Challenge Run: White Gear Warband

Inspired by the WoW Iron Man Challenge, the naked hunter, pacifist challenges and the neutral pandaren who hit level cap... I propose a challenge for those who want something more fiesty than a normal levelling experience.

White Gear Warband

Rules:

• White gear only. No fine, masterwork, rare exotic, ascended or legendary weapons or armour, except for trinkets and aquatic headgear.

• Fine trinkets and a breathing apparatus from karma merchants are permitted, as white versions do not exist. A true Warband member does not fear the finer things, provided they are earned through toil.

• No transmutation other than cultural armour. A true Warband member does not hide gear behind fancy illusion, but may display the armour of their culture with dignity and honour. Gear should be dyed white (or as close to as budget allows) with details in blue permitted if fine trinkets are used.

• Potions, food and utility items are encouraged. A true Warband member does not go into battle without studying their enemies.

• No waypoint use. A true Warband member fears not the open road, whether it be by foot, saddle or Asura gate.

• If you are defeated, you are disavowed. A true Warband member knows no defeat. The fallen are remembered with honour, but with the knowledge that they may never again raise arms in the name of the Warband. (Dead is dead.)

• Start at level 1. No experience boosts, no writs, tomes or level boosts. A true Warband member knows the value of hard work. Food and utility with an experience boost is allowed as a Warband member should go into battle well fed and ready to fight with a well-maintained weapon.

Addendum:

• Salvage and gathering tools can be of any rarity.
• Cosmetics that add zero gameplay benefit (mount skins, minis) are accepted.
• Crafted gear, including gear from other characters, should be declared but is otherwise accepted.
• TP and merchants are fine, as long as the gear is white (or rare/blue for the aquabreathers or trinkets).
• Enhancements/jewels etc may be blue/rare.

The goal is simple: get as high level as you can without being defeated or breaking the rules of the Warband. Think of it as an unofficial Hardcore Mode/Survival Mode (hence the food: it simulates hunger).

Anyone interested? I was thinking of putting a guild together of people who want a challenge to support, encourage, mourn the fallen and attempt content together without making life harder for other teammates.

@Gulbasaur.1865 said:Inspired by the WoW Iron Man Challenge, the naked hunter, pacifist challenges and the neutral pandaren who hit level cap... I propose a challenge for those who want something more fiesty than a normal levelling experience.

White Gear Warband

Rules:

• White gear only. No transmutation. A true Warband member does not hide gear behind fancy illusion.

• Fine trinkets from karma merchants are permitted, as white trinkets do not exist. A true Warband member does not fear the finer things, provided they are earned through toil.

• Potions, food and utility items are encouraged. A true Warband member does not go into battle without studying their enemies.

• No waypoint use. A true Warband member fears not the open road, whether it be by foot, saddle or Asura gate.

• If you are defeated, you are disavowed. A true Warband member knows no defeat. The fallen are remembered with honour, but with the knowledge that they may never again raise arms in the name of the Warband. (Dead is dead.)

• Start at level 1. No experience boosts, no writs, tomes or level boosts. A true Warband member knows the value of hard work. Food with an experience boost is allowed as a Warband member should go into battle well fed and ready to fight.

The goal is simple: get as high level as you can without being defeated or breaking the rules of the Warband. Think of it as an unofficial Hardcore Mode/Survival Mode (hence the food: it simulates hunger).

Anyone interested? I was thinking of putting a guild together of people who want a challenge to support, encourage, mourn the fallen and attempt content together without making life harder for other teammates.

Why bwhite gear, just go full naked :P

I would be up for it. But I would like one concession. I would like to use transmutations to change to Charr cultural armor only. Too much of the basic armor was obviously designed by snacks, er, humans. I don't like looking like some little girl's pet kitty playing dress up.

@Lamont.5973 said:I would be up for it. But I would like one concession. I would like to use transmutations to change to Charr cultural armor only. Too much of the basic armor was obviously designed by snacks, er, humans. I don't like looking like some little girl's pet kitty playing dress up.

Your reasoning is sound. Rules are amended to permit cultural armour transmutation.

Snow Albankin, the Guardian of Hoelbrak.

Declaration of stupidity: used a waypoint because I forgot.

I like this idea! I once tried to play naked (with an outfit but no armour) and allowing no deaths and it was fine until about level 20, then got noticeably harder. I think I was around level 25 when I died. This sounds like it might be more practical. And since I have a spare slot and I'm getting bored with my usual low level temps I think I'll try this. :)

Few questions:

1. Can we buy new equipment and consumables from NPC merchants? Or from the TP? Can we craft it?
2. Can other characters on the account craft stuff for this one? Or are they completely stand-alone?
3. Can we use cosmetics that don't require transmutation, such as mount skins, glider skins, minis etc?

@"Danikat.8537" said:I like this idea! I once tried to play naked (with an outfit but no armour) and allowing no deaths and it was fine until about level 20, then got noticeably harder. I think I was around level 25 when I died. This sounds like it might be more practical. And since I have a spare slot and I'm getting bored with my usual low level temps I think I'll try this. :)

Few questions:

1. Can we buy new equipment and consumables from NPC merchants? Or from the TP? Can we craft it?

Yes, yes, yes. As long as it is white/common (or blue/fine for trinkets and aquabreather).

2. Can other characters on the account craft stuff for this one? Or are they completely stand-alone?

Eeeeeeeh. I'm inclined to say yes if you declare it.

3. Can we use cosmetics that don't require transmutation, such as mount skins, glider skins, minis etc?

I see no reason why not. White with touches of blue is encouraged.

Also, I've created a guild on EU. If anyone wants to set up a NA counterpart, go for it.

@Gulbasaur.1865 said:

@"Danikat.8537" said:I like this idea! I once tried to play naked (with an outfit but no armour) and allowing no deaths and it was fine until about level 20, then got noticeably harder. I think I was around level 25 when I died. This sounds like it might be more practical. And since I have a spare slot and I'm getting bored with my usual low level temps I think I'll try this. :)

Few questions:

1. Can we buy new equipment and consumables from NPC merchants? Or from the TP? Can we craft it?

2. Can other characters on the account craft stuff for this one? Or are they completely stand-alone?

3. Can we use cosmetics that don't require transmutation, such as mount skins, glider skins, minis etc?

Cool, thanks. :)

I'm not sure I'll want other characters to craft stuff, I just thought I should check whether it's an option or not so I know the rules before I start.

Now I just need to decide on a character. I'm leaning towards a charr, but I already have a charr revenant who wears white and pale blue, so maybe I'll go for a different race. I'll also be in touch about joining the guild, but I think I'll have to leave one of my 'dead' guilds before I can get an invite.

Cool! Send me a message in game and I'll add you.

After much debate I settled on a character. This is Gwyn Wren, a sylvari ranger.

Who I just realised will be only my second character ever to not use the Hero's Band (because it's rare quality), the first was the one I made to attempt playing naked.

Ace Dragonheart.I am allowing myself a rune of speed because I am not using mounts. Also, at lvl 40 I am going to allow myself an eye patch because the toon is named for an old one-eyed tabby tom cat I had that was the toughest animal I ever met. He tangled with coyotes and foxes, survived distemper and being hit by a car. He was also smart. Our dog did not like him at first so he started bringing the dog rabbits and mice until the dog thought he was his best friend. And I think if I get him to 40 without dying Ace has the right to show a little extra cosmetic toughness.

@Lamont.5973 said:I am allowing myself a rune of speed because I am not using mounts. Also, at lvl 40 I am going to allow myself an eye patch because the toon is named for an old one-eyed tabby tom cat I had that was the toughest animal I ever met. He tangled with coyotes and foxes, survived distemper and being hit by a car.

Your honouring of a fallen hunter is noble. Accepted. (Also, I send you a guild invite. Will do some more advertising at some stage but at the moment it's only tiny weeny.)

Well, things got off to a rough start for me. Tip: don't do jumping puzzles, it's not worth the risk. I started over as per the rules but made an identical character with the same name because I really liked her.

Things are going a lot better on the second attempt. She's just gotten to level 10, but I'm not going to do the story until next week when I can get a key from it. I had to resort to buying equipment for her, because even with just 199% magic find I'm getting a lot more blues than whites, but luckily she got to level 10 on the Soundless Isle so it was a short run into Mabon Market for the merchants. No trinkets yet, I decided to wait until level 10 or I'd end up picking up slightly improved ones at every heart.

I think I'm going to check in with the NPC weaponsmiths and armourers every 10 levels for new pieces, since I'm not sure I'll be able to rely on drops like I usually do.

I got to level 10 on my guardian (and will go further). I am okay with NPC weaponsmiths and armourers. Guardian has amazing defence, but I'm used to glass cannon builds so anything is good.

I'm actually enjoying having to move around the map more without waypoints much more than I thought I would.

That's one of the things I've not had to think about much yet. I don't normally use waypoints much, unless I want to go a long way - for example doing dailies and wanting to get from the Crystal Desert to Orr. Since I've just been going around Caledon it's not been a problem. I'll have to try to remember as I get to higher levels though, especially if I stick with my plan of doing all 5 starter zones.

The biggest change for me is not only having a character where I have no goal except to level up and no reason to do it quickly but also a very good reason to go slowly - so I don't get overwhelmed and killed - and it's making me rethink how I normally approach combat in this game.

The slowness is actually quite amazing, isn't it? I'm calculating whether a fight is worth attempting and my build osmuchmore defensive than before.Glad to hear you're enjoying it!

2nd run is going well. First run, I forgot you can't glide in home instance and "splat." If you guys are planning to do the story we might want to band together for upper levels. I think some of the story is going to be pretty tough.

The story got tough surprisingly quickly for me. I was level 14, doing the level 10 story and managed to pull too many Nightmare hounds. I used my healing skill and was back down to 1/2 health quickly. Luckily I was able to run away and they focused on Caithe instead, but I really need to learn to be careful about pulling too many enemies.

I think banding together would definitely help at higher levels. I'd say we could ask other people to help too, but I imagine they'd all be in exotic/ascended gear so that might make things too easy. I have a few friends who I'm sure would be willing to throw on white gear and help me out occasionally, but it might be difficult to get help that way on a regular basis.

That sounds like a good idea - banding together. I'm still at level 12 but haven't played that character for a bit. Will keep at it as a slow burn.

Hit level 20. I was trying figure out why my leveling was going so much faster than I remembered from first playing (I have not actually leveled through play for a long time). Then I checked. At 30,000 AP I have an account wide 36% AP gain. That was a bit disconcerting as it changes the whole experiment quite a lot. So, I thought about finding food and utilities that do not have xp bonuses to even the experiences out. But all the food/utilities I can find include xp bonuses on kill. Anyone know any low level food or utility that does not?