Chaos Descending - Guide to Winning
Posted: 01 Dec 2018, 07:00It's that time again for another Guide to Winning!
If you haven't, you should read the previous expansions guide to winning. They contain some very valuable information, such as how to manage campspots and other various tricks.
Like usual, you should likely read the previous guides I have written, as each one helps in different areas.
Link to KA - Guide to Winning (Part 2)
viewtopic.php?f=13&t=375
Link to KA - Guide to Winning (Part 1)
viewtopic.php?f=13&t=334
Link to AoM - Guide to Winning
viewtopic.php?f=13&t=175
Link to ToV - Guide to Winning
viewtopic.php?f=13&t=57
Link to - Campspot/OFol
viewtopic.php?f=13&t=180
Proper group make up.
If you've read any of my previous guides, this basically repeats the same thing, over, and over. Use anything you want, but for best success, the standard group is still the best.
Tank, Bard, Enchanter, Priest1, Priest2, DPS.
At the time of writing this, the flavour of the month (fotm) is:
Tank, Dirge, Coercer, Mystic, Warden, Ranger.
Anyways... Do whatever will make you enjoy the game for your group.
Chaos Descending is unlike most recent expansions. Heroic zones, even t1, are very punishing. There are however, a few HUGE 'short cuts' you can do, that will make your lives a lot easier.
Adventure Signature Line
Like usual, you should do the signature time line. It's very short this expansion. Yes it's the same old solo crap... Just do it.
Get Mastercrafted gear.
This is likely the most important, yet depending on your resources, one of the most difficult parts. When you do Mastercrafted gear properly, it is better than ALL TIER ONE HEROIC GEAR. Period. You won't actually get a single upgrade from t1 heroics after you do this.
There are two difficult parts to this. Getting the rares (not realllly that hard), and getting the recipes (or finding someone with the recipes). The reason these two tasks are difficult, is you really (shouldn't) do either one afk, as they are both in public zones. This is how you end up suspended, banned, or on drunder.
Getting the rares: Harvest, it's just that simple. (Or if you got plat, buy them from the broker).
Getting the recipe books: Broker is by far the easiest, but if you want to get them properly, you have to do solo zones, or PQ's (the instance, or the ones in the contested zones). Do NOT do this with your entire group at once, or you will get petitioned. However, you can probably do it on 1-2 toons at a time, just be safe.
Use refined rares, this gives you a few hundred potency boost. Don't cheap out.
You will be crafting yourself 5-7 armor slots (5 if you have ethereal BP/Shoulders, or all 7 pieces if you do not).
You will be crafting yourself all other non-weapon slots (cloak, 2x charm, 2x ear, neck, 2x ring, 2x wrist, belt).
You will be crafting yourself a ranged weapon.
You will NOT be crafting yourself a primary or secondary. You will have gotten a weapon from doing the sig line, and you will be getting upgrades to it as you acquire heroic coins.
I personally went with options that had mitigation on them if those options were available.
Craft away...
Once done, experiment on them. To do this, do the following:
Bring up the experiment window, select the item. Double check if the item has crit bonus as an option or not (armor/weapons do not, the rest do).
In the console type one of the two:
This takes about 15 minutes, per item. Do this for each item you have crafted for yourself. Yes, this is a long and tedious task.
The jewelry will be around 3.2k potency at this stage.
Equip the gear. If you're going to infuse it, you can do it now. It doesn't matter if you do it now, you can always do it later, or not at all. I personally do not have much plat and did NOT plat infuse at all.
Head over to the reforge, now pick a stat you do not care about, such as: DPS, Haste, Multi-attack, extra cast speed, reuse speed, ability mod. Do NOT touch crit bonus. Reforge the stat into potency. It does not matter how much it says it's going to give you, just do it. Do NOT try to put 1 point into it, when you zone, it will actually restore the item, so just move the slider the entire way over.
Once you've done this for all your items, go ahead and zone. Your jewelry should now have 3.8k potency. Yes, that's right, just under 4k potency per piece of jewelry, with 60 resolve.
You now have better gear than anything that drops in tier 1 heroic zones. Congrats!
Do NOT change out any of this gear for 65 resolve gear, it has 400-500 LESS potency per piece.
You CAN (and should) change out this gear for 70 or HIGHER resolve gear. The 70 resolve gear has equal or more potency. (More on this later).
If your jewelry does not have 3.8k potency, it means you missed a step, re-read and actually follow the steps this time.
What next?
Well, I don't exactly have the best plan of attack at this time.
You should do the t1 heroics, even though there is no loot in there for you (literally, there is no loot you can use, you have better already).
You're doing t1 heroics and solos for the following reason(s).
1) You need heroic currency (so make sure you get the missions). You will be buying some important upgrades with these currency. You will also be getting coins or armor tokens. You need these to get heroic armor (although t1 armor is NOT worth using, you will need it in order to get a t2 piece of armor).
2) Shinies - While we do not know what the final reward is, there is a good amount of 70 resolve gear that comes from the shiny collections. So it's worth doing just for that.
You can attempt to go right into t2 heroics if you wish, however, t2 is VERY challenging.. so good luck.
Status merchant (heroic currency).
You will notice there are weapon upgrades in here.
If you can use a two hander (non-tanks, non-scouts, non-clerics [they need a shield to use Shield ally]), you want to save 1700 coins for the two hander. This is 180 resolve (270 when upgraded with essences).
If you can not use a two hander, then you want your secondary. (This is 90 resolve, 135 when upgraded with essences). 850 coins.
If you can get your hands on the super rare tradable cloak, you can buy the upgrade here. I believe 500 coins.
The green adorn.
If you completed the GUK collection last expansion, there is a new blue adorn you want on here. I believe it's 850 coins.
I'll add to this post as I get more information. At this time I have been too busy to zone into a t2 zone, so I do not have any personal information regarding them.
If you haven't, you should read the previous expansions guide to winning. They contain some very valuable information, such as how to manage campspots and other various tricks.
Like usual, you should likely read the previous guides I have written, as each one helps in different areas.
Link to KA - Guide to Winning (Part 2)
viewtopic.php?f=13&t=375
Link to KA - Guide to Winning (Part 1)
viewtopic.php?f=13&t=334
Link to AoM - Guide to Winning
viewtopic.php?f=13&t=175
Link to ToV - Guide to Winning
viewtopic.php?f=13&t=57
Link to - Campspot/OFol
viewtopic.php?f=13&t=180
Proper group make up.
If you've read any of my previous guides, this basically repeats the same thing, over, and over. Use anything you want, but for best success, the standard group is still the best.
Tank, Bard, Enchanter, Priest1, Priest2, DPS.
At the time of writing this, the flavour of the month (fotm) is:
Tank, Dirge, Coercer, Mystic, Warden, Ranger.
Anyways... Do whatever will make you enjoy the game for your group.
Chaos Descending is unlike most recent expansions. Heroic zones, even t1, are very punishing. There are however, a few HUGE 'short cuts' you can do, that will make your lives a lot easier.
Adventure Signature Line
Like usual, you should do the signature time line. It's very short this expansion. Yes it's the same old solo crap... Just do it.
Get Mastercrafted gear.
This is likely the most important, yet depending on your resources, one of the most difficult parts. When you do Mastercrafted gear properly, it is better than ALL TIER ONE HEROIC GEAR. Period. You won't actually get a single upgrade from t1 heroics after you do this.
There are two difficult parts to this. Getting the rares (not realllly that hard), and getting the recipes (or finding someone with the recipes). The reason these two tasks are difficult, is you really (shouldn't) do either one afk, as they are both in public zones. This is how you end up suspended, banned, or on drunder.
Getting the rares: Harvest, it's just that simple. (Or if you got plat, buy them from the broker).
Getting the recipe books: Broker is by far the easiest, but if you want to get them properly, you have to do solo zones, or PQ's (the instance, or the ones in the contested zones). Do NOT do this with your entire group at once, or you will get petitioned. However, you can probably do it on 1-2 toons at a time, just be safe.
Use refined rares, this gives you a few hundred potency boost. Don't cheap out.
You will be crafting yourself 5-7 armor slots (5 if you have ethereal BP/Shoulders, or all 7 pieces if you do not).
You will be crafting yourself all other non-weapon slots (cloak, 2x charm, 2x ear, neck, 2x ring, 2x wrist, belt).
You will be crafting yourself a ranged weapon.
You will NOT be crafting yourself a primary or secondary. You will have gotten a weapon from doing the sig line, and you will be getting upgrades to it as you acquire heroic coins.
I personally went with options that had mitigation on them if those options were available.
Craft away...
Once done, experiment on them. To do this, do the following:
Bring up the experiment window, select the item. Double check if the item has crit bonus as an option or not (armor/weapons do not, the rest do).
In the console type one of the two:
- Code: Select all
ogre experiment -pot 4 -cb 1
- Code: Select all
ogre experiment -pot 4 -primary 1
This takes about 15 minutes, per item. Do this for each item you have crafted for yourself. Yes, this is a long and tedious task.
The jewelry will be around 3.2k potency at this stage.
Equip the gear. If you're going to infuse it, you can do it now. It doesn't matter if you do it now, you can always do it later, or not at all. I personally do not have much plat and did NOT plat infuse at all.
Head over to the reforge, now pick a stat you do not care about, such as: DPS, Haste, Multi-attack, extra cast speed, reuse speed, ability mod. Do NOT touch crit bonus. Reforge the stat into potency. It does not matter how much it says it's going to give you, just do it. Do NOT try to put 1 point into it, when you zone, it will actually restore the item, so just move the slider the entire way over.
Once you've done this for all your items, go ahead and zone. Your jewelry should now have 3.8k potency. Yes, that's right, just under 4k potency per piece of jewelry, with 60 resolve.
You now have better gear than anything that drops in tier 1 heroic zones. Congrats!
Do NOT change out any of this gear for 65 resolve gear, it has 400-500 LESS potency per piece.
You CAN (and should) change out this gear for 70 or HIGHER resolve gear. The 70 resolve gear has equal or more potency. (More on this later).
If your jewelry does not have 3.8k potency, it means you missed a step, re-read and actually follow the steps this time.
What next?
Well, I don't exactly have the best plan of attack at this time.
You should do the t1 heroics, even though there is no loot in there for you (literally, there is no loot you can use, you have better already).
You're doing t1 heroics and solos for the following reason(s).
1) You need heroic currency (so make sure you get the missions). You will be buying some important upgrades with these currency. You will also be getting coins or armor tokens. You need these to get heroic armor (although t1 armor is NOT worth using, you will need it in order to get a t2 piece of armor).
2) Shinies - While we do not know what the final reward is, there is a good amount of 70 resolve gear that comes from the shiny collections. So it's worth doing just for that.
You can attempt to go right into t2 heroics if you wish, however, t2 is VERY challenging.. so good luck.
Status merchant (heroic currency).
You will notice there are weapon upgrades in here.
If you can use a two hander (non-tanks, non-scouts, non-clerics [they need a shield to use Shield ally]), you want to save 1700 coins for the two hander. This is 180 resolve (270 when upgraded with essences).
If you can not use a two hander, then you want your secondary. (This is 90 resolve, 135 when upgraded with essences). 850 coins.
If you can get your hands on the super rare tradable cloak, you can buy the upgrade here. I believe 500 coins.
The green adorn.
If you completed the GUK collection last expansion, there is a new blue adorn you want on here. I believe it's 850 coins.
I'll add to this post as I get more information. At this time I have been too busy to zone into a t2 zone, so I do not have any personal information regarding them.