Things You Should Not Buy From Merchants In Avowed

With Avowed’s long-anticipated release finally here, Obsidian fans and fantasy RPG experts alike are immersing themselves in the sprawling, incredible world first penned by Obsidian writers in the Pillars of Eternity series. There are so many things about this game that sets it apart from other RPGs without necessarily reinventing the wheel. Combat, exploration, and the opus of many Obsidian titles, the writing, are all here in full force.

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Crafting and equipment in this game are fairly lightweight but by no means simplistic, and it strikes a good balance between rewarding players who invest in their gear without turning Avowed into some sort of ultra-hardcore survival sim. Merchants, in particular, sell many items or unique armor pieces that can be essential to players’ builds. However, in the living lands, there is plenty that can be found within the bounty of the wilds, and while merchants sell some essential items for adventuring, they also sell some things players should focus on acquiring or crafting rather than buying.

5

Upgrade Materials

Save Money By Harvesting And Deconstructing

Upgrading is an essential way of bolstering the power of one’s equipment in Avowed, and there are several tiers within each upgrade level to focus on acquiring. In practice, this means that upgrading weapons is a game-spanning journey, not something that can be finished just by scrounging up a few materials. Plenty of merchants sell upgrade materials as part of their stock, and while this might seem tempting, especially in a pinch, in general, there are more efficient ways to acquire upgrade materials.

Many upgrade materials can be found on the corpses of slain beasts, with pelts, in particular, being a staple among equipment upgrades, alongside bear claws and other ingredients procured from animals. Softwood Branches and Paradisan Ladder plants are similarly vital for those early game equipment upgrades, but rather than spending 100 gold to acquire some, they can be found in droves in the wild or by breaking down common weapons.

4

Cooking Ingredients

There Are Plenty Of Free Ways To Gather Ingredients

Recipes can provide some life-saving food and drinks in Avowed for a fraction of a health potion’s price. The best part of the cooking system in this title is how modular it is, often requiring “fruits” or “vegetables” but rarely asking for a specific instance of either. Alcoholic beverages can even be made with spoiled produce, making them a great way to clear out the some inventory space without letting anything go to waste.

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Many of the ingredients used to make these items can be found at merchants’ stands, but that money would be better spent elsewhere. Miscellaneous food items are a common drop or loot reward in Avowed, and when freshness isn’t even a requirement for making some of the best meals in the game, why spend money on food when it can simply be scavenged?

3

Common Weapons

Often Found As Loot Or Drops

Common weapons are a great find in Avowed. While unique weapons will of course, be more appealing to use for the player, those early-level starting weapons provide an excellent amount of crafting materials when deconstructed and can be funneled into gradually upgrading those more reliable, high-tier weapons that are more commonly used in battles. Enemies like brigands or the early-level grave robbers encountered outside Paradis can drop these common weapons.

The frequency of these weapon drops—and their prime purpose as compacted crafting ingredients—means that buying them from merchants is often not worth the money. They are not good enough in combat to warrant the purchase, and as mentioned above, the ingredients their deconstruction produces can usually be found elsewhere for free.

2

Grenades

Simple To Craft And Find

Grenades are a staple in many of the merchant inventories in Avowed, despite being one of the biggest money sinks in the game. Grenades require one of three common crafting materials plus an alcoholic beverage of any kind to create—a paltry crafting requirement. Magran’s Fury, an interesting grenade that is actually a volatile, explosive fruit, is one of the most common resources found in the starting areas of the game.

Grenades are an exceptional tool in the early game when players don’t have many stat points or skills to their name, as they dish out potent AOE damage and can keep those more persistent enemies (cough cough Xaurip gankers) from surrounding the player. However, Grenades are so common that it’s more worth the player’s time and money to find or craft them than it is to purchase them from merchants.

1

Cooked Food

Cooking At Camp Is Cheaper And More Rewarding

Among the most prevalent loot available in Avowed is cooked food. Similar to titles like Monster Hunter Wilds, Avowed does an incredible job creating a tantalizing array of foods for the player to consume, ranging from meals that can help players out in a pinch, all the way to meals that surpass even healing potions in terms of their effectiveness. Buying food from a merchant is often a waste of time, as the ingredients players have picked up from adventuring are often enough to make meals in almost every situation.

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Beyond this, cooked items are often found in chests or as ambient items that can be picked up across the map, and the same merchants selling food are often also selling potions, which on average are more effective and can be purchased at a similar price.

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Systems

Released

February 18, 2025

ESRB

Mature 17+ // Blood and Gore, Strong Language, Violence

Publisher(s)

Xbox Game Studios