Neverwinter’s 26th module is Demonweb Pits, and it’s rolling out on July 18th, Cryptic and Gearbox announced today. Launching on PC, PlayStation, and Xbox, the module will cap off the ongoing Menzoberranzan storyline and task players with protecting the city from Lolth, the spider goddess, across the Narbondellyn adventure zone and House Fey-Branche – plus there’s the capstone dungeon and Lolth fight itself. Note: The description contains plot spoilers for folks who aren’t caught up!
“Following the events of Menzoberranzan, Gromph Baenre, the Archmage of Menzoberranzan, has recovered his lost demon summoning tome, Zhaun’ol’leal. Pouring over ancient texts within the Sorcere, the Archmage hoped to find a way to gain access to Lolth’s domain within the Abyss, the Demonweb Pits. This caused a spell to materialize and fracture under its own weight, resulting in the Material Plane and the Demonweb Pits to be connected — allowing demons, including Lolth, to step into the Underdark and a torrent of abyssal magic to flood into the Narbondellyn district. To stop Menozberranzan from being torn asunder, you’ll need to join forces with Noori, a brilliant Sorcere mage and cousin to the Archmage, to seal the rift and send Lolth back to the Abyss!”
Among the chunks of new content is a “post-leveling experience” for players after level 20. Ahead of the reveal, we chatted with Elliot Minner, Lead Content Designer for Neverwinter, about what to expect from the leveling experience update specifically!
MassivelyOP: What specific types of content will the Hero’s Path push players into doing? Is it all endgame-centric? How much is solo-friendly?
Cryptic’s Elliot Minner: The Hero’s Path is an all-new Meta Adventure added to our existing Adventure system that will help guide players by providing new goals once they hit level 20. There are two main focuses of the Hero’s Path.
First, we wanted to make sure players are aware of all the different systems they should focus on to make their characters better once they’ve reached level 20, like mount and companion bolster, enchantments and insignias, and mount collars. The Hero’s Path provides some guidance and rewards for reaching key progression milestones like getting all of your equipped enchantments to Legendary quality.
Second, we wanted to make sure players were aware of the various activities that will help them reach their progression goals. The Hero’s Path will ask players to complete various Random Queues, assist Sybella with Legacy Campaign questing, and train with Instructor Corbin on advanced combat tactics.
The Hero’s Path is meant to provide long term goals and guidance for all players on their journey to endgame play, but it’s up to the player how they get there.
Does the new system add anything during the 1-20 experience that new players and characters should be aware of?
This system is exposed once a player reaches level 20, with a new quest from Sergeant Knox to get started. Leveling players should stay focused on leveling, but once they reach 20, this is the first thing they should start looking into.
Do players have to embark on the Hero’s Path, or can they skip it and keep playing the game at 20 the way they do right now? Must players tackle everything in a set order, or can they jump around tackling different things?
Like our other Adventures, players don’t need to complete the Hero’s Path but there are some really great rewards if they do! In general, though, the Hero’s Path isn’t something that will force players to play any differently, and for many players, they will have already met some of the various conditions for progression milestones. While there are set milestones before a player can claim rewards, most tasks are retroactive, so players can focus on different aspects of their character in whatever order they prefer.
How will it work for alts or vets who’ve already done it once?
The rewards for completing the Hero’s Path are once-per-account, so while it can still serve as a helpful checklist for alts, the system is primarily meant to guide and reward a player their first time through Neverwinter.
What sorts of rewards are included along the Hero’s Path track? Anything unique that can’t be acquired any other way?
The rewards at each milestone are meant to help players reach the next milestone, so players won’t want to miss out! The final progression milestone, for getting all the various progression systems to Mythic quality, will also be awarded an exclusive title and cape to show off the accomplishment.
Does the new system intersect with the battle pass system at all? How are the rewards different from what players can already get through the pass?
We wanted the Hero’s Path to exist outside of any situational or timed events, and really stand on its own as a high-level guide, setting goals for players throughout their journey in Neverwinter at any point in time. Because of that, this system doesn’t interact with battle passes.
What else in the game is on the devs’ agenda for possible accessibility and tutorial changes like these in the future?
We would like to see the effect this system has before we plan more additions, but we will keep monitoring the current progression flow and make adjustments as needed once we see how players interact with the Hero’s Path.
Finally… when can we expect it to roll out to the live servers?
The Hero’s Path will be live alongside our new module Demonweb Pits on July 18th!
Thanks so much to Elliot Minner for chatting with us!
“In the new module, Demonweb Pits, heroes brave enough to answer Bregan D’aerthe’s call for aid will discover plenty of new content within Neverwinter, including the new Narbondellyn Adventure Zone. It is here you will explore the grounds of House Fey-Branche, a powerful house of Menozberranzan and assist this venerable and mighty house in constructing the Realm Engine to drive back Lolth.
Throughout all neighborhoods in Menzoberranzan, you’ll be able to take on challenging hunts that will have you go up against horrifying monstrosities from both the Underdark and the Demonweb Pits itself. With these new hunts, they’ll feature modifiers for you to make each hunt more challenging to earn greater rewards, and have a mix of mechanics introduced in previous hunts from the Dragonslayer and Barovia modules for Neverwinter. For those looking for a deadly challenge, you can take on the Demonweb Pits dungeon with new bosses, including a challenging fight against Lolth, new secrets, rewards and three difficulty tiers to choose from (Normal, Advanced and Master). In addition to this new dungeon, quality of life improvements will be introduced, most notably a new post-leveling experience that offers new goals for players after reaching level 20 (the max level in the game), along with new rewards as you make leveling progress – extending the new user-experience and improving guidance into the endgame experience for Neverwinter. “
