What is the cheapest medium ascended armor I can craft?
I will craft it and then change the stats to what I need.
I can’t craft it yet, as I have a ways to go to get the gold I need, but if I craft them one at a time, i’ll get there eventually.
I’m guessing around 100g per piece of armor?
The biggest expense in crafting ascended armor comes from the ascended mats; the cost of the ‘prefix’ is much less and not necessarily more than the cost of the 5 ecto to change the stats.
For some, a limiting factor is acquiring recipes (cost for armor recipes is typically 5 laurels + 3 gold; each insignia is 21k karma) and/or local currency to purchase some of the components.
GW2 BLTC — follow the links to the “used in” to compare total costs. Again, you’ll see that it’s within 10 gold and often closer, represent a ‘wash’ if you’re comparing the total costs when changing stats.
tl;dr
If you know the recipes, make the one you need directly and skip the “changing stat” method.
If you don’t know the recipe, use one of the guides above to make the cheapest one you already know; if you don’t know any recipes, acquire the one you need, and follow (1).
Personally, I’ve prepared for my future needs by buying Hronk’s recipes with Guild Commendations (1 commendation/recipe). The relevant exotic insignia/inscriptions can be acquired cheap on the TP.
John Smith: “you should kill monsters, because killing monsters is awesome.”
Just to clarify… those insignias are for crafting ascended directly. The MF uses exotic insignias, not ascended, for stat conversion. Those are a more reasonable 1-15g per insignia, with the exception of Minstrel’s and Trailblazer’s (30+g).
But I’d agree that the cost of crafting vs MForging isn’t significant percentage-wise. But, the economy changes, so when you’re ready to make your armor, just do your own calculations using the websites linked above and see which method is more worthwhile. Also have a look at GW2efficiency… by putting in your API, it’ll be able to take your preexisting mats into the cost calculations. https://gw2efficiency.com
Just to clarify… those insignias are for crafting ascended directly. The MF uses exotic insignias, not ascended, for stat conversion. Those are a more reasonable 1-15g per insignia, with the exception of Minstrel’s and Trailblazer’s (30+g).
Right, my apologies if that wasn’t clear — the OP asked for the cheapest to craft outright and so I was addressing that, not the net costs of building the cheapest and then converting. (There are too many permutations, so I thought it would be sufficient to showing that crafting the ‘cheapest’ outright isn’t a big discount.)
John Smith: “you should kill monsters, because killing monsters is awesome.”
