Level 1 to 60 Maxed: Total AD Cost

zeusom

I hope this post is informative and useful, not discouraging, and sparks some productive discussion. Refinement prices on the rise and the number of ways to make substantial AD in game is shrinking. Neverwinter is free to play and fun to play through all stages, but *most* players would like to be able to fully max the potential of at least one toon someday through playing the game.

So what is total cost in AD of one fully maxed toon?
GRAND TOTAL ESTIMATE (One Best In Slot MAXED TOON): 120,000,000 AD

Here is breakdown to arrive at this number which is based on average of what the most advanced players are using - it is a rough but realistic estimate of AD cost of obtaining full best in slot and endgame maxed toon. This is for PvE but cost of maxed PvP toon would be more or less similar in final number. This is based on a well-played character meaning that boons and gear are obtained through playing not paying sp there is substantial time investment implied here to. Item cost estimates are based on current lowest auction buyout or astral bazaar prices.

CAMPAIGNS
Sharander Boons & Unlocks..................125,000 AD
Dread Ring Boons & Unlocks.................150,000 AD
Icewind Dale Boons & Unlocks...............110,000 AD
Tyranny & Mod 5 Boons & Unlocks.........210,000 AD (assumes all 6 books farmed not bought)

BASIC GEAR (assumes an augment pet with 3 item slots)
Any T2 Gear.......................................0 AD (assume farmed or bought cheap)
Greater Armor Kits 4x..........................400,000 AD
Personalized JC Pieces 5x.....................850,000 AD (assume 150k/ea for gemmed)
Greater AP/Reg/Stam Jewels 5x............500,000 AD
Gemmed Exquisite Shirt/Pant................200,000 AD

COMPANIONS (5x Purple, using an SW build for example)
Cat Level 30.......................................1,550,000 AD
Erinyes Level 30..................................2,000,000 AD (bought on sale)
Blink Dog Level 30...............................1,250,000 AD
Dancing Blade Level 30.........................1,450,000 AD
Wild Hunt Rider Level 30.......................1,500,000 AD

MISCELLANEOUS
Adorable Pocket Pet..............................80,000 AD
Tymora's Lucky Coin.............................400,000 AD
Doohickey...........................................1,000,000 AD
Greater Bag of Holding 4x......................1,000,000 AD (126 of 126 max inv slots)
Rank 3 Mount.......................................1,000,000 AD (on the lower end)
Fashion/transmutes/dyes.......................500,000 AD (varies a lot )

ARTIFACTS & ARTIFACT EQUIPMENT (3 Artifact & 4 Art Equipment pieces to Orange)
Artifact 1, Sigil............................................0 AD
Artifact 2, Lantern or Waters.........................200,000 AD
Artifact 3, Dragon Heart (any)......................700,000 AD
Artifact Weapon..........................................0 AD (Mod 5 campaign)
Artifact Offhand..........................................0 AD(Mod 5 campaign)
Offhand Stat/Class rolls (Cubes of Aug).........500,000 AD (estimate; varies a lot)
Artifact Cloak............................................0 AD (Mod 5 campaign)
Artifact Belt..............................................0 AD (drop, or very cheap on AH)

Refinement of 3x Artifacts............................13,000,000 AD
[Each needs 3,850,000 rp or 1,925,000 rp if double rp + also 5 GMoPs, wards]

Refinement of 4x Artifact Equipments...........18,500,000 AD
[Each need 4,645,000 rp or 2,322,000 rp if double rp + some cheap marks and wards]

*Prices based on current but rising price of 100,000 AD for stack of 99x Peridot
*Prices based on assumption of refinement ONLY during 2x RP weekends
*Prices not account for usage of feeder artifacts or rp 'crits' which will lower rp cost for regular artifacts

ENCHANTMENTS*
Perfect Vorpal Enchantment 1x..............5,000,000 AD
Perfect Soulforged Enchantment 1x........4,000,000 AD
Radiant Rank 10 Enchantment 15x.........39,000,000 AD (2.6mill/ea)
Draconic Rank 10 Enchantment 4x.........8,000,000 AD (2mill/ea)
Dark Rank 10 Enchantment 4x.............7,200,000 AD (1.8mill/ea)
Eldritch Rank 10 Runestone..................1,500,000 AD (for Augment Pet)
Perfect Bonding Runestone 2x.............6,800,000 AD (for Augment pet, 3.4mill/ea)

*Assumes use of 5x Jewelcraft personalized items and use of augment pet with 3 JC-compatible slots giving
a total of 19 Defense/Offense enchant slots and 4 utility slots
*Assumes the use of mostly Radiant enchantments which is typical)

Of course this will vary with details but this very good working estimate based on current AH prices.
This does not include many other common costs such as character slots, bank slots, rerolls, special packs, etc.
Obtaining this amount of AD for this BiS endgame stuff purely from the real dollars to Zen would cost $2400 USD!
Better to farm as much as possible but unfortunately AD farming/making opportunities are sparse.
Perhaps achieving Best in Slot maxed toon is not realistic goal for most players.

Best wishes and happy hunting

isuuck2

only 2400usd? i would have thought it would be in the 4000USD

ironzerg79

How much do you think it would "cost" to get a completely maxed out in everything character in WoW?

hfgtfsdfs

Sharander Boons & Unlocks..................125,000 AD
???

It cost 5000 zen thats, 2.5M AD not 125k.

ironzerg79

hfgtfsdfs wrote: »

Sharander Boons & Unlocks..................125,000 AD
???

It cost 5000 zen thats, 2.5M AD not 125k.

This is based on a well-played character meaning that boons and gear are obtained through playing not paying sp there is substantial time investment implied here to.

And I see what you're trying to get at...but for a fully maxed out character in an MMO, $2400...eh. I know there's people in EVE who's accounts are worth tens of thousands of dollars.

zeusom

Nice catch, ironzerg ^^

The numbers are what they are, thought it would be useful to put them out there in one place. I have no idea about Wow or other MMO much, but if other games can cost far far more to max that is a nice piece of context to bring to the table and in line with reason for this post - productive discussion.

pointsman

Draconic enchants and Dragon Heart artifacts are BiS? Really? Huh.

And you've thrown in a lot of unnecessary things. C'mon, a doohickey is NOT required for anything, not even for PVP.

But anyway, if you choose not to grind for anything, you will pay out the nose for your character. I think that is working as intended. It is the time-money tradeoff. You can either pay in time spent, or pay in money spent. The less you do of one, the more you end up doing of the other.

pointsman

zeusom wrote: »

No idea, never played it.



From post: "This is based on a well-played character meaning that boons and gear are obtained through playing not paying sp there is substantial time investment implied here to."

Umm, no. Your implicit assumptions are that very little, if any, playing goes into acquiring boons and gear.

Cost for me to obtain Sharandar and Dread Ring boons on all of my characters: 0 AD

dragoness10

Well, seeing as how you can earn in game AD fairly easy to the point you've got more rough AD to refine than you can do in a day this knocks down any "RL cost" fairly fast. In addition to that some savvy Auction House sales knock it down further. If you can earn Zen with the surveys or other legit methods you can always sell those for in game AD too. Buy items with gold, and sell them for AD.

You can earn the items needed for boons with praying - once every six days you get a case of them for Sharandar or Dread Ring. Save it for seven days instead, and you get enchants and/or wards which further save you AD.

There's always an implied RL cost to everything, and sure it shows appreciation you'd spend at least $10 here (Devs need paychecks), but it's not needed in order to lvl and gear up.

dodgo

zeusom wrote: »

Tyranny & Mod 5 Boons & Unlocks.........210,000 AD (assumes all 6 books farmed not bought)

GL with that

lazaroth666

zeusom wrote: »

Perhaps achieving Best in Slot maxed toon is not realistic goal for most players.

I have 2 BIS maxed toons.

BTW, you forgot a very important thing, a maxed character wouldn't use a 1M mount, it has to be a Tenser's Floating Disk so add 14M more. Dragon Heart artifacts aren't useful, switch it for another much more useful, cat augment companion is bad, change it for a black dragon ioun stones with 3 off slots and 3 personalized archmage's rings and change those draconic enchantment, brutal or radiants are better for defensive slots at least.

mystagogue

pointsman wrote: »

Umm, no. Your implicit assumptions are that very little, if any, playing goes into acquiring boons and gear.

Cost for me to obtain Sharandar and Dread Ring boons on all of my characters: 0 AD

Interesting. How were you able to open each Boon without the AD cost associated with it?


http://neverwinter.gamepedia.com/Boons

zeusom

pointsman wrote: »

Cost for me to obtain Sharandar and Dread Ring boons on all of my characters: 0 AD

pointsman wrote: »

Cost for me to obtain Sharandar and Dread Ring boons on all of my characters: 0 AD

DREAD RING
Valindra's Tower Key: 50,000 AD
Study Thayan Writings I (7/7): 7000 AD (1000 AD each time)
Decipher Thayan Writings (24/24): 48,000 AD (2000 AD each time)
Plat/Adam/Mithral Gauntlet Unlock: 45,000 AD
TOTAL 150,000 AD for basic unlocks (95,000 AD) & boons (55,000 AD)

Do same for Sharander & you'll get number similar to mine, this is from playing through it, horrendous spark farming to very end.

smulch

Campaign tasks cost AD.

For dread ring, you have 7 daily at 1000 ad each and 24 at 2000 each.
Then there's the key and gauntlets that amount for 95k ad.

Same for every other campaign.

That said, a lot of this stuff is ridiculous.

You don't need bags, you don't need dyes or transmutes. Other misc items are very debatable.

pointsman

Okay, I was wrong. I thought the OP was referring to buying Thayan Relics or something similar.

BUT, if all you are after are the boons, you do NOT need to unlock gauntlets or the dungeons. So your stated cost for these boons is still inflated.

dragoness10

Dread Ring Daily Dungeon - Once you get the Mithrail Gauntlet it starts paying for itself. Always get the end chest for the Mark inside, and other items. The chest the Gauntlet opens provides refine items. The onyx bits you get from random mobs in Dread Ring can be exchanged for other needed currency.

I nearly forgot the mob drops like Symbol of Lloth, and Blackdagger Insignia. These picked up and exchanged for the Seals provide another source of income in game that's passive. Just run around to pick up all loot.

zeusom

Ahaha you guys are crackin me up.. and kinda ripping apart some details of my build and purchase choices As said in post details will vary widely. No you dont neeeeed Doohicky but they are fun, yes there are better artifacts than Dragon hearts, yes Draconic enchants are not usually BiS.. No dyes/transmutes are not necessary neither are 4x Blue bags but most endgamers have them, and lastly I love Cat and is best for me because it lovable unlike 3x offensive Black rock and still holds 3x Personalized JC items. And of course you need a Tensor's FLoating Disc as a capstone.

Many things in list could be done or not done with more or less AD. Like said in post, minor details will vary, but a ballpark figure of ~120million +/- 20 million is about right.

The Post only covers costs not income or ways of offset or cover those costs.

ironzerg79

I think his analysis is pretty accurate on the costs. Don't quibble over that.

And the cost is the cost. But if you add up the total cost to have a "maxed out" toon in any of these MMOs, you're going to price characters up to the thousands of dollars.

Again, $2400 for a maxed toon really makes me say "eh".

frishter

ironzerg79 wrote: »

Again, $2400 for a maxed toon really makes me say "eh".

$2400 for a maxed out toon makes me think anyone who spends that is an idiot. No offense to anyone who actually does spend that amount. But you know, you can buy a lot of nice stuff that took a lot more to make than some virtual pixels you don't have the rights to that won't last more than a couple of years. Say for example a top of the line computer with all of the bells and whistles or cheap car.

ironzerg79

Yeah. Which is why it's silly to put these kinds of dollar amounts on anything in a game.

It's a leisure activity. It's what we do for fun, to relax.

At the end of the day, no one really cares how "maxed out" your toon is, except you.

frishter

ironzerg79 wrote: »

Yeah. Which is why it's silly to put these kinds of dollar amounts on anything in a game.

It's a leisure activity. It's what we do for fun, to relax.

At the end of the day, no one really cares how "maxed out" your toon is, except you.

Unless you have a floating disk, that is one thing to be jelly about. Though after wanting one for a while and actually being able to afford it soonish, I'm not sure I can be bothered after it being so long

pointsman

ironzerg79 wrote: »

Yeah. Which is why it's silly to put these kinds of dollar amounts on anything in a game.

It's a leisure activity. It's what we do for fun, to relax.

At the end of the day, no one really cares how "maxed out" your toon is, except you.

Oh no no no. Because without a doohickey a player is sure to lose in PVP. lol

dodgo

4 x leadership toons = 120mil in 6 months. how much should one pay for a maxed leadership too?

vascodergamer

dodgo wrote: »

4 x leadership toons = 120mil in 6 months. how much should one pay for a maxed leadership too?

That is not true, you only get 25000AD x 4 Toons x 7 Days x 26 Weeks = 18200000 AD in 6 months.
You will need about 172 weeks (~3.3 years) to get that much ADs thru leadership, assuming you refine 25k AD each day on each toon.

zeusom

dodgo wrote: »

4 x leadership toons = 120mil in 6 months. how much should one pay for a maxed leadership too?

Woa a little bit off on the numbers there unless you meant 40x toons.
Here is excellent post on different ways of leveling leadership, see post #15 myowmyow: http://tinyurl.com/ntp55uh

Over first 6 months a new leadership only toon can earn about 1.5 million AD at best so 4x toons would make ~6million AD not 120 million. At level 20 a leadership toon will make somewhere like 2-3 million AD in 6 months.

vaulwyn

ironzerg79 wrote: »

How much do you think it would "cost" to get a completely maxed out in everything character in WoW?

60-120$ Been there done that, 2-4 months in a competitive end game guild.

naicalus

smulch wrote: »

you don't need dyes or transmutes.

Have you seen TR T2+ gear? *shudder* You totally need dyes and transmutes.

I mean this: http://www.iankunx.net/rainbowclown.jpg

compared to this: http://www.iankunx.net/veldrinwalk.jpg

Start getting into Profound or Black Ice or Draconic whatever and it actually manages to get uglier than T2, which at least has a somewhat whimsical demented murderclown look. (Although that first shot isn't even the full ugliness of Swashbuckling Captain, it's so old it's 2/2 Sinister Shade/Master Assassin.)

But yeah, all in all, it's depressingly expensive to advance in this game, and there's no longer any real method to make AD, especially if you weren't already rich to do AH flipping. My TR's advancement has ground to a crawl, and my CW/HR's advancement have stopped completely. There's just no income anymore to do anything with.

healary

OP obviously did not put in the cost of TIME. TIME is not costless so ToD Boon 6 + 7 alone cost far more than the price of merely a Dragon Queen book.

Also missing is the cost of the profession assets that need to make the jewelry and other stuff. That would be millions and millions AD more.

frishter

healary wrote: »

OP obviously did not put in the cost of TIME. TIME is not costless so ToD Boon 6 + 7 alone cost far more than the price of merely a Dragon Queen book.

Also missing is the cost of the profession assets that need to make the jewelry and other stuff. That would be millions and millions AD more.

You don't need profession assets...

zeusom

healary wrote: »

k.
Also missing is the cost of the profession assets that need to make the jewelry and other stuff. That would be millions and millions AD more.

Since the required Jewelcrafting assets (Mithral Bezel pusher 1,500,000 AD for example) cost more AD than just buying the 5 or so Gemmed JC pieces off the AH, they are left out and the AH price of 5x pieces is included instead. Leveling JC to 20 and converting AH bought Gemmed to the BoP Personalized pieces can be done almost free (Worn bez pusher = 1 gold).

Any profession assets are also left out of OP since they would be considered separately as part of investments/assets that should pay for themselves in time (one would hope) to make AD not part of an endgame 'build'.

cryptfoundation

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