Guild Wars 2

Or, rather, where you do prefer to get the exotics to salvage for it? I’m thinking of finally biting the bullet on ascended crafting soon, and Dark Matter is the part of the process I’m the most hesitant about.

Do you craft exotics, then salvage them? Buy them on the Trading Post? Some third option?

I’ve got plenty of freebie Black Lion Salvaging Kits to use, but any suggestions to keep the cost to a minimum would be appreciated.

I usually just salvage random exotics I find that aren’t worth much.

If you read that sentence and are thinking “how many random exotics can someone find”, that’s probably a sign that you need to do some more fractals.

I used dungeon armor. Usually the cheapest. Do some dungeon runs, make money, buy armor, and salvage

if you just want dark matter, I would say to buy the cheapest exotics off the TP.
usually you can buy some for 50-70s.
then salvage with a Master or Mystic SK.
I hear BLSK gives slightly more, but unless you are literally swimming in them, I would suggest saving them for something more worthy of their use.
the good news is that MSK has about a 50% chance to get a GoDM, and I value them at 1g each (by crafting and selling ascended inscriptions), so you are effectively breaking even.

I salvage ones that aren’t worth that much gold, and/or ones that I want to unlock the skin of.

The 3 exotic settler trinkets on buy order usually yield enough ectos and exquisite passion flowers to recover your costs or make a little profit.
Or put in buy orders for shamans exotic weapons of accuracy, again ectos, the sigil and the occasional inscription should cover investments or yield profits.

You can always invest in expensive exotics with pricey runes and the possibility of a insignia with the black lion salvage kits.

Only fractals and bought-with-dungeon-tokens exotics, would never waste any gold for it, I’d rather stay without ascended if I wasn’t lucky enough to find more than I need/want. Wish I could sell it to you.

Xiahou Mao.9701:

I usually just salvage random exotics I find that aren’t worth much.

If you read that sentence and are thinking “how many random exotics can someone find”, that’s probably a sign that you need to do some more fractals.

I’ve accumulated a decent amount this way and I don’t even do fractals^^

Just keep an eye out for the exotics (specially armor pieces) that sell for barely a gold, if not less. You can even make back some of the potential profit with any ecto drops from the armor.

I’m still slowly collecting various Exotic skin collections (just finished collecting all the Legionnaire weapons last night!), so I salvage these for chances at Dark Matter in addition to unlocking the skins.

I’m up to 297 Dark Matter now. 107 more to go…

If BLSK are not an issue, I suggest you use dungeon tokens to buy exotics.
Head armor is cheapest. If you use below list, your chances are good to salvage for insignias that sell rather well. If you don’t do dungeons, buy the cheapest armor/weapon you can get with below stat combination to salvage for insignias/inscriptions and sought after runes. IF you use mystic/master salvage kits, salvage trinkets as has already been mentioned in an above post.

AC — Soldiers (pow tough vit), Magi (heal prec vit)
CM — Rabid (cond prec tough), Shaman (vit cond heal)
TA — Rabid (cond prec tough), Magi (heal prec vit)
SE — Soldiers (pow tough vit)
CoF — Nothing
HotW — Soldiers (pow tough vit)
CoE — Dire (cond tough vit)
Arah — Rabid (cond prec tough)

Note: For dungeons, start with tokens up until SE, as you can salvage the rares from CoF onwards for ectos.

This is the most profitable way to make use of BLSK and dungeon tokens.

I get tons of it from PvP … tPvP is very good for completing reward tracks fast (and every track gives you 5 exotics).

I’ve already crafted 2 ascended armor sets and 6 ascended weapons and there are still 2 and a half stack of Dark Matter on my storage alt :/

eithinan.9841:

You can always invest in expensive exotics with pricey runes and the possibility of a insignia with the black lion salvage kits.

^ This .. at least if you have enough Black Lion Kits and don’t need to buy them.

For example i needed some Traveller Runes some days ago, and just bought items
with those runes for less than the price of the single runes.

Thanks, folks! These are exactly the sorts of suggestions I was looking for.

Black lion salvage kits of Dungon armor. I have fond that crafted exotics have less return on dark matter.

Dungeon armor and weapons. I got totally triggered by the dungeon collections, so I’ve been obsessively running dungeons to unlock the skins. I’m at almost a whole stack of dark matter now, it’s just a byproduct for me. As is the gold, kinda. I forgot how much gold you can get doing dungeons… which you could then use to buy more exotics.

Down to my last six blsk.

Pvp reward tracks give plenty of exotics.

I used to buy exotic armor for insignia salvage back a long time ago and profited using the rare kit not blsk… got like 800+ dark matter and never even used them all since then. Probably have 600 left.

there is a collecting achievement that grands you dark matter, i believe it’s one of the armor ones

I’ve got all my dark matter from salvaging random exotics that I’ve gotten as drops, worth less than 2g. I have never purchased an exo to salvage it. I hate crafting, so… ya.

Assuming you have unused/leftover BL kits:

1) Check our TP prices of armor and weapons with good runes/sigils on them.
2) Check out said rune/sigil prices.
3) Place buy orders on items for which the difference between 1) and 2) is considerable.
4) Salvage.
5) Profit.
(6. Craft high level items with left-over dark matter.)
(7. Even more profit.)

Buttercup.5871:

Assuming you have unused/leftover BL kits:

1) Check our TP prices of armor and weapons with good runes/sigils on them.
2) Check out said rune/sigil prices.
3) Place buy orders on items for which the difference between 1) and 2) is considerable.
4) Salvage.
5) Profit.
(6. Craft high level items with left-over dark matter.)
(7. Even more profit.)

Bonus points: salvage things that provide insignia and inscriptions to craft with and save making those high level crafted items.

If you are in serious need of Dark Matter, I suggest you useryour BL Salvage kits on the Exotics. I definitely see more Ectos and Dark Matter when using them. (I have no numerical proof of this, just certainly seems this way to me).

Wiki doesn’t say anything about whether or not BLSK are better but I had a noticeable increase in dark matter from salvaging when I switched from mystic kits to the BL kits. Maybe it was only chance, but it was sufficient for me to switch over.

I know BLSK has been shown to be slightly better rate of ectos from rares, so I imagine it’s the same with dark matter and exotics.