In Nightreign, Relics are the way for you to build up your character outside of the Expeditions. You make a lot of decisions that will affect a specific run, but Relics — these little things affect all of your runs. Expect to spend some time earning them and, once you have accumulated a few, expect to carefully consider your options: your frequent co-op teammates, your playstyle, and your combat preferences will all affect your decisions a bit.
Few key facts before we start:
Relics are earned after a run ends — when you die during the Night and lose the run, or after you defeat the Nightlord (final boss). Drops are random.
Relics come in 3 tiers that offer increasing number of random effects, up to 3.
You can equip relics at the Roundtable Hold (central hub).
Relics come in four different colors: Yellow/Luminous, Green/Tranquil, Blue/Drizzly, and Red/Burning.
Each Nightfarer (playable class) starts with a specific Relic Rite — a set of 3 Relic slots of fixed colors: the Relic needs to match the color of the slot to be equipped.
Additional Rites with different Relic color combinations can be purchased from the Small Jar Bazaar with the Murk currency, back at the Roundtable Hold, or earned from Remembrance questlines.
We will expand on all of these in the guide below.
What Are Relics?
Relics are items that offer equippable passive effects that persist between Expeditions. You will get Relics from Expeditions, and you can equip them at the Roundtable Hold before venturing out. Relics have 2 features: Color, and Tier.
You can see the Relic’s color from the icon, or its name:
Yellow relics are Luminous.
Only Nightfarer with a Yellow slot pre-release is Guardian.
Green are Tranquil.
Recluse has 2 Green slots. Duchess has 3.
Blue are Drizzly.
Only Nightfarer with a Blue slot pre-release is Wylder.
Red are Burning.
Guardian has 2 Red slots.
You can see the Relic’s tier from the number of the effects, or its name:
Tier 1 Relics are Delicate. They only provide 1 passive bonus.
Tier 2 Relics are Polished. They provide 2 passive bonuses.
Tier 3 Relics are Grand. They provide all of the 3 passive bonuses.
You will notice that some of the random effects you find on these relics are relatively general (like stat bonuses), while others are more specific to certain characters and abilities. This allows you to fine-tune any Nightfarer towards a certain playstyle.
Picking the right relics is crucial to a character build. We highly recommend you take a look at our Build Guides (coming soon!) to assist in your decisions.
How Do I Get Relics?
Finish your first Expedition (i.e., your first run) to get some Relics. Whether you defeat the Nightlord in that Expedition or not does not matter as long as you make some progress. The quality and the amount of Relics get better depending on how far along you get.
You will know it when you see it: a “Reward” screen should come up at the end of your run, listing a few icons with the different Relics, plus some amount of Nightreign’s currency, the Murk.
Once you start earning some Murk, another option for obtaining Relics will be to purchase them: back at the Roundtable Hold, you can visit the Small Jar Bazaar and buy from his limited set of different colors and tiers, costing either 500 or 700 depending on the tier.
You can also sell Relics you no longer want in exchange for Murk.
You will be able to browse all of your currently owned Relics at the Roundtable Hold before your next Expedition — see the next section for more details.
How Do I Equip Relics?
You can’t access your relics during a run — the only time you can adjust them is back at the Roundtable Hold (your central hub) before you venture out for an expedition.
Following your first run, once you spawn in front of the roundtable, head to the left to find an altar clad in blue cloth. You will get an option to interact and “Perform Relic Rites.” This will open up a Relic Rites menu. On the left side, select your target Nightfarer (your character class) and their Relic slot. Access your full Relic collection on the right.
Hovering over the Relic will tell you its properties. The Relic’s icon and name will both tell you its color. The Relic color needs to match the slot color on the target Nightfarer to be equipped. Look to the left side to cycle between Nightfarers and their slots.
The Relic name will also tell you its Rarity, but you can easily see that from the number of the effects: Delicate/Tier 1 Relics will only have 1 passive bonus available. Polished/Tier 2 Relics will come with 2 effects. Grand/Tier 3 Relics are the highest tier and will have all 3 effects. These effects are random.
If your collection is starting to get a bit clogged, you can always sell Relics you no longer want to the Jar Merchant.
What Are Relic Rites?
Relic Rites are different sets of slots for equipping your Relics. You might have noticed that the name of the menu brought up by the altar where you equip your Relics is also called “Relic Rites,” which can get a little confusing, but in this section we will specifically be referring to the sets of Slots and not the interface.
Each Nightfarer starts out with 3 slots of different colors:
Wylder: Red, Red, Blue
Guardian: Red, Yellow, Yellow
Duchess: Red. Blue, Blue
Recluse: Blue, Blue, Green
Ironeye: Yellow, Green, Green
Raider: Red, Green, Green
Executor: Red, Yellow, Yellow
Revenant: Blue, Blue, Yellow
When equipping the Relics, you will need to make sure that the color of the Slot matches the color of the Relic. In addition to the icon color, you can get the color of the Relic from its name: Yellow relics are Luminous, Green is Tranquil, Blue is Drizzly, and Red is Burning.
These starting colors are not the only configuration available for each character. We will discuss that in the next section.
There are three ways you can get new Rites (color sets) for a Nightfarer:
Purchase at Small Jar Bazaar after defeating First Boss/Tricephalos (1 Goblet, new color set)
Completing Remembrance Quests — for most characters, it’s the Second one (1 Chalice, has one universal slot)
Purchase at Small Jar Bazaar after defeating more Nightlords: 4 unique Nightlords, 7 unique Nightlords, and Heolstor (3 Grails, slots of same color)
Though, before you get too excited, note that these will replace your current Relic set, not add to it. Their benefit is a different color combination for players who lean heavily into a single class — you are only ever able to equip 3 Relics when headed into an Expedition.
We hope you found this Relics overview guide helpful! If you have any suggestions, please leave us a comment below — in the meantime, best of luck tinkering with your Nightfarer builds!
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Mila Grish
Dedicated contributor at EIP Gaming and a part-time collector of books she will never have time to actually read. Jumps on the newest releases just as quickly as on the uncovered dusty collections from the basement. For her, shiny graphics can never be an excuse to not have a polished player experience or an immersive story.
