Hello there! And welcome back to The Chronicles of One Telaran, my weekly leveling guide through the rather large and quest-filled world of RIFT.
Guess what? Something amazing has happened. Something utterly unexpected. Do you want to know what it is? Go on, have a guess.
No, my spouse hasn’t said I can legally change my son’s name to Zoltan the Great. I’m still working on that.
No, the cast of Jersey Shore haven’t spontaneously combusted. More’s the pity.
No, scientists still haven’t discovered the reason for the appeal of James Franco.
Give up?
I made it to Sanctum.
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I'm here! Now. Where's the party?
I know! Crazy, right? I decided to just go for it, instead of trying to get all the Silverwood quests finished first. I realized if I was going to do that, it would probably be weeks before I reached the city.
So here I am. And what do I think, I hear you ask. Well, the locals are certainly very friendly. In fact, they were so friendly I got a standing ovation and fireworks. Nice.
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Yes. Cheer for me peasants. For I, might Caedryn, made it to Sanctum.
Also, there are a lot of people around. A lot of quest-givers. It’s actually slightly overwhelming at first. So many people. Who to talk to first? I spend the first hour just wandering around being jealous of all the players who seem to be riding really cool steeds. Is that a leveling thing? How do I get one? It certainly seems to take a lot of effort our of everything. There was a stables nearby so I thought I’d mosey on over and see how much the rides were. The answer? Very, very, very expensive.
Oh well.
So. Sanctum. The capital city of the Guardians. What’s it all about? How did it come to be here? Who built it?
I’m glad you asked.
It seems the island that Sanctum was built on was “gifted” to the Guardians by the Vigil. And yes, those were air quotes around the word “gifted”. I must apologize for that. I’m usually of the opinion that people who do air quote will be first up against the wall when the revolution comes, but I thought it fitting in this case. I mean, really? A gift? Were title deeds handed over? What about the people who lived there? What happened to them?
The story goes that the Dwarf King, Borrin Gammult was wandering around Silverwood shortly after the sundering of the Ward. He received a vision of a divine city emerging from the sea, and took it as a sign. (Well, you would, wouldn’t you. Unless you were partaking in certain illegal substances.) Borrin decided the Gods had picked him for a reason, and he became the master architect responsible for the building of Sanctum.
That’s his story and he’s sticking to it.
Sanctum itself is named after the Sanctum of the Vigil, the domed basilica in the center of the island. I took a stroll inside and tracked down a room that served as a rather cramped headquarters for the Guardians. Here I found Shyla Starheath, Borin Gammult, and Cyril Kalmar fighting for position on a throne at the top of a set of stairs. It’s from this tiny room that Cyril leads the efforts to retake Telara from the Dragons and the rifts.
My first thought on seeing them was, “Really? Couldn’t the three of them picked a bigger room? The smell in here come Summer must be horrendous. Especially with all that plate armor and leather and stuff.”
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What? No air conditioning? Seriously?
There are a lot of interesting things to be found in Sanctum of the Vigil, specific Orders that really open up the lore of the world. First off we have The Order of the Temple. They hang out on the ground floor and coordinate the fight against the Defiant, (and there are a few Defiant footholds around Sanctum so you can easily indulge in some Defiant-based thuggery if you want to practice your battle skills.) We also have the Harmonious Crusade - priests who actually summon riftspawn and torture – ahem, excuse me – interrogate, the monsters to find out where the next rifts will appear. That’s handy. If you want to increase your standing with these guys, head out into the wilds and close down some rifts. They’ll love you for it. Then there are The Consecrators. Theses guys seem like the James Bonds of Telara. They are agents of the Guardians who track dragon cultists to their hideouts and monsters to their lairs. Sort of dealing with threats to the world before they can make a nuisance of themselves. Definteily MI5. I hope we can get quests from these guys at some point. Wouldn’t mind doing some Consecrator work.
I head outside again and once I’ve done a complete circuit of Sanctum, I realize that the island has actually been split into districts named after each of the gods. Thontic’s Row is where you can do all your banking and sell off the copious amounts of treasure you’ve gathered up on your adventures. Then there is Tavril’s Plaza, a garden area where druids and bards hang out, being all calm and tranquil and stuff. Bahralt Street is where the Master craftsmen forge all the cool weapons and armor we all wear. I discovered an Auction House here where you can put your own property up for auction, setting the minimum price bid price accepted and so forth. (You can also bid on items as well.) And then there’s Thedeor’s Circle, where the Guardians come to spar. You can do a bit of practicing here, fighting the wooden targets. Just to see what your various bonuses and special abilities do. And finally there is Mariel-Taun’s Village. She’s the Goddess of the Heart, so it makes sense that the homes and shops of the normal people of Sanctum would be named after her. Here you can find stuff to buy, ranging from new, very expensive clothes, to clothing dye, to those wonderful mounts I can’t seem to get hold of.
After taking all this time to get here, I load up on quests and find myself having to leave again. The main set of quests I’ve been given seem to be about the Fae creatures in the area, and how the Life Rifts are increasing in number. There’s a lot of mention of Prince Hylas as well. Ah, so this is where I get these quests. I should have come here earlier.
Idiot.
Anyway, see you guys later. Time to kill me some Tinkerbells!
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Nice statues
