Beginner guide — the loop and the first million

The core loop

Start with Woodcutting: the Normal Tree cuts in 3s for 10 XP. Burn part of the logs in Firemaking (19 XP per Normal Log), keep the rest to sell. In parallel, fish shrimp (level 1) and cook them (5 XP, 2s): that is your first combat food.

Skill order

Priorities for your first sessions, in order: 1) Woodcutting + Firemaking (fast XP, GP), 2) Fishing + Cooking (food), 3) Mining + Smithing (gear: the Smithing table lists all 279 recipes by metal tier — bronze first), 4) Farming as soon as you have seeds (it progresses on its own, replant whenever you pass by). Leave Thieving for later: failures deal damage.

A reasonable numeric target for this stage: ~level 50 in your 4-5 engine skills (101,333 XP each, exact curve on the Skills page).

First combat without dying

Equip the best set your Smithing can make, bring a big stock of cooked food, and stay in the areas at the top of the table (Farmlands: chickens, cows). The first dungeon, Chicken Coop, only chains 6 monsters; Undead Graveyard (8) can wait for better gear. Until you own Auto Eat, NEVER leave the screen during combat.

The milestone: Auto Eat

Every spare GP of this stage goes to a single purchase: Auto Eat Tier I, 1,000,000 GP in the shop — the game then eats automatically when your HP drops below the threshold. It is THE unlock that turns Melvor into a true idle: offline combat, overnight farming, chained dungeons. Before it, bank slots and small shop purchases (see the Shop page) come after food and gear.