Your First Days

This page is a suggested plan for your first sessions in Nytheria, as a child of Getting Started. It follows the order the quest book itself uses: a short prologue on the first night, then the chapter First Fire, then The Marked Road, with the Hearth and Home chapters whenever you want food, farms and storage. The plan is a suggestion, not a rule. <!-- src: Q §7 (Night 1, Early game rows; "suggestion"), §2.1, §2.2 -->

Before you start#

You need a new world, the journal key and a little time after dark. Read Getting Started first if you have not set up your keys. <!-- src: IA §2.3 template -->

Know three things before the first night:

• The book gates its chapters. Only One Leaf is open at the start. Every other chapter opens after a quest in an earlier chapter, so chapters are not all open from day one. Work you do early still counts, but a quest completes only after the quests it depends on. <!-- src: Q §1.3 (flexible mode), §1.5; Changed table #32; IA §8 #11 -->
• Items are never consumed. A quest that asks for food or a tool takes nothing away, so the same stack can finish many quests. <!-- src: Q §5 -->
• You claim rewards yourself. Open the quest and click each reward. Nothing is paid out automatically, and each player claims their own copy. <!-- src: Q §4.2 -->

Night one: the prologue#

The prologue is the chapter One Leaf, with four quests. It is played on the first night and gives 1 XP level per quest, 3 levels in total. <!-- src: Q §2.0 overview table, §2.1 One Leaf -->

You get a paper leaf, a torn page, called A Leaf, Torn Out. Every online member of a team that has not found the journal gets one. The text on it asks you to light a fire after dark and keep the leaf by you. <!-- src: Q §6 Prologue -->

1. Find Me. This is a checkmark quest, so you complete it by opening the book and ticking it. <!-- src: Q §2.1 One Leaf -->
2. A Fire and a Leaf. Light a campfire after dark with the torn leaf in your inventory. The fire answers with a direction and a number of paces. <!-- src: Q §2.1 One Leaf, §6 -->
3. Her Mark. This one is optional. A stack of stones stands about halfway to the journal, and passing it completes the quest. <!-- src: Q §2.1 One Leaf, §6 -->
4. Under the Spruce. Follow the direction to a fallen spruce and open the chest under it. The journal is in the chest, with flint and steel and three bread. <!-- src: Q §2.1 One Leaf, §6 -->

According to the story data, the site is built 120 to 260 blocks from the fire that answered. Bring torches, food and a weapon, because you cross open ground at night. <!-- src: Q §6, Unverified 8 (config value, placement can differ) -->

Opening the chest finishes Under the Spruce. That one quest opens First Fire, The Marked Road, all five Hearth and Home chapters and Titans of Nytheria. <!-- src: Q §2.1 One Leaf, §1.5 gate chain -->

After that, press L. The journal screen has four sections: The road so far, Her pages, Purse and wares, and Fires and titans. Clicking a chapter in the journal opens the quest book at that place. <!-- src: Q §6 journal screen; CQ §1.6 -->

The first day: First Fire#

First Fire is the classic first chapter. It has 15 quests and wants wood, stone, iron and a fire that stays lit. <!-- src: Q §1.2 subtitle, §2.1 First Fire -->

The visible quests ask for the following, roughly in this order. <!-- src: Q §2.1 First Fire -->

The campfire quest has an optional minute beside a lit campfire after dark. Looking at something does not count while its quest is still locked, so finish the quests before it first. <!-- src: Q §2.1 First Fire (optional minute); Q §1.3 (observation tasks linear) -->

The chapter also has three hidden quests, which appear in the book only when you complete them. <!-- src: Q §1.2 table (First Fire hidden 3); IA §4.1 (number of hidden quests is Open) -->

Rewards are small and practical: sticks, saplings, torches, apples, coal, arrows, a bucket, six bread, rolls on the Kindling Cache and one Traveller's Cache roll, plus 11 XP levels and 2 embers for the whole chapter. The capstone gives a map, a cartography table, a Traveller's Cache roll, 3 levels and 1 ember. <!-- src: Q §2.1 First Fire rewards -->

Wood and fire the easy way#

FallingTree fells a whole tree when you break one log. Sneak while chopping to take a single log. <!-- src: CQ §2.5 -->

Right click a ripe crop with a hoe to harvest it, and use bone meal on more plants than in vanilla, with RightClickHarvest and Universal Bone Meal. <!-- src: GC §2 overview (Right Click Harvest hoe required; Universal Bone Meal 14 extra targets) -->

Staying alive#

The first nights are about food, a bed and not losing your gear. <!-- src: Q §7 (Early game) -->

• Sleep. Early Bedtime lets you sleep from tick 11,500, earlier than in vanilla. Beds work in the Overworld. <!-- src: CQ §2.6; W §1.5 -->
• Eat. Hunger drains 35 percent slower than in vanilla, because the pack's HungerDial mod multiplies all food exhaustion by 0.65. A food bar lasts about 54 percent longer. AppleSkin shows food values in tooltips. <!-- src: GC §2 Hunger Dial (0.65, 35 % slower, 54 % longer); CQ §2.3 -->
• Fight with care. Monsters get tougher the more you play, because Player Difficulty gives each player a multiplier from 1.00x up to 2.50x. Builders who avoid fighting stay low. /scaling shows your own number. See Difficulty & Player Scaling. <!-- src: GC §1 Player Difficulty; GWS §3.7 -->
• Know what dying costs. Your items and XP go into a grave. See Death, Graves & Respawning. <!-- src: GWS §3.6 -->

Making a home: Hearth and Home#

The five Hearth and Home chapters are mostly optional. Of 74 quests, only the five capstones are required, one per chapter. You can do them in any order, whenever you want food, farms, fish or storage. <!-- src: Q §2.0 overview table, §1.4 optional -->

You do not need to finish them to move on. They are a good first-week goal because they teach the pack's food and storage mods. <!-- src: Q §7 Early game -->

Start with the kitchen#

Build a Farmer's Delight cooking pot, which needs a wooden shovel, a water bucket, bricks and iron. The Farm & Charm pot is cheaper: iron and a shovel. Then plant tomatoes, rice, cabbage and onions from Farmer's Delight, and barley, oats, corn, lettuce and strawberries from Farm & Charm. <!-- src: GC §2 Where to start -->

Each capstone offers a choice kit. The Pot That Travels and Something for the Road let you pick one of three: 16 bread, two apple pies or eight organic compost. <!-- src: Q §4.4 -->

Make storage early#

Start with wooden Sophisticated Storage chests or barrels (planks and a redstone torch), a first backpack (string, leather and a wooden chest) and Packing Tape for moving a full chest. Later you can join your chests into one searchable list with Obscura's Simple Storage. <!-- src: GC §4 how things connect (Early, Mid) -->

Carry On cannot pick up Sophisticated Storage blocks, which is why the pack gives you Packing Tape. <!-- src: GC §4 Overview -->

A Roof and a Pot#

A Roof and a Pot ("Salt, a knife, a pot, and a fire to put it on") starts the cooking mods. You place a campfire, get a cutting board, a knife, a cooking pot, a skillet and a stove, then make a salad, a vegetable soup and tomatoes on a rope, and hold eight foods. Only the capstone, The Pot That Travels, is required. <!-- src: Q §2.2 A Roof and a Pot -->

Baking, wine and tea#

The Long Table is about bread, wine, tea and sharing them. The visible quests have you set up a Herbal Brews kettle and stove with three teas, a Bakery dough and caking station with a cake stand, Vinery grapes, a press, a fermentation barrel and a bottle of red wine, and a table with four chairs. You also sleep in a village and share a slice. <!-- src: Q §2.2 The Long Table -->

Wine takes time: Vinery fermentation runs 5 minutes in the barrel, and aging is slower, one wine year is eight hours of play time. <!-- src: GC §2 Wiki-worthy (wine fermentation 5 min), how things connect (aging) -->

Fields and animals#

Fields and Fences ("Things that grow while you are elsewhere") asks for a fenced field, 32 wheat, a feeding trough and a chicken coop from Farm & Charm, cheese from Meadow (curds first, then a full wheel), corn, lettuce and barley, fertilised soil and breeding animals 10 times. The capstone, A Herd Worth Leaving, needs 16 leather, 16 feathers, 16 white wool and a tamed animal. <!-- src: Q §2.2 Fields and Fences -->

Some numbers help planning: a sprinkler and a scarecrow each reach 8 blocks, fertilised soil 5, and a chicken coop holds three chickens and nine eggs. <!-- src: GC §2 Wiki-worthy details (ranges) -->

Storage and a home you can find#

Shelves and Signposts ("Where things go, and how to find them again") covers furniture and storage. You make three pieces of Handcrafted furniture, 10 Chipped blocks, a Sophisticated Storage barrel, an iron chest and an upgrade, an iron backpack, eight lanterns, a candle holder, a quiver and a globe. The quests also ask for matching windows and eight roof pieces from the Macaw's family. The capstone, Her Lamps, Still Lit, wants four waystones. <!-- src: Q §2.2 Shelves and Signposts -->

Fishing#

Fishing is replaced by Tide, which has 102 fish, 13 rods and a minigame. The chapter Still Water starts by asking you to sit by water for a minute. <!-- src: GC §2 Overview; Q §2.2 Still Water -->

Setting out: The Marked Road#

The Marked Road has 13 quests and is about travel and marking the way. Its subtitle is a line to keep in mind: "She left signs. Learn to read them." <!-- src: Q §1.2, §2.1 The Marked Road -->

You walk 1,000 blocks, draw a map at a cartography table, place waystones (one, then two with a bound scroll), craft a Sophisticated Backpack, get two leads and eight bones, a saddle and a name tag, a spyglass and a notice board with a writable book. The capstone, Where She Went, wants a Nature's Compass and 3,000 blocks walked. <!-- src: Q §2.1 The Marked Road -->

Rewards include a Warp Stone, warp scrolls (four, then eight), paper, ink and Traveller's Cache rolls; the capstone gives eight warp scrolls, a Traveller's Cache roll, 3 levels and 1 ember. <!-- src: Q §2.1 The Marked Road rewards -->

Waystones in Nytheria cost experience points, not levels: about one point per 100 blocks, at most 27. Scrolls are free. See Waystones. <!-- src: GWS §2.1; IA §8 #4 -->

Finishing Where She Went opens the next part, The Road, with Ruins and Rumours and Bells in the Mist. See the Progression Route for what comes after. <!-- src: Q §1.5 gate chain -->

Embers and torn leaves#

Two small systems start in the first chapters and run through the whole book. <!-- src: Q §6 -->

Embers are the currency of the journal. They come as quest rewards (38 quests pay them, 64 embers in the whole book), as Ember Coin items from some caches, and the wallet holds up to 999. You spend them in the journal under Purse and wares. The first ember comes from the quest Embers in First Fire. <!-- src: Q §6 Embers, §4.1, §2.1 First Fire; IA §4.1 Open -->

Torn leaves are pages of the story. There are 16, and you find them as items in loot chests in the story's dimensions and as A Page, Torn from three loot caches. Using one pastes it into the journal, under Her pages. <!-- src: Q §6 Torn leaves, §4.3; IA §4.1 Open -->

Loot caches and rewards#

Hostile mobs have a small chance to drop a cache: about 1.5 percent combined for a hostile mob and 0.3 percent for a passive animal. The Kindling Cache and the Traveller's Cache are the early ones. Caches open with a right click. <!-- src: Q §4.3 -->

Chests in structures use Lootr Remastered, so every player gets their own loot. See Per-Player Loot (Lootr Remastered). <!-- src: W Key facts, §3.2 -->

Playing with friends#

Everyone starts in a personal team. Joining a party shares quest progress. Rewards and embers are per player, so each of you claims your own. See Multiplayer. <!-- src: Q §5 -->

Common problems#

• I cannot complete a quest. It may be locked. Locked quests show a padlock, and you need to finish the quests it depends on first. <!-- src: Q §1.3 (show_lock_icons) -->
• The fire does not answer. Do it after dark with the torn leaf in your inventory. <!-- src: Q §2.1 One Leaf -->
• Nothing happens when I press L. See Troubleshooting. <!-- src: CQ §1.6 -->
• I died. Your grave holds your items. See Death, Graves & Respawning. <!-- src: GWS §3.6 -->

See also#

• Getting Started - keys, world and journal basics
• Progression Route - a suggested order for the whole pack
• The Quest Book - how the 27 chapters fit together
• Waystones - what teleporting costs
• Death, Graves & Respawning - recovering your items
• Difficulty & Player Scaling - why monsters get tougher