Guild Wars 2

Hi Guys,
I’m not sure whether it has been posted here before or not.
(the search function doesn’t seem to find anything atleast) but the prices for the dragon’s revelry cake have gone through the roof and there’s still no sign of chef 500.
I know there are a lot of people who don’t really give a kitten about bufffood at all, but I do.

Any ideas when they will implement that? Are there any good alternatives for builds with celestial gear? (Not that I’m running one, just curious to know)

The alternative would be using a birthday blaster. It’s +40 to all stats, so 5 less then the revelry cake, but has +10% Karma, +15% Magic Find and +15%XP from kills.
You’d have to use a primer though to extend it’s duration to 12hrs.
Even using Celestial gear though, most would run power or Defensive food.

For chef 500, there’s a recent post.
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/dungeons/Can-we-have-500-cooking-soon

The recipe for the starcake was always intended to be rare, as a nice RNG drop for spending gems on Rich Dragon Coffers (a few people got the recipe automatically, as a result of the original drop table being bugged).

I have mixed feelings about ANet changing things at this late date. On the one hand, the OP is right about the higher prices — it will keep getting higher as more players who know the recipe stop being as active, without any new source. On the other hand, it seems unfair for them to change the rules.

I’m inclined to support the OP’s (implied) suggestion that ANet offer this recipe again. Perhaps the best way to do it would be through BL chests.

Illconceived Was Na.9781:

For chef 500, there’s a recent post.
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/dungeons/Can-we-have-500-cooking-soon

The recipe for the starcake was always intended to be rare, as a nice RNG drop for spending gems on Rich Dragon Coffers (a few people got the recipe automatically, as a result of the original drop table being bugged).

I have mixed feelings about ANet changing things at this late date. On the one hand, the OP is right about the higher prices — it will keep getting higher as more players who know the recipe stop being as active, without any new source. On the other hand, it seems unfair for them to change the rules.

I’m inclined to support the OP’s (implied) suggestion that ANet offer this recipe again. Perhaps the best way to do it would be through BL chests.

The price of starcakes has nothing to do with the rarity of the recipe but the unusually high amount of ingredients needed to cook it.

Wanze.8410:

The price of starcakes has nothing to do with the rarity of the recipe but the unusually high amount of ingredients needed to cook it.

I don’t think we can agree on this one.
Let me back up my opinion with some data. (Most of it checked on gw2 spidy)

Last year, in august we had a whopping price of 3.23g per cake. At the same time, the price for the ingredients have not changed at all. The most expensive ingredient -Saffron – was at a sell listing price of 3,90s per unit. It costs 3,89s at the moment.(19.02.2017).

However, what is extremly special about this specific date is the sell listing amount we had back then. Only 174 Dragon Cakes were on the trading post which clearly impacted on the price.

The problem is, that we can’t tell how long it will be ‘til we get the next shortage. Or what happens if the demand for the pieces of Zhaitaffy gets higher than the amount available. We had 4,5 million of them on the trading post for a time. Now we’re at just 60k. With only 3 options left to get them.
A) Generosity’s Reward
B) Gift from Mawdrey II
C) Fluctuating Mass

However, here’s the deal. The chance to get the zhaitaffy seems to be incredibly low and on top of that it only seems to drop 1 unit, whereas 40 are needed for the cake.
It’s apparently listed on the loot table for those 3 containers, yet a lot of openings of more than 250 bags have not shown a single piece of zhaitaffy.

So, the recipe itself can’t be obtained anymore and the pieces of Zhaitaffy are rare, yet this bufffood is certainly the best option for certain non-meta hybrid builds.
As haleydawn pointed out, the birthday blaster is to some extent a shortduration, free alternative. However, it lacks a total of 35 stat points(7*5) and lasts only 10 minutes.

Considering that not everyone likes to spam their birthday blasters all the time, there should be something else as a valid long lasting alternative for those of us, who are loving their hybrid builds(even when they are totally out of the meta) yet would like to get the most out of it.

Spot on Kapy.

I think this recipe should be purchasable, it originally dropped from gemstore chests during Dragon Bash (awesome 2 week event) that took place in June 2013. So, why not ask for the Bash to return as a yearly event, The Gods know we need more of them.

Kapy.9387:

Wanze.8410:

The price of starcakes has nothing to do with the rarity of the recipe but the unusually high amount of ingredients needed to cook it.

I don’t think we can agree on this one.
Let me back up my opinion with some data. (Most of it checked on gw2 spidy)

Last year, in august we had a whopping price of 3.23g per cake. At the same time, the price for the ingredients have not changed at all. The most expensive ingredient -Saffron – was at a sell listing price of 3,90s per unit. It costs 3,89s at the moment.(19.02.2017).

However, what is extremly special about this specific date is the sell listing amount we had back then. Only 174 Dragon Cakes were on the trading post which clearly impacted on the price.

The problem is, that we can’t tell how long it will be ‘til we get the next shortage. Or what happens if the demand for the pieces of Zhaitaffy gets higher than the amount available. We had 4,5 million of them on the trading post for a time. Now we’re at just 60k. With only 3 options left to get them.
A) Generosity’s Reward
B) Gift from Mawdrey II
C) Fluctuating Mass

However, here’s the deal. The chance to get the zhaitaffy seems to be incredibly low and on top of that it only seems to drop 1 unit, whereas 40 are needed for the cake.
It’s apparently listed on the loot table for those 3 containers, yet a lot of openings of more than 250 bags have not shown a single piece of zhaitaffy.

So, the recipe itself can’t be obtained anymore and the pieces of Zhaitaffy are rare, yet this bufffood is certainly the best option for certain non-meta hybrid builds.
As haleydawn pointed out, the birthday blaster is to some extent a shortduration, free alternative. However, it lacks a total of 35 stat points(7*5) and lasts only 10 minutes.

Considering that not everyone likes to spam their birthday blasters all the time, there should be something else as a valid long lasting alternative for those of us, who are loving their hybrid builds(even when they are totally out of the meta) yet would like to get the most out of it.

About the price spike in august:

Saffron DID see a decent raise in value from 20th of Juli to 20th of August last year from 2s to 4s, which explains people stopping cooking starcakes. One their prices started to rise a well, people started cooking starcake again.

And you only need one player with that recipe to cover demand, as long as you pay a profitable price.

So again, the price of starcakes has nothing to do with the rarity of the recipe.

I would also argue that this food needs to be that expensive, considering that it gives 315 extra stat points compared to the 170 regular food gives, plus 20% MF.

Compared to other foods, the price has also been incredibly stable over the last year (same for Zhaitaffy) apart from the spike of 3 weeks in August.

Wanze.8410:

Saffron DID see a decent raise in value from 20th of Juli to 20th of August last year from 2s to 4s, which explains people stopping cooking starcakes. One their prices started to rise a well, people started cooking starcake again.

The raise wasn’t out of the ordinary though and we have in november 2015 an even higher price as well as some other lows. Also, if that’s all it takes to stop them from cooking those cakes, there would be an up and down.
My guess is, that it’s directly linked to the release of heart of thorns and a returning player base (and with that some people who have had the recipes unlocked)

Wanze.8410:

And you only need one player with that recipe to cover demand, as long as you pay a profitable price.

As soon as this happens, this one player has a monopol which would be devastating.
Thing is, the less crafters there are the more of them will ask for higher prices. It doesn’t work differently in real life. The more people can offer a specific service, the more of them will try to sell it cheap for some fast profit and not for a higher price.

Wanze.8410:

I would also argue that this food needs to be that expensive, considering that it gives 315 extra stat points compared to the 170 regular food gives, plus 20% MF.

All stat gear has generally higher stats(because it’s not focused on one stat increase), what’s weird though is the rarity of this food.
It’s just basic when it should be masterwork.

Wanze.8410:

Compared to other foods, the price has also been incredibly stable over the last year (same for Zhaitaffy) apart from the spike of 3 weeks in August.

Don’t know which graph you’ve seen, but the price of zhaitaffy has increased quite a lot. http://www.gw2spidy.com/item/43319
The spike is in my opinion merely a demonstration of what we can expect, should there be no option to craft the food normally. The crafting cost in august was no where near the selling cost and people had to buy those, because there was no alternative. Of course, one might argue :
Just buy other food – power/condition whatever. But if you like your jack of all trades style and want that hybrid build to work, you should have the option to do so without these unnecessary limits.
And on top of that, it’s not like a skin or so. It directly affects your gameplay to some extent, which is why I see it as a problem.

The highest buy order is 1.42g while it costs 1.60g to craft, so I dont see why I should start crafting these, if buyers arent even willing to cover crafting costs and tp fees for me.

And if you would calibrate the gw2spidy graph to one year, you would see zhaitaffy mostly being valued between 2-3s in the last 6 months. Considering the price swings other food and ingredients are going through within a year, this is quite stable.

Wanze.8410:

The highest buy order is 1.42g while it costs 1.60g to craft, so I dont see why I should start crafting these, if buyers arent even willing to cover crafting costs and tp fees for me.

You don’t get to craft these in the first place, my friend. That’s the point. People who craft that stuff can store them in abundance in their guild vault/bank and sell them whenever they feel like the profit is enough. Who knows how old that star cake is, when someone buys it?

Without any doubt, there’s going to be a hard limit what people would pay for a 30 minute bufffood. However, there’s no alternative to that food when it comes to maximizing hybrid builds and it’s not in your or my power to change that because the recipe is only available to very few people.

At this point, I’m quite certain that most of these cakes aren’t freshly crafted because that would – as you pointed out – mean a minus for the crafter. It’s quite likely that those who have the recipe ordered quite a huge amount of zhaitaffy, which would also explain why there are only 60k units left, whereas there were 4,5 million before.

Wanze.8410:

And if you would calibrate the gw2spidy graph to one year,

As you can see in the first sentence of my last post, I’m always using a full view to look at the progress over the years, not just one year.

Considering the price swings other food and ingredients are going through within a year, this is quite stable.

Most food seems to be stable and tied to the gold inflation. I checked three popular foods and couldn’t find anything concerning.
Plate of truffle steak(Power builds) http://www.gw2spidy.com/item/12467
Rare Veggie Pizza (Condition builds) http://www.gw2spidy.com/item/12464
Delicious Rice Ball (Healing builds) http://www.gw2spidy.com/item/68634

But that’s again missing the mark. Just because the price of a certain ingredient seems to be stable right now, doesn’t mean that we don’t have to worry about it. (I feel like I should make a reference to the overfishing of the seas in RL)
Almost every food in gw2 is on the trading post in abundance, but both the dragon’s revelry cake and the pieces of zhaitaffy are barely available anymore and it seems like people aren’t noticing. It’s hard to tell if we will ever run out of them, considering the low demand of bufffood for hybrid builds. What we can be sure of though, is that those players who have the recipe are a minority in gw2 and that they can charge whatever the hell they want just like they did on august 15, last year.

I guess I’ll have to make some…when the price is right. =)

Kapy.9387:

Wanze.8410:

The highest buy order is 1.42g while it costs 1.60g to craft, so I dont see why I should start crafting these, if buyers arent even willing to cover crafting costs and tp fees for me.

You don’t get to craft these in the first place, my friend. That’s the point. People who craft that stuff can store them in abundance in their guild vault/bank and sell them whenever they feel like the profit is enough. Who knows how old that star cake is, when someone buys it?

Without any doubt, there’s going to be a hard limit what people would pay for a 30 minute bufffood. However, there’s no alternative to that food when it comes to maximizing hybrid builds and it’s not in your or my power to change that because the recipe is only available to very few people.

At this point, I’m quite certain that most of these cakes aren’t freshly crafted because that would – as you pointed out – mean a minus for the crafter. It’s quite likely that those who have the recipe ordered quite a huge amount of zhaitaffy, which would also explain why there are only 60k units left, whereas there were 4,5 million before.

Wanze.8410:

And if you would calibrate the gw2spidy graph to one year,

As you can see in the first sentence of my last post, I’m always using a full view to look at the progress over the years, not just one year.

Considering the price swings other food and ingredients are going through within a year, this is quite stable.

Most food seems to be stable and tied to the gold inflation. I checked three popular foods and couldn’t find anything concerning.
Plate of truffle steak(Power builds) http://www.gw2spidy.com/item/12467
Rare Veggie Pizza (Condition builds) http://www.gw2spidy.com/item/12464
Delicious Rice Ball (Healing builds) http://www.gw2spidy.com/item/68634

But that’s again missing the mark. Just because the price of a certain ingredient seems to be stable right now, doesn’t mean that we don’t have to worry about it. (I feel like I should make a reference to the overfishing of the seas in RL)
Almost every food in gw2 is on the trading post in abundance, but both the dragon’s revelry cake and the pieces of zhaitaffy are barely available anymore and it seems like people aren’t noticing. It’s hard to tell if we will ever run out of them, considering the low demand of bufffood for hybrid builds. What we can be sure of though, is that those players who have the recipe are a minority in gw2 and that they can charge whatever the hell they want just like they did on august 15, last year.

First of all, I have the recipe unlocked, so i get to craft whenever i want.

Second of all, I dont see any point in arguing with you about supply and demand, if you take the seasonal festival as a reference point for supply and fail to see the stable trend over the last year.

I dont know how you can argue that there is a supply shortage for an item that no one is willing to pay the crafting costs and tp fees for because quite clearly, there is no demand that would justify any iteration.

Wanze.8410:

First of all, I have the recipe unlocked, so i get to craft whenever i want.

I almost thought so. Pretty much explains, why you’re against my position.

Wanze.8410:

Second of all, I dont see any point in arguing with you about supply and demand, if you take the seasonal festival as a reference point for supply and fail to see the stable trend over the last year.

I could very much say the same about you ignoring that there has been a shortage and that I already told you, that the stability of a price does not make it less concerning, just like some supermarket’s sell endangered fish for a regular price.

Wanze.8410:

I dont know how you can argue that there is a supply shortage for an item that no one is willing to pay the crafting costs and tp fees for

This makes me really sad. I literally took a lot of my time just to point to you out why the crafting costs are of no importance in my post before, because that’s the second time you write that.

These cakes on the TP aren’t freshly crafted, but most likely come from other players (maybe even you?), who used to invest in saffron, zhaitaffy etc. when they were less expensive. Since there are so few of you guys who have the recipe and are actively playing, the market of this item is solely dependent on what you guys are willing to sell and willing to craft. As you pointed out now twice in the row, let me explain you this a second time again. There is no alternative for maximizing hybrid builds. That’s the whole point.
Surely, it’s problematic that the price isn’t tied at all to the crafting cost and that it has such enormous up and downs where you can craft it and immediately sell it for a good profit – or an enormous loss. But the main problem is the low supply available at all. And on top of that, one of the ingredients (zhaitaffy) almost vanished from the market and became expensive as well. That’s why anet is supposed to do something.

The dragon’s revelry cake is an incredibly strong bufffood, easily the most expensive non-buffet bufffood, yet the rarity of it is basic and it’s completely reliant on players that used to buy black lion chests 3 years ago.

Wanze.8410:

because quite clearly there is no demand that would justify any iteration

Now, let me show you the power of statistics once more.
If you check the 3 top-tier buff-foods I listed in my post before and go for an all-time view, while also only showing “buy listing volume” & “sell listing volume” you’ll notice something.
In all three cases, the sell listing volume is in 90% of the time higher than the buy listing volume, I think you can clearly see what’s going on yourself.

Now, we take a look at the dragon’s revelry cake.
Odd, it’s completely the other way around? There are almost 4 times more people making lower buy orders than there are people making sell listenings? What could that mean?

I’m also tired of discussing with you, but at the same time I’m certain you should understand what’s going on. I can’t blame you for not wanting that other people get this rare recipe or that anet offers alternatives.

I’m confused. Why would more people having the recipe make it less costly to craft the item? Would that somehow make the cost of the ingredients go down?

I admit, I know next to nothing about the TP or how to work it, but the reason I don’t craft items for sale in some cases is that I would lose Gold doing so.

I may be missing something; if so, my apologies.

Inculpatus cedo.9234:

I’m confused. Why would more people having the recipe make it less costly to craft the item?

No one said that. That’s what Wanze was getting wrong all the time. The main problem is, that fewer people means, that those few people can influence the price a lot more. Those people who are storing the cakes and invested in them. As I pointed out in a post earlier, the cost of the cake increased once dramatically when there were only 174 units left. I also pointed out, that zhaitaffy (the main ingredient next to saffron) is also running short with only 60k units left, whereas 4,5 million were on the market once.
Anet would have to fix both or offer an alternative, else we’re going to have an oligopoly for the toptier bufffood for hybrid builds.

Edit: Fixed a typo.

The biggest problem with the item in question is that Zhaitaffy, one of the key ingredients, will not drop in the game ever again. And each time someone makes one of these starcakes, more and more of the Zhaitaffy disappear. Bringing back Dragon’s Bash would help this, but as it was part of Season 1’s Living World updates (and on the old LA map mainly, to boot), this would require a lot of dev work to update to the current map. I would rather the staff be working on new content than reviving a festival they did only once.

Also, if your “build” is so dependent on this one item that it doesn’t work without it, maybe you should reconsider your build. I’m not saying you should go to the meta builds, but find some other, more easily reproducible food that can be sustained. So you can’t have the absolute best item for your strategy. Either your strategy is flawed, or you need to work around it. (For the record, I do NOT have the recipe unlocked. In fact, there are quite a few lost recipes I’d like to have access to but can’t because Reasons.)

Finally, why is this in the HoT forum? It has absolutely nothing to do with the expansion, or LWS3! It should be in the General Discussion.

Rognik.2579:

Bringing back Dragon’s Bash would help this, but as it was part of Season 1’s Living World updates (and on the old LA map mainly, to boot), this would require a lot of dev work to update to the current map.

You’re right about that, but I wouldn’t necessarily go so far. It could be something way more simple – maybe make it drop in a fractal or implement a sweetshop-vendor who sells all kind of candy.

Rognik.2579:

Also, if your “build” is so dependent on this one item that it doesn’t work without it, maybe you should reconsider your build. I’m not saying you should go to the meta builds, but find some other, more easily reproducible food that can be sustained.

You’re implying here that
a) I have a hybrid build that requires it, eventhough I clearly stated that I’m not running one actively.
b) That I somehow said that it doesn’t work without it, although I said yesterday, that it only affects one’s gameplay to some extent which is enough to make it important. I know that someone could work around it, but lets be honest. If you go for all stat and see that there is a buff-food that has the all-stat theme then it’s the best option.
(315 points worth of stats vs regularly 170 focused stats)

Rognik.2579:

(For the record, I do NOT have the recipe unlocked. In fact, there are quite a few lost recipes I’d like to have access to but can’t because Reasons.)

Okay? :o

Rognik.2579:

Finally, why is this in the HoT forum? It has absolutely nothing to do with the expansion, or LWS3! It should be in the General Discussion.

Might be a mistake on my part, I wasn’t expecting this to go all about the cake (You know it’s a lie) and was actually hoping to talk about the chef 500 as well and perhaps an introduction in heart of thorns.

Kapy.9387:

Inculpatus cedo.9234:

I’m confused. Why would more people having the recipe make it less costly to craft the item?

No one said that. That’s what Wanze was getting wrong all the time. The main problem is, that fewer people means, that those few people can influence the price a lot more. Those people who are storing the cakes and invested in them. As I pointed out in a post earlier, the cost of the cake increased once dramatically when there were only 174 units left. I also pointed out, that zhaitaffy (the main ingredient next to saffron) is also running short with only 60k units left, whereas 4,5 million were on the market once.
Anet would have to fix both or offer an alternative, else we’re going to have an oligopoly for the toptier bufffood for hybrid builds.

Edit: Fixed a typo.

who are those people that invested in them?

I am investing and trading since launch and I certainly dont have any starcakes left in my banks from dragon bash. That was over 3.5 years ago. You might think it would be a nice deal to have a couple of stacks of starcakes lying around somewhere that i got when they cost 30s.

But that was over 3 years ago. 30s back then was worth as much as 2-3g now and reflect the crafting costs of the materials at that time.

Wanze.8410:

who are those people that invested in them?

Most likely the same people who bought within a week 1,5 million pieces of zhaitaffy.
We see on gw spidy that the sell listing volume for the dragoncake peaked at 2750 units, which makes a total of 137.500 pieces of zhaitaffy. Of course, some of the zhaitaffy also go to the other dragon bash foods, though it’s not likely to be that much because those bufffoods were pretty much common in the lootboxes back then.
So, there’s still a lot of zhaitaffy somewhere, if it’s not in your bank, then perhaps at someone else’s. Some people invest in black lion skins, others in metals, and then again…others in event items.
Another thing that back ups my assumption that people invested in this food, is the increase of the saffron price from 10 to 90 copper, because every other dragon bash food doesn’t require saffron and it’s only new use that came on Jun 10. , 2013 is that for the dragon’s revelry cake.

Wanze.8410:

But that was over 3 years ago. 30s back then was worth as much as 2-3g now and reflect the crafting costs of the materials at that time.

Come on, Wanze.
Let me quote myself a couple times.

Kapy.9387:

At this point, I’m quite certain that most of these cakes aren’t freshly crafted because that would – as you pointed out – mean a minus for the crafter.

Kapy.9387:

This makes me really sad. I literally took a lot of my time just to point to you out why the crafting costs are of no importance in my post before, because that’s the second time you write that.

Kapy.9387:

Surely, it’s problematic that the price isn’t tied at all to the crafting cost and that it has such enormous up and downs where you can craft it and immediately sell it for a good profit – or an enormous loss. But the main problem is the low supply available at all.

Once again, the problem is not whether those people made the biggest profit of their life, if it’s the deal of the century or not, it’s that people have to rely on those who can craft it and that they set the price – whether it’s a fair price or not. We have a shortage of this cake and the pieces of zhaitaffy required to craft it. Even if we assume that there has been a gold inflation of 1000% (30s back then->3g now) it’s totally not important because it’s quite likely that no one crafts them nowadays anyway and people are most likely just selling what they have stored.

And I’m fine with rare skins and all that stuff. Molten Jetpack for 9k gold? To hell with it. Whoever wants to pay so much.
But we’re talking about some really good bufffood that for some reason has still the basic rarity eventhough it’s stat-value and production costs are heavy and is exclusive to very few crafters and short running supplies.

Well, best of luck with the Devs releasing Zhaitaffy and/or recipes, along with the other rarer items. Maybe they will show up in the BLCs. Who knows? Hats were available after 7 years in GW.

Kapy.9387:

Once again, the problem is not whether those people made the biggest profit of their life, if it’s the deal of the century or not, it’s that people have to rely on those who can craft it and that they set the price – whether it’s a fair price or not. We have a shortage of this cake and the pieces of zhaitaffy required to craft it.

As a buyer, you can set your own price via a buy order. But as of now, people dont put in buy orders that cover the crafting costs and tp fees. For that, we would need buy orders to be at 2g, not less than 1.5g as we have them now.

If more people would have the recipe, you would have more people not crafting it because its unprofitable atm.

I wouldnt have bothered with this topic, if you all you wanted was Anet to reintroduce the recipe so you get to craft the starcake on your own. But instead you invent some bogus scenario of someone storing 1.5 million zhaitaffy somewhere in an empty cubby-hole on his account for 4 years.

Those 1.5 million zhaitaffy would have been enough to craft 75k starcakes, which would have been enough to provide a whopping 60 starcakes every day over the course of 4 years.

Chances are, that we simply have run out of the original bulk supply of the festival.

IIRC, I had bought around 10k zhaitaffy initially in early 2014 before we all thought the 2nd dragon bash festival will occur.

I dont think that I ever used them to craft starcakes. It was always more profitable for me to either sell the zhaitaffy directly or buy koi cakes from sonder the seller for it.

I ran out of zhaitaffy, when koi cakes went over the 10s mark in 2015 and I ued my last supplies to cash in on them.

Inculpatus cedo.9234:

Well, best of luck with the Devs releasing Zhaitaffy and/or recipes, along with the other rarer items. Maybe they will show up in the BLCs. Who knows? Hats were available after 7 years in GW.

They reintroduced several other items as well, after years of waiting. For example the easter bunny ears from 2013. They also implemented food that surpasses other toptier food, just like the winterberry steak is better than the truffle steak. Eventhough it would be certainly easier to just add a candy vendor.

Wanze.8410:

As a buyer, you can set your own price via a buy order. But as of now, people dont put in buy orders that cover the crafting costs and tp fees. For that, we would need buy orders to be at 2g, not less than 1.5g as we have them now.

You’re repeating yourself once more.

Wanze.8410:

The highest buy order is 1.42g while it costs 1.60g to craft, so I dont see why I should start crafting these, if buyers arent even willing to cover crafting costs and tp fees for me.

Wanze.8410:

for an item that no one is willing to pay the crafting costs and tp fees for because quite clearly, there is no demand that would justify any iteration.

Wanze.8410:

If more people would have the recipe, you would have more people not crafting it because its unprofitable atm.

Yeah, we pointed that out already and I quoted myself 3 times 7 hours ago about this.
I’m slowly losing my hope.

Wanze.8410:

I wouldnt have bothered with this topic, if you all you wanted was Anet to reintroduce the recipe so you get to craft the starcake on your own.

So, with so few units of zhaitaffy left – what am I going to do with it? Why do you constantly assume that I need that recipe, when I’m not running a hybrid build?
I clearly stated multiple times that I just find it important that there is an alternative for players who run those builds.

Wanze.8410:

But instead you invent some bogus scenario of someone storing 1.5 million zhaitaffy somewhere in an empty cubby-hole on his account for 4 years.

Plural, my friend. Please read carefully. The first sentence of my post 7 hours ago clearly states:

Most likely the same people who bought within a week 1,5 million pieces of zhaitaffy.

the same people.

So, there’s still a lot of zhaitaffy somewhere, if it’s not in your bank, then perhaps at someone else’s.

This sentence was referencing to your whining that you didn’t invest in that cake.

Some people invest in black lion skins, others in metals, and then again…others in event items.

Here it becomes clear once more, that I certainly don’t think that only one person bought 1,5 million zhaitaffy. “Others” is plural again.

Wanze.8410:

Those 1.5 million zhaitaffy would have been enough to craft 75k starcakes, which would have been enough to provide a whopping 60 starcakes every day over the course of 4 years.

Look, we’re getting closer to the problem and the serious question, why there are only so few star cakes left and what we do, if we ever run out of it.

Wanze.8410:

Chances are, that we simply have run out of the original bulk supply of the festival.

With a peak of 4,5 million units and several other things in mind, like the sell listings of the koi cake – it’s in my opinion safe to assume, that there’s a lot of zhaitaffy left or that it has been used for the dragon’s cake.

Wanze.8410:

IIRC, I had bought around 10k zhaitaffy initially in early 2014 before we all thought the 2nd dragon bash festival will occur.
I dont think that I ever used them to craft starcakes. It was always more profitable for me to either sell the zhaitaffy directly or buy koi cakes from sonder the seller for it.
I ran out of zhaitaffy, when koi cakes went over the 10s mark in 2015 and I ued my last supplies to cash in on them.

That’s your personal love story.

What has the supply of zhaitaffy to do with the amount of able crafters anyways?

They reintroduced zhaitaffy as reward frequently in recent years from old and newer material eaters. Since then, new supply seems enough to cover demand for new starcakes, as I dont see recent price spikes, except since you opened this topic.

A we are blindly assuming things like millions of zhaitaffy being stored in imaginary vaults of players we dont know, I can only assume that you are an investor yourself that wants ot rise the price of zhaitaffy of starcakes and therefore opened this topic to create a panic.

To answer the OP’s other question, the following (speaking partly from experience and partly from conjecture) are interesting options for celestial builds:

1. The 10% damage reduction mussel dishes. 10% damage reduction is huge, and synergises well with the durability that celestial gear provides. Of the four options my favourite is Mussels Gnashblade for its +15% boon duration; if not running boons then the 5% condition damage reduction from Curry Mussel soup is also attractive.

2. Condition duration food. Celestial does not give bonus condition duration, key to making the condition part of hybrid damage work. Your food slot is a sensible way to get this stat. Even for a hybrid a Rare Veggie Pizza is probably the best way to do this as it provides a +20% bonus and is easy to make.

3. Endurance regen food. The only food line I can think of that will let you avoid (rather than reduce) damage, multiplying the advantages that your superior vitality/toughness/healing will give you. Orrian Truffle and Meat Stew is the strongest at +40% and will also let you stack might.

4. Downstate food. Somewhat case-specific, but note that the new Spectral Aid signet buffed downstate performance, particularly for celestial builds. Fire Salsa is the strongest here, multiplying your health by 2 and direct damage by 1.2.

Other foods can be useful for specific builds and situations.

Wanze.8410:

What has the supply of zhaitaffy to do with the amount of able crafters anyways?

Has been said before, to make it short:
Many recipes with few ingredients -> crap.
Few recipes with many ingredients -> oligopoly, crap.

Make good bufffood available to everyone, not just those people who opened lots of chest 3 years ago.

Wanze.8410:

They reintroduced zhaitaffy as reward frequently in recent years from old and newer material eaters. Since then, new supply seems enough to cover demand for new starcakes, as I dont see recent price spikes, except since you opened this topic.

Exactly this is what I answered you in my first answer, two days ago.
That this might not be the case and we’re running really short with like 50-60k left.
My personal assumption is, that people are both not willing to pay the price for the cake(hence the high amount of buy listings compared to sell listings) and that the production almost stopped, relying on stored cakes.

As I also pointed out earlier, it’s not clear when or if we run out, because the majority of the players are not playing hybrid builds. However, we can clearly see that the situation is problematic and that people have to search for alternatives, thats what I asked for when I created this thread. I wanted to point out this problem, the low amount of sell listings and not debate about the prices. The rarity of both the recipe and the ingredients play a role in it, that’s why we came into this discussion. The price spikes are merely a demonstration of what can happen, if we run out and have to rely on what ever is left.

Wanze.8410:

A we are blindly assuming things like millions of zhaitaffy being stored in imaginary vaults of players we dont know

Kapy.9387:

Another thing that back ups my assumption that people invested in this food, is the increase of the saffron price from 10 to 90 copper, because every other dragon bash food doesn’t require saffron and it’s only new use that came on Jun 10. , 2013 is that for the dragon’s revelry cake.

Do you even read what I write? I mean…I highly doubt that at this point, lol.
Increasing saffron prices(900%!) hint at a production of dragon cake and thus would explain why in the very same week 1,5 million zhaitaffy disappeared.

Wanze.8410:

I can only assume that you are an investor yourself that wants ot rise the price of zhaitaffy of starcakes and therefore opened this topic to create a panic.

What.
So you think that someone who openly asks for alternatives and is hoping that anet provides something for that, is someone who invested in that stuff? Like…honestly?
Do you see anyone panicking here? Lots of people don’t even eat bufffood outside of the raids.
————————————————————————————————-

Professor Sprout.1560:

To answer the OP’s other question, the following (speaking partly from experience and partly from conjecture) are interesting options for celestial builds:

1. The 10% damage reduction mussel dishes. 10% damage reduction is huge, and synergises well with the durability that celestial gear provides. Of the four options my favourite is Mussels Gnashblade for its +15% boon duration; if not running boons then the 5% condition damage reduction from Curry Mussel soup is also attractive.

2. Condition duration food. Celestial does not give bonus condition duration, key to making the condition part of hybrid damage work. Your food slot is a sensible way to get this stat. Even for a hybrid a Rare Veggie Pizza is probably the best way to do this as it provides a +20% bonus and is easy to make.

3. Endurance regen food. The only food line I can think of that will let you avoid (rather than reduce) damage, multiplying the advantages that your superior vitality/toughness/healing will give you. Orrian Truffle and Meat Stew is the strongest at +40% and will also let you stack might.

4. Downstate food. Somewhat case-specific, but note that the new Spectral Aid signet buffed downstate performance, particularly for celestial builds. Fire Salsa is the strongest here, multiplying your health by 2 and direct damage by 1.2.

Other foods can be useful for specific builds and situations.

Thank you kindly sir, you saved my day. Eventhough these bufffoods are certainly different from the flat attributepoint increase that the dragon cake provides, they are valid and good alternatives.

If you are running a celestial build you shouldn’t be running starcakes. You probably shouldn’t be running them anyhow since +/- % modifiers on food are better.

Starcake has +315 attribute points. If you’re running full ascended celestial gear, with all-stat runes, you get to 1599 in every stat.
Assuming you’re talking about superior sharpening stones, the 6% and 4% come down to 0,06*1599 + 0,04*1599 = 96 + 64 = 160
Thus, you’ll get 160 focused statpoints in power vs 315 all stat points.

Kapy.9387:

Starcake has +315 attribute points. If you’re running full ascended celestial gear, with all-stat runes, you get to 1599 in every stat.
Assuming you’re talking about superior sharpening stones, the 6% and 4% come down to 0,06*1599 + 0,04*1599 = 96 + 64 = 160
Thus, you’ll get 160 focused statpoints in power vs 315 all stat points.

Food /= Utility

I’m talking about,
+20% condition duration
-20% condition duration
+10% damage
-10% damage
66% chance to life steal
-1 condition on heal
+70 regen
+20% boon duration

You get the idea.

Food/utility is the place to pickup a solid focus for your celestial build rather than just a little more of the same.

Oh and full celestial armor/weapon/trinkets is 639 btw.

Hi! I’m logged in on a friend’s account atm.(Forgot phone at home, can’t confirm sms)

Justine.6351:

Food /= Utility

Definitely right, my mistake. I was in a hurry and couldn’t clearly understand what you meant with:

You probably shouldn’t be running them anyhow since +/- % modifiers on food are better.

Now, here comes the part where we probably have other opinions.

Food/utility is the place to pickup a solid focus for your celestial build rather than just a little more of the same.

Celestial build focuses on not picking up a focus. The moment you do, your base stats are too low to fully support one direction. A berserker build relies on a power focus, thus he benefits from damage % the most. Condi build with condition duration etc.
Being a jack of all trades is not in the meta obviously and is not about efficiency, but being able to do everything equally good.

Justine.6351:

Oh and full celestial armor/weapon/trinkets is 639 btw.

You mean 1639. I forgot to add the weapon, you the all-stat runes I mentioned.
It should be 1717.

Date.6594:

Hi! I’m logged in on a friend’s account atm.(Forgot phone at home, can’t confirm sms)

Justine.6351:

Food /= Utility

Definitely right, my mistake. I was in a hurry and couldn’t clearly understand what you meant with:

You probably shouldn’t be running them anyhow since +/- % modifiers on food are better.

Now, here comes the part where we probably have other opinions.

Food/utility is the place to pickup a solid focus for your celestial build rather than just a little more of the same.

Celestial build focuses on not picking up a focus. The moment you do, your base stats are too low to fully support one direction. A berserker build relies on a power focus, thus he benefits from damage % the most. Condi build with condition duration etc.
Being a jack of all trades is not in the meta obviously and is not about efficiency, but being able to do everything equally good.

Justine.6351:

Oh and full celestial armor/weapon/trinkets is 639 btw.

You mean 1639. I forgot to add the weapon, you the all-stat runes I mentioned.
It should be 1717.

Celestial gear isn’t about MOAR stat points. It’s about swapping a gear’s stat points with other stat points that happens to give the right amount of vita/toughness without gross compromise of other desirable stats. Using a rune set or food specifically for its celestial stat on a celestial geared character is a very poor compromise. It’s like saying, why meerly have below average stats in everything when you can have slightly less below average stats in everything? The rune set, sigils and consumables are the place to compensate for the compromise of using alot of celestial gearing.

This is the same reason people still use the ascended berserker/valk and just valk trinkets even though marauders exists. In a build that has good crit chance naturally, marauders is a poor stat compromise over something like berserker/valk even though mathematically it has more stat points.

Justine.6351:

Celestial gear isn’t about MOAR stat points.

Believe it or not, when the gear first came out 3 years ago, this was the main point of having it. This gear was a new reason for people to try out hybrid builds and making jack of all trades. I still remember a few of my good ol’ guildies who raged about the nerf of the celestial gear. You may go for an offensive build that also has a fair share of points in both support&defense, you may also call it hybrid build, but saying that celestial gear absolutely has to run with something different than a starcake is just mäh. Especially when we consider the greatest weakness of celestial gear; every % bufffood works on a purely damage/defensive/supportive build better, as the stats it scales of are higher.

Justine.6351:

It’s about swapping a gear’s stat points with other stat points that happens to give the right amount of vita/toughness without gross compromise of other desirable stats.

You don’t seem to get the idea behind jack of all trades. Every stat is desirable in that moment, when you go for all-stat. As soon as you swap gear to adjust to your personal playstyle, you’re going for an offensive/defensive/support oriented build.

Justine.6351:

Using a rune set or food specifically for its celestial stat on a celestial geared character is a very poor compromise. It’s like saying, why meerly have below average stats in everything when you can have slightly less below average stats in everything?

I’m not sure if you did the math here and what you define as average stat. If we put all people together and assume you’re the only celestial geared guy playing on the server, you’ll see that you’re not below average stats, but above it. The healer/condi/pure tank won’t have the power you have. Yet you will have less power than the berserker. You won’t have as much healingpower as the healer, yet more than the others etc.

This celestial gear has obviously a little bit more stat points than other gear, because it will make a build above average in every aspect, but a master of none. Which is also the reason why it’s not in the meta. Focusing on one certain stat with a rune is absolutely not wrong, but then again, you’re specialising for a role at that moment.

Justine.6351:

This is the same reason people still use the ascended berserker/valk and just valk trinkets even though marauders exists.

In a build that has good crit chance naturally, marauders is a poor stat compromise over something like berserker/valk even though mathematically it has more stat points.

That is a problem of gw2’s balancing. Just like there are useless adept perks, there are armor sets that – when tested – are argueably weaker than other sets because certain stats are becoming less good the more you have of it. The best example for this is the toughness stat. If you google “toughness vs.” or “toughness curve” you’ll find some interesting posts on both reddit and the official forums, regarding the damage reduction it provides compared to the stats invested. The same goes for an exceed of precision, as in your example.
You may call it a compromise, however, as I said before:

Kapy.9387:

Being a jack of all trades is not in the meta obviously and is not about efficiency, but being able to do everything equally good.

If you don’t want to eat a starcake because you want to have more power in your hybrid build, then it’s fine. Does it make it useless? Certainly not, especially not with 315 statpoints.

Kapy.9387:

Justine.6351:

Celestial gear isn’t about MOAR stat points.

Believe it or not, when the gear first came out 3 years ago, this was the main point of having it. This gear was a new reason for people to try out hybrid builds and making jack of all trades. I still remember a few of my good ol’ guildies who raged about the nerf of the celestial gear. You may go for an offensive build that also has a fair share of points in both support&defense, you may also call it hybrid build, but saying that celestial gear absolutely has to run with something different than a starcake is just mäh. Especially when we consider the greatest weakness of celestial gear; every % bufffood works on a purely damage/defensive/supportive build better, as the stats it scales of are higher.

Justine.6351:

It’s about swapping a gear’s stat points with other stat points that happens to give the right amount of vita/toughness without gross compromise of other desirable stats.

You don’t seem to get the idea behind jack of all trades. Every stat is desirable in that moment, when you go for all-stat. As soon as you swap gear to adjust to your personal playstyle, you’re going for an offensive/defensive/support oriented build.

Justine.6351:

Using a rune set or food specifically for its celestial stat on a celestial geared character is a very poor compromise. It’s like saying, why meerly have below average stats in everything when you can have slightly less below average stats in everything?

I’m not sure if you did the math here and what you define as average stat. If we put all people together and assume you’re the only celestial geared guy playing on the server, you’ll see that you’re not below average stats, but above it. The healer/condi/pure tank won’t have the power you have. Yet you will have less power than the berserker. You won’t have as much healingpower as the healer, yet more than the others etc.

This celestial gear has obviously a little bit more stat points than other gear, because it will make a build above average in every aspect, but a master of none. Which is also the reason why it’s not in the meta. Focusing on one certain stat with a rune is absolutely not wrong, but then again, you’re specialising for a role at that moment.

Justine.6351:

This is the same reason people still use the ascended berserker/valk and just valk trinkets even though marauders exists.

In a build that has good crit chance naturally, marauders is a poor stat compromise over something like berserker/valk even though mathematically it has more stat points.

That is a problem of gw2’s balancing. Just like there are useless adept perks, there are armor sets that – when tested – are argueably weaker than other sets because certain stats are becoming less good the more you have of it. The best example for this is the toughness stat. If you google “toughness vs.” or “toughness curve” you’ll find some interesting posts on both reddit and the official forums, regarding the damage reduction it provides compared to the stats invested. The same goes for an exceed of precision, as in your example.
You may call it a compromise, however, as I said before:

Kapy.9387:

Being a jack of all trades is not in the meta obviously and is not about efficiency, but being able to do everything equally good.

If you don’t want to eat a starcake because you want to have more power in your hybrid build, then it’s fine. Does it make it useless? Certainly not, especially not with 315 statpoints.

It’s not useless, its just not optimal.

I mean you bring up toughness and that is kinda what I mean. Celestial gear brings the right amount of toughness without it being wasteful. Healing power scales like garbage but celestial gear brings in a good amount but not so much that it is again wasteful.

The strength of celestial stat is bringing in just the right amount of defensive stats without becoming a negative compromise on the more desirable stats.

Starcakes and lolrevenant runes are not ideal choices for a celestial build because they compromise on the principal efficiency of the celestial gear stat choice which is:

Just enough, make up for any inefficiency with +% modifiers and might stacking.

Justine.6351:

It’s not useless, its just not optimal.

Alright, lets talk about optimal since you ignored the entire rest of my post.
You prefer to

make up for any inefficiency with +% modifiers

A celestial build certainly lacks attribute points in any categorie compared to the full damage/defense/support alternative builds. Thus, your +% scales of something that is most likely at a maximum of ~1900 when it could be more than 2700.

the principal efficiency of the celestial gear stat choice which is:
Just enough, make up for any inefficiency with +% modifiers and might stacking.

You clearly have a certain build in mind if you say that celestial gear has to come in principal with might stacking and when you’re talking about making up inefficiency. (Warrior much?)

Dragon’s cake’s advantage is that it’s not situational and clearly fits the all-stat theme. Whatever you’re doing, it helps – and that with a good stat bonus. But is it the only way to go? Not really, unless you want the maximum amount of stats possible. This thread was originally intended to find alternatives, which have been mentioned by professor sprout and haley. Another problem this thread was on about, was the low amount of dragon cake that is available on the market. We discussed about economics and stated our opinions on the dragon cake. Then you came in, stating that the cake shouldn’t be used at all on celestial gear anytime, anyhow although it has it’s use and it has it’s advantages; it’s somewhat decent for every situation, just like the celestial gear itself, especially when you can’t decide on a role, but you want to be able to do everything to some extent. As soon as you go for a +% food, you’re focusing on a role partly. It doesn’t mean that you’re not playing a hybrid build anymore, but that you build up strengths. Being indecisive and not taking a role is of course not optimal and inefficient and especially not in the meta, but hell – it’s another playstyle.

Kapy.9387:

Justine.6351:

It’s not useless, its just not optimal.

Alright, lets talk about optimal since you ignored the entire rest of my post.
You prefer to

make up for any inefficiency with +% modifiers

A celestial build certainly lacks attribute points in any categorie compared to the full damage/defense/support alternative builds. Thus, your +% scales of something that is most likely at a maximum of ~1900 when it could be more than 2700.

the principal efficiency of the celestial gear stat choice which is:
Just enough, make up for any inefficiency with +% modifiers and might stacking.

You clearly have a certain build in mind if you say that celestial gear has to come in principal with might stacking and when you’re talking about making up inefficiency. (Warrior much?)

Dragon’s cake’s advantage is that it’s not situational and clearly fits the all-stat theme. Whatever you’re doing, it helps – and that with a good stat bonus. But is it the only way to go? Not really, unless you want the maximum amount of stats possible. This thread was originally intended to find alternatives, which have been mentioned by professor sprout and haley. Another problem this thread was on about, was the low amount of dragon cake that is available on the market. We discussed about economics and stated our opinions on the dragon cake. Then you came in, stating that the cake shouldn’t be used at all on celestial gear anytime, anyhow although it has it’s use and it has it’s advantages; it’s somewhat decent for every situation, just like the celestial gear itself, especially when you can’t decide on a role, but you want to be able to do everything to some extent. As soon as you go for a +% food, you’re focusing on a role partly. It doesn’t mean that you’re not playing a hybrid build anymore, but that you build up strengths. Being indecisive and not taking a role is of course not optimal and inefficient and especially not in the meta, but hell – it’s another playstyle.

So use scholar runes, rice ball food, condition damage utility

still more efficient than starcakes and lolrevenant runes.

I often find that people who need to dissect quote another in aggressive defense of themselves are not worth responding to further and so I will end my interaction and let you have any further ground.

Justine.6351:

I often find that people who need to dissect quote another in aggressive defense of themselves are not worth responding to further and so I will end my interaction and let you have any further ground.

I’m sorry that I took the time, to read carefully everyone’s texts while also admitting that I did some mistakes and also appreciating good answers.
But I’m sure, that this way is better than quoting a whole text, ignoring 90% of it, stating an opinion without backing it up with any reason or data.

I think we’ve gotten derailed from the original post.

The OP was concerned about the high market price of the singular food with celestial-type bonuses, i.e. the Starcake

The OP was wondering whether the devs had mentioned if/when Chef-500 would be implemented. Apparently, they believe that would mean the introduction of alternatives. Personally, I doubt very much if the devs want to introduce celestial foods at all and even if they did, I can’t imagine that Chef-500 is coming any time soon. (The main champion for Chef among the devs is busy with other primary projects and even has several pet projects ongoing.)

With regards to the cost. The recipe itself is no longer obtainable, but that seems hardly to be an important driver in the cost of the cakes. Producing two cakes requires 40 Zhaitaffy, 1 crystalline dust, 50 saffron, and 2 white cakes. Sell offers for the Zhaitaffy + saffron alone require 3.3 gold.

Even with a new faucet for Zhaitaffy, the costs would still be about 1g/cake, which seems far too much for anything that people would use daily.

tl;dr I’d give up on the idea of having affordable celestial buff food in the near or even distant future.