I've seen guides posted before about how to make loads of influence using enhancement converters. Today, I'm here to tell you that not only is that method for chumps (since most people have already read that guide and caught onto it) but that there's a far better way to earn influence that will absolutely crash the server's economy once people figure it out. I've made some money off this, but I feel like it's time to reveal this method (which I'm sure other people know) in order to hopefully make the economy less dumb.
How Do I Get Started?
The first thing you want to do is realize how to get the most money out of your reward merits. I play primarily on Torchbearer, so all of these numbers are going to be Torch-specific. If your shard is different, you may need to adjust this a bit to fit.
On Torchbearer, one Enhancement Booster sells for around 1.1 to 1.2 million. I've seen some people get lucky and sell for as much as 1.7, but that's an extreme outlier. Most of the time, it's going to be between 1.1 and 1.2 million inf unless someone is dumping on the market like crazy (which everyone will be once they read this guide). This means that for 100 reward merits, you're looking at over 22 million influence even after AH fees. In contrast, pretty much everything else is going to sell for less than that. The closest I've seen anything get are the purple sets that are used by fire farmers, but even those usually only reach 22.5-23 million inf on a good day and may not sell for that much if people undercut you.
I made an alt and levelled it to around 40, and I had some 500 reward merits from doing TFs and trials. I cashed these in for a bit over 100 million influence by converting them to Enhancement Boosters at a ratio of 5:1.
This is going to be your starting capital for crashing the economy.. with no survivors.
I Have the Money, What Now?
Simple. The server owners have seeded the auction house with Super Packs, which are CoX's term for loot boxes. There are three types:
Heroes & Villains: These contain the first set of Archetype Origin Enhancements (ATOs) for each AT [ex: Command of the Mastermind for MMs]
Rogues & Vigilantes: These contain the second set of ATOs for each AT [ex: Mark of Supremacy for MMs]
Lords of Winter: These are significantly more expensive, but contain winter enhancement sets that sell at a significantly higher price.
You're going to want to start with the first two types, which are priced at 10 million inf each. Lords of Winter packs are 25 million each.
Now, here's what's in the Super Packs:
Candy Cane Salvage (Lords of Winter only, practically useless)
Brain Storm Ideas (20x or 40x, will only pop up once per pack)
Enhancement Converters (common as dirt)
Enhancement Unslotters (also common as dirt)
Enhancement Boosters (uncommon)
Enhancement Catalysts (rare)
Reward Merits (25x, will only pop up once per pack)
Various Temp Powers (guaranteed in every pack)
Free Tailor Vouchers (uncommon)
Dual/Dual Team Inspirations (these are guaranteed in every pack)
Archetype Origin Enhancements (H&V/R&V only, 1 or 2 per pack)
Winter Enhancements (Lords of Winter only, 1 or 2 per pack)
Most of this stuff is pretty worthless. What we're after are the ATOs/Winter Enhancements, the Reward Merits (which can be converted to boosters and sold) and the Boosters/Catalysts (which can be sold directly). Pretty much everything in these packs should be sold directly - don't try to use a Catalyst on one of the ATOs you unbox because I find that people don't buy Superior enhancements as much. For the inspirations, you can use or delete the health and endurance ones, which don't sell. The others you can just put up for 1 inf each to avoid AH fees and sometimes make 100,000 inf off them.
The temporary powers are a nice side bonus - these can include the Experienced power (which gives you half a level of patrol XP, great for levelling alts) and the temp power that boosts your influence gain for an hour.
The trick here is that the contents of a Super Pack can usually be sold for far more than the Super Pack itself was worth. If you get lucky and find a Brute ATO, these can sell for 10 million by themselves. Most ATOs are in the 6 to 8 million range, so if you're getting two in a pack that's potentially 4 to 6 million inf in profit PER PACK. The profit from this will more than offset any losses you might take from bad unboxes where you only get one ATO. Once you factor in stuff like the reward merits and boosters/catalysts you're almost guaranteed to make a profit provided you have enough starting capital.
I'd also recommend splitting your money between two types of packs so that you don't accidentally flood the market.
How Well Does It Work?
Remember the 40 alt I told you about? I have had them at zero influence gain from kills the entire time I've been playing them. Within a few days, I turned that 100 million influence into almost 300 million. Once you get enough inf to afford ten or so Lords of Winter packs at once, you gain influence even FASTER, as most LoW enhancements are worth at least 22 million by themselves, meaning it's almost impossible to lose money on them. My most recent LoW unboxing was 7 packs where I got a total of 11 Winter enhancements that I sold for 20 million each: I could've gone higher but I wanted fast sales.
25 million x 7 = 175,000,000 inf (175 million)
20 million inf x 11 = 220,000,000 inf (220 million)
Minus AH fees, that's still probably around 215 million influence, or 40 million influence in profit from around five minutes of screwing around with super packs. In contrast, a 50+4 ITF farm run with full kills will take you probably two hours and yield a bit over 30 million. I know which one I'd rather do.
Won't This Crash the Economy?
Oh, it ABSOLUTELY will. If enough people do this, the number of ATOs and Winter enhancements will vastly out-number the amount of alts being generated to buy said enhancements with AE farm money. In fact, I'd be willing to bet that if enough people figure this out, the only things that will still be worth money are the Summer Blockbuster enhancements and Hami-Os because of the increased amount of time it takes to farm those.
