Guild Wars 2

But spending gems on Black Lion Keys are flat out not worth it.

Why isn’t there a mystic forge recipe for Black Lion Keys like:

• 25 Black Lion Chests
• 30 Philosopher Stones/5 Crystals
• 20 Blue Essence of Luck/4 Green Essence of Luck/2 Yellow Essence of Luck/1 Golden Essence of Luck
• 10 Mystic Coins

And have Black Lion Keys also come with Black Lion Chests when you buy keys off the Gem Store.
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But right now, if ArenaNet gave you and every player 800 gems, what would you do with it?

Nova Stiker.8396:

And have Black Lion Chests also come with Black Lion Keys when you buy keys off the Gem Store.

This makes no sense

Create a new character do personal story to level 10 get black lion key, can do this in under a hour.

Delete character rinse repeat…

Merry xmas.

Nova Stiker.8396:

And have Black Lion Chests also come with Black Lion Keys when you buy keys off the Gem Store.

A black lion chest is like 4 copper. You can afford a key, but not a chest?

It’s an incentive to buy keys. You have these chests you cant open. Keys are also rewards from PS steps and very rare drops from enemies.

Meglobob.8620:

Create a new character do personal story to level 10 get black lion key, can do this in under a hour.

Delete character rinse repeat…

Merry xmas.

With a staff ele it can be done in 25-30 minutes, just do personal story and nothing else until the lvl10 PS pops up. Complete it and enjoy your key.

Meglobob.8620:

Create a new character do personal story to level 10 get black lion key, can do this in under a hour.

Delete character rinse repeat…

Merry xmas.

This. I rotate though all the different proffs and there is no difference in run time. Human, commoner and that is all you need to do a key farm.

Meglobob.8620:

Create a new character do personal story to level 10 get black lion key, can do this in under a hour.

Delete character rinse repeat…

Merry xmas.

Just a couple of things to speed it up for those who don’t already know:

Choose human/commoner (already mentioned)
If you have deluxe version each new toon gets the banker golem and can access your bank so you can begin immediately with better armor and weapons

So go to the TP and buy the best level 0 armor you can find that takes an upgrade and put a minor rune on each piece that gives +10 power as its first attribute (be sure all your runes are different so that you don’t get the second attribute instead of the +10 power on any piece)

Same with a weapon (or two if using main and offhand). You can put a garnet pebble or a sigil in for more power.

If you want to maximize effectiveness even more you will need to use skins and transmutation splitters. Buy a headpiece, shoulder piece and any level back item. Skin them with whatever skins you have lying around (HoM for head and shoulder if you have them). Now use a splitter on each of them and you will have a level 0 helm, shoulder and back item each with an open upgrade slot that can take more power upgrades. (This gets around the limitation that head, shoulder and back items with upgrades do not inherently come in levels less than 10)

If you got the Pola doll, it also is a level 0 item that can take a power upgrade such as an adorned garnet pebble.

Doesn’t really matter what profession or weapon you choose you will be pretty much 1 and 2 shotting everything up till “infiltration.” (you do not have to kill the drakes in infiltration, by the way)

Some other hints:

1: put fancy skins on all your armor that way you won’t mix your good armor up with your starting armor and accidentally delete a character wearing your good armor

2: unlock any weapon skill that are useful in the opening sequence just because centaurs are easy and plentiful there. (depending on weapon choice you may not need or want all 5 skills)

3: if you get to the garrison and the doors are closed run around to the back side to skip straight to the giant elemental closing sequence

4: For the heart quest feed the cows 6 bags of feed and then water 2 or three corn plants – this is fast and going there opens the way point south of the bridge which will be useful for desperate medicine.

55: bags of feed give you a speed boost – pick one up to speed yourself on your way to the bandit cave for the medicine run.

6: Always choose to save the hospital instead of the orphanage. The only thing you need to really watch out for in the fight at the hospital is one of della’s early shots. Jump in to get the fight started and then go back outside and hide behind the door for a couple of seconds before going back in and taking her down.

7: let the npcs do the work in the level 10 mission (the commander) while you put your good armor back in the bank and do any salvaging/selling you need to do (an excellent way to raise luck level, incidentally.

8: if you have two free slots use 2 toons for the farm and alternate back and forth, passing weapons, armor and accessories back and forth – this also helps protect you from accidentally deleting a toon with good weapons or accessories still on them.

9: If you want you can switch to a ranged weapon for the hospital sequence but I usually find it just as easy to use whatever I happen to have already. As long as you get della down the others are pretty simple.

Personally, I enjoy warrior, thief, ele and mesmer for the farm but any prof and just about any weapon set will work fine. Also playing with a guildie makes it even faster and a lot less boring.

And, oh yes, although it should be obvious, don’t bother worrying about the mission levels. you will be only level 5 when you finish the level 10 mission.

any hints i missed?

Not horribly profitable but decent and you get some good dyes and boosts that you can use on other toons.

Also right now you can buy one key for a friend and then get 25 keys for yourself at 40% off. I generally only buy keys if they are on sale and I have no other gem purchase I feel like making. The chests build up quite a bit between those events.

The recipe you suggest is far pricier than just getting a key, I think.

Lamont, all of that is not really necessary. Just take the character and use it. The only change I make is buy a longbow for warrior and a sceptor for guard (blue, can be resold at the end). All others are given a ranged type weapon.
At the end everything is sold to the tp or salvaged. Anything that can’t be sold or salvaged is left on the character and deleted with it.

It should take less than 15-20 mins to farm a key. Mesmer is the fastest I could pull off so far and with no difficulty even without awesome armors sets.

Yargesh.4965:

Lamont, all of that is not really necessary. Just take the character and use it. The only change I make is buy a longbow for warrior and a sceptor for guard (blue, can be resold at the end). All others are given a ranged type weapon.
At the end everything is sold to the tp or salvaged. Anything that can’t be sold or salvaged is left on the character and deleted with it.

No, it is not necessary. So, if you just want 1 or 2 keys then, no, don’t bother with anything other than starter equipment.

But it does cut down the time of the run a great deal (often cutting 1/4 to 1/3 of the time required) and if you are going to be farming a lot of keys (and you will have to farm a lot if you want the black lion tickets) the minutes you save on each run will add up significantly in the long run.

Remember Guild Wars 1?
Remember Locked chests and lock picks?
Remember Locked chests were random in zones and lockpicks were bought for 1.5 silver?
Remember there was a chance at a blue/green/yellow from locked chests?
Remember how that went towards a title?
I can’t think of anyway how that perfectly good system could fit in GW2 with some changes/additions.
But hey, GW2 is an all new improvement and advancement on the game, right?

Why would you want BLC keys?

Yeah, getting wintersday gifts in the chest is really disappointing.
That’s why you should always open chests outide of seasonal events.

As far as I know, the Wintersday gifts aren’t taking up a loot slot, they are in addition to the regular 3 sets of items from a BLTC chest. So, why would getting extra items be disappointing?

http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Bl_chest

Inculpatus cedo.9234:

As far as I know, the Wintersday gifts aren’t taking up a loot slot, they are in addition to the regular 3 sets of items from a BLTC chest. So, why would getting extra items be disappointing?

http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Bl_chest

This is fact, Inculpatus is correct. Freebies are never a bad thing. :P

I stand corrected, then.

I still didn’t know it, though. And I know nobody in my guild knows that.

Paulytnz.7619:

Inculpatus cedo.9234:

As far as I know, the Wintersday gifts aren’t taking up a loot slot, they are in addition to the regular 3 sets of items from a BLTC chest. So, why would getting extra items be disappointing?

http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Bl_chest

This is fact, Inculpatus is correct. Freebies are never a bad thing. :P

The problem isn’t what is inside the chests, the problem is acquiring keys.

Which is right now limited too farming personal story as no one in their right mind would spend gems to buy Black Lion Keys.

You could just farm gold and convert your gold to gems.

Zanshin.5379:

You could just farm gold and convert your gold to gems.

Right now, 160g vs 25 keys.
The point remains.

The way I see it, the way black lion chests are set up with the keys is to get you to spend real money. They give you options on how to obtain them in game (gold to gem, PS reward, random drop) but those options will always be secondary to the money making incentive. You have to remember that Anet is doing it because other game companies have been doing this for longer. Nova Striker says that no one in their right mind will spend real money on keys. I could be wrong but I’m guessing either a lot of people or just the right number of people have been spending money on similar items in games for a while now. Anet could increase the drop rate and number of ways in which you acquire keys but you have to accept that Black Lion Chests are a profit making mechanic and little else.

I haven’t done any Personal Story quests in AGES … but could you cut the time it takes to get that key at level 10 by partnering with a level 80 friend (who would 1 shot everything and also give movement buffs)?

Note: You’d have to cut the time it takes in half for this to be an effective strategy.

Lord Kuru.3685:

I haven’t done any Personal Story quests in AGES … but could you cut the time it takes to get that key at level 10 by partnering with a level 80 friend (who would 1 shot everything and also give movement buffs)?

Note: You’d have to cut the time it takes in half for this to be an effective strategy.

Travel time and fixed cut scenes are what take up the majority of time. Another player would have minimal impact.

You know you’re a key runner when you gear the runners out to look better than normal level 1s. It’s a nice diversion from the normal game play. Plus, you get to hear “I’m uptown Johnny, baby……man plus!”, as many times as you can handle! :P

Dalanor.5387:

Meglobob.8620:

Create a new character do personal story to level 10 get black lion key, can do this in under a hour.

Delete character rinse repeat…

Merry xmas.

With a staff ele it can be done in 25-30 minutes, just do personal story and nothing else until the lvl10 PS pops up. Complete it and enjoy your key.

its much faster if you do it with high level friends that rush you through everything by killing everythign for you in a matte of seconds.

Just invite like 2 friends with lvl 80 charas or guildies and let them farm with you the keys. That way you can farm much faster the keys, as like when you do it alone.

Orpheal.8263:

Dalanor.5387:

Meglobob.8620:

Create a new character do personal story to level 10 get black lion key, can do this in under a hour.

Delete character rinse repeat…

Merry xmas.

With a staff ele it can be done in 25-30 minutes, just do personal story and nothing else until the lvl10 PS pops up. Complete it and enjoy your key.

its much faster if you do it with high level friends that rush you through everything by killing everythign for you in a matte of seconds.

Just invite like 2 friends with lvl 80 charas or guildies and let them farm with you the keys. That way you can farm much faster the keys, as like when you do it alone.

Say you had 1 friend with you. Instead of helping you, he could be starting his own character and getting his own key at the same time that you are. So you’d need to get keys at double the speed (if working together with a friend) to make it worth it.

But Yargesh.4965 above says that that’s not possible because most of the time is not in killing but rather in travel and cutscenes.

Bagel.4598:

Remember Guild Wars 1?
Remember Locked chests and lock picks?
Remember Locked chests were random in zones and lockpicks were bought for 1.5 silver?
Remember there was a chance at a blue/green/yellow from locked chests?
Remember how that went towards a title?
I can’t think of anyway how that perfectly good system could fit in GW2 with some changes/additions.
But hey, GW2 is an all new improvement and advancement on the game, right?

That system is kind of like the tri-key chest we got. The BLC key system is basically a money-grab which I wouldn’t be surprised to be the brainchild of than Nexon micro-transaction guy.

Crafting key that let you use your Philosopher Stones or Crystals would be great,stuff like mystic coins are kinda useless for most players now any way so I give this idea +1 :P

Xae Isareth.1364:

That system is kind of like the tri-key chest we got. The BLC key system is basically a money-grab which I wouldn’t be surprised to be the brainchild of than Nexon micro-transaction guy.

And how do you suppose an MMO with no sub fee is supposed to keep their servers open?
Plus you can farm those keys trough creating/deleting human characters if you really need them that much.