Guild Wars 2

I woke up this morning and had a random idea about precursor acquisition. I tried to fully think it through, but I’m still not fully awake so if this is a horrible idea or has already been discussed I apologize in advance. What if anyone could acquire a precursor just by throwing four ascended weapons of the same type into the mystic forge? I was thinking this might be too easy of a way to acquire a precursor, so maybe they could be made account bound when obtained through this method in order to prevent the market from flooding. (all 4 ascended weapons would be account bound anyway)

The reason I posted this in this forum is to get feedback on what kind of impact this could have on the trading post prices if they were / weren’t account bound?

As an example, say I wanted to craft Spark. I would need the following for four ascended daggers (someone please correct me if I’m way off with my math):

32 Deldrimore Steel Ingots (not going to break these down further)
12 Spiritwood Planks (not going to break these down further)
400 Thermocatalytic Reagent
80 Piles of Crystalline Dust
40 Globs of Dark Matter
4 Exotic Imbued Inscription of Choice
Ascended Recipe (5 Laurels, 3 Gold)
4 Vision Crystals:
– 80 skill points
– 2000 bloodstone dust
– 2000 dragonite ore
– 2000 empyreal fragments
– 120 obsidian shards
– 600 Thermocatalytic Reagent

Does anyone have any ideas on what could make this a little more challenging if it is too easy? Could this be a substitute for the scavenger hunt that may never be created?

It’s nice too because if someone was lucky enough to get 4 ascended weapon chest drops they could essentially forge their own precursor that way without grinding out the ascended crafting / level 500.

It could also give people a reason to actually save up all those ascended materials that just get thrown away. It seems on the surface as a clear cut goal to actually crafting out your own legendary in full. You would no longer have to worry about getting a random drop through the open world or mystic forge (or buying for 1k gold on the TP).

No.

They clearly said that they don’t want to hurt the precursor market and your solution would totally ruin it. It would be good idea at start but not after almost 2 years.

Even though your idea prevents them from being sold they are precursors that are now no longer being bought on the TP so it would have the same results.

Something this cheap would have to be far more than simply accountbound-gated. The finished legendary would similarly need to be account-bound.

There would also need to be some considerable time-gate (something purchased with the equivalent to 180 laurels, or a similarly time-gated currency) and/or gold-sink (250 icy runestones).

I’m not sure even this would be enough, but that’s probably a bare minimum starting point.

EDIT: in all, rather than 4 daggers, I would prefer something like “upgrading” a single dagger.

Maybe 1 spark = 5 bloodstone shard (1000 skill points) + 250 icy runestones (250 gold) + 150 xyz (150 laurels) + 1 ascended dagger

EDIT 2: I think something of this expense would no longer need to be account-bound or restricted in any way.

Been thinking about this some more. I feel like “xyz” needs more flexibility.

Perhaps instead of simply laurels, it can be flexible with its acquisition.

• 1 laurel
• 3 guild commendations
• 5 skill points
• 100 badge of honor
• 100 any dungeon token
• 100 fractal relics
• 5000 karma
• 3 gold
• (5 from completing a PvP reward track)

tgkiii.5927:

The reason I posted this in this forum is to get feedback on what kind of impact this could have on the trading post prices if they were / weren’t account bound?

32 Deldrimore Steel Ingots 160G
12 Spiritwood Planks 50G
400 Thermocatalytic Reagent 6G fixed rate
80 Piles of Crystalline Dust 19g
40 Globs of Dark Matter account bound, adds value to exotics
4 Exotic Imbued Inscription of Choice 20G
Ascended Recipe (5 Laurels, 3 Gold) x4=20 Laurels+12g,+86k karma only for first precursor
4 Vision Crystals:
– 80 skill points
– 2000 bloodstone dust
– 2000 dragonite ore
– 2000 empyreal fragments
– 120 obsidian shards 242k karma
– 600 Thermocatalytic Reagent 9g

Let´s try to find out what would happen if this would be implemented.
I wrote the actual gold value behind each ingredient to have an estimate what a precursor would cost this way.

We are around 275g plus account bound mats. Just for clarification: You need to buy 4 individual recipes for different inscriptions but only once, you can use the same to craft additional precursors.
Overall, the account bound mats can be farmed within a week.

Right now prices for precursors are mostly defined by demand and the average price of forging one in the MF. I estimate the average price of forging a precursor is a little under the highest buy order, the difference between it is the profit the forger makes to cover labour costs and the risk of profit loss, as it is a slow process.
Lets assume that Spark has the highest bid of 1000g and it costs 800g to forge it.
Now lets have a look at the mats that are used in forging and crafting a precursor:
Forging mostly needs t5 wood, ore and fine t5 mats (t5 leather for bowstrings to a way lesser degree).

Here is a list of ingredients required to craft a single ascended dagger:
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/index.php?title=Special:RunQuery/Base_ingredients_query&Base_ingredients%5B1%5D=Coalforge%27s%20Razor&Base_ingredients%5B2%5D=Coalforge%27s%20Razor&wpRunQuery=true

Apart from the account bound mats, it focusses on not only on t5 common mats (not as much as forging) but also on t2-4 and t6 common mats, indirectly on t1 through material promotion, and t6 fine mats as well as ectos.

Lets go back to precursor prices.
if we are able to not only forge but also craft them, supply will rise and prices fall.
In case of spark we assume that it costs 275g + account bound mats to craft it, 800g to forge it and the lowest buy order is 1000g. I would actually argue towards making crafted precursors tradeable because it will ensure that prices for all mats involved are being brought back into a new equilibrium faster due to higher velocity of trading and it would act as a account bound mat sink. Some people acquired lots of them without a proper sink and that is not desirable.
Now everybody will stop forging precursors and start to craft them. Prices for t5 common and fine mats will drop while prices for t1-4 common mats will rise.
T6 common and fine mats as well as ectos will also see a higher demand, even though there could be additional supply added through promotion of t5 mats, which became cheaper in the process as well as ectos from salvaging rare weapons, which also get cheaper due to limited demand.
When equilibrium is found between forging and crafting the new buy order price for spark might be at 500g, while it will propably cost 400g each to either forge or craft it, depending on how crafters value their account bound mats and forgers value their time spent and the associated risk of RNG.

How does it impact reward structures and progression?

Pro´s:

- Good sink for account bound mats
- Lower Precursor Prices
- Linear Progression
- higher prices for t1-4 common mats will mean lower level characters and content in lower level maps will yield more gold for their awarded loot

Con´s:

- t5 mats, rare weapons and ectos get cheaper, which means endgame players get less value for their earned loot
- Crafting from 0-325 will become more expensive
- Crafting ascended weapons and heavy armor will become more expensive
- The higher supply of precursors will lead to a higher demand for ectos, t6 mats as well as for other mats that are required for crafting legendary gifts

I suspect the demand for t6 mats might be so high that its price increase would equal the amount of savings on the precursor.

Overall, i would estimate that the price for Legendaries in general would stay pretty much the same. It all depends on how people value the different kind of effort they put into acquiring their Legendary, either by crafting or buying it.

Thank you everyone for your responses. I know it’s not a perfect solution and would need a lot of thought before implementing anything. I did have another thought of limiting this process. What if it also required a one-time use item obtained through completing your personal story? That way an account was limited to one per character (assuming you complete the story with each one).

Right now legendary weapons require map completion – this would be a way to also tie in personal story completion, which currently only provides a pact weapon token as far as I remember.

tgkiii.5927:

Thank you everyone for your responses. I know it’s not a perfect solution and would need a lot of thought before implementing anything. I did have another thought of limiting this process. What if it also required a one-time use item obtained through completing your personal story? That way an account was limited to one per character (assuming you complete the story with each one).

Right now legendary weapons require map completion – this would be a way to also tie in personal story completion, which currently only provides a pact weapon token as far as I remember.

Precursor crafting has been discussed for a long time now and i think i never saw an argument against using a token being awarded from completing the personal story.
The same goes for a token that is awarded via Achievement chests, every 5-10k points.
So i think both should be required in crafting it, if we want to put a reasonable timegate on precursor supply

Wanze.8410:

Precursor crafting has been discussed for a long time now and i think i never saw an argument against using a token being awarded from completing the personal story.
The same goes for a token that is awarded via Achievement chests, every 5-10k points.
So i think both should be required in crafting it, if we want to put a reasonable time gate on precursor supply

Could always introduce Time gated method using Tokens added into reward or some other (new content) with relatively low but reasonable chance similar to fractal token method to redeem receipt to craft soulbound Precursor

50 – 100 + (1 per day )tokens would be long enough id guess for receipt ( considering new Mats are introduced some time gate some content based)

It would still take a life time to make and people who love to farm / grind / mf can still gamble for faster precursor but it would give option to people who don’t play 24/7 and farm like mad to get chance for legendary.

Just an thought tho

Why is everyone concerned about plummeting precursor prices? The whole point is that they’re too expensive. Let them fall. Hard.

Buttercup.5871:

Why is everyone concerned about plummeting precursor prices? The whole point is that they’re too expensive. Let them fall. Hard.

Yeah, the precursor market is beyond toxic. The process of making a legendary should be “So I’ve got this precursor, what do I need to collect to make it a legendary”, not “I’ve collected everything else, now I need to flush the toilet/grind an obscene amount of gold”.

Buttercup.5871:

Why is everyone concerned about plummeting precursor prices? The whole point is that they’re too expensive. Let them fall. Hard.

Right now i would guess that the droprate of precursors is more or less balanced with the droprate of the other mats that are required to craft the gifts.

Significantly increasing the precursor output will of course result in lower prices for them but without increasing the output of those mats, their prices will rise significantly.
And you have to ask yourself, if that is a desired side effect or not.
Sure, people who have crafted all their gifts before and only need a precursor, will be delighted but those that still need gifts, wont be so extatic. IF you look at the ingredients for Gift of Metal/Wood/Might/Magic it would mean that crafting exotic and ascended gear will become very expensive.

Wanze.8410:

Buttercup.5871:

Why is everyone concerned about plummeting precursor prices? The whole point is that they’re too expensive. Let them fall. Hard.

Right now i would guess that the droprate of precursors is more or less balanced with the droprate of the other mats that are required to craft the gifts.

Significantly increasing the precursor output will of course result in lower prices for them but without increasing the output of those mats, their prices will rise significantly.
And you have to ask yourself, if that is a desired side effect or not.
Sure, people who have crafted all their gifts before and only need a precursor, will be delighted but those that still need gifts, wont be so extatic. IF you look at the ingredients for Gift of Metal/Wood/Might/Magic it would mean that crafting exotic and ascended gear will become very expensive.

That has been the argument for far too long. I don’t buy it anymore. All Anet has to do is turn a few nobs and voila, the t6 problem is gone. If they want to, they can do it; in fact, they have done it before. But they don’t want to because it’s good for gem sales and key sales. No legendary? Get an awesome [insert black lion weapon]. It’s almost a legendary! Want a precursor? Buy our gems and convert them to gold!

This game needs to give players a new focus. The legendary cow has been milked for too long now.

I agree with Buttercup, changing the drop rate of t6 mats to keep the prices in line is very easy to do for anet and is NOT a good argument against this idea.

Yeah, the whole “prices will increase!!!1” thing just feels like hand-wringing concern trolling from the robber barons.

You can get most of the components for legendary gifts without spending a cent if you’re patient enough. Ore and wood can be gathered, t6 mats can be bought with laurels, killing world bosses gets you plenty of ecto, etc. If Anet added a reliable way to obtain lodestones (dungeon tokens, maybe?) and silver dubloons (because everything about those has always been a mess), you’d be set.