Enchanted Velium Bits ??

[Dalur]

Kellaen

This part of one of your replies confuses me "I got #203 - 210 without destroying the metal bits, so you don't need to destroy it each time. Just click click click click away"

What do you mean you don't have to destroy the metal bits? Are you talking about different metal bits than the enchanted ones?

[eniamn]

enchanted bits are lore. some are destroying them after each success. you can just leave one in inventory and it will kill all your other successes.

[Dalur]

Ahh ok thanks, that makes sense now.

[ddubois]

Best way to get velium?

2 small pieces velium
coldain velium temper
spell: Enchant Velium

What's status of the vendor now? Is he up and selling the spell and the temper, or just the spell?

I've never really farmed CC, so I don't know the layout or anything. I play a 65 enchanter, and have a 65 cleric alt on another account. I've been known to 2-box these two characters to AE greenies for PLing or for farming. Can I do the same in CC, and if so, what's the best place in the dungeon to pull the most velium droppers? Do some mobs in CC have a better drop rate?

I've also been known to aggro a crystal golem out of the castle in Velks, train it to zone in, mez it, zone out and back in, then charm and haste the golem, and give it weapons to dual wield. So I can kill spiders extremely quickly in velks (I kept bottom three floors clear IIRC). So do the spiders drop lots of velium, or do I need to kill other mobs deeper in? Would I just be better off in CC anyway?

Is ToFS drop rate/kill rate superior to both of these?

Basically, I'm asking for advice on what is the fastest path to velium given my resources.

[ColdHeart]

I farmed CC a fair bit, training the orcs to the bottom then AE them. You'll need to Lev to do this ideally. Also there are various side passages which have more miners. Only the miners drop the velium. The orcales, watchmen and the like don't.

I found CC great, as Frosthome is just down the passage and you can build up a fair amount of faction with these guys :-) Use the forge to chisel down any bricks which are too large and the bank to dump it all. I also used the thurg gate potion to quickly get back to Thurgardin (yes I was lazy :-p)

[Dalur]

ddubois

The vendor in Thur only sells the spell now. You will have to either make your tempers or buy them.

As far as velium farming goes, I found CC to be pathetic. Only the miners seem to carry the velium and they are hopelessly outnumber 3 or 4 to 1 from the other types of orcs in CC.

If you are not allied to Skyshrine, I would suggest going there to farm your velium. In a couple of hour period of time, I could easily fill up 6 10 slot backpacks with bricks and small pieces.

By the time I was done breaking down the bricks, I would usually have 7 to 8 stacks of velium pieces.

If you go this route, you will want to try to kill only the gargoyles and the golems (the semi transparent ones). I don't think any of the other types of mobs in the zone drop velium.

[Candiil]

Re: Best way to get velium?

Originally posted by ddubois
2 small pieces velium
coldain velium temper
spell: Enchant Velium

What's status of the vendor now? Is he up and selling the spell and the temper, or just the spell?

I've never really farmed CC, so I don't know the layout or anything. I play a 65 enchanter, and have a 65 cleric alt on another account. I've been known to 2-box these two characters to AE greenies for PLing or for farming. Can I do the same in CC, and if so, what's the best place in the dungeon to pull the most velium droppers? Do some mobs in CC have a better drop rate?

I've also been known to aggro a crystal golem out of the castle in Velks, train it to zone in, mez it, zone out and back in, then charm and haste the golem, and give it weapons to dual wield. So I can kill spiders extremely quickly in velks (I kept bottom three floors clear IIRC). So do the spiders drop lots of velium, or do I need to kill other mobs deeper in? Would I just be better off in CC anyway?

Is ToFS drop rate/kill rate superior to both of these?

Basically, I'm asking for advice on what is the fastest path to velium given my resources.

I did all my velium farming in CC, with one experimental trip to ToFS. In total, I farmed about 1000 small pieces of velium, which with another 200 I had in the bank for a long time got me from 191 smithing to 220 smithing.

I got to know they spawn points and patrol routes of the miners, and then devised a pattern to keep them dead and minimize the wait between respawns. This also discouraged anyone from trying to siphon orcs from me, since there were never any for them to kill, and only I knew where and when the next would spawn.

At first I started at the bottom and worked my way up, since this allowed me to run to town whenever I needed to, but it became very difficult to hold on to the miners in the middle galleries because people who were working their way down would kill them. So I eventually decided to forego ever going to town and start at the top.

Pattern:

1. Zone in and OOC a camp check. Do a /who and see who else in already in the zone. Leave if there's too many people or someone calls "upper orcs". If lucky there will be a miner just down from the zone in, this is a good sign no on e has molested the orcs recently, because you want the upper passages to be fully popped.

2. Make pet (level 65 enchanter), haste, SoV. Memorize Pilliage Enchantment. Get all buffed up and Runed.

3. Miner #1 wanderes from the zone-in down to the first intersection. Wait for him to wander to the zone-in and then pull with Pilliage Enchantment and kill.

4. Farther down, Guards #1 and #2 flank the passageway. Pull and kill them.

5. Next you will come to a split. Go left, this is the Dead End.

6. Miner #2 is a wanderer who spawns in the Dead End. If you are lucky, he's there and moving around. Kill him.

7. Miners #3 and #4 are static spawns in the Dead End. Pull and kill.

8. Return to the split and take the other passage (right when coming from the ZI).

9. This passage is very long. Miners #5, #6, #7, and #8 wander this passage. Pull and kill them all as fast as possible.

10. Going down this passage, there is another Dead End off to the left. At its end is Miner #9.

11. This passage eventually terminates at the Mine Shaft. There are guards #3 and #4.

12. Cross the blue crystal bridge, and there is Guard #5. Do not fight him at his spawn point; his flight path will cause both him and your pet to warp to the bottom of the pit. Pull him slightly away from his spawn point.

13. At Guard #5's spawn point is a passage leading up. (Not the blue crystal.) Follow this passage up, it has the spawn points for Miner #10 and #11. They may have wandered off, in which case try again next cycle.

14. At the top of this passage is Guard #6. Kill him. (To you left, you will see the tunnel directly below the ZI.)

15. Retrace your steps to Guard #5 and ascend the crystal ramp. At is top is Guard #7. You should now be in a passageway with a blue crystal floor.

16. Miner #12 spawns on the blue crystal floor. Kill him if he is there.

17. Guard #8 is next, standing next to an outcropping of quartz crystal. Kill him.

18. Following the passage down, the ceiling will now be blue crystal, and the floor is rock. In this passage, Miner #13 and #14 spawn. Kill them.

19. This passage terminates at the Mine Shaft. There may be one more miner (#15) hanging out on the crystal bridges there.

20. It is now close to time for respawns to begin. Retrace your steps back to the ZI and wait for Miner #1 to respawn. If you killed everything in the correct order (which takes a little luck) then you will know the time and position of the next orc spawn.

Notes:

The first clearing is the most important, since it will set the spawn pattern for following cycles. Miner #2 wanders out of his Dead End and can be confused with the 4 miners that spawn in the long hall. The other wanderers have a similar wanderlist, and sometimes it takes a few cycles to figure out who is who.

Miners can spawn as miners, oracles, herbalists, and sometimes the inspector.

Guards can be watchmen, or oracles, and sometimes the elusive Foreman Smason will make an appearance.

The oracles and herbalists are very annoying since they do not drop velium, and SoW any other orcs they encounter.

The respawn time is about 17 minutes, give or take a few seconds.

[casala]

Go to tops in velks. Kill all the spiders there for decent drop rate of velium (lots of blocks / bricks). I can usually fill up 4 10-slot backpacks fairly quickly usually along with some drops like the chitin gloves. You even get a little AA exp at lvl 65.

[ddubois]

I tried farming spiders on the floor of Velks with my charm-a-crystalline-sentinel trick. (BTW, they nerfed the glass wall. You can't cast thru it now, but you can still make a level 1 pet and send it in. It'll warp in, die before doing enough damage to make the sentinel summon, and then the big guy will warp out.) I only saw velium from the two golems at ZI, none from spiders. However, this was at ZI, I didn't realize the spider up top were more forthcoming. Maybe I will go back.

I also tried CC. I hated it. I kept getting lost, and my pet would get lost and backtrack and take 5 mins to catch up to me. Or I would fall to the bottom and spend 15 mins trying to find the way back up. Having to pillage guys because you aren't sure if they are SoWd, and chasing down guys you didn't pillage: more annoyance. As much as I appreciate the detailed guide Candiil posted, it just didn't work for me. I supposed if I invested time learning CC it could be bearable, but honestly I'd rather not.

I might have a couple of the ToFS keys in my bank. I'm not looking forward to the upfront cost of time to spend on farming keys to get to the "wedding" floor with the velum droppers. But I would much rather farm some place where I can aggro all the mobs at once, AE them, loot, and go AFK for a bit, than meandering through the hell that is CC mines. Can someone tell me how many mobs there are in ToFS that drop velium and what kind of respawn/drop rate there is?

It sounds like Skyshrine has the least "initial" time investment: No setup, no learning spawn patterns, no farming keys. You zone in, start killing. That sounds pretty attractive. I'm already 204, so I only need ~16 skillups off this - I'm not farming velium forever.

Decisions, decisions.

[lilsneezy]

Farming velium

If you're not interested in learning a zone to farm velium, then just farm it out of the bazaar. You should be able to buy all you want there. If the money sink doesn't interest you then give CC or Velks another try, they really aren't all that complicated.

Lilsneezy
Guild Leader
Neo Dracus
The Rathe

[Aethn]

CVT is back on Test. Around 5pp, buyback is 4ppish.

Thank god they didnt make the buy/sell 25/22 again or the exploiters would have scored big time.

[Candiil]

Originally posted by ddubois
As much as I appreciate the detailed guide Candiil posted, it just didn't work for me. I supposed if I invested time learning CC it could be bearable, but honestly I'd rather not.

I did take me quite a while to learn the map and figure out the bad spots to kill things, and even then I would occasionally lose control of my pet as it would blindly follow an orc over the edge.

I did go to ToFS to check it out, I had no keys to start with and was on level 5 in about 90 minutes. The keys go on your keyring after one use. There are 11 (or maybe 13) static golem spawns there that drop velium, and a few random spawns, and loot from the nameds that will actually sell in the bazaar. I never worked out a good way to quickly travel to the 5th floor without fighting, but I guess that Pacify would get you through most of the encounters.

[Maevenniia]

Originally posted by Candiil
<snip>
I did go to ToFS to check it out, I had no keys to start with and was on level 5 in about 90 minutes. The keys go on your keyring after one use.

Are you sure? I don't recall the TOFS keys going on my keyring ever, but it's been a long time since I went back....

[PetrosDaroc]

Yes, the ToFS keys do go on your keyring...and I only had the key to level 6 (key from 5th floor) and when I used it, it put all of the previous keys on my keyring as well. When you do /key, it will read Tower of Frozen Shadows: 5 (meaning 5 keys for ToFS).

[Dunhere]

Traveling ToFS just needs IVU and regular invis. First two floors are all undead, third floor is all live mobs in the corridors (only part you need to travel through) and while the fourth floor looks like a mix, the undead there don't see invis. Floors 5 and 6(a) are undead again, and 6(b) is live long as you don't kill any bats.