In Vanguard MACROs are simple but also extremely useful. After you learn how to make them you will not want to play without them! To get started simply follow these instructions: Right click one of the hotkeys on your hot bar and a menu will pop up titled: “Make Macro”. Enter a Name and if you want, an icon chooses it in the little scroll box or click the “Text-Only Macro” at the bottom and it will simply display the title that you entered above. In the center box enter the macro that you want to create and hit save. That is all there is to making a macro in Vanguard. Now that will not help you much if you do not know what you can add to it so here is some examples:
/follow <name>This will follow the target player. Note the follow is not well performed and you will fall off cliffs or get blocked by trees, boulders, and door jams.
/assist <name>This will assist the player you name and give you theirtarget. Everyone needs a good assist macro to avoid chaos when grouping!
/target <name>This will target that player.
/find <name>This will try and target anything with that name. Very usefulfor finding mailboxes, NPCS and such.
/cast “Ability Name” This will cast the ability that you specify. Keep inmind that the abilities use roman numerals and that the “Abilityname 1” is acapital i. So “Blizzard III” would be blizzard iii. You can right click the abilityicon to see its exact spelling.
/reactionautochainThis will auto chain your abilities as they becomeavailable.
/reactionautocounterThis will auto counter attack with your abilities asthey become available. Like after a parry ect.
/reactionchain # The “#” is the location of the spell on your finishing attacks bar, i.e., the first spell would be “reaction chain 1”. The advantage of this command is that you can easily take advantage of multiple level finishing moves for a spell you want to make a priority. For instance, “Concordant Palm” must be preceded by “Concordant Hand” for a disciple. This command will activate both.
/reactioncounter # This command has the same functionality of /reactionchain,but applies to counterattacks.
Sometime macros can stop working and you will need to retype them. No idea why, they just do. Some examples of Vanguard macros:
/assist Pidge — Assist the tank in the group
/lootall Loot whatever corpse you have targeted
Or create a macro with several in command:
/reactionautochain
/reactionautocounter
/cast “Ice Comet III”
/cast “Strike of Scaryness V”
/cast “Hammer of Smashing IV”
/cast “Blizzard IV”
Cancel whatever you are casting:
/cancelability
Items with right-click effects:
/itemuse “item name”
Cycles your offensive target to the next nearest harvesting node:
/targetnextnode
Cycles your offensive target to the next nearest NPC:
/targetnextnpc
Cycles your defensive target to the next nearest PC:
/targetnextpcdefensive
Clear offensive target before assisting the tank:
/targetoffensive clear/assist “main tank”
Target the nearest corpse and loot everything on it:
/endloot/lootall/loot/targetnextcorpse
Drag your corpse if there is one nearby, or drag the nearest player’s corpseotherwise:
/targetnearestpccorpse
/targetmycorpse
/corpsedrag
Target by group member number (1=self, 2=first member of group etc…):/targetgroupmember X
· OT = Old Targonor, level 40+ grouping area. Named kills needed here forGriffon Mount quest line
· RI = RahzInkur (mid 40’s – 50 dungeon)
· RK = Renton Keep (place to get diplo buffs and good mid teen questarea)
· RT = Riftseeker’s Torrent (low level dungeon)
· SoD= Shores of Darkness (50+ quest area, also known as KDQ – KamellotDaily Quests)· SoK = Sea of Kojan (high level solo area)
· SS = Shimmering Shores (high level raid, group, solo area)
· T1, T2, T3 (T = Tier) – Used primarily in relation to crafting, gear,harvesting to denote the level/tier. (Note, that the Tier of a crafteditem refers to the level of combine/resource it takes to make it, notnecessarily the level of the final product. Different crafted items aredifferent levels. Chestpieces are always at the top of the list, so aT3 Chestplate (Blue) would be usable by a level 29, but an (upgraded)UR T3 crafted chestplate (orange con) would be 2 levels higher at level31. Still T3 though, because the resources used were T3.
· T1: Level 1-10 Crafting (Novice), (Harvesting need 0+ skill)
· T1-T3 is also used to refer to the level of POTA (Pantheon of theAncients Progression gear) (T3 being the best you can get).
Vanguard does so many things right, but also many things wrong. In the great, large world of Telon one can get lost in the size and scope of the world. But the land and seas can shrink with the advent of a recent mount that they added called a Pegasus.
The game has horses and boats, two great ways to travel through the world. But sadly, to entice new and returning players the game added a Pegasus which is a flying mount. The world instantly became smaller with this addition, and sadly completely made the horse and boat obsolete. Worse, they hand out the Pegasus on the starting island for doing some minor quests.
Perhaps the flying mount wouldn’t be so bad if it was a reward for a 50th level character, giving them the ability to travel much quicker through the lands, but they hand it out at 10th (or so) level to complete newbies to the world. Suddenly the world isn’t as mysterious and unknown as it was before because now you can simply fly around, in an out of trouble, with ease.
Let’s return to the roots of travel, horses and boats. Give the crafters, those that can make boats, a reason to do their craft.
My suggestion is that they remove the Pegasus from the game. Give it out as a final reward to a long and arduous quest.
There are six primary Adventuring attributes in Vanguard. Unlike other MMOs, each attribute has a purpose and needs to be considered as you develop your character.
For example, a Warrior may want to put additional points into Intelligence (Int) to increase his tactical capabilities in battle or to counter an assailant’s magical spell. Likewise, a Druid may want to increase her Strength (Str) so that she could do more damage in melee combat.
Constitution (Con) Increases health points and damage resistances.
Dexterity (Dex) Increases melee critical hit bonus, ranged damage, chance to evade attacks and spells, mitigation of melee damage, chance to defend with defensive abilities, and chance to recognize and react to enemy abilities.
Vitality (Vit) Increases healing effectiveness, in-combat health and energy regeneration, and un-mounted movement speed.
Intelligence (Int) Increases spell damage, chance to identify and recognize tactics, chance to detect opponents and perceive what they’re doing in combat, chance to counter opponents’ spells, and chance to prevent opponents from countering your spells.
Wisdom (Wis) Increases energy pool, spell critical hit bonus, chance to identify spells and recognize tactics, chance to detect opponents and perceive what they’re doing in combat, chance to counter opponents’ spells.
Here is a quick note about crafting in Vanguard. When preparing your work table, that is the process of adding ingredients and fuel to the recipe, remember you cannot mix different quality materials. So if the recipe calls for 2 Cotton Bundles, one cannot be A Quality and one be B Quality. Both must be of the same quality for the recipe to accept it.
There are innumerable monsters, creatures, and mobs in the lands of Telon. They are organized by level but also with a dot system denoting their ferociousness. Dots over the creature represent how tough, powerful, and deadly they can be. There can be found 1 to 6 dots over a creature.
The power of the dots is explained thusly:
One Dot: Very easy to solo and weaker than the average monster of this type. Any class can dispatch these creatures.
Two Dot: More difficult but still soloable by classes that have good dps.
Three Dot: Tough and must be tackled by duo teams or much higher-level characters.
Four Dot: Very tough and needs a small group to tackle and kill. Duo’s that are high level may be able to take down these creatures.
Five Dot: Extremely powerful monsters. These creatures require full groups or small raid parties to conquer.
Six Dot: Raid bosses that require full raids to take down.
A solo character should use this system to gauge which monsters they should engage. Duo’s or small groups can best four dot monsters, but often require more fighting five dot mobs. Raid groups are needed for Six Dot mobs.
Introduction This document is designed to be both an overview of the Vanguard crafting system and a guide toward being a good crafter.
The crafting system in Vanguard rewards proper crafting builds. If you simply begin crafting with no understanding of the system, then at best you will be a crafter who obtains mediocre results at your level. To be a great crafter you must be observant and understand the system.
Crafters provide useful materials to every sphere of Vanguard, from boats and houses for everyone, bags, weapons, and equipment for adventurers to diplomacy, harvesting and their own gear.
You can begin crafting by locating the Crafting Advisor in the nearest city to your starting area. The Advisor will guide you through a series of introductory quests to help get you on your way. If you cannot find the Advisor, call a guard and they’ll point you in the right direction.
The introductory quests provide a lot of contextual advice, so it is worthwhile to pay attention to them. The quests will provide you with all the gear, tools, and utilities you will initially need so you should avoid buying anything until you have completed them; otherwise, you’ll end up with useless duplicates you won’t be able to sell back for what you paid for them. Since your goal is to make money that would be bad way to start.
Trades Crafters are divided into three trades: artificers, blacksmiths, and outfitters. Each trade has a primary trade and two specialized trades.
For example, Artificer is a primary trade and has carpenter and mineralogist as specialization trades. You will need to specialize in one of the two subclasses of trades, for example carpenter versus mineralogist.
ARTIFICER (Carpenter/Mineralogist) The artificer works with stone, wood, and gemstone. Carpenters can create wooden melee and ranged weapons. They are the primary boat builders. Mineralogists create weapons made from stone. They can also create magical focus items or jewelry to increase the power of spell casters, some forms of arrows and are the primary housebuilders. Both can make various arrows.
BLACKSMITH (Armor smith/Weapon smith) The blacksmith works mainly with metal. They make most weapons, fashion all types of heavy armor and produce tools for harvesters (and eventually crafters). Blacksmiths also make some forms of arrows as well as fasteners and other items for boats and houses.
OUTFITTER (Tailor/Leatherworker) The outfitter deals in leather and cloth. Tailors fashion all light armor, normal clothing, cloaks, and inventory bags. Leatherworkers fashion all medium armor, saddlebags, and hand wraps for some non-Thestran monk/disciple weapon recipes. Outfitters in general also make sails for boats and items for houses.
Attributes There are four crafting attributes: problem solving, reasoning, ingenuity, and finesse. These contribute to the effectiveness of your crafting actions.
All characters will begin with 90 points in all attributes. No attributes are rewarded from 2nd to 9th level; you essentially start with 9th level attributes.
Beginning with 10th level, crafters gain 32 attribute points per level. These attribute points are allocated as follows:
• 7 points are automatically awarded to each of the 4 attributes.
• 4 points are awarded to your Attribute Points pool to be manually allocated as you wish (1 point granted at 20%, 40%, 60%, and 80% experience).
The cap for each attribute is increased by 10 for each level gained, beginning with level 10.
Therefore, the cap at level 10 is 100, at level 11 is 110, etc. In other words, level*10. This cap only applies to allocation of attribute points; bonuses from gear do not apply. After all Attribute Points have been allocated, you may use Refund Points to reclaim used Attribute Points much like adventuring sphere attribute points. Every one Refund Point will allow you to decrease any one attribute and increment a different attribute. Refund points are granted to the player as they earn crafting experience.
Thus, Refund Points will accumulate faster as you increase in level. Refund Points can only be used to reclaim Attribute Points that were allocated manually.
Problem Solving Increases the effectiveness of your remedy actions. Remedy actions include tool, utility, and station actions used to eliminate or utilize complications.
Reasoning Increases the effectiveness of your utility actions. Utility actions are normal crafting abilities used in the process that require utilities to execute. Reasoning is particularly useful for raising quality of items.
Ingenuity Increases the effectiveness of your station actions. Station actions are normal crafting abilities used in the process that do not require tools or utilities.
Finesse Increases the effectiveness of your tool actions. Tool actions are normal crafting abilities used in the process that require tools to execute. [NOTE] Until you gain more familiarity with attribute effects you should attempt to keep them relatively balanced.
Skills There are two types of skills: parent skills and process skills.
As you gain experience and levels you can control how these skills advance. You cannot directly change their value. You set whether they trend upward (plus), downward (minus) or stay as is (locked) in the skills tab of the crafter section in the character sheet.
Above each action family is the action header, if there is a number beside the header you have skill points to spend and using an action set to trend upwards has a chance to increase that skill when used. If there is no number you have allocated all of your available points and must use the minus to set one skill to trend downwards to free up points or wait till you gain a level, at which point you will receive more points to distribute. Increases in each skill only occur when performing that skill. Decreases in each skill only occur if you have no available skill points in that skill family and perform a skill set to decrement. The more difficult the work order or recipe the more likely a change will occur.
Parent Skills Parent skills affect specialization and define what kind of crafter you are. Parent skills also control how many items you can bring to the crafting table, your effectiveness completing work orders or recipes and grant special actions, like making multiple items at once as your skill increases. Parent skills are divided into refining: creating base materials and finishing: creating completed objects. The finishing portion of the parent skill is further subdivided into the trade’s primary focus and two specializations.
Parent Skills List
• Artificer Refining: Forming
• Artificer Primary Artificer
• Artificer Specialization 1: Carpenter
• Artificer Specialization 2: Mineralogist
• Blacksmith Refining: Metallurgy
• Blacksmith Primary Blacksmith
• Blacksmith Specialization 1: Weapon smith
• Blacksmith Specialization 2: Armor smith
• Outfitter Refining: Material Preparation
• Outfitter Primary Outfitter
• Outfitter Specialization 1: Tailor
• Outfitter Specialization 2: Leatherworking
Process Skills Process skills define how effective a crafter you are. There are three types of process skills: station skills, utility skills, and tool skills.
These skills are set and controlled independently for both refining and finishing processes. You never have sufficient skill points to maximize all three process skill types. Increasing one skill above a balanced build level will require decrementing one or both other two. As you obtain higher skill levels, you’ll automatically learn new actions. Notification that you have learned a new action will appear in your chat window.
Tool Skill The tool skill affects tool actions, simply any actions that require tools. Tools are non-expended items such as chisels and shears that are placed in a crafter’s tool belt. Tool actions advance both quality and progress. Tool actions are important for progress since there are typically more tool steps than utility or stations steps, particularly in lower level recipes.
Utility Skill The utility skill affects utility actions, simply any actions that require utilities. Utilities are expendables used during the crafting process, such as charcoal or cleaner. The utility skill is very important for quality as it has the only quality only action.
Station Skill The station skill affects actions that do not use a tool or utility. In general, a higher station skill will also reduce complication frequency.
[NOTE] Utility and Tool skills are your primary skills. Until very higher levels you will want to focus on them, to what extent you should focus on them is detailed later in the guide.
Actions As you increase your parent and process skills you learn new actions. Increased parent skills will grant the ability to make multiple secondary components.
For example, carpenters will learn to make 3 or 5 wooden grips at a time. Increased parent skills also grant the ability to make uncommon versions of recipes through the application of catalysts. Primary, secondary components and catalysts are addressed later.
Initially you will have a limited set of actions to advance progress and quality. At higher skill levels you will receive new process actions that provide lower or higher progress or quality for lower or higher action point costs. Some new actions will allow increasing both progress and quality at the same time. These new actions provide finer granularity in efficiently completing recipes. Increased process skills also give new complication resolutions. The full suite of resolutions for a given process skill may not be available unless you increase that skill to maximum.
Tool belts and Utilities The equipment tab or the crafter pane, on the character sheet (c), has a slot for one utility pouch and 3 crafting tool belts. When you receive your first pouch and tool belt during the crafting introductory drag them to the appropriate slots in your crafter equipment pane.
Once they are equipped you can right click them to open them. In general, your recipes will require about the same number of tools as you can put into a level appropriate tool belt. In some cases, though you may need more slots, particularly for tools used in complication resolutions. You can wear up to three toolbelts to hold these tools.
Clicking the tool belt button during a recipe will allow you to ‘switch’ tool belts for a small 5 AP cost. You can examine the content of a tool belt during a recipe by right clicking it but you cannot change the contents. You should check that you have the appropriate tools in your tool belt before starting a recipe, particularly if you are shifting to a refining recipe from a finishing one or vice versa.
Crafting Process
Recipes Recipes consist of a description for the item you are making, a list of utilities you’ll need to complete the item, and a list of tools you’ll need to complete the item. Any text in red informs you of missing items from your inventory or tool belt that would prevent you from completing the recipe. Recipes can be viewed by looking at the crafting tab of your abilities sheet (p) or by right clicking an appropriate workbench. Item recipes are addressed in more detail later.
Workbenches There are six types of workbenches; each of the three primary trades has refining and finishing workbenches. Recipes must be undertaken at the appropriate workbench, for example there is a blacksmith refining bench and blacksmith finishing bench.
Pressing ‘n‘ will cause names to appear over workbenches (as well as NPC heads).The number of items you may bring to a workbench is driven by either your refining or primary trade skill.
Every 100 points of skill allows you to bring one more item to the table. Items are either materials (wood, stone etc) or dusts/powders for recipes or utilities for recipes and work orders. Once you select the workbench and recipe you will be prompted to add items to the bench.
In the table setup pane left click each item you wish to bring to the table within each category. Items you have selected will appear in boxes below the setup window. If you forget an item and discover it in the middle of the recipe there is nothing you can do but cancel the recipe. This will result in the loss of any materials used. Assembly tables are special workbenches. They are typically used to combine materials (but not always) from different trades.
For example, an assembly table is used to combine outfitter sails and rigging to a carpenter mast to make a fully functional mast assembly.
Stages (Progress and Quality) Every recipe or work order has a number of Action Points (AP) associated with it. The basic goal of crafting is to increase quality as high as possible while completing progress through all stages before running out of AP.
Each recipe is divided into stages and each stage is further subdivided into one or more steps. To complete a stage you must gain 100% progress.
Each stage must be completed in order. The steps within a stage may be completed in any order. A two-step stage would require 50% progress to complete the first step and 50% progress to complete the second step. A three-step stage is divided into three 33% progress steps.
Each step has a set of actions you may perform. These actions cost varying amounts of AP and provide varying amounts of progress and quality. Mousing over the action will show its AP cost and effect. Once you have finished the progress on a step you may not go back to that step to improve quality. It may take a few runs through a recipe to figure out where and when to advance quality without running out of AP’s and total failure.
Higher level recipes have more steps (and thankfully more AP) per stage. Where appropriate the first stage of non-work order recipes will allow you to specify how many or what specific type of an item you are making. At early levels, your recipes will have one station, utility and tool step, by 20th level recipes will have two tool steps, by 30th they will have two tool and two utility steps. Adjusting your skills and attributes to properly account for the increased number of actions in these recipes is important. There is no single correct build from 1st to 50th level, you must adapt to changes.
Complications During the course of completing a recipe complication will crop up. The likelihood of getting a complication is driven in large part by your station action skill.
Complications are a random chance during each action. In general, you should expect to see 3 or 4 per turn. If you have a high station skill you may only see 2 per turn, if you have a low station skill you may see 5 or 6 per turn. Since complications are a random chance per action you should do as few actions as possible during a recipe.
In other words, try to do the highest AP cost action that doesn’t waste AP by providing more progress than needed to complete a step. There are three boxes to the right of the crafting stages that show any active complications. Mousing over the complication will describe how many turns it lasts and its nature.
Some complications cause subsequent actions to cost more AP, some cause progress loss, some quality loss. Complications are beneficial in some cases and will increase quality or progress. Bad complications tend to be red; orange ones are detrimental but can probably be ignored; and green ones are beneficial. Selecting an active complication will bring up all known resolutions.
Resolutions can be tool, utility or station-based actions. Your ability to remove a complication is driven primarily by your problem-solving attribute and secondarily by the appropriate process skill (utility, tool etc.) for the chosen resolution. Whether it takes one, two, three or even four applications of the resolution is driven by those factors. Not all complications are bad, some provide beneficial gains others are merely annoyances that typically can be ignored. Learning the difference will be extremely important where an A versus B or C grade result is concerned.
Example 1: Minor Friction complication lasts 5 turns and causes a 33% increase in AP cost. You could choose to ignore it and do a 100pt AP progress action instead. This would result in a 166pt deficit (33% of 5 turns * 100pt). If instead you applied the lowest cost (35 AP) resolution 3 times you’d only lose 140 AP. (3* 35pt action is 105AP + 35 AP due to the increased cost during those 3 actions).
If you clear the complication, you save 26AP but you risk having another complication appear. If you ignore it you lose 26AP but may be in a position to simply complete the recipe. You could further decide to only do low cost actions while the complication is up to further mitigate the cost.
Some complications cause progress loss that can affect steps you have completed within the current stage. When this occurs the previously grayed out step will relight and you will need to return to it. They will not re-open steps in completed stages. These complications can also cause negative progress, when that occurs you will need more than the normal 33, 50 or 100% progress for that step.
These are by far the worst complications. Recognizing them and ensuring you have effective utilities and tools to attack them is essential in becoming a successful crafter.
Note: Complications are random, a build that averages 2 or 3 complications per recipe could experience 4 or 5, a build that averages 4 or 5 could experience only 2.There is no rule that says you can’t get more or fewer than some target number. There is no harm in completing a recipe with an active complication, it is not required that they be removed.
Work Orders Work orders provide the primary mechanism for gaining experience and levels in Vanguard. Refining and finishing taskmasters in all cities offer work orders; additionally, some NPC’s may have mini-quests in the form of work orders.
Since you’re doing the local establishment a favor by completing their work they don’t expect you to bring anything but your tools and utilities to the job. Any lumber, stone, metal, cloth or other raw materials required for the job will be supplied at the table(they won’t appear in your inventory).
If you choose to use your own materials for the work order you will receive a small initial grade boost, about 2/3rds of a grade if you use Grade A material. Refining work orders use raw resources; finishing work orders use refined resources. Work orders typically require you to make three instances of an item (each instance is commonly referred to as a leg. Some work orders have only one leg some have as many as five).
Types For each trade there are four types of work orders: one for refining, one for the primary trade, and one for each of the two trade specializations. You should give some forethought to what you want your specialization to be. Taking work orders prior to 10thin both specializations will cause you to skill up in both.
While this may be attractive in trying out both trades it will have a very adverse effect on your ability to complete recipes. Once you have specialized at 10th level you will only be able to accept refining work orders and primary trade or chosen specialization finishing work orders. Work orders you’ve received show up in your quest log or can be viewed by right clicking the appropriate crafting table type and selecting work orders’. Once you complete a work order it must be turned into the taskmaster who supplied it. Hail the taskmaster, select ‘current’, then the work order in question then click ‘complete’. Work orders are abandoned by clicking ‘abandon’ instead of complete.
Difficulty and Grade The taskmaster list all available work orders in order of difficulty, from easiest to impossible difficult. Success completing quite easy to difficult workorders can vary depending on your skill, attributes, gear and tools. In general, a medium crafter should expect to obtain A quality on very easy work orders, B on easy, C on moderate, and C or D on difficult.
Simply completing a very difficult work order is its own reward. Moderate work orders vary from one level below yours to one level above yours. They are sorted within the block of moderates from highest to lowest level. You will see a noticeable difference in difficulty between the easiest and hardest moderate workorders.
Experience Work orders are the primary method of gaining experience. From a per leg point of view single item work orders provided the most XP, followed by set (3 items) and batch (5 items) type work orders.
From a time expenditure point of view, including running back and forth to the taskmaster set or batch type work orders provide more XP. The higher the quality you achieve the greater the experience reward. There is a delay before a given work order will refresh. If you focus solely on single or set type work orders you will either be forced to try overly easy or difficult ones or resort to doing batches. In general it’s best to focus more on the level of the work order than the quantity type.
Rewards There are a variety of rewards for work orders; the most obvious is experience. In addition, you will receive faction that is necessary for later quests, monetary or vendor-coins, dusts, tools and gear.
The quality of the reward is directly driven by the quality of the turn in. There is no benefit to completing a work order to 100% quality; any equality is equivalent to any other. Completing all legs of a work order A quality will generate better XP and item rewards than B quality. The level of gear and tool rewards is driven by work order level. Higher-level work orders return higher-level gear. There is no pat answer as to whether extremely easy, easy, moderate or difficult work orders are better to undertake. Getting A on easy is superior to getting C on moderate, in terms of experience earned. Where gear rewards are concerned the moderate completed to C grade might be better.
In some cases, for instance, faction rewards, trivial work orders are best. Work orders with only one leg never supply gear or tools as rewards. Non taskmaster work order rewards can take various forms.
For instance, completing all three legs of the Tursh Fair Ring Toss work order gives a Raki, in addition to monetary and gear rewards you will receive city and continental faction when completing work orders.
Learning Recipes In general, particularly early on you will learn recipes from your local crafting instructor. Simply hail them and select those recipes you wish to learn. As you gain levels your crafting instructor will offer you new recipes.
Upon reaching 11th level you will need to complete the tier and specialization quests discussed later. All recipes have level, specialization, and faction requirements that must be met before you can learn them. Continents have their own recipes, continental style quests required to unlock these recipes are covered later. The more rare or prestigious the recipe, the more likely it will have faction requirements. Higher level recipes are typically available in larger cities like Ahgram, New Targonor or Tanvu.
Special recipes will involve finding and completing quests and are not simply learned from an instructor. You can list the recipes you currently know from the crafting tab of your abilities window (p). In general, crafted items consist of a primary component and one or more secondary components.
Catalysts Catalysts have varying affects like increasing stats (str, int, dex, etc), attributes (health, or energy, armor class, etc), increased range, damage etc. Mousing over a dust will describes its effects, what items it can be applied to and what tier it’s applicable to.
When creating items, you will have opportunities to add catalysts, in the form of dusts, powders or shards to the primary and secondary components. Recipes will list in their description whether they allow for the addition of catalysts. When setting up the table you will see a ‘catalyst’ listing along with the normal utilities listing, simply select the dust you wish to add. Catalysts are added to items immediately before the next to last stage.
A dust icon will appear where the normal action icons are. Clicking that icon or typing will apply the catalyst. The icon is easy to miss so take that portion slow until you get a feel for it. Item names are a function of the primary stat affected by the dust added to the base material (lumber, stone, metal etc).
For example, adding Attuning Dust of Intelligence to a barbed board results in a Grifter’s Board. Using that board in a staff recipe results in a Grifter’s Staff. The item names by primary attribute for the first two tiers are:
Attribute Tier 1 Name Tier 2 Name Intelligence Charlatan’s Grifter’s
Wisdom Mystic’s Oracle’s
Strength Sentry’s Protector’s
Dexterity Brigand’s Brute’s
Vitality Votary’s Fanatics
Constitution Drifter’s Wayfarer’s
Grade and EE The level of an item is affected by the grade at which it is completed. In general, an item will be 3 levels lower for each reduction in grade.
If a Grade A bow is level 28 then the grade B version will be level 25, grade C will be level 22. There are corresponding reductions in the magical characteristics with grade as well, but they tend to be set such that grade C items are comparable to world drop items of the same level.
Vanguard uses a gear limiting system called Equipment Expertise (EE). Every piece of gear has a percentage cost associated which is calculated based on the slot the item goes in (some slots cost more) and the difference between the item’s level and your own.
You may not equip a piece of gear that costs more than 20% toward your total EE expense and you may not go over 100% total EE expense.
You can see a given piece of gear’s cost when mousing over it. Your total EE is calculated separately for each sphere and is listed at the bottom of the equipment tab for each sphere on the character sheet.
While there is an attraction to making all grade A items, there are very good reasons for making grade B or C items. First, when you learn a recipe grade C may well be the best you can accomplish, secondly, the EE system places limits on differential between a character’s level and their gear. To a level 17 ranger that grade A bow is useless but the level 22 grade C bow may be extremely good.
Final Product (primary component recipes) Primary component recipes represent finished products. They will include a list of one or more secondary components required to complete the recipe. The secondary item is added to the table (currently listed under polish) much the same way a utility or catalyst would be.
In the final cleaning step the secondary item will be added to the primary component and you will receive the completed item. If you have more than one of the required secondary items be careful when adding it to the table. The simplest approach is to identify it in your inventory and see that it is removed when you add it to the table. Primary component recipes have one additional table slot to account for the additional secondary item.
Rare/Legendary Items It appears we’ll have other recipes we learn that will take a final product and rare resources as tabled items (similar to normal recipes). Completion of this upgrade recipe will result in a rare or legendary item.
Deconstruction Deconstruction is a special form of recipe. At 11th level you will need to travel to a nearby outpost to learn deconstruction recipes. Common, uncommon, rare or even more powerful items can be destroyed in return for base materials (wood, metal etc) or magical essence (dusts, powders, etc). When starting the recipe the first stage allows you to choose the type (resource or dust) reward you want. Deconstruction works just like normal recipes except you must achieve Grade A results to be successful. Higher-level items return higher level materials and dusts but are more difficult to deconstruct. Use the appropriate tier deconstruction recipe when destroying objects. For example, use the amateur version when destroying items 11-19th, the apprentice version when destroying 20-29th level items. The rewards from deconstruction are based on the lower of the items tier or the recipes tier. Using a higher tier recipe on a lower tier item just results in more work.
Leveling and Quests
Specialization Quests At level 11 your crafting instructor will offer you a quest to specialize in one of the 2 subclasses of your primary class. Once you have completed this quest you will no longer see work orders for the complementary subclass, for example carpenters will no longer see mineralogist work orders.
Specializing is mandatory, if you attempt to spread your focus between the primary and secondary trades (for example artificer, carpentry and mineralogy) you will probably be unable to complete any work orders or recipes effectively.
Tier Quests There are 5 tiers of crafting: novice(1st level), amateur(11th level), apprentice(21st), initiate(31st) and journeyman(41st). Starting at amateur each continent has its own tier quests and they require 100, 200, 300 and 400 continental faction to obtain.
Provided you meet the faction requirements then at 11th, 21st, 31st and 41st level you will be presented with a quest from your crafting instructor to pass a test for the next tier. Early tier quests are found in any city on your home continent, later tier quests can be found in major cities. Local crafters gain 100 continental faction upon completing tier quests; and foreign crafters gain 50 continental. To reach the 100, 200, 300 or 400 faction requirements for a continent’s tier quest foreign crafters have to obtain the missing 50faction by completing work orders.
Once you’ve completed the tier quest your crafting instructor will again have recipes available for you to learn if you have the necessary faction for those recipes. Some recipes require completing the faction range for that tier. For example, you receive can obtain the apprentice tier quest when you have 300 faction.
Foreigners will receive 50 faction, for a total of 250, upon completing the quest. Some apprentice level recipes will require 300 faction before they are offered. To obtain tier quests on remote continents you must first pass that continent’s continental style quest.
Continental Style As a Thestran if you would like to learn recipes in Qalia, i.e. Qalian style recipes, you must first travel to Ahgram, the capitol of Qalia. Your crafting instructor there will provide you with a quest to travel the continent talking to other crafting instructors in remote cities.
Completion of this quest provides 50 continental factions, you must then earn another 50 faction (100 total) by completing work orders on that continent at which point you’ll be allowed to learn amateur Qalian style recipes. Completing one leg of any level work order, including trivial completed to any grade, including D, provides one city and one continental faction Work orders obtained in outposts outside the primary cities typically provide even higher faction gains.
The process continues much the same as it would for a Qalian passing tier quests with the caveat that you’ll need 200, 300 and 400 continental faction points to obtain the apprentice, journeyman and initiate tier quests for that continent. To learn continental crafting in Thestra or Kojan you would travel to New Targonor or Tanvu respectively. You can see your faction with various crafting entities via the /showfactioncommand.
Kill on Sight (KOS) Some races of Telon may hate your characters race and attack you on sight. You can improve your faction with them via adventuring, diplomacy or crafting. Most (but possibly not all) cities have outposts that are associated with them. By far the most effective way, when possible, to remove KOS effects is crafting.
For example crafting at the Southwatch outpost grants Bordiner’s Cleft faction at a rapid rate.
Recipe quests Some large projects like houses and boats require passing quests to make the basic components. There will generally be in game hints as to where these are. Keep an eye out near docks and other likely locations. The crafting of some rare forms of armor, weapons and other items can be learned from NPC’s scattered throughout Telon. (Note: this guide will not be listing them).
Item quests Scattered throughout the towns and outposts of Telon are NPC’s in dire need of crafting help. Some of them may not be readily apparent but they will happily reward you, and in some cases your friends with much needed crafting gear.
There is no true grouping in Vanguard crafting but it’s not uncommon for these quests to require items from 2 or more trades.
Builds This section covers various builds and some rather simple build theory. The information in this section is based on testing and feedback from numerous players in game and in the Vanguard Crafters Forum. It is not based on developer input or access to code, as such it is subject to change and may well be inaccurate to begin with.
Skills One of the most consistently miss-configured skills after release is the station skill. While it’s true the station skill affects complication frequency that effect is not open ended.
Above a certain point station skill no longer has an effect in complication reduction, nor does it have any meaningful effect on progress action results. Having a station skill that is too high merely bleeds points away from tool and utility skills. There are two skills stats reference below your base skill and total skill.
Base skill is your process skill value without gear; total skill is your process skill value with gear. The sum of all of your finishing process base skills is 24 * your level, ie 240 at 10th,480 at 20th. The builds listed below are all based on calculating your target station skill as a function of the sum of your base skills and then holding your total station skill to that value. This means when you’re done your base station skill will be below the target but your total station skill will be equal to the target.
Your target station skill should be somewhere between 25% and 35% of the sum or your finishing process skills. A target below 20% will see poor action results in addition to increased comps, a target above 35% will see decreasing returns from those skill points. 25-28% of your un-geared total skills would be an offensive build, 29-31% would be a balanced build and 32-35% would be a defensive build. Since you receive 24 points per level to distribute it works out that 25% is 6 points into station/level, 29% is approximately 7 points into station per level and 33% is 8points into station per level.
In the text below a build of the form 30/35/35 build would be a balanced build with 30% of base skill points in station, 35% of points in utility and tool skills before gear effects are added. When gear is added or removed your station skill is returned to the calculated target value and remaining points are distributed between utility and tool skills. Remember, these percentages are before gear is factored in. Any excess points in station after gear is worn are shifted to utility and tool skills.
Balanced crafters Balanced crafters would have a 30/35/35 station, utility, tool skill distribution They should expect to see 4 or so comps per recipe. With level equivalent gear they should achieve high C low B grade on moderate and high B low A on easy WO’s. They want to achieve decent quality without an overwhelming number of comps. They would typically have balanced attributes as well. Those that are slightly more risk adverse might put more points in problem solving attribute to ensure clearing comps in 2shots. Those that are less risk adverse might put more attribute points in finesse or reasoning. The primary purpose here is to try and hit Blue kit type rewards from WO’s and reliably achieve good results on crafted items knowing there will be occasional failures.
Offensive crafters Offensive crafters have a low station and high utility/tool skills; a typical build might be 26/37/37. They would typically see 5, 6 or more comps per recipe. Offensive crafters are only interested in grade. They are willing to live with the occasional C or D WO grade in exchange for successfully making the occasional A grade real world item a few levels above them. With level gear they can occasionally hit Grade A on moderate WO’s and Grade A on easy WO’s. They also periodically fail or get grades below their norm. They get a larger percentage of supply packs than kits (so worse rewards) due to failures than the other types. High DPS type offensive crafters will sometimes boost ingenuity and problem solving to offset their poor station skill and increased comps.
Defensive crafters Defensive crafters have a higher station and lower utility/tool skills; a typical build might be 33/33/33. They would typically see 2 or 3 comps per recipe. Defensive crafters are interested in consistency. They want to consistently hit C grade on moderate WO’s or B grade on easy WO’s. They’re willing to trade a relative inability to reach higher grades for never failing. Defensive crafters might frequently boost problem solving such that they’re guaranteed to clear comps in two shots.
Gear and attributes As you put gear on, your skills will shift. Set your station to return once again to the target value and place any remaining points in utility and tool skills.
It is very difficult to adjust your attributes through any mechanism other than gear. You should select gear to give you the attributes you desire first then redistribute any skill points they provide.
In general ingenuity and problem solving are less important than finesse and reasoning early on. There’s no correct setting but consider keeping your highest and lowest attributes within 25% or so of each other. Pay attention to which skill seems to be lagging and consider improving it’s attribute, If you find most (not some) resolutions require 3 or more 50pt actions to clear their complication consider raising problem solving.
From 1st level until you begin seeing recipes with two tool steps you should favor reasoning over finesse and utility skill over tool skill since your primary quality raising skill is a utility one. Around 20th level as you begin seeing recipes with two tool steps and gain a low progress, high quality tool action you should consider inverting that balance. You should favor finesse over reasoning and tools skills over utility.
At 30th tool and utility begin to equalize, and at 40th station begins being more important again since there will be a 2nd station step. Note: Learned actions are a function of your un-geared base skill. If you find lots of plus station gear, wear it and then migrate those excess points to utility/tool skills you still have a respectable total station skill but your base station skill can be very low. This can cause you to forget station actions.
General Crafters are essentially trading risk for reward. If you have a low risk you’re going to get low reward. If you’re normally an offensive crafter but you gain equipment that gives you a very high EE (and therefore abnormally high skills/attributes) you might want to shift to defensive since you can now achieve those Grade B moderate and Grade A easier without the added risk of complications.
If you have really bad gear and are normally defensive, you might want to shift to offensive so you can at least occasionally (with luck) achieve good results.
If you want to consistently get Grade B on moderates and get a low number of comps per recipe, you’ll have to have nearly defensive build with almost 75%+ EE. An offensive crafter with that same gear could probably hit A grade on recipes 2 or 3 levels above him (with failures along the way).
There is no correct build. There is no best build. There are inferior builds. The information above will not make you a great crafter, it will hopefully make you a better than mediocre crafter. There is a great deal more nuance in recipe type, skill setting, complications and attributes that is not covered here.
Here is an excellent introductory video by Renfail on the virtues and validity of Vanguard in its current state. This video was actually made a couple of years ago, but is still true.
You may learn two harvesting skills (primary and secondary) from the harvest trainer in your starting area. Resources appear throughout Telon in the form of nodes. If you have the appropriate skill type and level, and the right harvesting tool in your tool belt you can harvest a node by simply right clicking it.
Your character has three harvesting attributes skill: your base harvesting skill used in grouping (described below) and your primary and secondary harvesting skill.
Gear
Gear plays an important part in effective harvesting. You will receive a basic harvesting outfit during the harvest intro quest as well as a harvesting tool belt. The tool belt works basically the same as your crafting tool belt. As you advance in skill you will want to upgrade your equipment, particularly your tools to get the greatest yield.
Tiers
Resources have tiers much like crafting recipes do. Tier 1 resources are used in tier 1 recipes, tier 2 resources in tier 2 recipes etc. Once you’ve achieved 100 skill in your primary or secondary skill you will need to purchase the next tier training manual from a local harvesting instructor for that skill: amateur for tier 2, apprentice for tier 3, and initiate for tier 4. The common resources for the first 4 tiers are:
There are also rare and ultra-rare variants of those node types, for example nickel is the rare version of tier 2 metal.
Grouping You can have up to six players grouped during harvesting. Grouping greatly increases the yield per node (not necessarily per person) as well as increases the chance for additional items. To begin harvesting simply right click the node as you would in solo harvesting with the following caveats. The person starting the harvest must have the proper tool and primary or secondary skill for the node tier and type. Anyone joining in the harvest must have the proper tool and base harvesting skill for the node tier and type. When assisting in harvesting your base harvesting skill is used in deciding if you have sufficient skill not your primary or secondary skill. It’s advantageous to have all five harvesting tools in your tool belt at all times so you can join a group harvest.
I think it is too easy to simply sit back and complain about what Vanguard did wrong. Certainly there are innumerable aspects of the game that need polish and perhaps even a complete overhaul, and there is a place for that. But the worse thing to do is dwell on only the negative aspects of a solid and well designed game, mostly since the game has done some really incredible things right.
I am curious what other players feel that the game got right. Here is my 10 aspects that Vanguard did right. Do you agree? The following list is in no particular order but represents my free spontaneous thinking of all the glory of what Vanguard does correctly.
Rich Character Development: I have said this before but I really enjoy characters that are full bodied with stats, scores, attributes, and skills. I hate the paper cutout games where one character simply is another with a skin. Vanguard nails this. The stats, skills, and attributes are robust. It feels like your character is always growing and developing.
Large World: Many MMOs have huge land but they make the mistake of inserting some kind of system to move quickly around in it. I know when I lived in Tokyo I never truly realized the size of the city because subways would wisk me around the city and it just felt so much smaller. In this way, other games do the same. Vanguard on the other hand just makes the world seem so expansive. Certainly they have some modes of quicker transportation including mounts, boats, riftstones, and even caravans but they do it just right where it isn’t too much or too little.
Mounts: Up until just recently I think Vanguard did the mounts right. Recently with some garish looking ground and flying mounts, I begin to question this but overall I like how it works. You gradually increase in ground movement speed as you level. You start with basic mounts at 10, so it feels like you can have something right away but there is so much to improve. I like how they get the crafters involved with horseshoes and barding and how that increases in level.
Classes: I love classes. I so dislike games that just glom all abilities together into generic pathetic classes. Vanguard nails it with unique and specific classes. Each class feels special and has its own unique way of playing. It doesn’t water down or generalize anything. I am a altaholic and specifically in this game I can never decide what class I want to play because each is so unique.
Races: I love races. I love a race that is more than a skin but has some special ability or something unique about the race. I so dislike games that make races just a graphic skin. Vanguard does this well.
Travel: Much in the way of two aspects above, the size of the world and mounts, but I love travel in the game. They do not trivialize it like so many other games. It takes a bit of time to get to places, so the travel feels real as well as the world. I remember the days before riftstones and the world felt even larger, but they implemented the changes well. Nothing more fun to be in the wilderness and see a fellow player run/riding past you on his way to some far flung quest.
Crafting: I was initially wrong when I said that crafting was a bitch. Well perhaps it is a pain in the ass, but that’s what makes it so special. That is what they did in the game. Other MMOs trivialize crafting because those devs think that crafting is tertiary to the game, but in Vanguard each sphere is challenging and fun. Each has its own quests and gear. They make all the spheres seems special. I so hate MMOs now that you just grind recipes until you can find that 1 item that you need.
Diplomacy: I have done very little in the way of diplomacy but that mere fact is cool that there is some aspect of the game that I could always turn to if others get a bit boring at the moment. So cool for it to be taken seriously and to have their own quests and gear.
Death: Don’t make death nothing more than respawning and running back into the fray. Vanguard does it right. You die and its going to hurt. You don’t go back to your tombstone — it’s really going to hurt. You don’t have the time to go to your tombstone? Well, summon it but take a hit on XP. Perfect. Simply the way it should be. Period.
Dungeons: These formidable places aren’t to be trifled with. Mobs inside these places are mean and dangerous. In other games I would just charge into a dungeon and not think twice about it, but in Vanguard you need a group and you need to find one. No instant dungeon group makers and other sissy lazy ass systems. You want to do a dungeon, you better have guildies or a network of ingame friends. Period.
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