Tomb of Annihilation Preview: The New Seal of the Protector Vendor

Neverwinter’s module 12, “Tomb of Annihilation” offers a true flurry of new gear for all tiers of players. But before we dig into the new stuff we are going to deal with a rather large change to the acquisition of Relic pieces from the Storm Kings Thunder campaign.

Out with the old, in with the new!

In case you didn’t notice, both the Seal of the Protector as well as the Seal of the Elements and the corresponding gear are pretty outdated. Introduced in Elemental Evil they have served as Salvage fodder for the longest time now. So it’s about time to put the stuff away, at least as rewards at the Seal Vendor.

In Module 12 the trader will be reworked and all Elven and Alliance pieces scratched. Additionally Seal of the Elements will be replaced with Protectors in all loot tables. The Seal Vendor will then sell purple Ostorian Rings, unrestored Relic Gear and all necessary reagents to restore it. The body pieces and rings are 300 Seals, all other gear 200. The prices for the reagents can be looked up in the picture on the left.

Relic gear for everyone!

This essentially means that Relic Gear will become the new standard for all classes. The cost for a restored chest piece is 1,375 Seals for example, more than reasonable. You can probably even farm a full set on a single day. The one thing that the Seal Vendor can’t do for you is farming Voninblod of course. But even fully discharged you have a very cheap item level 420 set that’s also going to help in Storm Kings Thunder content. Compared to Elven Gear, which was 405, it’s only a moderate uptick, but with Relics you have the option to go all the way up to 480.

With the new gear that’s coming in “Tomb of Annihilation” it was a necessary adjustment. The base sets that can be bought for ADs start at 420 as well, the new height will be 500. Literally nobody would have been grinding Heroic Encounters in Storm Kings Thunder for the Relic Gear reagents. Now with the Seal Vendor you have a great starting point and can improve your gear with Voninblod until progression takes you to the next source of 480+ item levels.

And Salvage?

Some folks, me included, originally thought this could be a slight nerf to Salvage values, but it’s actually quite the opposite for single characters. Currently on preview the chests still drop Elven and Alliance gear, but you’re of course now exclusively getting Protector Seals, which you can trade for those Ostorian Rings. So content that formerly dropped Elemental Seals gets a little bump in Salvage value, most namely Shores of Tuern, which probably already was the best farming spot for rough ADs.

The rings however are currently bound to character. So players that mainly farm on one toon and spread Salvage across their account can no longer do that with the stuff they buy with Seals. Bosses and chests do still drop Elven and Alliance BtA gear by the way.

And the Economy?

If you still own any Lanolin or other reagents related to Relic Gear, sell them asap. The market already heavily reacted on PC and it’s bound to get worse. Lanolin for example is 15 Seals, which means you can buy four to six for each completed dungeon. It will eventually sell for pennies. It’s also time to say goodbye to any Heroic Encounters in Storm Kings Thunder and Sea of Moving Ice. With the exception of Bryn Shander (Voninblod farming) the areas are now officially outdated.


What’s your opinion on the new vendor design? Share your thoughts in the comments below or visit the corresponding thread on our message board!

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9 thoughts on “Tomb of Annihilation Preview: The New Seal of the Protector Vendor

  • July 3, 2017 at 9:12 am
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    I noticed moult isn’t for sale. If no one does the heroics anymore, won’t this make restoring the weapons unattainable for anyone who doesn’t already have them?

    • July 3, 2017 at 11:31 am
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      The weapon sets still have to be grinded. But Moult is cheap these days, close to 1k on AH (PC).

      • July 4, 2017 at 4:52 pm
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        Moult is still clocking in around 15k each on the Xbox

    • July 3, 2017 at 11:15 pm
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      You also need to grind HEs for Storm Giant rep to be able to get the seals from SVA to restore the weapons. So going for Relic weapons may end up in a weird place. Then again, BHE runs in SoMI are already kind of sparse.

      • July 3, 2017 at 11:22 pm
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        And by “restore” I mean “upgrade.”

  • July 4, 2017 at 11:06 am
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    Do you any information about a new Artifact set which is used the Fragmented Key of Stars, its that real? ty

  • July 29, 2017 at 12:07 pm
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    It doesn’t seem very well thought to replace gear pieces that you look forward to have with gear pieces that you have no idea if it’s worth to have because its specs are not shown. Sure, it’s epic equipment, but I shouldn’t have to buy 2 bracers to find out which is best for my char build.

  • November 28, 2017 at 6:47 am
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    You said:

    “But even fully discharged you have a very cheap item level 420 set”

    So it should drop only to Tier I, item level 420 and stay there? That’s what the gear farmed in SKT does?

    Because I restored a chest piece and it had stats of:

    Max hp, Power, Crit, DEF and at Tier II (1 hour remaining) the stat values were:

    23,178, 1597, 1064, 800, Item Level 435.

    But after an hour in combat, these dropped to:

    21,109, 1460, 0973, 761, Item Level 420.

    So it is now item level 420, Tier I with 2 hours remaining, and has the same stat values as Elemental Drowcraft, item level 420, but a different stat distribution.

    But what happens when this gear loses its “Tier I, 2:00 hours remaining”?

    Does it become Item Level 405, the same as normal Drowcraft?

    Or does it become “rotted” again, so I have to re-restore it?

    If it becomes Rotted, what would happen to any slotted enchants? Due to my 4 years experience in this game, I would not be even slightly surprised if they vanished into the ether for all time, with “Support” telling me to “be more careful in future”!

    And it would not surprise me if the relic gear from Protector Seals is not the same as genuine SoMI gear, IE, drops from Tier II to Tier I in an hour of combat and then to Tier 0 in another 2 hours.

    And what about the Vivified version, which needs Voninblood? Will that also eventually drop to normal Drowcraft? Or rotted?

    If so, I might as well stick to Elemental Drowcraft until I get some Chult gear. At least when I upgrade that it stays upgraded!

    But I have no use for anything that will drop to that old blue Elven level, or even the item level 411 Elemental gear we can get from Tiamat. I already have better than that.

    One good thing is that when restored the Seal gear salvages for a decent amount, rather than the derisory 1100 AD.

    Cost in PE is 900 seals for all four pieces and 800 for the reagents, so 1700 for the full set.

    With the reagents, the Seal cost per piece is:

    400 Helm
    550 Chest
    400 Arms
    350 Feet

    and they will salvage for the same AD as gear from Tiamat.

    Not sure where you got 1375 per chest piece from.

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