Desert Oasis: Our guide to playing Black Desert’s season servers

The introduction of Black Desert’s season servers this summer was my chocolate-in-peanut-butter moment of the year. I didn’t know the combination would be so good! Other players seem to think so as well. The special season servers were pretty packed throughout the entire season, and there was never a dull moment in server chat!

It was also nice to see that many players were actually newcomers to the game. But with an influx of new players comes a variety of questions. And while some people absolutely abhor answering newbie questions, I like being helpful. So for today’s Desert Oasis, we’ll go over the topics that pop up the most in the season server chat!

Playing for time (stones)

Thanos may have only needed one time stone, but BDO players will need thousands. Unlike on regular servers and characters, time-filled black stones on these servers drop from mobs and are given as quest rewards. These are the black stones players will use to enhance their tuvala gear. Regular black stones won’t be needed here! They drop pretty regularly, so be prepared to get as many as possible for all the enhancing you’ll be doing. Treat it like they’re the currency of the season. Hoard them.

Along with time stones are tuvala ores. Exchange these with the blacksmiths in any of the major towns and they’ll give you the tuvala gear. Since ores are exchanged for the weapons and armors, this is how players will repair the permanent durability damage caused by failed enhance attempts. Do not use memory fragments for repairing gear. If a DUO awakening weapon needs to recover 50 of the durability damage, trade five ores for five awakening weapons and use them to repair the durability damage.

Finally, there’s the refined magical black stone. These useful little guys will give a guaranteed upgrade between PRI to TRI. These materials will make the enhancing experience much easier overall. It’s a great way to practice failstacking and learning the ropes for the more advanced and risky enhancing sessions of non-seasonal items.

Knowing the right people: Fughar and the Blacksmiths

Fughar is an NPC located near one of the stable areas in the main cities. He’ll be giving out daily quests to players, which everyone should be doing. For this season’s incentive, completing 40 of his daily quests will get the player a PEN Capotia earring at the end of the season. It’s a powerful earring that takes a while to craft, so it’s a very nice surprise. Unfortunately for the second season, it won’t be offered again, but Pearl Abyss promises to give something else that should be just as good. Even if you’re behind this season, the quests are easy enough, and the rewards provide enhancement materials for the season’s exclusive Tuvala gear.

Tuvala gear doesn’t just drop in the world; instead, the Blacksmiths of the major cities offer it in exchange for Tuvala ores, which do drop in the world and are offered as quest rewards. One piece of gear needs one ore, and one accessory needs five.

Questing and you

The first thing players will do as soon as they roll up on these servers will be to do the main quest until the end of the first Valencia storyline. It’s a pretty lengthy quest chain (and it can be pretty boring), but the rewards are well worth it. The July 15th update made the rewards even better too. PA added a set of armor known as the Naru gear, which is beginner armor that’s not only easy to enhance but can be traded up for Tuvala gear.

These quests aren’t the only things players should be doing; they should be also working on the daily quests and the weekly quests. As mentioned earlier, Fughar provides daily quests, most of them only take a few minutes to do and the rewards are pretty good.

What’s less obvious are the weeklies. These weeklies provide the rewards to enhance the Tuvala gear, and the dailies provide rewards at the end of the season depending on how much is done before the season ends. It involves killing 5000 of a specific mob. The quests are already available in the in the quest list under the “recurring” tab, but this isn’t immediately obvious to newer players. I personally recommend soloing the quest because it’ll means more time stone drops and it’s good for experience as well.

Can’t have a season without a season pass! There’s also a special season pass players can purchase and reaching milestones like getting to level 61 grants special rewards. I bought it; overall, it’s a pretty good deal, considering that it includes storage maids, an outfit box, and a pet.

With all these in place, players will have plenty to do in the current and future seasons.

The right tools for the right job: Naru and Tuvala gear

Seasonal characters cannot use non-season items. That’s fine, though, since the seasonal equipment is decent. After players enhance the Naru gear to PEN, they can be traded for PRI level Tuvala, and they’re awesome items.

Named after Tuvala the panther, the companion of the Crow Merchant Guild’s mysterious leader, these items are the reason people play the season servers. While not as powerful as the boss items and regular accessories, they are easier and cheaper to enhance. Once the season ends, players can pick one item to exchange into a boss item of equivalent power. Rule of thumb is that the Tuvala trades into a boss item that’s a level less. So a PEN Tuvala helmet will trade for a TET Giath’s helmet.

The Naru gear was added midway through the season, but it provides an even easier item set to enhance and will be useful up until the end of the Mediah storyline where people will transition to Tuvala.

Even after the season, the Tuvala gear will not go to waste. At season’s end, the gear will be family items for new characters to use. In a sense, they’re kind of like heirloom items to help with leveling! There’s only a month left in the current season, and players who start today won’t get the earring, but the Tuvala gear alone is start the season, even at this late point! There’s still a month anyway!