Trion had their first Friday Livestream Extravaganza for 2014 with Community members Greg “OverloadUT” and Elizabeth “Dahanese” as well as Senior Design Director “Dead Simon” and Senior Systems Designer “Faratha”. They went over a couple of things including some of the stuff coming to Patch 2.6.

Click here for a replay of the 10th January Friday Livestream Extravaganza video on twitch.tv.

tl;dr:

• New Craft Profession: Dreamweaver coming to Patch 2.6 with VFX dimension items, 15 new Dimension Keys and Dream Orbs (which act like Runes but stack with them).
• Unstable Artifacts – Approx. 1,200 new artifacts, 150 new collections. Planar Nut currency for each collection used to buy 6 Planar Squirrel Mounts. Some Sets will have Fluff item rewards, including some dual-use and interactive Dimension Items.
• Other Patch 2.6 Stuff:
  • 4 Acts of the Air Saga Quest (Crucia Storyline) with 30+ quests.
  • New Stronghold 5-man boss fight with Level 15, 30 and 60 versions.
  • 2 new Fire-based Raid Rifts.
  • 2 new Zone Events – both a Fire and Water zone event that are Crucia-themed. “Bloodfire Behemoth”.
  • Bounty System.
  • “Bindings of Blood” teaser. (no idea what it is)
• Possible New Tier of Loyalty: Black-Tier
• Others:
  • New Macro Icon Art
  • Shepherd’s Crook is coming!

Below is a summary of all the important things relating to the livestream. As always, everything can be subject to change prior to the content hitting Live.

Legend:
Black/Normal Text = Livestream Summary.
[Dark Blue Text] = My own comments. i.e. May not be indicative of actual content.

Dreamweaving

Slated for Patch 2.6, Dreamweaving is a new craft profession that relies on the salvaging of Artifacts for Dream Ribbons as the main craft ingredient in each recipe.

The Dreamweaving Class Trainer is Reva Song who is located next to the Dimension Key vendor to the right of the stairs leading to the Craft Station in Tempest Bay.

Creates:

• A multitude of visual-effect Dimension Items including animated fires, motes, waterfalls, lightning and paints.
• 15 new Dimension Keys.
• Dream Orbs (like runes, but stacks with runes).

This takes a craft profession slot – but 2.6 will up the max craft profession slots to 10 (currently 9) so you are able to obtain all craft professions.

Other Info:

• You can make your own crafting station called a Dream Focus that can be placed in a dimension.
• Recipes cannot be gained using Craftsman’s Marks.
• Salvaging Artifacts gives Dream Ribbons – the primary craft ingredient required for the recipes.
• Higher Rarity Artifacts give more Dream Ribbons. Higher Dream Weaving level gives more Dream Ribbons.

Find out more about the Dream Weaving craft profession in RiftGrate’s write-up of the December PTS update. Half-way through the article is all about Dream Weaving.

Video: Dream Weaving VFX Dimension Items:

Check out most of the VFX dimension items that Dream Weavers will be able to create (excludes the Cash Shop recipes).

Dream Weaving Dimension Key Album/Gallery – Check out all 15 Dream Weaving Dimensions you can craft and trade.

All items crafted by Dream Weavers are tradeable.

Dream Orbs

Dream Orbs act like Runes, but stack with them. They are stat enchants that go on all armor slots except Belt and Cape. There’s Lesser, Median and Greater Dream Orbs.

The Dream Orbs are RNG-based. They either provide your class with:

• Main Stat-only
• Main Stat + SP/AP
• Main Stat + END
• END-only

And the numbers are within a certain range. This range is based on both the slot the Dream Orb is enchanted into (i.e. Chest/Legs; Shoulder/Helm or Gloves/Boots) as well as the item level and gear tier. Gear of Level 40+ can use it.

For example: Tier 2 Relic gear will have better stats than Tier 2 Epic gear and so on and so forth.

Several players have posted some of the ranges they’ve been seeing from testing on the PTS:

• “Greater Dream Orb Stats on Legs of varying gear tiers” by Accol.
• “Greater Dream Orb Stat Ranges for Cleric Tier 2 Relic gear on all slots” by bctrainers.
• “Greater Dream Orb Stat Ranges for Tier 1 Epic/Relic + Tier 2 Epic/Relic gear on all slots” by Nypsie@Gelidra

Terrain Paint

Terrain paint overlaps the current eligible surface such as natural terrain and building blocks and replaces it with the desired Paint. There are currently a variety of Paints – mainly Planar-based like Death-themed Terrain Paints.

Terrain paint overlapping the Terrain in Infinity Gate dimension as well as a Cube building block. Note: The Infinity Gate ‘upper layer’ cannot be overlapped.

They paint straight down and different Terrain Paints can possibly blend – dependent on the Terrains used.

Two Terrain Paints overlapping

Dream Packs – Testing

There’s currently Dream Orb Test Packs on the Public Test Shard (“PTS”) that you can purchase to test out the various items the Dream Weaving profession can create.

You can obtain them from:

• Master Mode Dummy Foundry NPC. [Instructions]; or
• Avestia Forta <Dimension Goods> NPC in Tempest Bay. [Location].

Unstable Artifacts

Further information about Unstable Artifacts has been revealed by Dead Simon. Here’s a run-down of everything we know:

• Has approx. 1,200 new artifacts and approx. 150 new collections.
• Blue-colored (normal is white, twisted is red).
• Coming in Patch 2.6.
• Only available temporarily during brief periods of time such as during certain zone events.

Rewards:

You will receive special tokens called Planar Nuts for the completion of each collection. Approx. 23 of these tokens will allow you to purchase a planar Squirrel Mount.

There will be 6 Squirrel Mounts, one for each plane. I.e., Fire Squirrel Mount, Death Squirrel Mount/etc.

Collecting all 6 Planar Squirrel Mounts will provide you with an additional group-based companion pet where you can summon all the Planar Squirrels.

Specific Unstable Artifact Set Rewards

Some of the Unstable Artifact Sets will also reward additional fluff items on top of the Planar Nut currency.

Since they are Artifact Set rewards, you can get an infinite amount of them after you unlock them using the Trophy system.

Greg showed off some of them in the livestream today. Some of them are interactive dimension items, others are simply interactive items and others are dual-use – can act as both a dimension item and/or useable in your inventory.

Haunted Bell

Places a Bell in your dimension. Clicking on it summons forth a large collection of bats that will spew out in all directions from the item.

Lightning Rod

As the name suggests, this is a dimension item that places a Lightning Rod on the ground. Click on it and a series of Lightning strikes will hit the Lightning Rod.

Hailol Jig Ball

This has to be a favorite. “Hailol Jig Ball” drops a Keg with a series of control spheres and a ‘Disco Ball’ with multi-colored lights streaming from it. The lights flash, stream/orbit and alternate all over the area.

You can rotate and move this item.

You’ll notice the Keg with control spheres. Picking a Color Sphere will indicate which color you wish to adjust. The rows/columns of white color spheres are controls that adjusts:

• Speed
• Movement type: Sweeps or Orbits
• Flash Rate

And remember, since this is an Unstable Artifact Set reward, you can buy an infinite amount from the Trophy section of the Rift Store once you have unlocked it. Rotate it around; throw a dozen into your dimension – just be wary of FPS.

Gorgeous Frog Carving & Froggy Caller

The Gorgeous Frog Carving turns you into a combat frog (one that can still use abilities without going out of the disguise). You can’t use them in Instances however.

The Froggy Caller called forth 5 different frogs to you.

These frogs have both a land-based movement animation as well as a water-based swimming animation.

Dual-Use Items

There’s a multitude of Dual-Use Items that can both be placed in dimensions as well as useable in your inventory. These are not consumables – they are permanent, with CDs.

These items include Bees, Butterflies, Dragonflies and Spiders that will spawn around the dimension item if it is placed in a dimension, or spawn around the player if it is used in their inventory.

Other Patch 2.6 Stuff

Epic Air Saga Quest

There will be 4 Acts to the Epic Air Saga Quest being introduced in Patch 2.6 with 30+ quests. The Epic Air Saga Quest will conclude the Crucia storyline.

New Zone Events

Two new zone events are being introduced with a Crucia-related theme. There is a fire-based one and a Water-based one.

Simon let slip at the end of today’s livestream that one may be called “Bloodfire Behemoth”.

Bounty System

Simon was tight-lipped about the Bounty System other than mentioning that it would come with 2.6.

However, parts of the Bounty System are up on the PTS:

An NPC can be found lodged in-between the Artifact vendor and World Event vendor in Tempest Bay to the left of the Porticulum.

There’s also a new Achievement sub-category under the Character category with 130 Achievement Points currently assigned to it, although it only has this single achievement up thus far “Start Small, Aim Big”.

New Raid Rifts

Two new Raids Rifts will appear with 2.6. Although Simon didn’t mention anything about them, we already know from the PTS that they are Fire-based and called “Bloodfire Incursion” and “Hell’s Insurgents”.

5-man Stronghold

A 5-man boss fight. Simon seemed to indicate that there’s a Level 15, 30 and Level 60 version of this Stronghold. Not much information on this.

“Bindings of Blood”

Simon mentioned a “Bindings of Blood” as one of the 2.6 content but left the audience to speculate what in the world this meant. [So far we’ve heard of a ‘Bloodfire Behemoth’-possible zone event as well as the Raid Rift ‘Bloodfire Incursion’. Bindings of Blood is probably related to the Bloodfire cult/group and is fire-based. Either that or it could be related to the Bloodstorm dragons themselves.]

Possible New Tier of Loyalty: Black-Tier

Either by accident or intended, Trion has opened the floodgates to speculation of a Black-Tier Loyalty level above the current Red-Tier.

Trion used the Dev Client during today’s livestream and when Greg opened the Rift Store to purchase a Dimension Key in order to show off some of the items in the Dream Weaving craft profession, the top-right hand corner showed a Black orb.

A new Black-Tier Loyalty? Possibly! Wonder what items it’ll contain!

For those currently nearing or at max Red-Tier Loyalty – do not fear! Daglar has stated that any loyalty you earn beyond the current maximum will continue to be recorded.

Other Stuff

• Dead Simon confirmed Shepherd’s Crook is indeed coming! (and thus likely the Lamb companion pet as well).
• There’s new Macro Icon Art that uses the Raid Mark icons.

Conclusion

Look forward to finding out what the exact Patch 2.6 release date will be at some point. There’s a few things being added to the game with Patch 2.6. Check back here over the coming weeks when Trion may add a few more updates to the PTS for Patch 2.6!

[Also, Faratha carries a big mug. Could it be a clue for 3.0? It has a design on it – Shi-Ming? Who knows!]