How to Play Guide for Shards of Azuria

This page covers everything you need to survive the first hour in Shards of Azuria.

Movement and line of sight[ | ]

You move with a combination of WSAD and the mouse. Assuming you use default settings, use WSAD to move laterally and horizontally. By pressing the right mouse button or RMB, you make the character move towards the cursor. Get used to movement in Azuria, as it takes a bit of practice.
Line of sight is important, as you can only see what your character sees. Line of sight is obscured by walls and obstacles, depicted as black sections in your field of view. Naturally, you see poorly in the dark, so exploring during the day and bringing along a torch for delving is highly recommended.

To interact with items and characters, approach them and click on them. You need to be on the adjacent square to do so, so if you can't open that door or talk to Gregor, move closer. Talk with Gregor to get your first quest. Clicking on NPCs is usually recommended, as they can divulge additional information or quests.
Before leaving Azuria to the south-east, explore the adjacent buildings and talk to the characters there. Each will give you a mission intended to familiarize you with the game's systems and explain the different playstyles. However, to truly progress, you need to leave the city through the south-east gate.
Speed up by using Mana Rush, your default ability. Doing so consumes a minor amount of mana, but makes you move faster. Useful for crossing larger distances.

Combat occurs in real-time. Approach any of the bugs and smack them with LMB or keep it pressed to continue attacking. Combat ends when either of you is dead, so keep punching the insect until it dies. Once it's dead, press and hold R to collect its droppings. Err, loot.
Harvesting raw materials for crafting occurs in the same way, except you whack the tree or rock (with your fists, ouch) to destroy it. Once it's "dead", hold R to collect materials.

Hit V to open the crafting interface. Recipies are displayed below the crafting interface, segregated by type. To craft items, you need one, two, or three ingredients and depending on the type of item, a crafting station or one of the crafting masters from Azuria. Crafting a rock hammer requires no special skills.
Abilities, spells, armour, and other items are crafted the same way. Pay attention to the recipes and you can't get lost.
Gathering crafting items occurs naturally, as in any roguelike: Kill enemies, complete quests, and loot everything you see with extreme kleptomania.