Just starting Ultima IV for the first time as well. As far as people joining you I'll drop a hint from what I've found so far...

***Possible Spoiler***

In Lord British's castle there is a jester that mentioned the greatest bard in land is in Britain. Mayhaps look around there? :-)

***End Spoiler***

As far as you other questions I've no idea. I'm just going around exploring at the moment trying to figure stuff out on my own. I'm sure there are more knowledgeable folks around here who can point you in a direction. Otherwise there are hint books available from GOG and of course walkthroughs around the net.

Here are some more hints... Make sure you talk to Lord British. He will tell you what your quest is, and give you some guidance. But, basically, your initial goal is to be virtuous - just go around doing good deeds. See this post for more help. The Seer in Lord British's castle will tell you how you're doing. Make sure you talk to him! Only certain characters will join you. When you're talking to people, you can always ask 'join' to see if they'll join. (Remember, you should always also ask 'name', 'job', and 'health'). Don't worry too much about the dungeons until you've progressed further in your quest to become the Avatar.

Firstly, find Lord British. He should be in the throne room at the top of Castle Britannia. Talk to him about things that he mentions to get more of a clue about what to do. You can also ask him for help from time to time throughout the game and he'll give you some hints as to what to do next. The game is very non-linear.

You should also be wandering around each town, village and castle you come across, talking to everyone you meet. Exhaust their dialogue. Every character in the game responds to "name", "health" and "job". Some reply to "join" by joining your party. All reply to "bye" (end conversation) and "look" (repeat the character's physical description). Other than those, each character in the game replies to two unique words each. These words are usually directly related to something the character themselves say to you in response to "job" or "health". For example, if you type "job" to a character called Bob, he might tell you that he works in the kitchen. If you then type in "kitchen" he might respond by telling you he likes to cook chicken. If you then type "chicken" he might tell you where he gets his chickens from. In this case, "kitchen" and "chicken" are Bob's two unique words that he responds to. At that point you can move on to another NPC.

Sometimes you may not be able to find the second unique word an NPC responds to. In these cases another NPC somewhere in the game will tell you what to say to them. If Tom responds to "job" by telling you he practices magic, and he then responds to "magic" by telling you that he knows how to cast a spell, you might find that Tom doesn't respond to anything else like "spell" or "cast". However, an NPC in another city called Paul might tell you to seek out Tom and ask him about the sleep spell. Going back to Tom and asking him of "sleep" should confirm that "sleep" is Tom's second unique word he responds to.

On the topic of moongates, look at the map that should come with the game. You should see small circles dotted around the map near key cities in the game. These are the locations of the moongates. Now look at the top of your screen. You should see two moons. The phases of these two moons change while you play. The first moon tells you which moongate is open. The second moon tells you where that moongate will take you. So if the first moon is solid white, look for the solid white circle on the map. You'll see it's near the town of Minoc right up near the top. This means that there is a moongate open at Minoc. If the second moon is solid black, look for the solid black circle on the map. You'll see that it's near the town of Moonglow, on a large island at the far right of the map. This is where the moongate will take you to. So if you're near Minoc and want to go to Moonglow, you should jump through the moongate at that particular time.

Hope this helps. Don't worry about dungeons yet.

thanks for the info im gonna try to find lord brittisch and explore and talk to npc's i hope i can find a moongate to the start town since they sold plate mail there. But i have to say most town names are very familiar to me since i used to play ultima online. My first mmo i played since back then i couldnt get ultima 7 to work, i had the cd version.

As far as moongates go - there's one near to every Towne (Britain, Yew, Minoc, Skara Brae, Jhelom, Moonglow, Trinsic) and by the ruins of Magincia. They are indicated on the map. They're great for getting to and from some of the island townes in the beginning of the game, but eventually you'll want to familiarize yourself with the oceans (need a pirate ship) and, unfortunately, with the walking paths, since there are a lot of features in and around the townes that you'll miss if you stick of moongate travel.
Think of it like driving - sure, the highways get you where you want to go fast, but you miss the countryside. Of course, you also miss all the orcs between you and your destination...

i didnt know it was possible to travel betwean them without the moongates sometimes there are mountains or swamps with poison you. I died of poison once.

Well there's another way to both cure (as in, Cure poison) and heal (as in Heal injury, replenish lost HPs [Hit-Points]), among many, many other things. That would be the casting of magical spells, in this case the spells of Cure and Heal. This can be done when you have a char in your Party with MPs, Magic Points.

Some characters have more MPs than others. A Fighter has none at all, but a Mage will have the most of all. Spells are actually Mixtures of Reagents (herbs, in other words). There's at least one town where you can buy some of the herbs available in the game, but there are other sources as well. And it is up to you to find what are recipies of Reagent-Mixtures to produce each spell. Once again, talking with the NPCs wherever you find them helps immensely. Having a look at The Book of Mystic Wisdom, the Spellbook that comes with the game, also helps. You can read it through, or use it as a reference. But I'd recommend actually reading it and then using it as a reference as needed during the game hehehe

Hmm, unfortunately the Spellbook available on this site is incomplete, missing its Page 8. But thanks to another member of this very forum (grviper), and Abandonia, you can get the full, complete copy from here:

http://www.abandonia.com/en/games/25548/Ultima+IV+-+Quest+of+the+Avatar.html

Download it in .PDF from the link there called "Spell Book". Go on ahead and get the "Player Reference Card" in .PDF as it will help, and is for exactly the very version of the game that you got from this site, the IBM version, or (MS-)DOS verson.

And if it interests you there are also links to two of the other many platform-versions of the game. And if your interested in the C64 version, I can tell you all about that hehehe Otherwise just get those docs and enjoy much the DOS version from here on GOG, as it's great! hehehe

Hmm, maybe I'm just roughly guessing, but it seems to me that you just dove-in and didn't actually read the manual hehehe Heh, unlike what is common and even about standard in games today, it was quite rare when games of that olde Golden Era would explain in-game how to play it and what to do. Furthermore so many games would offer gameplay that was not self-evident: Ultima IV: Quest of the Avatar is certainly one of those, unlike Space Invaders-types and Pac-Man maze-/gobble-games. For such not-so-obvious games like Ultima, that were numerous, you'd really, actually have to read the manual that came with it! Fortunately, you can get the manual in .PDF either from that Abandonia page, or just right here from GOG. It's called The History of Britannia as Told by Kyle the Younger or just simply "The Book of History".

(You read The Book of History.)

(No, really! Read The Book of History!) hehehe

That will tell you a lot about the char-classes, monsters, available weaponry, townes, shops, the Moongates, etc. and even a bit about magic and spells. Go on, read it! hehehe

I dunno how much of an RPG-player you might be, but it might be that Ultima IV: Quest of the Avatar will be one of the greatest CRPGs you'll EVER play hehehehe

All the locations on the main continent (Britain, Yew, Minoc, Trinsic, the castles Brittania and Empath Abbey and the villages of Paws and Vesper) can be walked. Check your map. In fact, there are several other things - dungeons, shrines, the villages, and so on - that you'll miss if you only go by moongate. If you want to get off the main continent, moongates are the easiest way to go - but again, you miss dungeons, shrines, and other features that you can get to by boat or by Blink spell.

Thanks for the reply, Im play all kind of rpg's my first rpg was eye of the beholder 2 and the first game i bought wich came with a hint book how to survive the first partion of the game. I even had played pnp rpg wich too bad died today. Shall we say those days a bought most of the games wich had the rpg genre lable. Yeah i know i should read that manual (i should buy a printer) I dont like to read from a screen maybe im old fashion but if Im gonna read something big i want to sit on the couch and enjoy it. I always was interested in ultima when i was a kid but you needed be almost a rocket science to understand how to get those games to work well, Im glad that gog has brought them again so i still have a chance to play them.Im glad i played ultima online so rthat i know those places :)

Hello, I have been playing the game for a month more or less and I don't know why but my Magic Points (MP) are not regenerating so I can't use magic. I read that in the NES version the MP regenerates as you walk or fight but in my game it doesn't.
Is the version of the game what makes the MP not regenerating or maybe it's a problem of my game files?

Your MP only regenerates up to a certain amount that depends on your character's class and INT (DEX on NES due to what I suspect is a translation mistake); if your MP is already full, you won't get any more.

Also, Fighters and Shepherds don't get any MP, and can't ever cast spells. (Well, in the NES version, they can eventually, but not on other versions.) If your main character is one of those classes, you will need to recruit somebody who can cast spells in order to have access to magic (and I'm pretty sure there's at least one item you can't realistically get without magic). Alternatively, you could just start over (and doing so might be a good idea if you're a Shepherd).

The MP amount for each class is as follows:
* Fighter, Shepherd: 0
* Tinker: INT / 2 (no access to more expensive spells)
* Bard/Paladin/Ranger: INT (possible to access every spell with this amount)
* Druid: INT * 1.5 (but note that Druids get poor INT growth at level up on PC)
* Mage: INT * 2 (can cast the most powerful spell right away)

By the way, one thing to note: The NES version is so different it might as well be a different game. The structure of the game is still about the same, and the maps are similar, but the game mechanics are completely different. (I do note that MP does work the same way on NES, except that walking around in towns doesn't refill your MP on NES, and that the DEX and INT stats are mislabeled on NES.)

Edit: Why did you post in a long dead topic rather than making a new topic? A new topic would be far more visible, and you could even have given it a better title than just the game's name (something like "[Ultima 4] MP not regernerating", for example).

He didn't need to do that, no one's gotta do that. He posted his post in the right place. What your saying makes no sense, and he posted on-topic well enough, this topic.

"Long dead"? Pfft! Then how come it's still here instead of locked or deleted? People can (and should) post on-topic here as long as the tread is here (which is why it's here, even now when you read it, whenever "even now" might be). You're telling that guy wrong, see.

Read and post about THIS topic HERE in THIS thread. Other threads are for other topics, and new threads are for topics not yet posted by anyone else yet. "Long dead"? No, it's right here, see? Or are you not reading this while reading it whenever right now? ???

Ok but in which thread should we argue over whether and when it's appropriate to start a new thread vs reuse an existing one? Should we have that discussion here or start a new thread to discuss it?

I have no idea if GOG is one of them but there certainly are sites that will delete messages/lock topics/possibly even punish you for posting in such an old topic, regardless of whether or not it is still open to do so. Of course some people just believe it is something you shouldn't do, either due to experience with such sites, or a belief they came to separately.