Neopets for Noobs!

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So you've just joined Neopets and you're feeling a little overwhelmed? Relax, that's a perfectly normal reaction! Neopets is a BIG place and takes time to learn. But don't worry, soon you'll be posting intelligently about your favorite parts of the site and looking with pity on the poor noobs that come after you!

Neopets has something for everyone: chatting, action games, puzzles, virtual pets and battles, and a whole online world! Neopians can spend as much or as little time on it as they want, as your pets will never die (I took a year off, myself). The site is a virtual world where everyone has a pet. You can explore lands, play games, and even buy and sell virtual items.

This newbie guide will get you accustomed to some of the most important parts of the site. Take your time with each section... it's a lot of info!

Contents:
  1. Know Your Sidebar!
  2. Something Has Happened!
  3. Making a Friend
  4. Creating a Pet
  5. Items
  6. Caring For Your Pet
  7. NeoPoints (NP)
  8. Status
  9. Know The News


Know Your Sidebar!
Now, let's take a look at the first thing you need to know to navigate the site: the trusty sidebar. The first thing you need to do is get to know each link, so just click and skim it each page. Don't go exploring yet! You might get too lost if you try to see and understand it all now. Just see the general function of the sidebar links. There is a lot to be said about these things, but here is an overview for now:


Something Has Happened!
Random events are a very cool part of Neopia. Sometimes a bar will appear at the top of your screen that says "Something Has Happened!" Underneath the bar is a description of the random event. Sometimes it gives you an item, or increases your pet's statistics, or takes away some of your NP and items! Keep a lookout because you never know when it's going to happen! They don't happen every day, but if you continue to play, they will happen!

Making a Friend:
Neopia is a very social place, and it's easy to meet other users. If you need help at any time you never have to look far!

Chat Boards:
If you ever have a question or just want to chat, go to the Boards on your sidebar. Click it now and take a look. That front page is a list of board topics. Posting off topic can get you in trouble with The Neopets Team: the masters of Neopia, so just try to find the right section for what you want to say. For more posting rules read the chat rules.

Now scroll down and click on the topic "Newbies". You see right under the top banner it says "NeoBoard Index » Newbies" and they link to the front page and the board page. To the right of those is the "new topic" link. This is for when you want to make a thread of your own! You can only do this after you've been in Neopia for 12 hours, I believe. The newbie board and the idea board are good places for general talk, and the help board is good if you have and questions or needs. HTML won't work in your posts... you need NeoCode, which I will explain in a status section later.

Neomail:
If you want to talk to someone specifically or need to speak privately, you can neomail them! Neomail is a letter you send to someone on the site. Try it! Click "send" on top of the neomail page. Now put in a username like mine, tinita_f, put in a topic like "testing" or "hi", type a few words in asking for a response and send!

Events
When you get a new neomail from someone else an icon will appear in the top left of every page. Don't click it yet! This is an event icon.
Events include neomails, trade events, gifts, neofriend events, etc. You'll see them all as you do more on the site. For every event there is an event record that describes the details of what happened. Instead on just clicking the icon, click the words under it, "show all". That will take you to the "All Events" page:
If you were to click on the icon itself the event record would be deleted automatically without your ever seeing it, and you would be sent to the page where the event happened. If the event is a gift, it links to your inventory. If it's a neomail, it links to the letter, etc. The event record in the "all events" page has important info you don't want to miss! I always check the all events page before clicking the icon to go to the event and delete the event record. If you want to delete a few events on a list, use the check boxes. If you want to delete them all, click the last checkbox to check them all. NEVER use the link at the top there to delete all events because that will delete events that might have appeared while you were looking at the event page that you haven't seen yet! (don't laugh, it's happened to me.)

Neofriends
Also, It can be helpful to remember who you have met, and that is where your Neofriends List comes in handy! When someone is your neofriend you can challenge them to multiplayer games. The list also appears when you want to make a neomail or send an item to a friend. Demonstration? OK! You can get to your neofriends page through the neomail link on our sidebar. At the top middle of the page is the link to neofriends. You can add a neofriend two ways: 1) at the bottom of the neofriends page you can put in a name and click, "Add Neofriend". 2) Click the neofriend link at the bottom of your pal's user lookup!


Guilds:
One sure fire way to meet a group of people is to join an active guild. Guilds are groups of neopians who share interests and want to talk and have contests or host guild member events. More about that in the status section here.

Create a Pet:
All of Neopia is populated with them: they're Neopets! And you can have one! or two! or three! or four! But don't... I suggest you start with one pet. Everybody wants a full house of 4 pets, but when you are first learning about the site and its creatures, it's best to learn to care for them with one pet only.

If you haven't already chosen, or if you've been on the site a few weeks and you feel like you are ready for a second pet, there are three places you can get a pet: the pound, the grundo adoption center, or the "create a neopet" place. For starters, click "create a neopet" at the top of the sidebar to make your own.

Making a New Pet:
The first thing you have to do is choose what species of pet you like. What is in front of you is a selection of a few of the species in a certain color, so to see more click "more neopets". You can choose your own color, so don't let that be part of the choosing process. And don't choose on looks alone! Each species has typical personality traits. Lennys are smart, Wockys are adventurous, Kougras are lucky! Click the picture of the species example to see a bit about each one. The choice is important because this pet is representing you in Neopia. Your pet tells other players about your personality! To see all the neopets on one page, click the "Pet Central" link on the sidebar, then click All Pets.

One thing to be aware of is that some pets will not be available to you. Tonus only come out once in a while, cybunnies are very limited, kois are not going to be released again for a while, and krawks are really hard to get! If it says "limited edition" or "restricted" under the picture, forget about it... unless you want a grundo! If you want a grundo, skip to the next section.

Once you have chosen a pet you can create, click the radio button under the picture and click the "I have chosen" button. Now we get specific! Choose what color you want your pet to be, gender, and the other personality traits. Before you pick a name for your pet, open a new browser with neopets in it. In the search bar type the name you want and search to see if the name is already taken. One trick is to put an underscore or a number to make a name original.

Now you have to get your pets' statistics. They are picked randomly, but you do get some choice in the matter. Take a look at the stats before you. You could just take those, or "re-roll" to get new random stats. You can only re-roll three times, so chose wisely! Once that's done, your pet has been born!

Making a Grundo:
Making a new grundo is a different procedure. You can only get one from Neopia's Space Station! Click on the "explore" button to see the world map. On the right is the space station. Nice, no? Now click on the area at the bottom left that says (upside down) "Adopt a Grundo". Click "Enter Agency". Now we get to the grundo adoption!

Now pick a color and gender. Before you pick a name for your pet, open a new browser with the neopets site in it. In the search bar type the name you want and search to see if the name is already taken. One trick is to put an underscore or a number to make a name original. Once that's done you've got a Grundo!

The Pound:
If you have a generous heart you could adopt an abandoned pet from the pound. This costs a few neopoints, but you could end up with a slightly more experienced pet then one you create yourself. If you want to pick up one of these poor misfits, click the "Pet Central" link near the top of your sidebar. Look down... see the teary eyed purple Bruce (penguin)? That's the link to the pound. At the front page of the pound click the uni (unicorn) to adopt.

That brings us to the adoptable pets! Here's a quick view of the page:
You can read the info on the selected pet there and decide if you want it. If you want one of the two pets around it, click on the link at the top there to search for that pet by name. If you want to see some more pound pets, click the "Find a Neopet At Random" button to see some others. Just choose one!


Items:
So now you have a pet and you need to care for it, feed it, groom it... you need stuff. There are thousands of "items" in Neopia and they are a HUGE part of what Neopia is all about. Let's look at your items right now! Click on the link on the top right side of your sidebar that says "NP" (NeoPoints). This goes straight to your inventory! If you haven't done it already, accept your "Newbie Pack". As your inventory is telling you, these are a few virtual items that all neopians get when they first sign up! All of these things are worth very little in the marketplace, so feel free to use them up. Lets start by reading the book to your pet. Click on the book and a popup window will allow you to do stuff. Take a look:
Ignore all the blah in the middle. The action list changes a bit for each type of item. The example is of a food item so it has the option to feed your pet(s) the item. The book will have the option to red that book to your pet. Some things are common to all items. Here is a quick word on each with more info in the next sections: Go ahead and select the option of reading your book to your pet & see how grateful your pet is! The book is gone now, because that is the way it is with magical books. Now, you have a piece of food from your newbie pack, but your pet is born FULL, so don't feed it to him/her yet. You can do that next time you log in. You will be using the rest of the items throughout this neopian walkthrough.

The MarketPlace:
Now is a good time to take a look where we are. This is the marketplace! It has the market toolbar at the top of the page. You don't need to know all the icons now, and if you ever get confused you can hover over the icon and a few words will show up to tell you what it is. here is a short description of each one:
You can get to the main market area of neopia by clicking the "shops" link on your sidebar, but the market toolbar shows up if you go to your inventory by clicking the amount of NP (NeoPoints) you have, or if you enter a shop from a neopian land, because these are all market actions. Anything that has to do with neopian items or NP is a market thing.

Not every link on the market toolbar is to a market page. In the next few sections we will focus on the ones that compose the marketplace.

Neopia-Run Shops:
To buy items you need neopoints, they work like money. Neopia has shops that are run by the site, and that is where you can usually find the cheapest items. Click on "shops" on your sidebar will take you to the first shop map. There are a number of things on the map, but most of them are shops:

The problem with trying to buy from Neopia-run shops it that all the other users know how cheaply you can get things there, so items go fast. One that doesn't sell out all the time is the "collectable card shop" on the second shop map. Click the sign that says "The Bazaar", or click the bottom half of the middle circle in the market topbar. The card shop is on the bottom right. Click it and you will see some collectable card items. Click on one and it takes you to the haggling page. When you try to buy an item in the Neopia-run shops you can haggle down the price if you want. The only problem is that there are a limited number of items in stock at any given time, and time spent haggling might allow someone else to buy out the item before you!

Neopian shops are found here in the marketplace, or in any of neopia's lands you see on the map when you click "explore" on the sidebar. You can look at those others later, when you explore neopian lands.

User-Run Shops:
The easiest way to get a specific item you want is to pay full market price to a user who is selling that item in their shop. Each user can have a shop. More about making your own shop in a later section. For now lets see how to buy from other users. To find out who is selling an item for the cheapest price we go to the Shop Wizard. Click on the wizard hat on the left half of the market topbar. Now you can type in part of an item name or the whole name, and the drop-down list lets you tell the wizard which you are doing. If you are looking for the item in a gallery, you could put a minimum price of 100,000np. At that price the site does not allow the item to be bought, so it is considered a gallery item. Otherwise, put nothing in the minimum price. If you have an idea what price you are willing to pay for an item you can put that into the maximum price box.

Lets do a quick search. Put in "angel", leave the drop-down list as "containing my phrase", and leave the rest blank. Click "Search Shops". The search results have the cheapest at the top. These may not be the cheapest in neopia, though, because the wizard only searches sections of shops at a time. Since we put in "containing my phrase" the wizard will look for a different item with the word angel in it if we refresh, so let's try that: hit the F5 key to refresh. Cool, no? ok, let's go back to the wizard front page and try another search. Put in "Yellow Aisha Plushie" and select "Identical to my Phrase" this time. Now it will show only that item! This time if you refresh, the wizard will look in different sections of user-run shops. This is the best way to find what you are looking for at the cheapest price.

Click on the username of someone who has the item. This will go to the shop that the user has made. The item you were looking for is above all the other items, but under the user's writings. If you really wanted to buy the item all you would have to do is click the item and then click "OK" on the alert. Then the item would be in your inventory!

It is best to keep most of your NP here because neopian "random events" can can sometimes take away part of your NP if you have it out! Take out some money if you plan to go shopping or spend it on one of the games of chance.

Safety Deposit Box:
Click on the safe icon of the marketplace toolbar, next to last on the right. This is your safety deposit box where you can store thousands of items! The things in your inventory are subject to any neopian "random events" that can alter or destroy them! This is rare, but it will eventually happen to you. Anything that is important or expensive should be kept in the deposit box for safe keeping.

Money Tree:
Now click the tree icon next to the safety deposit box icon. This is the Money Tree! If you "donate" an item it ends up here. Users all over Neopia donate items and NP (money) here for anyone who wants it. Getting something from here can be very difficult, though.

To get ANYTHING off the money tree you have to have a fast connection, and you have to click fast. First put all your NP in your bank account. Now just let the page load. Now hover your mouse on the left or right side of the middle object, or, if there is no middle, on the left side of the right-middle object. Got it? Now have one hand poised to click with the other ready to hit the "F5" key so it will refresh. NOW CLICK! Click on the square loading under your mouse before the page is even completed! You now have a CHANCE at getting something. Didn't work? Go back & try again! That's all you can do.

QuickStock:
An easy way to get things into your safety deposit box, shop, or in the money tree is by using the quickstock. At the top of your inventory, under the market topbar, are a few links that are mostly redundant. The important one is the second one- quickstock. Click it! Whatever items you have are listed there, along with all the common options all items have. This can be useful when you want to put a bunch of things in your shop or deposit box.

Trades:
One way to get items is to trade your items in the trading post! Click the faerie's face between the money tree link and the bank link. That is the trading post! You can put up items you don't need to ask for ones you want.

Click on "create a new trade" and the items in your inventory will show up on a list. You can pick up to 10 items per lot, so go ahead and check off a few things. Under that there is the "wishlist" area where the person making the lot says what they are looking for. You can type in that this lot is "NFT"- Not For Trade since this is just a test trade. Click the button and you've put up a lot! If you hadn't said for people not to bid, other users could offer you items or NP on that lot, and you could choose to accept or reject their offer, or even close the lot and give it to nobody!

Let's look at some examples of other user's lots. Click "browse Lots", then "newest 20". These are the last 20 posts created.
If an item is worth 100,000np or more it can't be sold in a regular shop, so most people use the trading post to sell these "unbuyables".

Auctions:
Another way to get items you are looking for is in the neopian auction house. Personally, I think it can take a long time to get a specific item, and it's too easy to get outbid... but thousands of neopians must find it interesting because the place is always jumping. Click the mallet on the left half of the market toolbar. What you see is the front of the auction page with the auctions that are the closest to coming to an end. If you just want to browse the lots, click on the "41-60". That way you have a little time to browse before the auction ends.

Click one of the auctioned items. Before you ever bid on an item, remember to look up the market value by searching the item in he shop wizard to see the cheapest prices, that way you know how much you should be willing to bid.
For info on putting things up for auction, check the NP section.

Caring For Your Neopet:
Neopets are not very sensitive creatures, so you can give them as much or as little care as you want. For some owners having a happy, healthy pet can be fulfilling. Others want a pet that is buffed up and armed to the teeth to fight other pets in the battledome! Still others just want to have a decent looking pet to sit & look nice in their userlookup to be the envy of other users. These next sections will show you the ropes.

Quick reference:
First, you need to know how to check up on your pets! To check on your pets, click the name of your "active pet" (If you only have one pet, it is automatically the active pet) to go to the QuickRef page. This is where you can see all of your pets, see if they are hungry, their health and happiness, and their stats. If you have more then one pet, the one with the picture that is not "grayed out" a bit is the active pet. To change the active pet, click on the picture of the one you want to be active. The active pet is the one who usually gets all the random events and effects from certain games.

Feeding Your Neopet:
The first thing your neopets needs is food. A Neopet needs to be fed at least every few day to keep him happy. After all, if your pet gets too upset his color will turn red! There are 5 ways to get your pet the food he needs:
  1. If you are really low in neopoints and have less then 3000np, you can get fed at the Soup Kitchen! You can find it in the marketplace. Just click the soup faerie face icon to go to the user-run shop market(a place you never need to go to otherwise), then click the soup faerie's place:

  2. Another way to get free food is from the Giant Omelette! You can go once a day to get a piece of omelette worth three bites of food! This is available to all neopians. To get to it click "explore" on your sidebar, then click "Tyrannia" in the top right of the globe. Then click the sign on top that says, "plateau". There is the omelette at the bottom left! Click it, then click "grab some omelette".
  3. If you don't want to feed your pet omelette every single day you can get him some food in one of the neopian food shops or user-run shops. Put the name of any general food into the shop wizard and click any name. Browse a few shows until you find the food you want. Search that specific food in the wizard to find the cheapest one being sold! If you want cheap food but your omelette has run out, you can always buy cheap omelette...
  4. Another way to get food is through the Dice-A-Roo. It is a game of chance that sometimes gives food. More on finding games in the games section later.
  5. Finally, if you don't want to bother feeding your pets at all, but want them healthy, you can put them in the Neolodge. The cheapest room is 5np a night, so it's a very cheap alternative! It's supposed to be used when you know you won't get to be online for a long time and you want your pets fed for you, but it works if you just don't want to bother with the task of feeding. You don't have to click on any of the "extras", just stick your pet in cockroach towers, click 28 days, and you have your pet fed for almost a month for 140np!
Playing With Your Pet:
Everybody wants their pet to be contented. For one thing, if your pet gets too angry it's color turns to RED! You need to keep the little guy happy.

Start by going to your inventory. Click on the "Shops" button on the sidebar, then click the left-most icon on the market topbar (it's supposed to be a swag bag). In your inventory should be a toy, usually a plushie. Click on it! If you need a review of the item window, check the Items section of this guide. Use the dropdown list and select "Play with *your pet's name*" then click "submit". Your pet will then tell you if they like the toy or not! Their opinions never change, so don't try to get your pet to play with a toy they don't like or eat a food they refuse to touch!

Every time you play with your pet, or groom your pet with a grooming item like a brush or a mirror, they will get happier. The happiest they can be is "delighted!" so once they are there you have done your job!

Pets get unhappy if you leave them alone too long (active pet only) or if they are sick (see next section).

Pet's Health:
Just by living in Neopia, your pet runs the risk of catching an illness. If your pet gets sick you can tell! If it happens as a random event and you don't notice the event when it happens, you may check on your pets one day and find one of them sick! There are several ways to get your pet feeling good again:
  1. To cure your pet, check the QuickRef to see what they have, then go to the Hospital in the main shops area to see what the cure is. Once you know what item you need, you can buy it at the Pharmacy or in a user's shop.
  2. If you don't want to have to spend NP to make your pet well again (it can be quite pricy!) you can go to the Healing Springs every 30 minutes. Eventually, your pet will be healed! The healing spring gives healing potions for when your pet is hurt (not sick), some snowballs (battle items), it can heal your pets, or even feed your pets! I suggest you go every 30 minutes, even if your pet isn't sick!


Your Pet's Statistics (BattleDome!):
So your pet is happy and healthy? Time to go to the next level and build up your pet's battle stats! Even if you aren't that into battling, having good stats can be good for you. When neopian wars happen you can win NP, prizes, a trophy, and even an avatar for participating! To see all of your pets stats, check the QuickRef. To up your stats:
  1. Some random events will bring up your level, strength, or defense. This isn't the most efficient way to up your stats, though.
  2. If you want to up a specific stat, you want to go to one of the training schools! The Swashbuckling Academy takes items called "dubloons" as payment for classes. The Mystery Island Training School takes items called "codestones". Dubloons and codestones are not cheap, but the training schools are a necessity to any battledome master, and they are the only sure thing.
  3. Another way to up your stats is the Lab Ray. It can help your pet, damage your pet, turn your pet your pet into any species, color, or ANYTHING! It's totally random. Good Luck! More info at the link above.
NeoPoints (NP):
They say money makes the world go around... well, NP makes Neopia go around! NeoPoints are the currency of this online world, and you want to have millions! These next few sections will show you how to make it and keep it. If you need a refresher on how to spend it (ha), go to the Items section.

The Bank:
It's easy to make when you know how, but not that easy to keep! So the first thing you need to do is open a bank account. One VERY important place you must go to every day is the bank. Click on the little pillar looking icon near the middle of the right half of the market toolbar. If you haven't done it already, sign up for a bank account. None of the information really matters until you come to the "account type" thing. You should start out with the "Junior Saver" account because it has no minimum for deposit. When you do get more neopoints try to upgrade your account as much as possible! The better the account type, the better your interest rate. You can come to the bank to collect interest every day! It can really add up.

Games:
The most common way of making NP is by playing games. Check out the game selection by clicking the "games" button on your sidebar. There are three types of games: Puzzle, Action, and Luck/Chance. The fourth square is the Featured Game, which gives you twice as much NP as the game usually gives.

Take your time getting to try all the games. The main Tip Page has a bunch of game guides to help you get good scores. For a list of a few games that give quick NP, check my Quick Cash list.

You can search for a specific game in the search bar above all the games, or in the search bar on the sidebar. Or just click on one of the games and read the description! Here is what you see when you click to a game's page:
At the end of every flash game it has two options: "Restart" and "Send Score". If you like your score, send it and it will translate into NP. Otherwise, restart the game & try again. You can only send a score three times a day for any one game, and the maximum amount you can make is 1000np per score sent.

Your Shop:
By now you have seen how to buy items from user-run shops. Now lets make a shop of your very own! Click "shops" on your sidebar, then click the "Your Shop" icon on the market topbar:

If you have a shop this link goes to your shop's stock (items you have for sale), but if you don't have one yet, click on "Create/Edit a Shop".
It cost some NP to start a shop, but it's worth it! That way whenever you have an item you have no use for, you can just sell it. A lot of people spend most of their time buying stuff cheap from Neopian Shops and selling them to other users in thier shops! Once you have a shop, you can change what the shop front will look like:
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