How to earn reputation with The Archivists’ Codex in Korthia

Relics are a thing of the past. But as they say, everything old becomes new again. And that’s the case with a new faction in Shadowlands‘ patch 9.1, The Archivists’ Codex. They play an important part in Korthia, with some substantial rewards hidden behind their ranks of reputation. And the main way to earn this rep? Turning in thousands of Relics and Relic Fragments.

The Archivists’ Codex is not a typical faction that provides quests or rewards reputation on a kill. How does one open up this new faction? Where do these Relic Fragments come from? And what will it take to earn all of the reputation needed? Let’s take a look at one of the two new factions in Korthia.

Unlocking the Archivists’ Codex faction in Korthia

To start, unlocking this faction will be easy. Perhaps even accidental. You set out towards Korthia in the new patch 9.1 campaign, and while doing that preliminary questing, you happen upon a rare creature, or perhaps a treasure. For fun — or for the rewards — you kill the rare or click on the treasure and then you loot a book, Researching Korthian Relics, which starts you on a new quest.

After a chain of nine quests, plus four side quests teaching you the basics of how Archivists’ Codex works, you’re ready to start collecting Relic Fragments. These quests will also put you at 700 reputation into rank 1 (out of 6 total ranks). After that, it’s just a matter of turning in the Relics to Archivist Roh-Suir, near Keeper’s Respite in Korthia (for those who use an addon for coordinates, at 62.8, 22.6). There are no quests specifically given by the Roh-Suir, they’re just an NPC to turn your Relics and purchase items (when you have enough reputation and when you have enough currency).

But to do that, you need Relics, so how do you get these Relics now that you’ve unlocked the faction?

Obtaining Relics for the Archivists’ Codex in Korthia

There are three main sources for Relics:

• Rares
• Treasures
• Random Korthia mobs

Like the initial quest item that drops to open the faction, two of the sources are rares and treasures. Each rare and treasure can only be looted for Relics once per day. Most of the time you’ll find several Relic Fragments, and when turned in to Archivist Roh-Suir, they provide 1 Cataloged Research — the new currency — and 0.5 reputation with Archivists’ Codex. Yes, half a reputation point. Then there are other Relics that can be found — uncommon Relics reward 8 Cataloged Research, rare Relics reward 48 Cataloged Research, and epic-quality Relics reward between 100 and 300 Cataloged Research. Each provide half as much reputation as they do currency.

In addition to rares and treasures, mobs have a small chance to drop relics, mostly just the Relic Fragments. Upon reaching Rank 2 with the Archivists’ Codex, you can buy Research Report: All-Seeing Crystal for 100 Cataloged Research. This allows you to see which mobs are carrying Relics, similar to how there is a power in Torghast allowing players to see which mobs grant a new Anima Power. Once unlocked, this is available to all characters on an account, so you’ll only need to buy it on one character. It’s definitely worth spending the Research on.

There’s another lucrative, but not sustainable, source of reputation — there are 20 Relics scattered across Korthia that provide a one-time quest. Each will provide 250 Cataloged Research and 500 Reputation. Different Relic quests become available at different ranks, and some require special items. A walkthrough of the quests can be found here.

The reputation needed for each Rank isn’t the normal amount for a faction, it’s closer to what’s needed for levels of friendship, similar to the Tillers back in Mists of Pandaria. Here’s how much you’ll have to earn to increase your standing:

• Rank 1: 3,000 (or 2,300 after the initial quests)
• Rank 2: 4,500
• Rank 3: 6,500
• Rank 4: 11,000
• Rank 5: 16,000.

After that, you’l be atRank 6 and earn a Paragon box every 10,000 reputation. You receive 10,000 reputation from the one-time quests, so ignoring those, and the initial 700 — that is a total of 30,000 reputation from Relic drops. Hopefully rares and treasures are easy to come by.

Why gain reputation with the Archivists’ Codex faction?

Some of the greatest rewards in Korthia are tied behind the Archivists’ Codex reputation. All of the new gear earned in patch 9.1 cannot use the sockets from the previous patch, so if you want to add a socket to any new gear, including the upgraded legendries, you need an Alloy-Warping Facetor. And one way to purchase that is to reach rank 6 with the Archivists’ Codex and spend 5,000 Cataloged Research. That means players who need a lot of sockets need to farm a lot of Relics. (Though you can also buy this socket is from the other Korthia faction, Death’s Advance, when Exalted with them, for 1,000 Soul Cinders.)

Do you have low-level Conduits you want upgraded? At Rank 6, for 3,000 Cataloged Research, Death-Bound Shard can upgrade a random one, but we only recommend this when you have a mountain of currency to spare.

World Quests in Korthia offer ilevel 207 gear — at first. However, if players want better gear from these World Quests, they have to purchase different Research Reports. These will increase the rewards, up to a maximum ilevel reward of 233. Some rewards purchased are account-wide, such as the All-Seeing Crystal. The Research that increases World Quest rewards is not listed as account-side, and this may need to be unlocked by each character to increase gear rewards.

There is also some gear, like a recipe for a Crafter’s Mark of the Chained Isle, to upgrade crafted gear to ilevel 230. And at Rank 6 there is a single piece of gear, for each armor type, of ilevel 239, that has a Domination Socket. Also, there’s a mount. There should always be a mount for reaching the highest level of reputation.

As long as rares and treasures are easy to find, and the mobs that drop relics are part of the daily questing process for the Death’s Advance faction, this might be part of the routine that grants additional rewards. Not something that is forcing players to grind fragments for what is necessary to their gameplay.

Originally published 6/28/2021