Vanguard Screenshot
Here is a picture I snapped while running around Vanguard. Click the image for actual size.
Vanguard: Lotus Hold
I decided to head over to Lotus Hold, which is southeast of Nakai Dojo. Nao Tak said I should go there and find a man named Bautali. It seems they need some help over there. On the way over, I found a Pegasus Trainer just west of Lotus Hold who will rent you a flying pegasus at the rate of 25 copper for five minutes. I also found a Riftway right next to Lotus Hold.
I found Bautali inside the Hold and he had a bunch of quests to give. Standing next to him is Hai Tang who also has many quests to hand out. I picked a few from Bautali and got started on them. I had to go kill a bunch of tigers, ostra’s, varana’s, and others. The varana and ostra were easy to find, but just like back in the starting areas, the tigers were extremely rare. I got so tired of running around looking for the tigers that I put that one on hold and worked on some other quests.
Located on the beach which is down the hill from Lotus Hold is a bunch of burned out houses that the orcs have taken over. The quest Orc Assault: Martok Deadbringer wanted me to go kill a few of the Deadbringers, so down to the beach I went. The beach is crawling with orcs, so it was easy to quickly find what I needed. The quest netted me 1 silver, 40 copper, and 3220 experience points.
Back at Lotus Hold, I discovered that the stress and fear of constant orc attacks have caused some of the villagers to go crazy. Some guy named Mung decided to take a group of them away from Lotus Hold to find some other place to live. It seems that the crazed villagers took Tao’s Idol of Focus with them when they left and they didn’t ask permission to do so. I was tasked with getting the idol back.
The crazed villagers are found up on a high hill that is a ways south of the Nakai Dojo. They stand close to each other, so I had to use Nature’s Calm in order to pull a single. The very first one I pulled had the idol. Nice luck. Returning the idol to Tao resulted in me receiving 1 silver, 40 copper, and 3220 experience points.
I then started a quest that tasked me with retrieving some treasure boxes that the orcs had stolen from Lotus Hold. These boxes are located around the burned out houses down on the beach. I had to clear the way of orcs in order to get to some of them, but I also found that I could sneak in behind the houses and get to some of the treasure boxes with minimal combat. There is a wooden wall behind the houses that has gaps in it and I found a couple gaps that I could squeeze through.
I ran back to Lotus Hold and turned in the treasure box quest and the kill animals quests. They all gave about a silver each and 3220 experience points each. I dinged level 16 while doing these quests and here is a list of spells that my Druid received:
- Barbwood Talisman III: AC 60, HP 120, 17 damage shield
- Wild Growth I: 935 to 986 damage over 24 seconds
- Solar Flare II: 297 to 319 fire damage & 107 to 118 over 4 seconds
- Restore II: 503 point heal
- Summon Earth Elemental II: Summons a pet for 3 minutes
- Quelling Wind I: Lowers hate by 3%
Vanguard: The Two Hour Search For Crates
Did I say that Lieutenant Oda was a prick? Yeah, well, I absolutely meant it. After insulting my prowess, he then gives me a new quest that frustrated me to no end. I don’t think I will ever forgive him.
The quest is called the Short Handed Nakai. It seems that his army is so busy that they allowed some orcs to steal some supply crates. He wants me to go recover three of the crates. Sounds easy enough, right? Well, there is one little problem. The quest text makes no mention at all as to where I must go to find the crates. None at all. This is actually the first quest I have found that does this.
I wasted 2 HOURS of my life looking for those damn crates. I ran down the road all the way to Lotus Hold and found none. I searched every inch of Thrakos Island (which is full of orcs) and found none. I searched and searched with no luck. I even asked in region chat and had no luck.
I finally had to break down and visit the VG Curse website to find the answer. I searched the database and a commenter gave me the clue I needed. If you ever need to do the Short Handed Nakai quest, here is what you need to know: You will find the orcs and crates by traveling south of the Nakai Dojo. They will be on and near the beach in that area.
I can’t tell if it is bad game design or if I am just a dumbass. I think it is the former, while I would imagine that most of you readers would think the latter.
Anyway, I had to return the crates to Commander Kato. My reward was 2788 experience and 1 silver, 30 copper in coin. Kato then gives me the Kill The Coward quest. This is a group quest that requires you to go kill the traitor Hanji Kotoawa.
Here is a picture of me after trying out the Wolf Shape spell.
Vanguard: Gremlins And Orcs
After completing The Menace Grows, Ju Ming gives me one last task to perform. This one is called The Head of the Beast. I am to go find gremlin Augurs and wrest something called a Pulsating Portal Shard from their grubby little claws. I must obtain enough shards to combine them into an Orb of Calling. This Orb will summon the Kojuko General who, not surprisingly, needs killed.
As I mentioned in my last post, if you keep going along the coast, you’ll find more and tougher types of gremlins. So, I ran past the first two camps that I attacked earlier and found the third camp. This one had the Augurs. I dispatched some Augurs and found some portal shards, but I didn’t combine them. This quest is a group quest, so I’ll need to wait until I can find some help before finishing this one.
Speaking of finding a group, in all my time spent in this gremlin area, I only saw one other player the entire time. Even after SOE merged some servers, the player population is very low. It may be better at the higher levels, but as a low level player, it is rather disheartening.
Just a few steps away from Ju Ming, there is a fellow named Nao Tak. He also gives out some quests. One of them is called Otherwordly Artifacts. He wants me to kill gremlins and recover 5 inert portal shards and 5 fiendish portal shards. Gremlin killing seems to be common pasttime around these parts.
I ran around and killed random gremlins until I had enough of the shards. I returned them to Nao Tak and I received 2431 experience and a measly 60 copper. Are Ju Ming and Nao Tak related or something? Nao gives one last quest called To Lotus Hold. I sat that one aside and worked on a few other quests first.
Back at the Nakai Dojo, Lieutenant Oda has some tasks for me. I get from him the Pride of the Army quest. I am to patrol the road leading out of the Dojo and look for invading Martok orcs. I have to visit 4 patrol points and clean out any orcs I find.
The way it worked out is that you simply run down the road and wait for an invisible Martok Ambusher to jump you. Kill the orc, run down the road some more, and wait to be jumped again. You do this until you have reached all four patrol points.
I returned to Oda after completing my patrol and I discovered that he didn’t seem to have much confidence in my abilities.
Prick.
–Wolfen
Vanguard: After The Big Update
The folks at Sony gave Vanguard a big update while I was away from the game. I had completely forgotten about it until it came time to buy my new spells. I dinged level 15 while whacking gremlins, so I went over to the Nakai Dojo to see what was available.
I hit up the Druid spell vendor and that is when I remembered the game update. There were several spells for the levels I had already gone through as well as some nice ones for my current level. Some of the highlights for me were:
- Lifestream 1: AOE Heal
- Rampant Roots: AOE Root
- Ire II: Arcane Direct Damage
- Wolf Shape: Turns me into a wolf
- Ant Shape: Turns me into an invisible ant for 3 minutes
- Starfall: 1982-2087 Direct Damage
For soloing, the two that really stand out for me are Ant Shape and Starfall. Ant Shape is really just a fancy way of granting invisibility. I turn into a small ant that I can see but enemies can’t see. Three minutes isn’t very long, but it is nice to know when it will wear off. It also has a five minute refresh before you can use it again.
The other great spell is Starfall. With the damage is produces, I am able to one-shot kill orcs with ease. The one limiting factor to Starfall is that it uses Phenomena points. You have a set number of points and each time you cast Starfall is subtracts from that total. Once you use up those points, you must wait for them to refresh. I believe it takes 1 hour for used points to refresh.
They claim that there were some graphical performance tweaks in the update, but everything seems the same for me. It runs just like it did in January. Things still hitch and I still have to use the /flush command every now and then to get performance back. They claim that a fix for the hitching is on the way. Let’s hope so. As a reminder, my PC is an AMD X2 6000+, 3gb RAM, and a Nvidia 8600GT 512mb video card.
Read MoreA Return To Vanguard: Saga of Heroes
So I’m finally back to playing and blogging. I started up Vanguard from right where I left off, so here is the continuation of my gaming experiences.
I had been running some quests that Ju Ming had given me, so I looked in my quest journal and started from there. I began with The Gremlin Menace quest. It seems Ju Ming wants a few gremlins dead, so he tasks me with going out and killing some Kojuko Despoilers and Ravagers.
The gremlins are found along the coast not far from Ju Ming’s house. The first gremlin camp I encountered had the gremlins I was looking for. They were guarding a portal that they were using for nefarious reasons. Naturally, I did my duty and dispatched the required number of gremlins. The gremlins were numerous but I could easily pull them all solo.
I returned to Ju Ming and told him of my good deeds. He rewarded me with 1905 experience and 1 silver, 10 copper cash money. If you ask me, he’s a little stingy with the coin.
The next quest he gives is called The Menace Grows. This time I am tasked with killing gremlin Disrupters and Razorclaws. You can find these gremlins by traveling past the first gremlin camp. The camp is right next to the first. In fact, if you keep traveling along the coast, you will come across camp after camp of gremlins. The further you go the tougher the gremlin you find. Once again, I did my duty and slew many o’ gremlin.
Ju Ming was pleased with my progress, but once again he was stingy with the coin. I received 1 silver, 20 copper for my efforts. Experience rewarded: 2341
–Wolfen
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