Oopsie - Yellow Salvage

[tidge]

1 hour ago, Andreah said:

If I need ATOs or Winter-O's, I buy a few packs, convert to what I need, and then sell everything else for a net profit.

 

I've done this, but I grew bored of opening packs.

[Andreah]

34 minutes ago, tidge said:

 

I've done this, but I grew bored of opening packs.

It is tedious, for sure.

 

However, I still open a few hundred now and then. 

[Yomo Kimyata]

It got a lot worse for awhile, and it seems better now but it's slow enough that I have a hard time maintaining enough focus to click slow enough for an extended period of time.

[Hedgefund]

You can open literally hundreds of packs in seconds with these macros:

 

salvage_open S_HVSuperPackSalvage$$salvage_open S_RVSuperPackSalvage

 

salvage_open S_WinterPackSalvage

 

You can put them all together or break out the first one into 2, I have them set up this for whatever reason.

 

Just click click click click click until they're all gone.  The animation for opening one will still play but the packs will continue to open.

 

Then you have to manage the drops and I can't help you there.

[tidge]

I know how to use the macros, it doesn't make it any less boring for me. I don't have any opinion or attitude beyond this.

[Stormwalker]

5 hours ago, tidge said:

I can only write about my own feelings and motivated behavior: I'm frivolous with my own use of merit rewards, to the point (and beyond) of inefficiencies. Even so, I still only burn Empyrean Merits on Incarnate powers... that is, when I remember to craft Incarnate powers. I am sure that I have occasionally bought Super Inspirations to help with an iTrial. If I had to rank how I burn Reward Merits, it's pretty much:

1. Converters (especially on new characters building up their own wallet)
2. Boosters (level 50s, obviously? Precise scaling of enhancement bonuses for specific PVP zones isn't my game)
3. ATO/Very Rare Recipes (I almost never use Winters) from the vendor
4. Unslotters (because I'm too lazy to pull them out of mail!)

The third one is incredibly rare, and it has literally been because I simply didn't feel like marketing for a single, specific piece NAO. I'd simply be lying if I said I hadn't done it.

 

I've been out of the League of Ebil Marketers for a long time... yet I still market my drops (crafted, converted), essentially so each character can "pay it forward" to future builds. This is basically second nature for me, so like others I am surprised to read about bad attitudes towards the Auction House. While I try to be open-mided... I remain surprised that there would be any significant overlap of players who (a) despise the marketplace (b) farm (multi-box?) Empyrean Merits (c) participate on the forums and (d) remain ignorant of alternate means to "get the good stuff".

 

Things I am and am not willing to do in the name of making inf:

 

• I don't farm.  Ever.
• I do run missions at high spawn sizes.  I usually can't be bothered to defeat all on outdoor maps, but sometimes I do if I'm enjoying the particular mission (this often depends on the enemy type.  Some enemies are lots of fun to fight, others are more of a slog).  I generally do defeat most, and usually defeat all on indoor missions.
• I usually check the value of my uncommon/rare recipe drops on AH vs. the value of the enhancement itself, and either sell or craft and sell as appropriate.  I always do this with purples, of course.
  • If I happen to get a drop which provides a lucrative conversion opportunity of which I am already aware, I'll take it, but I generally don't seek out those opportunities.
  • I should really probably look for a popmenu mod that shows me what the conversion options are, I know one exists I just haven't gone looking for it.
• I always put rare salvage on AH and I usually check if uncommon salvage is above vendor price.
• When I am buying enhancements, if one piece of a set is out of whack in price with the others, I will buy one of the other pieces and convert.  This has at times saved me millions of inf.  Example, last night I saved 2.5 million on one transaction just by buying a Steadfast Protection End/Res and converting it to the Res/3% def.
• I do have a tendency to pay "buy it NAO!" prices if they aren't completely ridiculous, but I refuse to reward people who are deliberately jacking up prices to absurd levels.
• Lately I have more and more started bidding on the enhancements I need, then logging off the character so that I won't pay the "buy it NAO!" price. 
  • This is because more of my characters (I've mentioned I have 37, right?) are getting up into the levels where I am buying them set IO's (two more of them hit level 22 last night, and I have two that are closing in on level 50) and thus I am having to be more careful with my inf expenditures.
• I buy converters with Reward Merits and sell them.
• I buy unslotters with Reward Merits when I need them.
• I buy boosters and catalysts on the AH because it's usually a better value than buying them with Merits.
• I don't convert Emps to Reward Merits, because I use my Emps for Incarnate abilities.  When I get all my Incarnate abilities unlocked on my 50's, I'll save the Emps for my alts to use when they hit 50 and unlock their Incarnate slots
• I funnel inf from my two 50's to all my alts, because my 50's are pretty good at making inf and my alts are not so much.

Essentially, I try to do the market activities which return value for the least time investment so I can get back to running missions, which is where the fun is for me.

Edited July 26, 2022 by Stormwalker

[Andreah]

2 hours ago, Hedgefund said:

You can open literally hundreds of packs in seconds with these macros:

 

salvage_open S_HVSuperPackSalvage$$salvage_open S_RVSuperPackSalvage

 

salvage_open S_WinterPackSalvage

 

You can put them all together or break out the first one into 2, I have them set up this for whatever reason.

 

Just click click click click click until they're all gone.  The animation for opening one will still play but the packs will continue to open.

 

Then you have to manage the drops and I can't help you there.

I use these macros. They won't open cards any faster than the rate limiter allows. 

 

In the past, I was able to open packs as fast as I could click the macro. That would occasionally cause it to stop opening them for a long while.

 

In recent months, I have not been able to open another pack until the fourth card in the current pack is turning over. I can click the macro, but nothing happens. It still may stop opening packs for a while, but this is less common than before. It also makes opening cards much slower and more tedious. 

Edited July 26, 2022 by Andreah
Adding more detail

[Hedgefund]

Ah, I have to confess I haven't done this in months, probably a couple of months before the WP sale to get rid of inventory before it was seasonally adjusted.

[Yomo Kimyata]

1 hour ago, Andreah said:

I use these macros. They won't open cards any faster than the rate limiter allows. 

 

In the past, I was able to open packs as fast as I could click the macro. That would occasionally cause it to stop opening them for a long while.

 

In recent months, I have not been able to open another pack until the fourth card in the current pack is turning over. I can click the macro, but nothing happens. It still may stop opening packs for a while, but this is less common than before. It also makes opening cards much slower and more tedious. 

 

I've never used the macros, just click and whatever, but yeah, try to open faster than one pack ~5 seconds and it hangs and takes even longer.  So opening 100 packs now takes, like, carry the 5, at least a minute and a half!  Ain't nobody got time for that.

[Andreah]

9 minutes ago, Yomo Kimyata said:

Ain't nobody got time for that.

What's interesting, is this adds time and tedium-friction to the production of pack contents. Fewer people being willing to put up with the tedium ought to put a little upward pressure on the prices of the things they drop, especially the ATOs.  

[Ironblade]

18 hours ago, huang3721 said:

I am not sure. As this thread has shown, anyone with astronomical inf can play the market. Other players with lesser inf simply has to bend to their will, ie. Waiting until the price stabilizes. It's not a PvP match if you can't fight back.

I think it would be more accurate to say that anyone with astronomical wealth can (or can attempt to) *MANIPULATE* the market.

ANYONE can play the market.  And, if you have patience and half a brain, it's a path to achieving astronomical wealth.

 

 

16 hours ago, Andreah said:

Up until recently, I would have agreed with you. But I've asked around and a surprising number of players seem to do this. Sometimes I wonder if we're so attuned to the market and our (market) logic we lose connection to non-attuned players approach things. 

 

I'm still aghast at how many people buy recipes with reward merits. I never even stopped to think they might be getting those merits by converting their spare emps.  And some of them don't dig hard into the incarnate system, and a few not at all.

I still sometimes use Reward Merits to buy enhancements because it's faster and easier.

 

Up until recently, I didn't even know we could convert Astrals and Empyreans into Reward Merits but I have over 36,000 of them.  What else am I going to do with them?  Every so often, I'll spend a thousand to buy 3,000 converters and turn those into about 2 billion inf but I'm certainly never going to use them all up.  Once you have enough inf, you don't need to be efficient with it.  I have nowhere near the half trillion that some people have, but I do have enough to not care.

[Hedgefund]

The Missourian in me made me want to see for myself how the macro worked now.  Well, I've been to Mizzou once in my life, so let me say the "empiricist in me" instead.

 

I set my stop watch for 15 seconds and clicked like Hector Salamanca .  From past experience I expected to see 10, 15, maybe even 20 fewer packs in my inventory but instead *drumroll* 4.  4 packs in 15 seconds.  Yikes.  This settles whether I'm opening my Winter Packs stash or not before selling (not opening).

[golstat2003]

On 7/25/2022 at 11:44 PM, Stormwalker said:

 

I'm starting to think that some players view "the market" as some kind of evil cult that if they get involved with it, it will corrupt their pure gaming experience.  Or else some kind of arcane mystery that takes hours of investment to understand, perhaps.

 

I mean, I totally understand reluctance to actually put work into the market - I don't put work into the market, because it takes time and I'd rather spend my time running missions.  But I am at least willing to take the bare minimum steps to ensure I don't get the worst possible return for my Merits.

 

The view of the market is similar to the view of PVP. Some avoid both at all costs for similar reasons. They don't see either as what the point of the game is: play a superhero and arrest bad guys.

[Stormwalker]

2 minutes ago, golstat2003 said:

 

The view of the market is similar to the view of PVP. Some avoid both at all costs for similar reasons. They don't see either as what the point of the game is: play a superhero and arrest bad guys.

 

I mean, I don't have any interest in PVP, for exactly the reason you mentioned, but that doesn't stop me from doing basic, minimal market activity (stuff that doesn't take up a bunch of time).

 

I think some people just assume that anything to do with the market will chew up a bunch of their time, which really isn't true.  There are a lot of things you can do that are really low-effort that will still improve your returns quite a lot.

[golstat2003]

4 minutes ago, Stormwalker said:

 

I mean, I don't have any interest in PVP, for exactly the reason you mentioned, but that doesn't stop me from doing basic, minimal market activity (stuff that doesn't take up a bunch of time).

 

I think some people just assume that anything to do with the market will chew up a bunch of their time, which really isn't true.  There are a lot of things you can do that are really low-effort that will still improve your returns quite a lot.

 

Oh I agree. I don't think it takes that much time. But some folks just DO NOT, AT ALL want to play marketing simulator just like some folks D NOT AT ALL ever want to step anywhere near PVP.

 

I don't get it, but I understand where they are coming from.

 

Keep in mind we have many folks who have said they use merits to ONLY buy recipes. 

I think that's the worst use for Reward Merits ever, but hey if they hate the market that much, let them do them.

 

(I will say many of the problems with the AH interface may also contribute. It's UI needed to be revamped and fixed 10+ years ago)..

[Stormwalker]

4 hours ago, golstat2003 said:

 

Oh I agree. I don't think it takes that much time. But some folks just DO NOT, AT ALL want to play marketing simulator just like some folks D NOT AT ALL ever want to step anywhere near PVP.

 

I don't get it, but I understand where they are coming from.

 

Keep in mind we have many folks who have said they use merits to ONLY buy recipes. 

I think that's the worst use for Reward Merits ever, but hey if they hate the market that much, let them do them.

 

(I will say many of the problems with the AH interface may also contribute. It's UI needed to be revamped and fixed 10+ years ago)..

 

And if someone wants to play that way - if someone is aware of their options, aware of the tradeoffs they are making in order to play that way, and still chooses to play that way - more power to them.  I am not here to tell anyone else how to have fun.

 

I just don't want people to be discouraged from using the AH because they think it is too much work, when the truth is that it is exactly however much work you want to put into it (and your returns are relative to how much work you choose to put into it).

 

I want people to be informed and make informed decisions.  Past that, I don't care how they have their fun, as long as their fun isn't harming other players or the game as a whole.

[MoonSheep]

On 7/25/2022 at 7:15 PM, Stormwalker said:

 

My take is this:

• They need quality feedback (and not whining or tantrums)  to help them get it right.

 

aw man, that’s me ruled out then

[Ukase]

4 hours ago, MoonSheep said:

 

aw man, that’s me ruled out then

In all honesty, and I place myself in this group, any adult that plays this game for more than an hour a day probably lacks the maturity to be dispassionate about reviewing and analyzing upcoming content that might negatively impact their future game play. 

I continually remind myself that I'm playing a game for free, which beats paying 15 bucks a month that I used to pay. And, really, these guys, in particular the GMs, are every bit as good as the ones that were around during live. Game play for me is better than live, but that's because I think I understand the game better now than I did then. 

There's always something to complain about, and I'm seriously not happy unless I have something to complain about. But they really don't give me a whole lot to complain about. 

[MoonSheep]

1 minute ago, Ukase said:

In all honesty, and I place myself in this group, any adult that plays this game for more than an hour a day probably lacks the maturity to be dispassionate about reviewing and analyzing upcoming content that might negatively impact their future game play. 

I continually remind myself that I'm playing a game for free, which beats paying 15 bucks a month that I used to pay. And, really, these guys, in particular the GMs, are every bit as good as the ones that were around during live. Game play for me is better than live, but that's because I think I understand the game better now than I did then. 

There's always something to complain about, and I'm seriously not happy unless I have something to complain about. But they really don't give me a whole lot to complain about. 

 

to give you some credit, i wouldn’t say it’s that enthusiastic players lack maturity, i’d view it from the perspective that changes to the game will have a larger impact on their daily routine if they are regular players

 

MMOs by nature are a second society, changes to that environment can be quite emotive

[tidge]

21 hours ago, Ukase said:

In all honesty, and I place myself in this group, any adult that plays this game for more than an hour a day probably lacks the maturity to be dispassionate about reviewing and analyzing upcoming content that might negatively impact their future game play.

 

I understand the sentiment, but as someone who has played for "more than an hour a day" (by almost any means of measurement) I'm reasonably dispassionate about almost proposed/hypothetical/upcoming changes. I certainly am capable of taking advantages of disproportionate circumstances, but most of the time I am pretty zen about... whatever.

 

If there is an axis I have any passion about, it is the ability to play the game solo. Yet for me, this doesn't mean I have to be able to solo all content, nor does it mean that I'd have to be able to practically insta-level any new character and be able to nigh-instantly accumulate game wealth (in any currency). For example: I'd be annoyed if 2XP from P2W went away, but it wouldn't ruin the game for me. I'm drawn to the marketplace forum because more than any other aspect of Homecoming, this is the part of the game that I feel allows me to be a very effective solo player. Well... this and "everybody gets the Fitness pool".

 

In Homecoming: I certainly enjoy PUGs and other socialization, but I also enjoy(ed) dive bars, blind pigs, and pickup sports. (self-eyeroll at the listed order!) The "being able to solo" is more of a recognition/acceptance of my own personal non-need to measure my own enjoyment (or worth, or disappointment) against others.

[Troyusrex]

On 8/4/2022 at 5:19 PM, Ukase said:

And, really, these guys, in particular the GMs, are every bit as good as the ones that were around during live. 

a big +1 in this, even before adjusting for the size of their team and resources they have. They do a solid job with little money or support. 

[Ukase]

On 8/4/2022 at 9:19 AM, Ukase said:

I continually remind myself that I'm playing a game for free, which beats paying 15 bucks a month that I used to pay. And, really, these guys, in particular the GMs, are every bit as good as the ones that were around during live. Game play for me is better than live, but that's because I think I understand the game better now than I did then. 

I'm gonna quote myself, because it bears repeating. 
I should know better than to host a team event in Goldside content, as several of those missions are "borked". I say "borked" because, apparently that's the highly technical term at least one GM uses in reference to the mission we had to get help with last night. 

Two Friday nights in a row, I used the Menu-Support to ask for assistance because we couldn't complete the mission, despite no glowies or NPCs left to clobber. Each time, a GM was there within 2 minutes, maybe even less than a minute. 

[Ironblade]

On 8/4/2022 at 10:19 AM, Ukase said:

In all honesty, and I place myself in this group, any adult that plays this game for more than an hour a day probably lacks the maturity to be dispassionate about reviewing and analyzing upcoming content that might negatively impact their future game play.

Pshaw!  Playing this game demonstrates less maturity than 'adult' games like golf or poker?  😛

[Ukase]

9 hours ago, Ironblade said:

Pshaw!  Playing this game demonstrates less maturity than 'adult' games like golf or poker?  😛

Ha! you might have a point there!