Quick Facts

Storylines
Forming an Understanding Danger Near and Far A Mysterious Voice Core of the Matter Seeking the Unknown Finding Firim Security Measures Unseen Agents Now You May Speak Surveying Cyphers Cyphers of the First Ones The Way Forward Patterns Within Patterns Patch Intro Call of the Primus A Hasty Voyage Strangers in a Strange Land Long Lost Firim Give Me A Hand A Mutual Exchange For Research Purposes The Road to Haven Forging Connections Destroying the Destructors Defending Haven This Old Waystone The Forces Gather Our Forward Scouts Favor of the First Ones Necessary Harvest Knowing is Half the Battle Scour the Sands Harmony and Discord Battle for the Forge Together, We Ride In Plain Sight Reinforcements May Be Necessary This is Your Fault, Fix It Nothing is True A Break in Communication Doppelganger Duel Fighting for the Forge Seeking Haven Danger Near and Far A Mysterious Voice Core of the Matter Seeking the Unknown Finding Firim Unseen Agents Security Measures Now You May Speak Surveying Cyphers Cyphers of the First Ones The Way Forward

Screenshots

Videos

Comments

Comment by barbasol

Kind of frustrating it has you choose from 3 shoulder items with different Pocopoc enhancements and at this point they have explained absolutely nothing about how any of it works. Guess I'll choose a random one and hope I don't regret it....

Comment by entropicdragon

For Beast Mastery hunter, the gear reward options were:

Empathic Enigmatic Cowl "Equip: Grants Pocopoc the ability to take over creatures without consuming energy.
This ability grows more powerful as you research the Cyphers of the First Ones."

Broker's Enigmatic Cowl "Equip:Enhances Pocopoc's perception, allowing it to discover additional hidden caches.
This ability grows more powerful as you research the Cyphers of the First Ones."

Synchronous Enigmatic Cowl "Equip: Resonates with Pocopoc, increasing the stats and effectiveness of its forms and abilities.
This ability grows more powerful as you research the Cyphers of the First Ones."

Comment by w0nka

I found this helpful:

You can find Cypher gear for all armor slots, but not weapons.

What's more, there are special abilities found only on Cypher gear armor pieces that can help you in your adventures in Zereth Mortis (and, in some cases, elsewhere in the Shadowlands). You'll be able to have up to three of these abilities at a time, and these abilities will scale in power with your current Cypher Equipment level, no matter the ilevel of the item in question.

Battle Rhythms - Battle Rhythms gear has abilities that enhance your effectiveness in combat within outdoor Shadowlands zones. These abilities can be found on cloth chest pieces, leather head pieces, mail shoulder pieces, and plate head pieces. All those Cypher gear pieces will have one of these three abilities.
Scouring – Scouring gear will cause your attacks to have a high chance to dispel buffs on your enemies. Or, if they don't have any, to put a debuff on the enemy that reduces damage dealt and increases damage taken.
Nova – Nova gear will cause your attacks to have a chance to deal bonus Cosmic damage with every hit.
Crystallic – Crystallic gear has a "crystallic" socket for a crystallic item obtained from Enhancement Consoles after unlocking the Elic Cypher research.
Pocopoc Harmony - Pocopoc Harmony gear has abilities that enhance your and Pocopoc's abilities within outdoor Zereth Mortis. These abilities can be found on cloth shoulder pieces, leather shoulder pieces, mail head pieces, and plate chest pieces. All those Cypher gear pieces will have one of these three abilities:
Synchronous – Synchronous gear will improve Pocopoc's combat stats, regardless of what mode.
Empathic – Empathic gear will allow Pocopoc to take over coreless automa and use its abilities without paying any Pocopoc energy.
Broker's – Broker's Cypher gear will allow you to locate additional hidden treasure chests within Zereth Mortis with bonus treasure.

Personal Melody - Personal Melody gear has abilities that enhance your movement within outdoor Shadowlands zones. These abilities can be found on cloth wrist pieces, leather hand pieces, mail feet pieces, and plate hand pieces. All those cypher gear pieces will have one of these three abilities:

Temporal – Temporal gear will increase your movement speed.
Dimensional – Dimensional gear will allow you to cross great distances quickly, leaping straight to a target location within range (like all Cypher gear abilities, this becomes more powerful as you increase your Cypher equipment level, which will increase the range on the jump).
Recreative – Recreative gear will allow you to re-create yourself upon death.

Comment by XNQrE

In general this whole talent system would be fine, if it was clear to the user what each option does. It's like being given a talent tree for a class and you haven't played the class yet.

Comment by hochrami

Based on the trees of upgrades for Pocopoc in the Cypher Research Console, I'm picking the "Broker's Enigmatic Cowl", that being the one that increases perception for finding hidden caches.

The first tree that unlocks starts with Cachial Understanding, and this is the only item that seems to enhance the starter ability. I expect there will be other opportunities to get other gear that boosts other things later, but I'm thinking being able to find more caches to open will give me more resources to do stuff with.

Comment by howyadoinman

If you couldn't unlock the Metrial Understanding, disable all your addons and try again.

Comment by Shkar

How to choose your item reward:

TL;DR: Pick the one that lets Pocopoc take over creatures without spending energy.

"Equip: Grants Pocopoc the ability to take over creatures without consuming energy."

Extremely useful for obtaining Apocopocolypse Now, does not scale with item level (though supposedly scales with cypher level). Marginally useful for outdoor combat even after obtaining the achievement, as it lets you save energy for Pocopoc's other abilities. The option I would recommend, though not useful until you've unlocked Dealic Understanding.

"Equip: Enhances Pocopoc's perception, allowing it to discover additional hidden caches."

Allows you to find Shrouded Cypher Cache while Pocopoc is searching for useful things, which can contain Gromit Soul without fishing. Can be used immediately with no research, and technically helps improve your research speed, though the chests are rare and a pain to find. Like the previous option, does not scale with item level though supposedly scales with cypher level. A valid choice (more useful when you've obtained flying), but not recommended.

"Equip: Resonates with Pocopoc, increasing the stats and effectiveness of its forms and abilities."

Makes Pocopoc better in combat. Immediately useful (to a minor degree), but more useful with more cypher research. Unlike the others which are non-combat focused, you would ideally want a higher item level version of this ability through world/daily quests after you have upgraded your cypher research. Least recommended option.

Comment by Mypciscraze

Hi all

I present Forming an Understanding Storyline part of Secrets of the First Ones. This Story line have 11 Quests.

See Video Full Quest chain if need it - https://youtu.be/xeYJ3hnVZXk
.

Quest Name:	Start and description
1 Danger Near and Far	Get inside bulding 40 74
2 A Mysterious Voice	Open Door then kill all waves last is The Culler
3 Core of the Matter	Speak with Elder Kreth 34 64
4 Seeking the Unknown	Go inside bulding 33 65 and press on Undelivered Mail
5 Finding Firim	Go 36 55 and search Xevveth corpse then move to cave 35 45 to speak with Firim
6a Security Measures	press on 10 Triggered Trap they are outside cave.
6b Unseen Agents	Kill 3 NPC: Xy'anath 38 46, Xy'bok 38 48 and Xy'varek36 50
8 Now You May Speak	Speak with Firim will be cinematic then conversation then press on Cypher Console
9 Surveying Cyphers	Examined Tranquil Concordance 38 48, Tranquil Concordance 32 62 and Tranquil Concordance 49 71 look from water side. Then go to cave 51 61 and kill Maw-Frenzied Lupine and press on Resonant Echoism
10 Cyphers of the First Ones	Use Cypher Console and pick up 1st skill. You will get Pocopoc spell to summon Him. YOu will unlock as well Zereth Mortis Effort.
11 The Way Forward	Go to Highlord Bolvar Fordragon to finish storyline after that Quest You will be able to do Patterns Within Patterns. Patterns Within Patterns is not required to finish storyline.

.
Thank You i Hope that Help You :).

Comment by Bursi

On a quite new character, I had to do some of the old campaign quests (2/9) until helping to free the Runecarver's arm. I got The First Move when I turned in The Weak Link and returned to Oribos.
You can talk to Highlord Bolvar Fordragon instead of Polemarch Adrestes to skip until Korthia.

When I skipped it, I immediately got Call of the Primus. Talk to Tal-Inara in Oribos to start the questline for Zereth Mortis.
She also offers a skip, I've you have done the campaign with an alt before. You'll start there with 3/7 chapters of Secrets of the First Ones and unlocked world quests.

Beware that you will miss the rewards of the first three chapters, if you skip them.
Edit: With the Hotfix for March 18th, players who skip the Zereth Mortis story will get the reputation with the Enlightened.

Campaign:
Chapter 1

Call of the Primus - Talk to Tal-Inara, turn in at The Primus after that
A Hasty Voyage - click Anima Wyrm behind you. Click Blast of Decay and Necrotic Barrage to fill the bar. Don't skip the cinematic
click Kick, Hold Tight! and Pull the Reins to match the emotes.
Long Lost Firim - find Firim and click the 4 objects
Give Me A Hand - follow Firim, click the door, then Disabled Automa and defeat Genesis Guardian
A Mutual Exchange - go to south, step on the teleporter and click your extra button Activate. Kill Yggdreth the Despoiler and loot the core
For Research Purposes - collect 12 items
The Road to Haven - mount Polly
Forging Connections - go to Haven, talk to Elder Kreth
Defending Haven - kill 13 enemies
Destroying the Destructors - destroy 4 objectives
This Old Waystone - follow Elder Ara to the cave. Stand in front of the waystone to get the extra button Open the Waystone. Click the stone, turn in in Oribos
The Forces Gather - return to Zereth Mortis and talk to Elder Kreth

Chapter 1 took about 25 minutes with itemlevel <190.

Chapter 2:

Favor of the First Ones - burn 8 objectives
Necessary Harvest - collect 15 protein from enemies
Our Forward Scouts - find and talk to 3 Knight of the Ebon Blade
Knowing is Half the Battle - travel to the marked area, meet Shandris Feathermoon
Scour the Sands - go to the yellow circles to discover the area. If you lose your stealth, talk to Shandris Feathermoon nearby
/way 48.43 47.54 1
/way 51.51 48.59 2
/way 50.60 45.25 3
/way 47.99 44.84 4
Battle for the Forge - kill 8 enemies
Together, We Ride - click 5 Injured Ranger
In Plain Sight - reach the obelisk and kill enemies behind you until Converted Guardian is attackable. Kill it
Reinforcements May Be Necessary - return to Haven
A Break in Communication - give orders to 3 NPC
Nothing is True - kill 4 Jiro Caretaker: throw questitem Tonal Jammer on Jiro Caretaker
This is Your Fault, Fix It - click 5 Forge Defense Node
Doppelganger Duel - go to the marked area in the middle of the map and fight against this person :-)
Fighting for the Forge - talk to Lady Jaina Proudmoore
Seeking Haven - click the teleport to return

Chapter 2 took about 40 minutes with itemlevel <200.
I got several itemlevels, about 1900 rep with The Enlightened, some Anima and 12 renown so far (chapter 1 & 2).

Chapter 3:

Danger Near and Far - go to the marked area and enter the building
A Mysterious Voice - click the door, watch dialogue and kill attacking enemies
Core of the Matter - return to Haven and talk to Elder Kreth
Seeking the Unknown - enter the building at 33.63 65.78 and click the information
Finding Firim - find the NPC, click its corpse and go to the cave
Security Measures - click the Sensory Synchronizer near you. Leave the cave and reset 10 traps
Unseen Agents - kill 3 enemies
Now You May Speak - talk to Firim and click the console
Surveying Cyphers - examine the 3 concordances marked on your map. Visit the fourth location. Kill Maw-Frenzied Lupine and click the item behind him. Return to the cave
Cyphers of the First Ones - click the console again. Unlock the first option and get your Pocopoc
The Way Forward - return to Haven

Chapter 3 took about 30 minutes with itemlevel 200. It gave less rewards than the previous ones.
In total I got about 2k reputation, 15 itemlevels and 15 renown.

Accept Patterns Within Patterns before you go on with anything.

Comment by Wyr3d

Also unlocks this sidequest chain Small Pet Problems

1. Look who I found!
2.Flora Aroma and Broker Beaker
3. Cascades of Magnitude
4. Culling the Maelstrom
5. Can I Keep Him?

Links

Cyphers of the First Ones

Investigate the Cypher Console.

	Cypher Console examined (1)
	Metrial Understanding unlocked (1)

Description

The way is not quite clear, but the first steps have been made. It seems the divine construct has taken more of a liking to you than to me. Now that it has given you the beginnings of understanding, see what else it wishes to show you. The results should be enlightening.

Progress

Completion

Rewards

You will be able to choose one of these rewards:

	Empathic Oracular Mantle		Broker's Oracular Mantle
	Synchronous Oracular Mantle		Empathic Cryptic Shoulderpads
	Broker's Cryptic Shoulderpads		Synchronous Cryptic Shoulderpads

You will also learn:

	Zereth Mortis Effort

You will also receive:

	Cyphers of the First Ones

Gains

Upon completion of this quest you will gain:

See if you've already completed this by typing:

/run print(C_QuestLog.IsQuestFlaggedCompleted(64230))

Guides

Cypher of the First Ones Zereth Mortis