NPC WOTG Access, Limit Break and new "Fellow Point" system

[Septimus]

All of my armor is locked, so I'm unfortunately not much help. I can say that between the fellow point update and the point where I bought my 4th lock, my NPC went through two natural hand armor upgrades. They were both along the heavy armor line (kote -> scorp. -> darksteel), even though I was NPCing in areas of different control.

Back when I did my upgrading, I just spammed max kill calls in Ronfaure and locked as each part came up (except for hands, because there wasn't a 4th lock back then). If you're having trouble now, you may want to try something along that line.

After the March update you can no longer get gear upgrades off of too-weak mobs, you have to kill EP+ mobs to upgrade gear now. When in doubt, do the coffer-key dropping mobs in the various beastmen strongholds, that is what always works for me.

[Suiram]

So today after 3 consecutive calls fighting the same mobs after legs hit Lv12 (75 total kills) the hand armor upgraded to Lv8. One thing I've been considering is this, there are 48 total possible upgrades, I wonder if it's tiered to where after a certain point you need to kill so many consecutive mobs to upgrade? For instance the slowdown occurred for me after exactly 32/48 upgrades (starting at 4/48). Is there anyone else whose armor is slow or not levelling, who are using mobs that give the NPC exp, and who have less than 32/48 combined upgrades among all four slots?

[Kurstone]

too weak mobs still upgrade npc armor, upgraded hands/body/feet with orcs/tigers in batallia for lv12 sandy armor, anyone here upgraded freestyle(beastman) path lately on demons? or what else? used 4 charges on demons/ahriman (TW) and nothing so far, i know its likely i need to use more calls, but wanna confirm before burning tactics on them.

[Septimus]

too weak mobs still upgrade npc armor, upgraded hands/body/feet with orcs/tigers in batallia for lv12 sandy armor, anyone here upgraded freestyle(beastman) path lately on demons? or what else? used 4 charges on demons/ahriman (TW) and nothing so far, i know its likely i need to use more calls, but wanna confirm before burning tactics on them.

Interesting. After the March update I called my NPCs in Oldton Movolpolis about 10 times and never got an upgrade. I fought demons in Castle Zvhal and got upgrades right away.

[Suiram]

Based on my experiences the last week or so, I'm beginning to think it might just be something as simple as the check for which slot to upgrade is now done before checking if it is locked. It would explain why I had a piece upgrade every call up until I locked 2 pieces, body and legs, after which I started getting calls with no upgrades. Then yesterday I burned 5 charges (signal pearl and 4 tactics pearls) all on mobs that gave my NPC max exp, and I got feet upgrade after the first one, feet upgrade after the 2nd one, at which point I locked feet and got no upgrade on 3rd and 4th, and then a hand upgrade on 5th.

Nothing conclusive to say the least, and doesn't explain why I didn't get a single feet upgrade prior, but would be something to look out for when more data comes in.

[Kurstone]

Interesting. After the March update I called my NPCs in Oldton Movolpolis about 10 times and never got an upgrade. I fought demons in Castle Zvhal and got upgrades right away.

me too i used like 6 calls in oldton and didn't get any upgrade, and i remember someone in other wiki saying gobs dont upgrade armor but idk.

[Suiram]

I saw that, too. It's just that one guy's research, but he says it suggests that the upgrade path is determined by monster class rather than by regional control. I guess it would make sense for them to implement a change like that with expanding into Campaign areas where it isn't so balanced as for regional control.

One thing that guy says it that Gobbues progressed him along Bastok path, and my own experience with Funguars has also been Bastok, so if there is any merit to that then perhaps it's broken down by category, like all Plantoids are Bastok, etc.

[Lordwafik]

NPC healers are smart now! Oh so sweet.

Instead of waiting until you hit yellow and immediately casting C5, they regularly cast C3 when you are at ~85% HP.

It ain't Regen, but it's a start.

edit: It's actually even better than that... it casts C3 when you need it, or C4 if you need more than C3, only casting C5 when you need more life than a C4 will give. So simple, yet so awesome.

If your NPC is giving you C4, I think it's time to call the FBI.

[FallingHigher]

Guess I'll share some my armour upgrading experiences.

Few months ago used to go to Ronfaure/Yughott and kill Orcs there. I did this like two months straight with the leg slot left unlocked. In all the time spent doing this I got only one upgrade to Eisendiechlings(lv4?). Naturally I was a little irritated that I didn't have more progress so I just thought I'd go level as normal to get points and upgrade that way seeing as it had just come out in the update.

A couple weeks after I read a theory where someone had gone to Uleguerand Range under beastmen control and killed rabbits and tigers, which resulted in their npc's unlocked body armour going down the sandy path. I was intruiged at this and wanted my own npc to have lv10/11 sandy armour so I thought I'd give it a go, as upgrading with fellow points was going a bit slow. Got my new tactics pearl on sunday as well as my signal pearl and headed down to Uleguerand with my npc's feet unlocked (they were lv3 windy, Seer's I believe). After using the first charge on killing tigers and rabbits I summoned my npc for the second tine and she was wearing the lv1 sandy feet. I kept going until I had lv4 sandy feet, then went back each day in the week with my signal pearl doing the same and surely enough the feet kept levelling until they got to the desired Adaman Sabatons I wanted. To add they didn't reset to lv1 at once just went straight through from lv1>10.

And yeah didn't see before I started typing this but @ the guy who had mentioned the theory about killing certain mobs for upgrades, I believe this to be the case also, as I was levelling in the Nest a few weeks before I stumbled on aforementioned theory, and my npc had I.M body (sandy path) which I had left unlocked(stupidly). At the time I thought regardless of where and what you killed I thought your npc's armour would advance according to which nation controlled that region (CN was under sandy control at the time). Anyway I called my npc again and she was wearing, low and behold, the lv1 bastok body piece, awful Lizard Jerkin. I was mainly killing fungars, scorpions and crawlers, so yeah wasn't going there again.

Afterwards I locked my hands, legs and feet (all were sandy path then), and left the ugly Lizard Jerkin unlocked a week after when I went to Kuftal. Was killing mainly crabs, but also scorps, cactuars and spiders and summoned her again and she was wearing lv1 windy body lol.

So yeah, I personally believe it's the mob type, which I wish I had found out a few weeks prior so I could've avoided all the setbacks. Now she has lv10 sandy legs/feet, and lv5 sandy hands which I'm working on atm, just upgrading with points.

[Ryphen]

I noticed when leveling my NPC that killing Steelshells in Boyahda made her armor progress down the Windy path, but killing Processionaires sent it down the Bastok path. Windy had control of the zone every time I was there.

I think raptors work along the Sandy path, because I got that armor the couple of times I killed them in Cape Teriggan when that was under Windy control.

[FallingHigher]

I noticed when leveling my NPC that killing Steelshells in Boyahda made her armor progress down the Windy path, but killing Processionaires sent it down the Bastok path. Windy had control of the zone every time I was there.

I think raptors work along the Sandy path, because I got that armor the couple of times I killed them in Cape Teriggan when that was under Windy control.

Yeah I was in the tree last night doing Steelshells only, with body left unlocked (need to farm up 60k fellow points still to buy the fourth lock option), and her body armour was levelling along the windy path.

[Gwynplaine]

Are these implemented yet, or is it more stuff from last update that isn't available yet?
http://wiki.bluegartr.com/Hmd._Omelette
http://wiki.bluegartr.com/Hmd._Salis._Steak
http://wiki.bluegartr.com/Hmd._Carbonara

[Kirschy]

Guess I'll add some experiences since I've been playing /w my NPC a lot.

I lvled from 30-41 on Goblins in Altepa. Never once got an upgrade to any of the armor she was wearing. She was stuck in the scale mail which she started in. (I killed specificalli only goblins.)

From 41-45 I moved to Beetles in Western Altepa Desert. After each call, my NPC had her boots upgraded (Along the Bastok Path). By the time she was 45 she had lvl 3 Bastok Feet.

Today I lvled her in Crawler's Nest. I killed a variety of mobs this time. Beetles, Crawlers, Scorpions, and Flies. She hit 46, and I called her again /w a tactics pearl and she had swapped her hands to Bastok lv1. After the tactics pearl I called her at a r. point and she still had lizard hands instead of upgrading.

To me it feels like certian mobs might give points to upgrade particular pieces. Such as Beetles doing Feet, and something in crawlers nest being hands.

[FallingHigher]

I think there may be a glitch with the fellow point system. Well not the point system itself, it's that I upgraded hands to lv5 sandy a couple months ago and kept them locked until now. I unlocked them and wanted to upgrade them through the same method as I levelled feet (killing tigers/rabbits in Uleguerand).

Been there five times this week now and after killing stuff I've had no upgrades after which I thought was odd. Dunno if it's bad luck and it doesn't always upgrade straight away or it's because there's some weird glitch that won't allow them to level up that way after upgrading with points. Just a small thought I had, I'm probably wrong.

[Suiram]

Did you have any other pieces locked? I do think it's a strong possibility as I said in an earlier post that it decides to upgrade a particular slot in a given call before checking if that slot is locked, occasionally leading to a string of failed upgrades if you have any locked coupled with the fact that certain circumstances seem to make it "prefer" to upgrade certain slots instead of a random distribution.

On another note, Raka is Lv63 now so my long journey of Brass/Electrumcap levelling is over. In the end I had over 35 calls, over 900 mobs killed, got Body, Hands and Legs Lv12, Feet Lv4, and whopping 10 agaricus mushrooms. I've locked feet now since I'll probably do Steelshells which the above post said are Windy, and may just buy the rest of feet with Fellow points after I buy the third duration upgrade.

[FallingHigher]

Did you have any other pieces locked? I do think it's a strong possibility as I said in an earlier post that it decides to upgrade a particular slot in a given call before checking if that slot is locked, occasionally leading to a string of failed upgrades if you have any locked coupled with the fact that certain circumstances seem to make it "prefer" to upgrade certain slots instead of a random distribution.

On another note, Raka is Lv63 now so my long journey of Brass/Electrumcap levelling is over. In the end I had over 35 calls, over 900 mobs killed, got Body, Hands and Legs Lv12, Feet Lv4, and whopping 10 agaricus mushrooms. I've locked feet now since I'll probably do Steelshells which the above post said are Windy, and may just buy the rest of feet with Fellow points after I buy the third duration upgrade.

Nah body, legs and feet were locked. It just seems weird I went from lv1 through to 10 consecutively with feet but haven't got any upgrades with hands yet.

[Kirschy]

Just lvled my NPC another two times in nest. First time I only killed crawlers, and had an upgrade on hands. Second time I only killed beetles, and body upgraded(Bastok path). I think Surium is right, and when you do each call, it decides which piece is going to get points.

[Rollercoaster]

Pre NPC update, I'd always followed another guide on NPC gear:
Mobs that are water based = Windy
fire = Sandy
earth = Bastok
dark = Beastmen
Never had a problem, rank 10 Windy body killing crabs/pugs in Saruta and rank 10 Sandy legs and feet killing Orcs in Ronfaure. But now they've changed it, no upgrades on the TW mobs. Reading what others have posted, I think it still is whatever mob belongs to a nation is what path they'll follow, just need to kill higher lvl ones.

[Septimus]

Are these implemented yet, or is it more stuff from last update that isn't available yet?
http://wiki.bluegartr.com/Hmd._Omelette
http://wiki.bluegartr.com/Hmd._Salis._Steak
http://wiki.bluegartr.com/Hmd._Carbonara

I suspect that they are from Mixed Signals like the other Homemade items, and that the personality of your NPC is what determines what item that you get. There are 12 Homemade items and 13 personalities, but one of the personalities is "Sisterly", meaning that each gender may only be able to chose from 12 personalities and one of the Homemade items is shared between the two.

Then it is just a matter of lining up the personalities with the items. Has anyone started an NPC since the last update who can shed some light on this?

[Xanthe]

Pre NPC update, I'd always followed another guide on NPC gear:
Mobs that are water based = Windy
fire = Sandy
earth = Bastok
dark = Beastmen
Never had a problem, rank 10 Windy body killing crabs/pugs in Saruta and rank 10 Sandy legs and feet killing Orcs in Ronfaure. But now they've changed it, no upgrades on the TW mobs. Reading what others have posted, I think it still is whatever mob belongs to a nation is what path they'll follow, just need to kill higher lvl ones.

Riddle me a Mandragora.