It is done. As of this morning, this is what my character select screen looks like:
Yes, I have completed my Legendary, that I wrote about wanting to get not too long ago. I made Kudzu, the longbow, for my Ranger, and along the way learned a lot of things! Not just things about how to make money quickly in-game, but also more about my playstyle on various professions, and also things to do when you just need to take a break from the work.
First of all, it did not take nearly as long as I had expected. I started working on it back in mid-January, and as I had written in my previous post, my goal had been to finish by August 25th. It is now March 12th – it took me just under two months to complete. Having done this once, I think I’d be able to do it again…which is good, as Bifrost has caught my attention again. Most importantly, I’ve learned a few important things about how to go about getting a legendary in an efficient manner.
My first tip is to pick a legendary that you like. If you’re going to be spending this much time and money on a weapon, pick one that you like the look of – even if it means that you’re getting one for an alt instead of your main! My main is a Mesmer. I am not fond of the legendary greatswords, Bolt and the Minstrel do not suit her at all, I don’t really use scepter or torch at all, and Quip is…well, Quip (I actually do not think it’s as ugly as most people do – I think it’s a hilarious weapon. However, again, it does not suit my Mesmer at al). Bifrost I love, but I had started that one before and stopped for reasons I’ve written about already. That, and I don’t use staff too frequently on my Mesmer anymore. Kudzu has always been my favorite of the legendaries, so it’s no surprise that’s the one I chose to make, even though it required leveling my Ranger.
On the flip side, if you do decide to make yours for an alt, make sure it’s a profession you enjoy playing! Luckily I fell in love with my Ranger once she hit around level 50. Just like you shouldn’t make a legendary you hate, don’t make one for a character or profession you dislike.
Yes, that’s my pet on the wall behind me…no, I don’t know how it got up there.
Second, finish map completion ASAP. You need 100% map completion to craft a legendary, so you may as well get it done early. You get a good amount of money from completing all of the hearts, not to mention the zone rewards. In higher level zones you will receive exotic armors, which can be sold for gold (or if you get particularly unlucky like I did and get ones worth 40s, salvaged for ecto). You are also going to need all of those skillpoints for the bloodstone shard and for getting your mystic clovers.
Learn to at least tolerate World vs. World early on. I am not a fan of WvW. I have not had good experiences there. But completing that 100% is part of map completion…as well as those pesky badges of honor you need. There are multiple ways you can go about getting those. Some people have good luck with getting them from fighting and taking on groups. I personally have never had any luck with that…and I don’t enjoy it anyway. Where did my badges come from? The jumping puzzles. There is one in each borderlands, as well as the one in Eternal Battlegrounds. Completing them brings you to a chest that gives you a number of badges depending on your level – at level 80 I was generally getting 4-5 from the borderlands puzzles (as low as 3, as much as 6), and between 13 and 18 from the EB chest. The borderlands puzzles are very easy to do; the EB puzzles is much trickier, being probably one of the hardest jump puzzles in the game. However, the way it is set up means that a fall doesn’t generally mean you have to restart. And if there are friendly Mesmers around, even better – a well-placed portal can skip you past the vast majority of the puzzle!
Just be careful, though, because while my experiences are that most people consider the jump puzzles neutral territory (I have definitely done a borderlands puzzle run alongside someone from Sea of Sorrows and another from Sanctum of Rall with all of us just letting the others go on our own way), there’ll be the occasional fight that breaks out. My advice: if you see someone from another server, make a friendly emote at them (/wave or /bow). If they don’t reciprocate, it may be better to back off until you have some allies with you. If they do, then it’s generally safe to proceed.
Chuck it all into the Forge…and get a shiny!
Work on mystic clovers first. These are, no lie, one of the most frustrating parts of the process. I’m not a fan of the Mystic Forge – I think it’s a cheap cop-out way of doing things. And I’m not fond of how so much of this game is RNG based. Clovers are, at least, one of the kinder RNG gambles in the game – if you don’t get the clover(s), most of the time you get tier 6 mats in return. This isn’t guaranteed, of course – there are also mystic coins, ecto, lodestones, crystals, obsidian shards, and bags of treasure in the loot table for what can come from a failed clover attempt – but most of the time, if you don’t get a clover, you’ll get some number of t6 mats out of it, and having a decent chunk of mats already helps greatly when it comes to getting those stacks completed.
Connected to that, use the 10 clover recipe as much as possible. Yes, throwing 10 ecto at a time into the mystic toilet can be a painful experience. However, the rewards are much greater – 10 clovers, or up to 40 mats. Once I started seriously working on my clovers, I got far better results out of the 10 recipe. Still, it’s all probability, so everyone’s results will vary.
Save, save, save! You need a lot for a legendary. Full stacks of each tier 6 fine crafting material, tons of karma, 100 gold for icy runestones, on average two stacks of ecto…and that’s just the common ingredients. As tempting as it may be to sell these things for quick cash, don’t – not unless you’ve got all you need! At that point, of course, sell away.
Try leveling an alt. This may seem like weird advice, as leveling characters is not always cheap. However, hear me out here. First of all, if you have a short attention span like I do, playing on another character can help refresh you and keep you interested in your goal. It keeps you from burning out on always playing the same character. And, you’re going to want those skillpoints. I used my main, my Mesmer, to get the bloodstone shard (200 skillpoints). I used my alts for the skillpoints required for the crystals and philosopher stones for making mystic clovers. It’ll also be very helpful for the next tip:
Mix things up a bit. Don’t just farm the same things over and over and over – not only will you get bored, but you’ll hit diminishing returns quickly. Find a few things you enjoy doing that are bringing in money, and rotate between them. For a while I did lots of CoF. Then fractals, then Orr, now the meta-events, while swinging back towards Orr with regular dungeons mixed in…it will be a grind. There’s really no other way to put it. But sometimes it’s best to sacrifice a small amount of efficiency to keep things fun.
Don’t be afraid to take a break or splurge a bit. Saving up all that money is hard. But don’t feel like it can’t ever be touched for anything ever and you can’t ever treat yourself. I bought my thief the human t3 top not long ago, because I’ve been wanting it for her since before launch, and why not? Last week I spent about 15g on my necromancer, buying armor skins and unlocking dyes once she got to level 80. Did it set me back a bit? Sure…by like three days. But it was worth it, because not only did I get two characters looking awesome, but like anything, treating yourself occasionally is a good thing.
Last, and completely optional, work on it with friends if possible. Myself and my two [TWIT] co-leaders have been doing our legendaries together. I probably would have given up on mine long ago if I didn’t have both of them working on it alongside me. Not because we’ve been helping each other out (which we have been – I wouldn’t have finished today if they hadn’t helped!), but because if you get frustrated at something, you have someone else that’s doing the same things you are, and understands why you’re frustrated, and can sympathize. It’s not monetary support that’s most important here – it’s the moral support.
Also, it’s really helpful when you’re manically running dungeons to get those tokens.
Now, this isn’t really a guide or anything, and knowing me I’m sure that there’s something I’ve forgotten. Rather, it’s just a collection of tips based on what I’ve learned in crafting Kudzu, things that I can make use of to be better prepared for when I do start actually working on Bifrost (that one will be a truly long-term goal as, having completed one legendary, I’d prefer to just take my sweet time on a second). The most important advice of all is to set goals, but to not worry too much if you don’t meet them, and don’t work so hard on it that you begin to hate it. If you stop collecting for a while, the stuff you’ve gotten will still be there.
Good luck – trust me, it’ll be worth it in the end!
Since people have asked about the precursor: I purchased mine on the trading post. Any gold weapons I got as drops I salvaged, any exotics I sold, and I simply saved up the 360 gold that Leaf of Kudzu cost. They can drop from meta-event chests, and since those guarantee a rare or better now, they are more than worth doing, but the best thing to do is just save money and hope for the best.
As someone who started working toward Kudzu about a month ago – great piece! Some parts of the process are going much faster than I thought they would, some much slower. I actually enjoy WvW now, and leveling an alt has helped me rediscover some of the fun/challenge that I’d forgotten about while spending way too much time in Orr obsessing over materials. This makes it seem not only possible but worthwhile to keep going!
As an old school Korean MMORPG player, I tend to have the focus to not get bored when farming things. I mean spent 5days straight farming rep and leveling 2 professions in WoW to get a single mount, and I don’t even really use it. Just a call back to my old Korean game history(wow isn’t Korean but the grind element of certain things makes it feel like the older kMMOs).
I hate the fact that you get met with diminishing returns, probably one of the most irritating things when farming is farming something solidly and then getting shit back and making you break flow to go find another source.
I don’t agree with the leveling an alt/or splurge advice. That’s damaging and disattentive, and fairly distracting to a hardcore grind. Especially because you lose focus and end up not feeling the sense of reward for it.
Maybe im just too used to the Korean games to really be appreiciative of westernized mmos, but any advice given about methodology is greatly appreciated.
Is there a list that shows what you can get on a legendary item? Because I have a very specific off the meta build that I need a bow with power toughness(cleric) on it.
See, I can’t stand heavy grind, and I don’t know how people can do it. It gets so boring so quickly. But I am not and have never been a fan of typical MMOs, so that sort of heavy grind being missing is part of what’s so good about this. I didn’t have to grind the same thing until my eyes and fingers bled.
And I explained my reasoning for leveling an alt and treating yourself on occasion. The game isn’t only about obtaining this one item, it’s about having fun.
I agree with Verene. I know people farm for various lodestones (especially charged and corrupted) and some have made 7-10G in an hour. I tried farming for lodestones but I got so bored, so quickly. I hated every minute I was there and decided to never do it again. The prospect of getting lodestones was attractive and exciting at first but after killing the same enemies 150+ times and get 0-1 lodestone, I wished I spent my time doing something else. I realize it will take me longer than dedicated farmers to get my legendary but I feel I will enjoy the process more if I do not farm relentlessly.
Anyway, great piece of article about your journey for Kudze, Verene. Good Read
FranBunny, as far as I know all Legendary weapons have the same 3 stats, and these stats aren’t higher than the equivalent exotic stats, so the best thing to do is just pick what ever legendary weapon u like the skin of the most then transmute the skin onto an exotic with the stats you want
I think it’s fairly safe to assume that the majority of GW2 players DON’T enjoy grinding – the fact that the element of grinding is less prevalent than in “typical” MMOs is one of the game’s best selling points. So kudos to Verene for suggestions on how to sing “You’ve lost that grinding feeling, whoa that grinding feeling…” a bit more loudly. If you actually LIKE the hardcore grinding, you’re welcome to it, but I dare say that most people will agree with Verene’s opinion that taking a little longer to get that legendary you wanted but retaining the love for the game far outweighs getting it as fast as possible and then quitting because “the game bores you and you’ve done it all”.
Nice, Congrats.
What’s your take on getting the precursor? Just grind for Gold till you can buy it?
How did you worked on the base weapon? I probally have wasted and whole legion of Cof, Ascalon, HotW Greatsswords to get that f&&*%# Twilight.
How do you get the Precursor?
Nice Blog
And how did you got your precursor ?
maybe you need to read the story. She said she bought it from TP
I’m going for Kudzu, too
Ranger is my main (I’m a career Ranger in just about every game I pick up). And I love the advice for leveling alts, and mixing it up. Grinding is no fun, and the game isn’t designed that way. I’m pursuing mine passively, slowly – I’m just saving things, and well, when I get there, I get there. I’m not looking forward to getting Leaf of Kudzu, though, I think that’s going to be the most expensive/hardest part. I’ve heard that putting 4 weapons with the stats of the precursor you’re going for into the mystic forge increases your chances, as opposed to any 4 gold or exotic longbows. I’ve tried it a bit, no luck… yet. Do you have any advice on precursors?
1000 rares ~ 1 precursor
I think I just died a little inside, lol.
Great Posts, I just turned 80 on my Thief and still deciding what to do, this post makes me want to pursue my Legendary. Thanks for the info, now I have something to look forward to!
Also, to know where you stand with your monies, Brave Vesperia has designed a wonderful weapon calculator so you can know where you stand always even if the prices fluctuate.. Also, it is of course cross referenced by guild wars 2 auction spidy @ http://www.gw2spidy.com.
Hope this helps!
Character Deathtide on Taint, Crystal Desert.
Oh it didn’t post there link: here it is lol http://calculator.bravevesperia.com/
That is awesome – thank you!
why do you have 2 thieves? a waste of space if you ask me
They’re fun, and because I like having crafting professions spread across my characters.
I would much rather work on the Mystic Clovers last.
The thing is, I plan to save up the required mats WHILE I work on the other Legendary components.
So, I want to have a surplus of 10% of the required mats by the time I start working on clovers; then I just dump them all into the Mystic Forge at once and have it over and done with.
And if by some chance I end up short a few, it’s not a big deal compared to a steady sequence of hits or misses drawn out across several months.
See, I found it more efficient to do clovers first because they’re a probability-based item, and the stuff you get from them you’ll need anyway.
I bought my Leaf of Kudzu after the Kraka Event for 60 Gold
hahahah
I actually got it from that chest, and sold it for 70g. Not my smartest move ever.
Great article. You did all of the same processes that I did to make my two legendary weapons for my Warrior. I made Twilight at Christmas time and finished The Predator on March 3d. I would like to add that having many alt characters is a very easy to get the large number of skillpoints you need for clovers and your Bloodstone shard. I robbed all 7 of mine to finish the rifle, but still needed to farm about 150 more by events and fractal runs to finish the second one.
Skill points is why I suggest making and leveling alts – I have 6 level 80s now and being able to strip their skill points made things so much easier.
This is somewhat encouraging. I have drooled over The Flameseeker Prophecies shield (after taking a look at screenshots of them all, I can safely say that it is the only legendary weapon I am interested in) since they announced legendary weapons in that video they made a long time ago.But I labelled it as something that I will simply never attain. I have never enjoyed grinding. I just can’t find doing the same thing over and over entertaining. If someone else find killing X mob a billion times over fun, then props to you, but I can’t.
The other reason I’ve labelled it unattainable is because I’m generally not very good at video games. I’m okay at them I guess, but I’ll never be “top,” and you’ll never see me on any kind of leader board. I play games to have fun with my friends, so I’ve never had the competitive mindset it takes to get the best stuff. I don’t care about having the best stats, I just want to look pretty/awesome. I often see people with gear in games, and I ask them “How did you get that”, and they’ll respond with “Oh, I got it from X Nightmare mode dungeon.” Then I’m like “Oh…well, looks like I’ll never be getting that.”
But from reading your post it brightens my hopes just a little bit that maybe getting the shield isn’t as impossible as I previously thought. Maybe one day I’ll have a shiny-glowing-book-shield-thingy. I got my best friend to try GW2 during that free weekend event a while back, and he loved the game immediately. He is going to get it when he finishes school at the end of April. So perhaps playing with him will brighten my hopes of getting it. Oh Shiny-glowing-book-shield-thingy, one day you just might be mine. One day…
Congrats! I am ever-so-slowly working on Meteorlogicus and see Bifrost/Kudzu as far off goals. I appreciated the advice here as well. In particular, the part about utilizing alts. My main’s an ele, but I want to get Bifrost for my mesmer alt, who is still 1st level.
good job
A very comprehensive guide. My will towards obtaining Incinerator has been waning, especially from your earlier points about WvW. Jumping puzzles usually camped, laggy servers sometimes rendering zerg collisions unplayable. I’m a long way off, only having the shard and map completion under my belt, but this has given me a few pointers and an uplift to keep going and keep trying hard. Thanks a lot.
The badges of honor were the last thing, other than the precursor, that I finished. But don’t lose heart! It may take a while but it will come.
I am god awful at jumping puzzles so I’ve found that just following around commanders and fighting champions/players at camps and towers and such have gotten me along just fine. I earned 68 badges of honor playing for about 6 hours just doing that. It was actually pretty fun, too! Much better than falling off a jumping puzzle and trying to get it right over and over again for 5-10 badges.
See, I could never get badges that way. Where with the jump puzzles, I was able to get 250 in two hours.
Excellent advice, much appreciated. I have limted time between family and work so having what you outlined will help use the time effectively. I’m also contemplating just buying one from the trading post and saving myself the time and work but there is satisfaction is creating your own legendary weapon. I’m only level 50 so I still have time to decide.
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Hello,
great guide. I have one problem here. I can play only 1h/day max. Probably not even that. Is there any chance for me to get the legendary in a reasonable time?
Kind regards
Where did you got your Leaf of Kudzu? Buy it or from drop?
It says right in the post – I saved up the gold and bought it on the trading post.
Sorry, my bad. I didn’t saw that. I have got a lot of materials, but need Leaf of Kudzu. So I must save more money and buy it too. Drop is so low… :/
Yeah, the drop rates on it are terrible. I really hate the precursors, to be honest. It’s by far the worst part of making it.
Yop,we’re thinking in our guild too.
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