Grim Harvest – Rift World Event Guide

So, those of you that have been visiting this blog for a while should know that I love me some Live Events.

Thus it should come as no surprise that I was very excited when I heard that Trion would be having their very first one barely a month after the game released.

While I’m still a little confused as to the title of said event (they tossed River of Souls around everywhere pre-release yet now it seems to be called Grim Harvest in the UI/Achievements), that doesn’t mean I’m not ready to dig into it and post up all the juicy tidbits of information like I’ve done with guides in the past.

As Trion’s events are completely new to me, this guide will be a work-in-progress like my original WAR Live Event guides so make sure to check back often as I’ll be adding/updating information on-the-fly over the course of the event.

Enjoy!

~Gaar

Grim Harvest
(World Event – March/April 2011)

From her bastion in the River of Souls, Alsbeth captures the souls of the mightiest of Telara’s fallen villains.  Only the Ascended stand between this new army of monstrosities and the total destruction of Telara.

General Information

Grim Harvest started on March 30th and should continue through April 16th.  The event seems to come in three phases as follows:

1. Growing Darkness <–Completed
2. The Reaping <–Completed
3. Echoes of the Past <– Completed

The World Event Merchant for Defiants is named Boularna and is located at (5940, 5273) in the College of Planar studies in Meridian. (Alternately, one of the quest-givers, Seruldu Elhar, sells the items as well.)

The World Event Merchant for Guardians is named Brendnall and is located at (7505, 3099) in Thontic’s Row in Sanctum.  (Alternately, one of the quest-givers, Sister Belladonna, sells the items as well.)

The currency for Grim Harvest is Otherworldly Sourcestone.  You seem to get a single piece 2-6 from closing rifts or stopping the small invasion groups.  You now get 4 pieces for closing a Minor Rift and 8 pieces for closing a Major Rift.  However, it appears you get a stack of 10 or more for defeating a zone-wide invasion boss like the Harbinger of Alsbeth as well as a few for defeating invasion forces.

Unfortunately, it goes in your backpack instead of your Currency tab, so make sure to leave room for it.  It can also accidentally be sold to a vendor, so be careful!

It is awarded like Planarite from rifts/invasions as well as being a reward for completing the event-related quests.

Purchaseable Items for Grim Harvest

• Hagbrood Hatchling – 100 Otherworldly Sourcestone

Image courtesy of Niyoru – Faeblight Server

• Shade Touched Scarab – 100 Otherworldly Sourcestone
  

• Shade Touched Hound – 100 Otherworldly Sourcestone
  

Courtesy of Asmodel – Faeblight Server

• Touch of the Shade – 100 Otherworldly Sourcestone

Touch of the Shade – 30 minute buff – Lasts through ability use – Reusable

• Guise of Death – 500 Otherworldly Sourcestone

Guise you get is class-based (Cleric/Mage get caster, Warrior/Rogue get melee apparently) – Doesn’t break on combat – Images courtesy of Dnight and Big

• Vial of Liquid Shadows – 10 Otherworldly Sourcestone

The glow applied lasts for 24 hours – one use per Vial

• Lesser Soul-Iron Band/Loop/Ring/Signet – 50 Otherworldly Sourcestone – These items are unique-equip despite it not saying so (can only wear one)

• Soul-Iron Band/Loop/Ring/Signet – 100 Otherworldly Sourcestone – These items are unique-equip despite it not saying so (can only wear one)

• Greater Soul-Iron Band/Loop/Ring/Signet – 200 Otherworldly Sourcestone – These items are unique-equip despite it not saying so (can only wear one)

• Exalted Soul-Iron Band/Loop/Ring/Signet – 300 Otherworldly Sourcestone – These items are unique-equip despite it not saying so (can only wear one)

• Lesser Deathstones – 40 Otherworldly Sourcestone

• Deathstones – 80 Otherworldly Sourcestone

• Greater Deathstones – 160 Otherworldly Sourcestone

• Exalted Deathstones – 240 Otherworldly Sourcestone

• Sub-30 Trinket Set – 100 Otherworldly Sourcestone

• 30+ Trinket Set – 200 Otherworldly Sourcestone

• 40+ Trinket Set – 300 Otherworldly Sourcestone

• 50 Trinket Set – 400 Otherworldly Sourcestone

Phase 1: Growing Darkness

New rifts and invasions from the Plane of Death are appearing across the world.  Visit Sanctum or Meridian to learn how you can help defend Telara and earn Otherworldly Sourcestone, which can be used to obtain items of power and mystery.

• Prepare for Alsbeth’s impending assault on Telara!

Phase 2: The Reaping

Alsbeth is attacking Fortified Wardstones with undead Colossi pulled from the River of Souls.  Destroy these creatures in each zone to save Telara from Destruction!

• Shimmersand Defended
• Droughtlands Defended
• Freemarch Defended
• Stonefield Defended
• Scarlet Gorge Defended
• Gloamwood Defended
• Silverwood Defended
• Moonshade Highlands Defended
• Iron Pine Peak Defended
• Scarwood Reach Defended
• Stillmoor Defended

Phase 3: Echoes of the Past

Alsbeth has resurrected powerful commanders to lead her undead legions.  Travel to the portal opening at Caer Mathos in Stillmoor and stop her once and for all!

• Defeat Alsbeth at Caer Mathos

Grim Harvest Quests

So far there are only a handful of quests available, most of which are dailies.  This may change in each phase, so keep your eyes out for more!

Update: Quests are going to be adjusted so you can only complete them in the appropriate-level zone for you!  Keep that in mind when you go to do them from now on. The Harbinger of Sorrows quest is the one that was adjusted to work only on level-appropriate content.  The rest seem to be doable anywhere still as of 4/1/11.

Bolstering the Defense – Defiant/Guardian

This quest is a bread-crumb type quest picked up from NPCs at wardstones around Telara.  It leads you to the main quest-givers in Meridian/Sanctum and looks to be only available once.

The forces of Alsbeth have been growing stronger.  Her harbinger has been seen all over Telara, and the Plane of Death has been asserting itself everywhere.  She’s obviously planning some sort of assault.  We need to bolster our defenses in preparation for whatever may come at us.  The new Fortified Wardstones are a start, but we need your help.  Return to Meridian/Sanctum with news from the front.

• Bring the report to Seruldu Elhar in Meridian or Sister Belladonna in Sanctum

Seruldu Elhar is found right next to the Porticulum in Meridian at roughly (6154, 5177).  Talk to her to complete the quest if you’re a Defiant.

Sister Belladona is found right by the fountain in Tavril Plaza at roughly (7371, 3048).  Talk to her to complete the quest if you’re a Guardian.

We put so many of our resources into building the Fortified Wardstones, but these reports don’t paint a very pretty picture.  I’ll have to see what more can be done.  For now, get back out there and give those invaders a run for their money!

Rewards: 1 Otherworldly Sourcestone

Harbinger of Sorrows (Daily) – Defiant/Guardian

The Harbinger of Alsbeth has been wreaking havoc all across Telara.  Death invasions have filled the world with his blight.  Fight back, and seal 3 rifts from the Plane of Death.
Only rifts that give experience will give credit.

• Seal 3 rifts from the Plane of Death

From what I was able to tell, fully closing any Death rift gets you credit whether it’s a Minor or a Majorand regardless of zone as long as you’re in an appropriate-level zone for you.  I did both regular Death rifts and one of the new ones and got credit for every one, even when I showed up a bit late.

Well done!  Those death invaders will think twice when they see the likes of you!

Rewards: 15 Otherworldly Sourcestone

Exorcising Evil (Daily) – Defiant/Guardian

The Harbinger of Alsbeth’s invaders are using Corrupted Essences to fortify their power.  Please, <your name here>, find one of these Corrupted Essences, exorcise the corrupting energy within it, and return to me.

• Find a Corrupted Essence

You’ll want to track down an invasion group coming from one of Alsbeth’s Death rifts to loot this item.  If you find a Death rift and no one’s there yet, just stand outside it and wait for an invasion group to spawn and head out, then take them out.  (I tend to look for the invasion groups that have Werewolfs in them as they’ve dropped the item for me every time so far.)

Once you have one, click the icon in your quest tracker to use it.  An Ethereal Husk will spawn and you’ll need to kill it.  It is level-appropriate but does very little damage.  Once it’s dead, return to Seruldu Elhar/Sister Belladonna to complete the quest.

Well done, <your name here>.  The corruption within this essence has been purged.  Now it is nothing more than a shiny stone.  Perhaps my crafting friend will find a use for it.  Thank you again, <your name here>.  Take this reward as a symbol of my gratitude.

Rewards: 10 Otherworldly Sourcestone, XP

Shadows of Regulos (Daily) – Defiant

Found at roughly (6156, 5165) in Meridian

Regulos has ears everywhere.  With the ward in its current state his minions are even able to peek into Meridian itself.

Find these locations where the ward is weak and draw forth his minions.  Kill them before they can inform our enemies.

• Use the Shade-Tuned Planar Trap where the ward is weak in Meridian
• Shadow of Regulos (3)

These can be found throughout Meridian, even inside the buildings.

Once you find one, click the icon in your quest tracker to get the ground-target to show up, then click on the ground under the weakness.  A Shadow of Regulos (Level 15) will appear out of the void and you can then kill it (The NPCs around you will help, so if you’re lower than 15, try it anyway).  If you’re having trouble finding weaknesses, search around inside more of the buildings as there tend to be less people looking for them inside.

Perfect!

Rewards: 15 Otherworldly Sourcestone, XP, 2 Gold, 63 Silver

Shadows of Regulos (Daily) – Guardian

Found at roughly (7372, 3047)

They peer into our world, attempting to hear our plans, our secrets.  We can’t see them without enchantment, but they are always here.

Take the Sphere of Glimpsing and use it to pull agents of the foul Regulos into Telara.  It will strengthen the ward, and leave Regulos with one fewer minion.

• Use the Sphere of Glimpsing where the ward is weak in Sanctum
• Shadow of Regulos (3)

These can be found throughout Sanctum, even inside the buildings.

Once you find one, click the icon in your quest tracker to get the ground-target to show up, then click on the ground under the weakness.  A Shadow of Regulos (Level 15) will appear out of the void and you can then kill it (The NPCs around you will help, so if you’re lower than 15, try it anyway).  If you’re having trouble finding weaknesses, search around inside more of the buildings as there tend to be less people looking for them inside.

Well done.  Each minion slain makes the ward that much stronger.

Rewards: 15 Otherworldly Shardstone, XP, 2 Gold 63 Silver

With Death Denied (Daily) – Defiant/Guardian

You have done well in assisting with our defense <your name here>, but invaders still roam the lands.

This stone has been infused with the energies of the plane of Death and should make short work of the weaker invaders that threaten us.

Go, test it and see if we can use their power against them!

• 5 Invaders Destroyed

This quest only appears after completing the first three dailies.  Track down invaders from the plane of Death any type of invaders in any zone (the minions are what you need, not the bosses), target them, then use the icon in your quest tracker.  Once again, these are the invasion groups that are sent out from a rift.

So what happened <your name here>?  They blew themselves up?  I wasn’t expecting that!  I mean, it’s fantastic but we definitely need to study this more.  Thank you <your name here>!

Rewards: 10 Otherworldly Sourcestone

Diminishing Returns – Defiant/Guardian

A remnant from one of the outer planes, it appears to be some kind of shadestone.  This curious sample seems to be slowly disintegrating.  Return it to Seruldu Elhar/Sister Belladonna.  Perhaps she will understand why this would be.

• Bring the Evanescing Shadestone to Seruldu Elhar/Sister Belladonna

You start this quest by looting an Evanescing Shadestone from a Death rift.  This can be done in any zone from what I can tell.

Once you loot one it will inform you that it offers a quest.  Right-click it to start the quest.  All you have to do is return it to Seruldu Elhar in Meridian (Defiants) or Sister Belladonna in Sanctum (Guardians) to complete the quest.

Don’t wait around once you loot one though!  If you wait too long, the item fades from your inventory and you’ll have to track down another one.

This piece of shadestone represents a serious problem!  It appears to be a Evanescing Shadestone, a form of shadestone found in the River of Souls.  But this is strange, it looks to be losing its power.  Whatever is happening, this could be very bad for all Telara.  I fear taht if more of our once defeated enemies are resurrected from the River of Souls, we could be facing a total destabilization of the ward.

Rewards: 1 Otherworldly Sourcestone, XP, Completes the ‘Grim Survivor’ Achievement

Tools of Destruction – Defiant

I have yet to obtain the item that starts this quest personally, so can’t run down the specifics like the above quests just yet.  However, Tilunas from my server (Faeblight – Defiant) was gracious enough to let me grill him on some details as he had been lucky enough to loot the item.  So here’s what I have so far:

This quest starts by looting the Shadetouched Weapons Cache during one of the event invasions.  Currently it’s thought it comes from defeating the boss of the zone invasion, the Harbinger of Alsbeth. Apparently, it can be looted off any part of the event invasions.

Harbinger of Alsbeth

Once you have the item, right-click it to generate the quest.  At this point, I’m going to go out on a limb and say the requirements are probably the same regardless of your level as they seem pretty generic.  The requirements are the same regardless of level.

You have found a mysterious cache of shadetouched weapons.  These powerful instruments could do a great deal of damage to the enemy, but the set appears to be incomplete.

Recover the Missing weapons and return the cache to the hands of Boularna in Meridian.

• 5 Shadetouched Scepters – Found in Death invasions, presumably the invasion groups leaving rifts
• 3 Shadetouched Blades – Found in Death rifts
• 1 Shadetouched Executor – Found on a Death colossus

Wonderful!  These are prize weapons, indeed.  I will get this cache to the quartermaster, where they can be distributed amongst our forces.  Here, take this one for your efforts.  It is a prize like no other!

Based on that item list, it would appear to be completable in a single zone invasion (can be any Death invasion in any zone), but that depends on your luck with loot I’d guess.  You can even get the Scepters and Blades ahead of time from regular Death rifts and the invasion groups that come from them.  Once you’re done, you give the items to Boularna in Meridian.  She’s the World Event Merchant in the College of Planar Studies (5940, 5273).

As for rewards, it appears it’s class-based as Tilunas is a Rogue and was offered a choice between a Drake Spine Longbow and a Serrated Gravemaker Incisor.

Drake Spine Longbow (cache looted in Scarlet Gorge)

Serrated Gravemaker Incisor  (cache looted in Scarlet Gorge)

Serrated Gravemaker Incisor (cache looted in Iron Pine Peak) – courtesy of Dnight

His Shadetouched Weapon Cache was looted in Scarlet Gorge and the quest stated it was Level 30.  If the items scale like Trion said they’re supposed to, then one would hope the stats are better on the Level 50 versions. However, that is speculation until I can find someone who has said Level 50 version of the quest. (It has been confirmed that the weapons scale with level based on the zone you loot the cache in.)  Tilunas was Level 50 but the item gave him a lower-level version of the quest, one would guess because of the zone it was looted in.  One would also hope that the quest is repeatable so that you can get all of the available options, but all this may be wishful thinking.

Hopefully I’ll loot my own soon and can give you more information.  ~crosses fingers~

Rift/Invasion Loot

It wouldn’t be much of an event if it didn’t bring new loot!  Get it while you can because Trion has already said that it either won’t be seen again or will be ultra-rare if it sticks around.  (I’ll be updating this section as I get info/screenshots of everything.)

Grave Goods Box – Looted from closing a rift

Shroud of Anti-Life – Looted from an invasion force leaving a rift (breaks on ability use)

Spectral Horse – Looted from a Harbinger of Alsbeth invasion

~More coming soon!~

Grim Harvest Achievements

With the World Event comes limited-time-only Achievements!

Grim Bounty
Collect 300 Otherworldly Sourcestone.

• Collect 300 Otherworldly Sourcestone – From rifts/invasions/quests

Grim Hero
Participate in the Grim Harvest final event.

• Participate in the Grim Harvest final event – Participate in the opening of the River of Souls in Phase 3

Grim Protector
Participate in the Grim Harvest zone invasions.

• Participate in the Grim Harvest zone invasions – Participate in stopping the invasions in any of the zones during Phase 2 (Only needs to be in one zone to unlock)

Grim Survivor
Identify the origin of the Evanescing Shadestone
Prefix Title: Grim

• Identify the origin of the Evanescing Shadestone – Loot an Evanescing Shadestone and complete the quest it gives

Grim Victory
Unlock all Grim Harvest Achievements.
Title:  the Soul Survivor

• Grim Bounty
• Grim Protector
• Grim Hero
• Grim Survivor

Take Me To The River
Participate in the final River of Souls opening event.

• Participate in the final River of Souls opening event

Update: This last Achievement has been moved to the Raids>River of Souls section of the Achievements and has had its requirement changed.

~waves~

While the event is technically over, Trion introduced a few new things via the “River of Souls Reward Pack” so I thought I’d run through those real quick as kind of an addendum to the event guide.

Any character that you had made prior to the 4/20/11 update was eligible to receive an in-game mail from Trion that held the Reward Pack.

Once you accept the Reward Pack and right-click it to open it, you automatically receive the following two items which are used automatically:

Writ of the Grim Protector

Writ of the Grim Hero

These grant the Legacy Achievements that were only available to those that participated in Phase 2 & 3 of the World Event.

Based on whether you’re Defiant or Guardian, you’ll also receive one of the following items:

Defiant’s Seal of Purity

Guardian’s Seal of Purity

These are the quest-givers.  I’ll detail the quests below, but they provide a quick turn-in to receive two things:  250 Otherworldly Sourcestone & a Shadetouched Weapon Cache.

And finally, you had a chance to receive one of the following four items:

• Grave Goods Box – Common

• Shroud of Anti-Life – Uncommon

• Nimble Spectral Horse (90% Speed) – Rare
• Swift Spectral Warhorse (110% Speed) – Ultra Rare

Defiant Seal of Purity Quest

The Seal of Purity is only rewarded to those who have fought valorously against Alsbeth the Discordant and her risen hordes.  Return this seal to Asha Catari and you will be rewarded handsomely.

Asha Catari can be found in her usual spot in Meridian at roughly (6086, 5058).  Talk to her to complete the quest and receive your rewards.

Rewards:  250 Otherworldly Sourcestone, Shadetouched Weapon Cache

The Seal you hold is proof of your courage, and commitment to our cause.

Guardian Seal of Purity Quest

The Seal of Purity is only rewarded to those who have fought valorously against Alsbeth the Discordant and her risen hordes.  Return this seal to Cyril Kalmar and you will be rewarded handsomely.

Cyril Kalmar can be found in his usual spot in Sanctum at roughly (7513, 3049).  Talk to him to complete the quest and receive your rewards.

Rewards:  250 Otherworldly Sourcestone, Shadetouched Weapon Cache

The Seal you hold is proof of your courage, and commitment to our cause.

The Tools of Destruction quest these give is completed just like the one that was available to us during the event.  Simply loot the various items listed from invasion groups, rifts and a Colossus and then turn it in to the World Event Merchant for your reward.