I finally got myself back into WildStar on a regular basis this month. I’m still having trouble finding purpose on my max-level main, but I’ve been doing what I love most and running expeditions. The last time I played with any regularity was right when the Arcterra content was launching. Because of that, I never played through the Vault of the Archon story dungeon. Now I have fixed that oversight.
The Vault of the Archon is the second max level story dungeon, and it is focused on solving the mystery that is uncovered at the end of Omnicore-1. As an Exile, I got to journey alongside Deadeye Brightland and Dorian Walker in search of Eldan secrets. To be honest, the whole thing was worthwhile just to listen to the banter between these two characters. There’s a mechanic where you have to scout ahead and secure safe spots for everyone, and each time you clear a new one they have a small conversation when they catch up to you. On my first playthrough I didn’t do all of the side content so I only saw a small part of their interaction, but the second time I made sure to clear the entire place just so I could hear them talk. I would love more of this kind of storytelling in games please.
As for the dungeon itself, it wasn’t super challenging in my out-of-date raid gear but it was fun. If I want a real solo challenge I’ll be getting one in their next update anyway with the new expedition and “Mythic +” style scaling difficulty. Doing all of the optional exploration in the dungeon for a gold medal was pretty time consuming but now that I know my way around I’m sure it will speed up. There’s way more encounters in this one than in Omnicore-1 if you do a full clear. Running both of these story dungeons back to back took up an evening of playtime but did a great job of reminding me why my heart will always belong on Nexus.
