A Guide to Understanding Ascended Food in Guild Wars 2: Part One
Have you ever walked up to a map meta and there it is, a smorgasbord of 3-4 Ascended Feasts, and wondered which one you should eat? Want to use your 500 Chef to help your squad before that daily Strike Mission get maximum buffs with Nourishment? There are so many nuances to Ascended Food Crafting, hopefully, I can clear some of that up for you with a series of guides that cover the big stuff.
I’m going to break it down into pieces so you can create the fests that are best for you and your groups. In this first guide, I will focus on the Cultivated Herbs & Spices, which are the actual Ascended Ingredients in the Ascended Feasts. Cultivated Herbs & Spices have an affect on the top stat in the Feast and offer some pretty nifty boons.
What is Ascended Food Anyway?
Acended Food is the highest tier Nourishment available and comes in the form of feasts that can be shared by any number of players once placed for 5 minutes (so grab quickly). The sharing aspect, on top of the big boons, is a large part of the appeal for crafting Acended Food. With one item, a full squad of 10 can be powered up for an hour (longer if using a primer)! Once you learn the recipe (through discovery or purchase) they are easy to make and get most of the materials for. In order to craft Ascended Recipes you must have a maxed-out Chef (500) that has completed Gourmet Training. Once created, the feast is Account Bound.
How do I get Cultivated Herbs & Spices to craft Ascended Feasts?
Most of the ingredients needed for these can be crafted through ingredients found in the open world through gathering (for the plants) and killing foes (for the meats). Cultivated herbs & spices, however, need to be grown in your home instance garden, or can be bought through the Trading Post (TP).
To grow these you need Varietal Seeds, which you obtain through forging herbs in the open world. The trickier item is the Enriched Compost you must craft through a tree of crafting.
Each of the Extract of Nourishments is derived from using your Portable Composter on crafted, or TP purchased craftable, food. The Guild Wars 2 Wiki has drop rate lists for each rarity of the extract, so you do not have to guess what food to make/buy to get specific extracts to drop. This will save you money, time, and materials.
Unlike other seed packets you use in your garden, Varietal Seed Pouches are only good for 1 crop each, so if you want to fill a whole garden plot, you will need 4 pouches. These also do not regrow automatically until you grow them again. So, you can see the appeal of buying these from the TP. Cultivated Herbs & Spices run from 20s-40s (+/- depending on the market), so breaking down which you want to spend your hard-earned gold or limited time/materials on is what I’m here to help you do!
What does each of the Cultivated Herbs & Spices do anyway?
Glad you asked! Each one has a unique effect on the top stat of the Ascended Feast you craft. Cultivated Cilantro is great for any group content offering a 66% chance to steal life on a critical hit. If the whole group is carrying this buff, a huge dent in the enemy’s damage can be made very quickly, so really great for World Bosses! If you’re going into a scenario when lots of Condition Damage is expected, Cultivated Clove might be a good one to choose, decreasing incoming Condition duration by 20% stopping that damage quicker. If you’re looking to buff your healers, Cultivated Mint increases outdoing healing by 10%. On the other side, you can use Cultivated Peppercorn to decrease incoming damage by 10% to make healing easier on your buddies if peppercorn is applied to the remainder of the part or squad’s food supply. Another option to accomplish a similar effect is Cultivated Sesame Seed giving the boon of gaining 85 health every second.
I hope you’ve found this guide helpful and are one step closer to being confident in your crafting or food choice skills. Leave a comment here or some love on Instagram/Facebook. Would love to hear more about what you would find helpful!
Credit to Guild Wars 2 Wiki for information