Today, on January 18, a big event starts in Lost Ark, centered around a crossover with the franchise “The Witcher”. Additionally, there are minor improvements in the patch notes. One of these optimizations brings even greater joy to the fans than the event itself.
What is this update about? Lost Ark receives major content updates monthly. The January update includes something special, namely a huge crossover event with the Witcher franchise. Along with this, numerous new features are being added to the world of Arkesia.
- The new “Island of the White Wolf,” which features a story questline and a daily quest.
- You can meet well-known characters Geralt, Yennefer, Triss, Ciri, and Dandelion in Lost Ark, with the original voice actors from the games even in English.
- Numerous new outfits and weapons inspired by the Witcher series, including Geralt’s armor and Ciri’s outfit as purchasable skins in the shop.
- Music tracks from The Witcher for your island and the character screen.
- A character menu background showing the Witcher fortress Kaer Morhen.
- A new card set featuring characters from The Witcher that grants you bonus attributes.
- New hairstyles and scars for character customization to help you look more like Geralt and Ciri.
Aside from this event, there are also new skins and mounts inspired by the Chinese Lunar New Year and numerous “Quality of Life” improvements. These are currently causing a much bigger hype than the event itself.
What improvements are coming? Besides bug fixes and some small tweaks that improve the overall gameplay, there are mainly 2 changes that are very well received by fans. On one hand, there will be an instant cast function for skills, awakening abilities, and combat items.
This means you won’t have to awkwardly press your AoE skill first and then select the area you want to attack. Instead, your skill will directly activate where your mouse pointer is located. You can enable this feature as soon as the servers are back online.
On the other hand, adjustments are being made to the controversial Pheons, indirectly reducing their costs. This is particularly well-received by the community, as players have been calling for a change to the Pheons for months.
You can watch a trailer for the event here:
Pheon problem is finally being alleviated
What are Pheons anyway? Pheons are an additional currency originally introduced by Lost Ark to stabilize the market. They are meant to prevent users from buying items cheaply to sell them at a higher price.
So, you need to pay extra for Pheons, in addition to gold, when buying valuable items from the trading post. This has been bothering users for months, as you have to buy Pheons for a lot of gold or real money.
They were already criticized at launch. Pheons were only introduced in Korea after several years, when most players had already equipped their characters. Additionally, Korea had several more events than the West in which players could earn Pheons.
However, they have been present since the launch in our version. Lost Ark expert Sywo already mentioned them as one of the biggest problems in our version 5 months ago in an interview with us.
What is new now? The January update reduces the Pheon costs for jewelry in endgame and relieves the players. For Tier 1 and Tier 2, you no longer need any Pheons, and for the current Tier 3, significantly less.
To buy legendary jewelry, you now only need 9 instead of 15 Pheons. The costs for relic jewelry have been reduced from 25 to 15.
Despite a few people being upset that the change comes too late, almost everyone finds the new Pheon costs good.
What do the fans say? At this point, we would like to share some quotes from the community with you so that you can get an impression of the mood.
- Pvtmiller says: “We sacrificed our Pheons so that future generations can finally save gold” (via reddit).
- Regarding some complaints, ExaSaurus writes: “Damn, we finally got the Pheon costs reduced, and you still find something to complain about? Just be happy when the game does something really good for you” (via reddit).
- seanhagg95 says: “I saved for 5 months and just equipped my characters 3 days ago. I could have saved 100 Pheons. Still, I’m very happy for everyone else!” (via reddit).
- Prestigous Guest writes: “I bought 7 jewelry pieces less than 10 hours before the patch notes were announced. Of course, that is unfortunate, but I am still very excited about the changes!” (via reddit).
What do you think about the changes? Did you also recently spend too many Pheons? Or do you not care at all and just want to look like the Witcher Geralt himself? Do you have another highlight in the patch? Feel free to let us know in the comments here at MeinMMO.
MeinMMO author Mark Sellner thinks: Lost Ark goes too far in the battle against bots – Punishes new players hard
Only the luck-dependent ability stones remain at 9 Pheons. However, the community is still thrilled with the changes.
Community cheers – “Really good move”
How are the players reacting? They are happy, though some are annoyed that they had to spend so many Pheons until the change finally happened. It is particularly well-received that the western version has jumped directly to the same level as Korea thanks to this change.
In the Korean version, there were also two more updates of Pheons between the previous and current costs. Furthermore, it has been announced in Korea that Pheon costs will continue to be reduced.
Despite a few people being upset that the change comes too late, almost everyone finds the new Pheon costs good.
What do the fans say? At this point, we would like to share some quotes from the community with you so that you can get an impression of the mood.
- Pvtmiller says: “We sacrificed our Pheons so that future generations can finally save gold” (via reddit).
- Regarding some complaints, ExaSaurus writes: “Damn, we finally got the Pheon costs reduced, and you still find something to complain about? Just be happy when the game does something really good for you” (via reddit).
- seanhagg95 says: “I saved for 5 months and just equipped my characters 3 days ago. I could have saved 100 Pheons. Still, I’m very happy for everyone else!” (via reddit).
- Prestigous Guest writes: “I bought 7 jewelry pieces less than 10 hours before the patch notes were announced. Of course, that is unfortunate, but I am still very excited about the changes!” (via reddit).
What do you think about the changes? Did you also recently spend too many Pheons? Or do you not care at all and just want to look like the Witcher Geralt himself? Do you have another highlight in the patch? Feel free to let us know in the comments here at MeinMMO.
MeinMMO author Mark Sellner thinks: Lost Ark goes too far in the battle against bots – Punishes new players hard
