Heraldmoor

The skills

Combat: Attack, Strength, Defence, Hitpoints and Archery. Gathering: Woodcutting, Mining and Fishing. Making: Smithing, Cooking, Fletching, Firemaking and Leatherworking. They feed each other: ore you mine becomes bars at the furnace, bars become weapons and armour at the anvil, logs become bows and arrows, hides become leather armour, and the fish you catch keep you alive in a fight.

How the grind is paced

Every skill shares one experience curve. Level 2 takes 97 experience, level 10 about 1,300, level 50 about 100,000 and level 99 about 12.5 million: half of that is earned after level 92. Six tiers of metal, bronze, iron, steel, crucible steel, meteoric iron and heraldite, need higher levels to work, and the finest ore lies in the Wildlands and the Hoarfells beyond them.

Why it feels worth it

Gear wears down as you use it and can be repaired, prices are set by players, and the wildlands hold the richest resources along with the risk of other players. What you build up is yours to trade, sell from your own shop, or lose if you’re careless.

How to start

  1. Open Play now in your browser.
  2. Pick a name, choose how your character looks, and you’re in Millhaven, the capital, across the market square from the King’s castle.
  3. Talk to the Guide by the fountain for your first task.
  4. To keep your character, add a password in Settings, then Account.

At a glance

Price
Free to play. Nothing in the game is sold for power.
Plays on
Any up-to-date web browser: iPhone, iPad, Android phones and tablets, Chromebook, Windows and Mac.
Download
None. You can add it to your Home Screen for a full-screen app icon.
World
288 × 672 tiles: the safe Kingdom with eight towns and villages, the Southmarch below it with Wardbury, the King’s muster field, the Wildlands across the middle where players can fight, and the frozen Hoarfells in the far north, with the richest resources and a single hamlet.
Combat training
Wardbury’s drill yard, 5 minutes’ walk from Millhaven: pells, dummies, a quintain, archery butts and a sparring ring, with monsters graded by distance all round it.
Skills
13 to level: Attack, Strength, Defence, Hitpoints, Archery, Woodcutting, Mining, Fishing, Cooking, Smithing, Fletching, Firemaking, Leatherworking.
Horses
Every player can claim a free horse at the Royal Stables and ride it anywhere, 12 coats to choose from.
Adventure
5 story quests, 3 boss fights for 1 to 5 players, and a town raid every weekend.
Pace
The world moves in 0.6-second ticks, the steady rhythm of classic tile-based MMOs.
Players
One shared world: trade face to face, duel, group up, chat and meet at weekend events.