Guild Wars 2

I had an interesting discussion with a guildmate regarding a Guardian in my last party that had a Legendary weapon, but I also pointed out that same person appeared to be undergeared for the Fractal level we were attempting, which was 20+.

I brought up the undergeared subject because this same Guardian appeared to be in Gladiator gear, which is the crafted heavy Rare set. I would know because I’m a Master Crafter and I have basically memorized the looks of each of the crafted armors for the three weight classifications. Meaning that I could probably see if you’re appropriately geared armor-wise without having to ask you to link your gear before entering any dungeon. This is assuming that gear hasn’t been transmuted. With exceptions to Culture gear, Order gear, and select individual pieces, I don’t know many people who would transmute the looks of a full entire non-Exotic set into something with Exotic quality stats.

Please note that if I asked someone to link something, it’s not because I want to see if you’re geared for the content in question. It’s because the armor or weapon skin looks interesting, but I don’t recognize where it came from. In other words, I never request for specific elitist-like demands when recruiting people in Lion’s Arch for dungeons. All I ask is if you have a brain, know how to play your profession well, and know (or at least adapt to, if you’re a first-timer) the encounters in the dungeon we’re attempting.

Maybe I’m wrong, and I hope I am, but considering my last group was full of all kinds of fail-sauce such as botchy pulls, stuff not dying fast enough, teammates dying to stupid stuff, party wipes in the most trivial places, and so on; I’m also lead to believe that the Guardian’s gear wasn’t transmuted and is an authentic untransmuted Gladiator gear. Ergo, moderately undergeared for the attempted Fractal level! Although, I do know players who can hold their own despite not finding the time to acquire a full set of Exotic armor and trinkets, I don’t think that Guardian was one of them. Coupled that with an Elementalist that either goes AFK or goes Leeroy-mode … well … I somehow could see a disaster in the making.

Going back to the subject of the Legendary, my guildmate concluded that this Guardian may have been an alpha tester and “cheated” by knowing where to farm up the materials for the Legendary before acquiring other pieces of gear. I’m not sure if that makes sense— maybe that would be the case if this game was only a few weeks old, but at 3 months old? If that person was really an alpha tester and has been playing since pre-launch, then I’m sure that Guardian would at least be fully Exotic’ed by now. That and I’m pretty sure I could load up a guide to build a Legendary and no-life my way to one in a matter of a week or two starting at the very moment that I ding 80.

Instead, I’m lead to believe that this Guardian focused on getting the Legendary first before other pieces of gear. The real question is: do you think that actually makes sense?

TL:DR version—
Does you think it makes sense for someone to acquire their Legendary weapon first before acquiring Exotics in other slots?

Personally, I don’t think it looks wrong as some people are a bit more focused on certain aspects of the game than others, and depending on the Explorable dungeon, you could probably get by in just simple greens and blues assuming you can carry your own weight while earning the tokens you need to buy your Gifts … but it’s something I’ve been scratching my head about since the end of that bad group that my guildie and I was in.

Have you thought about the possibility of him using yellow MF gear?
To answer your question: The most effective way to obtain the legendary is not spending any money on other things.
Since there is basically no requirement gearwise to farm money in Orr, yes does make sense.

Then again, I personally would not be able to enjoy the game without my epic looking gear

It could very easily be transmuted skins- I did that with some of my armors since I hated, hated the Exalted skin, same goes for my husband, he is a leatherworker and he has definitely transmuted entire sets of armor the moment he crafted them.

That said- I did run around for ages in my whispers rares, while my exotic set was sitting in my bank so who knows?

Indeed, could be that he just swapped skins for what he thought looked cool.

Or could be that he payed someone in China to get the mats for him to make his legendary.

The world will never know…

But when I was working up to my Berserker’s Draconic set (which I had bought before I was lvl 80, I’m just like that), when I got to gladiator, I swapped the skin for the primeval just because I thought the gladiator set looks lame. Same with Pit Fighter, but that’s just my opinion…and that , ladies and gentlemen, is what makes the world go around…different opinions.

aren’t legendaries account bound? If so then….i guess you understand?

Legendaries are sellable and soulbound on use.

then he just crafted it on another char.

Mystery resolved !

Wait yeah, I think you have to be level 80 to equip it too, yeah? Maybe he just used lower level skins to freak people out, and in a round about way, create threads like this?

Queue in the eerie 50’s horror movie sound…

I’ve though about transmuting my exotics into crappy lvl 5 white armor, just to surprise people in W3. But I lack the balls to throw away my awesome armor look just like that ;p

well there’s nothing wrong in not having exotics and instead just aiming for a legendary in any case if he hasn’t got exotics, there are so many ways of obtaining them that you would think that the game is making it rain exotics. The most efficient way would be to craft them, however if he made the legendary on that char I wouldn’t be surprised if he doesn’t have armorsmithing. Unlike squishy armor, heavy armor can be a bit costly, so easiest it would be to aquire it from loot drops/ karma or dungeon tokens. Found a really good team for AC yesterday, ran it 3 times, took us a bit over an hour and bam – insta 180 tickets. So if every day you ran several dungeons by the end of he week you would probably have a nice amount of tokens and gold, making you able to afford some pieces of armor with tokens, some pieces with gold.

Sender.7958:

I’ve though about transmuting my exotics into crappy lvl 5 white armor, just to surprise people in W3. But I lack the balls to throw away my awesome armor look just like that ;p

I did the opposite. All my level 15 to 30 alts are wearing level 80 and cultural armors. Maybe this person decided to make his new guardian his main and gave him the legendary weapon from another character. His guardian may have just turned level 80 and does’t have the karma or tokens to get exotics yet. And also is probably broke from crafting the legendary.

I skinned my exotic armor with the lvl 65 winged skin.

Real Life Money is the easiest way to legendaries.

I use a chest piece that is crafted for the early 20 levels, but that is full exotics with one of 6 superior runes of earth in……

Sorry, this post makes no sense, “You have memorised all the armour sets and therefore know I am undergeared”…..

No you dont, sorry, you just dont, Transmutation stones have nullified your extensive knowledge of armour skins, oh well….

Shifu.4321:

Real Life Money is the easiest way to legendaries.

You can’t buy everything with them if you do it legally. Badges, dungeon badges, skill points and karma needed can’t be bought. Of course it might pay if you bought it off a bot site, but that’s risking a lot. Otherwise to get the mats you would spend over 500 dollars and I don’t know a single person that can spend this much on a skin in a game.

Many people are skipping exotic to get legendary. You can always get exotic by token or karma which will never inflate. Precursor and mat , however, will inflate or be speculated. Your guildmate is just smart enough to have a priority.

Well it’s a legendary weapon, not armor…. and considering the precursor is exotic, they have at least one exotic.

Maybe if the road to getting a legendary was less about RNG/farm and more about skill, then it might have been prudent for a player to deck themselves out in exotic equipment… but it would still be a choice the player has to make.

I have exotics on my Mesmer and I transmuted to look like the wing set because I liked the look better. My brother had exotics on his warrior and transmuted them to look like the Pit Fighter skin I think. Even my weapons are exotic transmuted to the Ebonhawk skins.

You really can’t judge a character’s gear by it’s looks. I’m sure there are a good few characters running around with pearl swords transmuted to look like anything else, and some CoF sets in disguise.

If I wanted I could probably transmute my quiver to look like the Mad King’s biography and have a pink with a green skin ^.^

Thanks for the feedback all!

BUTTERBLUME.3217:

Have you th

ought about the possibility of him using yellow MF gear?
To answer your question: The most effective way to obtain the legendary is not spending any money on other things.
Since there is basically no requirement gearwise to farm money in Orr, yes does make sense.

Then again, I personally would not be able to enjoy the game without my epic looking gear

The use of yellow Magic Find gear is a possibility. I don’t know many people who have a full-blown Exotic Magic Find set, as in every piece is like Explorer’s Awesome Stuff of The Explorer type of set (unless they’re very obsessed about farming).

Personally, I think it would be a waste of money. At the most, I just have another set of Exotic gear with only Magic Find upgrades in it. That way, at least my damage isn’t totally screwed. That and it seemed to have payed for itself in a reasonable amount of time. Of course, the use of Magic Find in dungeons is quite a controversial topic on its own. As with me, I generally don’t wear Magic Find gear while in PUGs regardless of difficulty. As far as Magic Find is concerned, it would be nice if Magic Find were to be implemented in a way that benefits all the members in the party, not just the person wearing it. I’ll probably get pretty deep into that subject in another thread though.

Morrigan.2809:

It could very easily be transmuted skins- I did that with some of my armors since I hated, hated the Exalted skin, same goes for my husband, he is a leatherworker and he has definitely transmuted entire sets of armor the moment he crafted them.

That said- I did run around for ages in my whispers rares, while my exotic set was sitting in my bank so who knows?

I was hoping that the skins were just transmuted, but after last night’s failed group, I’m lead to believe that they weren’t. On the other hand, I do have to agree that I’m not a big fan of most of the crafted Leatherworking sets. Come to think of it, I’m not a big fan of the looks of most of the crafted sets in general. But I guess the mentality behind crafted sets is that it doesn’t have to look pretty— it just has to be functional.

Aoshi.4785:

Wait yeah, I think you have to be level 80 to equip it too, yeah? Maybe he just used lower level skins to freak people out, and in a round about way, create threads like this?

Queue in the eerie 50’s horror movie sound…

Now that you mention it, I know the armor set from the Karma vendors in Genderran Fields is quite popular despite it being a level 30’s Karma set, especially the heavy version. Miyani , the vendor at the Mystic Forge, wears that set. I have bumped into a few folks in Orr with that look. In that case, it’s a bit more obvious that the skin was transmuted … unless that person has the cajones to do level 80 content in level 30 gear. I don’t know many who are the latter but the former seems plausible.

han.9042:

I did the opposite. All my level 15 to 30 alts are wearing level 80 and cultural armors. Maybe this person decided to make his new guardian his main and gave him the legendary weapon from another character. His guardian may have just turned level 80 and does’t have the karma or tokens to get exotics yet. And also is probably broke from crafting the legendary.

If the Guardian in question is a very fresh 80, then I’m willing to bet that they were also carried to Scale 20 in Fractals. Then again, the earlier levels could be done easily in average gear. It’s when Agony starts to kick in when you have to start paying attention. Even around 15 is when the trash starts being a little rough.

YPC.6349:

Many people are skipping exotic to get legendary. You can always get exotic by token or karma which will never inflate. Precursor and mat , however, will inflate or be speculated. Your guildmate is just smart enough to have a priority.

I know people who are like this in many MMOs I have played. In their mind, it’s like “What’s the point?” when it comes to obtaining gear in steps versus skipping tiers and quality levels. That kind of mentality makes sense when there’s a recent gear-reset due to new content and/or higher max level. Likewise, I knew people in my last guild who have crappy level 65 Masterwork rings but won’t replace them with Rares or Exotics because Ascended rings exist. Sadly, their effectiveness takes a major hit due to the major level difference in gear.

@Everyone—

I do agree that Transmutation Stones really do provide the perception that one could be exceptionally geared for the content in question by transmuting an Exotic skin with lower quality stats. In that case, at least provide the skills to compensate. Come on now! Low-level skins transmuted with Exotic stats, however, can be quite appreciative.

You could have easily solved this by feigning interest in his armor and asking him to link it.

I dislike the look of the exotic heavy armor. With the exception of the skirt and helm (which I don’t turn on visuals for), the rest of the set I use on my guardian is transmuted from lower levelled equipment . Heck I have a couple of transmuted weapons with lower level skins too.

I don’t really see how you can make the assumption that not many people would transmute non exotic onto exotics, that’s just your personal taste.

I’m going to have to guess transmuted gear. I’ve seen people with legendaries with the exact armor your talking about but it was transmuted. That apparently is a popular armor for some reason.

Most of my exotic gear is transmuted to look like rares. I simply like the look better — exotic heavy is generally over-the-top goofy and impractical-looking, at least to my taste.

I would say there’s about a 90% chance that’s what the OP encountered. There are a LOT of skins out there, and tastes vary. For anyone with the drive to get a Legendary, odds are they also picked up some orange armor and trinkets. The difference in degree of difficulty is staggering

I want one of my characters to have the look of the starting Light gear because I think it looks better than many other types. Looks are all based on my someone likes. I personally hate the gladiator appearance but I know someone who loves it.

Going with the look of the crafted exotic sets, I don’t like the look of Light but like the look of the heavy set. I have no idea what the medium looks like as I don’t have anyone high enough for it yet. So, if would craft Exotic sets and transmute to something I like. So (eventually) for my mesmer I will have the acolyte (starter, not named exotic) look but for my necro I will have the named exotic look (which is also acolyte). They will have same stats (well, same value, potentially different stats) but have completely different looks.

Before speculating who and how and why, it’d be handy to have the character’s player confirm what the gear is.

Both my 80s look like they’re wearing rares. And I do have exotic mf set for one of ‘em. But it’s skinned to look lvl 60 rare.

For what it’s worth, there is a website where you can commission a legendary weapon. But I gotta think if you’re gonna spring for a RMT legendary, you’ll also spring for the costume you want to wear with it.

I transmuted my L80 exotic hat with my character’s starter hat that had no stats on it. I don’t think that kind of thing is all that uncommon. There are definitely exotic sets out there where I would have to transmute every piece cause I hate the look. Otherwise as someone else mentioned a second MF set is also a possibility. I think it is extremely unlikely that someone farmed up a legendary without getting exotics.

Thanks for the feedback everyone!

AwwGasm.2504:

You could have easily solved this by feigning interest in his armor and asking him to link it.

I dislike the look of the exotic heavy armor. With the exception of the skirt and helm (which I don’t turn on visuals for), the rest of the set I use on my guardian is transmuted from lower levelled equipment . Heck I have a couple of transmuted weapons with lower level skins too.

I don’t really see how you can make the assumption that not many people would transmute non exotic onto exotics, that’s just your personal taste.

One of the exceptions I noted in the OP were: Culture gear, Orders gear, and individially select pieces (as opposed to an entire set of matching pieces). Full entire low-level sets would be a bit more iffy for me depending on the set, but individual mix-and-match pieces seem understandable. But I do understand that some people have different tastes than others. I’m not saying that your taste (or anyone else’s taste for that matter) is bad or good or whatever, and I respect whatever opinions anyone has on a certain set of gear. Same could apply to a lot of pieces of art, movies, music, and so on. Personally, I just find it kind of interesting or maybe strange depending on the situation and context.

As for asking to link a piece of gear— If I don’t know what that skin is, then sure I’ll ask. That’ll be all the information I need. Heck, I could just screenshot the character in question and cross-reference it with screenshots on the wiki if they won’t link it. If I were to ask to link something that has a skin I already know about , I would probably end up going into Elitist territory, since the only other information I would learn is what stats are on it. At that point, I might as well start asking them about dungeon experience and other intricate stuff that Elitists like asking about before a dungeon starts. Besides, I haven’t played every profession to level 80, nor have tested them all in the sPVP lobby. It’s not like I’m going to know if so-in-so stats are actually good for your build or whatever.

mulch.2586:

For what it’s worth, there is a website where you can commission a legendary weapon. But I gotta think if you’re gonna spring for a RMT legendary, you’ll also spring for the costume you want to wear with it.

That’s just plain silly, but I guess if you have the IRL money to burn on a Legendary, then I suppose you probably have the same money to buy a matching outfit with the suitable dyes. Or even use that same money to hire a Chinese farmer to do the dirty work for you. It’s not something I’d like to look into though since buying gold from other sources outside the Gem Store can be shady at best.

grizzlebizzle.9371:

I transmuted my L80 exotic hat with my character’s starter hat that had no stats on it. I don’t think that kind of thing is all that uncommon. There are definitely exotic sets out there where I would have to transmute every piece cause I hate the look. Otherwise as someone else mentioned a second MF set is also a possibility. I think it is extremely unlikely that someone farmed up a legendary without getting exotics.

I actually agree in regards to starter gear— I’ve actually seen a good number of starter items transmuted with exotic stats. I think some of those are interesting. In particular, the starter shoulders for the Guardian, the starter masks for the Mesmer and Necromancer, and even the Elementalist eyes.

Back to the scope of the thread, farming up mats for a Legendary without spending the money on exotics seems plausible as mentioned previously. Things to consider is that most Legendary weapons only need 500 of one dungeon token. You really don’t need Exotics outside of dungeon content, though it is nice to have.

I transmuted my Exotic weapons to the rare skin.

If I am testing new builds, i wont buy exotics for them, ill wear greens to see how it works, if i like it ill pay for the stats and upgrade to exotics

I hate having all my stats be on gear, in gw1 stats were easily resetable

He probaly did what most others had done. Buy from a gold seller, By all the mats and stuff off the TP. However the 500.000 skill points needed just got me scratching my head.

They make sense now because of the new changes made on the 15th.
They will always be made BiS and will be perpetually bumped in power to equal whatever tier weapon is the most powerful.

So no matter what it is guaranteed to be grindless after achieving it until the game dies or they change their mind again.Yes the grind is there to get it but the fact that you never do it again makes it a must for me above anything else.

I have my level 80 Elementalist running around in Exotic armour that is comprised of the level 25 Shadow Garb set along with the hood from the Winged crafted pieces.
I can’t stand the look of the T5 and T6 light armour sets so I transmuted everything the moment I made it.

So I would definitely suggest that it is quite probable said player simply preferred the appearance of the lower tier armour.

OP, why are you so concerned about this and writing paragraphs upon paragraphs on it? If he chooses to spend more money on a legendary than his own gear set then that’s his choice