Guild Wars 2

To keep it short, here is some motivation/insights as to why there is a problem:

Exhibit A: Lower tier crafting material is expensive
Exhibit B: The most lucrative use for karma is to buy low level gear, MF forge it, and salvage it for lower tier materials.
Exhibit C: People do not level their characters on purpose just to get more lower level gear (chests etc.)

The problem:

I helped out a friend on a new account lately, and wanted to show her crafting. However, i was unable to show her much, as the crafting materials where insanely expensive for a new player.

Likewise, it is much more profitable as a new player to just sell all you crafting stuff you salvage, rather than exploring crafting yourself.

Can we please just get more appropriate level loot?
Maybe add a rule that every rare/exotic drop is your level, but blue and green items have a much higher chance of being the downscaled level?

After doing a downscaled dungeon run today (TA Exp, no skipping, kill each mob), all my loot is level 80 beside 1 piece of level 75. Not a single piece of level 55 armor or weapon to be found

After doing a downscaled dungeon run today (TA Exp, no skipping, kill each mob), all my loot is level 80 beside 1 piece of level 75. Not a single piece of level 55 armor or weapon to be found

When you’re downscaled, the gear that drops is appropriate to your level. This is why it’s better to do World Bosses on characters over level 69, as the rare items they get will yield ectos, etc.

As to the crafting materials, what they’re doing with the new map rewards is showing which maps can give what rewards, so if you want something in particular you can pick the map that has it.

The only things that affect the price of, well anything on the tp really, is supply and demand. If it’s better for a newer player to sell now and buy or grind for it later, then that’s up to them. When the supply exceeds the demand, that’s when prices will go down. As far as I see it, there’s no issue there. Newer player just have to work for it, like we all do, but a little harder.

As someone only a few months into playing I must agree it was hard for me to start crafting. Once over the hump I was enthused to find things cheaper as I went along.

But I don’t think changing how drops work will add to the fun. I’ve stayed around lower maps while leveling because I could still benefit a little while I helped others. It’s one of the many things I love about gw2.

Memphisjz.1405:

To keep it short, here is some motivation/insights as to why there is a problem:

Exhibit A: Lower tier crafting material is expensive
Exhibit B: The most lucrative use for karma is to buy low level gear, MF forge it, and salvage it for lower tier materials.
Exhibit C: People do not level their characters on purpose just to get more lower level gear (chests etc.)

I thought I’d only be able to get lower level materials with lower level characters too – but that isn’t true. You can get all low level materials by farming low level areas. You get a bit less because the gear will mostly (not always) be level appropriate and even by salvaging low level weapons you’ll likely get an ancient wood log and an ori. Anyway: farm mobs who drop lootbags. I’m farming bandits in queensale and have got a lot of jute. There are also spots in fireheart rise where you can farm linen and so on.
Only when you solemly use EotM to level you’ll be better off with lower level characters as the loot that drops there is 97% level appropriate.

Edit: spelling

Only gear drops scale to your level. mat drops and the like drop as the mobs level, or perhaps the level you are scaled to. things like cloth have no natural consistent source (a chance from level-appropriate humanoid loot bags) and so are a bit of an oddball; i personally think this is a problem, since it drives those mat price artificially high with comparison to other basic crafting materials, but the consensus seems to be no change is needed. /shrug
at least it gives me something to spend my karma on, otherwise that would be a largely useless currency.

Exhibit B is incorrect: converting karma to mid-tier scraps is not the most lucrative use for karma; it’s just one of the simplest.

Also, there’s no perfect balance between downscaling X% of loot vs Y%:

• people with new 80s have always wanted more L80 loot across the board
• area-appropriate loot means an ever lower chance of rares and exotics (which some people prefer).
• changes to the game, over time, often mean what seems in low/high supply today might not be tomorrow (for example: silk used to sell at vendor value)

tl;dr it’s a mistake to assume that changing the balance of downscaled:level-appropriate loot is going to make things better in the long run.

For me, mid-tier cloth is in a good place. I get gold — which I can use — for cloth which I have no interest in. Increasing supply on mid-tier cloth, for instance, would devalue it, which means I would get less gold, and would have to acquire more cloth to get what I get now. If his change were adopted, I would be in a worse place as far as return for selling cloth goes, precisely because I do not farm it, just get it in the course of play.

Mid tier cloth is in demand for the same reason silk now is, because of Ascended. I’m not sure if the OP wants the change to loot because he’s farming for Ascended and wants it faster, or whether he (likely, mistakenly) thinks increasing supply would lead to more profit for him from selling cloth. However, it seems to me that while my preference is no better than his, it certainly is no worse.

IndigoSundown.5419:

For me, mid-tier cloth is in a good place. I get gold — which I can use — for cloth which I have no interest in. Increasing supply on mid-tier cloth, for instance, would devalue it, which means I would get less gold, and would have to acquire more cloth to get what I get now. If his change were adopted, I would be in a worse place as far as return for selling cloth goes, precisely because I do not farm it, just get it in the course of play.

Mid tier cloth is in demand for the same reason silk now is, because of Ascended. I’m not sure if the OP wants the change to loot because he’s farming for Ascended and wants it faster, or whether he (likely, mistakenly) thinks increasing supply would lead to more profit for him from selling cloth. However, it seems to me that while my preference is no better than his, it certainly is no worse.

To be honest, I’m not sure if this would work out how you’re thinking it does. If I get 50 of any mat a day because it has a low drop rate, and sell it for 4 silvers each, then I’m getting 2 gold per day (not taking fees into account). If supply increases and then I am selling 200 a day for 1 silver each, I’m still getting 2 gold. The increased supply does not necessarily translate into a direct loss of income per hour just because the price is lower per unit. It would only result in a direct loss on the mats that you’ve already stored up.

This is why trick or treat bag farming is such a fast source of gold, despite the bags only selling for between 4 – 5 silvers each, because they can be acquired very fast so the gold income vs time spent is high. I could of course try farm powerful blood which sells for 50 silvers each, much more than trick or treat bags, but because they are hard to acquire, trick or treat bags are pretty much guaranteed to net me more income per hour.

Take silk as another example. It is way easier to get than Linen, but I’d bet if I tried to farm silk to sell, and then tried to farm linen to sell, I’d probably make more per hour on silk, just because of how much easier it is to get.