After Change, Voninblod Farm is Right Where it Needs to be

Today I’d like to talk about one of the more underrated changes of the Cloaked Ascendancy update. In the new module, all Relics return 50% more Voninblod. It’s kinda interesting the devs are not getting more credit for the change given how much players protested when they learned Neverwinter would reintroduce Empowerment in Storm Kings Thunder. Maybe it’s because players tend to post only when there’s something to complain about. But maybe it’s also because the mechanic is still a bad design, even with considerable more Voninblod from Relics.

The mechanic still has to go

To be clear, I still don’t like Empowerment one bit. Any mechanic that requires players to constantly grind in order to maintain their gear is absolutely horrible. For the same reason I’d like to burn all Overload Enchantments, another Icewind Dale invention that can be labeled an utter failure. If you are serious about grinding and progression in this game, you have more than enough stuff to do. Sharandar, Dread Ring, daily ADs, you name it. We never needed Voninblod, because it directly competes with other activities on our daily task list. In case you don’t have unlimited amount of time per day, it’s an either or.

For those that can do Svardborg, Vivified gear brought a little bit of relief. At 150 item level in unempowered state it’s still better than pretty much everything else. So if you care about those 40 extra item levels, you have to farm Voninblod. If not, you still own darn good stuff. That’s ok and how I actually think the system should always have been. One major issues of Voninblod gear was the fact that you had to empower it to even be on par with gear that you already owned from the Elemental Evil and Underdark cycle. That’s just pathetic.

Gear is maintainable now

Again: Vivified definitely helped in that area, but farming Voninblod still took away too much time from other activities. Playing the campaign on the only character that’s rocking full Vivified, I decided to not care about Empowerment at all. I would take the Relics that I came across while doing dailies and running Treasure Maps, but not more. My Voninblod drained from over 50,000 to about 15,000 before the Cloaked Ascendancy. As you would expect just doing dailies was not enough to maintain the set whatsoever.

This completely changed after the module launch. It was sort of a coincidence that I turned in the Relics I found doing dailies and then looked at my Voninblod stock and was like ‘hell, today gave a lot’. So I went to Bryn Shander for the first time since weeks to actually farm Relics and soon realized that maintaining the gear wouldn’t be such a pain any longer. It’s really that much better. The +50% is exactly what makes farming Voninblod more rewarding than grindy. I personally do no longer skip it because it’s painful, but gladly complete it because I know I won’t have to do it for at least another two weeks.

And it’s not limited to Bryn Shander alone. Treasure Maps and HEs drop considerably more and Fangbreaker Island finally returns more Voninblod in a run than you armor consumes. All in all, you now can maintain Everfrost gear by doing content where the resistance is actually needed.

Still some issues left

A 50% Voninblod boost obviously doesn’t solve all problems. If you really want to minimize your Voninblod consumption you still have to switch gear in content that doesn’t warrant it. Additionally there’s no way around the fact that the mechanic is an annoying design as a whole. But at least the change has made farming Voninblod viable. I now might even get those last two boons from the Sea of Moving Ice, because my Voninblod stock is rising again.


What’s your opinion of the current state of the Voninblod farm after the changes? Share your thoughts in the comments below or visit the corresponding thread on our message board!

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j0Shi

j0Shi plays the Neverwinter MMORPG since the open BETA in 2013 and is a regular contributor to the blog and the whole UN:Project. Originally a Guardian Fighter, he has built up ALTs of all classes and plays on BIS/near-BIS level.

6 thoughts on “After Change, Voninblod Farm is Right Where it Needs to be

  • March 1, 2017 at 10:15 am
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    who cares.. they changed it after the mod was done.. there is no kudos from me at all..

    cowards and chumps..

  • March 1, 2017 at 10:26 am
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    I feel like they are setting us up for whatever ‘loadouts’ that are coming.. having a set of gear that has a reason not to wear it all the time and another set for regular stuff and RP farming seems intentional. I know I’ve taken to putting my empowered vivified gear in my bag and still wearing my other gear with quartermasters ect farming utility gems when I’m doing the new zone.

  • March 1, 2017 at 12:07 pm
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    I completely agree. I never liked the black ice empowerment and I don’t like voninblod empowerment. I have always hated overload slot enchantments that expire as well. They are completely unnecessary mechanics, and for the all around health of the game (and I would argue including long term profitability), those mechanics should be forever scrapped never to rear their ugly heads again…

  • March 2, 2017 at 7:24 pm
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    Nah, you were fooled. They quietly nerfed the drop rate of the rarer relics and multi-relics. I’m making lesser VB/hr than before the change.

  • March 19, 2017 at 5:28 pm
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    So on ps4 we should keep all the relics untill new mode is out and get a 50% more VB?

  • January 22, 2018 at 3:45 am
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    Damn glad they make the game and not you then. I love the charge mechanic. Keeps things lively and not as forgotten as most MMOs. I personally hope they add MORE things like that, and re-tune black ice overloads to make black ice worth farming again. Neverwinter is the only MMO where I log in and instead of going “ugh, theres nothing to do.” I go “shit, how am I gonna finish all this stuff?!” It’s why it’s kept me playing so long.

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