Leveling Alchemy in the War Within is similar to the process in Dragonflight. Rather than the traditional path of learning recipes from a profession trainer, Alchemists instead learn nearly all of their recipes via the Experimentation mechanic.
The War Within Alchemy Changes
One change for Alchemy in The War Within is that you now Experiment on a specific herb, instead of Experiment for either phials or potions. Just like before, you have a chance to learn a new recipe each time you Experiment. If you learn a new recipe, it will be a recipe that requires the herb you experimented on.
There is still a small chance each time you experiment to fail the attempt, causing you to take nearly fatal damage, and receive a debuff that prevents you from further experimentation until it wears off. However, a major change from the Dragonflight Alchemy Experimentation mechanic is that the duration of the debuff is now only 10 minutes, down from 4 hours.
Formulated Courage
While you can just wait for the Recent Catastrophe debuff to expire, players that choose to specialize in Alchemical Mastery with Profession Knowledge will be able to craft Formulated Courage, which allows them to experiment for 10 minutes without receiving a debuff from unsuccessful experimentation attempts. If they fail the experimentation they will still receive the near-fatal damage and be thrown back from the table; but they won’t receive the debuff, meaning they can continue to Experiment.
To be able to craft the Formulated Courage you need to have spent 30 knowledge in the Alchemical Mastery specialization. Since the duration of the fail debuff is down to 15 minutes, we don’t find Formulated Courage to be especially needed, and suggest you place your knowledge elsewhere.
Alchemy Trainer & Crafting Table Location
The alchemy trainer in The War Within is Tarig, they are located in The Foregrounds in the southern part of Dornogal. The Alchemy crafting table is located next to the trainer.
How to Learn Alchemy Recipes in The War Within
Since Mycobloom is the only common herb of The War Within, and is used in the most recipes (not the most expensive ones), we recommend you start experimenting with Mycobloom.
Firstly, this is to get all the cheap recipes out of the way, using the cheaper herb; instead of experimenting with one of the uncommon herbs and getting a cheap recipe (feels bad man). Secondly, because several of the better recipes also use Mycobloom, you will be learning better recipes using the cheaper herb.
Based on our findings, there are two approaches you can take:
- If your aim is to learn everything as cheaply as possible, you can keep Experimenting with Mycobloom until you have learned all those recipes, and then you continue with the uncommon herbs based on which is the cheapest, until you know all the recipes.
- If your aim is to level as fast as possible, you might need to Experiment with uncommon herbs earlier, as the recipes that take you from 80 to 100 skill are all recipes that have no Mycobloom in them; therefore, you must learn one of these recipes to get the last levels.
The time it takes you to use Experimentation to learn all Mycobloom recipes will vary depending on which recipes you learn, how many failed experiments you get, or how much Courage you choose to consume.
Leveling The War Within Alchemy
Since it’s unclear which recipes will be available for individual Alchemists, there is no exact path for leveling to 100 in Alchemy. Instead, we recommend a set of “rules” you should aim to follow when leveling:
- Start by crafting Algari Healing Potions. This recipe will turn gray at 25, but they are required for the next step.
- Craft Neutralizing Concoctions using the Algari Healing Potions and Dilution Solution, which can be purchased from the alchemy vendor. This will give you Coreway Catalyst, which is required for Wild Experimentation.
- Whenever you are able to, and do not have the failed Experimentation debuff (Recent Catastrophe), you should complete as many experiments as you can with Mycobloom, in order to unlock as many recipes as possible.
- If you are unable to experiment, you should craft whichever recipe you can that offers skill-ups and, based on the prices and availability of mats, ends up being the cheapest.
- If you have recently found a new recipe, you should craft it for the profession knowledge you receive for the First Craft bonus.
- From Alchemy level 80 to 100 you will need to craft flasks. To discover these recipes you have to experiment with uncommon herbs: Arathor’s Spear, Blessing Blossom, Luredrop or Orbinid. Once you learn one recipe that will be the thing you craft to get to 100.
Profession Knowledge
Regardless of what Alchemy specialization you want to aim for, we recommend spending your first 35 knowledge points the following way.
- Start with the Alchemical Mastery specialization. The center wheel of this specialization will increase your Alchemy skill for Alchemy recipes. Put your first 5 points in the center to unlock a sub-specialization.
- The 5 sub-specializations match the five herbs you can experiment on. Put your next 20 points in the Mycobloom Lore sub-specialization. This will reduce your failure rate with Mycobloom Experimentation.
- Put 10 more points in the main Alchemical Mastery Wheel to unlock a 2nd sub-specialization.
- Now choose one of the uncommon flowers. Just choosing it will increase your chances of finding a Flask Recipe when you Experiment with that flower.
Note: This does mean you are locking 35 early knowledge points in the Alchemical Mastery specialization and these can’t be refunded. So only follow this suggestion if you don’t mind spending knowledge points in the way we are recommending.
This should be helpful in both finding recipes faster, and leveling to 100 Alchemy skill faster.
Darkmoon Faire
When Darkmoon Faire is active you can gain 2 skill points and 3 knowledge points; it will be a short quest from Sylannia called A Fizzy Fusion.
We recommend leaving this as late as possible to get the most value out of the increased skill points.
