Crimson Desert – 30 Things to Keep You Busy After Beating It

by

As promised, Crimson Desert offers a huge amount of content beyond its main story – and the story itself is quite lengthy! There are many different things to do, including hidden mechanics and items the game doesn’t immediately explain. While you can explore some of these activities during the story, it’s even more rewarding to return later when your character is stronger and you have more inventory space, thanks to helping people in the towns you visit.

No matter when you finish playing Crimson Desert, here are 30 things you can do next, starting with the most straightforward options.

Reassembling the Greymanes

Once you’ve set up Howling Hill Camp, it’s a good idea to help Marius and the other Greymanes with their requests, even if you start small. Completing these requests unlocks new buildings, like a cooking station and a shop. Plus, you can send the Greymanes on missions to collect resources and clear blocked areas, making it easier to defeat enemies and explore the rest of the map.

It’s a Simple Life

The best meals in the game need a lot of ingredients. While you can buy them or send Greymanes to collect them, you can also raise animals and grow crops at your camp. This gives you a reason to find plant seeds as you explore Pywel, and it’s helpful to be able to specifically farm the ingredients you need for certain recipes.

Rebuilding Pailune

After finishing Chapter 7, the Greymanes can start the major project of rebuilding Pailune and bringing back its former glory. This will require a significant investment of resources, including donations and assigning Greymanes to different jobs. The rewards are considerable, particularly for the Institute, which has research projects that unlock new designs and other advantages.

Slay the Spires

Once you finish the Spire of Stars, more Spires will become available as you progress through the story. These Spires feature unique puzzles and platforming sections, often leading you to important areas in the Abyss. Some Spires, like the Spire of Clockwork, require you to complete a specific task – in this case, finishing Chapter 8 – before you can access them.

Into the Abyss

The Abyss in Crimson Desert is a compelling feature, with each island presenting distinct puzzles and challenges you’ll need to solve to progress. Completing these areas also unlocks convenient fast travel points throughout the world of Pywel. Because stamina costs are significantly lower in the Abyss, it’s easier to quickly reach specific locations before the game loads the next area.

Harness the Elements

Completing the Spires is useful, as it unlocks powerful elemental attacks you can use in the Abyss. You’ll find Wind by finishing the Clockwork Spire’s Riddle Square, Ice in the Ringing Truth Spire’s Path of Trials, and Fire deeper within the Tree of Slumber. Lightning is unlocked by completing the Courtyard of Precision. Though not essential to beat the game, these attacks will be very helpful for the content after the credits roll, so it’s worth getting them all.

Find Hidden Treasure

Want to go on a treasure hunt? You’ll sometimes find maps showing locations with useful rewards, like new gear. These maps aren’t always easy to spot – you might need to search around, especially in places like Karin Quarry. Pay attention to your minimap for clues! You can also find treasure in unexpected places, such as The Singing Catfish, where you can even find a Pirate King Hat that helps you locate nearby treasure.

Bounty Star

You’ll start finding bounty posters and notices pretty early in the game, both on bulletin boards and scattered around the world. While they can give you some quick cash when you need it, I suggest completing them all after you’ve unlocked all the major cities. This is because even in the starting area, you’ll find bounties for targets located far away, and it takes a significant amount of time to transport them back to the authorities, even with a fast horse. So, focus on the main story first, then efficiently collect all the bounties without much trouble.

DO NOT STOP EXPLORING

Crimson Desert truly encourages players to explore its world. You’ll constantly discover new things – secret puzzles, useful items, strong armor, and interesting quests. The game doesn’t guide you every step of the way, and that’s a good thing! Be sure to explore every nook and cranny, because you might be surprised by how much content it holds.

Iron Chef

You can find recipes everywhere in Pywel, and you’ll keep discovering more even after you’ve learned a bunch – selling these extras can earn you a good amount of Copper. It’s worth trying to collect them all! Some recipes restore your health, spirit, and stamina, while others temporarily grant powerful resistances. Alchemy works the same way – there are potent recipes that can boost your maximum health, damage, and other stats.

Collecting All the Pets

As we mentioned earlier, pets can be really helpful – they’ll collect items from fallen enemies, saving you the trouble of searching every body. Plus, you can actually befriend most dogs and cats in the game and add them to your team, if you want!

Toll the Bells

When you visit towns like Hernand, Scholastone, or Calphade, you can climb the clock towers and ring the bells to reveal the surrounding map. This not only makes exploration easier, but also helps you complete quests for the Priorin Forest Guardians.

Buy High, Sell Low

Want to earn extra money for camp without constantly using Greymanes for missions? Consider trading goods! Once you’ve helped the Goldleaf Merchants Guild, you can package items and load them onto a wagon (linked to the “Grounds of the Sunrise” quest) for delivery. Be aware there are some challenges: packaging costs money, you need at least 25 items, and you absolutely can’t get off the wagon, or you’ll lose everything. If you can manage those things and enjoy a leisurely journey, trading might be a good option.

Natural Born Collector

In Crimson Desert, you can constantly expand your knowledge by discovering and learning about all kinds of creatures and plants. While it might seem like just collecting items for crafting, there are special Challenges tied to them. If you have a Sealed Abyss Artifact, completing these Challenges – like finding every type of mushroom or herb – will reward you with additional Abyss Artifacts and Abyss Cores.

Weapon Mastery

I’ve been finding these Sealed Abyss Artifacts, and they’re pretty cool. Basically, each one throws down a combat challenge based on a certain weapon. Like, there’s ‘Sword of Trials 1’ where you have to beat three enemies with a sword in under 30 seconds. Completing them gets you Abyss Artifacts, and eventually even Abyss Cores. Even if you don’t need the rewards, they’re a fun way to shake up your battles and experiment with different combat styles.

Min-Max Abyss Cores

Collecting Abyss Cores is useful, but combining them to create more powerful versions – and especially Greater Abyss Cores with special abilities – is even better. While Greater Cores are rare, getting Tier 3 Cores is still worthwhile, as they provide valuable improvements to your attack, defense, critical hit chance, and healing power.

Beat the Arm Wrestling Champ

Arm wrestling is just the first of many quick challenges you’ll face. You might see a message appear after winning three matches in a row, but don’t stop there! The fourth opponent is often the strongest, and beating them will earn you some serious bragging rights. After that, keep exploring to find and defeat even more champions.

Challenges and Changes

Okay, so I’ve been checking out the new challenges with the Sealed Abyss Artifacts, and some of them are seriously insane! It’s like they were designed for a super-powered Greymane. We’re talking about stuff like leaping from the Abyss and landing within 30 seconds, finding twenty allies, building up Howling Hill, and even… traveling two kilometers without moving?! But honestly, the rewards – Abyss Cores, Artifacts, and Faded Artifacts – make it worth the effort. They’re way more interesting and creative than the standard mastery challenges, that’s for sure.

Damiane and Oongka

Damiane and Oongka aren’t central to the main story like Kliff—they each get a small part, but that’s it. You can play as them whenever you want, as long as they aren’t busy with a quest. Plus, perfecting their equipment and abilities can add many hours of gameplay. You can also simply call them in to help you during quests for extra support.

Go Fish

Fishing is a popular and enjoyable activity in many video games. It’s not just a relaxing pastime—sometimes you need to fish to survive! Certain recipes actually require fish as an ingredient. If you’d rather not focus on animal husbandry in Pywel, spending some time fishing could be a great alternative. Plus, you might find a special fishing rod that automatically reels in your catch, making the whole process much faster.

Faction Quests

As you advance the story and assist different groups, particularly during the major liberation missions, you’ll unlock new quest lines specific to those groups. For instance, aiding Count Roberts in Hernand will send you to the Karin Quarry to deal with the Bleed Bandits and a powerful machine called Marni’s Excavatron, and eventually operate a crane there. There are plenty of other faction quests available – even for the Greymanes – and completing them rewards you with valuable resources, equipment, Contribution points, and stronger alliances.

Optional Bosses

Some enemies aren’t found by just exploring areas and defeating everything in sight, like in The Crimson Nightmare. The Staglord, for example, is part of a questline for House Serkis, requiring you to find Marshall Middler at the Icemoor Castle Ruins before challenging the Staglord. Similarly, certain enemies appear as part of requests – such as the three Lunar Reapers in Demesis – so be prepared for unexpected battles.

Decorating Your House

In addition to farming, fishing, and animal husbandry, Crimson Desert lets Kliff personalize his own home. Situated near the camp entrance, you can buy furniture and decorate as you please. While it doesn’t have a major purpose at first, buying a Cauldron unlocks the ability to craft elixirs, giving you a helpful advantage in combat.

Research Projects

Like many online games, Crimson Desert lets you invest in research projects to unlock useful things like crafting recipes and resource locations. You’ll start with the Pororin, who can help you make basic healing potions, find where to gather ingredients, and even boost your Spirit. These projects cost a lot of Silver and take time to complete – you can either wait it out or speed things up. If a project gets stuck, be sure to check back with the researcher – they might need your assistance.

Cleansing the Sanctums

Once you’ve met the witch Elowen, you can begin clearing out the Sanctums scattered throughout the land. Each Sanctum is cleared by defeating enemies and then restoring its core – you’ll either need to insert power cubes or repair pillars. Completing a Sanctum unlocks Kuku blueprints, letting you craft useful items like a jetpack for Oognka and a laser helm. To cleanse more Sanctums, you’ll need to find and meet other witches, such as Lyselia, Bari, and Areciel, so be sure to help anyone who seems to need it.

Clearing Abyss Cressets

Abyss Cressets are strange and fascinating discoveries. You’ll find some of them right out in the open, and simply interacting with them will give you an Abyss Artifact. Others are hidden inside ancient ruins and require you to solve tricky puzzles – these puzzles range from easy to very difficult. But they’re always worth trying, because clearing a Cresset unlocks a new fast travel location.

Resist and Disorder

Robbing people? That’s old news. But causing real trouble and getting paid for it? Now that’s an interesting idea. Certain powerful artifacts from the Sealed Abyss will ask you to do some questionable things – like secretly destroy landmarks, sell stolen goods, and pickpocket people in cities. You won’t necessarily get rich, but these artifacts and the special cores you find with them are definitely worth the effort.

I Fought the Law

Another option is to do what most Skyrim players have tried at least once: cause some trouble and fight the city guards. This will lower your reputation in that area and give you a bounty – which can get very expensive – but it’s a decent way to practice your combat skills. Just make sure you succeed in the quick-time event when you’re grabbed, or you’ll be arrested!

All You Need is Kill

Even if you’re not actively trying to earn Abyss Artifacts through specific tasks, simply exploring and battling enemies is still beneficial. Notice the yellow bar next to your mini-map? It fills up as you defeat foes, and when it’s full, you’ll receive an Abyss Artifact. If you’ve finished most of the main content or are just looking for something to do, feel free to defeat large groups of enemies for rewards.

Maxing Out Trust

Don’t forget to talk to the people you meet! Building trust with NPCs throughout the game—and even after you finish the main story—is really helpful. Giving them gifts will boost your relationship even faster, so hold onto those Copper Pouches! Once you’re best friends with an NPC, they might unlock special items or quests, letting you buy unique goods at Howling Hill. You might also get clues about rare horses you can find and tame.

Read More

2026-03-29 16:45