Incarnate Comp and Threads

[Hedgefund]

1 hour ago, Oklahoman said:

 

Indeed. But I am curious how fast it could be done with a small team:

• Player 1 is stationed in Ouro or a base with a Crystal of Fire and Ice.
• Player 2 is stationed outside the first mission (cave entrance).
• Player 3 is stationed outside the second mission (office building).
• Player 1 starts the arc, then goes to contact and waits there.
• Player 2 enters the cave as soon as the arc starts, flying to the end and killing the 1 enemy to end the mission. Player 2 then goes to the third mission.
• Player 1 talks to Heather to get the next mission, then goes to the third mission (the sewer entrance that's really a warehouse).
• Player 3 enters the office building as soon as the mission is up, taking out all the objectives, then heads to the fourth mission (the real sewer entrance).
• Player 1 calls Heather for next mission, then they and Player 2 enter the third mission, taking out all the objectives. When done, call Heather for the final mission.
• Player 3 does Incan or ATT once the mission pops up to the fourth mission, and all 3 stealth to the final room.

You could essentially eliminate travel time, I think. Just wonder how quickly you could do the arc with 3 people doing something like this.

To begin, players 1-3 are all going to need to be in the same zone, whether that's Ouro or an SG pillar.  Just like you need everyone to be in the same zone for an iTrial.

 

For a team of 3, the first mission is no longer going to be just one mob.  It's going to be a boss and several other mobs.  What's unfortunate is that, at that end room, there will be some that need defeating, some that don't.  After multi-boxing several hundred Heathers by now, I still haven't been able to 100% figure out which ones are which (aside from the winged bosses).

 

Given that having 3 players insures bosses and larger spawns, I really don't think you'll see much, if any, time savings over soloing with bosses off.  I might be wrong,   

 

Speaking for myself, multi-boxing is worthwhile even if it adds another minute or two, the marginal cost of another reward table is 1-2 minutes, well worthwhile.  With other teammates you're going to get 1 reward table.

 

Bottom line, I dunno, if you give it a go, let us know what you find out.

[lemming]

52 minutes ago, Hedgefund said:

For a team of 3, the first mission is no longer going to be just one mob.  It's going to be a boss and several other mobs.  What's unfortunate is that, at that end room, there will be some that need defeating, some that don't.  After multi-boxing several hundred Heathers by now, I still haven't been able to 100% figure out which ones are which (aside from the winged bosses)

They're the ones that say something, plus there's at least one other indicator.  I've always spotted which ones that are required at least.   Sometimes they're very close to other groups.

 

I think time savings really depend on the composition of the team.  

[WuTang]

3 manned this yesterday for several runs. Solo -1/1 no bosses I can clear it with a tanker in 9 min and some change (9:17 personal best). As a group we got under 10 min once, the rest were ~10:30. The variables are cave size in mish 1, glowy locations in mish 3, and location of boss and goons in mish 2. Some personal variables: my clicking speed and getting stuck behind rocks and wall in mish 1, 3, and 4. How spread out the goons get with more people can be a pain if someone isn't watching and aggros loads on their way in then you end up having to kill way more than needed.

 

We could probably squeeze a bit more time if we could coordinate a lil better. Like in mish 2 have someone head all the way down and start the NPC convo while the others kill the required mobs. But I think the one heading down, if they don't have stealth, may scatter the mobs and make killing take longer.

 

Either way it's done, solo or small group, I ain't complaining. This so much quicker and easier than any other way I've grinded (that a word?? Is now!) for Incarnates.

[tidge]

I'm guessing that aside from random objective placement and that first map (I feel like my solo times vary +-90 seconds due to these) the biggest effect will be how/if enemies scatter once engaged. I find the Knives of Vengeance to be the worst, both due to flight and their durability/RNG versus AoE. Even the Tsoo (with teleportation, flight and kin) don't grief me as much as those angry ladies! The second (office) map also has opportunities for them to run/hide as well as trick a player into aggroing a group that isn't required to engage with.

[GM Crumpet]

I'll run Heather on -1/1 and just run to the mission objectives. I can do it in 10 to 15 minutes depending on the alt. It gives  you a pick off the incarnate table and a random common incarnate component. You lose a lot in XP and inf, but as you are farming for components it's worth it. The chances of the incarnate table are standard, so you have as much chance of a purple pick on -1 as you would on +4.

 

As for threads, you get them for everything you do at level 50. Even joining an MSR will grab you a haul of them. I'm sure someone will correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe incarnate content has a higher drop rate than normal content. 

 

And yes, empyrian merits drop every 3 levels and are used to craft orange and purple components. If you have enough you can convert them to threads in the incarnate crafting menu. You can also convert shards into threads. (It's upgrade I believe)

[GM Crumpet]

Also, you can convert one component into another for a small price. That white you can't use? Convert it into a white you need. (Same applies for all the other rarities)

[Uun]

20 hours ago, GM Crumpet said:

As for threads, you get them for everything you do at level 50. Even joining an MSR will grab you a haul of them. I'm sure someone will correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe incarnate content has a higher drop rate than normal content. 

If you're looking for shards, they only drop in normal content. They don't drop in incarnate content.

[Hew]

1 hour ago, Uun said:

If you're looking for shards, they only drop in normal content. They don't drop in incarnate content.

Trick here....

 

Shards are the cheapest, most economical way to get your entry level common incarnate powers. 

 

It is 12 shards for a common, vrs 60 threads.

[tidge]

IIRC, Shards can only be used to directly craft the alpha slot components. I typically use them for Alpha T1, T3 and T4 via 4:1 commons. I skip T2 because of the extra cost in shards to upgrade to an uncommon piece.

[golstat2003]

On 1/26/2025 at 11:45 AM, Hew said:

Trick here....

 

Shards are the cheapest, most economical way to get your entry level common incarnate powers. 

 

It is 12 shards for a common, vrs 60 threads.

I still find threads faster. I level once after 50 and have 120 threads, with alpha open and read to craft for.

[Oklahoman]

7 hours ago, golstat2003 said:

I still find threads faster. I level once after 50 and have 120 threads, with alpha open and read to craft for.

 

I'm willing to believe that shards are quicker to unlock slot Alpha. I've never used them, but also you can hit a point in the game where you have more than one 50 that you start sending Epyreans and Transcendents between your toons and shards can become irrelevant. It may be cheaper to gather shards, but it's way more convenient to just use the Emps you earned on another toon.

 

Regardless, after Alpha is unlocked I find shards to be annoying, just another thing I have I have to convert to something else. Much like you can reject small, medium, or large inspirations (or inspirations of a certain type, recipes, and so on) I wish that after Alpha is unlocked you could just reject shards.

Edited 4 hours ago by Oklahoman

[tidge]

35 minutes ago, Oklahoman said:

Regardless, after Alpha is unlocked I find shards to be annoying, just another thing I have I have to convert to something else. Much like you can reject small, medium, or large inspirations (or inspirations of a certain type, recipes, and so on) I wish that after Alpha is unlocked you could just reject shards.

 

This may not mean precisely what you were trying to say, unless of course "may I always reject Shards after level 50" was the ask.

 

In my own experience, there isn't a huge difference in time between collecting threads and collecting shards, at least not when it comes to being able to craft common components for Alpha slot abilities. Threads seem easier mostly because of the dumps that occur at certain levels, and threads will be included as direct rewards for certain content.

[Oklahoman]

13 minutes ago, tidge said:

This may not mean precisely what you were trying to say, unless of course "may I always reject Shards after level 50" was the ask.

 

To clarify, when I suggested that in another thread I said the option to reject shards would only become available (maybe at Luna) after you have unlocked Alpha, but it wouldn't be a requirement and you could always change it later. After Alpha is unlocked you may still want to collect shards to build out Alpha, or just collect them to convert to threads, and that's fine - no change needed. At some point after Alpha is unlocked maybe you want to start rejecting shards for whatever reason, but then you can always go back later and begin accepting them again. Same as how a START vendor will let you reject/accept small inspirations, etc. only with a check on the Alpha slot. If Alpha is not unlocked, you don't have the option to disable shards.

[lemming]

I'll use shards on the second branch of my Alpha and occasionally will build a different Alpha since sometimes I want to try something else.   I also don't concern myself too much since I do have lots of extra empyrean merits, so if I want I could fully build T4s on alts right out the gate long before they hit 50 even.

[Uun]

You don't need shards or threads to unlock Alpha. It unlocks the first time you level after 50, or sooner if you run Mender Ramiel's arc. Unlocking it early has limited benefits unless you transfer Empyrean merits from another character. As far as constructing Alpha abilities, I only use shards to construct the T3 (and the second T3 for the T4), getting the Notice of the Well from the WST (or the Flames of Prometheus badge). I have constructed multiple T4 Alphas on several characters.

[Oklahoman]

2 hours ago, Uun said:

You don't need shards or threads to unlock Alpha.

 

Right, I used the wrong terms there, really meant to say using shards to slot Alpha, not to unlock it.