In this week's article, Drakkos gives us a look at just what happens to all the adena we make, in an effort to cut costs and start us on our road to a legitimate fortune.
About seal stones. I have played 2 dwarfs and have spent at least 80% (prolly more like 90%) of my time in catacombs. I could not possibly have spent on personal goods (greater cp pots/gsap/ghp) or sold more than 50% of my ancient adena.
I have used almost all of the AA I've accumulated on unsealing armour/weopons and buying tattoos, etc. etc. So it would seem the article does not account for having to buy AA later on, because you use a lot during A grade and above.
Also, the profit on farming in cats is at least twice any money you can make on stones.
And, the article does not address how odd it is that AA is at most only 3X's the price of adena when you consider only melees do any cignificant play in catacombs. and how odd it is that 75% of the people who play in cats probably never consume any of the AA they collect at all. If we could somehow limit, those who play in cats 24 hours a day, the price of AA would be more like 10x's adena. escpecially considering S grade users would have difficulty collecting enough AA for their own personal use.
These are all good points and I thank you for them. My intention with the first 4 posts (#4 on the way as we speak) was to do INTRODUCTORY information targeted toward a newer audience.
Although I agree with your comment about aa and its use in sealing/unsealing armors (mostly after A-grade), the newer player has to earn adena to equip themself to GET to lvl 61. As an earlier post in Money Matters mentioned--it takes a melee toon conservatively some 30 million adena (or more) to put great gear on their toon at lvl 40+ (c-grade).
The 'value of stones' piece was intended simply to show the newer player that some options come about from hunting in catas with regards to making money in the L2 economy. The usual (legit) lvl 30-60 player isn't going to easily generate the adena to be concerned with unsealing and resealing armor for sale. Likewise, I wouldn't advise anyone to use aa on the first level tatoos.
Regarding "profit in catas" I don't agree that you make more in either drops or adena than you will in selling aa/stones/consumables. As the article points out. In the time you get the equivalent of 30,000 aa in the catas (roughly 90,000 adena) you will have gotten maybe 25-40k in adena--this is certainly true up to the lvl 65 cata's.
And depending upon the party, you may have significant EXPENSE fighting over time in the cata as the mobs die harder.
Just taking adena/mat drops and typical solo expenses you will spend more than you make in all the lower catas. The variable that makes it profitable is in the seal stones that fall.
As for why aa is deflated--I never considered sharing my opinions on that issue in introductory informational pieces.
The next submission will be a "general treatment of Marketing concepts" in L2. It will be the fourth and final of the introductory articles. Also targeted for the newer player and considering CONCEPTS--supply/demand, pricing, strategic locations, etc.
I appreciate the feedback and may even mention your ideas in an edit of the Value of Stones (with your permission) so that "other" uses of aa are, indeed, mentioned at least.
Thank you again for the feedback and comments. I appreciate them very much.
I never said you get more from drops or adena. I said you get more from farming. In the catacomb, you get 2-7 crops per seed cast on mobs. since most mobs in catas are XX hp mobs. if you can get 2 bones/iron ore or varnish per mob. that is 2-5k extra per mob in addition to the dropped mats and adena (and spoils) and AA.
and there is no reason to spend AA on consumables. castle lords trade in the crops and sell the goods. eventually they will get lazy, or will need money quickly to take care of deals . and like i said, eventually, you are going to need AA. so if you sell it all, you are just going to have to buy some back.
For example, at some point in time you should be able to buy GSAP's for 15k to 20k. which is cheaper than the 23k in your equation. and when they crank out GSAP's, its like 2,000 at a time.
how to squeeze a cata mob. take crop, spoil, adena, drops, blank scroll, and AA. Take them ALL!!!! oh yeah, and kill them with a pole and some VR. (go to racetrack and offer 10k or some AA or some mats for VR, if you don't have your own. making an offer beats the hell out of begging any day. people appreciate any offer)
alt seeds do suck. i know full drops dont happen. i guess ive never paid any attention to reg drops. sometimes i dont seed all the mobs.
and yep. pull mobs in corner, spoil festival, seed, next target seed, repeat. then when they start dropping, harvest and sweep. as a dwarf, it takes a good minute to kill white mobs in a cata. plenty of time to spoil, farm, collect.
and don't tell anyone on my server, but im the kind of dwarf to wait for the monday when you can't buy any gsap's from the priest, buy every last one in every city, then resell them after a few k mark-up. WEEEEEEE
I'm quit sure, I've gotten at least billion adena worth of mats from farming. oh yeah. OE is the devil, btw
I guess my point is farming > exchanging AA for GSAP's
escpecially, when you can just contact a castle lord and say, "YO YO. I want to buy 2k/5k/10k or whatever GSAP's(or enchants or whatever) for 15/16k each" selling a never ending stream of hundreds of millions worth of adena worth of goods is a pain in the buttocks, and most castle lords will be willing to sell them to you, if they don't have people in the clan already doing it, and they don't hate your guts.
yeah. id hate to say it, but i think i made more adena per hour on warlord/destroyer academy toons in the 35 level range. go up to track. buff myself. go down to pilgrims. pull mobs out of 3 full and 2 half rooms. didnt even need a healer. just some heal pots for emergency. just pick up the moster piles. might not work now with new vr. prolly could only do 2 full and 2 half rooms. :P
thanks for screwing the dwarf again NCSoft. like i wasnt leveling slow enough, had to slow me down some more with the VR screwwgy.
Today we've had yet another update in our Money Matters series. This week, Drakkos talks about his experiences and observations in marketing - buying low and selling high - and gives us tips on how we can do the same.
Today we've had yet another update in our Money Matters series. This week, Drakkos talks about his experiences and observations in marketing - buying low and selling high - and gives us tips on how we can do the same.
Here's my tip....buying low and selling high only works if few people are doing it.
Once it's the 'thing' to do, all that happens is you get an inflationary bubble where prices spiral upwards until something crashes. It's just a question of when the piper comes for his dues.
Today we've had yet another update in our Money Matters series. This week, Drakkos talks about his experiences and observations in marketing - buying low and selling high - and gives us tips on how we can do the same.
We hate the ads as much as everyone else, but unfortunately they (being google ads) are a part of IGN. Until their policy changes, we can only fight the bad ads.
Today we've had yet another update in our Money Matters series. This week, Drakkos talks about his experiences and observations in marketing - buying low and selling high - and gives us tips on how we can do the same.
Here's my tip....buying low and selling high only works if few people are doing it.
Once it's the 'thing' to do, all that happens is you get an inflationary bubble where prices spiral upwards until something crashes. It's just a question of when the piper comes for his dues.
PainAmp--part of my intended message was supposed to be: "work to be unique--consider multiple factors--etc".
You are correct--if everyone is buying up "cheap cast-off D-jewels" cheaply then the price will rise and the last guy to buy doesn't get a bargain.
My suggestion is to be broad enough and flexible enough to have positions in multiple markets. With enough experience, it does become possible to either anticipate a market a bit or to influence it.
I've found that not many will put in the time to truly market. With the # of players on Lionna, I can just about the name the couple of dozen who routinely enter and exit market opportunities to their advantage. With the sheer # and types and grades of items and merchandise there is plenty of room, imo, for other players to give it a try.
My focus in this piece was to answer the argument: "does marketing work?"---which many experienced players automatically reply to with a 'no' answer. In fact marketing USUALLY works if your inputs are valid and you put in the effort and consideration.
Simple conversion markets (I buy your stuff low and resell it higher) aren't the only example of what players call 'marketing' in L2.
Standing on their own they 'can' work if one knows what they are doing and applies some honest effort.
I've made hundreds of millions in this game legitimately--by far the SMALLEST part of that income is from manoring, hunting, quests. Probably 90+% of what I have been able to earn has come from some form of marketing.
Straight 'conversions' are honestly more of an entry level activity in the market and will definately return more modest adena amounts over a longer period of time.
Thanks for the feedback.
~D~