Tips for a new player

hynafol · April 2016

Hey all.

I've been really enjoying this game as of late and have started to wonder how i can better improve my gear. I'm level 64 and have pretty much been spamming quests with my brothers having a lot of fun. That seems to now have been a mistake, or at least it is in my mind. I'm starting to notice how rubbish my gear is becoming compared to people similar to my level. It's worrying me most after recently reading how people get vote kicked from epic dungeons due to having low IL (mine is 1070).

Now, I don't want to be spending money on this game so have seeked out guides to farming AD, however I seem to not understand many of them as they're mostly aimed at people with experience. Could anyone link me to a guide better suited for a noob?

This doesn't completely rule out the possibility of putting money in this game, I may not want to at the moment but after all, this is a free game that I'm enjoying a lot. But even if I were to buy Zen, it would be wasted because I'm a noob. What should zen be spent on?

Also is VIP worth it?

Thank you everyone.

speedokillz · April 2016

There are plenty of posts out there by searching "...things I wish I knew about Neverwinter..."

Also, the quests that give gear as a reward tend to be some of the better stuff while leveling. The Tree/seed quests in protectors were decent, if I remember. The the blue gear that drops in your daily dungeon run is useful sometimes, too.

The VIP rewards are very much worth it in my opinion. The ID scrolls...ok, the epic dungeon key, good, but the daily lockbox key is by far worth it. In 1 month of VIP that is 30 lockbox keys.

zman81420 · April 2016

Get to level 70 and then start acquiring gear, anything before endgame is null

wdj40 · April 2016

It is not null, some of the best times I had in the game were levelling up my 1st character through all the quests, finding and equipping new armours and such including levelling Dungeons.

It only becomes null after you have made your 1st character level to 70 etc and have possibly bought Packs with your earnings, my 1st pack was Heirloom which then made all characters made after that not need to do any of the fun stuff of my 1st time through. But was worth it for the equipment and the Companion is BiS for some classes, which is also able to be used for every character you make.

Back to topic if you are going to buy things with Zen make sure you do it during a sale or when you have a specific voucher drop. Don't buy things at full price until you have excess AD/Zen. Personally I would get VIP 1st and then one of the Packs, save up for those and most of them are worth it. Some packs have Companions which can be used for every character you make and some have Epic Mounts for every character too etc.

Those 15% off anything vouchers have saved me a fortune in AD/Zen and 40% off lockbox key vouchers are very good.

spookymoo · April 2016

Hi Couple of things : I would suggest VIP if you can afford it. Even if you just get 1 month to try it you will get a lockbox key every day for 30 days and you may be lucky and get something worthwhile. You will also get Tarmalune Trade Bars from lockbox which you can save up for some good gear - check out the vendor in the market for what's available. 2. If you have some spare AD check out the Auction House for gear. 3. Refining your artefacts from green to blue to purple will help your gear score. 4 If you are buff PvP is good to get AD and gear. 5. Are you in a guild ? I would recommend joining one If you haven't already as I am sure a good guild will help you run some dungeons and also help you do the Elemental Evil / vigilance quests (Drwned shore, Reclamation Rock) which will get your artefact weapon. Lastly have you unlocked Tyranny of Dragon campaign? At 70 you will get more campaigns so it's worthwhile getting into the habit of doing them now.Unless you have loads of money to throw at the game it takes a while and its can be hard going but you will get some good gear eventually.

reaper · April 2016

Like the rest said the VIP is with while you won't really get good gear until 70 then just go the the well of dragons and run the demon heroics for the ichor and element seals then you can buy drowcraft armour. Do tranny of the dragon campaign as soon as you can start. And work on level the artifacts you have.

firepats12 · April 2016

Mandatory hate post, before anyone else:

Tip #1: Delete Neverwinter from your Hard Drive
Tip #2: Play a good game.

Easy as that. lol, don't know how my gf still plays this game.

moogie101 · April 2016

-Every day try & do 2x skirmishes & 2x dungeons as these will give you additional AD just for completing each.
-If running Epic dungeons then equip any decent gear you receive which is better than your own. The rest you can salvage for AD.
-Demon Hunting missions in Dread Ring/ Icewind Dale & Well of Dragons are a really easy way to get a lot of the items you need to upgrade your Boons in the relevant campaigns. Plus also the Heroic Encounter Rewards give you Rings which if not useful can be salvaged for more AD.
-Leadership in Professions can earn you AD, however it takes ages to upgrade to that point & not as rewarding as it once was.
-If you se an event coming up via the Calendar then stockpile the relevant items. Currently my bags are stuff with refining items for next weekends event, plus gear to salvage in two weeks when it will be worth double AD.

As for what to buy with AD or Zen that's down to how you play. Extra bags are always useful. Certain Armour or weapon enhancements can be great. I'm upgrading my Soul Forged at the moment as it brings you back to life when killed which can be very useful.

reaper · April 2016

Also check out the forum for your class and check out the build I had to redo mine when I got up in the 60 level

armadeonx · April 2016

You should be using the Mulhorand weapons for your class - and the cloak too if you can afford it. You should also aim at rank 7 enchantments. Until you get your Resistance Ignored to 60%, armor penetration is a much more important stat than power for overall damage.

The gear you pick up as mission rewards is decent for the 60-70 Vigilance Task areas but you can find some better stuff on the AH and it doesn't cost much.

You should've run the Vault of Nine quest by now and picked up the artifact for your class.

Personally I find 1-60 is fun but 60-70 is dull. I finished levelling my 6th character today & I've rushed him through that stage in about a day and a half.

You should already be researching which artifact set you want to gear up with at 70: Lostmauth, Black Ice, Greater Lathanders etc. Each set is good for particular classes.

Earning AD is supremely important for getting the stuff you want. As others have said, do 2 x dungeons & 2 x skirmishes every day. On top of your invokes this should get you about 20k per day.

Once you hit 70 your immediate focus should be boons & I'd suggest running the demon heroics in Dread Ring to save up for T2 Drow gear & earn a couple of extra boons. I assume you're already running the Tyranny campaign every day? If not, you should be.

One of the most important but costly aspects is getting a decent weapon enchantment. How much this adds to your damage output cannot be over stated and is absolutely essential if you want to be competitive.

To cover one of your original points, yes people do get kicked from dungeons for having poor gear. Tbh, with the bubble nerf coming you probably shouldn't step foot in one until you're over 2.6k AND with new ways of earning T2 level gear & salvage you really don't need to.

wdj40 · April 2016

Also do not listen to people when they say don't bother with Leadership Profession. This may be true for your 1st main character. But after you make multiple characters have them spam Leadership... It takes a long long time to get it above Lv20 but when you do you can get a bucketload of Refinement items which can then be put into the shared bank.

Not only that but during double AD events the high level Leadership Rare tasks bring in 3200 AD each. This can add up in a short time.

Actually to get your main character high level equipment your Alts can go a huge way into making that happen.

hynafol · April 2016

Thanks for the replies. I'd like to note I'm a Devoted Cleric. Up to this point I've been pretty good at keeping my brother alive, although you'd probably argue that isn't a hard thing to do yet.

I have done the Temple quest and aquired the artifact. First campaign mission has been completed and I'm now doing the the second lot.

I'll consider getting VIP soon, sounds like it's worth getting.

Also, I'm having trouble with slavaging items. I'm aware the item level must be 60+, but even then I still cannot salavage them. They also aren't bound to my character either.

reaper · April 2016

Salvaging the item has to be alot higher than 60 and when you go to invatory click on the item inspect it and it has to say salvageable on it

hynafol · April 2016

reaper#3644 said:
Salvaging the item has to be alot higher than 60 and when you go to invatory click on the item inspect it and it has to say salvageable on it

Oh right. Thanks for the information.

xalorus · April 2016

^ All of this

Tc and enjoy.

armadeonx · April 2016

hynafol#1574 said:
Thanks for the replies. I'd like to note I'm a Devoted Cleric. Up to this point I've been pretty good at keeping my brother alive, although you'd probably argue that isn't a hard thing to do yet.

I have done the Temple quest and aquired the artifact. First campaign mission has been completed and I'm now doing the the second lot.

I'll consider getting VIP soon, sounds like it's worth getting.

Also, I'm having trouble with slavaging items. I'm aware the item level must be 60+, but even then I still cannot salavage them. They also aren't bound to my character either.

DC's are fun if you have a DPS'er around to party up with so you're lucky there

I'd suggest going for the Greater Lathander set & your focus for stats should be power, recovery & defence. You should look to getting your resistance ignored to 40% but it's a lower priority when you have help.

power = better healing
recovery = encounters recharge faster & daily fills faster too
defence = for obvious reasons

The one point that new DC's don't usually understand straight away is the 'empowered' function, & especially when using astral shield. When your divinity is full & you switch to it (right bumper) you get 3 strikes of any encounter & this makes you empowered until you use another encounter - that next encounter will fire with the empowered bonus.

Empowered Astral Shield is a hugely effective protection circle & if you drop it during any difficult fight it'll keep you both alive. When not in danger you can just use empowered on your dps skills for greater impact.

sundance777 · April 2016

A couple things you can do for cheap, every few levels check your gear, search the Auction House to change out a couple pieces of your lowest gear for cheap blue gear. While you will not end up keeping this gear it helps you keep up with the mobs as you level and it costs just a few hundred diamonds for a few pieces. Also, something that you may or may not have started doing yet is refining your artifacts up a bit. You can easily make them blue with the random enchants you pick up while leveling and then take them to purple during double refinement, they give great stat increase and are often overlooked when just starting out in the game.

ltsmithneko · April 2016

Once you reach 70 go to my guide for Ad and refinement it should help you figure out decent ways to progress from there on, for now level.

hynafol · April 2016

Thanks again for the replies.

I've been reading some guides here and there in the internet (mainly PC ones, so I hope they apply to Xbox also) and often come across people saying this game becomes P2W quite badly once you hit level 70. Now, I know a free game needs to make money somehow, and I do plan on buying myself VIP, but are these comments correct? It was also mentioned that grinding AD for Zen as an alternative to paying is extremely long.

From an unbiased standpoint, how long would it take me to get into a decent position to start making an impact on my character? I understand refining items to purple is an expensive process, one that is extremely long should I choose to take then AD route.

By the way, I embrace the grind. I don't mind doing it, I just want to know what I'm getting myself into.

cesar · April 2016

wdj40 said:
Also do not listen to people when they say don't bother with Leadership Profession. This may be true for your 1st main character. But after you make multiple characters have them spam Leadership... It takes a long long time to get it above Lv20 but when you do you can get a bucketload of Refinement items which can then be put into the shared bank.

Not only that but during double AD events the high level Leadership Rare tasks bring in 3200 AD each. This can add up in a short time.

Actually to get your main character high level equipment your Alts can go a huge way into making that happen.

Problem with Leadership is the time it takes to level it.

armadeonx · April 2016

Speaking as a player who's spent very little on the game, it is entirely possible to get your gear to 'decent' reasonably quickly for free.

As ltsmithneko said, check out his guide here

Getting geared is an important aspect and making the right gear choices is just as important. For artifacts, my personal choices for DC are Symbol of Fire, Waters of Elah'zad, Eye of Lathander & Black Ice Beholder. The Beholder may strike some as an odd choice but its primary stats are recovery & armor pen - I do like to actually kill things when soloing. My guild has power & Arp boons so when in a party I choose power & when soloing I choose Arp but I still need it over 50% Resistance Ignored. You should've chosen Waters as your free one, the others will cost you around 1 mill AD to purchase or you can run Kessels for the Beholder & if you're v. lucky you may get an eye of Lathander from Dread Ring.

For armor, Dragon Flight should be your end goal (v.good for DC) but as a starting point aim for Drow by running Dread Ring Demonic Heroics for ichor. Drow won't cost AD, just time (4 weeks) and level the Jewellery Crafting profession to 25 as personalised rings of recovery are very good choices.

For neck and belt, go for Greater Lathanders - with the Eye of Lathander completing the set, you gain the ability to instantly resurrect & heal a dying player from a distance.

Don't forget gemmed elemental pants & shirt - average cost is 125k per piece.

Total spend, you're looking at 1-2 million AD. If you follow the above guide, this should take you between 30 - 90 days depending on time & focus. Don't forget you'll also be spending time working on boons.

Edit: after this, you'll also want to get a Negation armor enchantment & also a weapon ench - there are several viable choices here depending on what you're aiming for. For companions, I'd start with an ioun stone with lesser bonding runes - once you level the bonding stones up a few levels you can think about swapping them on to a proper companion but it's not worth it to begin with. Not to mention, auto-targeting has a nasty habit of swinging you round to heal your companion when your trying to heal a player - lol.

hynafol · April 2016

Perfect, thank you very much. I'll be sure to check that guide out and get working on some AD farming.

I'm going to save my refining for a double refinement event. Probably best considering I'll only be running VIP.

Thanks all for the help, any other tips are of course greatly appreciated.

Unknown · April 2016

This content has been removed.

hynafol · April 2016

I'll be paying for VIP for a bit until I get the hang of farming AD and most of all have a fair bit of it.

Also, could anyone link me to a good DC build guide? I want to compare mine to one of them and see if I need to tweak anything. I found a few but fear they may be outdated.

armadeonx · April 2016

They are about to make some big changes to the DC so don't respec until things settle. Haste is getting a serious nerf, pretty much killing the top path as a viable choice. Safest atm is the middle path but as you're already in the mid 60's you may as well carry on for a couple of weeks til the new mod drops then we'll see where we stand. I'm going to have to respec my DC for sure.

Tips for a new player

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