Buy ATOs?

[Erratic1]

From the Merit Vendor you can purchase an ATO for 100 merits. You can purchase 3 converters for 1 merit.

 

On the Auction House, converters sell for 70 thousand influence. Most ATOs I look at sell for around 10 million influence.

 

So if you had 10,000,000/70,000 = 143 converters lying around you could sell them for the influence to buy the ATO. 143 converter would cost 143/3 = 48 merits, which is 52 merits less than buying the ATO from the Merit Vendor.

 

Yeah, you have to wait for the converters to sell (but they do sell).  Is there anything else I am missing?

[Gulbasaur]

You do have to wait, but they sell quickly.

 

I normally shove mine on slightly below the average and they sell pretty much immediately. Failing that, next time I log on it's there. It's a brisk trade.

 

I find the delay is actually in buying the ATOs, but it rarely takes more than a day.

Edited June 27, 2022 by Gulbasaur

[Omega-202]

Nope, you're not missing anything that's all correct. It's always been more efficient to sell converters and buy what you want, with Purps being close to the break even point.  

 

FYI, the reason for the high converter value is because they are a profit generating engine via converting garbage uncommon IOs to rare IOs and less valuable rare IOs to more desireable rare IOs.  40k in crafting materials and 3 converters (210k, about 250k in total) get you a random rare IO that can sell for 500k-5 mil.  

[tidge]

I think the only thing not explicitly stated is that it is possible to buy the packs that contain the ATOs and put the goodies in the AH for sale.

[Uun]

I usually buy enhancement boosters (10 for 50 merits) and list for 1,099,999 each. That price will usually clear within an hour and I usually get more than asking.

[SeraphimKensai]

I was born to be a gamblin' man. I like to buy super packs, and open them like people wagering their paychecks on them to see how it goes. I usually end up making a decent profit but it can vary.

[Ironblade]

7 hours ago, Erratic1 said:

Yeah, you have to wait for the converters to sell (but they do sell).  Is there anything else I am missing?

I will answer this two ways.

 

1)  Nope, you've got all of it entirely right.  My only additional comment would be that, for a bit of extra work, you can make even more by buying trash recipes and converting them yourself.  You see, that's where all those converters are going - to people converting trash into gold.

 

2)  Nope, you've got all of it entirely right.  But sometimes I'm too lazy to take that extra step.  I have over 30,000 reward merits spread across my characters so I can afford to waste them by buying the purples or ATO's directly.

[Akalabeth]

Uhm... are you including the 5% listing fee and 5% tax on sold items in your calculations?  Not going to math it.

 

I usually use merits for winter e's which are normally around 20m each.  I don't see the point in just hoarding merits "cause it's better to farm and buy them with inf".  And 300 converters sold works out near/less than the cost of those if you consider tax.

[Akalabeth]

Ok I mathed it.  selling converters at 70 each, nets you 63k each after taxes which like 159 converters to get 10m not what you said.

[Bill Z Bubba]

11 hours ago, Erratic1 said:

From the Merit Vendor you can purchase an ATO for 100 merits. You can purchase 3 converters for 1 merit.

 

On the Auction House, converters sell for 70 thousand influence. Most ATOs I look at sell for around 10 million influence.

 

So if you had 10,000,000/70,000 = 143 converters lying around you could sell them for the influence to buy the ATO. 143 converter would cost 143/3 = 48 merits, which is 52 merits less than buying the ATO from the Merit Vendor.

 

Yeah, you have to wait for the converters to sell (but they do sell).  Is there anything else I am missing?

 

I've wasted tons of merits then. Any time I'm lacking AT IOs I buy them with merits. Probably tons of converters, too. <shrug> I'm still rich enough all the time to fully kit out my next alt at buy now market prices.

[Andreah]

I think the merit costs of a number of things could be adjusted to not be quite so far off the market equivalent values of the merits and the things you could buy directly with them. Some of them are wildly bad deals. Others, pretty fair. I think the losers in this are the more casual folks who don't stop to work out the ratios.

[Shred Monkey]

12 hours ago, Erratic1 said:

From the Merit Vendor you can purchase an ATO for 100 merits. You can purchase 3 converters for 1 merit.

 

On the Auction House, converters sell for 70 thousand influence. Most ATOs I look at sell for around 10 million influence.

 

So if you had 10,000,000/70,000 = 143 converters lying around you could sell them for the influence to buy the ATO. 143 converter would cost 143/3 = 48 merits, which is 52 merits less than buying the ATO from the Merit Vendor.

 

Yeah, you have to wait for the converters to sell (but they do sell).  Is there anything else I am missing?

 

This is all true.  I always look on the AH for all my enhancements.  BUT... sometimes some ATO's are readily available on the market.  Even if they're listed, they're not always listed at the 10M inf price range.   In those cases, I use merits.  

 

 

[Andreah]

14 minutes ago, Shred Monkey said:

BUT... sometimes some ATO's are readily available on the market.  Even if they're listed, they're not always listed at the 10M inf price range. 

Sometimes you can get very good deals on them. But also, if you're willing to plan ahead a day or two, you can bid modestly and get the ones you want in the 5-8 million range. 

 

The recently worsened state of pack opening and emails claiming probably reduces supply.

 

Also, one could buy any five Superpacks, and expect to get 6 ATO's from them, and then a few dozens of converters should get the complete set desired. And bonus stuff to use or sell.

[Yomo Kimyata]

There's all kind of ways you can acquire an ATO.  Some are more efficient than others, but if you've got plenty of merits, go ahead and buy it.  This is like worrying about tipping a shoeshine a dollar or a hundred dollars if you make a million an hour.  This game is very generous and very forgiving.  

[tidge]

7 hours ago, Yomo Kimyata said:

There's all kind of ways you can acquire an ATO.  Some are more efficient than others, but if you've got plenty of merits, go ahead and buy it.  This is like worrying about tipping a shoeshine a dollar or a hundred dollars if you make a million an hour.  This game is very generous and very forgiving.  

 

My sloppy and (market) inefficient approach to ATO, (catalyzed) PVP, Winter-Os, and Overwhelming Force pieces is driven by:

• I have my (small) fortune (Accumulated Inf, Merits, Catalysts)
• I have an SG base with pieces usable by sub-50s (that aren't used on lvl 50 builds)
• I play through content to get a feel for a character and its powers

Since my characters are spending significant time below level 50, A new character typically grabs those pieces I identified to slot... it saves me the trouble of worrying about enhancement bonuses giving out (especially after the inherent bonuses for low-level characters fade). When those characters are "done" with the pieces they go back in the SG base.

 

Where do they come from? I typically just buy packs (or open already bought packs on other characters) and play a little bit of converter roulette. In my mind I have some vague ideas of which ATO (and Winter) pieces will be worth more on the market to be able to afford a buy of any pieces I want. This is sloppy and inefficient, but it gives me a reason to open packs for other goodies. For those times when I want a specific piece that I am reluctant to spend Inf on the market, I absolutely will spend merits.

 

Aside from Anniversary Badges, I usually find myself only spending merits on Converters and Boosters... sometimes Unslotters if I don't want to bother pulling those from email (or when I have discovered I have extracted all of them already!) I wouldn't do this if I was Inf-poor (on Homecoming, with the AH & fungible asset updates), but as I mostly play arcs TFs/SFs I usually find even a fresh level 50 with ~1000 Merits... not enough by itself for a full suite of Merit-Vendor supplied enhancements, but more than enough to combine with my other stuff (including the Inf fortune) to kit out the first level 50+ build. Every character is on its own to supply pieces for second and third builds!

[Golden Azrael]

I've not done much with or bought Super Packs or Winter Packs.

 

Can anyone tell me about these?

 

It sounds like a 'bundle' deal containing AT sets and other goodies?

 

Just something I've not explored yet.

Some great posts in this thread kicked off with Erratic's 101 post.  I like seeing practical maths costs as it allows me to wrap my head around things.  Mandatory reading for those still using Merits to buy AT sets.  (I'll only use Merits to buy an AT set IF I can't get it on the market ie. It's not available or the price is way too high.)

 

Azrael.

[Ukase]

On 6/27/2022 at 7:18 AM, Erratic1 said:

From the Merit Vendor you can purchase an ATO for 100 merits. You can purchase 3 converters for 1 merit.

 

On the Auction House, converters sell for 70 thousand influence. Most ATOs I look at sell for around 10 million influence.

 

So if you had 10,000,000/70,000 = 143 converters lying around you could sell them for the influence to buy the ATO. 143 converter would cost 143/3 = 48 merits, which is 52 merits less than buying the ATO from the Merit Vendor.

 

Yeah, you have to wait for the converters to sell (but they do sell).  Is there anything else I am missing?

Yes. 
What you're missing is the actual USE of the converters. 
100 merits gets you 300 converters, as you mentioned. But let's go with your version of 143 converters lying around. 

But...what if...what if, as I'm playing my character, I get various uncommon & rare recipes & salvage drops, and then opt to craft those recipes, regardless of what they are, and whether I can use them or not? 
Given (ya just have to trust me on this) the average use of 15 converters per try to turn something fairly useless like a Perplex into something useful like ...an Oblit, or a Perf Shifter proc or something that routinely sells for 2-4M, I can reasonably take 9 IOs and make 27M. That's better than the sale of the 143 converters*70,000=10,010,000 

Mind you, sometimes, the sales may take a little longer, and crafting/converting of 9 recipes isn't instant. But it doesn't take that long, either. 

The folks in this game that have the most influence are the folks that USE converters, not sell them or trade them. Anyone that tells you differently doesn't understand math. 

 

[Andreah]

21 minutes ago, Golden Azrael said:

Can anyone tell me about these?

 

It sounds like a 'bundle' deal containing AT sets and other goodies?

 

There are three kinds of Superpacks, Hero and Villains, Rogues and Vigilantes, and Winter Packs. They are bought from the Auction under Salvage->Special. The first two cost 10 Million Inf each, and the Winter packs cost (nominally) 25 Million each. Sometimes players resell winter packs for less.

 

Each pack is opened and flips five cards on your screen to show you. Each card reveals a drop which could be one of many things, including ATO's. The full lists are in the wiki.

 

https://homecoming.wiki/wiki/Super_Pack

https://homecoming.wiki/wiki/Super_Pack/Heroes_and_Villains

https://homecoming.wiki/wiki/Super_Pack/Rogues_and_Vigilantes

https://homecoming.wiki/wiki/Super_Pack/Lords_of_Winter

Edited June 28, 2022 by Andreah

[Agorazium]

I’m too lazy to spend a lot of time converting so I use 100 merits to buy event IOs, several of which sell for 20m. That’ll then buy me 2-3 ATOs depending on the set. 

[Andreah]

100 Merits can buy 20 Enhancement Booster (or 300 Converters) which sell for ~1.5 million each, which nets you ~27 Million inf after market fees. Sometimes they move faster if you list lower and settle for ~20 Million after fees. Anything you can buy in the neighborhood of this price is a fair deal.  (300 converters would sell for around 20 Million after fees, but it's more clicking and stack management).

 

If a player is spending merits on anything that's substantially lower cost in the auction than this ~200K per merit, they could get a better deal. This isn't an issue for those of us with huge piles of Inf and other wealth, but I try to steer more casual players to this route so they can get a lot more for their hard earned merits.

Edited June 28, 2022 by Andreah

[Ukase]

18 minutes ago, Golden Azrael said:

I've not done much with or bought Super Packs or Winter Packs.

 

Can anyone tell me about these?

 

It sounds like a 'bundle' deal containing AT sets and other goodies?

 

Just something I've not explored yet.

Some great posts in this thread kicked off with Erratic's 101 post.  I like seeing practical maths costs as it allows me to wrap my head around things.  Mandatory reading for those still using Merits to buy AT sets.  (I'll only use Merits to buy an AT set IF I can't get it on the market ie. It's not available or the price is way too high.)

 

Azrael.

Oh, the joy of packs! The tedium of clicking on hundreds of them!
There's a clever chap who was kind enough to go to the test server and acquire and open hundreds of these packs and compiled a list of what you're likely to get in a given pack. @Bopper and @Faultline have done the grunt work here, so I take no credit. 

The long and short of it is: with Hero/Villain packs, you can make inf, but not a great deal. With Winter Packs, those of us who bought a ton of them at 10M 2 years ago when they were on sale, and this past year (Winter/Christmas time) on sale for 15M are making a figurative killing. 
 But, even at 25M, you can make a tidy sum of about 5-10M per pack, possibly more, depending on RNG blessings. 

[Golden Azrael]

7 minutes ago, Andreah said:

100 Merits can buy 20 Enhancement Booster (or 300 Converters) which sell for ~1.5 million each, which nets you ~27 Million inf after market fees. Sometimes they move faster if you list lower and settle for ~20 Million after fees. Anything you can buy in the neighborhood of this price is a fair deal.  (300 converters would sell for around 20 Million after fees, but it's more clicking and stack management).

 

If a player is spending merits on anything that's substantially lower cost in the auction than this ~200K per merit, they could get a better deal. This isn't an issue for those of us with huge piles of Inf and other wealth, but I try to steer more casual players to this route so they can get a lot more for their hard earned merits.

 

Thanks for the wiki links.  I'm now more up to speed on them.

 

I may just buy one of each from the market and just have a 'play' with them.

 

Azrael.

[Troo]

8 minutes ago, Andreah said:

100 Merits can buy 20 Enhancement Booster (or 300 Converters) which sell for ~1.5 million each, which nets you ~27 Million inf after market fees. Sometimes they move faster if you list lower and settle for ~20 Million after fees. Anything you can buy in the neighborhood of this price is a fair deal.  (300 converters would sell for around 20 Million after fees, but it's more clicking and stack management).

 

If a player is spending merits on anything that's substantially lower cost in the auction than this ~200K per merit, they could get a better deal. This isn't an issue for those of us with huge piles of Inf and other wealth, but I try to steer more casual players to this route so they can get a lot more for their hard earned merits.

 

So what I'm reading here is prices are too cheap?

[Golden Azrael]

4 minutes ago, Ukase said:

Oh, the joy of packs! The tedium of clicking on hundreds of them!
There's a clever chap who was kind enough to go to the test server and acquire and open hundreds of these packs and compiled a list of what you're likely to get in a given pack. @Bopper and @Faultline have done the grunt work here, so I take no credit. 

The long and short of it is: with Hero/Villain packs, you can make inf, but not a great deal. With Winter Packs, those of us who bought a ton of them at 10M 2 years ago when they were on sale, and this past year (Winter/Christmas time) on sale for 15M are making a figurative killing. 
 But, even at 25M, you can make a tidy sum of about 5-10M per pack, possibly more, depending on RNG blessings. 

 

I'll explore the link, Ukase.

 

So you can have the value of opening the packs but they seem like sought after market items as well.  

 

A win-win.  

 

They were something that passed me by (inexplicably perhaps?)  I guess I was too buy looking at the Trees in CoH.

 

I guess you can work hard or work smart.  I'm beginning to wake up to the latter prospect.

 

Azrael.

[Golden Azrael]

5 minutes ago, Troo said:

 

So what I'm reading here is prices are too cheap?

 

Sometimes they can be.

 

I started buying the AT sets with Merits.

 

After I wised up, I spent cash on them if the market rate was cheaper.  (I upgraded with Cats at L50 later.)

 

Sometimes, the price is really high or the item is not available so I used Merits.

 

Azrael.