Guild Wars 2

I’ve seen a variety of responses regarding what mobs/chests can/can’t drop precursors.

I’d like to know before I waste my time in search of one.

What I think I found:
1. Need Level 80 character.
2. Can potentially drop from any mob, even in Queensdale, etc…
3. Better* chance from High Level mobs, such as in Cursed Shore.
4. World Boss Chests have a higher* chance.
5. End of Dungeon rewards have a higher* chance.
*Higher/better chance – likely statistically insignificant. Such as .00001% to .00002% won’t really be noticed by a single player.

Is that about right? I know I could play the mystic forge lottery, but I’m not that wealthy yet.

In general, I’ll probably have the gold before I get a drop, but don’t want to waste my time doing dailies in Queensdale, when I have to be in Cursed Shore to even have a chance, even if it is extremely small.

I am not sure you can really ‘search’ for one. I think I have around 1300 play hours, opened literally 1000s of meta chests, and thrown an unbelievable amount of stuff into the MF. Still, I ended up just buying my precursor.

Last week, though. Venom dropped from (I assume) a Krait in Sparkfly during the event where they attack the lab neat Teq. (Only a guess since I didn’t notice picking it up until I went to sell after the event).

But I know people with more hours and an UNREAL amount invested in the MF that are still empty handed. Either save the gold or play and pray.

Wayland.3528:

I am not sure you can really ‘search’ for one. I think I have around 1300 play hours, opened literally 1000s of meta chests, and thrown an unbelievable amount of stuff into the MF. Still, I ended up just buying my precursor.

Last week, though. Venom dropped from (I assume) a Krait in Sparkfly during the event where they attack the lab neat Teq. (Only a guess since I didn’t notice picking it up until I went to sell after the event).

But I know people with more hours and an UNREAL amount invested in the MF that are still empty handed. Either save the gold or play and pray.

This is pretty much the best answer you will get. It’s a very small chance any way you go about, and I’d say probably 95% of people will farm the money before they get the certain precursor they want. This isn’t a real statistic by any means, just what I have observed. Hell we had a precursor drop for someone last night in guild, too bad it was the scepter and he was trying to farm the 1h sword.

You should just save up and buy it. It is very unlikely you will ever see one drop, and near impossible you will get the one you want.

It’s a 100% drop from this boss:

Be aware it can drive you crazy!!!

I’ve played over 1000 hours and never had a precursor drop for me.
But apparently it’s possible to get it dropped from a random mob or dungeon chest.

I completely understand the improbability of any precursor dropping.

I also don’t want to completely eliminate the chance of one dropping either. 0.00001% chance is still greater than 0%.

The thing you have to understand here - The only way to get them is the way described (MF or random drop from high level content) - yet everyone says "save up and by one". If everyone did this, there would be NO PRECURSORS. I’ve mystic toilet dumped 200g and ended up with 2 precursors (dawn/the hunter). The fact is, they are not worth the 600g+ they are posting for and the people who recommend saving the 600g for it are typically the ones selling them and hoping the price continues to drive up. I’ve never met a single person who spent over 300g and ended up with no precursor. Just gotta sack up and toss that gold in there - it’s not easy, but imo its much faster than the 600g+ grind.

The number 1 thing you can do when searching for a pre-cursor is :

Do not search for a precursor!

If you enjoy and like this game at all you will not put yourself through this torture lol. Just play the game, do some dungeons, WvW, dragon events, DE’s, dabble with the mystic toilet if your bored and have couple gold to spare and just have fun with it. The RNG in this game is brutal and unfair, searching will only make you hate the game.

docMed.7692:

I’ve never met a single person who spent over 300g and ended up with no precursor. Just gotta sack up and toss that gold in there – it’s not easy, but imo its much faster than the 600g+ grind.

I’ve tossed in over 300g with 0 precursors. I really should have just saved up, but I mfed in piecemeal whenever I had a bit of extra gold.

Over 300g as well, over 2000 hours of play, no precurser. A guildie randomly throws in 4 rares, pics up a precurser, they had to ask what it was as they only been playing the game for a little while. Like everything in this game its down to luck.

Tamaki Revolution.3548:

docMed.7692:

I’ve never met a single person who spent over 300g and ended up with no precursor. Just gotta sack up and toss that gold in there – it’s not easy, but imo its much faster than the 600g+ grind.

I’ve tossed in over 300g with 0 precursors. I really should have just saved up, but I mfed in piecemeal whenever I had a bit of extra gold.

Technically that’s just 1/2 the low end value of the highest precursors. There’s still of course the chance you couldnt get it, but it’s few and far between. Don’t get me wrong – I hate the current implantation of precursors, but i much prefer MF dumping than saving the ever growing and inflated TP prices.

Just start saving for your second legendary… maye the time you have saved 500 – 700 gold you will get a precursor drop >.>

P.s. I am still waiting for a precursor with almost all the reset of the Mats (besides the kitten Charged Lodestones)

docMed.7692:

The thing you have to understand here – The only way to get them is the way described (MF or random drop from high level content) – yet everyone says “save up and by one”. If everyone did this, there would be NO PRECURSORS.

Fortunately 99.9% of the gaming population never reads the forums, so they are blissfully unaware that they will absolutely, positively never evereverever get a precursor by any means than buying it off the TP so they just ignorantly go about their business and every day dozens of precursors pop into existence out of thin RNG.

DreamReaver.7514:

Over 300g as well, over 2000 hours of play, no precurser. A guildie randomly throws in 4 rares, pics up a precurser, they had to ask what it was as they only been playing the game for a little while. Like everything in this game its down to luck.

Play time isn’t really a representation of grinding for a precursor. You can farm around 1500g in about 20 days played if you grind cof p1 hardcore in a zerk mes/war group (I’ve done the math), which is just under 500 hours played. So, they definitely have the rarity of a precursor (and in turn a legendary) done right. Where they get it wrong is the process itself is very boring, highly luck based, and there’s things that inflate the market drastically (like cof p1 farming is currently doing and has been doing almost since launch).

docMed.7692:

DreamReaver.7514:

Over 300g as well, over 2000 hours of play, no precurser. A guildie randomly throws in 4 rares, pics up a precurser, they had to ask what it was as they only been playing the game for a little while. Like everything in this game its down to luck.

Play time isn’t really a representation of grinding for a precursor. You can farm around 1500g in about 20 days played if you grind cof p1 hardcore in a zerk mes/war group (I’ve done the math), which is just under 500 hours played. So, they definitely have the rarity of a precursor (and in turn a legendary) done right. Where they get it wrong is the process itself is very boring, highly luck based, and there’s things that inflate the market drastically (like cof p1 farming is currently doing and has been doing almost since launch).

Sorry doc, but according to my math 500 hours in 20 days means that one day has 25 hours. Even if you lowered the number of hours played to 480 (as you said “just under 500 hours”) that would mean that one has to play 20 days 24 hours per day… Uhm?
Sorry, but this math makes me question your math… Not saying that 1500 gold thingie is wrong, just pointing out that it’s impossible to do it in 20 days with 500 hours of play.

Ballistic.4531:

docMed.7692:

DreamReaver.7514:

Over 300g as well, over 2000 hours of play, no precurser. A guildie randomly throws in 4 rares, pics up a precurser, they had to ask what it was as they only been playing the game for a little while. Like everything in this game its down to luck.

Play time isn’t really a representation of grinding for a precursor. You can farm around 1500g in about 20 days played if you grind cof p1 hardcore in a zerk mes/war group (I’ve done the math), which is just under 500 hours played. So, they definitely have the rarity of a precursor (and in turn a legendary) done right. Where they get it wrong is the process itself is very boring, highly luck based, and there’s things that inflate the market drastically (like cof p1 farming is currently doing and has been doing almost since launch).

Sorry doc, but according to my math 500 hours in 20 days means that one day has 25 hours. Even if you lowered the number of hours played to 480 (as you said "just under 500 hours") that would mean that one has to play 20 days 24 hours per day... Uhm?
Sorry, but this math makes me question your math... Not saying that 1500 gold thingie is wrong, just pointing out that it’s impossible to do it in 20 days with 500 hours of play.

"Just under 500 hours". That’s my way of saying 480 hours rounded. I also said "played", so yes, you would have to "play" 480 hours. How much play a person does per day will dictate the rate it takes to earn this. For example, if you play 10 hours a day (all of it going to grinding), that would mean it would take 480/10 (48 days) to grind out the 1500g.

About 20 days played is what it would take if you grinded it out non-stop (which is what "played" refers to). Literally sitting in your chair for 20 days and rinse/repeating cof p1.

The Oversized Grub in the Eternal Battlegrounds has an increased chance of dropping precursors over other bosses or mobs, but honestly if it were 10 times the chance, that still is almost nothing, so it’s always always a gamble.

If you want a better chance of stumbling across a precursor than the average joe, play many more hours that involve activities with a lot of loot. Farm the hell out of chests from world events, dungeons, even jumping puzzles and anything that involves killing lots and lots of mobs.

WvW has a better rate of precursor drops overall, even from guards.

There are precursors in this game? Where? {:þ

I had The Colossus drop for me yesterday from a boss chest in SE exp path 3. The chest after destroying the armored carrier.

Chickenshoes.6250:

The Oversized Grub in the Eternal Battlegrounds has an increased chance of dropping precursors over other bosses or mobs

I highly doubt that unless you prove it.

RNG is RNG…

It doesn’t mean that if there’s a 1% chance that you will get it once for every 100 times you run something. It means that there is a 99% chance you wont get it on EVERY RUN.

So, there are those who will get it “by accident” on the first chest they open, or the first dungeon they run, or the first low level mob they hit with their newly minted level 80, and there are those who have a full stable of 80’s that they play non-stop who have never gotten a named weapon, never mind a precursor.

I am not going to go out of my way to get one. If I “accidentally” have one to drop, then I’ll go from there.

Good luck to all the farmers out there!

I’ve been playing since beta and I have yet to see a precursor drop. A friend of mine had Dusk drop in WvW, and another friend has had 2 sheild precursors from the forge.

I had to save up 700g to buy my staff precursor off the TP.

Precursors are exotic weapons.

As far as I know, nothing that drops exotics has Precursors edited out of their tables.

I dunno why people are too concerned about precursors. The cost or grind of the mats are crazy anyway. when you gather up all the gifts, it shouldn’t be a big problem. If you’re not gonna buy it, at least throw cheap random rares/exotics to MF, so even at the end if you get a random precursor you can sell it and buy yours.

I think the precursor drop is more like first come first serve on “secret days”. I talked to someone on my server who said it is possible to find a unique recipe that will have 15% return rate. The recipe unique to that day was 1h swords, so he said, and he pulled 18 precursors out of the MF in one day, more like a couple hours. He then cornered the market on the items for that recipe. So this means that there are people who are raking in precursors and we are all wasting our time with rng bs.

That sounds kittened, if its true I will hire a Hitman to set fire to Anet headquarters.

Logos.6498:

I think the precursor drop is more like first come first serve on “secret days”. I talked to someone on my server who said it is possible to find a unique recipe that will have 15% return rate. The recipe unique to that day was 1h swords, so he said, and he pulled 18 precursors out of the MF in one day, more like a couple hours. He then cornered the market on the items for that recipe. So this means that there are people who are raking in precursors and we are all wasting our time with rng bs.

No. Just no.

Not only would that mean that the devs intentionally trashed the game’s market, but that they had to put in extra work making separate secret recipes for those precursors. Also, believe me, if that were true, we’d all know about it due to the absolute kittenstorm when the right person found out and publicly proved it.

What you just said is basically GW2’s equivalent of all the “secret” ways to get Mew in Pokemon Red/Blue that kids used to spout off and make up all the time.

I droped The Legend from Teq, was farming it for 7 days. I watch boss timer at Dulfy site and did`t miss one spawn. Second was The Chosen and I got it from mystic forge. Trow only yellow stuff in it (lvl 74-80). My opinion is that is easy to get precursor just need to be patient.

And you had to necro a 3-year-old thread just to brag about it. -shakes head-

Mea.5491:

And you had to necro a 3-year-old thread just to brag about it. -shakes head-

Haha.

Hahahaha. ;’)

docMed.7692:

The thing you have to understand here – The only way to get them is the way described (MF or random drop from high level content) – yet everyone says “save up and by one”. If everyone did this, there would be NO PRECURSORS

No, because they are a random drop. So they would drop from high level content whether someone is searching for one or not. If no one flushed items down the MF I suppose no one would get a precursor there. But they would definitely still drop in-game.

People who have had luck in the MF always tell others they should do the same. Yet I have seen people throw huge numbers of items in the MF and never get a precursor. They could have just saved their money and purchased one.

Been playing actively since beta, if precursor drops were a thing, I’d have seen one by now. It’s a hoax, fake news, precursors don’t drop.

MAXIMILIANUS.3429:

I droped The Legend from Teq, was farming it for 7 days. I watch boss timer at Dulfy site and did`t miss one spawn. Second was The Chosen and I got it from mystic forge. Trow only yellow stuff in it (lvl 74-80). My opinion is that is easy to get precursor just need to be patient.

I don’t believe you.

Any random exotic drop can be a precursor. Since exotics drop so rarely for most people and the chance of the exotic being a precursor is even less likely, there’s absolutely no value in going out of your way to farm one.

What you should do instead is do things that increase your opportunities for seeing exotics. That means events that include tons of loot-bearing foes. Defending or assaulting most of the Orrian temples is better than just about anywhere else, because all the loot is scaled for L80 and there are mobs of mobs. Doing personal stories and map completion results in a lot less loot.

MAXIMILIANUS.3429:

I droped The Legend from Teq, was farming it for 7 days. I watch boss timer at Dulfy site and did`t miss one spawn. Second was The Chosen and I got it from mystic forge. Trow only yellow stuff in it (lvl 74-80). My opinion is that is easy to get precursor just need to be patient.

Djinn.9245:

I don’t believe you.

You should, because there’s considerable evidence that patience (and plenty of rares) is sufficient. The data for forging four rares is mighty consistent over time, just over 1 chance in a 1000. If you forge 4000 rares at a cost of 25s each, you’d spend 1000 gold for a ~70% chance to get a random precursor, which is why it makes more sense to slowly sell your rares, save the coin, and purchase the precursor directly.

Of course, that still means that most people aren’t going to see a precursor drop in the forge nor anywhere else. And maybe that’s more patience than most people are willing to devote — I know I’m not, which is why I don’t change my behavior to try to get one to drop. I’d rather do stuff that’s fun for me and save up.

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