Tales of the Aggronaut

Rift Puzzles and Cairns by Level

July 16, 2013 by Belghast

One of the coolest things that Rift has is hidden puzzles, cairns and static spawn treasure chests scattered throughout the world. Your instinct is to gather up the list and go after them as soon as you can… but since each of them gives you a physical reward… there is a bit of a trick to it. Essentially each puzzle or lootable in the world has a fixed level range… and in order to give you the best possible reward it is always a good idea to wait until exactly the maximum level.

Since I have a large number of friends just starting the game, I figured I would take a few moments to compile a list of puzzles, cairns and lootables by level range. This is in many ways a remix of the information found on KFGuides.com and I will be redirecting you there for the individual puzzle and cairn information. They have done a ton of work organizing this information I am just presenting it in a checklist form, similar to my bonus level ranges post from SWTOR.

Level 30 Rewards

Lake of Solace / Freemarch

The lake of solace is a really unique case. Not only does it have a puzzle deep within the lake, and a cairn, but it also has eight distinct lootables buried deep within the depths of the lake. Each one will give you a potion that is worth 8 minutes of underwater breathing. For location of the puzzle, tips for completing it, location for the cairn, and location for each of the 8 lootables please check out the following guide at KFGuides.

Silverwood

Silverwood is the starter zone for the Guardians and offers both a puzzle and a cairn that can be found. Unfortunately there are no lootables that I know of. For location of the puzzle, tips for completing it, and location for the cairn please check out the following guide at KFGuides.

Level 35 Rewards

Stonefield

Stonefield is the second area for the Defiant and is connected to both Freemarch and Scarlet Gorge. It has a puzzle and three separate Cairn locations. For location of the puzzle, tips for completing it, and the location of all three cairns please check out the following guide at KFGuides.

Gloamwood

Gloamwood is the second area for the Guardians and is connected to both Silverwood and Scarlet Gorge. It has a puzzle and a single cairn location. For location of the puzzle, tips for completing it, and the location of the cairn please check out the following guide at KFGuides.

Scarlet Gorge

Scarlet Gorge is the beginning of the mixed faction zones. It is connected to both Gloamwood and Stonefield and acts as a bridge between the two faction starter areas. It has a puzzle and a single cairn location. For location of the puzzle, tips for completing it, and the location of the cairn please check out the following guide at KFGuides.

Level 40 Rewards

Scarwood Reach

Scarwood Reach is a mixed faction zone and connects to both Scarlet Gorge and the high level zone Stillmoor. It has a puzzle and a single cairn location. For the location of the puzzle, tips for completing it, and the location of the cairn please check out the following guide at KFGuides.

Level 45 Rewards

Moonshade Highlands

Moonshade Highlands is a mixed faction zone and connects to Silverwood, Gloamwood, and the high level zone Iron Pine Peaks. It has a puzzle and a single cairn location. Please note, the puzzle requires two players to click in a pattern in order to complete the puzzle. I can be solo’d but is extremely difficult and requires perfect timing. I would highly suggest bringing a friend along for the trip. For the location of the puzzle, tips for completing it, and the location of the cairn please check out the following guide at KFGuides.

Droughtlands

Droughtlands is a mixed faction zone that connects to both Freemarch and the high level zone Shimmersand. It has a puzzle and a single cairn location. For the location of the puzzle, tips for completing it, and the location of the cairn please check out the following guide at KFGuides.

Level 50 Rewards

Iron Pine Peaks

Iron Pine Peaks is a high level zone and represents one of the three end game daily zones for the original game. It touches Stillmoor, Scarwood Reach, Scarlet Gorge, Gloamwood and Moonshade Highlands. It has a puzzle and a single cairn location. For the location of the puzzle, tips for completing it, and the location of the cairn please check out the following guide at KFGuides.

Shimmersand

Shimmersand is a high level zone and represents one of the three end game daily zones for the original game. It touches Droughtlands, Freemarch and Stonefield. It has a puzzle and a single cairn location. For the location of the puzzle, tips for completing it, and the location of the cairn please check out the following guide at KFGuides.

Stillmoor

Stillmoor is a high level zone and represents one of the three end game daily zones for the original game. It touches Iron Pine Peaks and Scarwood Reach and has a puzzle and single cairn location. For the location of the puzzle, tips for completing it, and the location of the cairn please check out the following guide at KFGuides.

Ember Isle

Ember Isle is a challenge zone that was released after the launch of the initial game. It featured level 52 or higher mobs and was designed for extremely well geared players. After the launch of Storm Legion they scaled back the mobs a bit to turn this into an alternate leveling zone. Unfortunately KFGuides seems to have stopped following the game as a result we have to rely on alternate sources for information. This zone has both a puzzle and a decent guide to locating it and completing it can be found here. Additionally if you prefer there are a number of youtube videos showing the process. I have not found a really good guide for how to get to the Cairn but you can find the location coordinates here. Additionally there are also a number of youtube videos showing the path.

Storm Legion Puzzles

In Storm Legion they seemed to shift the focus of these puzzles away from being an excellent source of gear, to being a way to collect various items for your dimension. I still love the concept of in game puzzles so I myself will be tracking these down and completing them. Previously I had only completed the original puzzles and did not even realize there was a puzzle on Ember Isle or that the tradition had continued into Storm Legion.

Essentially there are puzzles now in City Core, Kingsward, Moriban, Steppes of Infinity, Seratos, and Eastern Holdings. The Stylish Radish of Better Homes and Dimensions has an awesome guide that outlines all the things you have to do to complete the puzzles of Storm Legion. Many of them seem to have collection prerequisites, and essentially unlock new items for you to purchase on Omi the Mistress of Puzzles in Tempest Bay.

That’s All Folks

That is all I currently know about puzzles and other nifty things out in the world in Rift. Hopefully compiling this will help someone out there. Remember for the old world puzzles and cairns, wait until the level listed before completing them to assure the gear is the best possible you can get.

Crashing Castles

July 16, 2013 by Belghast

Good morning you happy people… and this time I actually mean it. I am not sure what it was… the fact that I was completely exhausted by the end of the day, the hour or so I spent playing with friends… or the 15 minute walk I took before bedtime… but something helped. I went to bed around 9 pm and slept the entire night through without any panic attacks. Probably some of the best sleep I have gotten in awhile. So thank you all for the varied suggestions yesterday on the subject.

Crashing Castles

One of the best side effects of the steam sale, is it is a great opportunity to get your friends hooked on amazing games when they get priced on the cheap. I’ve been a huge fan of Castle Crashers for years, and used to play it with some friends on the Xbox 360. When it was released on steam… I picked it up immediately because seriously… it is worth buying on every platform you own. Right now it is going for the absolutely bargain basement price of $4 as part of the daily sale… and should be up there for at least another 24 hours.

As a result I got recruited last night when Ashgar picked up multiple copies of the game and gifted it to anyone who didn’t already have one. I have to say this was exactly the type of fun I had been needing. For me, Ash and Tam it was much like coming back home to our side scrolling fighting game roots… and we all adapted pretty quickly. Rae on the other hand, we could tell never really played that type of game… this compounded with the fact that she was playing with the keyboard… made the evening frustrating for her.

On that note… I highly suggest you pick this title up especially if you hail from the era of Final Fight and Double Dragon. But if you do so… I also highly suggest you have a gamepad to play it on. This was designed to play with an Xbox 360 controller… and I feel it plays best when I use that. It is completely playable on anything else however… but just remember all the tips and suggestions given in game… will be geared towards that specific controller. It won’t say press heavy attack… it will say press Y.. so if you are using something else there had to be a bit of translation in your head.

Just as a note to anyone on my steam friends list. I will almost never turn down an opportunity to play some castle crashers. There is something about this game that is so pure and fun that it just takes me back to the days of feeding quarters to gauntlet or teenage mutant ninja turtles and playing with three other friends. I really hope they create a sequel someday that is just as fun. The only game that I might like more than this as far as side scrolling beatemups… is Guardian Heroes… if it ever made its way to steam I would be immensely happy. Speaking of which… I need to get some people together to play the D&D Shadows of Mystaria steam port.

Granite Falls

Right now on my little warrior I am slowly making my way through the granite falls area. Stonefield has always been one of my favorite areas in the zone, in part because it was the area shown in the original cinematic trailer for the game. Additionally the town of Granite Falls is one of the prettiest in the game, and the falls themselves have always looked extremely epic. Sooner or later I will end up having to buy the Granite Falls dimension so I can have my very own copy.

I am up to my favorite quest chain as well, involving the crypt near town. Essentially giving me ANY quest chain involving undead and I will be happy. I started working on this over lunch, and got about halfway through the sequence of quests before I got drafted for castle crashers last night. My hope is that today I will push through the rest of Stonefield and move on to the Scarlet Gorge area. I feel like this is an area that just does not get enough credit in the game. I will have to play up another character when they have gone through with the redesign of the zone that is supposedly in the works.

Defying Reason

Also over lunch yesterday I decided on a whim to boot up Defiance for a little bit. I have an odd relationship with this game. I like it mostly… but I just can’t seem to take playing it for very long. I am happy to log in, kill a few rounds of mutants, maybe complete a quest… ride around in my dune buggy for a bit… and then log. I figure it would be much more enjoyable if I was playing regularly with a large group of people, but solo I seem to have a very short attention span.

I guess overall I just don’t like shooters as much as I once did… and the whole behind the back shooter thing works well but feels just awkward enough to give me a low tolerance for it. I really like the television show and the world, but so far I see little resemblance between the two other than having my very own “cat woman” telling me what to do. I just wish that the story had been set in the St. Louis area that we are vaguely familiar with in the television show… instead of out in California. Additionally since I am NOT from the California area and have never been… there just isn’t the same payoff as there is for other people. I didn’t realize that Mount Tam was an actual place… but I would have been able to pick up landmarks in Missouri.

Ultimately it is a good game… and it is pretty enjoyable… but I have the same patience with it that I have for Borderlands 2. I seem to be happiest when I play in spurts, unlike my friends that can literally play Borderlands 2 for hours and hours on end. Defiance definitely scratches a similar itch for me… and I finally found a weapon that I like. Essentially it is a heavy energy machine gun thing… reminds me of shooting a BAR in the WW2 area shooters. I can take down the baddies pretty successfully with it… but I cringe at the thought of eventually out leveling it. I have yet to find another weapon that I enjoy anywhere near as much as it.

I think this will continue to be one of those titles that I boot up every now and then… but never really dig too far below the surface. Additionally the game feels very “un-social”, and very much single player. I rarely if ever end up encountering other players when I play, and if I do they are usually buzzing around on their way to the next objective. I am sure this changes as you get higher in the content, but I am still in the starter area essentially. I could push through I am sure and get to the next area… but I figure why force myself when I seem to be enjoying little spurts of play here and there.

Wrapping Up

Well it is that time again… I need to wrap this up so I can get on with my morning and get into work. Today is trash day, so I need to make sure that is out by the curb. Additionally I really need to run some stuff by the cleaners. If I don’t get a start on these things I will end up extremely late for work. Right now I am essentially the boss, as mine is off on vacation… but it sets a bad example if I start slacking myself in the process. I hope you all have a great day… and here is hoping that today will be relatively panic free.

Don’t Panic

July 15, 2013 by Belghast

Good morning you happy people… with the most forced cheeriness I can possibly muster. I had a pretty lousy night last night… and was unable to get to sleep until well after 1:30 am. I will get into the whys a bit later, but suffice to say… today is my first day back at work since the July 3rd. To raise the ante a bit, my boss will be out of the office and as a result I will be filling in for him in all the meetings he attends. This essentially is the equation for one of the most un-enjoyable weeks I’ve probably ever experienced.

Don’t Panic

I’ve been experiencing what has been termed panic attacks of varied levels of severity for some time. When I had my first ones… I literally thought I was having a heart attack… and as such was told to rush to the emergency room. At which point they hooked me up to an EKG, did some blood work… and essentially told me that I had had a panic attack. The problem is… were this a one time occasion I could take it in stride. This ends up happening most nights when I go to lay down and start trying to pack away the thoughts from one day and prepare for the next.

Last night was another night where I was in the thrall of the panic rollercoaster, and as such just could not sleep. The particular recipe last night was far less about a heart attack sensation… and more about hyperventilating, a feeling of shortness of breath… which is odd because I know the difference from being a life long asthmatic. I literally tried everything I could think of to calm myself down. I tried some deep breathing exercises and they worked exactly as long as I was doing them. Once I stopped for a moment… my body went back into full freak out state.

Essentially from what I can tell this is all being caused by the very real anxiety I experience at work. Essentially everything is in a state of turmoil. We are a ship without a rudder right now, and without a strong force at the head of our department… we are constantly shifting priorities based on which is thing is the most political advantageous. As a result my work world is pure hell, and I have no stability at all. This is something that I am finding out I guess my mind craves… stability.

What is so frustrating… is I understand what is going on… but I seem to be completely helpless to stop it. I had a pretty major freak out session during the day on Saturday… and at the suggestion of my wife I had a beer and seemed to calm down. So last night I tried the same thing… the last thing I want to end up doing is medicate with alcohol… but I was desperate. Unfortunately… that “fix” seemed to be a one time only thing… and in truth after I had finished my hard cider… everything seemed to get worse.

I essentially know it is work related because while we were in Albany… I had absolutely no panic attacks whatsoever. It was only once we returned… and I started to dread this work week that they came back with a vengeance. Ultimately I am going to have to see some form of medication to get me through these. I’ve never been on any form of a mood altering medication… and I have avoided them like the plague. However I am feeling like I need something, to help my body realize what my mind already does.

Elite Loyalty

Last night I managed to push across the loyalty barrier for the next tier. Upon completing the “purple” tier I got what is probably my favorite loyalty reward yet. I now have the option to display the red thorned “elite” mob portrait ring on my own player portrait in the UI. This is one of those little things that just feels cool. While roaming the world that portrait ring is ubiquitous with danger… and being able to rock that appearance on all my characters is just slick.

Additionally I got the Loyal Helmed Murdantix mount for all of my characters, and you can see my baby warrior riding it. It is extremely similar to the Ancient Murdantix mount that dropped in a raid instance, but it has the extra added bit of having a really cool helmet / blinder on it. For whatever reason it feels so much cooler to me than the old one. I’ve always loved the various “biped running on all fours” style mounts, but this is probably my favorite of them so far. It feels like I am riding a troll or werewolf or something similar into battle.

Of late I have been splitting my time mostly between Belghast@Faeblight the little warrior shown above, and Belgrave@Deepwood my level 53 nightblade/riftstalker rogue. I am still having a blast on both… especially the baby warrior. Which I am sure seems a bit insane since I have a level 60 warrior already. I find it interesting to play through the old content with fresh eyes. I working with the Dark Thane prebuilt spec, and it has changed massively since I last played it. I am enjoying the sense of discovery each time the game gives me a new ability to play with. Essentially it lets me learn the spec an item at a time, rather than being deluged with everything it offers at once at level 60.

On Belgrave, I have just started Seratos and am making my way slowly to Necropolis. I really love the dark bone woven zones of later Dusken… and they all seem to be carnage quest bonanzas. I am a major junkie when it comes to those kill quests… I just wish the reward source stones were actually useful to Belgrave. I have essentially purchased everything I can upgrade wise with them for awhile. I still have yet to figure out what exactly to do with the excess ones. If you guys know some cool use for them other than the gear upgrades… let me know.

As an indication for how much I am enjoying Rift… yesterday I took a break from my NDA bonanza just to get in some play time. That is saying a lot… because I love beyond love the game I am playing that is still under NDA. One of the interesting things about the free to play conversion is the daily and weekly gifts. Which surprisingly got upgraded massively when I bumped up to this next tier of loyalty. Instead of purple boxes… I started getting orange ones… and out of my weekly box I pulled a orange deeps box… which netted a really nice purple dps weapon for Belghast@Deepwood.

I find that the draw of knowing I have a new box every day keeps me logging in regardless of what else I am playing. It is something extremely simple but for me… it is effective. After logging in… I usually end up playing around and questing or crafting or even just hanging out in guild chat and talking. I love that Trion chose to use the carrot and not the stick when it came to the free to play conversion model. It seems to be working, because I am seeing lots of people online quite often. Would be awesome if I could get more of a critical mass there so we could do bigger things.

Wrapping Up

Since I am thoroughly out of it… I need to get this morning thing underway. I hope I survive the day with the small modicum of sleep that I was able to get. I also hope that today ends up being far better than I have made it out to be in my mind. I pray beyond reason that I can have a night off from the panic attack rollercoaster, because it is pretty much the opposite of fun. At least I guess if it happens again I can continue building in Minecraft… which is what ultimately caused me to calm down enough to sleep. I hope you all have a great day… and I hope it is stress free.

Paradigm Shifts

July 14, 2013 by Belghast

Once again this morning I am sitting down to write about what I did last night… but finding it that I can’t really discuss anything I did last night. As a result I am searching the depths to find a topic to talk about that doesn’t break those three magical letters… N, D and A. The big news today… are things I don’t really want to talk about… so I want to talk instead about a few paradigm shifts that have really made a difference in my life, and changed the way I look at things.

Steam Sale Season

Right now it is essentially Christmas for PC gamers… because the ever increasingly insane Steam digital distribution sale is going on. For the last three summers, Steam has brought us PC titles discounted as much as 80% off retail price and quite frankly I have gotten used to this concept. What the Steam sale has done for me… is made me realize that if I wait a bit… I don’t have to pay the retail price for a game. While this concept seems simple… it has permeated the way I view gaming in general.

Essentially I have reach a point where most games just are not worth the ubiquitous $60 price tag. They are worth something to me… enough so that I wouldn’t even dream of pirating a game these days… unlike the heady college days of downloading whatever I could get my hands on. The problem is… the amount of money I am willing to pay is far from what the game companies want to charge.

It is like I have developed these containers in my head and as something comes out I immediately slot the title into one of them based on my interest. The first bucket is… that I want the title at release and am willing to preorder it. This bucket seems to have the least number of titles that fall into it… and is reserved for those game series that I absolutely love and will happily consume anything that is released as part of it. See The Elder Scrolls, Fallout, and Bioshock’s of the world.

The second bucket is… I am interested in the game, but only willing to buy it if the price drops. This is a larger group of games, and most of these are things I think I would like but don’t necessarily align to my “favorite” types of games. I am always looking for a deal… and I am willing to entertain these games if a significant deal arrises. The third bucket is… I am interested in the game, but only willing to buy it on one of those insane steam summer sales. I am talking about when a $60 game sells for $4 type sale.

Finally of course there is a bucket that the game genres I just have no interest in. The odd result of all of this is that I only really pick up games if they are on sale. I find myself less and less willing to pay even $40 for a new game… but instead am willing to wait out the good deal. This has trickled down into all aspects of gaming… and I find it particularly jarring now that I have re-engaged with the console gaming world. A world where essentially you have three options… pay $60, wait for the red banded edition for $20 or buy them used.

Coming from the steam world… console gaming feels fundamentally broken. Most games are not worth $60 to me… and quite frankly a large number are not even worth $20. For console titles… I tend to snap them up when they are $15 or less… that is the price point I am comfortable taking the risk on. So as a result… I pretty much only buy my games from pawn shops and other non-gamestop used game sellers. All of this is 100% a direct result of the training that steam has given me… to always look for a deal… and that I can always get the game cheaper somewhere else.

Amazon Prime

Another huge shift for me was when I decided to pony up for the $70 a year that upgrades your Amazon account to Prime. The free video streaming sounded tantalizing… but quite honestly they are so far behind the curve in letting you filter the content… that we never end up using it. For me the real meat of the prime deal is the fact that it gives you free second day shipping on any item you order that supports the prime program. This has completely changed the way I look at shopping in general.

I have never been a big showroomer, in that I went to the store… and then ended up purchasing online. Quite honestly if I can skip the whole going to the store experience I will every time. The decision point always came down to… wether or not this was something I needed quickly. If so I would end up trekking out to Best Buy and dealing with the annoying blue shirt mafia just to get the item I needed. Instant gratification has a price… and it was both a monetary and annoyance price for me.

The thing that Amazon Prime does is change the equation entirely. How often do you actually need an item without a few days notice? I have come to realize that most of the time there are very few absolute emergencies that necessitate me going out to a store to buy something. Even in those situations… Prime members get a significant reduction in next day shipping as well. In almost every case over the last few days… I have been able to wait the few days it would take for it to arrive. Previously it used to take roughly a week to get an item from Amazon, but lowering that shipping time to two days… was a complete game changer.

The only negative effect is it drives my wife insane. She feels like we are always receiving a package from Amazon, but in every case… these things are items I would have had to go out to a store to purchase. I would much rather do my research online, do my price comparisons online… and finally order online. Being an introvert, anything that keeps me from having to deal with salesmen is always a positive. Additionally there are a lot of things I simply cannot get in a store around me. Tulsa is not exactly a huge market… for example the closest IKEA to us… is six hours away.

For example… yesterday while running around town we decided to pop into Ulta to see if they still had the pomade I use. It is the only product I have ever found that adds hold and body without making my hair feel “crunchy” like a gel. The stuff is fairly expensive, but it literally takes me 2-3 years to go through a container. After roaming around the store we finally asked a guy stocking the shelves… and he indicated that they no longer carry it.

Previously my choice would have been to find a new product, which involves a lot of trial and error and a lot of buying expensive containers that you end up not liking, or I could have gone to the other Ulta locations in town hoping that there was an off chance that one still had it on the shelves. Instead my wife whipped out her phone, looked it up on Amazon… and I will have my container here on Tuesday. Essentially knowing we have fast and free shipping on whatever we want to order has completely changed the flow of our purchase decisions.

The Next Thing

I am not sure what the future will bring and what new paradigm shift will come with it. I feel that television and movies are fundamentally broken right now. In order for them to survive they will have to come up with a new and more equitable system for the customers. A prime example is that my wife after returning from the forensics workshop wanted to watch some of those early episodes of CSI… back when it was more focused on the science and less on the interpersonal drama.

We got home… fired up Netflix… and while CSI Miami and CSI New York were available… the original was not. I checked Amazon Prime and the same thing was true. I fired up a trial account for Hulu Plus only to find they had access only to CSI Miami. If your television show is not available on any of the three major streaming services… you are essentially fucking over your fans. I checked Amazon, and it would have cost $1.99 an episode… or $24 a season. Quite frankly a television show is just not worth that to me, and I have no real desire to own media… I just want streaming access.

Instead we went out to a local used chain… Vintage Stock and paid $10 for a DVD copy of Season 1… and I am now in the process of ripping and converting them to digital format. All so we can consume the content in the way we choose. This entire process is broken… and hopefully someone will fix it. I feel like the whole concept of broadcast television is equally broken. Having to wait for a show to come on in the world on on demand streaming just feels extremely archaic.

Hopefully someone will come along and design a system that provides one subscription with all you can eat programming and make it work in a way that the old media dinosaurs can profit from. Ultimately companies are going to have to realize that some money is better than no money at all. Had we struck out on getting a used copy of CSI… I would have pirated the content out of spite. Essentially they gave me no legal means to stream their content. Customers want to give you their money, but they want to do it in a way that makes them feel like they are not getting bent over in the process.

Wrapping Up

Well we are just about to watch some of those said CSI episodes… but I have been delaying the process since I type much faster when I do not have to filter out the television. As a result my wife has been patiently waiting for me to finish up this post. I hope you all have a great Sunday, and that the start of the work week begins in a not too painful way. Mine will be a hassle since I was gone a full week.. and often times various bits of work stacks up waiting on me. Thankfully now that I have some awesome co-workers they tend to take care of 90% of it.