Nightstar Sand appears as bright yellow spots on desert sand, at night only, and is picked up rather than mined — no pickaxe, no Mining suitability. Nodes respawn on a 20-minute cooldown, which makes a tight loop around one dune field far better than a long circuit.
Desert. Night. Yellow glints on the sand. 20-minute respawn. You need 60 for a single Air Walker EX, so start early.
At a glance
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Weight (per unit) | 1 |
| Max stack | 9,999 |
| Rarity | Common |
| Time of day | Night only |
| Node defence | 3 |
| Pickup cooldown | 20 minutes |
| Tool required | None |
| Internal name | NightStone |
In-game description: "Sand that can be found in the desert at night. Used as a material for crafting certain accessories and other items."
One source lists 1,000; another lists 1. No sale figure is quoted here.
Where to look
| Area | Region | Corroboration |
|---|---|---|
| Dessicated Desert, northeast corner — beyond the mountains north of Duneshelter | Palpagos Islands | Single source |
| Feybreak, southwest corner — especially the northern coast beaches | Feybreak | Single source |
| Desert biome generally | Palpagos Islands | Single source — map filter and item description |
One reference carries no area names and no coordinates — only a map filter link. The other gives the two descriptions above but no numbers, and its own framing describes Feybreak as part of the Palpagos Islands, which is wrong. This guide describes the regions rather than inventing coordinates. Community map data counts 271 Nightstar Sand markers across the world.
The 20-minute cooldown is short. Pick a dune field with several nodes in view of one another, clear them, run a lap of the area for the rest of the night cycle, and the first ones are back before dawn. Travelling between distant deposits wastes the timer.
Pals that drop it
| Pal | Quantity | Rate | Corroboration |
|---|---|---|---|
| Starryon Primo | 1–2 | 100% | Single source |
| Wistella | 1–2 | 100% | Single source |
One source states Nightstar Sand "cannot be purchased from merchants or obtained from enemy drops". Another lists the two droppers above at 100%. We report both; the drop list comes from extracted game data, so the drops are probably real, but they are not confirmed.
What Nightstar Sand builds
| Item | Nightstar Sand | Category |
|---|---|---|
| Air Walker EX | 60 | Mobility |
| Air Walker Mk III | 50 | Mobility |
| Triple Jump Boots | 50 | Mobility |
| Air Walker Mk II | 40 | Mobility |
| Triple Air Dash Boots | 40 | Mobility |
| Air Walker Mk I | 30 | Mobility |
| Double Air Dash Boots | 30 | Mobility |
| Advanced Bow | 20 | Weapon |
| Beam Sword | 20 | Weapon |
| Metal Detector | 20 | Tool |
| Air Dash Boots | 20 | Mobility |
| Double Jump Boots | 20 | Mobility |
| Anti-Gravity Belt | 10 | Accessory |
About 20 recipes fall in the 10–60 range, so the list above is close to complete. The mobility gear dominates: if you intend to build the full Air Walker ladder plus boots, you are looking at several hundred sand across the whole progression.
One source lists a flat 20 for the Beam Sword. Another lists an escalating schematic ladder — Schematic 1 at 25, then 30, 35 and 40. The flat figure is likely the base weapon only.
Why it matters for Chromite
The Metal Detector at Technology level 58 costs 20 Nightstar Sand, and it is the tool that reveals buried Chromite on Feybreak. If you are planning a Feybreak resource run, the desert trip comes first — or you use Smokie instead and skip the sand entirely.
What to do next
- Set your base near the Dessicated Desert and farm the sand across successive nights.
- Decide early between the Metal Detector and a Smokie for Chromite — one costs 20 sand, the other costs nothing.
- Prioritise Air Dash Boots over the full Air Walker ladder; the marginal mobility per sand is much better at the bottom.