Are heavy damage and light damage mutually exclusive?

Question

At first, I was putting bonus % damage against lightly wounded targets on all my gear, under the assumption that anyone who is damaged would count.

I.E., if you stab me once, I'm bleeding a bit. Stab me twice, and I'm bleeding heavily - but I'm still bleeding a bit...right? In Amalur, maybe not.

So my question is, do "lightly wounded" and "heavily wounded" act as mutually exclusive states, akin to bonus damage during day/night? Or are heavy wounds simply a continuation of the lightly wounded state, akin to real-wirld logic?

Asked by Gumbz

Answer

This answer on the KoA boards might help ya: http://forums.reckoning.amalur.com/showthread.php?6582-what-are-lightly-wounded-targets-Gem-question-I-think. Summarizing: it does sound like they are mutually exclusive states. What's not clear is where the dividing line(s) are for lightly wounded and heavily wounded...seems like lightly wounded is about 75% health or so.

Answered by Granger44

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What are the numbers in the top-left of the weapon/armor stats display?

Question

This post talks about weapons and armor stats, but doesn't explain the numbers in the top-left corner of the display:

What do the different weapon damages imply?

These numbers seem to be base quality levels, which is also represented by their name color (green, blue, purple, gold, etc). Is that correct?

Asked by user1113270

Answer

I think the numbers you're referring to are the xx/yy numbers. Those numbers refer to the condition of the weapon/armor.

The xx part refers to the current condition of the item, which degrades with usage. Weapons degrade when they're used to attack and armor degrades when you receive damage from enemies. When an item's condition reaches 0 and it is used, it'll break and lose all its effectiveness. You'll either have to repair it at a blacksmith or use a repair kit.

The yy part refers to the maximum durability of the item.

Answered by Vinay S Shenoy

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Is there a good way to store things in Kingdoms of Amalur?

Question

In other games I've had to resort to creating storage characters for the purposes stashing items I might find useful in the future, especially when trying to collect sets.

Since Kingdoms is going to have me gathering gems, reagents, items, sets, etc, is there any place I can safely stash what I'm not using?

Asked by Stephen

Answer

Eventually you can acquire a house, which when upgraded will have a chest which can store up to 155 items. Apparently over the course of the game you can acquire many such houses, but the first you're likely to find is in Canneroc.

Given that your gems, reagents, and "ingredient" type components stack so nicely in your inventory under their sub-containers, you're unlikely to want to actually stash those. But it's a great place to stash pieces of equipment and all the books you've stolen but not gotten around to reading!

Answered by Sterno

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What are the limitations and penalties of going on a murder spree?

Question

As my time in Amalur wound down last night, I decided to do the only logical thing and murder everyone I came across. I managed to make mincemeat of most of a village of Fae, but then I encountered someone who had a quest indicator over their head. I couldn't do damage to them, and talking to them seemed to indicate that they were still regarding me as a "friend" and that they still wanted my help with a quest.

(This was despite the fact that I was repeatedly bludgeoning him over the head with a magical staff of burning things with fire that was soaked with the blood of their compatriots, but I digress.)

It seemed I was able to take out most of the "non-essential" NPCs in an entire town this way, and I wasn't once stopped by a guard or other law enforcement individual. Further, there was no reaction from the citizens spared on account of their relative immunity to my attacks.

What are the limits to my murderous rampages? Can I kill shopkeepers? Does it matter if they're "generic" villagers or they have unique names? Are there any side quest NPCs that I can murder?

Further, what are the consequences? Will I be caught and sentenced to 2 minutes in prison at some point? Is there some "faction standing" that I tanked during this?

Asked by agent86

Answer

You can kill almost anything except main quest givers. Side quest givers are a hit and miss because the ones you ARE able to kill will have a fate-like essence surrounding them. That means they will revive. Some will never die and continue to revive and attack you. An example is the first city you get to in the plains where a side quest giver is collecting arm bands. Attack him and everyone else and you will see what I am talking about. Guards are also unlimited and always seem to match your level in some way. If you resist arrest it takes a very long time for them to cool down so to speak.

Answered by Ekopalm

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Does Enduring Agony increases the damage of bleeding and poison?

Question

I know that Enduring Agony (finesse ability) increases the duration of poison and bleeding but does it increase their damage as well?

Asked by ChrisHateZ

Answer

I'm sure you've figured it out by now, but I'll answer if only to provide one clear answer, combining all the information.

Enduring Agony does not increase the damage per second of bleeding and poison abilities, but it does increase their duration which effectively increases their damage by extending the duration of the DPS effect. For example, an effect of 10 poison damage over 5 seconds is a DPS of 2 damage/second for a total of 10 damage over 5 seconds, but with 1 level in Enduring Agony, the effect lasts 6 seconds (5 * 1.2 = 6), thus dealing 12 damage over 6 seconds. An additional 2 points in this example would yield 14 damage over 7 seconds, etc. It's not going to make or break the amount of damage you deal as the numbers are usually so small.

The more useful aspect is that by increasing the poison and bleeding effect duration, the weakening of the opponents damage dealt caused by the poison effect and the weakening of the opponent's defense by bleeding are also extended. By extending the bleeding effect, you also extend the window to do more damage with other attacks, leading to a further improvement in damage.

Additionally Enduring Agony also increase the damage of Shadow Flare which, while not devastating towards the end of the game, it also causes a bleed effect and can still be marginally useful against big enemies if all 5 blades hit and can be good if you need to stun some enemies quickly.

Answered by skovacs1

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What specific actions decrease a weapon's condition?

Question

I know that "using" a weapon will cause its condition to decrease. What specific actions will cause the condition to drop?

Is it only if a weapon connects with an enemy and causes damage?
What if a weapon is used to break an object (boxes, vases, etc.)?
Does simply swinging or shooting a weapon cause a decrease in condition over time even if it doesn't connect with anything?

Are the specific actions that decrease a weapon's condition universal or are there different conditions for different weapon types (daggers, fae blades, longbows, sceptres, etc.)?

If there are different actions that can decrease a weapon's condition, does one decrease the condition more than another (if striking an object and striking an enemy both decrease a weapon's condition, does striking an enemy decrease the condition more quickly)?

Asked by Weezle

Answer

The amount of degradation your weapon experiences is directly proportional to the amount of damage that your weapon inflicts.

Since your weapon will only inflict up to the remaining health of the entity you are attempting to destroy it will only degrade by that amount. In other words, if you have a set of Prismere Chakrams that inflict 199 damage and you attack a poor defenseless storage crate that has, let's say, 5 armor, your weapon will degrade by whatever 5 attack does to it and not 199.

I had a similar question when I was questing near Didenhil: Does attacking boxes hurt my weapon? So what I did was fairly simple: I repaired all my stuff at the blacksmith, ran outside and smashed a bunch of crates, then ran inside and repaired my stuff again. Lo and behold, they had a bit of damage (-1). Then I thought, what about my staff? What if I just launch a bunch of fireballs and don't actually fight anything? And the answer is yes, that does degrade your weapon. I would assume that if you are dumb enough to use a sceptre, it would also degrade in a similar fashion. Physical/piercing weapons do not seem to be affected by just waving them about.

Answered by SomeNorCalGuy

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Are there any blacksmith merchants who sell “master” level components?

Question

I've been buying "Improved" and "Greater" tier components from merchants, especially the blacksmithing merchants in Rathir. I was hoping that once I got to the eastern continent I could find a merchant that sold "Master" tier components. However, there doesn't appear to be a merchant of this type in Mel Senshir, and the other couple of places I've come across (mostly Fae encampments) don't have them either.

Is there anywhere in the game I can buy Master (or better, if it exists?) weapon and armor components?

Asked by agent86

Answer

There is no place in game to buy a master or flawless componet for blacksmithing. There however is a few ways to increase your odds and getting one. Some people talk about master crafting an item with your junk, than turning around and breaking it a part and you may get a flawless that way.

The other way that I know that does seem to work, there are items that are found through the game that say "mastercrafted" though they are not items you made. These items give to have a lot better chance to giving flawless componets.

The last thing that is time consuming is you can save your guy everytime before you go to the blacksmith and salvage your equipment, if you dont like what you got reload and repeat. You will get different items, no garuntee that you will get better items.

Dont know if it is possible to get a master or flawless item from "oridanry" equipment (white name).

Answered by NoNameNeeded

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Where can I find skill books?

Question

I have found a couple of skill books that when read, leveled up my skill, one in sagecrafting and the other one in stealth.

Are the locations of skill books random? If it isn't random, where can I find all the skill books?

Asked by Marcelo

Answer

This information can be found here

---

Alchemy: Plains of Erathell, behind secret door near Urul Tusk

Blacksmith: Warsworn Questline, Hall of Firstsworn Forge Room

Detect Hidden: Traveler's Questline (Going Rogue, or later.)

Dispelling: House of Ballads Questline, Ballads Library

Lockpicking: Orieator's Tomb in Northern Forsaken Plain

Mercantile: Motus Mining Outpost Questlines, Located in the fully upgraded house that is given as a reward.

Persuasion: Reward for Paper Trail quest in Adessa

Sagecraft: In the well at St. Hadwyn's Mission (House of Ballads questline)

Stealth: Traveler's Questline (Going Rogue, or later.)

---

To answer your question, the location of the books is very much static.

Answered by Emerica.

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Is the lockpicking skill good for anything other than picking locks?

Question

Since skill points are gained rather slowly in Kingdoms of Amalur, I find myself giving quite a bit of thought as to what skill I invest in each level.

I currently have two points invested in lockpicking, and I am wondering if I have any reason to invest any further in the skill.

I find it relatively easy to overcome locks designated as "hard", and I don't mind the mini-game, so the skill's milestones (which allow to force locks with 100% success) aren't overly appealing.

Is there any other use for this skill that I should consider before ignoring it completely? I remember reading somewhere that dispelling, which is similar (albeit more useful to me, as I find dispelling quite harder than lockpicking), is used in place of persuasion during a specific dialog. Something similar could affect my investment in lockpicking.

Asked by Aubergine

Answer

It's hard to prove a negative since I didn't do every side quest, but no, I found no other use for Lockpicking throughout the game. Of course, I also didn't find the special case for Dispelling that you mention, either.

If you're good at the lockpicking mini-game, you can definitely save your points for other skills, just as you could with Dispelling if you're good at the dispel mini-game. It seemed to be a commonly expressed sentiment that picking locks was pretty easy and the skill points were a waste. This isn't dissimilar from Skyrim, where people similarly ignore the lock picking perks if they happen to be good at the mini-game.

Answered by Sterno

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What is the save file location for Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning?

Question

I want to create backups from my save files for Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning.

But I can't find them! Where are they?

Asked by Rev

Answer

This is a Steam Cloud enabled game so all your game saves are synched to the Steam Cloud so you can log in with them where ever you are.

However, your settings files and game saves will find their way into the folder:

%USERPROFILE%\My Documents\My Games\Reckoning

I can verify that I have seen game saves in that folder in the past, but it may only be used in the event Steam Cloud is not accessible or you are playing in offline mode. Otherwise, all your games saves are managed by the Steam Cloud.

Answered by kazzamalla

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Is it better to save my Reckoning for a particular situation?

Question

Right now whenever I fill my Reckoning meter, I generally try to save it for one of two situations:

• Many enemies are surrounding me (say, 4 or more) because I believe using it can grant me a significant experience bonus and a chance for rare alchemical elements per-kill.
• I'm in a really tough fight with a strong enemy, in which case I can make use of its damage output increases.

I'm always torn about these situations. I don't really understand the core mechanic fully - is the XP boost worth using on multiple enemies? How much extra damage will I do, and does that really matter in a tough fight? Are there some specific instances that really make Reckoning mode shine?

Asked by agent86

Answer

Hrrmm I find it works best when my ass is being kicked :)

It greatly increases your damage (I'd say by at least double) and slows down time. When you "kill" people while in that mode, they stick around and your finishing strike will kill all enemies that are down and provide you an experience multiplier based on how many enemies are down. The tutorial told me that if I don't strike the finishing blow, the downed enemies will get back up, however I haven't actually witnessed that yet.

But that said, it fills up quickly so I just use it anytime there are 3+ enemies on the screen. It provides a multiplier for the number of enemies you kill with it, so more enemies = more experience. I'd rather use it on a group of 4 small enemies than 1 big enemy.

Answered by Rachel

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Will %XP items increase all of the XP you gain?

Question

I found a pretty handy little necklace while playing Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning. It looks a little something like this:

Now this little gem has me wondering:

Does the Experience Bonus count toward all experience earned (Quests, kills, lockpicking, dispelling, etc.)?

Asked by Tristan

Answer

Yes, it stacks as a "+" and is not multiplied. An example is if you have four items granting +1% exp then you will get a total of +4% exp. Keep in mind that items like this are useless after level 36 and should be substituted with something more effective in combat. The max level is level 40 but the bonuses received in skills and abilities or miniscule.

Edit:

Exp bonuses apply to all sources (dispelling, lockpicking, quests, defeating enemies, etc,...). I have consumed exp potions to defeat enemies and simultaneously receive bonus exp from finishing a quest. By applying Reckoning mode and exp bonus potions you can gain about 30k exp multiple times in the game.

Answered by Ekopalm

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What does %elemental damage get me?

Question

I just made a pair of daggers with +8% poison damage. I didn't have any decent Rivets available, so it was a choice between that and +8% bleed damage.

The dagger now has a listed bonus of "+8% poison damage".

Does this mean:

• Whenever the dagger deals damage, it deals an additional 8% of that damage as poison damage?
• Whenever my character deals poison damage from any source, it deals 8% more damage?
• Whenever the dagger deals damage, 8% of that is poison damage?

Or maybe even something else entirely? What's going on here?

Asked by Raven Dreamer

Answer

I take it to mean an increase to the existing damage of that type. In your particular example, it would be option 2.

I've seen armour items with + percentage elemental damage. Because an armour item does not do damage by itself, it would not make sense to limit an increase in elemental damage to the item making that damage.

On the flip side, if you have + percentage elemental damage, and are not actually applying any of that type of damage, then the stat is wasted.

Answered by Reuben

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Is atheism a bad choice?

Question

During character creation, I'm allowed to choose a god to worship, all of which grant different permanent game bonuses. One of the options is to worship no god, which yields a paltry 1% experience bonus, by far the weakest of the options. If this source for the experience/level progression is correct, that only amounts to 19,480 of 1,948,000 experience by level 40 (max level), which even by that point is only about 1/8th of a level. With such a small bonus, you'll barely level faster than followers of gods, and the cap effectively means that at max level, you no longer have a bonus relative to them, seemingly make this a poor choice.

Is there any other gameplay or story benefit beyond that character creation benefit for not worshipping a god, such as extra availability of quests or not having some opposing god's followers hate you, or anything like that?

Asked by Sterno

Answer

Having now completed the game, I can say that choosing to worship no god does not seem to have a story effect or any other benefit besides the explicitly listed experience bonus.

Answered by Sterno

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Can I make a profit off blacksmithing?

Question

In Kingdoms of Amalur, my character found putting points in blacksmithing rapidly generated a hurricane of parts, pieces, bits, bobs, and odds n' ends. This sent my OCD into panic mode, and I immediately went on a selling binge, because having so many components was mindbogglingly overwhelming.

Selling components isn't very profitable. In fact, I'd much rather have the pre-salvaged items to sell. But that got me wondering - I'm a blacksmith. I can turn components into items... but are those crafted items worth more than the pieces I salvaged to make them in the first place?

So two questions: can I make a profit by salvaging items for their components, then using said components to smith my own items? Is there any advantage into salvaging items you've made? I can't imagine it could result in better components than what you used to make it... could it?

Asked by Raven Dreamer

Answer

After noticing that I occasionally got better components from decomposing junk weapons, I decided to try this as an experiment. I took a set of Fine Steel Chakrams:

Fine Steel Chakrams (22 durability)
12 physical damage
12 fire damage
24 burn damage over 3 seconds
Value: 218 gold

and broke it down. I received 2 parts, a "Steel Flame Disc" and a "Simple Handle."

I then went into the assembly screen and put the two items back together again. What resulted was:

Fine Steel Chakrams (22 durability)
15 physical damage
12 fire damage
24 burn damage over 3 seconds
Value: 238 gold

Weird, eh? So then I took this apart again and got both the "Steel Flame Disc" and the "Simple Handle," but also a "Basic Grip."

Assembling these three components made a similar set of Chakrams, but these had a +5 to health attached to them, which increased the value to 258 gold.

As a corollary to this, you could also say that the secondary parts you get are not related to the abilities on the base item - in this case, I got a +5 health part out of a weapon that had no such enchantment before I took it apart.

However, in every case I've found thus far, I've gotten the same primary part (in this case the "Steel Flame Disc") as the item that went in - assuming I got one at all.

The only downside is that there's a chance that you'll lose components when you disassemble, so trying to make money this way would probably be somewhat marred by the need to load repeatedly to get the results you want.

Answered by agent86

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Which potions are the most profitable to sell?

Question

I have plenty of potion ingredients and I'm low on cash, so I want to make potions to sell for profit. What are the most profitable potions to make money off?

EDIT: I'm able to craft master level potions, but the best would be a list that contains all potion prices. like this list for gems.

Asked by Ilya Melamed

Answer

I'm currently a level 6 Mercantile and Alchemist but did a respec to level 10 for this and here's some numbers.

Potions:

Essence of Fate              1251
Greater Damage Boost         1251Master Healing/Mana           969
Other Master Potions          915Minor Damage Boost            474Fate Potion                   346
Greater Potions               346
Greater Phasewalk             346Liquid Seduction              163Minor Phasewalk               131Purification Potion           101Minor Potions                  49

Ingredients:

Edelweiss                      49
Leechwood Bark                 49
Prismere Dust                  49
Scarwood Bark                  49
Seaflax                        49
White Flake                    49
Ysa's Breath                   49Bloodroot                      28
Eel Petal                      28
Scarab Salts                   28
Sky Blossom                    28
Star Thistle                   28
Tindertwig                     28Black Cohosh                   10
Cripplespore Caps              10
Embereyes                      10
Sativa Fibers                  10
Scarlet Flowstone              10
Softscrabble Powder            10

There are other potions out there but they cannot be brewed AFAIK.

You can do the math over which is more worthwhile considering your ingredient counts over which you can brew.

Answered by Jeff Mercado

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What's the most efficient way to make money?

Question

What's the most efficient way to make money? Is there a good place to farm with a relatively high $$$ drop, or even one-time loots that are especially well rewarding?

Asked by Toast

Answer

What is working for me is a combination of the following:

• Smash everything

All the chests and destructible items add up ... a box killing rampage earns a slow but steady income. If you use a chakram or some area affecting magic, it's not even that slow. Don't miss the sunken treasure, look for ripples on the water to indicate their presence.

• Change your shards to gems

A shard sells for around 150, a gem for around 1000. It's pretty basic math to see that combining 2 shards before selling them more than triples your income from them. Suddenly Sagecraft + Mercantilism start paying off.

• Detect hidden your way to fame and fortune, well fortune anyway

Don't pass up the chance to hit a small hidden area with even more treasure. Hidden treasure, doors and such will add enough to a regular walk through of an area to make it well worth it.

• Loot everything in sight

This game isn't cheap on the pops, and it's your personal mission to supply the Kingdoms of Amalur shopkeepers with every kind of crap imaginable.

Answered by Stephen

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Do I need to be worried about selling quest-crucial items?

Question

I was going through my inventory to sell to a merchant and ran across some items that sound like they might have been quest related items, but I don't remember: People's Journals, Warsworn Ranks, Graveside Letter, etc.

Do I need to be worried about potentially selling something that I would need to complete a quest?

Asked by Weezle

Answer

No. The game will not allow you to sell or junk quest related items and they will not take up inventory space either.

Answered by Vinay S Shenoy

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Does using 'Auto-Attempt' count towards Open Sesame achievement/trophy?

Question

The description for the Open Sesame achievement says: Dispel 50 wards. When I bring up the Dispel Ward menu I have the option to either 'Dispel' it or 'Auto-Attempt' it. If I auto-attempt and it works does that count toward the Open Sesame achievement?

Asked by Weezle

Answer

Yes, it does. Read the last post in this link

Answered by Vinay S Shenoy

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Do critical hit bonuses apply to staves?

Question

I've decided I want to play a mage in Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning. However, during the character customization, I wasn't expecting to play a mage, so I chose the +crit chance/+crit damage power. Now I'm wondering,

Does this critical chance apply to the base attack with staves as well as normal melee weapons? Particularly when the staff doesn't have "Physical" or "Piercing" damage?

Asked by Tristan

Answer

Yes, you get critical hits with Staves (and Scepters and Chakrams) as a Mage and gems, DIY sagecraft builds or other Crit bonuses will increase the Damage and/or Frequency of critical hits.

Generally speaking, esp. with Staves/Scepters, you will NOT get physical bonuses. You WILL get physical bonuses with Chakrams, my work-a-day Mage Weapon.

Piercing, Bleeding bonuses are a no-go for most Mage-specific weapons as well.

Keep in mind that as opposed instead of a Finesse-type or Might-type character your Sorcery-type character will be inflicting (most) critical hits with Magic. So be on the look out for items that give you a "X% Critical Hit Damage with Magic" or just plain "X% Chance to Critical"

But you will do better with a Stave if you focus on technique instead hoping for criticals during 'button mashing.' The Stave is best as a slow masher: When attacking a single big baddie it's better to pause between button hits. HIT-breathe-HIT-breathe-HIT-breathe and then a quick bam-bam-bam with your melee weapon of choice. After all, the Stave is to the mage as the greatsword and hammer are to the Tank. It's for finish work and one-on-one fights -- not thinning the ranks. You'll want chakrams and advanced spells (lightning storm) for that.

Answered by SomeNorCalGuy

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