Dumbest IO purchase you've made...?

[ThaOGDreamWeaver]

...so I'm wandering around with a mid-level blaster last night and got an interesting drop: an Experienced Marksman recipe from the Sniper PVP set. Oooh, nice.

 

So I take a look through the complete set, and in there is a Recipe for Range/Fast Snipe: promising to make all your Sniper moves instant cast. Fun...

Maybe I should have looked it up on the Forums first, but I blew 100 Reward Merits on it and then a bunch of inf on the parts.

Took my first snipe with it, and...

...hey, where's my Sniper Shot bonus message?

 

Oh.

 

After a trip to Icon for a pair of donkey's ears, I then blew another 150k on an Unslotter and sold it on. Hopefully whoever bought it knows what they're about, but I basically spent a ton of merits and inf nerfing my own build.

 

What other bad, dumb, horrible, no-good, 0 stars would not recommend purchases have you made and wanted your cash back - or want to warn others about?

 

[Ura Hero]

I hate that set.  The recipe is clearly marked as an Orange Rare.  The IO is marked as a Purple Very Rare.  It's fooled me into buying it to try to convert to another Very Rare more than once because I forget and didn't bother to read the full text.

 

I put in a bug report on it.  Maybe it will get fixed soon™.

[tidge]

I hate that piece, but I did eventually end up using the other 5 pieces in a Blaster's Snipe (available at a low level), since Experienced Marksmen keeps the set bonuses (one of them is IIRC +MaxEnd) at lower levels and can be boosted. My Scrappers/Stalkers don't bother with that set.

 

EDIT: as far as warning other players, I used to warn folks not to try to use HO Membrane in Fortunata Mind Link, but it has been a while since I saw a build posted that suggested using it.

Edited January 31, 2022 by tidge

[Greycat]

I really wish there were the opposite of that one, that actually *prevents* Fast Snipe. I mean, I'll use fast snipe because it's *there,* but I find myself waiting for it to decide I haven't attacked and am not under attack when I just want to take out a minion or LT I know will be trouble ahead of time.

[SeraphimKensai]

Personally I'd change the Fast Snipe proc to something like a Double Tap proc, chance to hit twice.

 

Since people don't need to stack tohit to unlock the fast Snipe, and this allows to keep make the snipe interesting by making the proc fairly unique so that it still does good damage as opposed to being one that is largely useless.

[Yomo Kimyata]

I'd say hands down that is the worst proc available.

 

My two biggest marketing failures (and I apologize for repeating myself, since I've mentioned these before):

 

Entropic Chaos.  Early on I was enamored by how useful this set was.  I decided I was going to corner the market, because this was going to be the be-all end-all.  It wasn't that simple to replicate, so I wasn't worried about massive supply entering the market.  I neglected to consider two factors:  1. There are very few people who deck themselves out in full sets at lvl 17, and it feels like most people rush to 50 rather than play organically; and 2. Decimation is a superior set that is slottable five levels later.  Sad trombone.  I did not succeed in making Entropic Chaos a thing, although I'll still slot in on slow levelers.  

 

Performance Shifter.  When they talked about the new End Mod sets, I was giddy.  Every alt needs a Performance Shifter proc!  And they are going to be more difficult than ever to create!  This is inf in the bank!  So I bought thousands of IOs, converted my face off, and waited with anticipation for the release.  I managed to get prices about 1mm higher for a week or four, and then supply kept coming in and prices dropped.  So I cleaned up that supply and more supply kept coming in and prices dropped.  So I walked away for a while and came back and cleaned up the supply and more supply kept coming in and prices dropped.  I still am involved in a minor way, but the margin is way too low for me to spend my time there.  And to this day I'm not sure if I'm just missing something integral about creating Perf Shifters or if there are simply one or more people who are creating lots of supply for very very thin margins.  Shrug.

[Burk]

53 minutes ago, SeraphimKensai said:

Personally I'd change the Fast Snipe proc to something like a Double Tap proc, chance to hit twice.

 

Since people don't need to stack tohit to unlock the fast Snipe, and this allows to keep make the snipe interesting by making the proc fairly unique so that it still does good damage as opposed to being one that is largely useless.

 

Keep in mind that Experienced Marksman is a PvP set. The Fast Snipe is there for pvpers that were concerned that the changes to quick snipe were going to make it unusable as an opener in pvp.

[tidge]

1 hour ago, Yomo Kimyata said:

I'd say hands down that is the worst proc available.

 

I'm not going to argue, except is it really a "proc"? Whatever it is, a few rolls of the converter wheel can turn it into something much better.

 

There are certainly other procs I would never try to market: Stupefy's %Knockback comes to mind... and I like stuns.

[Yomo Kimyata]

21 minutes ago, tidge said:

 

I'm not going to argue, except is it really a "proc"? Whatever it is, a few rolls of the converter wheel can turn it into something much better.

 

There are certainly other procs I would never try to market: Stupefy's %Knockback comes to mind... and I like stuns.

 

Fair point.  I (mis-)use the term proc to refer to that last IO in the set that isn't solely adding to attributes.  I call it a Miracle proc; a LotG proc; a delightful Overwhelming Force proc.

[Yomo Kimyata]

On 1/31/2022 at 12:34 PM, tidge said:

 

 

There are certainly other procs I would never try to market: Stupefy's %Knockback comes to mind... and I like stuns.

 

I've been exploring stuns a lot lately, and I'm trying to find a place for this proc in something other than a pure chaos build.

 

Right now, I'm thinking it should go in an AoE power with a chance to stun.  I'm thinking maybe Whirling Mace slotted with Stupefy proc, Overwhelming Force Proc (which hopefully changes it to knockdown and adds damage), two lvl 53 Nucleosis, the Absolute Amazement proc and a +5 Absolute Amazement Stun/Endurance.  I'll try this out if I think about it later.

[Ukase]

Purchase? You guys are crazy enough to actually bid for and BUY an IO? 

Surely you jest. 

I thought you guys knew better. Have I taught you nothing? 

In this game, just like in life, "Every dollar (inf) you save multiplies to the bottom line." - A.M. Agapos, Economist (deceased) 

Agapos was the smartest professor I ever had the privilege to learn from. Now, I don't think he was famous, or anything, like Friedman, but I suspect he was on par. He wrote the most tedious book I ever didn't finish: Government-Industry and Defense: Economics and Administration.  

We've established that if you have a farmer, converters are free, via emp merit conversion. We also know that when you farm, either afk, or actively, the rng gives you recipes. Some common & uncommon, a few rare, and on occasion the very rare. Why would you buy? 

Yeah, I know, I know. Time is money, and there's no wrong way to turn a buck. And if it works, by all means, proceed, I'm just being silly. 

Hopefully, the OP will suffer through the first several lines and see this: 

NEVER buy a recipe with merits! I would venture to say that the most that pvp IO should cost you is 2m to buy the recipe. (They're attuned, remember?) The rare salvage is now going for less than 500k. So, crafting, salvage and recipe for this item would be certainly less than 2.5m.  3M if you just had to buy it all instantly. And, if you couldn't stomach the idea of crafting, it would be what? 5m? 6m at the most? 

100 reward merits for a recipe that YOU have to craft and spend another 500K inf on, and if it was level 50...how much more to craft it, another 500k or so. When you could have just about instantly sold the converters from those reward merits for 18M at least, after AH fees. 

Yes, that was an insane purchase with merits. I get that for some folks, they have more merits than inf, and clicking can be tedious. But just break it down into smaller portions, sell them as you earn them, and it's not so bad. Or reach out to me and I'll buy them in bulk, as a courtesy. (70k each)
Just know you'll always make more using converters than selling them. 

[Andreah]

52 minutes ago, Ukase said:

NEVER buy a recipe with merits!

I repeat this to anyone I care about.

 

Even if you're buying your set IOs, it's better to convert your reward merits to converters/boosters and sell them for cash than to spend the merits on recipes. 

 

They work so hard to get their merits and then basically throw half or more of them away. Just don't do it!

[tidge]

On 2/6/2022 at 6:53 AM, Ukase said:

In this game, just like in life, "Every dollar (inf) you save multiplies to the bottom line." - A.M. Agapos, Economist (deceased) 

Agapos was the smartest professor I ever had the privilege to learn from. Now, I don't think he was famous, or anything, like Friedman, but I suspect he was on par. He wrote the most tedious book I ever didn't finish: Government-Industry and Defense: Economics and Administration. 

 

What was his badge count?