With all the discussion on this topic, I wanted to check things out on Bullroarer and see how these all play out.  There were a few things I really wanted to check out:

  • How the existing high tier relics works with Melding
  • Items you can now create via this system
  • Items in the Store
  • And finally, what all the new relics look like

First off, one of the notes in the diary was that refining (new term for deconstructing single relics) existing high tier relics will be more valuable and that’s certainly true.  The refining of these relics will result in the following amount of shards:

  • Tier 6 – 192 Shards
  • Existing Tier 7 –> 464 Shards
  • Existing Tier 8 –> 1119 Shards
  • Existing TIer 9 –> 2696 Shards

Now using those shards you can create various items:

  • Relics including one of that tier – 1/2/4/16/39/96 Shards based on the Tier
  • Scroll of Delving (adds 10 levels to LI) – 5,392 Shards
  • Scroll of Empowerment (increase legacy tier) – 6,495 Shards
  • Scroll of Renewal (resets legendary points spend) – 2,696 Shards
  • Stat Legacy Scrolls – 3,356 Shards
  • Level 55/60/65 Legendary Items – 464/2,238/6,495 Shards

Now the other area that has caused most of the controversy is with regards to the store:

  • Scroll of Empowerment – 295 Turbine Points
  • Scroll of Delving – 195 Turbine Points
  • Remove Relics – 175 Turbine Points
  • Stat Legacies – 195 Turbine Points
  • Relics
    • Tier 1 – 55 Turbine Points
    • Tier 2 – 125 Turbine Points
    • Tier 3 – 165 Turbine Points
    • Tier 4 – 275 Turbine Points

One big difference here is that these are ALL Bind to ACCOUNT items such that you can’t trade or sell them.  My main concern here is the massive difference between these costs and those of the Shards and Skirmish marks, these seem VERY low to me.  But they are BoA so perhaps that’s part of the reason they’re cheaper.  I personally won’t be using these from the store, but I don’t think its terrible to have them there for folks who do want to buy them.  However, I really want the Scroll of Removal as part of the existing barter options like the rest of the items.

And now for the bread and butter of the changes, all the new relic options:

New Tier 6 Stats:

  • Setting of Clear Thought – +20 Will, +780 Tactical Offence
  • Setting of the Abyssal Depths – +20 Might, +780 Melee Offence
  • Setting of Precision – +200 Morale, +780 Ranged Offence
  • Setting of Grace – +200 Power, +780 Outgoing Healing
  • Gem of Crags – +20 Vit, +520 Melee Crit
  • Gem of Precise Eye – +20 Agi, +520 Ranged Crit
  • Gem of Lore – +20 fate, +520 Tactical Crit
  • Rune of Fortress – +1040 Incoming Healing, +520 Block
  • Rune of Readiness – +114 ICPR, +520 Parry
  • Rune of Sun – +114 ICPR, +520 Evade

New Top Tier Unique Relics:

  • Setting of Stability – -5% Item Wear, +260 BPE, +1300 Incoming Healing
  • Setting of Beginnings – +650 Melee Defence, +114 ICPR, +20 Vit
  • Setting of Ending – +7.5% Dev, +520 All Crit, +114 ICMR
  • Gem of Earth – +10% Partial Block/Parry, +520 Block, +200 Morale
  • Gem of Charity – +650 Tactical Defence, +780 Outgoing Healing, +200 Power
  • Gem of Hope – +260 Critical Def, +520 evade, +20 might
  • Rune of Courage – +10% Partial Parry/Evade, +20 agi, +520 Parry
  • Rune of Power – +650 Ranged Def, +520 All Crit, +20 fate
  • Rune of Wisdom – -2.5% Attack Duration, +780 resists, +20 will

What does all this mean?  There’s a ton of new options and in looking at them as a whole, it looks like we’re replacing pure stats (vit, agi, might, morale, power) for things like resists, defenses, and other previously thought to be secondary stats.  In looking at the new armor sets, these are all getting huge boosts to the core stats so I don’t believe we’ll need to use our relics to get those up to the levels where we want them.  This should allow us to create not only more well rounded characters but more customized ones as well.  If you look at many of these stats, they’re very hard to find on current gear, so this really gives us a chance to fill out various other stats that are much harder to cap.  Now of course, the flipside is that there are drops to various stats from the previous higher tier relics so many (I can certainly see this) see these changes as a nerf.  However, I’m holding off until I can see how all these relic settings fit in with the new gear as I’m comparing those as a complete set and not individually.

Overall, I’m happy with that caveat that I’m giving Turbine some leeway here as none of us have really seen all of the new content and how we need to equip/build our characters going forward.  But I can really see how many are not happy with the new changes, I’m just more optimistic.

Oh, and remember these are all still beta so things may change 🙂