Obikin89's Requiem for Neverwinter
MOD 21

Leveling

Leveling is quite straightforward : follow the trail, do all the quests in every area, and you'll be level 20, the maximum level (down from 80 before mod 21, but it changes nothing, except all of the characters made before mod 21 are now level 20 even those who were still leveling). This will take you about 10 hours. There are many things you'll learn during your leveling, which you should keep in mind for later. All of this, and more, is written on this page, to help you have a smooth progression.

⚠ Disclaimer

My only real advice to newer players is "Fly, you fools !".

Neverwinter is currently in its worst state ever, nothing works as written, tooltips are full of mistakes, the stat system makes no sense and is overly complicated, there are powers that just won't crit or their critical hits will be miserable compared to what they should be... It's a complete mess. And it's becoming less and less new player friendly.

On top of this, Cryptic Studios is regularly modifying items, nerfing without notice nor even anything written in patch notes, making your items completely obsolete just because they feel like it. They have no shame putting stuff on sale to nerf it, or make it obsolete, or put something better at a cheaper price in the store, just a week or two after the sale. They have no shame advertizing better items than what they are actually selling in their packs. They have no shame pushing completely broken content on Live. And they just lost 40 employees after their other game, Magic:Legends, failed miserably, because they left major bugs in the game for way too long. Their lack of quality control is their trademark. The way they code stuff is nothing but bad practices, making everything a pain to maintain, and as they regularly change everything in the game, it ends up in tons of bugs and discrepancies. Do not trust anything from Cryptic.

And just before I published this page, they just locked new players away from trial queues with no warning... They now require 40k+ item level to enter (35k if you have a fixed group), trial queues rewarding almost half of the currency you can get every day... It's going to be very tough for new players.

Now, if you understand, and still wish to play that game, you'll find pretty much everything I know about Neverwinter on this website. It is valid for mod 21. I will not update this website any further, so it will be outdated at some point. Good luck, and most importantly : have fun !

If you are a new player (level 10 or below), you can click on the following links to receive very valuable rewards (a Mercenary companion, a Carmine Bullette mount, a Greater Bag of Holding, and a character slot, among other things) :

Levels

Leveling is all about completing a series of quests. There is no longer experience points in the game. Levels unlock Ability Score points, Powers, Feats, and content, but they don't give you better stats, nor Damage, nor HP. Maximum level went from 80 to 20 with Mod 21, which changes nothing appart from the number. This is to put Neverwinter more in line with the Dungeons and Dragons pen and paper game from which it's derived.

Here are the requirements for each level :

Leveling Areas (Scaling)

While leveling, you will travel to areas in which your item level is scaled to a certain value, which means that if you have more item level than this value, your Hit Points and Damage will be lowered in those areas, to fit the maximum value allowed. What matters in those circumstances are your stat percentages and damage bonuses, nothing else. Increasing your item level further will do absolutely nothing and only a good balance of stats and playing well can save you (positionning is especially important to deal more damage and avoid taking combat advantage damage). You'll find out that most of the areas and dungeons in the game are scaled content, which makes your total item level quite irrelevant as long as it's above the scaling level. Note that you start the game with 5000 item level.

Note that The Loose Thread quest, when you return to the Adventurer's Guild after The Whispering Caverns, is not scaled. And it's coming out of nowhere... To survive it, you must be quite careful at evading all of the attacks (running around the arena during the ghosts phase helps a lot), and use potions / health stones if you need them.

The Vault of the Nine quest, available at level 20, which gives you your Class Artifact (unlocked for the whole account) is scaled to 25k item level.

Leveling Adventures (Rewards)

Adventures are series of quests that give good rewards once completed. Contrarily to end game campaigns, you do not have to repeat content to complete them. By completing the Leveling Adventures, you will reach level 20, gain good rewards (do not forget to claim them !), and unlock new content.

Acolytes of Histories

During your travels, you'll find Acolytes of Histories. These will tell you of the tragic tales of Cryptic cutting content out of the game. All of the places they tell you about were actual areas you'd visit while leveling. All of them being removed from the game with mod 21. Cutting Old Sharandar (which was sooooooo much better than New Sharandar) with mod 20 was not enough.

Tutorials (Level 2)

At level 2, you will obtain your first mount and learn a few very important mechanics.

Your First Mount

As soon as you complete the tutorial, Sergent Knox will send you to get your first mount. You can either pick the Waterdeep Horse or the Sabino Horse. Both have the same stats and powers, both will let you travel at the maximum speed (all of the mounts in the game have the same speed). You can buy both of them, plus the Palomino Horse, the Appaloosa Horse, and the Brindle Horse for 5 gold each at the Mount Merchant, so it doesn't matter which you pick.

To complete the quest, you must "equip" the mount in your inventory.

Now, you have a mount that gives you a tiny bit of Movement Speed via its Equip Power : Fast Striding, and a Combat Power : Explosive Equalizer, that deals a bit of damage in an area, which you can use once every minute (with the same button you use to mount when out of combat). Both will get much better as you get new mounts.

You can read more about mounts, their powers, insignias and collars on this page. But do not worry too much about this for now, just play the game until you get more mounts.

Mechanics

Dodging is a very important mechanic which you'll need to master to be able to beat content. Dodging requires Stamina (the blue bar above the giant icosahedron [d20] on PC, or the green bar on the left of your tactical power at the bottom of your screen on consoles). Different classes have different ways to avoid or mitigate damage.

Combat Advantage is obtained by surrounding monsters. It's indicated by a bar at the feet of monsters when there's someone else or a companion around : where it's white is where you need to stand, when it's blue you'll deal more damage (which depends on your Combat Advantage stat percentage). Monsters can also deal more damage when they surround you (which you can mitigate with the Awareness stat). So be very careful with your positioning !

Every class has a special mechanic, which you'll need to use properly to maximize your potential.

You'll learn how to use your mount power (which is quite underwhelming at first, but becomes very potent later).

Your Daily Power requires Action Points, which are generated when you do specific actions while in combat. When the giant icosahedron [d20] at the bottom of your screen is full and glowing, you'll be able to unleash a very strong power of yours, wich will consume your Action Points.

You can read more tips and tricks about mechanics on this page.

Tutorials (Level 5)

At level 5, Sergent Knox will send you to many people who will teach you a few very important things :

Invoking your Deity

You can invoke your Deity 6 times a day at a campfire or in town : when you log in, and then with a 15 minutes / 30 minutes / 45 minutes / 1 hour / 1 hour and 30 minutes cooldowns (so it takes at least 4 hours of cooldowns if you want to invoke your Deity 6 times, but you do not have to be logged in the whole time).

Invoking your Deity gives you an Ardent Coin the first time you invoke on each of your characters every day. Ardent Coins can be exchanged in the Vault of Piety (Options -> Store -> Vault of Piety), in the Ardent Favor tab. You can get the White Horse and the Medium Snowswift Horse mounts, the Angel of Protection companion, the Celestial Grace Dye Pack, weapons for every class (only for fashion), and Elixirs that give different buffs for 1H. All of these can be exchanged, or sold in the Auction House.

The 1st and 6th time you invoke your Deity on each character, every day, you get a Celestial Coin. These coins are also exchanged in the Vault of Piety, in the Celestial Synergy tab. Buy Coffer of Celestial Artifacts with your Celestial Coins. These coffers have a small chance to give you a Coalescent Ward (which are used to guarantee an enchantment/artifact upgrade, only use them for things which have a 1% chance to upgrade). They can also give Enchanting Stones rank 5 (two of them if you open the coffer during a double refinement event !). Coalescent Wards are extremely important once you reach end game. These are bound to account, so you cannot sell them, but you'll need many of them. If you invoke your Deity a single time every day, you will obtain about one coalescent ward per year, per character. It takes time, but having many characters and invoking once per day on every of them, is a pretty reliable way to get them.

Invoking your Deity also gives you Bonus rAD. The Bonus rAD is added to a reserve (capped at 150k), and each time you earn rAD, you'll get 50% more, from your reserve, until your reserve is depleted. rAD can be converted to Astral Diamonds, the main currency of the game, on your Riches page. You can convert up to 100k rAD to AD every day.

And you'll get an Invocation Blessing each time, which, when used, gives you a small random buff for 15 minutes.

Your First Companion

You can choose between the Cleric Disciple (healer), Man-at-Arms (tank), Wayward Wizard (ranged damage dealer) and Dog (melee damage dealer). The Wayward Wizard is the best pick if you do not have a better companion yet (it's actually a decent companion even at end game). You can buy all of them plus the Sellsword, Con Artist, and Adbar Shield Maiden for 2 gold each.

The companion you've picked will be an item in your inventory. You have to equip it, give it a name, and summon it from your Companions page, to complete the quest.

Your summoned companion is very important to give you combat advantage : by positionning properly and surrounding your foes, your damage will be improved by your Combat Advantage percentage. That's a huge boost, so always pay attention to your enemies' feet : when there are blue stripes is when you surround them, and deal more damage. Monsters can also get combat advantage over you, so be careful and do not neglect your Awareness stat.

You can read more about companions, companion gear, and runestones, on this page. But do not worry too much about them for now, just play the game until you get more of them and you can afford better ones (at much higher levels).

Seals of the Adventurer

While leveling, you will regularly gain Seals of the Adventurer. You can exchange these seals in Protector's Enclave, either on the Market Place or in the Adventurer's Guild, to the Adventurer Seal Trader. There are Adventure Seal Traders in many other places too. Your seals can be exchanged for 950-1000 item level gear for any of your characters, for 250 seals each.

Main Hand and Off-Hand Weapons, Shirt, Trousers, and Rings, are Bound to Account (so you can give them to new characters, for a total of 5950 item level, to make their leveling a bit easier). Head, Armor, Arms, and Feet are Bound to Character though, so you'll have to get them while leveling. They do not have level requirements.

Assuming you stick with the quests and I didn't miss any seal, you can buy your first piece in Vellosk, after completing the Sacred Meeting quest. You can buy your second piece after completing Moonlight & Shadows in Vellosk. You can buy your third piece after you complete The Throne of Idriss in Ebon Downs. You can buy your 4th piece after completing An Axe Too Far in Icespire Peak. You can buy your 5th piece after Icespire's Frozen Heart in Icespire Speak. You can buy you 6th piece after completing Chasm Report (back to Sergeant Knox after The Chasm). You can buy your 7th piece after completing Back to the Surface (back to Sergeant Knox after completing The Whispering Caverns). And then you'll be level 20 with other ways to gain seals and better items to look for.

Note that the Bard's Main Weapon is bound to Character for "some reason" (No Quality Control), and while you would expect this to be fixed within a week in other games, in Neverwinter we can be happy if it's fixed by next mod...

Later, if you do not know what to do with your seals, you can get 500 rAD for 500 seals. Not much, but better than nothing. Rank 5 enchantments are useless as you'll get much better ones along the way, and rank 10 enchantments are very affordable on the Auction House. Also wonder why they'd leave the box for a random piece of gear of your level for 500 seals while you can get any piece you want, surely with a much better item level for half the price... But well, yeah, Cryptic...

Queues

While random queues are very important to gain rAD (which can be converted to Astral Diamaonds, the main currency of the game, on the Riches page), a leveling character has absolutely nothing to do in dungeons... At level 5, you do not even have access to your Paragon path, which means you are missing about 50% in your ratings from Forte, you have very few of your Powers, none of your Feats, a single Class Feature... What was Cryptic thinking about ? If you go to dungeons at that point you'll have the worst experience ever in a video game, and people will be pissed at you for being completely useless... So don't. Wait until you are level 20. It won't be long and you'll have a better experience then. Even then, there are dungeons that simply shouldn't be in the Dungeon Queue as they are mechanic heavy and you will not have encountered any of the mechanics until way later in specific campaigns...

Tutorials (Level 8)

At level 8, you will be introduced to the Mail, the Auction House and Astral Diamonds. You will also be able to get your own Workshop for Crafting. While the Mail is self explanatory (game tells you that you've got a new mail, but you actually don't... Been that way since mod 21 launched, bet on how long it will last), the others require a bit more explanation.

The Auction House, and Astral Diamonds

Astral Diamonds are the main currency of the game. You generally get them from dungeons (and a couple of other places like Expeditions in Undermountain) as rough Astral Diamonds (rAD), which you can refine 100k a day on your Riches page. This is the main thing that limits your progression.

Astral Diamonds are used to buy items on the Tarmalune Trade House (Auction House). And can also be used to buy a couple of things to a couple of vendors throughout the game.

Selling items on the Auction House costs Astral Diamonds : to put anything on sale, you must pay 10% of the price up-front as a Posting Fee (extremely annoying when you are trying to sell something expensive), unless you are VIP rank 8 (VIP is pretty much a premium subscription, which gives tons of benefits, which you can buy in the Zen Market) in which case it's free. If the item sells, you get the Posting Fee back, while you don't if you get your item back before the end of the sale duration (1, 3, or 5 days). Whether you are VIP or not, the Auction House takes 10% of the price on every item sold.

So if you are trying to sell something for 1M AD, and you are not VIP : you pay 100k AD up-front, wait for the item to sell or the sale duration to expire (1, 3, or 5 days), and when the item sells, you get the Posting Fee back (100k) + 900k for the item. If you are VIP rank 8 or higher, you post the item for free, you can remove it and post it again at will for free, and when the item sells, you get 900k AD (90% of the price). This also means that if you buy something for 900k AD and you want to sell it to make a profit, you must sell it for more than 1M (Price / 0.9) to not lose AD, due to the Auction House 10% Fees, regardless of you being VIP or not.

The Zen Exchange

Astral Diamonds can also be exchanged for Zen in the Astral Diamonds Exchange. To buy Zen, you must input the highest price of 750 Astral Diamonds for 1 Zen (otherwise it just won't be processed ever because of the demand being too big), and wait. And Wait. And Wait. And if you're playing on PC : wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, and wait a bit more. It actually takes more than 6 months to exchange AD to Zen on PC. It takes about 2 months and a half on PS4, and a bit less on Xbox. Yes, it takes a while, but you'll be able to get everything for A LOT cheaper : wards, choice packs for weapon/armor enchantments, upgrade tokens... Wait for the next big sale (Black Friday / New Year / Anniversary in June) and get yourself VIP rank 12 (very worth it) and anything you want for basically half the price you'd find it on the Auction House. Considering it takes at least 2 years to max out a character, don't make your impatience make it 4 : don't buy anything on the Auction House, unless there's no other way, and exchange all of your AD to Zen. Beware : you can only put 5 offers for a maximum of 5000 Zen (3.75M AD) each. So do not put small offers or you'll have to remove them to put bigger ones... and it's first come first served, removing your offer means going back at the end of the line.

The Workshop

I've written a full page on crafting, which you can read here. It's basically only worth it to craft gold pieces and kits to improve your equipment... Though that requires perfect artisans, otherwise buying them on the Auction House is cheaper than crafting them... And masterwork, the end game of crafting, is a pure loss of time and resources, as none of the items you can craft are particularly good, most of them being totally useless for the past 2 years, and the update coming for Masterwork 7 won't change anything about that (unless they really rework how crafting works or they really boost the item bonuses). That's because with the new stat system (from mod 20) Stronghold weapons, Masterwork 3 weapons, and Masterwork 5 weapons are exactly the same in scaled content)... and Masterwork 7 weapons are only going to be more expensive for the same results if the trend goes on.

Tutorials (Level 11)

Paragon Paths and Loadouts

You finally get to pick your Paragon Path at level 11, which finally gives you stats from Forte, and makes you a bit more efficient. Paragon Paths are your specialty : they give different powers, class features and feats as you level up to 20, and you get different stats from Forte if you have different roles given by your Paragon Paths (tank/healer/damage dealer). Thanks to Loadouts, you can have access to both of your Paragon Paths.

You start with 2 loadouts. You can buy more loadouts from the Wondrous Bazaar (400k AD each). You can change loadout whenever you want for free at a campfire or in town. On different loadouts, you can make different choices on :

Each loadout saves a different state of your character. All the items, mounts and companions you have are accessible on all loadouts, but you can set different ones as active or equipped for each loadout.

Paragon Path, Ability Scores, Boons, and Feats, are semi-permanent choices : you can change them but it requires a Retraining Token. You can get Retraining Tokens during certain events from time to time, or from the Zen Market (100 Zen each). You also get 3 from the Adventurer's Reward Box at level 31.

I strongly advise getting a damage dealer loadout for solo, even if you want to heal or tank in dungeons. This will make your progression much better, and healing/tanking are really not necessary in solo content.

Guilds

Guilds not only are social places, in which you'll find help and friends, but they also offer their members guild boons, which will balance your stats and give you access to different bonuses. They also give you access to an entire zone, the Stronghold, in which you'll find daily quests and get currency to buy many different things (food, items, overload enchantments, explorer charts for masterwork materials...) when you donate stuff to their coffers.

Guilds cannot give you access to all of the guild boons, so choose your guild wisely. The most important thing for a new player is to get item level. In that regard, the highest level a guild is, the more item level you'll get from their boons, up to 3000, which is a very nice boost to damage and HP early on (300 Damage, 30k HP, +10/20% depending on your role).

Guilds are generally part of Alliances, which have a chat in common. Members of the same alliance can move to any Stronghold of the alliance. So, if you're not happy with the boons your guild offers, even though you like the people, you can always move to another guild of the same alliance, to keep the contact with your current guild mates.

You can look at the list of guild boons on this page !

Tutorials (Level 14)

You will learn about Enchantments and Refinement.

For the quest you need to Convert gemstones to Refinement Points and then Refine the enchantment you've been given. Obviously, because Cryptic, the gemstones you are given for the quest cannot be converted nor discarded, and you'll keep them forever as a memento of Cryptic not testing anything... So you need another source of Refinement Points (any gemstone will do : quartz, peridot, amethyst...). You may also need to turn Off the Option "Require Ward to Upgrade" in order to upgrade the enchantment.

Enchantments and Refinement

I wrote an entire page on Enchantments here.

The main things to remember is that you can convert gemstones, enchantments, runestones, and equipment you do not care about into Refinements Points, whenever you want from your inventory. Refinements Points are necessary to upgrade pretty much anything and you'll need tons of them later on for Artifacts. You will also need Marks of Potency, Enchanting Stones, and sometimes other materials, some of which are quite expensive.

If you fail to upgrade an item, you will lose all the materials used for the upgrade (but you will keep the item). Wards protect your materials so that you can try to upgrade them again and only lose the ward if you fail. There are also Coalescent Wards that guarantee an upgrade, but are much more expensive and only worth using on an upgrade with a 1% chance to succeed.

Overall, it's not worth upgrading enchantments, as you can get much cheaper ones from Tarmalune Trade Bars (obtained by opening lockboxes, for which you get 1 key every day with VIP), or even from the Auction House (not worth it if you can afford VIP). Enchantments are pretty useless nowadays anyway due to scaled content and them not really boosting any stat, simply rebalancing them.

Removing enchantments from equipment costs quite a bit of gold (which you can get with Crafting), so avoid slotting enchantments into pieces of gear you won't keep for a long time. Generally speaking, do not worry about enchantments until you reach level 20. You can buy rank 9/10 enchantments at a super low price on the Auction House later and keep them pretty much forever.

Tutorials (Level 17)

You will learn about Artifacts and Insignias. You may choose between Aurora's Whole Realms Catalogue, Waters of Elah'zad, and the Lantern of Revelations (pick the green Lantern, for it's a good debuff artifact).

Artifacts

You can learn more about Artifacts on this page.

Basically, you upgrade them, like you would enchantments. One of them can be placed as an Active Artifact, and you'll be able to use its power. It's cooldown and efficiency depends on its quality, so it's quite important that you upgrade your main artifact. Debuff artifacts are the best in group content, and you need everyone to use a different one as same artifact debuffs generally do not stack.

Your 3 other artifacts are just there for their stats and set bonuses. Set bonuses do not get better with the quality and stats do not matter that much, so these are not high priority items.

Insignias

For the quest, you need to convert the Alexandrite you're given into Refinement Points in order to refine the Wooden Insignia Rank 1. Contrarily to enchantments, insignias do not need Marks of Potency nor Enchanting Stones to be upgraded, but they require Insignia Powder, which is obtained by converting Insignias you do not need.

You can learn more about insignias on this page. Basically, Insignias are kind of enchantments which you can slot to your mounts (though they are free to remove). Each insignia exists in different types (generally 3 out of 5, namely Barbed, Crescent, Enlightened, Illuminated, and Regal). Depending on the type of insignia slotted on your mounts, you get access to different bonuses (which can stack up to 3 times with diminishing returns).

Tutorials (Level 20)

You will learn about Boons, campaigns, and Adventures.

Boons

Boons are small bonuses which you pick to improve your character. There are 3 types of Boons : Campaign Boons, which require Points earned with Adventures and Campaigns ; Guild Stronghold Boons, which are obtained by joining a proper guild ; and PVP Boons, which are obtained by competing in PVP (though theses only affect PVP).

You can read more about Boons on this page.

Campaigns

Campaigns are long term goals which require repeating quests either daily or weekly, generally for about a month or two. They reward Boon Points, and often give you access to a specific dungeon and keys for their chests once completed.

Adventures

Adventures are your immediate goal once you are level 20. All of them can be done in one go and will reward you with many things, including Boon Points and rough Astral Diamonds. Undermountain is the most important of them as it will give you access to expeditions which can reward rough Astral Diamonds, Artifacts, good Companion Gear, and some Equipment.

Read more about Adventures and High Level Priorities on this page.

Recruit Rewards (Event)

During a Recruitment Event, you can get extra rewards on the characters you create (everything is bound to character) :

Note that you can only earn a total of 200 Neverember's Incentives per event, 100 per character.

On the Market Place, in Protector's Enclave, you can exchange your Incentives at the Incentive Trader. The best things to get are either the Improved Bag of Holding (42 slots), if you need space, or Companion Upgrade Tokens. Considering the fact there's a new 60 slot bag at 500 Zen in the Zen Market, the bag is not worth it if you can exchange AD to Zen quickly, or if you're willing to spend real money.