How to play STATURE

STATURE is a free text-based crime RPG set in Greyhaven, a persistent city shared with other players. This guide covers everything you can do, from your first gym session to fighting for the Crown District.

Getting started

You arrive in Greyhaven with £500 and a free week of membership at Iron Yard gym. You get a random character name to begin with, and you can change it once for free from your profile.

The Getting Started guide on your home page walks you through the basics: train, try a crime, buy some gear and take a job. Every step pays a cash reward. After that, come back each day for your daily reward, which grows with your streak, and look out for timed city events that boost your gains.

Energy, Nerve, Focus and Health

Most actions cost one of three resources, and all of them refill on their own over time:

• Energy powers gym training and attacking other players.
• Nerve is spent on crimes.
• Focus is used for job tasks and focus activities.
• Health drops in fights and recovers over time. Medical items heal faster, and your maximum Health rises with your level.

Your sidebar shows when the next point arrives and how long until each bar is full. Boosters such as Energy Shots, Nerve Tonics and Focus Capsules refill a bar straight away, but each one adds to a cooldown, so you can only use so many at once.

Training at the gym

Your fighting strength comes from eight battle stats: Strength, Toughness, Technique, Discipline, Precision, Agility, Speed and Reflexes. You raise them by training at one of Greyhaven's five gyms, each with its own equipment and coaches.

Training builds Fatigue. Above 35, your gains start to slow, and at 88 you can't train at all until you've rested. Fatigue drops by one point every four minutes, so short, regular sessions beat long grinds. Daily coach bonuses reward you for coming back.

Crime, heat and jail

There are twenty-three crimes in six categories, from shoplifting to the Royal Mint Job. Each one costs Nerve, and some need tools, such as lock picks for a burglary. Repeating a crime builds your mastery of it, which improves your success rate and your loot. Pick an approach (Careful, Standard or Bold) to trade cash against safety, and keep working one category to unlock its perks.

Crimes raise your heat. The hotter you are, the more likely a failed job ends in a cell. In Jail you can wait out your sentence, pay bail or try to escape. Heat cools down over time.

Jobs and businesses

If you'd rather earn honestly, take a job with one of the city's employers. You can complete up to four tasks a day, each costing Focus, and you'll earn pay and job stats. Regular work earns promotions to better-paid ranks. Each industry also gives a perk while you work there, such as shorter hospital stays in Healthcare or more travel cargo in Logistics, and it doubles once you reach Supervisor.

Once you're established, you can found your own business, legitimate or criminal, hire other players as staff, run daily operations and grow its star rating. There are fourteen company types, from a Fitness Gym to a Backroom Casino, and each gives its staff and director a perk. A company backed by a Corporation or protected by a Syndicate also makes its organisation's trade goods at half the production cost.

Fighting and mugging

Attacking another player costs Energy. Fights play out round by round using both players' battle stats and gear, and every fight is logged so you can see exactly what happened. The loser goes to Hospital for a while.

From level 5, if you win a fight you started, you have ten minutes to mug your opponent for part of the cash in their wallet. Bank your money if you don't want to lose it.

Contacts and errands

Seven contacts around the city offer errands, including a street broker, a community centre and a smuggler's wharf. Each contact has three errands for you every day. They take real time, so start one, get on with something else and come back to collect. Doing good work raises your reputation with each contact, from Stranger to Inner Circle, and unlocks better errands. A car or boat gets you there faster, and you'll get an event when an errand is ready.

Scavenging and crafting

Send your character to one of eight scavenging sites to search for materials and blueprint fragments. Collect enough fragments to learn a blueprint, then craft your own weapons, armour and attachments at the Workshop. Crafted gear can be used, sold or traded.

Shops, markets and money

City shops sell everyday gear, food, medical supplies and boosters. You can sell your loot and crafted items to other players on the Player Market, bid in auctions, trade face to face and keep your savings safe in the bank.

Travel and trade runs

Greyhaven isn't the only place to make money. Four other cities, including Saltmarsh Harbour and Ironford, trade nine kinds of goods. Buy cheap where goods are made and sell where they're wanted. Prices move as players trade, so the best runs don't stay the best for long.

Contraband pays more, but police checkpoints can seize it. Back roads have fewer checkpoints but more robbers. While you're away, the rest of Greyhaven is out of reach: you can't train, work, commit crimes or fight, and nobody can attack you.

Organisations and wars

Players band together in organisations: either a Crime Syndicate or a Corporation. Members pool money in a shared treasury, research upgrades and take on operations together.

Organisations can declare 24-hour wars on each other. A declared war starts automatically twelve hours later. War points use fair fight: beating a much weaker player earns as little as half the points, and beating a stronger one earns up to one and a half times as many. At the end, each side's score is multiplied by its turnout, meaning how many members made three or more attacks. Rewards scale with how fairly a side fought and how decisive the result was. Every qualifying fighter earns a War Cache of war-only gear.

Borough Wars and the Crown

Greyhaven is split into boroughs, including Lowmarket, The Foundry, Docklands and Ironvale. Organisations fight 72-hour Borough Wars for control of them, scoring points from fights and from members' everyday activity. Each borough pays daily income and gives its holders perks.

Seasons last four weeks. The last 72 hours are the Crown War for the Crown District. The organisation that holds the Crown chooses city-wide policies that change how the game plays for everyone until the next Crown War.

Dynasties and estates

Alongside your organisation, you can found or join a dynasty: a family of up to twelve kin with its own crest and a legacy score ranked at City Hall. Each dynasty owns a family estate, which grows from a townhouse to a grand estate. Its rooms give every member small perks to crafting, scavenging and legacy.

Questions

Is STATURE free to play?

Yes. STATURE is free and runs in your web browser on desktop and mobile. There is nothing to download.

What kind of game is STATURE?

A text-based crime RPG and persistent multiplayer city game. You build a character in the city of Greyhaven through training, crime, work, fighting, trading, crafting and organisations, alongside other real players.

Can I play STATURE on my phone?

Yes. The game works in mobile browsers as well as on desktop, and your progress is the same on every device.

Do I have to commit crimes?

No. You can build your character through jobs, a business, trading, travel runs, scavenging and crafting. Crime is one route to the top, not the only one.

Can I have more than one account?

No. STATURE allows one account per player. A second account on the same device is not allowed, and linked accounts cannot trade with, attack or help each other.