You should let people know what they are in for.

[Damuri]

I've been owrking on my epic quest and the shawl quest. At first the shawl quest seems deceptively simple and there is a mouthwatering prize at the end. What you don't tell people is that this quest is more time consuming (and expensive) than any epic quest. If I had known this was going to be such a tough quest I would never have started now that I have my 6th shawl I feel I can't stop (I felt that way after my 4th shawl as well so mebbe its never too late to cut my losses but I can't stop myself).

I appeal to your mercy and sense of compassion... Let people know that this is not a connect the dots type of quest. It requires thousands of plat to work up tradeskills to appropriate levels and many many hours to collect the rare drops required to complete this quest.

[Maevenniia]

Taken directly from the first page you see after you click on “quests”, then “Coldain Prayer Shawl Quests” under “Velious Recipes”, the link to this page is Coldain Prayer Shawl Quests

Welcome, traveler! Herein you will find detailed instructions on how you, too, can acquire the legendary Coldain Prayer Shawls. You do realize that this is no small undertaking, don't you? The rewards of the shawl quests are rich, but the demands are many.
Ok, here, take the amount of work that you are right now envisioning you will need to put into the whole thing, getting from nothing to the eighth shawl. Now, if you are a pessimist by nature, multiply that amount by ten. If you are an optimist by nature, multiply it by a hundred.
That is how much effort will go into just getting your tailoring where it needs to be to complete the sixth shawl. We won't even talk about the smithing for the eight shawl yet....

No offense intended, but what part of this intro led you to believe these quests were easy?

[GraemeFaelban]

True, but actually perservering and getting the shawls gives a very rewarding feeling. Having completed shawl 7 just last night, I have decided to take a break before working on number 8, but I still feel it was well worth the effort and expense. My biggest single expense for the quest was buying the blood in the bazaar, that cost more than training up any single tradeskill to a reasonable level for the quest.

[Eumerin]

Sure, the writer of the Shawl walk-through could have added, "Abandon all hope, ye who enter here!" (found over the entrance to Hell, according to Dante - provided I remember my Inferno correctly), but then everyone would think the writer was just being funny and ignore it all.
Face it. No matter what was put in the quest walkthrough, the people reading it would never in a million years believe it was THAT difficult until they actually did the quest for themselves.
Now, of course, for me, already having plenty of experience with tradeskills, my difficulty comes from the fact that I can stand in Velk's all day long and holler for a group, but no one seems interested in giving my poor paladin a break.

[Niami DenMother]

Aye, it IS spelled out on the main site, at the start of the extremely detailed writeup for this quest. While it is regrettable that you're finding it more difficult than expected, we DO warn folks that it is no simple task.

"Mercy and compassion" have nothing to do with it -- as you've just proven, we have no way of forcing folks to actually read things before they start.

[Pojodan]

Reminds me of a cartoon.

Man #1 approaches man #2 rubbing his side in pain
Man #1: "Someone should put up a warning sign about that slippery ice"
Man #2, pointing at the 'Waring: Ice' sign: "But there is a sign!"
Man #1: "Yeah, well, someone whould put up a sign letting people know that there is a warning sign warning them about the ice!"

[OberonMiM]

That reminds me of that simpsons episode where homer goes safety crazy and soon the whole town is covered with signs (many of which say warning sigh ahead etc)

[Phinnin]

Shawl

Yeah, I am working on number 8 now and Woah Nelly!, its an epic quest alright.

This thread reminded me of a funny incident from last night: I was in CS and agreed to Rez some druid who was keelin' there. So I ask him about unrefined gems, has he seen any, etc. We start talking about the Shawl Quest and I ask him if he has started. He Replies:

Random Drood_076: "I have a friend who does tradeskills, he is doing the quest for me"

I laughed for 20 solid minutes.

I wish it were sooo easy.

[Craftah]

Well.... It is. Technically the only skills required are smithing and JC and you only need to get each to 150 or so to have a pretty good chance of succeeding on the combines. Someone else can hand in shawl 7 for you...

[Phinnin]

I guess

I guess you are right, but who in thier right mind is gonna do the quest to 7 just to hand it to someone else to finish 8.

And is 7 lore? So you would need to forego your own shawl to do it for someone else.

The dude was thinking about the solstice earring I am willing to bet.

[Moonlilly]

Yet another victim of my evil plans.

MUAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA.

In all seriousness the 8th shawls worth it.

[Pojodan]

I've heard of folks having 2 accounts, doing the quest with one character that has extremely high tradeskills then just PLing the JC and Smithing on the characters on the other account, getting the 7th shawl with the first account, and basically MQing it to their other character so that on doesn't have to get baking, tailoring, fletching, pottery up, just JC and smithing.

I suppose that someone could sell of MQs for the 8th shawl for rediculous ammounts of pp, but there is -so- much effort involved that they can probably make more pp in other persuits in less time.

[Damuri]

The sign should be bigger

Hmmmm. I guess there is a warning there and I even vaguely remember reading it.

I also remember thinking (a) it couldn't really be that tough and (b) mebbe everyone else had problems but I must be a Bada$$ cuz the first 2 shawls only took an afternoon and I got myself to almost 100 in all required tradeskills before dinner (and for less than 100PP).

I figured that at that rate I would be done with the shawl quest by the end of the week (that was almost a year ago :shock: ) and it would cost me almost 200PP to get my tradeskills up (a princely sum but I felt it was worth it :roll: ).

Now I find myself trying to figure out the best way for Clerics to solo sirens (again). PUHLEEEEZE someone tell me that this is the toughest part of the shawl quest.

[Verdandi]

As for the first two shawls being misleadingly simple, see the top of their guide page:

They are both also quite simple, by far the easiest quests in the entire shawl series. They are also the only ones that do not require any form of tradeskills, which may be part of what lures in unsuspecting folks who think that the whole thing is a breeze just because the first two steps are easy peasy. These aren't just the appetizers to the main course quests to come...these are the glass of water that's already on the table when you get there. Enjoy it while it's easy!

I tried to warn folks, I really did!

[Phinnin]

well

You wanted to hear is so here goes:

"the sirens are the hardest part of the shawl quest. Heck after you get your two hairs, the 8th shawl falls into your lap! Its cake from there...."

Now back to reality:

Ouch... Pain.... 8th shawl is hell.... stop... the... bleeding!

I need 4 furs, 1 emerald, 25pts of smithing and final walk to go!