Siege of Neverwinter Event Review

The latest edition of the Siege of Neverwinter event, that ran for two weeks until last Thursday, featured changes that didn’t look quite as impactful on paper, but turned out to be a significant upgrade.

For two weeks the Cult of the Dragon amassed forced to strike the Enclave and hero’s were needed to repel the threat. Unfortunately the event itself has become fairly unimpressive. Like many other it suffers from the devaluation of its rewards over time. The Battlefield Medic and Guard Archer do still sell for 100k and 50k, but as often the shot at one of these by running the event casually is slim to non-existent. A test I ran on the Defender’s Pack over a year ago returned an abysmal 1% drop chance for the Medic and I doubt this has changed, although the contents of the pack did get a slight modification. Big accounts can probably amass a sizable amount of Supplies through the event profession, but you would need to check whether it nets more profit than simply running other tasks.

So my personal recommendation is to not farm the event because the rewards do not warrant the effort. You can theoretically get additional Supplies and Medals from the Heroic Encounters, but once again drop chances are a major hindrance here.

You couldn’t do anything wrong with just running the dailies though. The five additional Supplies from the Stronghold quest were a nice upgrade, although players had to deal with a pesky bug when trying to send their guards to the battlefield. Then try your luck on the packs and get the Charger, which by the way can hold a nice Insignia Bonus in Champions’s Return for survival or tanky builds.

This alone however would have been a pretty boring affair for a two-week event, but two changes transformed it to one of the better ones in recent memory. Completing a one-time quest allowed Stronghold vouchers to drop on the event map. And they did drop in bunches. Actually we couldn’t believe it was working as intended, but since no nerf has been rolled out it might be legit. Basic campaign currency vouchers were mixed with event specific ones for Astral Diamonds, Gems, Influence and Surplus. The latter added a little bit less to the coffers than their basic blue counterparts. Especially Influence is something guilds are in need of, but generally the Vouchers helped with resources that are hard or grindy to obtain. Many guild leaders said they were receiving progression worth a few months, which is a nice boost in anticipation of the alliance system.

But not only guilds majorly profited. Players could amass Guild Marks and make a decent coin on Masterwork resources. The market understandably crashed over the course of the event, the Explorer’s Case: Skyhold for example went down from over 50k net worth to now about 30k, but simply farming the event map hands down remained the most profitable thing to do. I personally even have vouchers left because guild coffers were quickly capped, so the event will keep on giving during the next weeks.

If that’s not enough it got even better with the new Quartermaster’s Enchantments. After taking away the premier source of Enchantments for bots with skill nodes, the devs introduced an Utility Enchantment that’s better than Fey Blessings and returns unbound refining points. I’m a little bit surprised the market hasn’t reacted heavier. Rank 6s are back at pre-nerf value, but the market for Rank 5s remains stable although supply numbers are noticeably rising. Maybe the ongoing bug that sort of resets the auction house with each maintenance prevents a continuous decline. There’s obviously already botting going on. If accounts named bezoar1bezoar2… bezoarX are mass selling Rank 6s and byproducts like profession resources and the Minor Resonance Stone, you know something fishy is going on.

For players however this new source of RP is simply great. It took some time to figure out how the Enchantment is working, but it’s clear now that the level of the killed mobs determines the tier of the reward pack and the combined percentage of slotted Quartermaster’s the tier of the drops of the reward pack. You need to kill >60 mobs to get any Spoils of War and 67 is enough to get them mostly. Starting at a combined percentage of >5% the packs stop dropping Rank 4s and at >10% you are mostly of not exclusively getting Rank 6s and Rank 7s. The event map unfortunately was level 60, but even Abandoned Gear don’t return any Rank 4s any longer once hitting the 5% threshold. So while it would have been better to farm with the Enchantments on a 70s map, the combination of Vouchers and RPs was incredible for two weeks.

You could even make some ADs off the Enchantment in the first few days. Refining and reselling the Rank 9 and Rank 10 would yield a 30%-50% return of investment, but the market has since settled and according to our enchantment calculator it’s currently even better to buy the Quartermaster’s off the AH in some cases. Unfortunately the initial costs to get a reasonable percentage is rather high, but even considering the prices the Quartermaster’s should outperform the Fey Blessing in most situations. And unlike the Fey Blessing it retains its value if you can’t make use of the RPs yourself any longer. I’m still slightly pessimistic that the Quartermaster’s will last too long with unbound drops, so I’d enjoy it while it lasts.

The event was a success to most as it gifted players with a massive source of refining points and vouchers that we might not see again anytime soon. This shouldn’t cover up the fact though that the original event is slowly declining and on the long run adding a few new goodies here and there might not be enough to revitalize the Siege. I’d love to hear from players how much they’ve been able to pull from the event. RPs, Guild Marks, ADs, Guild progression. As you know I was on vacation and couldn’t take part for the majority of the event, so I can’t deliver accurate numbers unfortunately. Write it in the comments or post to our message board!

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.