Guild Wars 2

While other people have addressed problems with Fractals (basically that why do them at higher levels…so same old problem), I don’t see any posts addressing this crafting material. (And yes, I searched for one)

As of now, I have spent 3 gold, 60 laurels, and 750 badges of honor to try to get one. And all I got was +1 Agony Infusions and a rare drop for the Ascended Salvaging collection. (Happy for the latter one as I like the idea behind it.)

The problem is how much I have invested into trying to obtain a Ball for my legendary crafting and have nothing to show for it. If this boils down to bad RNG, then…yay…this is the precursor of the backpiece but now account bound only.

I don’t see why this item should both be randomized on drop AND account bound. Having the Fractal Mastery stuff done early, I’ve been able to farm the journal pages everyday so I’m a week away from completing the first journal and I have everything else (or at least I will once I get a Bloomhunger run in) for the first iteration of the backpiece. EXCEPT for the Ball of Dark Energy…and I won’t get another unless I risk an extra item on a character or an Ascended weapon or armor piece.

So, with the journal pages being a time gate for 2~4 weeks, we can get a full month of Laurels adding up to a total of 55 per month, roughly 2 or 3 necklaces depending on how much you do WvW. This can (and will lead to for me) having everything completed but no way to get one item from salvaging.

I suggest either removing the randomness of the item or removing the account bound nature of it. If I spend 20~30 laurels, a bit of gold, and possibly some badges of honor, I would expect to get something out of it if I cannot buy the item. If I can buy it, then it offers a way for the market to dictate its value and allows people another way to spend laurels. Either way, this removes something that can completely block progress made on the Legendary backpiece that is not directly affected by Fractals themselves.

UPDATE: Salvaging an ascended Scepter I had lying around yielded me one ball plus some of the components used to make it. While I still feel my point above is valid (as it actually takes a longer time investment to get necklaces, trinkets, and backpieces than weapons and armor), I would suggest that people try focusing on weapons and armor for salvaging in order to get this material.

I have gotten 2 balls of dark energy in that many tries. But I salvaged one ascended weapon and one ascended shoulder piece.

I salvaged about 6 ascended rings and got no dark energy. However, a friend of mine just salvaged on ascended armor piece and got one. So, I think there is something to that. However, it would be very disappointing salvaging an ascended armor piece and not getting one.

Went ahead and salvaged 15 trinkets yesterday (mostly rings, one amulet, two accessories). The last accessory gave me a dark ball; it was a Nomads trinket I got from living story, out of all things.

@DrEckers I’ll try to Salvage a piece of armor or weapon asap. Just spent all my laurels on amulets so…can’t buy anything new for a few days. (Thankfully I get an end of the month thing soon.)

@Xstein Can’t get them from rings. I got a bit ticked off at that too, but then I read the Ascended Salvage kit…and rings don’t drop Balls of Dark Energy.

And that’s really the point. With Armor and weapons being NEEDED for raids (since I pug everything as I won’t join a raid guild), it’s a huge investment of resources to throw away a weapon or piece of armor and not get anything. If weapons and armor could guarantee a drop, then I’d be more okay with that.

Update: I just salvaged an old scepter I had and got one on my first go. While I still feel the Ascended Necklace is a problem, I’ll update the OP accordingly.

Fade.1743:

I don’t see why this item should both be randomized on drop AND account bound.

I don’t see how that combination is good for any item in the game. All it does is frustrate the unlucky players.

The way I see it, if a item is rare enough that some people are seeking it and produced by RNG then it should be valuable to everyone lucky enough to receive it.
There should always be a way to acquire any item that is guaranteed to work even on the unluckiest player in the game, if that player is willing to put in the work to go down that route.

Making all RNG produced items tradeable solves both issues. The unlucky player just needs to accumulate gold and buy it from the lucky player.

But that’s never going to happen. Not in a game where bananas are account bound.

Guys, I am not sure if anyone posted this.

Ball of Dark energy can only get from salvaging Weapon and Armor, not trinkets. The information is in the achievement panel itself is I am not mistaken.

Yeah the information is in the wiki itself.

Kyle.5931:

Guys, I am not sure if anyone posted this.

Ball of Dark energy can only get from salvaging Weapon and Armor, not trinkets. The information is in the achievement panel itself is I am not mistaken.

Yeah the information is in the wiki itself.

Lol ty for that info, clueless as i was, i was getting quite frustrated after 50+ rings

From my own experience with salvaging:

Ascended rings will NEVER give you balls of dark energy. It says so right on the salvage kit.
Ascended accessories and amulets MAY give you balls of dark energy. After salvaging three ascended accessories, I got one ball of dark energy.

I am under the impression that weapons and armor give you a much higher chance of getting balls of dark energy than non-ring trinkets, but I have yet to salvage weapons/armor.

NovaanVerdiano.6174:

Went ahead and salvaged 15 trinkets yesterday (mostly rings, one amulet, two accessories). The last accessory gave me a dark ball; it was a Nomads trinket I got from living story, out of all things.

Are you certain about that? I read on the wiki that you can’t get them from Living Story rewards, which makes sense (in the context of things they’ve done before), although I’d like it if that info is incorrect, since I have absolutely no other use for them.

Andred.1087:

NovaanVerdiano.6174:

Went ahead and salvaged 15 trinkets yesterday (mostly rings, one amulet, two accessories). The last accessory gave me a dark ball; it was a Nomads trinket I got from living story, out of all things.

Are you certain about that? I read on the wiki that you can’t get them from Living Story rewards, which makes sense, although I’d like it if that info is incorrect, since I have absolutely no other use for them.

Yeah, my memory might be kitten but I can guarantee you the Quetzal Crest dropped it for me. The wiki isn’t always right; especially on new content there’s wrong info to be found, simply because people don’t know it better yet.

NovaanVerdiano.6174:

Yeah, my memory might be kitten but I can guarantee you the Quetzal Crest dropped it for me. The wiki isn’t always right; especially on new content there’s wrong info to be found, simply because people don’t know it better yet.

Cool, well I guess I’ll try it out and see if I get lucky. Better than doing nothing with them.

Xstein.2187:

I salvaged about 6 ascended rings and got no dark energy. However, a friend of mine just salvaged on ascended armor piece and got one. So, I think there is something to that. However, it would be very disappointing salvaging an ascended armor piece and not getting one.

You cant get them from rings sadly

Salvaged a weapon and got 1. Just salvage weapon/armor and u will get it easily.

I got 3 from salvaging over 100 items of all kind.

So far one single ball from a 100+ rings salvaged.

Feh… I completed the 3 order armor/weapon collections (was far along with them anyway) just for the ascended amulets, and I can’t salvage them. Bug?

Oh well, I have plenty of +1 agony infusions anyway.

Ive gotten 4 balls, from armor/weaps and one amulet iirc.

Rings don’t, as the wiki has stated (salvaged over 100 of those)

What I’m bummed about is the rate at which we get “Fatebreaker” items:( I’ve only gotten 1, from amulet

While you can “easily” get these from salvaging armor and weapons, with the new (nonexistent) droprate of ascended boxes from fractal rewards, they’re essentially impossible to obtain for anyone that did not have a stash full of ascended gear prior to the launch.

I’ve been working on my ascended gear for 2 weeks now, and I’m just missing 2 armor pieces and 1 accessory (gated by empyreal fragments at the moment, thanks dungeon nerfs…). I’ll be kitten ed if I’m going to make a perfectly good piece of gear and then salvage it because they don’t drop like candy anymore. Either rings need to drop these, or ascended droprates need to be reverted. *Or they could not be bound so I can purchase it.