Weapon Manuals have been a part of the game for years. However, it may come to you as a surprise that Snail Games keeps adding new sources for weapon manuals.
It takes 5023 weapon manuals to max out a single weapon and there are 11 weapons. That's over 50000 weapon manuals if you want to max out every single one.
Here is a list of weapon manual sources that take the least effort and time.
1. Roaming the World
Roaming the World is the combination of "Exploring Jianghu" and "Faction Challenges". The feature is active ever since the Night City patch. It feels the same as Faction Challenges, but the rewards are a bit different. The rewards are split up in two categories: Faction rewards, and tier rewards.
Rewards
Faction rewards are individual faction rewards. You can claim a faction's rewards as soon as you beat it six times. They do not contain weapon manuals.
Tier rewards are the rewards that are at the top right of the new Roaming the World window:
Finishing two Tier 6 factions reward you a total of 20 superior manuals for the week. Doing the tiers below them just for weapon manuals already becomes suboptimal, as you have to do more factions, for less rewards.
Shop
Roaming the world has a shop where you can exchange your Roaming the World points for weapon manuals. You can exchange 18 normal manuals for 18 points, 18 medium manuals for 90 points, and 18 superior manuals for 900 points per week. Getting the Tier 6 reward already gives you enough points to buy these weapon manuals for the week.
2. Night City: Night Walker
Night Walker is a weekly task in Night City where you open treasure chests to obtain Night Walker Points. For more information, please see the Night Walker Guide.
One full round of Night Walker gives you enough points (320) for 20 superior manuals for the week.
3. Cultivate Often
Cultivate Often refers to two sets of activities within the game: The Activity system, and the Bank daily quest.
Activity System
The game rewards you with points for your everyday game activities. After a certain amount, you can claim rewards from the Cultivate Often window.
Once you reach 100 activity points daily, you receive 1 medium manual.
Once you reach 500 activity points within the week, you receive 10 superior manuals.
Once you reach 750 activity points within the week, you receive 2 superior manuals.
Bank Quest
The bank daily quest asks you to do Team Practice, Sect Instruct and two Mind Demons. Doing these activities every day should already give you enough activity points for the above rewards.
The bank daily quest rewards you with 1 superior manual everyday, therefore, 7 superior manuals per week.
4. Murong Garden
Murong Garden is a daily quest from the Four Families update. In there, you can grow flowers in order to exchange for rewards, and all it takes is 160L bound money and a bit of time. The most optimal strategy is to just buy the 20L bound seeds and plant your garden full every day, for 96 flowers per day. With 280 flowers, you can obtain 10 normal manuals. This averages at 2.4 boxes per week, so about 24 manuals per week. It may sound little, but this reward box also gives you other goodies, such as traveling tokens and five aggregates.
5. Summary
Here's a short summary of the aforementioned sources and the amount of weapon manuals.
Source | Rewards per week | Total per week |
|---|---|---|
Roaming the World: Tier 6 Factions | 20 superior | 100 weapon manuals |
Roaming the World: Shop | 18 normal, medium, superior | 114 weapon manuals |
Night City: Night Walker | 20 superior | 100 weapon manuals |
Cultivate Often: Boxes | 7 medium, 12 superior | 74 weapon manuals |
Cultivate Often: Bank Quest | 7 superior | 35 weapon manuals |
Murong Garden | 24 normal | 24 weapon manuals |
Total | - | 447 weapon manuals |
This guide did not include manuals that Snail Games already spoon-feeds the players, such as daily sign in mail and daily sign in wheel of fortune. It also doesn't include one-off sources, such as achievements. Therefore, the amount of weapon manuals you get per week is practically more than the above table.