The big problem I've found with The Vale of Twilight is getting a group for the Shard itself. I've not had anyone willing to take on a new raider, and I've not got a character powerful enough to run the Shard solo: I've tried with my level 30 and just can't make it past the first stage. I don't know that a month and change will allow a lot of players the opportunity to succeed at crafting multiple greensteel items, but I admit that it is possible, especially if the players are self-quarantined and choose to spend a lot of hours making the long slog through the chain of quests. Epic Devil Assault will give a couple of ingredients on the average run, which can help add to the crafting stock. That has been my main way of acquiring bits and pieces for crafting. Since the most essential ingredients, the shards, are BtC one cannot have a higher level character grind them for lower level characters. Alas.

I been playing for a few years as a premium player but i had no idea about the Voice of The Master. I got mine last might after watching this! Thanks a lot Axel!!!

Always really liked your content good sir! This quarantine situation is a mess but it’s great to see more frequent content, stay well and keep up the good work my friend ✌️

Nice list, the sidebars for new players is great as this game can be quite daunting to start. One thing I'd mention about the mount farm: Pick a character that has speed (items, haste, w/e) to start. Get a path around the wilderness area you are comfortable with. Don't forget to use recall to shorten travel time (Perhaps hitting farm to north from zone, then hermit, recall, back out without reset and head for south loop). Once you have 15 tokens, get a mount for that character. Now that character can farm mounts way faster since you can use it in the wilderness. The tokens are account bound, mounts are not. So get a bunch of tokens, drop in shared bank, and all your alts can get mounts as well. Just be sure to take 15 tokens from stash on each character and turn in before the end of access if you don't have the pack! The mount turn in NPC can only be accessed via the pack itself, not in a free public area.

10) Favor! Run everything you can on elite for favor, often people will help that can open if you are first or 2nd life. This gives access to Drow race, +2 stat tome, Favored Soul class, +5 stat tome if you can get to 5k favor. At the same time you will get access to all the favor rewards from specific groups that unlock for your character. Including skill trees for Inquisitor, Harper, Vistani knife fighter, and if you are lucky Falconry. Also Artificer class. The game has tons of content that you will never normally see because the exp is not worth while, the difficulty for reward is not good, or there are no drops, this is the opportunity to try everything in the game for free. Lastly on favor, you get 25 ddo points for every 100 favor, so when at the end of april you lose access to everything you will have lots of ddo points to spend on the things you want the most. 9) Gear for your class! Take a moment to consider your character, what is the most important stat/s for that character? Go to google ddo and stat and find a page that shows all the gear with that stat on it. Find out what is best available to your level and go farm that. 8) Gear for next life! Reincarnation is the easiest, and slowest way to improve your character. But it lets you fix your mistakes you made the first time around. Plan ahead and google and then farm the equipment you will need. Your gear is saved in a reincarnation withdrawal bank and you can just grab it as you level up your new life. 7) Experience! The long term players have figured out the fastest quests to run for the most experience, often these are the only pugs (pick up groups) that are looking for people to join, and most of these are in packs that are not free to play. Now is your chance to level up as fast as possible. 6) Sharn! As axel stated, this is the best gear in the game. If you are new you don't know what you find the most fun to play, maybe your paladin seems boring compared to all the sorcerers around you. Go grab this equipment and save it for trying new things. 5) Barovia! Same as Sharn but easier to get drops and easier content to solo. 4) Slavers! This pack is hard but you get crafting materials. Often when you got that best sharn or barovia gear, it is missing something that you need. Slavers allows you to craft really good gear with just the stuff you need. This isn't necessarily worth spending money or ddo points on when so many other things are more important, so grab it now while it is free. 3) Vale! Same as Axel stated. 2) Voice of the Master (delaras tomb)! Super useful for all leveling, and the pack isn't worth spending points or money on so get it now, super easy and super important. As a secondary, Mantle of the Worldshaper from Threnal Pack, same exp bonus, get a set bonus when wearing both voice and mantle, and with more farming for Epic Tokens of the Twelve, you can merge them into an augment that you can put into any equipment you want for that sweet exp bonus. 1) FUN! Farming implies the drudgery of doing the same thing over and over. Don't do that. Think about what you would enjoy doing the most, and go do that. This is an amazing game. You do you.

As a new player, I think it would be helpful to mention the levels of the quests, since I’m not sure if I can even do the free content. Just some food for thought, thanks for the video.

Several good things suggested. I think that my wife and I will have to go collect some items. I really want those boots to free up the need of my feather fall ring.

A good list, thanks for the video.

Update: Content now free through August 31st! With a code available through then to keep it permanently, minus expansions. Minor correction: Getting a mount requires you to collect 15 feathers from Keep on the Borderlands wilderness area chests, not 10 as I said in the video. Still not that long of a farm.

Do more top 10s! 😁

I'm going to mention that if one reaches Epic levels, Thunderholme/Thunderforged are a must. Just getting the Tier 1 Thunderforged weapons you'd need blows pretty much anything in the same level range and is a LOT less of a hassle to grind for than Greensteel. With Thunderholme slayer groups often cycling everyday, you can get all the dwarven ingots you'll need for TR/ETR later on.

I'd also suggest running Tangleroot Gorge for House P Favour {75 gets you the option to have an NPC buff you with 30 minute +2 Stat buffs, Resist Fire/Acid/Elec/Cold/Sonic and Jump - All of which are mega useful buffs to have.} and The Visor of the Flesh Render Guards from the End Chain reward list. You may have to run the chain three times to get the Visor to drop but if you're Free to Play that's N/H/E which will get you the full favour while you're at it. Not sure if "Fragrant Drowshoods" are still important collectables but they have a decent drop rate in these quests too - Basically click on any mushrooms you see :} TIP: If you don't mind fighting oozes there's 2 mushrooms near the start of the quest in the later parts of the chain, just turn right when you hit the first T-Junction.

The Barovian Weapon is an easy farm and the weapons are really good. Into The Mists is a very short quest that can be run on any difficulty but Elite isn't that difficult to be fair - I would suggest reducing your graphics settings before going in though as it's a particularly laggy quest. The weapon trader is in the explorer zone when you leave the quest next to the road into Barovia Village so you really can't miss him.

new player here. got the bank space, literally currently grinding out voice of the masters. took a break and thought id just check out some yt ddo content, lol. white plume mountain is also my personal favorite pack (sharn is really great too tho) ive played through so far. the quest are all pretty different and puzzle/platformy, without being like, obnoxious, and entertaining whilst also still giving amazing rewards. also the mount is suuuuper useful for getting around, and while you are farming the chest, you can work on the Slayer there as well, which gives some nice xp, and/or decent loot for low lvl alts. i will say however, if you have access to a guild, WITH the public run speed buff, i dont think a mount is really needed if you have a speed up spell/clickie, unless you just want one. if the mount was actually instant casted, id say its worth on any account, but its slow as hell imo. i am however glad to know me loving clickies will make my life easier. two of my favorites are simple ones from korthos. the braces of aid for the temp hp and the bless goggles, since it applies to everyone, i even use this on my cleric so i can slot a different spell. both are just extremely useful, specifically when i wouldn't otherwise be able to do that. for example, being able to cast aid on lars heyton as a non healer to do that quest without him dying. thats like small potatoes example, but i can just imagine it only getting more useful as i learn more and get more clickies/more useful clickies? (expedious run clickies are MUST haves for me now on toons that cant get a movement spell too.) thank you

I like the staff in 3bc with gust of wind, I find it effective when I have one. Not sure if you mentioned Coin lords favor. Kind of skipped through some.

The WPM drops the item ONLY on Epic. VOT is accessible from guild ship (if high enough level guild) without going there via the Twelve: talk to captain; page2; Meridia.

Would love to see this form of video based on classes

Been watching more of your videos maybe i was too harsh about the donation thing that was my first video i watched i apologize but good video liked and subbed

add: the turn in sets from eveningstar, the turn-in weapons from borderlands ( really easy to get ) Remove: Greensteel. Greensteel is great but it has been ages since I've seen any one do the raid and since it's fairly difficult to solo.\ Questionable: The drop rate of Jack Jibbers blade is not just low. It's abysmally low.

- Falconry tree unlock for 700 free agents favor - Pendant of Combat from Keep on Borderlands pack, The Bugbear Bandits quest - great epic leveling item for melee characters

Should add mantle of the world shaper. Cloak that pairs with voice of the master. 2 piece set gives true sight.

Pale Lavender Ioun Stone and Eternal Flask of Freedom Movement both great items for soloing heroic reaper

Planar Shards. You can get a free large collectables bag just for kiling monsters in The Subterrane, Marketplace. 150 planar Shards.

We need a top 10 of FOTM builds over the years

I'd say slave lords, good heroic items that can be built very versatile/customized and they lowered the cost to make items so not too hard to farm now

Tbh, I don't know if Green Steel cost-benefit is worth at all. To get as "That Patrick Guy" said, the problem is getting a group. Despise my guild buddies are all nice and probably would help me on GS items, I'm not much fond of raids. I have a few Green Steel itens myself (2 Great-Axes for Barbarians, 1 Goggle who I crafted wrong and it became nearly useless). But I never used it too much after the first surge of Cannith Crafting. I have many raids I never played, as House C ones. I think I love Masterminds of Sharn because I was never required to play a raid to have a nice set. (Ravenloft have it too, but my gear was set in such way it was unlikely I would be able to enjoy any set bonus).

Hey Axel, thanks for the video! Just getting back into DDO after an almost 7 year hiatus. This video gave me and my buddies who picked up the game a great starting point for grabbing gear that I never had the chance to get previously as I was, and will most likely continue to be, a free-to-play cheapskate. Love DDO, but I have picked it up and put it down many times because of pay walls. The free month opened up a floodgate of content and I had no clue where to start with it. Thanks so much for the guidance! I'm not sure if you (or anyone else reading this) ever play spellcasters, but I'm on a first life sorc. Which area in the game has the best gear drops for evocation based sorcerors? I've played the crap out of Ravenloft, made it part way through gianthold and found gear lacking in power compared to ravenloft. Just finished the first 8 quests of Sharn and haven't found a single named loot piece. So far, Ravenloft is the best gear spot I've found hands down. However, the bonuses are starting to age since I'm lvl 16-17 now. Any tips?

Axel, do you recommend clearing the raven or sharn expansions on normal difficulty solo, or is it a must to do it on elite first try?

Need a update for faywild but overall great video man

i would add eveningstar favor for the key to the ES, unlocking fvs, art favor and sadly unobtainable quiver of alacrity

will there be part 2 ? maybe best sets for each class. best leveling gear and so.

Hey, I'm pretty new in DDO, can you do a video about augments? Idk who it works

checking every rare for the horse feathers, i managed 4 or 5 feather tokens per clear, took about an hour total.

yeah definitely get that ravenloft and sharn gear if you dont own it

Thanks for this video. So picking up on the new player loop... I am in Korthos and stalled on a quest NPC there (To Stormreach) Rinnar D'thuranni on the pier which tells me to talk to him about passage to stormreach however the NPC who has a green check over his head does nothing but shows dialogue of him saying his 'crew will not depart due to the dragon etc.". The green check over head has allowed me to complete and advance quests until now? BUT not with this guy. So how do I get to your Mount drop quest if they stop me in my tracks there? He also has a quest 'The Salavation of Korthos' which has stalled there as well for some reason. Is this about FTP benefits which is why I can not advance or am I missing something? I have joined the DDO Wiki page which works well for LOTRO but its not nearly as UI friendly and clear on the DDO Page? Hope its not a FTP issue otherwise back to LOTRO for me. That would be far to early to steer away players do storyline content being unavailable to progress so soon. If theres a site you can point me to that has these answers I can stop bugging you. Lol. Tks.

Dont forget heroic Abbot raid! Find high players to easily destroy it and get the gloves and more.

just a little correction, jibber’s blade can drop in heroics too, but only in the locked chest :)

You might want to do a re-do video for which adventure packs to buy so that it looks something like this: 1. Gianthold 2. VoN 3. Mists of Ravenloft (you can technically buy it for TP, and every TR does the chain at least once every life)* 4. Sharn (TR trains always do this, also in epics) 5. Sentinals of Stormreach (I see LFMs for this a lot more than Vale, for example) 6. Delera's Tomb (exclusively for VotM since the reward list got butchered) 7. Catacombs** 8. Keep on the Borderlands (for OP lvl 21 loot, nothing else)*** 9. Thunderholme 10. Nec 4 1-7 for heroics, 8-10 for epics. The first two are run way more than Vale ever will be. Also, all of Vale's raids (raids in general) are dead, so it loses its value there (w/o GS, which is impossible to farm up otherwise/still outclassed by RL gear except for on a few levels). Gianthold is always run, VoN, too. And they don't have worthless raids de-valuing them. The only thing Vale has going for it is its level range, but with Sharn out (and the fact that they are first-lifers), that doesn't mean much anyways. The glory days of the Shroud are definitely gone. (which is sad) (i.e. if they learn to bank xp, play at one level above instead of just getting packs that have quests at their level, they can still hit 20 easily) -Sands is pretty worthless too nowadays because the only quest in it that's ever run in a LFM is Wiz-king. Have fun farming up a Torc/Ring yourself in two months... -MotU is also never (emphasis on "never") run, buying it only to get ED's isn't all that practical. (good luck to the newbie trying to complete all 3 chains on his own). The raid is dead. -Tangleroot LFMs are less common... (non-existent, plus hires give DW for free) -Delera's is pretty (always) lacking in LFMs nowadays, and the reward list got cut. But VotM is still there, and epic, too. *Mists pretty much trumps every other pack in the list save GH and VoN for the fact that the gear is just too powerful. Sands, VoT raid loot... you name it. Conveniently, it costs more than double the best packs in-game. The raids are getting pretty dusty, though. **Thoughts on Catacombs: I see R1 LFMs going up way more than Tangleroot or anything else at its level (except for maybe WW, which is free anyways). So if newbs want to feel like they're actually playing a multiplayer game, then they should get catacombs (good loot is marginally important at low levels anyways, xp for a first lifer already covered). Also, it's epic now. ***LFMs for this one are going to decline pretty soon, though there do seem to be plenty of people in the public space. (in comparison to when Vale first came out, it's definitely not worth the price) Maybe you were picking from fun, loot, and xp for your original AP video, but especially today, there's a big gap between what's "fun" and what's "loot/xp". Most people are in the "loot/xp" group, but there are others still. Making two videos (one for fun packs, the other for loot/xp) would probably benefit new players today the best, given the game's atmosphere nowadays. But that is imo. This is speaking from experience on Thelanis (your server), just fyi.

Jibbers drop rate is crap, though. Useful, but be prepared for multiple, MULTIPLE tries.

When you say a certain pack has great gear or great sets you should give examples. More convincing/engaging that way.

so is there a guide for new players that want to stay in free 2 play getting and improving gear and gold or in game currencies

This game needs some kind of setup for a "realm" pvp and rewards in a zone or battlegroup. Law vs chaos vs neutral or good v evil v pve. I enjoy the pve but it's missing something..

I would, but I just quit playing. My VIP expired while I was hospitalized, and with a long road ahead of me, I can't see affording VIP again anytime in the near future, In the mean time, all the shared bank spaces I have bought are lost and my toon is frozen because he's an Alchemist which as VIP, you don't have the option to get and now I can't get it. They have basically left years of hard work unreachable by me. I don't have it in me to start over so I guess I'm done .

watching this video on May 1st.

Hi I need your help so I just started playing Dungeons and dragons online and I just finished the main quest and now I started a new quest in borderlands and my character is stuck in the corner and I can't move him or use any thing to get out and it started lagging and I don't know what to do can you pls help me.

I miss this game

amazed at how many people cant afford $15 a month for VIP. you are supporting the devs and gives you access to a lot.

You cant buy a mount btw

Dude. I have been watching your videos for nearly a year. I have just been too... shy? to say/ask this. Can you please stop "swallowing" in your talking? This is pre-recorded. You can do better. I know. Personal experience. It's just, I know it's my own problem, but I know my obsession and personal fixation on your swallowing (which you do in EVERY VIDEO, EVER, which is why for over a YEAR I have never spoke, I am too shy) but god damnit, it fucking breaks it for me, ever time.

Trying so hard to sale expansions for a game that is DEAD. Dont waste your time on ddo. The only ppl that play are staff. Just go back to WoW.