What's next for the Stronghold

[Juez Calvo]

Hail NOR,

I thought I'd chime in on the discussion now that I can get in to the forum. Thank you Dru for helping me and Phel for getting me back on.

I of the proposed Boon structures I would prefer the Explores Guild first, it unlocks A nice group bonus later, and at first unlocks the purple profession drops for Master professions. This can be traded for some good AD on the AH just for opening the profession nodes. Then you can buy better equipment on the AH.

The second one I like is Mercenary Outpost for crit bonus.

The Barracks just requires too much PvP points to want to do.

The bonus for the temple that I like is the Lifesteal, but I don't want to give up my stable boon of defense for it.

And the on that works on wards, most don't use wards and the wards I use from IWD or Dragon Glyphs, I don't think get any enhancement for the building.

[nmates]

Reminder: only one (1) SH offense boon can be active at a time. So, if you want the crit severity bonus, that's mutually exclusive with the ArPen boost. You can see that right now - on your personal boons page, we have two options in SH Offense: ArPen and Enhance Overload: Ward. If you pick one, the other deactivates. As a test, click on the Enhance: Ward item, and see if you have enough ArPen or would need to stack more darks.

If we're still deciding what the 3rd boon struct should be, can I recommend starting GH14? That'll give us more coffer space, and allow us to build rank 7 SH structures -- such as the boon plots (Wizard Workshop & Stables) we already have.

[tornnomar]

Barracks. Power, at Rank 5, which we can achieve, is the best bang for the buck. +3000 Power can be quite a deadly punch.

I had written up a nice little piece, but then I timed out. Teach me to not use the save draft feature:)

So to be quick, Power is everything. I'd drop the ArPen boon to grab the power boon. Because if you critically strike, you already have ignored your enemies armor, thats what a critical strike means. Add in the severity and thats even more damage, add in the extra POWER and the damage is that much more significant.
Yes, it would be cool to have extra severity and crit resistance, lifesteal, and an Explorers Guild boon that raises a random stat, yes, a random stat, like the Chult Weapons:) But I believe that we would be better suited with a Barracks.

Yes that means braving PvP to gather Conq Shards, which some of us do actually do.

Anyways, my two cents. And Benn's post is also where its at. In addition to the boon plot, a new Production Structure and 2 support structures has opened up as well. May I recommend a second warehouse to boost our capacity by 30% off the rip, BOON structure, then jump straight into GH 14?

[Ziek88]

I just want to clarify the explorer's boon. The first times I saw it I thought it was a random stat but have found it is actually based on members of your party as to which stats you get.

This is the tooltip.

Group Stat.png (25.44 KiB) Viewed 8581 times

The way it works is when you are solo, this stat will only give you Deflect.

2 members in your party is Deflect and Recovery.

3 Members is Deflect, Recovery and Critical Strike.

4 members in your party is Deflect, Recovery, Critical Strike and Armor Penetration.

5 Members in your party is Deflect, Recovery, Critical Strike, Armor Penetration and Power.

So the obvious drawback is the whole party HAS to be using this boon for it to be truly beneficial. Even when we push this thing to rank 7 that will be 1200 of each one of those stats in a full dungeon party. It isn't 3000 power but it is also fairly easily achievable at the moment. I'm with you Rain, I look forward to the Barrack's I just don't know that it's going to be a doable push this time around.

[nmates]

Barracks could be our 3rd boon structure. However, to get to GH15, we're going to need to get enough structures to rank 7. Boon Structure #3 is most naturally one of the items needed -- by my calculations, we'd need to get every existing building to rank 7 plus also Boon#3. The loophole is that Boon#3 doesn't have to make it to rank 7 if some other new building goes to rank 7. Things like an animal pen which boosts food production, something we're rarely in need of, or the lumberyard boost which we've needed more recently.

The downside is that it's more expensive, as we'd split spending between Barracks ranks 1-5 and Support 1-7. I've not done the research to see what might be the best option to get something else to rank 7. While a 2nd warehouse seems nice, getting the first warehouse to rank 6 took a *ton* of Heroic Shards, and I'm not sure how fun it'll be grinding those forever. Homework time...

[nmates]

In case you haven't seen Dru's in-game spammage, Explorer's Guild was chosen. Plus some support options, and GH14 is cooking. I've updated my spreadsheet to reflect that. I've also added some incomplete tabs w/ options as well as a "what we've completed" list. More to come.

[Phelaia]

As for building the Barracks, Rain has a plan to do PVP without pain. Will update later.

[Ziek88]

As for building the Barracks, Rain has a plan to do PVP without pain. Will update later.

*Moves to edge of seat

[tornnomar]

Hail *NOR/

Evil Plan? Hmm, a bit sadistic maybe, masochistic, okay okay, ya got me! EVIL PLAN!

10 person Private Q, 5v5 Domination Matches. 2 matches against each other. Before we go in, it will be decided which team will get the "win"
Wins are based on how long a Point is held.

There is also Glory as an award, but that is used towards PvP structures....

What we're after is the conquerors shards. These are awarded in groups of ten like all the other shards. All forms of PvP give them but this is the form we can control to ensure its all NOR....I think. I know that sounds bad, but I can't recall when we've had the numbers on to give a whirl. Even if we just see if its possible Q that way, I believe it is, because we have guilds in our alliance that have Barracks and I know that they are not a PvP guild. So theres gotta be a way.

Also every once in awhile, the Alliance does GG PvP, and thats easy, just follow your group and you'll be good.

I know that we are not a PvP focused Guild, but many of you suffered through it when the Blood Crystal Raven Skull was a Top notch Artifact. The same approach applies here, except we're bettering the guild as a whole. All in all, we chose some good structures, and since Ziek explained the EG boon (Thanks Ziek!) and the way it works....I think we did great! But it seems, like Ziek said, the EG boon would require cooperation amongst party members.

Most of us Neverwinter players who come to our section of the forum know how to play the game. Therefore we know that Power is a game changer and because of that, I move to get the last boon plot be made a Barracks, even if we just take it to the Rank we can achieve, 5. 3000 Power will help alot of members out.

And I'll leave you with some laughs:

[Ziek88]

Yesssssss. We shall call it "Rain's PvPalooza". I can put it on the event calendar. Thougts of when would be good? Realistically we could do 2 games and then all move to alts and do more. They would be pretty quick rounds given the winner was pre decided and I don't think there is any gearing requirement to enter. Just be level 70.

Sidenote, if this comes up on a night and bodies are needed I can hop on most nights if I'm not online. Just pester me on discord. Should go to my phone.

Some notes about PvP and the round mechanics
Winning team should capture all 3 points and then both teams should trade capturing point 2 a few times. There is some weird behavior that if a team doesn't score or the score is too much if a landslide the round doesn't count. Maybe this got fixed at some point but it was a problem in the past.