We have got to address Spirit Shards and Tomes of Knowledge

[Veprovina.4876]

9 hours ago, Sir Alymer.3406 said:

but if you do any sort of legendary crafting for profit, you're  going to run out of shards quite fast.

Well, did anyone think this is perhaps by design? So that you don't flood the market? 😛

I mean, it would be quite hard to flood the market with legendaries, and they'll still hold value no matter how many there are, but maybe Anet doesn't want you constantly pumping out legendaries, or t6 mats even. 

Personally, i'm always bottlenecked by crystalline dust when converting... I still have full mat storage of t5 materials, spirit shards galore, but no crystalline dust. And that's from like, 150 gold of trophy shipments. 

[Khisanth.2948]

5 hours ago, Veprovina.4876 said:

Well, did anyone think this is perhaps by design? So that you don't flood the market? 😛

I mean, it would be quite hard to flood the market with legendaries, and they'll still hold value no matter how many there are, but maybe Anet doesn't want you constantly pumping out legendaries, or t6 mats even. 

Personally, i'm always bottlenecked by crystalline dust when converting... I still have full mat storage of t5 materials, spirit shards galore, but no crystalline dust. And that's from like, 150 gold of trophy shipments. 

Yeah that argument is going off in a completely irrelevant direction.

"There needs to be more ways to get spirit shards so I can sell more legendaries" is not relevant to this thread.

 

BTW there is a recipe to convert t5 dust to t6 but it is probably not worth doing. You can just buy the dust. Sites like https://gw2efficiency.com/currencies/spirit-shards assumes you are buying the dust in its profit/shard calculation anyway.

[Veprovina.4876]

1 hour ago, Khisanth.2948 said:

Yeah that argument is going off in a completely irrelevant direction.

"There needs to be more ways to get spirit shards so I can sell more legendaries" is not relevant to this thread.

 

BTW there is a recipe to convert t5 dust to t6 but it is probably not worth doing. You can just buy the dust. Sites like https://gw2efficiency.com/currencies/spirit-shards assumes you are buying the dust in its profit/shard calculation anyway.

Maybe, maybe not. Why would it not be relevant if people constantly mention this as why they need spirit shards?

 

And yeah, i should start looking at gw2efficiency and other sites to see what's worth converting. I just never do it so much that i always forget to look it up.

[Epsilon Indi.2031]

7 hours ago, Veprovina.4876 said:

Well, did anyone think this is perhaps by design? So that you don't flood the market? 😛

I mean, it would be quite hard to flood the market with legendaries, and they'll still hold value no matter how many there are, but maybe Anet doesn't want you constantly pumping out legendaries, or t6 mats even. 

Personally, i'm always bottlenecked by crystalline dust when converting... I still have full mat storage of t5 materials, spirit shards galore, but no crystalline dust. And that's from like, 150 gold of trophy shipments. 

A majority of legendary crafting are account bound items you earn by doing content via map completion, buying an account bound crafting material with a currency that isn't spirit shards, or completing a collection.

Spirit shards become annoying to farm when you run out of them and don't have mastery lines completed for content that dumps xp at you.  Honestly, if a player can't put more mastery points into a track, XP gained should just default to growing the xp pool for the next spirit shard instead of being wasted.

Edited April 10, 2022 by Sir Alymer.3406

[Linken.6345]

4 minutes ago, Sir Alymer.3406 said:

Snip
Spirit shards become annoying to farm when you run out of them and don't have mastery lines completed for content that dumps xp at you.  Honestly, if a player can't put more mastery points into a track, XP gained should just default to growing the xp pool for the next spirit shard instead of being wasted.

That is already how it works now you just dont see the hidden bar filling up because the mastery bar is already filled waiting to be trained.

https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Mastery

If all masteries have been trained but not acquired, any experience earned will be sent to a hidden experience bar that will give spirit shards once all masteries in that region have been acquired.[1][2]

[Khisanth.2948]

35 minutes ago, Veprovina.4876 said:

Maybe, maybe not. Why would it not be relevant if people constantly mention this as why they need spirit shards?

 

And yeah, i should start looking at gw2efficiency and other sites to see what's worth converting. I just never do it so much that i always forget to look it up.

If that is relevant then we can just skip all the middle steps and go to "the game needs to give me more gold!"

[god fragment.5716]

Ive been having spirit shards problems ever since I started making legenadies to sell as well. However I dont see it as a problem. It's not like it's gated in any way or hard to get. Spirit shards are desighned to be a byproduct of playing the game and a way of never waisting xp. What I find most amusing about them is that they feel like an optical trick: if you focus on them, they feel like they are standing still, but if you don't pay them any attention, their numbers increase very fast 🙂

So if you focus on farming something else for a while which will make you a lot of gold and spirit shards. The best farming location that gives a lot of spirit is dragonfall its about 30g and 14 spirit shards per hour without boosters. Dragons stand has a better ss yeald but it not on all the time, same goes for Halloween labirint farm. You can also buy ss for fractal relics.

 

Spoiler warning I guess (If you can call any story development in the core personal story spoilable at this point):

 

 

 

 

 

 

There's also a design oversite of sorts in the lvl70 story instance "The battle for fort trinity" where before you retreat into the fort 9 veteran giants apear that endlesly spawn magots that give about 650 xp per kill. A friend and I used to level characters from 70 to 80 fast and it could be used to farm spirit shards but nothing else. I never really saw a point in exploiting it since I could make gold while farming spirit shards anywhere else. I did try out the jade bot scavenger protocols on the maggots and it works so now it might be viable for farming now. I never bothered exploring it, so I don't know if it's worth it.

 

[Veprovina.4876]

3 hours ago, Sir Alymer.3406 said:

A majority of legendary crafting are account bound items you earn by doing content via map completion, buying an account bound crafting material with a currency that isn't spirit shards, or completing a collection.

Spirit shards become annoying to farm when you run out of them and don't have mastery lines completed for content that dumps xp at you.  Honestly, if a player can't put more mastery points into a track, XP gained should just default to growing the xp pool for the next spirit shard instead of being wasted.

Well, @Linken.6345 beat me to it... 😛

Nothing is wasted, you still get spirit shards. 

 

 

  

1 minute ago, civokenes.3284 said:

There's also a design oversite of sorts in the lvl70 story instance "The battle for fort trinity" where before you retreat into the fort 9 veteran giants apear that endlesly spawn magots that give about 650 xp per kill. A friend and I used to level characters from 70 to 80 fast and it could be used to farm spirit shards but nothing else. I never really saw a point in exploiting it since I could make gold while farming spirit shards anywhere else. I did try out the jade bot scavenger protocols on the maggots and it works so now it might be viable for farming now. I never bothered exploring it, so I don't know if it's worth it.

 

And now Anet's going to patch this out... 😛 

Edited April 10, 2022 by Veprovina.4876

[Epsilon Indi.2031]

11 hours ago, Linken.6345 said:

That is already how it works now you just dont see the hidden bar filling up because the mastery bar is already filled waiting to be trained.

https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Mastery

If all masteries have been trained but not acquired, any experience earned will be sent to a hidden experience bar that will give spirit shards once all masteries in that region have been acquired.[1][2]

The way that reads is that it's delayed.  As I've played around with this on my alt, I've never gotten any spirit shards on that character and I've done a good dungeon romp (8 paths).  The spirit shards I've gotten on my alt are a lot lower than the spirit shards I get on my main, even considering the xp boost I have on my main from my AP.

[god fragment.5716]

2 hours ago, Sir Alymer.3406 said:

The way that reads is that it's delayed.  As I've played around with this on my alt, I've never gotten any spirit shards on that character and I've done a good dungeon romp (8 paths).  The spirit shards I've gotten on my alt are a lot lower than the spirit shards I get on my main, even considering the xp boost I have on my main from my AP.

It's not delayed. The wording on the wiki is a bit off. The patch notes quoted in the article don't mention any delays.

Did you check the amount of ss before you did the dungeons and after? You should hane gotten a few (2-5 would be my guess) but might have overlooked them if you only knew the approximate number of them. If I hadd aproximatly 45 shard I personally wouldn't notice getting a few shards because I actually have 44 and that changing to 47 wouldn't change my approximation.

AP xp boosts are account wide and all characters get the same xp.

[ProtoGunner.4953]

I made 10+ legendaries over the years and still have around 4'000 shards. So no, I have no problems with that. Oh and tomes stack up and I can't use them, since I have never levelled any character since 2015 (revenant).

[Rasimir.6239]

7 hours ago, Sir Alymer.3406 said:

The way that reads is that it's delayed.  As I've played around with this on my alt, I've never gotten any spirit shards on that character and I've done a good dungeon romp (8 paths).  The spirit shards I've gotten on my alt are a lot lower than the spirit shards I get on my main, even considering the xp boost I have on my main from my AP.

Your alt is level 80, right? When did you test that? I'm asking because I did pay attention to my spirit shard count during EoD, and anytime I was blocked from gaining more xp (as in all open masteries with full xp and not enough mastery points to unlock them) I actually did get spirit shards occasionally while gaining xp (e.g. from fishing or unlocking pois, waypoints and similar).

[Legend of Rogue.5394]

On 4/3/2022 at 7:16 AM, Teratus.2859 said:

Wait this is a post arguing for more?..

I thought it would be quite the opposite lol

I'm a fairly casual player and I have thousands of shards and stacks of tomes that I can't get rid of, even when I regularly use them on keyfarm characters.

These resources are insanely excessive to me.. and yet to others they are crazy hard to get.
Seems like the simple options here would be allow us to trade/sell them.

Maybe I am just playing wrong but I am constantly crafting legendaries, constantly stat swapping ascended armor, weapons etc because the meta seems to swap a lot or guilds require different things. 4k shards might seem like a lot but its really not

[Firebeard.1746]

I don't know if it's maxed masteries in most areas but even not doing dailies religiously i tend to have a lot of ss. That's probably why you're getting so many "confused" reactions. For most players SS is not the barrier for legendaries. Usually a strong meta with plenty of sub events will give at least 1. If not way more. 

Edited April 11, 2022 by Firebeard.1746

[Epsilon Indi.2031]

3 hours ago, Rasimir.6239 said:

Your alt is level 80, right? When did you test that? I'm asking because I did pay attention to my spirit shard count during EoD, and anytime I was blocked from gaining more xp (as in all open masteries with full xp and not enough mastery points to unlock them) I actually did get spirit shards occasionally while gaining xp (e.g. from fishing or unlocking pois, waypoints and similar).

This was ages ago (Before IBS launched) My alt is level 80.  I did AC 1-3, CM 1&3, SE 1&3, and CoF 1.  I noticed no discernible gain in spirit shards beyond what'd normally drop from mobs/loot containers.  I can try this again and see if something changes

[Khisanth.2948]

32 minutes ago, Sir Alymer.3406 said:

This was ages ago (Before IBS launched) My alt is level 80.  I did AC 1-3, CM 1&3, SE 1&3, and CoF 1.  I noticed no discernible gain in spirit shards beyond what'd normally drop from mobs/loot containers.  I can try this again and see if something changes

Icebrood Saga started September 17, 2019

The change was on January 14, 2020. Anything from before this date is no longer relevant.

[Khisanth.2948]

2 hours ago, Legend of Rogue.5394 said:

Maybe I am just playing wrong but I am constantly crafting legendaries, constantly stat swapping ascended armor, weapons etc because the meta seems to swap a lot or guilds require different things. 4k shards might seem like a lot but its really not

I don't think ANet has ever explicitly specified what weapon/armor stat changing was meant for but to me that looks more like it was meant to be more of a consolation prize when you get a drop and it is not the stat you wanted.  Approximately every 10 swaps and you are basically throwing away a piece of ascended gear in value. It is for the occasional adjustment not something to do constantly because you are indecisive. It used to be recommended way back around HoT's launch as a way to bypass the need for the HoT materials because their drop rates were horrible. Those drop rates were adjusted a long time ago. Unfortunately there are still people making blanket recommendations to craft then stat swap.

As for meta, for DPS it is been practically glued to the same stat for years. Support stats have changed a bit but those aren't frequent either. Does anyone actually believe ANet makes balance changes so often that the meta is constantly shifting? In the best of cases we get it maybe once a quarter or bi-annually.

If you are doing the endgame content that would even warrant chasing after the meta then you should have no issue equipping your characters with multiple sets. Fractals, strikes and raids all provide ways to get stat selectable ascended gear. If you can't then where are all the currencies from those going?

[Teratus.2859]

On 4/11/2022 at 7:07 PM, Legend of Rogue.5394 said:

Maybe I am just playing wrong but I am constantly crafting legendaries, constantly stat swapping ascended armor, weapons etc because the meta seems to swap a lot or guilds require different things. 4k shards might seem like a lot but its really not

That's an understandable reason then.
And I don't believe in "playing wrong" in Gw2 🙂 Gw2 has always been a game that gives you immense freedom in this regard.

I actively don't play meta builds because I dislike the high focus on DPS and the negative culture it sometimes creates in the game.

Personally I prefer to make different characters to run different builds and playstyles on each one, partly because theme is just as important to me as performance, it greatly impacts how fun I find the game.
So I don't regularly swap my gear and stuff around like that which makes it very easy to save up on things like spirit shards and transmutation charges etc.
Specially now that we have the template systems which allow for every character to have essentially two full build loadouts at once.

If you regularly swap your gear around like that then you should definitely prioritize a full legendary geared character or two, it'll save you so much in the long run.

Edited April 13, 2022 by Teratus.2859

[Argothian.3715]

Not to necro a near-dead thread, but there is a weird trend in GW2 where anyone brings up a valid criticism (spirit shards aren't reliably farmable because anet wants you to buy gold for your legendaries) and you get droves of people with the "kitten you, I got mine" mentality who basically just use it as an excuse to brag about their material stockpiles. We get it: this issue doesn't affect you. Then why feel the need to throw in your two-cents? There is a real problem when a 10-year-old game with an ever-shrinking population (like it or not, all active MMOs nowadays have a dwindling playerbase) has a crucial currency tied to several important features (stat swapping, crafting, etc) that is only obtainable through passive gameplay. As someone in a similar boat, grinding experience for spirit shards feels like an absolutely miserable way to play the game.

If they're going to go so long without adding meaningful content to the point where the only meaningful content is crafting legendaries, I think it's worth a re-examination.

[Imba.9451]

I honestly had a big abundance of Shards. Until I started crafting legendaries. Now I struggle with gaining them.

[mythical.6315]

27 minutes ago, Argothian.3715 said:

Not to necro a near-dead thread, but there is a weird trend in GW2 where anyone brings up a valid criticism (spirit shards aren't reliably farmable because anet wants you to buy gold for your legendaries)

That's not a valid criticism but instead a baseless assumption.

28 minutes ago, Argothian.3715 said:

you get droves of people with the "f*ck you, I got mine" mentality who basically just use it as an excuse to brag about their material stockpiles. We get it: this issue doesn't affect you. Then why feel the need to throw in your two-cents

What about all of the people who linked other sources which the OP conveniently left out?

29 minutes ago, Argothian.3715 said:

that is only obtainable through passive gameplay

False

 

[Ashantara.8731]

28 minutes ago, Argothian.3715 said:

Not to necro a near-dead thread, but there is a weird trend in GW2 where anyone brings up a valid criticism (spirit shards aren't reliably farmable because anet wants you to buy gold for your legendaries) and you get droves of people with the "f*ck you, I got mine" mentality who basically just use it as an excuse to brag about their material stockpiles. We get it: this issue doesn't affect you. Then why feel the need to throw in your two-cents? There is a real problem when a 10-year-old game with an ever-shrinking population (like it or not, all active MMOs nowadays have a dwindling playerbase) has a crucial currency tied to several important features (stat swapping, crafting, etc) that is only obtainable through passive gameplay. As someone in a similar boat, grinding experience for spirit shards feels like an absolutely miserable way to play the game.

If they're going to go so long without adding meaningful content to the point where the only meaningful content is crafting legendaries, I think it's worth a re-examination.

Well said.

I remember a time when I was struggling, too. I took a 3-year break shortly after GW2's release (because I didn't like how the game didn't feel like GW1 at all). When I returned, I got pressure from all sides to get ascended gear ASAP, and at the time my best bet was on crafting it myself. I was constantly short on Spirit Shards, it was a real pain.

[DarcShriek.5829]

Shards can be used to create T6 items to sell for profit.  It's easy to use all your shards if you're not careful.

[Aelin.9317]

Playing about 6 months now . I decided ascended gear was boring and went straight for crafting legendary things, the only ascended gear I have is from drops and envoy collection. Shards were a worry once or twice but my normal play gave me enough for most things, including a few stat changes on dropped ascended gear. I have 85 shards atm so not exactly a lot but the next thing I want to make is another envoy armour so it's enough. 

I have made an aurene sword, dagger and hammer. 2x heavy envoy pieces and 3x light wvw pieces. I fish, do metas, and the griffon races with friends a lot and it's quite a big chunk of exp from those. By the time I get the gold together for crafting whatever it is I usually have the shards for it too. And I have made these legendary in I think the past maybe.. 3 months? My first was one wvw armour piece a bit earlier maybe. I would like to make a staff after I finish the envoy armour, the wvw tickets take so long to get I don't even think about that armour till I have them. 

All my guildies tell me I am going for legendaries very fast so other newer players probably will have more stockpiled than I did when I decided to start going for them. I think shard acquisition is fine. Even WvW now with getting so many levels I got a silly amount of shards the past few days from that alone. 

Balance patches that cause meta change is every few months at best? So if you do not craft legendary at all and need to stat swap I would hope you have enough stashed from your usual play ^^ But at the same time, if the shards did drop like candy letting you stat swap constantly it rather makes legendary gear a bit pointless to have gone to the effort of making.  

[The Boz.2038]

Shards not being immediately farmable is not a "problem" that needs "solving".