Guides
Faction Grinding
How to raise standing with a hostile city. The slow path to acceptance.
Most cities on Norrath have at least one race or class that cannot enter without being attacked on sight. Faction grinding is the slow work of flipping that hostility to neutral or better, one quest turn-in or kill at a time. It is one of EverQuest's most patience-heavy systems, and on The Last Camp it is fully canonical — no auto-faction shortcuts, no donation mechanic.
Faction is also the gate to many quest lines, rare drops, and bind locations. A character who grinds Coldain to Ally unlocks the Velious shawl chain, Thurgadin armor quests, and a safe bind in the dwarf city. The investment compounds.
At a glance
| Field | Value |
|---|---|
| Faction visibility | /con <target> plus mob's listed faction hits |
| Tier order | Scowls → Threatening → Dubious → Apprehensive → Indifferent → Amiably → Kindly → Warmly → Ally |
| Speed multipliers | Quest turn-ins beat individual kills 5-20x |
| Friendly-fire | Killing allied factions tanks the target faction |
| Cap | No hard cap; some grinds take weeks of focused play |
How faction works
Every NPC belongs to one or more factions. Killing or completing a quest for an NPC adjusts your standing with each of its factions, sometimes in opposite directions. Behind the scenes the value is a numerical score; the displayed tier (Scowls, Dubious, Amiably, Ally) is a band on that score. The bands are not even — Indifferent to Amiably is a smaller jump than Apprehensive to Indifferent — but the score itself is monotonic.
You will not always see the underlying number. Use /con against a guard or named NPC of the target faction to read the current tier. Track tier transitions by repeating the /con after every batch of turn-ins.
When to grind faction
- You want to bind in a city whose guards currently kill you.
- You need to turn in a quest at an NPC who is currently KOS.
- You're targeting a rare drop from a faction-specific camp (Coldain Shawl, Cabilis crafted gear, Erudin epic pieces).
- You rolled a non-canonical race-class on The Last Camp and start KOS in your own home city.
Typical grind patterns
Kill enemies of the target faction
If you want Knights of Truth to like you, kill Freeport Militia members, Bloodsabers, or undead in Western Commons and Befallen. Each kill gives a faction hit to every opposing faction the mob belongs to. Read the kill log carefully — some mobs share factions you don't want to lose.
Complete faction-specific quests
Repeatable low-level quests are the mainstay. The Knights of Truth have undead-head turn-ins. The Coldain have a chain of Ulthork tusk and Velium-themed turn-ins worth 5-20 kills' worth of faction per turn-in. The Crushbone Orcs (the actual orcs, not the server) drop pawn pieces that turn in to the elves of Faydark. Always look for quest turn-ins before grinding raw kills — they are usually 10-50x faster.
Avoid friendly-fire
Killing members of allied factions tanks the target faction in parallel. Before committing to a grind site, read the faction display on each kill and confirm none of the cross-factions matter to you. Some grinds are zero-sum — every Coldain point you gain in one place loses you Kromrif points elsewhere.
High-value grinds
- Coldain Hero — Velious shawl chain, the canonical reason to ally with the dwarves of Thurgadin. Grindable through Ulthork tusk turn-ins in Iceclad and Eastern Wastes.
- Crushbone Orcs faction (for elves) — Faydwer newbie kill grind. Easy plat and faction.
- Sarnak Empire (for Iksar) — Lake of Ill Omen kill grind. Required for Cabilis quest access.
- Kromrif (Kael giants, neg-rep) — required to be hostile for Coldain rep, friendly for Kael City quests. Choose your side.
- Rallosian Army (Ogres, Trolls) — Innothule and Feerrott base.
- Knights of Truth (Qeynos) — undead head turn-ins from Western Commons cleric.
Speed-up tactics
- Always look for turn-in quests first; only fall back to raw kills if no turn-in exists at your skill band.
- Stack turn-ins. Carry 100+ items into the city and hand them in over a single session, not one at a time across multiple sessions.
- Group with someone who needs the opposite faction — clear the camp together, each gets full credit.
- Run the grind during low-server times. Faction grinds rely on respawn rate; competition for the spawn slows everything.
KOS recovery for non-canonical race-classes
On The Last Camp the any-race-any-class rule means your character may start hostile to its own home city's guards. The recovery path is the same as any faction grind — find a quest turn-in or a kill grind that targets the faction the city guards belong to, work through it, and re-/con after each batch. Don't rush; bind near a friendly city in the meantime.
Tools
/con <target>— read current standing. Repeat after every batch of turn-ins.- Faction log on each mob kill — appears in chat; lists every faction adjusted by the kill.
- Bind point flexibility — bind a Wizard or Druid friend nearby for emergency port-out when a grind goes sideways.
- Stack-friendly inventory — carry stackable turn-in items in a 10-slot bag; per-turn-in clicks add up over hundreds of repetitions.
Common mistakes
- Grinding kills without checking that the faction actually moves on each kill.
- Killing a quest NPC before completing all of their turn-ins.
- Ignoring the faction log and accidentally tanking an ally faction.
- Trying to grind from Scowls without a port-out plan when guards aggro mid-grind.
- Turning in items at the wrong NPC of the same faction — some accept, some don't.
- Over-grinding past Ally — there is no Ally+ tier; once you're Ally, additional faction is wasted.