A Couple Questions from a New Player

[Speedtrainer]

Hi, I am a new player to BnS and I have several questions. First though, I don’t subscribe, I just play for free. I also bought character slots and have all 8 classes now at level 6 except for my Blade Dancer which is level 10 and I am finished up at Foshi Pyres and heading off to Whalesong Cove for the first time.

1.       1. Should I use all my Hongmoon keys to open all the locked stalker weapon boxes so I can upgrade my weapon? What happens if I run out of keys and still have not gotten my weapon? And to break through to weapon level 6, do I need my class specific stalker weapon to do that?

 

2.       2. How can I get rid of my training sword? Please tell me I can, I hate when games lock you into equipment like that unless it is need later down the road.

 

3.       3. How far down in durability do I let a weapon go before I should repair?

 

4.       4. I can barely even see what I am looting half the time, can anyone recommend chat settings I could change to so it’s not constant gold spammers?

 

5.       5. Which Soul Shield set is better, Stalker or Blackram Critical?

 

6.       6. What level is the first dungeon available?

 

Thanks

[Aimo]

1. Since you are not premium, I don't think you can access the marketplace yet to just buy one. (Keys are generally worth more than the weapon at that level) If you have a character up to 16 (i think) you can trade/access the market and mail yourself the required stalker weapon. I don't think it's a big deal to wait til lv 16 to upgrade to stalker either, though some may disagree.

   If you run out of keys, the only ways to obtain more are crafting (around lv16), marketplace (lv 16 or premium), npc (costs more than marketplace and likely not affordable at low levels), quests, or surverys. If you have no means of using the marketplace or mailing yourself the weapon, I would personally just wait til you get to the point of being able to access the market to upgrade. Or if someone is willing to mail the weapon to you (since you can't trade at that level yet).

   You need your class specific weapon for all breakthrough and transform steps. Anything in between that you feed to your Hongmoon weapon can be for any class.

 

2. I haven't done it in a while, but I think you can just discard it. Drag it out of your inventory. I don't remember if a vendor will take it. Some people like to keep their training weapons for practicing animation canceling for classes like destroyer, but i dump all of mine.

 

3. I choose to repair at 30/100. Unless I die a lot, that usually prevents me from needing to use a field repair as those are expensive. You can probably get away with repairing around 20 or so at lower levels though. I find repair tools pretty cheap and don't really run out so I don't pay too much attention to it.

 

4. I made a chat tab to show only clan/party, one to show only clan, and one to show drops. You can create your own chat tab to show exactly what you want in it or edit one of the existing ones. All chat can get messy, but it hasn't been too bad lately if you spend time blocking spammers when you first log on (not sure if this is different for low level areas).

 

5. I'm assuming Blackram Critical is the Blackram Narrows purple soul shield set? Blackram Narrows set is better, but I wouldn't waste unsealing charms on it since leveling is pretty quick in this game. While leveling, I pretty much exclusively used soulshields either from wheels or from the valor stone npcs.

Edit: Just realized you were referring to the green Blackram Critical set. I'm not sure which is better.

 

6. There are a few dungeons around level 16 that are mostly solo (or party if you find them difficult). The first one I'd say is an actual dungeon would be around level 20-22 during the questline, Blackram Narrows. I don't remember what the minimum level requirement is.

[Speedtrainer]

1. Ok well it looks like everyone suggested to wait til level 16 to buy my breakthrough weapon. In the meantime, should I spend the copper and use the green weapons that I loot to evolve and max out level 5? Or should I vendor them for extra copper? And what should I do with the locked stalker weapon boxes, just vendor them?
2. Thanks for letting me know how to get rid of the training weapon, I could vendor it even though it says I can't. This brings up the question of how to get rid of the Hongmoon uniform because I just got a new outfit and I don't need the original anymore.
3. And I guess I will keep the Stalker Soul Shields until level 20. Just vendor the Blackram Critical ones?
Thanks.

[Gaiaprophet]

Don't vendor soul shields that you will not be using.  If you open your inventory and look at the bottom of the window, one of the buttons will be "Salvage."  Use that and it will either turn into a piece of junk (which sells for 1 copper, just like if you vendored 1 soul shield) or it will turn into "Fusion Powder" which you will be using in later levels to upgrade your soul shields.

 

As far as upgrading your weapon is concerned, it doesn't matter what you use to upgrade, so don't waste your time opening a bunch of boxes (such as the stalker ones), after you acquire your classes' weapon (which is required to evolve your hongmoon weapon.  Your Hongmoon weapon will be your main weapon until the end of the game and will require different things to upgrade.  On a side note, doing the surveys sometimes give you gems to use to upgrade your weapons.