Possible seal vendor oversight - Voninblod

zomak

So the new protector seal vendor sells unrestored relic armor. He also sells almost all the reagents needed to restore the armor under misc. So it certain seems like the idea is for you to be able to buy your armor and the restoration reagents from the seal vendor to acquire new usable armor. The one key reagent that is missing is voninblod. Currently there are only 3 ways to obtain voninblod, from SKT quests, from turning in ostorian relics in the SKT zones, or by using the traveling merchant in river district to trade abandoned treasures for voninblod. It also takes a lot of voninblod to restore the armor so we probably aren't talking about a quick trip through the area either. This isn't that much an issue for me personally as I am already over-geared for all of that content. Although it does require you to run that specific content.

However this could be an issue for a newer player that has barely 7500 IL, or even less if his guild mates carry him in a private queue, and is just starting to run dungeons to upgrade his gear. He gets the random piece of alliance armor from the chest and boss drops sure, and he can buy the rings with the seals sure, but when he wants to buy relic armor he can't restore it because I don't think a 7500 IL character is going to fair well is either bryn shander or river district.

This may have been done intentionally since the relic armor also uses voninblod to empower it and it's possible they didn't want you to be able to keep it empowered without running the specific content that provides voninblod. I cannot understand why this would be the case though and it still contradicts the seemed intention of being able to restore the armor using stuff from the seal vendor. Since the armor depletes no mater what content you are running your should have a source of voninblod in all of the content that someone using this armor should be running, or at least all of it that presents a decent challenge, such as dungeons. Especially since this is now going to be new level 70 players first major armor upgrade from here on out.

namelesshero347

You can farm most of the relic sites in bryn shander without fighting. It's just time consuming and boring.

callumf

I thought the same as the OP. Why introduce this relic armour and force players back into Bryn Shander to farm Vonin Blood? It was a painful enough process doing SKT boons in the first place, let alone going back to Bryn Shander to have my eyes BLEEDING from the pain of that awful whiteness! So is it an oversight? Or intentional. No way am I going back to hours of relic collecting for 15 il points or something.

silence1x

You can exchange abandoned treasures for voninblood from the traveling merchant in River District.

zomak

> @silence1x said:
> You can exchange abandoned treasures for voninblood from the traveling merchant in River District.

I know, like I said it's not a problem for me personally. What about my guild mates that just started to run epics, are barely 7500 IL, and haven't finished the campaigns that come before STK and River District. Should they be expected to jump ahead to this content and skip the story from the older content? Can their characters even handle that content? They can no longer buy the intermediate alliance and even armor to get geared for this content either. The relic armor that's available now is better sure but it isn't usable until they run this late end game content. Is it fair to them to expect this? Some of my guild mates are still wearing the trash drop blue 115 IL(in the old system) armor for some of their pieces, can they really handle Bryn shander or river district? And of course there are SKT spoilers in the river district intro so they shouldn't be expected to skip ahead.

silverkelt

no matter what you do, its a most boring procedure.. the least boring is probably running fbi ad nasuem.. but i have some issues with that dungeon (basically you have to have the epic key, or its not worth running) and I hate farming for keys.. in fact farming for vblood is about on part with farming for keys to me.

If you just run fbi without the epic key.. you can pretty much get NOTHING.. other the vblood (in fact you can get ZERO salvage for running fbi without the keys)

so its a pain the but to me.. either way.. I noticed some of my toons could get the 4th or 5th boon now.. but for the lack of several thousand vblood aquisition.

p.s.. I still hate mod 10.. still some of the most boring drivil, of any mmos ive ever played.. (travel time, amount of needless and boring HAMSTER grind introduced.. everything.. I still think its even a lower point then mod 6, mod 6 was broken.. but damn.. it was also fun.. ya know?

qexotic

Unfortunately, the best way to 'farm' VBlood costs AD. Buy 'Map in Bottle' off the AH and spend some time sailing round SoMI locating the chests. I found I was getting around 7-8k of VBlood from 20 bottles. Even with the recent drop in value of Lanolin, I found I was able to recoup the initial cost of the bottles by selling off all of the other unbound content that I did not need. As a nice bonus, you also get a load of RP and, if you are making keys for MVA, lots of fish to trade in

jonkoca

Just buy a purple trowel and farm cold run. Easiest, though boring, way.

dsn1118

zomak#4611 said:

> @silence1x said:

> You can exchange abandoned treasures for voninblood from the traveling merchant in River District.



I know, like I said it's not a problem for me personally. What about my guild mates that just started to run epics, are barely 7500 IL, and haven't finished the campaigns that come before STK and River District. Should they be expected to jump ahead to this content and skip the story from the older content? Can their characters even handle that content? They can no longer buy the intermediate alliance and even armor to get geared for this content either. The relic armor that's available now is better sure but it isn't usable until they run this late end game content. Is it fair to them to expect this? Some of my guild mates are still wearing the trash drop blue 115 IL(in the old system) armor for some of their pieces, can they really handle Bryn shander or river district? And of course there are SKT spoilers in the river district intro so they shouldn't be expected to skip ahead.

I agree with people saying about seal vendor.But do people use SKT gear.I think it is a waste since it constantly requires Voninblod to work its best.Just wanted add some info for newer players:

I know it is a long way around but T2s still drop elemental alliance gear.I am not sure about t1s though(I got a blue alliance belt from Tuern).Also you may want to farm drow gear after getting elemental alliance ones.You can try to get in a guild which are doing Dragonflight runs and farm them.My main GF still wears dragonflight and drow gears while I am doing missions.

These gears should be enough until we get newer gears from Chult campaign

eomer

Its been a long time I don't do it, but it's possible to farm roughly 20k+ Voninblod (In my case I don't even use Master Trowel nor the Rhemorhraz companion, which would requires less time) in about 1 hour on Bryn Shander, and, yes, it can get boring.

All I do is: use the potion that helps with relics find (don't remember the name exactly, something with everfrost?), wear a Frostburn gauntlet (those are cheap, and helps towards relic digging), gather a basic Trowel, turn on the music, locate the less populated instance on Bryn Shander and keep running in circles, from the edges to the center of the map.

I swear the music makes it less boring, but still boring.

plasticbat

I hate farming the vblood. Yes, I have been doing that for 2 night. If you really hate it, don't bother with it because you still need to keep on feeding vblood to it after you have it restored. Your vblood farming does not end just because you restore it.

callumf

plasticbat said:

I hate farming the vblood. Yes, I have been doing that for 2 night. If you really hate it, don't bother with it because you still need to keep on feeding vblood to it after you have it restored. Your vblood farming does not end just because you restore it.

THIS - so you do it one time, then another, then another and you soon realise you aren't playing a "game" you are doing a job of work. I work all day, don't need another job when I get home

arcanjo86

relic gear is total waste of time go to pilgrims gear +raider boots from myterious merchant

zomak

Everyone seems to be missing the point. How is someone wearing the regular trash blue armor, that was 115 item level in the old system not sure what it is in the new one, that drops from the cloak tower supposed to farm voninblod in order to restore the relic armor. They can't any anything better(theoretically anyway) without first farming voninblod. Sure a random alliance piece will drop from the T1 dungeon they ran to get the seals but that is only one piece and might not be the right piece after they run it more than once. They might keep getting boots over and over for instance. The mobs in bryn shander and river district would rip such a character to pieces.

There is still drowcraft armor they can go for, which is a very reasonable route for them. There is also guild armor if they are in a guild. But the point is the armor from the seal vendor is worthless unless you are already geared enough to handle bryn shander or river district to be able to farm voninblod. All of you are approaching this as someone who is already geared for that. I'm thinking about my newer guildmates that still need to gear up and how this will impede them, some of them have trouble with dread ring and well of dragons still, they certainly aren't going to be farming voninblod in bryn shander.

plasticbat

I would expect the less resourceful player needs to upgrade the gear multiple steps. How many pieces of gear were changed from level 4 to level 70? I don't see it is a big problem that someone cannot jump to relic in one step. Even my best character only has 2 pieces of relic and my other 4 main have none. How does this player farm seal to start with if his gear is so low level?

If this weak character depends on his big brother (the stronger main character) to pass down, the stronger main character can give him many capable gear to farm SKT. The league armor in mod 12 is decent and it costs decent price in AD.

zomak

> @plasticbat said:
> I would expect the less resourceful player needs to upgrade the gear multiple steps. How many pieces of gear were changed from level 4 to level 70? I don't see it is a big problem that someone cannot jump to relic in one step. Even my best character only has 2 pieces of relic and my other 4 main have none. How does this player farm seal to start with if his gear is so low level?
>
> If this weak character depends on his big brother (the stronger main character) to pass down, the stronger main character can give him many capable gear to farm SKT. The league armor in mod 12 is decent and it costs decent price in AD.

Yes but they removed the alliance and elven gear from the seal vendor so as far as the seal vendor goes relic gear is the first and only step.

Multiple steps sure I get. My first character ran his first tier 1 dungeon using the gear I described though. From there I got an alliance gear drop and some seals. Eventually I had a full alliance set. Then from there I upgraded to a combination of drowcraft and elven gear, with some dropped elemental alliance as an intermediary before completing the set.

Alliance gear and elven gear is effectively gone though except for what drops from the dungeons.

The league gear is in fact a good thing if the new players know to go the chult to buy it, which requires them to be capable of running the intro quests which didn't seem that bad to me but I'm a 10.6k HR so I don't know how bad it is for a 7.5k-ish character. I do know some of my guildies did get the league rings being under 7.5k though so it's doable.

I suppose drowcraft and league gear will be the first gear step now. Or the new company gear if they are in a guild and have the guild marks.

beckylunatic

zomak#4611 said:

The league gear is in fact a good thing if the new players know to go the chult to buy it

You can buy unbound League gear on the AH.

So buy rings with your seals, salvage them, and get yourself something else to wear.

Relic gear is honestly at this stage a trap unless you are deliberately going after it for purposes of specific stats.

plasticbat

beckylunatic said:

Relic gear is honestly at this stage a trap unless you are deliberately going after it for purposes of specific stats.

That is what I am thinking too when I was farming vblood. I kept on asking myself "what am I doing here?".

zomak

> @beckylunatic said:
> The league gear is in fact a good thing if the new players know to go the chult to buy it
>
> You can buy unbound League gear on the AH.
>
> So buy rings with your seals, salvage them, and get yourself something else to wear.
>
> Relic gear is honestly at this stage a trap unless you are deliberately going after it for purposes of specific stats.

I already have gear that is as good or better than league gear in every slot. Most slots are much better. I'm just thinking of the newbies and how useless the seal vendor will be to them for anything beyond rings and salvage.

Even umempowered relic gear is on par with dragon flight gear so I wouldn't say to avoid it entirely. And so if it has stats you like it's a valid option in gear progression, if you can get the voninblod.

It's also worth noting your get seals from demonic HEs. So from the standpoint of some who just reached level 70 on their first character. They just finished EE and sharadar. Now they are starting dread ring and doing the HEs there so they have seals. The only thing in the seal vendor they can actually use though is the rings. Of course they also will have ichor which they can buy drowcraft with, which they could then run bryn shander with. So it's not game breaking, it just seems like the intent was to be able to get the armor and restore it from seals and I'm pointing out that that isn't actually the case.

beckylunatic

Read "you" as the newbies, not a personal recommendation.

I've seen a lot of relative newbies buying relic items and asking alliance chat "now what do I do?", and my personal opinion is still that it's a trap and they should focus their efforts elsewhere.

plasticbat

beckylunatic said:

Read "you" as the newbies, not a personal recommendation.

I've seen a lot of relative newbies buying relic items and asking alliance chat "now what do I do?", and my personal opinion is still that it's a trap and they should focus their efforts elsewhere.

Huh! Your trap is not the same as my trap.
Your trap is about the newbie bought the relic gear and thought they hit gold. However, they cannot use it. Yes, it is (at least) a storage space. That piece will stay in the inventory for a long while.
My trap is about the need of keep getting vblood.

beckylunatic

I think it's a trap for both reasons, actually. Even if the new player succeeds at restoring their armor, they still have to keep it charged or it's not really better than less labour-intensive alternatives.

arcanjo86

plasticbat said:

beckylunatic said:

Relic gear is honestly at this stage a trap unless you are deliberately going after it for purposes of specific stats.

That is what I am thinking too when I was farming vblood. I kept on asking myself "what am I doing here?".

exacly, i asked my guild leader what would she recommend me to do, finish farming last 20k vb to restore last 2 pieces of relic gear or get pilgrim, she told me stop thinking about relic and go straight to new available items ^^, and i did pilgrim gear (helm, chest and gloves+ raiders boots from mysterious merchant, for recent lvl70 first timers buy league gear

wintersmoke

zomak#4611 said:

Everyone seems to be missing the point. How is someone wearing the regular trash blue armor, that was 115 item level in the old system not sure what it is in the new one, that drops from the cloak tower supposed to farm voninblod in order to restore the relic armor. They can't any anything better(theoretically anyway) without first farming voninblod. Sure a random alliance piece will drop from the T1 dungeon they ran to get the seals but that is only one piece and might not be the right piece after they run it more than once. They might keep getting boots over and over for instance. The mobs in bryn shander and river district would rip such a character to pieces.

There is still drowcraft armor they can go for, which is a very reasonable route for them. There is also guild armor if they are in a guild. But the point is the armor from the seal vendor is worthless unless you are already geared enough to handle bryn shander or river district to be able to farm voninblod. All of you are approaching this as someone who is already geared for that. I'm thinking about my newer guildmates that still need to gear up and how this will impede them, some of them have trouble with dread ring and well of dragons still, they certainly aren't going to be farming voninblod in bryn shander.

Ship HE's... run ship HE's

wintersmoke

beckylunatic said:

zomak#4611 said:

The league gear is in fact a good thing if the new players know to go the chult to buy it

You can buy unbound League gear on the AH.

So buy rings with your seals, salvage them, and get yourself something else to wear.

Relic gear is honestly at this stage a trap unless you are deliberately going after it for purposes of specific stats.

The only league gear on AH is feet & rings.

callumf

Whats this League gear please? Full names would help

zomak

> @callumf#9018 said:
> Whats this League gear please? Full names would help

Here are the boots for the GWF. There are other pieces for other slots and classes. You can buy it for AD from a vendor in chult port area. You can also pull unbound pieces(boots at least) out of the river in chult while fishing. Thus the boots are on the AH.

https://neverwinter.gamepedia.com/League's_Assault_Khuffs

callumf

zomak#4611 said:

> @callumf#9018 said:

> Whats this League gear please? Full names would help



Here are the boots for the GWF. There are other pieces for other slots and classes. You can buy it for AD from a vendor in chult port area. You can also pull unbound pieces(boots at least) out of the river in chult while fishing. Thus the boots are on the AH.



https://neverwinter.gamepedia.com/League's_Assault_Khuffs

Thank you

btairborne

I don't think it's an oversight, just not meant to be the step. I personally skipped blue Alliance armor altogether and went with 2 pc of Dusk and the rest Drowcraft immediately following elemental of Evil. I saw a lot of free to play people getting full Drowcraft. Alliance Armor was and still is entirely not worth it and I'm not surprised they got rid of it.