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Precursor drops


AoTsuki.8675

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@"MokahTGS.7850" said:To be honest, I think the game would benefit from a loot find mercy rule based on time played. Just some internal counter that your account accrues over time that buffs your chances of getting better drops. Better drops then "spend" these accruals and as time goes on you build up more. Random is all well and good, but going thousands of hours in a game without a better drop than an exotic worth 1-2 gold is kinda sad.Define "better drops". Does this mean precursors only? Ascended items? Named exotics? Items worth a certain amount on the trading post at a specific time?

Does Rage count as a "better drop" (the harpoon gun precursor currently worth about 32 gold)? Does Sam reset the counter (a regular exotic that is part of a collection, currently worth above 300 gold)? What about the person above that said they'd much rather have an ascended chest than a precursor? How does "better drops" work for them?

I don't think a "mercy rule" is as easy as you make it out to be. This game's reward and economy system heavily relies on the fact that people will get a lot of little bits of loot that add up, rather than the all-or-nothing reward systems we're used to from other games. Personally I very much appreciate this, as it means I'll be pretty much guaranteed to progress towards whatever goals I have, no matter what I do and how good/bad my luck at looting is. As such, getting a lot of drops that can be salvaged into materials and traded for other materials I need to reach my goals is a lot preferable to me to dropping a 30 gold exotic every once in a blue moon. A guaranteed exotic/precursor drop would either lead to the loot pool for those guarantees dropping in value quickly (after all, there are a ton of players playing, all of which would get those guaranteed drops either naturally or through the mercy rule) or the amount of gameplay needed to reach the guarantee threshold would be so large that it would be negligible for most people except for those dedicated to farming a lot (and those already have a good chance at dropping "something of value" the regular way).

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Not sure how many where drops, I know I got nothing for 3 plus years. Since then I know I got the dagger and the spear 2x from mob drops, maybe the focus. Then about 8 from mystic forge just throwing rares and exotics when they pile up in my inventory.Made the sword pre after I made Bolt since I lack patience so bought it the first time. Then sold the second Bolt.Made the predator and sold it, made kraitkin and kept it. May make kudzu but not sure, it was my latest from forge.

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I've had two - one from each end of the value spectrum.

Got Zap, which at the time was worth over 1,000 gold. I'd just joined a pug for HotW p1 and while waiting for the opener to get to the dungeon, I hopped into the water to kill a couple of things below the entrance - was half way through killing the veteran fish when the join button appeared. This was when you could just join dungeons from the prompt in combat. Very nearly did and would have missed the drop.

Years later I got Carcharias (~30 gold :( ) from a PoF bounty.

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I only had one drop and that was from the Jotun in Bitterfrost which has higher rates for them if i'm not mistaken.

Only others i've had were crafted or bought.. mostly bought.Their drop rates are just far too low for my tastes, specially since i've bad luck with RNG most of the time.

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I play for 4 years. Usually I clear all the mobs in an instance (fractal or dungeon) if the team is not asking for skip. I have the "Slayer" achievement for all the mobs (excepting the giants). For me the map exploration is not very fast because I kill (usually) everything in my way instead of avoiding the mobs.I dropped 1 Precursor till now. The Chaos Gun - in WvW. I don't know if from a mob/enemy or from a chest I opened. It remained in the inventory after salvaging all the gear I had.

Still, dropping precursors was never one of my concerns. So, even with 1 in 4 years I cannot say I'm unhappy.

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6 years and 4,8k hours in, nothing. Every time I think about it it makes me a little sad.

@"Blocki.4931" said:Back when PoF launched I bought it for my girlfriend and played through the story with her. We were in the Desolation, doing the heart at the Shadow's camp and I went to vendor some stuff when she asked me "Why is this item worth 450 gold?" and my jaw dropped.

Had something similar with Pokemon, hunting for shiny eevee and broke a 500+ chain by accident. I stoped because I was salty. My girlfriend wanted to try and didn't even listen to how you do this, she just rushed in the grass and the very first encounter was a shiny eevee with decent nature and stats. She also got a permanent hair stylist contract from a BLC, so one could see a pattern there.

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Across perhaps 4 years, I have only gotten 3 precursors: Dusk from a random Sparkfly mob when I was doing the hard wood logging route, and another Dusk that I can't remember where I got it from (the former was made recently into Twilight, the other vendored); and Leaf of Kudzu from the dragon box after a Shatterer victory. All with roughly 130%-140% account magic find and with no actual farming intent. So of course I went kitten when they arrived...

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Not a single precursor after 10k hours. Well, then came Istan.I got 2 precursor in 3 weeks there and later another two.The first one I got from one of the chests in Palawadan. That one you could loot multiple time the first weeks.The second and third one I got from Pieces of Common Unidentified Gear (the blue ones). I actually opened them in SW.The fourth one I got from a Palawan Phylactery.

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@AoTsuki.8675 said:Since my friend who is relatively new to the game dropped a precursor, I would like to ask you guys, did you ever get one dropped?I play since launch and never had one drop, had to buy them all off tp or craft.I won't say that I am not salty because I am.

First precursor drop I did get 2 years ago (have played gw2 for 4 years total), it was Zap (Sword) from Mad kings Labyrinth. 2nd precursor drop I did get this year cus i wanted to use up some mystic stones since i had over 1 stack so i did put some rare weapons in the mystic forge and it was Chaos Gun (Pistol). 3rd Precursor i did get this week from Generosity's Reward (Star of Gratitude) it was The Hunter (rifle).

Edit (note) have played +9k hours over the past 1700 days / 4 years 7 months.Edit2 (22/04-2020)- got my 4th precursor (leaf of kudzu) 2 days ago from gambling exotics in mystic forge (13,5k ingame hours(2198days))

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@AoTsuki.8675 said:Since my friend who is relatively new to the game dropped a precursor, I would like to ask you guys, did you ever get one dropped?I play since launch and never had one drop, had to buy them all off tp or craft.I won't say that I am not salty because I am.

Most people have not had one drop. I played since they launched and not salty could care less so I guess I am savor and sweet...

get over it. if you played since launch you could have farmed the gold to guaranteed one now and bought it.

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I've been playing since head start. Only precursor I've gotten was 3 months ago from Mystic Toilet by forging 4 random longbows I'd acquired by normal game play. I've played just over 5k hours across many different areas of the game. I have no idea how much of that time actually had a chance getting a precursor.

@Illconceived Was Na.9781 said:

If you want to ensure that you get a precursor before you stop playing, there are two nearly guaranteed methods:

  • Forge L74+ rares or exotics.
  • Open unidentified gear bags (rares if you can afford, blues if you can't) (and with as much magic find as you can manage).

According to the wiki, if you forge exotics they need to have an average level of 75 or higher for a chance of getting a precursor. Neither of those methods ensures a precursor. It could take an astronomical amount of time or gold, or you might never get one. The only real guaranteed way is to buy on TP or craft one.

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@Bollocks.4078 said:

@"Illconceived Was Na.9781" said:

If you want to ensure that you get a precursor before you stop playing, there are two nearly guaranteed methods:
  • Forge L74+ rares or exotics.
  • Open unidentified gear bags (rares if you can afford, blues if you can't) (and with as much magic find as you can manage).

According to the wiki, if you forge exotics they need to have an average level of 75 or higher for a chance of getting a precursor. Neither of those methods ensures a precursor.

The wiki's text is out of date. It used to be thought (with reason) that the average level has to be 75. But I've found that 74 works too; I've never gotten a sub L80
rare
from forging and the exotic rate for exotic 80s is the same as using L75 gear.

It could take an astronomical amount of time or gold, or you might never get one.

That's an incorrect restatement of the statistical data that we have. There's an astronomical chance that you might never get one; the people who forge precursors "for a living" have enormous amounts of evidence that it happens eventually.

It's fair to say that you might spend more than you save if you don't forge very many; it's not correct to say

The only real guaranteed way is to buy on TP or craft one.

The law of large numbers says otherwise. It's not guaranteed that you get an average number of precursors, but if you forge enough, a finite amount far below "astronomical," you will get them.


Putting some numbers on this and assuming the rates haven't changed from 1:143 exotic tries... forging 1000 times means a 99.9% chance you'll get at least one precursor. With 1500 forges, it's 99.99% chance. At 2000 forges, the chances are astronomical that you won't get any precursors.

For rares (again assuming the 'true' rate is 1:860 as the original data shows), it takes 6000 forges to have a 99.9% chance to get at least 1. At 8000, it's 99.99%. And by 12000 forges, the chances are astronomical that you won't get any.

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