Artificer Unlock Through Favor

[samthedagger]

I want to unlock the Artificer class through favor, but it looks daunting. My main toon is pretty much ready to TR but I think I want to try to unlock this before I TR so I would appreciate some thoughts and advice on ways to do this. Have you done it? If so, what strategy did you use? Obviously it requires doing pretty well in almost all the challenges, but some are just practically impossible to get a 6 star completion on.

[madmaxhunter]

That still bugs me. You can do it, if you run all the quests and raids on elite AND get all of the challenges to at least four stars, some will have to be all five stars (no, not counting epic, who runs those to five stars?). To me, it's buy at the store only. Sucks as a VIP.

[Malison]

That still bugs me. You can do it, if you run all the quests and raids on elite AND get all of the challenges to at least four stars, some will have to be all five stars (no, not counting epic, who runs those to five stars?). To me, it's buy at the store only. Sucks as a VIP.

The epic challenges are just as easy to get stars in as the nonepic challenges. That is, near impossible in Kobold Island, difficult in the Mansion, simple with coordination in the Palace, and trivial in Lava Caves.

@ OP: the strategy is run the flagging quests elite, run the raids at the highest difficulty you can find, and run all the challenges once on both nonepic and epic. It shouldn't be too tough to get a hard or epic hard completion of either raid; even on Cannith there's usually an EH run of each of them twice a week.

Getting stars on the challenges is generally easiest with a group of 2-3 self-sufficient toons. Being able to split up to complete multiple objectives at the same time is key, but the nature of double scaling means having a full group will do more harm than good.

4-6 stars are very reasonable almost all the challenges with the exceptions of: colossal crystals (past 3 is rough), dragon's hoard (120 kills almost requires a full group for larger incoming's, and the foreman has frustrating AI when you want him dead), and anything in kobold island.


Edit:
Thinking further, the mining challenges feel really easy to me perhaps because of the way I run them, which relies heavily on self-sufficiency of all party members. One person handles mining: lays torches, buys barrels, and protects the line and the entrance. A second person kills named objectives: the spectral dragon, the marilith, the fire giant warlock, etc. A potential third person does the running around objectives: find the azure motes, figure out where good mining patches are, etc. Parking a divine hireling at the entrance helps a little, as it will heal the kobolds so you don't have to worry about them.

[QuantumFX]

I want to unlock the Artificer class through favor, but it looks daunting. My main toon is pretty much ready to TR but I think I want to try to unlock this before I TR so I would appreciate some thoughts and advice on ways to do this. Have you done it? If so, what strategy did you use? Obviously it requires doing pretty well in almost all the challenges, but some are just practically impossible to get a 6 star completion on.

Do all the flagging quests on Elite and get as far as you can with the raids.

As for the challenges, I’m fortunate that I’m in a guild with people who got into the gear when it was released. Running the challenges with people you know makes the project easier to deal with.

Check out Ukenberger (aka Mr. Cow’s) YouTube channel. He has videos of the challenges that can give you an idea of how to tackle them.

Kobold Chaos is 6 starable. The rest of the kobold island challenges… not so much.

The Extraplanar palace quests are all 6 starable now. CR 25 has gotten a much needed difficulty revamp now that we can actually reach level 25.

Most of the Lava Caves can be 5 starred. The only exception (for me) is Colossial Crystals. Grabbing all 3 of the big crystals is a bear. However, 4 star completions are fairly easy there.

The Rushmore Mansion challenges can all be 6 starred now.

If you can’t get it done, you need to contact Feather_of_Sun and thank him for all the proxy nerfs to the cannith challenge gear.

[samthedagger]

Thanks for the information, guys. It is nice to know that it can at least be done. I am pretty good at farming some of the challenges for xp and mats. But finding a good group for stars seems difficult. Perhaps I need to start training with some guildies or find some like-minded folk who refuse to pay money for the artificer.

[Carkolda]

I personally unlocked it through favor. The suggestions are spot on. Elite flagging quests, then run all the non-epic quests on lowest difficulty possible and max star them. Then run the epics at whatever you can handle. Since they've fixed the scaling, bring as many friends as you can, especially in the Rushmore challenges. You invest maybe 5-6 hours and you can max out your stars and you should be able to just slog your way through the elite diff flaggings and you're set.

[Matuse]

I got it through favor, and I did it all solo except the two raids. Also did it without owning the House C pack, and went off of the free tokens. This is all pre-MOTU.

Blown to Bits, Power Play, Schemes of the Enemy: Elite
Master Aritificer: Normal
Lord of Blades: Hard
Behind the Door: 6
Kobold Chaos: 3
Buying Time: 4
Colossal Crystal: 4
Picture Portals: 6
Moving Targets: 5
Short Cuts: 1
Disruptor: 3
Labor Shortage: 4
Dragon's Hoard: 3
Time is Money: 4
Circles of Power: 4
ePicture Portals: 3
eMoving Targets: 4
eShort Cuts: 2
eDisruptor: 2
eLabor Shortage: 3
eDragon's Hoard: 3
eBuying Time: 4
eTime is Money: 3
eColossal Crystals: 4
=153 total favor.

[samthedagger]

I think one of the things I overlooked here is that the epic challenges have distinct favor from their heroic counterparts. This seems a little less daunting now.