their ability to gain the distance skill faster than any other vocation. The paladin is also noted for his well rounded selection of spells. One drawback to playing as a Paladin is that they are quite expensive to play. Arrows or spears must be bought and these items cost money. Paladins can conjure ranged ammunition using magic, but it is time consuming and uses a lot of mana. Since the mana regeneration modification in the game engine, they can make ranged ammunition much quicker now. They are rather hard when low level but are stronger at medium and high levels. This is especially true due to the fact that recent Tibia updates have restricted the use of spears, throwing stars, and throwable rocks by making them sometimes break. Paladins usually will gather many spears, which can be time-consuming or expensive for lower levels. Paladins gain shielding levels at about 80% the rate that knights do, however, they often end up with inefficient shielding skills since many Paladins use distance fighting very early without training their shielding. Also, it can be said that the later levels (and sometimes the earlier levels) of a Paladin use a crossbow or bow to do any real damage. Therefore, their shielding is not as important or used as frequently as knights.

Druids
Druids are non-melee oriented and focus on defensive and healing types of magic. They are the only class able to make the highly coveted Ultimate Healing (UH) Runes which are extremely useful to all vocations. Premium Druids also have the useful skill "Heal Friend", which heals a character greatly in a certain range. The skill is instant and is about half as powerful as an Ultimate Healing Rune. Druids have the ability to use "Mass Healing", make Intense Healing (IH) Runes, and make earlier offensive runes. Although non-melee oriented, gain shielding skills slightly faster than sorcerers, making them slightly better at melee fighting.

Sorcerers
The Sorcerer is the master of arcane magic and specializes in using magical spells with high damage to take out entire armies of enemies at once. Sorcerers, with their coveted Ultimate Explosion (UE) spell and other offensive magics, can outdamage a Druid. Compared to the druid, the sorcerer have always been considered to be the better mage.

Summer 2005 Update
Major updates are released twice yearly by CipSoft. During 2005 the magic systems were greatly altered. Soul points were introduced (Summer Update) which reduced the amount of macroers (characters using illegal macros) as they had to hunt monsters in order to continue creating runes ( Another major feature from the update was the breaking of spears. This made it harder and more expensive for Paladins to keep on "macro-training" while away from their pc. This is most problably the most controversial of the updates applied to the game a piece of evidence for that is the fact that in the 7.6 update spears were made more resistant to breaking, due to complaints and suggestions from the tibian general public.

Christmas 2005 Update
In the Christmas Update even more drastic changes occurred. Mana regeneration (magical power, a term often used in many RPG games) speed was increased by 4x, and experience level requirements (instead of magic level requirements) to cast spells were also created. The change has made it harder for druids and sorcerers to make money below level 25, as no worthy runes can be created. Also, changes were made in the game's graphics.

Spring 2006 Technical Update
On May 18, 2006 the Tibia 7.7 version client was released. This was only a techinical update, however. Changes included the white list, which allowed players to ignore everyone else except for characters in their white list and/or their VIP list. Players could also choose between either DirectX5, DirectX9, or OpenGL as their graphics engine. This led to a major increase in many players' fps (framerates per second). During the test server, the trade channel also got a new look. Players would have to press an "advertise" button and type in what they wanted to sell. This has yet to be implemented into the clients yet, however.

Summer 2006 Update
On August 1 2006, the new Shattered Isles (12 islands total) were introduced; the infamous Liberty Bay being the main settlement for players from the 12 islands. This city is famous for its sugar cane manufacturating and venetian style housing. But the city seems to be split into what they call the rich and the poor, where the east end is more for the rich and the west end is for the poor. Aside from the main city, there are numerous fascinating islands just off the shores such as Meriana, Laguna Islands and Treasure Island. A significant number of new creatures was included, plus an update to the look of the rotworm. Another major aspect of this update was the hotkey feature for items, wherein all usable items with triggers can now be set as hotkeys for one-touch instant actions. Also players are now allowed to shoot directly at people from the battle list; there is a built-in light intensity feature, plus new clothes and addons for outfits. A contentious inclusion is CIP adding cheat tools into the client. The update itself, like many others in the past received quite a lot of backlash in the community, especially on the official forums where protests littered the boards page by page. Fans are excited for the next update, consequently coming near Christmas as it does every year, for what they hope will be another great update for the game. With a pirate-themed island in the game, many fans are hoping that CIPsoft will expand on the current underwater theme and create an Atlantis-themed town perhaps. Others are hoping for an expanded slums-like Brazil town.

Christmas 2006 Update
On December 15, 2006, the Pits of Inferno was introduced, as well as the famous 'Dream Challenge' which allows one to join the Nightmare Knights and fight for good, or join the Brotherhood of Bones and help raise hell. Characters now have a quest log, allowing them to see information on major quests they have started or completed (Desert Dungeon, Paradox Tower, Djinn Factions, Post Officer). Houses were upgraded so litter bins and ovens were removed, and can be bought from furniture stores, in addition, window shutters were added to keep unwanted garbage out of houses. Banks were added in Rookgaard, and all the mainland cities, located at the current NPCs where you change gold. A Rookgaard Trade Channel was also introduced to keep the selling and buying of items separate from the mainland. New items were introduced and so were new monsters. New monsters that were introduced can all be found in the Pits of Inferno except a select few, those being Nomads, who will roam the desert of Darama, and Wyverns, who can be found all over Tibia. And finally, another feature to help stop cheaters was introduced. When you eat food, your character makes an eating sound (Yum, Crunch, etc).

Magic
There are two types of magic:


 * Instant magic - Magic that is cast automatically when you enter the words of the spell (Example: Exevo Gran Mas Vis, Exevo Mort Hur, Utana Vid).
 * Rune magic - Magic that is cast while having a blank rune in your hand (Example: Adori Vita Vis, Adevo Mas Hur, Adori Gran Flam, Adori Gran)

Spells can be bought from the guildleader of each vocation (kina, Paladin, Druid, and Sorcerer) which are located in most of the towns.

Knights have the least spells to buy, Paladins have a few more spells to buy, while Sorcerers and Druids have a large amount of spells to buy. Some spells can only be bought in premium account areas. Also, some spells require elite vocation ranks. The special promoted vocations are Master Sorcerer, Elder Druid, Elite kina and Royal Paladin. Vocations can be promoted with 20,000 gold, a paid account, and an experience level of at least 20 from King Tibianus of Thais, Queen Eloise of Carlin, the Dwarven Emperor of Kazordoon, or the Grand Vizier of Ankrahmun.

Magic wands (for Sorcerers) and rods (for Druids) are especially made for mages. With these weapons, they can use their magic points (Mana points) to attack creatures. These rods and wands need a certain level of experience to mages to handle them, as example, at level 8 you get your first free wand/rod, later, at level 13 you are more experiencend and are able to buy a better, stronger rod/wand, this is the same as level 19, 26 and 33.

Support And Rules
The Tibian support is based on a hierarchy of ranks, starting from lowest to highest: Tutor, Senior Tutor, The now defunct Counsellor, Gamemaster, and finally Customer Support

Tutors can take a simple test on their account page, and after 3 months of tutorship tutors become senior tutor. Senior tutors have the additional responsibilities of monitoring the public forums, and reporting illegal threads. Eg,Swearing,posting hack site links etc. Also, Senior Tutors report any remarks made by players which are against the game rules. Senior Tutors replaced the former rank of Counsellor, ask CIP has faith in people with no actual experience in answering rule violations and they were most recently moved up to the rank of Gamemaster. Many players disagree with this method, but much to their dismay, the CIPsoft had no comment on the matter.

Support itself is lacking at best, as cheating is at an extreme level, and with the current update it has grown to epidemic proportions. Account Sharing, Multi-Clienting and a plethora of other violations plague the game, but CIPsoft takes the time to use a ban on players who accidentally use a cuss word or use the game-chat to talk about Real life, as the RL-Chat itself is hardly ever used. Bans are commonly handed out to players who have done nothing wrong, while leaving the real account sharing players on the USA worlds unnoticed.

Customer Support should only be a last resort for players seeking assistance as the members send out email assistance which is generated by a bot and is almost all of the time the same letterhead that tells the same information to every player, regardless of the reason of banishment. It also should be noted that when a player receives a ban in game, whether it be justified or not, a removal of the banishment is against CIP code and is never acceptable.

Game modifications
Note: The following practices are likely in violation of the program's license or Terms of Service.

It is possible to edit the graphics of the game by modifying certain files, a technique that can be used to create interface skins or change the actual game sprites. These modified files are then exchanged on web sites and internet forums (such as ). Some such modifications may give players unfair advantages, for example when trees and other large objects are made invisible so that items hidden behind them can be easily detected. This is considered as cheating.

Other modifications include AFK tools and aimbots. These are also considered cheating and looked down upon by the official community but the usage of these tools is rampant. The first popular cheating application for Tibia was Tibia GG, followed by TibiaSuite. Tibiasuite did not become very popular, but TibiaSuite2 became one of the most used cheats on Tibia. Unfortunately for users, TibiaSuite2 had a backdoor that sent a persons account details to the creator of the program. Later other cheats took its place such as TibiaBot NG and BlackdProxy. Currently, there are several cheats available, but many require an additional payment after a short trial. However, many people have found a crack which can be used to tackle the 'trial' problem so that they can use the program forever.

Cheats are very popular in Tibia. In fact, the number of cheaters were so high that the game creators started to include cheats in the official client since the version 7.8. The official cheats are actually: aimbot, lighthack and autohealer.

Misc:

The Dark Age is a game that has evolved from Tibia.

Official website

 * Official Tibia website

English fan sites
multiplayer online roleplaying game (English and Deutsch)
 * World of tibia - Fansite of Europe's largest free graphical
 * TibiaWiki - jargon dictionary, lists of towns and creatures, etc.
 * Tibia.no
 * Tibiacity
 * Tibianews
 * Erig.Net
 * MyTibia
 * TibiaHumor