Guild Wars 2

This is the only recipe for ascended materials, that requires 100 T5 materials. All the others work with 50 instead. Furthermore you need three Silk Scraps for one Bolt of Silk, so that 300 Silk Scraps are required for a single Spool of Silk Weaving Thread. On top of this light armor almost exclusively needs Bolt of Damask.
The dramatic increase in demand for silk as well as the equally dramatic decrease in supply has caused its price to double over the past week. So, please, take a look at this and consider to adjust it accordingly. A good way would be to bring down the number of Bolt of Silk in the Spool of Silk Weaving Thread recipe to 50 as well.

Edit: Fixed grammar.
Edit 2: Also see this thread.

I agree this needs to be addressed soon. It’s up to 5g for 1 spool. Somewhat ridiculous in my opinion. The amount just needs to match, so make it 50. I want to be able to casually play the game for a couple hours in an evening and be able to make one daily refinement, which is not the case at this point.

You did have over a year of silk scraps going for vendor +1 copper on the tp to get a decent amount of silk lying around, there was plenty of time after they announced ascended armor to still get scraps under 20 copper each. Only people hurting on these prices are the ones that didn’t bother to see it coming.

Player Character.9467:

You did have over a year of silk scraps going for vendor +1 copper on the tp to get a decent amount of silk lying around, there was plenty of time after they announced ascended armor to still get scraps under 20 copper each. Only people hurting on these prices are the ones that didn’t bother to see it coming.

While this might be true, there are (hopefully) still people coming to the game now. How were they supposed to “see this coming”? And even after they announced ascended armor, they did not tell you the recipe, did they? Of course you could infer it from the other recipes, but it was still a speculation. It could have been totally different as well and you would be left with your 10000 silk scraps.

Ignavia.7420:

Player Character.9467:

You did have over a year of silk scraps going for vendor +1 copper on the tp to get a decent amount of silk lying around, there was plenty of time after they announced ascended armor to still get scraps under 20 copper each. Only people hurting on these prices are the ones that didn’t bother to see it coming.

While this might be true, there are (hopefully) still people coming to the game now. How were they supposed to “see this coming”?

A brand new account starting NOW should not realistically expect to have ascended gear TOMORROW. That’s just common sense. The prices will drop once people stop doing daily crafts to sell damask at a large profit to people who are still trying to craft their armor ASAP. Until then, I’ll be here flipping some silk each day to make mine free. The current market is so full of people trying to make this stuff as fast as they can that bolts are frequently going for more than what 3 silk scraps and the tp taxes costs you at the exact same moment, buying 3 scraps, making a bolt, and selling it is literally a profit much of the time.

Indeed, it is common sense that ascended gear is a long term goal. It is also common sense that the price will drop. The real question is however, why you need 100 Bolts of Silk (300 Silk Scraps) for a Spool of Silk Weaving Thread, when you need

• 50 Mithril Ingots (100 Mithril Ore) for one Lump of Mithrillium
• 50 Elder Wood Planks (150 Elder Wood Logs) for one Glob of Elder Spirit Residue
• 50 Cured Thick Leather Squares (150 Thick Leather Sections) for one Spool of Thick Elonian Cord

Is Silk really that much easier to get than Mitril, Elder Wood or Cured Thick Leather? Do you get twice as much Silk as any of the other two?

Edit: Added raw materials.

Ignavia.7420:

Indeed, it is common sense that ascended gear is a long term goal. It is also common sense that the price will drop. The real question is however, why you need 100 Bolts of Silk for a Spool of Silk Weaving Thread, when you need

• 50 Mithril Ingots for one Lump of Mithrillium
• 50 Elder Wood Planks for one Glob of Elder Spirit Residue
• 50 Cured Thick Leather Squares for one Spool of Thick Elonian Cord

Is Silk really that much easier to get than Mitril, Elder Wood or Cured Thick Leather? Do you get twice as much Silk as any of the other two?

Since I salvage every blue and green item i can for magic find i actually do end up with more silk than i have uses for. It builds up pretty quickly.

Uvatha.5476:

Since I salvage every blue and green item i can for magic find i actually do end up with more silk than i have uses for. It builds up pretty quickly.

And how is this compared to Mithril Ore, Elder Wood Logs and Thick Leather Sections? I would love to get some input on this, as I currently just have my data and since each player plays the game a little different.

Ignavia.7420:

And how is this compared to Mithril Ore, Elder Wood Logs and Thick Leather Sections? I would love to get some input on this, as I currently just have my data and since each player plays the game a little different.

I decided to log my days worth of activities and salvages to see how they may add up and if the data meshes with yours. I feel that even though this is a small sample in the grand scheme of things it’s an accurate portrayal of my history of salvages.

The following information is taken from basic, fine, and masterwork salvages using a Copper-Fed Salvage-O-Matic. The spoiler shows a more in depth breakdown of what was salvaged from each rarity category.

These numbers do not include drops similar to tattered hides, clumps of ore, or rags; nor do they include mats from bags like heavy moldy bags.

4 dungeons run
6 meta bosses completed

Armor – 60
Weapons – 89
Total drops – 149

Silk Scrap – 43
Gossamer Scrap – 8
Elder Wood Log – 58
Ancient Wood Logs – 5
Thick Leather Section – 33
Hardened Leather Section – 2
Mithril Ore – 40
Orichalcum Ore – 9

Essence of Luck (fine 10) – 108
Essence of Luck (masterwork 50) – 22
Essence of Luck (rare 100) – 2

It’s interesting to note that fine salvages yielded a greater number of mats while masterworks produced more essences of luck. This correlation between mats and essences may be an intentional trade off or because the sample size here is so small it may just be coincidence. Either way I felt it was worth noting.

The meta bosses were nicely timed to be in close proximity to each other so waiting was nominal to nonexistent. The dungeons were speed runs of AC 1/3, CoF1, and HotW1. Metas and dungeons together were less than 3.5 hrs total though the timing and ease of dungeon runs was optimal. Of course, this is not always the case.

At a rate like this it’s easy to see that 43 silk scraps a day can easily accumulate. Considering the time gated nature of ascended crafting, laurels, and gold costs one can easily farm enough silk for their crafting needs while also earning the other resources required to go toward said crafting at the same time.

Uvatha.5476:

4 dungeons run
6 meta bosses completed

Armor – 60
Weapons – 89
Total drops – 149

Silk Scrap – 43
Gossamer Scrap – 8
Elder Wood Log – 58
Ancient Wood Logs – 5
Thick Leather Section – 33
Hardened Leather Section – 2
Mithril Ore – 40
Orichalcum Ore – 9

Essence of Luck (fine 10) – 108
Essence of Luck (masterwork 50) – 22
Essence of Luck (rare 100) – 2

Uvatha, you say that at 43 silk scraps a day, you can easily accumulate a lot of silk. However, if you look at the amount of mithril ore you got, it’s very close to the amount of silk scraps you got and you also got more elder wood logs than you did silk scraps. So, by your reasoning, you should also have excess mithril ore and elder wood logs. If you get about the same amount of silk scraps as you do elder wood logs and mithril ore, then the recipes should be similar as well, right?

Uvatha.5476:

4 dungeons run
6 meta bosses completed

Armor – 60
Weapons – 89
Total drops – 149

Silk Scrap – 43
Gossamer Scrap – 8
Elder Wood Log – 58
Ancient Wood Logs – 5
Thick Leather Section – 33
Hardened Leather Section – 2
Mithril Ore – 40
Orichalcum Ore – 9

Essence of Luck (fine 10) – 108
Essence of Luck (masterwork 50) – 22
Essence of Luck (rare 100) – 2

Let’s see:

• 3 scraps = 1 bolt. 100 bolts = 1 ascended mat. 300 scraps = 1 ascended mat.
• 3 logs = 1 plank. 50 planks = 1 ascended mat. 150 logs = 1 ascended mat.
• 3 sections = 1 square. 50 squares = 1 ascended mat. 150 sections = 1 ascended mat.
• 2 ore = 1 ingot. 50 ingots = 1 ascended mat. 100 ore = 1 ascended mat.

So for every 1 ore you get you should get 1.5 logs, 1.5 sections and 3 scraps.
You got about the same amount of ore and scraps. You got about the right amount of logs compared to ore. You got less sections than ore. As you mention, small sample size, but you seem to think it’s accurate, so how does this work out fair?
And all of that is purely looking at just breaking stuff down. It swings even wider away from being fair to tailors/leatherworkers when you take into account mining/lumbering. If you want more logs or ore there are several maps you can go to to specifically target gathering that mat. The only way to get scraps (or sections, but you only need half as many of them as scraps) is via the salvaging RNG, the loot RNG (the salvageable junk), or the loot bag RNG…

How is 43 scraps for 3.5hours(when optimal) of work(play) anywhere close to enough for a daily refinement? you need 300 scraps, if they made it so you can refine it daily then they should make it achievable in a semi-casual days worth of play, which 3.5 hours I would say is about it. If we were to look at it as 43×7=301 scraps (7×3.5hours=24.5 hours of play time). This means you need just over a day of dungeons and bosses in an optimal environment to daily refine the silk.

Or we can say you play 3.5 hours a day for 7 days a week which also makes you enough for your 1 refinement. You need for example 4 just for heavy boots… So at your rate it would take approx 1 month per piece of armor, some probably more as they use more than 4. This would mean that it would take you about 6-8 months to get a character fully ascended… (By drops alone)

We can say some of what we find we sell and make a decent return and buy silk but even at this rate it would probably take 3-4 days to get 1 daily refinement. (But when selling you fall behind on other things you need)

What they need to do is change it to (2scraps = 1 bolt, if they really want us using more mats than other recipes) or (change it to requiring only 50 bolts, like the other mats)

They had their fun now I hope they fix this issue.

I already had a feeling that ore/log/leather/cloth salvaged at the same rates and yields.

But, those numbers prove that 300 per day is ridiculous, because you get each of those T5 mats at the same ratio as each other, whilst leather and cloth are only from salvaging (clothes are made out of thin air in GW2).

First I want to thank Uvatha for the very detailed research. This is more than I hoped for and certainly better, than what I did today, but this will do as well. Playing the game for about 4 hours I got from salvaging with a Copper-Fed-Salvage-O-Mat:

• 61 Mithril Ore
• 57 Silk Scraps
• 52 Elder Wood Logs
• 43 Thick Leather Squares

At this rate I would need about 5 days to gather the silk for a single spool. For elder wood and mithril it is easy enough to get more by just gathering some in Malchor’s Leap or the Cursed Shore. There is no way to boost your supply of silk or thick leather, however. Even if you would introduce “silk nodes” or “thick leather nodes” (I would not really want it this way), they would just be on par with mithril and elder wood. This still does not justify that you need 300 silk. Furthermore, I see no reason not to change the recipe for Mithril Ingots to need 3 Mithril Ore. 150 of the raw materials for all four of the recipes seems reasonable.

Another interesting observation is the highest peak in the price for Bolt of Damask, Elonian Leather Square, Deldrimor Steel Ingot and Spiritwood Plank. I took the highest one day average. The data is taken from GW2Spidy:

Bolt of Damask (Dec 12, 2013): Buy – 160,845.8 | Sell – 188,856.66
Elonian Leather Square (Sep 4, 2013): Buy – 21,282 | Sell – 35,481
Deldrimor Steel Ingot (Sep 4, 2013): Buy – 66,581 | Sell – 75,000
Spiritwood Plank (Sep 5, 2013): Buy – 52,474 | Sell – 69,312

Bolts of Damask were more than twice as expensive as Deldrimor Steel Ingots or Spiritwood Planks when they came out. Sure, there are also other materials involved, like linen, cotton and wool and you need Bolts of Damask almost exclusively for light armor. The new back items also require them. But it is still quite a difference and the silk probably affects this as well.

When I first started posting in this thread the OP asked this:

Ignavia.7420:

Is Silk really that much easier to get than Mitril, Elder Wood or Cured Thick Leather? Do you get twice as much Silk as any of the other two?

I simply replied that from salvages I have a fair supply of silk. This was followed by Ignavia wondering in what proportions they dropped in relation to other mats. Since I’m a data compilation enthusiast I was eager to supply my findings just for the sake of adding data to the conversation.

It wasn’t to justify the need for 100 silk scraps or saying it was appropriate to farm in one days time. Just because you can refine a mat once a day doesn’t mean you have to or should work to produce one a day just cause. Welcome to time gating. I did say, however, that it was a reasonable gain within the confines of time limitations.

The comments got me thinking about the nature of salvage, recipe requirements, and the balance in these recipes and how it actually all works out. I came up with two theories as to why so much silk is need and how the recipes for damask can be validated.

Many are quick to point out that my silk gain is on par with leather, ore, and wood. Note that ore can be salvaged from weapons and heavy armor. Wood comes from weapons only, leather from medium armor, and silk from light. (from the wiki http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Salvage)

Consider the fact that I had 60 pieces of armors of various types and 89 weapons. I had 33% more weapons which equals more ore than if I were just salvaging heavy armors alone. From the 60 pieces of armor it can be assumed that I had little heavy armor compared to light and medium because I’m also getting ore from the weapons. So assuming I had more light and medium, I ended up with more silk than leather.

This can indicate that the salvage rate for silk is greater than leather or that I ended up with more lights. I didn’t keep track at the time but if memory serves correct I think I had more medium so I lean toward the idea that the salvage rate of silk is actually higher than that of medium for leather or ore from heavy.

This could be even seen as reflected in the trading post since level 80 light armors of fine or masterwork quality sell at a minimum of 3 silver+ while medium and heavy can be found for as low as 1 silver 8 copper. If the salvage return on lights equals more silk then these others then the prices are higher since people have already purchased, salvaged, and sold these mats till the prices were too high to validate. This could be a clue that the silk salvage rate was/is pretty successful compared to medium or heavy.

tl;dr (pt1) – It may be possible, through salvage of armors, that silk is actually easier to obtain than than ore or leather.

Gossamer is only used in armor crafting. Light armor wearers are quick to say the recipe is unfair because so much is required of them but all professions need gossamer for their insignias at an equal rate.

Gossamer is needed for light armor and armor insignias only. Cured Thick Leather Squares are not only used to craft medium armor but are also involved in the production of light and also needed to craft bows. Mithril Ingots are used in heavy armor crafting but also needed for every (non bow) ascended weapon recipe. Since gossamer is only used in the armor crafting professions the mats don’t see the same sink that leather and mithril do.

Players who dual wield and have 2 weapon sets actually have to use more ore and leather in addition to their armor crafting if they want to go full ascended. This may have been a factor in making the cost of producing Bolts of Damask so high as there isn’t another mat sink outside of the armor professions.

Bolt of Damask – light armor, insignias (needed by all professions)
Elonial Leather Square – light armor, medium armor, bows
Deldrimor Steel Ingot – heavy armor, 12 different weapons

Looking at the uses for these mats spelled out it’s clear to see that there are more burdens on leather and steel since they’re used for so much more than just crafting an armor set.

I am no economist, but one would think that the additional silk sink would be to create an equal volume of use for all three materials and balance them out on the market side.

tl;dr (pt2) -Damask may require more silk because there aren’t additional mat sinks involved with other ascended crafting professions like those that require leather or ore.

Uvatha.5476:

Bolt of Damask – light armor, medium armor, heavy armor, insignias (needed by all professions)
Elonial Leather Square – light armor, medium armor, bows
Deldrimor Steel Ingot – heavy armor, 14 different weapons, inscriptions (needed by all weapons)

FTFY

And I wouldn’t describe 2 bows as ‘so much more than just armor’, leather classes got off easiest with the shortest time gated armor set (lol why are the armor sets even different time gates), almost no additional use for their material, and a head start since weapons were released to stock on leather. That’s why thick leather is still 8 copper and hardened leather is 26 copper.

Here is an overview of the T5 materials, you need for the various ascended items:

So let’s see how much it takes of each T5 material to gear up a character of each profession completely in ascended armor and weapons. For the sake of this scenario this means to get a full set of ascended armor and one of each weapon the character can use. If the character can use a weapon both as a mainhand-weapon and as an offhand-weapon, you want to get two so you can dual wield.

Elementalist (light armor, 2 daggers, focus, scepter, staff, trident):

• 5850 Elder Wood Logs
• 3000 Mithril Ore
• 10800 Silk Sraps
• 900 Thick Leather Sections

Engineer (medium armor, harpoon gun, 2 pistols, rifle, shield):

• 4050 Elder Wood Logs
• 3000 Mithril Ore
• 7200 Silk Sraps
• 2700 Thick Leather Sections

Guardian (heavy armor, focus, greatsword, hammer, mace, scepter, shield, spear, staff, sword, torch, trident):

• 9300 Elder Wood Logs
• 7800 Mithril Ores
• 7500 Silk Scraps
• 0 Thick Leather Sections

Mesmer (light armor, focus, greatsword, pistol, scepter, spear, 2 swords, staff, torch, trident):

• 8550 Elder Wood Logs
• 5800 Mithril Ore
• 10800 Silk Sraps
• 900 Thick Leather Sections

Necromancer (light armor, axe, 2 daggers, focus, scepter, spear, staff, trident, warhorn):

• 8100 Elder Wood Planks
• 4700 Mithril Ores
• 10800 Silk Scraps
• 900 Thick Leather Sections

Ranger (medium armor, 2 axes, dagger, greatsword, harpoon gun, longbow, shortbow, spear, sword, torch, warhorn):

• 8400 Elder Wood Logs
• 6500 Mithril Ores
• 7200 Silk Scraps
• 3600 Thick Leather Sections

Thief (medium armor, 2 daggers, harpoon gun, 2 pistols, shortbow, spear, sword):

• 5850 Elder Wood Logs
• 5100 Mithril Ores
• 7200 Silk Scraps
• 3150 Thick Leather Sections

Warrior (heavy armor, 2 axes, greatsword, hammer, harpoon gun, longbow, 2 maces, rifle, shield, spear, 2 swords, warhorn):

• 10200 Elder Wood Logs
• 10500 Mithril Ores
• 7500 Silk Scraps
• 450 Thick Leather Sections

Average:

• 7537.5 Elder Wood Logs
• 5800 Mithril Ores
• 8625 Silk Scraps
• 1575 Thick Leather Sections

So even in this worst case scenario (not many warriors want all those weapons), you need more Silk Scraps on average than you need Elder Wood Logs or Mitril Ore. And Silk Scraps cannot be gathered like those two. So here is my proposition:

• Decrease the amount of Bolts of Silk per Spool of Silk Weaving Thread to 50
• Increase the amount of Cured Thick Leather Square per Spool of Elonian Leather Cord to 100
• Optionally: Increase the amount of Mithril Ore per Mithril Ingot to 3.

Depending on the third point, the new average would be

• 7537.5 Elder Wood Logs
• 8700 Mithril Ores
• 4312.5 Silk Scraps
• 3150 Thick Leather Sections

or

• 7537.5 Elder Wood Logs
• 5800 Mithril Ores
• 4312.5 Silk Scraps
• 3150 Thick Leather Sections.

Yes, silk requirements are outrageous. But reducing the requirements would be unfair to those who already did the grind or went through the great expense of crafting their ascended armor.