Patch 12.0.5 Lingering Shadows shipped on the April 21 weekly reset and added two new outdoor systems that share a currency, a vendor hub, and a Great Vault row. Void Assaults are the casual rotating world-content loop in Eversong Woods and Zul'Aman, and Ritual Sites are the 1-5 player scenario layer with a 5-tier difficulty ladder. Both feed Field Accolades, both feed the Renown Track, and both unlock at the Bazaar's second-floor vendor row in Silvermoon. This is the guide for what each one is, where to spend what, and which of the loot caches you should not buy in bulk.
The simplest way to read the patch is currency-first, so the Void Assaults loop is where it makes sense to start.
Void Assaults are the outdoor world event in 12.0.5. Each week, one of two zones is active. Eversong Woods and Zul'Aman rotate, and both host the same two activity types:
The currency you are farming is Field Accolades. You can also exchange 100 Dark Particles for a chunk of Field Accolades if you have come into Particles through other 12.0.5 content. Every completed Strike and Incursion counts toward your World Content row in the Great Vault, so a few hours in the active zone on weekly reset day satisfies the row even on a fresh alt.
Ritual Sites are the instanced layer of 12.0.5 outdoor content. Each site supports 1 to 5 players, opens with five selectable difficulty tiers, and runs without a timer. Completing each tier unlocks the next, and the tiers themselves layer in extra modifiers:
Challenges are the tuning knob: each one cranks up encounter difficulty and also boosts the Spoils and Voidlight Marl payout. Tier 5 with the maximum 4 challenges is where the highest-end Hero-track Great Vault contributions live. If you have run Mythic+ this season and want a parallel weekly objective without the timer pressure, push a Mythic+ key instead for the same Vault row coverage at a faster clip.
Both Void Assaults and Ritual Sites feed a shared Renown Track (paid in Spoils, separate from the Field Accolades you spend on gear). The track runs eight ranks and each one unlocks a real quality-of-life or reward upgrade:
Spoils accumulate naturally as you clear sites, so the Renown push runs in the background while you farm Field Accolades for the gear or cosmetic caches you actually want.
The vendor hub is on the second level of the Bazaar in Silvermoon City, just above the profession area (TomTom waypoint /way #2393 48.11 49.10). It is not the northern district; older speculative coverage placed the hub in the wrong location. Four vendors share the row:
Once you know who sells what, the spend question is simply how many Accolades the slot you want costs.
Gear and cosmetic pricing is straightforward, but the cache for each cosmetic slot costs both currencies, not either one. The table:
| Item | Cost |
|---|---|
| Champion gear cache (Maren Silverwing) | 75 Field Accolades |
| Hero gear cache (Maren Silverwing) | 500 Field Accolades |
| Most cosmetic slot caches (Triam Dawnsetter) | 5 Field Accolades + 150 Voidlight Marl |
| Weapon cosmetic caches | 10 Field Accolades + 200 Voidlight Marl |
| Dark Obelisk decor (Rae'ana, R7) | 500 Voidlight Marl |
With pricing settled, the cache mechanic itself is the part most players get wrong.
This is the single most important correction to early word-of-mouth on the patch: cosmetic caches are RNG at open time, and duplicates can occur. Method's Field Accolades vendor guide is explicit: "The piece you get is random, which does mean you could end up needing to buy the same armour slot cache multiple times." There is no purchase-time appearance lock and no "buy one, learn it, then buy another" optimization. That tactic was a confident-sounding hallucination going around the early creator threads.
Practical implications for collectors:
With cache mechanics covered, here are the questions readers keep asking once they see the vendor list for the first time.
Eversong Woods and Zul'Aman. The active zone rotates weekly. Both zones host the same Void Strike and Void Incursion activities; the rotation is which zone is currently the spawn point.
Void Strikes are the smaller continuously-spawning scenarios. Void Incursions are the larger scenarios that unlock once enough Strikes have been completed in the active zone. Incursions pay better per minute and drop a wider variety of currencies.
1 to 5 players. The instance scales for solo play and small groups; difficulty selection (Tier 1-5) is the main tuning knob, not group size.
The Bazaar second level in Silvermoon City, just above the profession area. TomTom waypoint /way #2393 48.11 49.10. Four vendors share the row: Maren Silverwing (gear), Sergeant Vornin (mounts/pets), Triam Dawnsetter (cosmetics), and Rae'ana (housing decor).
Champion gear caches cost 75 Field Accolades each; Hero gear caches cost 500 Field Accolades each. Both are sold by Maren Silverwing at the Bazaar.
No. Cosmetic caches roll at open time and you can receive duplicates. The duplicate-protection mechanic is on the Voidforge bonus-roll system (a separate feature for Mythic+ and raid loot), and that system was bugged at 12.0.5 launch and hotfixed afterward.
For a fresh return to the patch, the right order is: clear two or three hours of the active Void Assaults zone on reset day for your Field Accolades opener, run a Tier 3 Ritual Site to start the Renown push, then decide whether to spend the early Accolades on a Champion gear cache for an undergeared slot or on cosmetic caches for the appearance you actually want. If your weekly time budget is tight, the Midnight Season 1 catch-up bundle wraps the Voidforge unlock, Field Accolades cap, and the early Renown ranks together so the Bazaar row is open and ready when you next log in.
