Credits to Toraso and the BnS Academy Discord
Part 0.5: Story
Most of story is fairly self-explanatory; you’ll want to do all quests that are either yellow (story), purple (training), or orange (raid). Raid quests only continue solo up to a certain point (after which you will need to complete the quest by doing the raid with an alliance), but are still integral in unlocking quests and receiving questline rewards.
With the awakening system, you’ll need to “redeem” achievements from Hongmoon Skills in your achievement menu (default hotkey “U”), and redeem the “Level 60” achievement when possible for skill points. Note that you should complete the purple quest “Legacy of the Hongmoon Clan” before starting on the last raid quest.
Part 1: Just Finished Story
Coming out of the story, you should have the following gear equipped (with your Hongmoon Points distributed among Offense and Focus, prioritizing Offense breakpoints first):
Dawnforged/Riftwalk Weapon
5 Pentagonal Gems (Diamond, Ruby, Amethyst, Citrine, and Sapphire)
Solak Accessories
Stormbringer Pet Aura
Stormbringer Heart
Stormbringer Soul
5 Set Skybreak Spire (BT) Soulshield, 3 Set Midnight Skypetal Plains (MSP) Soulshield
A note about the weapon: Story gives you Dawnforged/Riftwalk Stage 3 from a story raid quest, or you can purchase it from the merchant Junsorei in Mushin’s Tower.
Celestial Basin
Celestial Basin is located in the southeastern area of the Gunwon City area. You are going to be spending a lot of time here. The goal here is to farm Celestial peaches to turn into NPC Vendor Lee Youjin in exchange for upgrade materials, Soul/Mystic Badges, and depending on your current needs, various other items.
From the Peach Vendor in this area, you can obtain:
- Eminence XP Charms, available to HM14 and below characters
- Mystic Badges
And more!
The NPC in the middle here, Lee Youjin.
Dungeons At this Gear Level
You should be able to LFP (Looking for Party) into the following dungeons without issue, or join/create F8 lobbies for them. Doing these dungeons daily will help you build your gold reserves, and provide basic upgrade materials for your weapon. PLEASE REMEMBER THAT YOU SHOULD READ UP ON DUNGEON MECHANICS BEFORE YOU ENTER THEM, EXCEPTION BEING TO ANYTHING BELOW EBONDRAKE CITADEL IN THE F8 LIST.
- Cold Storage
- Heaven’s Mandate (Requires an Orb of Ascension)
- Tower Of Infinity 3 wins
- Naryu Sanctum
- Irontech Forge
- Ebondrake Lair
- Starstone Mines
- Hollow’s Heart
- Ebondrake Lair
- Starstone Mines
- Hollow’s Heart
Daily Challenge At this Gear Level
You should aim to complete the 3 easiest challenges at your current gear level. This will be Brawl in the Basin (kill 1 of the 3 basin mini bosses), and two of the remaining challenges off the Daily Challenge list for that day. This will allow you to start gathering materials and Solar Energy for you to use for your soul badge.
Weekly Raids/Challenge
At this point you should be able to get into parties recruiting for the Weekly raids Dawn of Khanda Vihar (DKV), Fallen Aransu School (FAS), and Snowjade Fortress (SJF). To unlock these raids, you need to complete the Orange quests “Dawn of Khanda Vihar” (done previously if you followed this guide) and “Fate of the Aransu”. You will only be able to complete these quests up to a certain point, and then it requires beating Raven King and Hive Queen to proceed (don’t worry about that now).
These raids give you a good amount of gold, Raven Feathers, Hive Queen Wings, and various materials. Do them every single week. Raven Feathers and Hive Queen wings are essential for upgrading the next 2 tiers of soul shields, as well as raid Legendary Accessories (Ring and Earring from Raven King, Necklace from Hive Queen)
Before you do these raids, accept the quest “Know Thine Enemy Part 1”.
This quest gives the last remaining pieces of the Skybreak Spire (BT) soulshield set, pieces 6, 7, and 8. It also rewards a Heptagonal Amethyst. It requires completing, in order:
- Fallen Aransu School
- Snowjade Fortress
- Hall of the Keeper
- Hall of the Templar
If you cannot find people willing to accept you into premade parties, feel free to make your own- just announce that you are recruiting for the weekly quests, and people will apply to join your party. Be sure to know the mechanics of these dungeons before you start doing them. The best time to do weekly quests is on reset day- Wednesday for NA/EU.
Part 2: Getting your First Legendaries
You should now focus on getting your legendary bracelet, mystic badge, and Soul Badge.
This will require completing at least two quests, The Dead Refuse To Die and Know Thine Enemy Part 2. Know Thine Enemy Part 2 is what gives you your bracelet, and The Dead Refuse To Die is a requirement to unlock Know Thine Enemy Part 2, as well as a source for your first mystic badge.
Quest: The Dead Refuse to Die
You must complete, in order:
- A quest to kill one of the Celestial Basin bosses
- Heaven’s Mandate
- Cold Storage
- A quest to defeat the Searstrike Sisters at the 16th floor of Mushin’s Tower
This awards your choice of mystic badge (refer to the BnS Academy class channel for which one you should pick).
Quest: Know Thine Enemy Part 2
This quest gives you your legendary bracelet (refer to the BnS Academy class channel for which one you should pick), as well as a Heptagonal Diamond. It requires completing, in order:
- Naryu Sanctum
- Irontech Forge
- Ebondrake Lair
- Starstone Mines
- Hollow’s Heart
Note that you must complete the second raid questline “Fate of the Aransu – Chapter 4: Vale of Tears” to access Ebondrake Lair.
Soul Badge
After about a month of playing, you should be getting close to having enough Solar Energy to buy your Soul Badge from Dragon Express (125 Solar Energy, or appx. 25 -30 Days of Daily Challenges). If you are one of the lucky classes that uses Eternity or Transcendence, you can instead buy them for 15,000 Celestial Peaches (or get them from Midnight Skypetal Plains), and skip the month wait. If you are a class that uses a soul badge from the Glory Token line (Glory or Sagewood), it may be possible to purchase it outright with gold, because Glory Tokens are usually very cheap on the marketplace.
Midnight Skypetal Plains
Midnight Skypetal Plains (otherwise known as MSP) is a 12-player instance that has no lockout, accessible from the portal near House of Pleasures in Zaiwei. The boss in Midnight Skypetal Plains, Sacred Longgui, has six stages, each with their own loot that drops once you defeat him. This loot can be exchanged in Midnight Skypetal Plains itself, featuring some rewards that otherwise only drop in raid instances with weekly lockouts.
Soulshield Fusing and Reinforcement
The soulshields you receive generally have random statistics applied to them, with the best rolls being Critical and then Accuracy for PvE. You can add further stats to the soulshields by purchasing (or crafting) Artisanal Shield Bases from F5. Once you have an Artisanal Shield Base, you can exchange it for a particular stat type in Dragon Express’s first tab, and then shift+click on a soulshield in your inventory to Fuse the Artisanal Primer into it. Keep in mind that stat increases are random, and that fusing into your soulshield more than once doesn’t necessarily make the stat higher. Always check the menu before pressing the upgrade button.
There is another method of upgrading soulshields called Reinforce or Reinforcement; this involves fusing the same type of soulshield together, such as a piece #3 Assassin BT soulshield with another piece #3 Assassin BT soulshield. This only upgrades stats that both soulshields share, but is separate from fusing the Primers and can be used in combination with it.
Dungeons At this Gear Level
You should be able to LFP (Looking for Party) into the following dungeons without issue, or join/create F8 lobbies for them. Doing these dungeons daily will help you build your gold reserves, and provide basic upgrade materials for your weapon. PLEASE REMEMBER THAT YOU SHOULD READ UP ON DUNGEON MECHANICS BEFORE YOU ENTER THEM, EXCEPTION BEING TO ANYTHING BELOW EBONDRAKE CITADEL IN THE F8 LIST.
- Cold Storage
- Heaven’s Mandate (Requires an Orb of Ascension)
- Tower Of Infinity 3 wins
- Naryu Sanctum
- Irontech Forge
- Ebondrake Lair
- Starstone Mines
- Hollow’s Heart
Part 3: Bracelet, Weeklies, and Hongmoon Skills
After you obtain the correct bracelet (consult a guide for your class and spec to determine if you need Divine Dragon or TIger), you should level it up to at least Stage 4. This can get a bit expensive, so make sure you do you dailies every day for as much gold as you can get.
Bracelet is often the most cost effective and most dramatic damage upgrade until it is maxed at Stage 10, so make it your #1 priority.
Hongmoon Skills
By now, you should be unlocking your Hongmoon Skills. You can obtain some of these via the Achievement Vendor in Zaiwei, Celestial Peaches in Celestial Basin, Clan Crafting, or lucky drops from older dungeons. You can also get them from the Zen Bean Trader in most towns, in exchange for Bloodstones (bought with Zen Beans) if you like PvP, since the only way to get Zen Beans is via PvP (Arena 1v1 or 3v3 Tag matches). Good news is Arena is gear equalized, so gear doesn’t matter, however, expect to lose a lot in the beginning, so grinding Zen Beans this way can be slow going. The daily quests from the PvP notice board can help.
Bloodstones can also be acquired from other miscellaneous sources, as they are a generic PvP material.
With the awakening system, you’ll need to “redeem” achievements from Hongmoon Skills in your achievement menu (default hotkey “U”), and redeem the “Level 60” achievement when possible for skill points.
Dungeons At this Gear Level
You should be able to LFP (Looking for Party) into the following dungeons without issue, or join/create F8 lobbies for them. Doing these dungeons daily will help you build your gold reserves, and provide basic upgrade materials for your weapon. PLEASE REMEMBER THAT YOU SHOULD READ UP ON DUNGEON MECHANICS BEFORE YOU ENTER THEM, EXCEPTION BEING TO ANYTHING BELOW EBONDRAKE CITADEL IN THE F8 LIST.
- Cold Storage
- Heaven’s Mandate (Requires an Orb of Ascension)
- Tower Of Infinity 3 wins
- Naryu Sanctum
- Irontech Forge
- Ebondrake Lair
- Starstone Mines
- Hollow’s Heart
Part 4: Black Tower and Hellion Dungeons
It’s time for you to Tackle Black Tower and get your Raven weapon! You will also start doing dungeons that reward Hellion Cores, and complete the Quest “Know Thine Enemy Part 2.”
Black Tower
This will be your first major raid. You can either try to find a Faction chat/Khanda Vihar area raid, or search for people recruiting for a raid in the BNS Raid Recruitment Discord (link at the end of this guide). Make sure to pick up the weekly quests for this raid at the Shrine of the Ascendant in Khanda Vihar.
Selection boxes for raid accessories will drop in Black Tower, so make sure to see what kind of bidding or priority system your group has.
Once you clear the final boss, don’t forget to finish the Orange Questline for “Dawn of Khanda Vihar”.
Upgrading your weapon to Raven tier
Time to get your next tier of weapon. This may take a bit of grinding to get enough gold for, but don’t get discouraged!
Going through the alternate weapon path (Dawnforged/Riftwalk) is cheaper than going straight to Raven from Baleful or Seraph. I would recommend doing this and swapping to Raven at stage 9. If you have an active clan, you can opt to instead keep on upgrading to Storm Dragon/Exalted to save costs, and switch to Aransu.
Dungeons At this Gear Level
You should be able to LFP (Looking for Party) into the following dungeons without issue, or join/create F8 lobbies for them. Doing these dungeons daily will help you build your gold reserves, and provide basic upgrade materials for your weapon. PLEASE REMEMBER THAT YOU SHOULD READ UP ON DUNGEON MECHANICS BEFORE YOU ENTER THEM, EXCEPTION BEING TO ANYTHING BELOW EBONDRAKE CITADEL IN THE F8 LIST.
- Cold Storage
- Heaven’s Mandate (Requires an Orb of Ascension)
- Tower Of Infinity 3 wins
- Naryu Sanctum
- Irontech Forge
- Ebondrake Lair
- Starstone Mines
- Hollow’s Heart
- Drowning Deeps
- Sandstorm Temple
- Ransacked Treasury
Links
All BnS Academy Dungeon and Raid Guides
Afterword
Some commonly used terms and abbreviations
A google document that explains some more common terms and abbreviations, and talks about basic game mechanics
Some words about clans: Clans offer the potential to skip weeks if not months of farming, by taking you into higher tier dungeons, potentially into the first raid in the game (Skybreak Spire/Black Tower), and by providing you with clan bonuses and crafting. A clan is not guaranteed to be good, but if you can get into a decent one, whether through the standard clan recruitment channel, Discord, friends, etc., it saves a significant amount of time and effort.
Some words about events: You can check what events are currently going on by browsing the news section on the official Blade & Soul website. These events are usually, but not always, easily done by new players, and provide lucrative rewards such as high-tier upgrade equipment, decreased costs to upgrade current gear, and more. Always try to do events if you can.
The original version of this guide was made by /U/MoonfireArt. I just updated/changed aspects of the guide to be more updated for the current July 25th patch and help people gear up more efficiently. You can generally find me in the BnS Academy Discord server, by the handle Toraso#6983. Best wishes on your BnS experience.
