Post by silva on Sept 7, 2005 23:45:06 GMT -5
Sorrow's Furnace has just gone live. And here I am, the dutiful and under-paid reporter, to bring you the scoop.
What is Sorrow's Furnace?
Sorrow's Furnace (SF) is an underground labyrinth, brimming with death, destruction and all manner of unpleasant challenges. It is very much a team-oriented mission.
Once you arrive in SF, there are no outposts and no means to save your progress (at least, none that I have found yet). It is like the Underworld or the Fissure of Woe, but this place has balls.
So, first things first. How do you get to SF? This is how (Area transitions are circled):
Please Note: As I was unable to find a decent party, I am unsure if the area marked is actually the Furnace proper, or just the preliminary area. Quest info leads me to believe that it is a preliminary area to the actual Furnace itself.
And what can you expect from SF?
Well, if you think this is going to be the standard "kill everything that moves" scenario, you are sadly mistaken. The denizens of SF have brains. They think, act and react like a human-controlled party (well, not the average party. These are more competent).
If you are a monk, you had better watch your back. These guys mean business and they will single you out.
And you had better take out their priests first. Why? These NPCs are not your standard mindless-drones. They've been around a bit and know how things work. They resurrect each other. Might not seem like a great feat, but when you have a group of 10 beating the hell out of you (targeting the monk first, of course) with three healers healing both them and themselves, you get to understand why this place is labeled "Enter at your own risk".
The first SF mission is to be found at the start of Grenth's Footprint (GF). You are told that you need to help 3 dwarfs and a human with their various tasks "to enter Sorrow's Furnace". If you screw up with one of the people you need to help, you are taken back to the last city you were in. The quest itself is worth a whopping 10,000 xp.
My first choice was the dwarfen High Priest. Thankfully, although he was rather homicidal, he knew how to take care of himself moderately. We were entrusted with the task of finding a tome that would be able to summon the Unforgiving One and destroy it.
Close to the surface, the Furnace is a blend of ruins and constructs that would be the envy of any dwarf clan:
We had no real trouble finding the tomb, as it was located in this little room:
Even though we had quite a hard time getting there:
After fighting our way through legions of Summit Wardens, Summit Surveyors, Priests of Sorrow, Enslaved Ettins and other horrors, we finally made it to the tome. But wait, it wasn't that easy. We needed to kill the enemy priest, before he could read the passages and summon the unforgiven one. This would have been easy if it were not for the excess of 10 mesmers and several elementalists who were constantly spamming you.
Finally we took the priest down, to which there was much cheering on my part. But wait, there was more. We had to find explosive crystals to bring down the roof and bury the tome forever. How hard could that be? Quite hard, when you have to fight through one of SF's newly introduced nasties: Dredges. Weird creatures that look like a cross between a Troll and an Ettin, and who pack one hell of a punch. If that were not bad enough, you have to leave several of your party behind to protect the High Priest, as he gets worked on by groups of Summit who want nothing more than to take him down. Sadly, we fell at the second crystal (of a total of four) and we were taken straight back to the Granite Citadel.
Disheartened, I vowed to mope and maybe check out some of the new features. We now have the ability to find unique weapons (that are marked in Green and are dropped by the bosses in GF/SF):
Here is a bow that was luckily dropped by a dwarfen ranger. As you can see, these unique weapons can be very, very good.
We also have several new regular items:
The Sup. Identification Kit costs a whopping 500 gold, and the Sup. Salvage Kit a tremendous 2 platinum.
We also have a wide variety of scrolls and of course, keys. You can purchase keys from any merchant, and it appears they have a fixed price depending on the area (A key from the Ember Light Camp costs 600 gold), meaning that the tactic of buying them until they run out of stock then selling them for large amounts of money is not applicable. A noble gesture.
We also have the introduction of the new Titan quests, quests that only the best of the best will be able to do. The first one, Defend Droknar's Forge, is given by the newly introduced Vision of Glint in Droknar's Forge, and offers a 20,000 xp reward for completion.
These quests supposedly give the best rewards in the entire game, so be sure to check them out.
Skill purchasing is now apparently capped at 1 platinum and 1 skill point per skill purchased (including Capture Signets). I assume that the early skills will be far cheaper.
And that's all for now. I will be organizing a party to head to Sorrow's Furnace, if we all so desire, and to search and destroy pretty much everything we can find.
Also, it would be a great idea to go and get the free music pack from www.directsong.com/direct_song_main.htm, as it really does add far more depth to the new areas.
You can read a full list of updates at: www.guildwars.com/news/gameupdates.html
Silva Quickblade, disgruntled reporter and Ranger Supreme signing out.
What is Sorrow's Furnace?
Sorrow's Furnace (SF) is an underground labyrinth, brimming with death, destruction and all manner of unpleasant challenges. It is very much a team-oriented mission.
Once you arrive in SF, there are no outposts and no means to save your progress (at least, none that I have found yet). It is like the Underworld or the Fissure of Woe, but this place has balls.
So, first things first. How do you get to SF? This is how (Area transitions are circled):
Please Note: As I was unable to find a decent party, I am unsure if the area marked is actually the Furnace proper, or just the preliminary area. Quest info leads me to believe that it is a preliminary area to the actual Furnace itself.
And what can you expect from SF?
Well, if you think this is going to be the standard "kill everything that moves" scenario, you are sadly mistaken. The denizens of SF have brains. They think, act and react like a human-controlled party (well, not the average party. These are more competent).
If you are a monk, you had better watch your back. These guys mean business and they will single you out.
And you had better take out their priests first. Why? These NPCs are not your standard mindless-drones. They've been around a bit and know how things work. They resurrect each other. Might not seem like a great feat, but when you have a group of 10 beating the hell out of you (targeting the monk first, of course) with three healers healing both them and themselves, you get to understand why this place is labeled "Enter at your own risk".
The first SF mission is to be found at the start of Grenth's Footprint (GF). You are told that you need to help 3 dwarfs and a human with their various tasks "to enter Sorrow's Furnace". If you screw up with one of the people you need to help, you are taken back to the last city you were in. The quest itself is worth a whopping 10,000 xp.
My first choice was the dwarfen High Priest. Thankfully, although he was rather homicidal, he knew how to take care of himself moderately. We were entrusted with the task of finding a tome that would be able to summon the Unforgiving One and destroy it.
Close to the surface, the Furnace is a blend of ruins and constructs that would be the envy of any dwarf clan:
We had no real trouble finding the tomb, as it was located in this little room:
Even though we had quite a hard time getting there:
After fighting our way through legions of Summit Wardens, Summit Surveyors, Priests of Sorrow, Enslaved Ettins and other horrors, we finally made it to the tome. But wait, it wasn't that easy. We needed to kill the enemy priest, before he could read the passages and summon the unforgiven one. This would have been easy if it were not for the excess of 10 mesmers and several elementalists who were constantly spamming you.
Finally we took the priest down, to which there was much cheering on my part. But wait, there was more. We had to find explosive crystals to bring down the roof and bury the tome forever. How hard could that be? Quite hard, when you have to fight through one of SF's newly introduced nasties: Dredges. Weird creatures that look like a cross between a Troll and an Ettin, and who pack one hell of a punch. If that were not bad enough, you have to leave several of your party behind to protect the High Priest, as he gets worked on by groups of Summit who want nothing more than to take him down. Sadly, we fell at the second crystal (of a total of four) and we were taken straight back to the Granite Citadel.
Disheartened, I vowed to mope and maybe check out some of the new features. We now have the ability to find unique weapons (that are marked in Green and are dropped by the bosses in GF/SF):
Here is a bow that was luckily dropped by a dwarfen ranger. As you can see, these unique weapons can be very, very good.
We also have several new regular items:
The Sup. Identification Kit costs a whopping 500 gold, and the Sup. Salvage Kit a tremendous 2 platinum.
We also have a wide variety of scrolls and of course, keys. You can purchase keys from any merchant, and it appears they have a fixed price depending on the area (A key from the Ember Light Camp costs 600 gold), meaning that the tactic of buying them until they run out of stock then selling them for large amounts of money is not applicable. A noble gesture.
We also have the introduction of the new Titan quests, quests that only the best of the best will be able to do. The first one, Defend Droknar's Forge, is given by the newly introduced Vision of Glint in Droknar's Forge, and offers a 20,000 xp reward for completion.
These quests supposedly give the best rewards in the entire game, so be sure to check them out.
Skill purchasing is now apparently capped at 1 platinum and 1 skill point per skill purchased (including Capture Signets). I assume that the early skills will be far cheaper.
And that's all for now. I will be organizing a party to head to Sorrow's Furnace, if we all so desire, and to search and destroy pretty much everything we can find.
Also, it would be a great idea to go and get the free music pack from www.directsong.com/direct_song_main.htm, as it really does add far more depth to the new areas.
You can read a full list of updates at: www.guildwars.com/news/gameupdates.html
Silva Quickblade, disgruntled reporter and Ranger Supreme signing out.
