Great guide doctor ! Lots of nice tips I'll be sure to use when I can't find a trial or feel like being an antisocial Incarnate. 
One remark though. I somewhat disagree with this bit :
Quote:
They're not essential, certainly, but I don't find them irrelevant either - and it would be easy for a first-time Incarnate to read this as meaning they don't work outside iTrials. Those apply to all incarnate content, which includes the Dark Astoria arcs. While they aren't that useful outside of iTrials, I know I was happy to have them for the final story arcs of DA. Even more so for the Taskmaster repeats. Nitpicking, I know, but I wanted to clarify that they do apply even solo so long as you're in DA.
|
Originally Posted by Dr Harmony
Lore and Destiny Level shifts are irrelevant to this lifestyle.
|
Thats a very good point.
I have to admit that i havent finsihed the DA story arcs yet, and having seen what Max has in store I'd definitely appreciate those extra level shifts now. 
And being able to race through these arcs is important if you want to push the boundaries of a casual incarnate lifestyle.
There's a potential 6 components and 2 Empyrean merits per week in it, which amounts to 160 threads per week.
If you have a character you enjoy playing, have got them to 50, and would like to carry on playing them, but don't enjoy Incarnate Trials, what's next? I'd imagined that the non-trial incarnate path would be long and grindy, but have been amazed at how easy it is. Amazed enough to prompt me to write this guide.
I've recently started doing this on a couple of characters. Wundastar (Fire/SS Brute) is an extremely capable solo-er and runs x8 missions on her own. Utopia Jones (Beam Rifle/Pain Dom Corrupter) doesn't solo too well due to lack of personal defensive abilities, and plays best in a team. Her progress shows that you dont need to be a flavour-of-the-month farmer to do this.
Both have successfully kept on fighting crime in Paragon City, teamed and solo, and worked towards their incarnate powers at a staggeringly quick pace.
Both had their Alpha and Judgement slots useable within a few days.
INCARNATE SHARDS and ALPHA
Use these to unlock your Alpha slot, which will give you your level shift eventually. You get these per enemy defeat from non-incarnate content, and their drop rate is not reduced by team size. So running radio mission or hero tips will give you these. A non-speed ITF typically hands out about 4 to 6 of these for an hour or so's work. Radio or tips missions would do exactly the same. 5 Hero tips on a team of 8 earned me 7 shards. Enemy level doesn't affect shard drops, so run team missions at +0/x8 for best effect. To get shards on your own, play at +0, and set for as many as you can handle.
Level 50 task forces also let you earn a 4-shard item instead of merits at the end, so this can speed up your Alpha slot progress.
If you have Vanguard Merits to spare, 150 of these make the 4-shard Gr'ai Matter item. Check your alpha recipes for this and plan accordingly. If you're a capable solo-er it may be worth knocking out some Borea missions to make this item, since you'll accumulate Shards and Vanguard Merits.
A Notice of the Well is handed out for completing the Weekly Task Force. This can reap triple dividends if you're lucky. An ITF earned me the Essence of the Incarnate item, a Notice of the Well, and 6 shards, enough to unlock Tier 3 Spiritual easily. A weekly Lady Grey would also earn you Vanguard Merits of course.
Tier 1 Alpha requires 12 shards, Tier 2 requires 20 more shards, and Tier 3 requires just 8 more shards plus a Notice of the Well.
Its quite feasible to have the Tier 1 alpha unlocked in a few days just from running five Hero Tip missions a day, or some similar non-incarnate activity.
I found the Tier 3 (and the level shift) took me just over a week to achieve, usually around the time I'd unlocked Tier 1 Interface and Judgement.
INCARNATE XP
Incarnate XP drops from enemies in Dark Astoria. For reference, Wundastar ran a five mission arc by Heather Townsend at +1/x8 or +1/x4 for a couple of missions, and unlocked 32% of the Judgement and Interface slots. This is equivalent to 20 threads roughly, or two 5 minute missions for Ephram Sha.
Utopia Jones running at +0/x1 for a repeatable mission unlocks about 0.5% of each slot per run.
Incarnate XP drops slowly compared to how you can accumulate threads.
INCARNATE THREADS
These drop from enemies in Dark Astoria solo content at random, maybe 1 or 2 per mission. You can also get them from three main sources:
1) Ephram Sha - he hands out repeatable missions that can give you 10 Threads per day
2) Signature Story Arc (SSA) - running Theoden of the Lost's arc gives you another 10 threads per week. Run it again to get an Astral merit which can make 4 threads if you like, and once more for a Hero merit to finance your incarnate activites.
3) Notice of the Well - complete the weekly task force every week for a Notice, which converts into 40 threads (Shards->Upgrade in the Incarnate Powers Convert tab). Save one of these for your tier 3 Alpha, convert the rest to threads. I recommend using the first to unlock Judgement quickly, and the second will be yours by the time Tier 3 Alpha becomes a possibility.
That's 120 threads per week for 5 minutes per day (Ephram Sha) another 15 minutes per week (SSA #1) and a single task force. Even a confirmed solo-er can get 80 threads per week. You'll probably pick up another 10 doing Sha's missions each week.
You can also get 10 reward merits and 5 threads for defeating Adamastor, if you summon him in Talos or Sharkhead. This is done by buying the Summon Adamastor recipe in Wentworths, crafting it, and then using the power at the summoning site by the old Dark Astoria gates in Talos, or Potter's Field in Sharkhead. It takes all of five minutes to do with a small team of 4 or more, and the rewards are on a 20 hour cooldown per character, so you could potentially make another 35 threads per week this way.
Incarnate Threads convert to incarnate XP, and also convert to the components used to craft non-Alpha incarnate abilities.
Each iXP conversion costs 1,000,000 inf, so be prepared to make some money. A single hero merit can probably net you 50 million as a Kinetic Combat piece if you buy the recipe and craft it, so the extra weekly SSA will finance this path. Unlocking all four slots with threads will cost you 150 million inf.
Judgement and Interface slots take 30 threads to unlock each, and Lore and Destiny take 45 more threads after that.
Tier 1 abilities take 60 threads to create, 3 x 20 for each common component.
Tier 2 abilities take another 100 threads.
Tier 3 take another 340 threads, which is starting to get a bit grindy, so choose which slots you really want to Tier 3 with this in mind. Lore and Destiny Level shifts are irrelevant to this lifestyle. I'd suggest focussing on Interface and Lore for the best bang-per-buck above Tier 1, but that will vary with build.
The story arcs in Dark Astoria give you a thread-based component at the end of each one, which is equivalent to 20 threads for each common. If you do run these, you should first check in with Taskmaster Gabriel and accept his mission because he'll give you 2 Empyrean Merits for completing all 6 arcs. These convert to 20 threads each.
JUDGEMENT IN 4 DAYS!
Nothing says "I'm an incarnate now" like unleashing a big old nuke every second or third spawn. You can unlock the Judgement Slot within 4 days of completing Mender Ramiel's arc.
You need 90 threads to unlock the slot and build a Tier 1 Judgement power.
Thats 40 from a Weekly Task Force, 10 from the SSA, and 10 per day from Ephram Sha for 4 days gives you 90 threads. The moment you get these you can unlock and craft and start using your Judgement power. The extra iXP and threads from even 3 Ephram Sha missions may push you over, so 3 days is not unreasonable. By the end of the second week you'll have another 150 threads, enough to unlock either Lore or Interface and equip to Tier 1.
Confirmed solo artists will of course take 4 days longer for the first unlock, but even so will be able to use Judgement in around 1 week of playing a +0/x1 mission for five minutes every day.
From there, it can take somewhere between 3 and 5 weeks to unlock the other three abilities and craft a tier 1, even if you solo exclusively.