Salvaging exotics for dark matter

I've read that level 68+ exotic armour and weapons should be salvaged with black lion salvage kits to get the best possible outcome of dark matter. I've read that using a mystic or master kit yeilds ~ 0.5 dark matter per salvage while using the BL kit yields about ~1.0. I wonder if this is still true. What I've read is 4 years old or older and my own testing does not bear this out.

I've been buying exotic armour on the TP and salvaging it. So far, I've salvaged 12 lvl 78-80 exotics and only 2 of them produced any dark matter, though one produced two and the other, three. So that's 5 DM from 12 exotics, all with BL kits. That's not even 0.5 per. A friend has salvaged 5 exotics the same way and received no DM at all.

Are all exotic armour and weapons equal in their chances to drop DM? Are BL kits really better than Mystic or Master kits? Is there a better way to get DM?

Thanks for the help! (again)

Your sample size is too small. There's two ways to get Dark Matter, salvage Exotics 68+, or get them (randomly and very rarely) from certain containers.The 'rarer' materials disclaimer on the salvage kits not only relates to Ectos/Dark Matter, but also the basic crafting material you'll get from salvaging (i.e for a high level item you more often get Mithril/Elderwood/Silk, but will sometimes get Orichalcum/Ancient Wood/Hardened Leather.)

As above, you're attempting to make a statistical analysis, and rebuttal against other people's research, with a sample size of 17, which is laughably tiny.

Black Lion Kits do have a higher chance of getting you Dark Matter, and the next best is Mystic Salvage Kits, the latter being cheaper per-salvage to Master Salvage kits. Good candidates for salvaging are usually armour that have a chance of yielding insignia when salvaged; these include stats such as Soldier (Power, Toughness, Vitality), Dire (Toughness, Vitality, Condition Damage), and Magi (Vitality, Precision, Healing Power). That way, you at least have a chance of recouping some of your costs by selling the insignias.

I use the BL salvage tool and average about 1 dark matter per item salvaged. This can vary, but over time that's what it comes to. I have also noticed that I can get dark matter from exotics as low as lvl 70 or so, but I'd stick with the 78-80 just in case.I will say that lately (like the past month or so) my success rate seems to have dropped a fair bit, where I'm getting maybe 8 for every 10 items salvaged, but I assume that's just chance.

The odds are somewhat low of getting just two dark matter from 17 exotics, if the drop rate is truly 50%, about 0.12%.

Given how many of us salvage exotics, we'd expect someone to suffer such low odds, since it would be seen by 1:1000 people.

The thing is... anyone getting e.g. 5/17 isn't likely to come to the forums to mention it, nor are the people getting 12/17. That's why @Ojimaru.8970 are others are correct: that's too small a sample to counter any previous research.

Keep collecting data until you have 100 samples at least and let us know how many dark matter you get.

@Ojimaru.8970 said:As above, you're attempting to make a statistical analysis, and rebuttal against other people's research, with a sample size of 17, which is laughably tiny.

Black Lion Kits do have a higher chance of getting you Dark Matter, and the next best is Mystic Salvage Kits, the latter being cheaper per-salvage to Master Salvage kits. Good candidates for salvaging are usually armour that have a chance of yielding insignia when salvaged; these include stats such as Soldier (Power, Toughness, Vitality), Dire (Toughness, Vitality, Condition Damage), and Magi (Vitality, Precision, Healing Power). That way, you at least have a chance of recouping some of your costs by selling the insignias.

If you are using a BLSK the best choice would be using them on things with expensive upgrades like superior sigil of force since that is guaranteed

Thanks for the replies! I wasn't really trying to rebuke as much as get confirmation since the analysis i read was over 4 years old. I was wondering if perhaps Anet had nerfed the drop rate. Just wondering, that's all. I have salvaged a few more and the drop rate has improved, 23 DM out of 32 total items.

Like with ectos there might be a difference depending on the slot as well. So gloves might have a lower chance than pants.

@"Gorkus.7496" said:Thanks for the replies! I wasn't really trying to rebuke as much as get confirmation since the analysis i read was over 4 years old.ANet only very, very rarely changes rates (and have announced it when they do).

the drop rate has improved, 23 DM out of 32 total items.For what it's worth, that's also rare, about a 1% chance of occurring.