What makes a weapon valuable to you?

Just kind of throwing this out there to see what exactly makes one version of weapon so much more valuable than another. For example, a chaos axe with 20/20 sundering and +30 health at 15/50 at req 9 will usually sell for a pretty hefty price. But why those mods? What makes a Fiery Chaos Axe of Warding with the same base stats significantly lesser. I always thought that sundering was kind of useless mod at times, so why the higher value.

I recently price checked a gold req 9 Fiery Gothic Axe with +5 energy and was told I could sell it pretty high with the right mods. Problem is, I have no idea what mods will make it really valuable in the sellers community so I haven't done anything with it yet. So I ask you, what makes a weapons worth, in your opinion.

There is a whole thread on this in the price check forum, but in short, your weapon upgrades are almost ALWAYS worth more separate, and not attached to your weapon.

As a result, buying expensive weapon upgrades and putting them on your weapon thinking it will make it incrementally more valuable is almost always a losing situation. You never get the value of your upgrades out of the ending purchase price.

So, in summary, don't go out and buy upgrades and apply them to your weapon. Sell it as is - you will net much more cash by doing that than by trying to make a LEET weapon.

Sundering ______ of Fortitude seems to be the most wanted combination for warrior weapons, personally I prefer Furious/Vampiric ______ of Defense.

Lets see...

Fiery is only available in one type of mod, being fiery. Fiery has no percentages. Every fiery mod is perfect.

Sundering mod is available in 20/20, 20/19, 20/18, 20/17, etc. This gradiation adds to the number of available items, making the highest number (20/20) seem the most rare and therefore the most expensive.

Within mods, Sundering is generally considered a "no cost" mod. It doesnt have any real negative characteristics and is useful for general purposes.

15^50 is usually considered one of the best damage modifiers because its condition is very easy to fulfill (stay healthy, which is something you wanna be doing ANYWAY).

the +30 health, again same idea with the sundering. Since theres +27, +28 and +29, the +30 looks rarer and more useful. Although the health is good vs degen, i generally dont consider this mod too useful except to sell to someone else.

Mods that are rare adn that are perfect are the ones people want. Many a time, the weapons that have these 'perfect' mods, people do not use.

About your statement comparing sundering/fortitiude to fiery/warding...well...sundering, i cant believe im saying this is better than fiery, but it is cherished more because it is rare and 'perfect'. Seeing as how all fiery mods are perfect, they are not as rare. About the fortitude and warding....+7 armor vs ele attacks...woopdeedoo. Fortitude gives you 30 extra health, equivalent to a minor vigor rune. This is normally better vs spikes, bcs many are adr now, and is superior to anything in gvg considering how long the matches are and the dealth penalty element.

Yeah, I was looking for a certain weapon with a certain skin but everyone who was selling one always added a useless 20/20 and a not so useless +30 and expected me to pay more.

When buying a weapon, I look for skin only.
I pay full price for skin.
If stats are below perfect then I'll pay 99.99% less (I don't care about crystallines, they're uglor)
If it has 20/20 on it, don't expect me to even look at the rest.

With that said, only sell skins with good stats. If it has mods, throw them in for free... don't expect someone to pay more for something he will replace with a much better vamp or zealous or with the recent warrior nerf.. an elemental prefix.

The acutal mods on the weapon are usually irrelavent. The inherent weapon statistics are what really sell it. Things like 15>50 matter so much more than the mods because mods can always be bought and replaced.

Ok, so I already know which mods seem to fetch a good price.... that's not what I'm asking.

Jetdoc, thank you for your explanation of leaving it unmodded... that's helpful.

Lyra, thanks for your input too. Personally I don't understand the +30 health mod. Yes, initially it's helpful, but I mean if you get some gnarly degen on you from a necro or mesmer, that +30 is gonna be gone in a flash.

Personally, I would think that for warriors, the Warding mod would be most beneficial especially since the adjustment to absorption. For casters I would think that a mod of Enchanting 20% would be most useful, especially on a +5 energy weapon. Am I wrong in my assumptions.

Still curious too, to see from other in the community what is a valuable weapon, to you and why?

That makes perfect sense to me... I look every now and again in the High End sellers forum and am just amazed at the prices being asked for already modded items that I would have to unmod to get what I want. I would rather pay the high price for the just the skin and buy my own mods seperately for cheaper.

So then, let me ask you this. Why are +5 energy weapons so expensive when it forfeits the 15/50 base stat? What is the value in a +5? That may sound totally noobish, but I really want to know.

ONE WORD:
skin.

A 15>50 blue weapon from collector is 0 gold if you have the monster drops.

+5 mods are for casters who want a mod but don't want to sacrifice the offhand.

My criteria for value:

1) weapon model + skin (if it looks like trash, it's worthless)
2) rare gold text
3) 15>50 (easiest conditional mod to work with)
4) requirement 7 or 8
5) +5 energy always (for swords + axes)
6) for caster gear, +10% faster casting and skill recharge for all skills
7) for one-hand caster weapons, +5 energy > 50% life

What makes a weapon valuable to me? One word: Perfection.

Personally, I don't collect anything that's not req 8, especially post-Factions/update. Caster/Offhand items need to be double-modded and weapons need to have 15>50.

I consider req 7's an oddity, so I don't collect them either.

Mods. The perfect mod combination. I don't care how it looks like. Players like me wonder how Anet is going to keep our interest for future chapters without offerering 'more of the same'. So I can only hope not too many people answer 'skin' lol, because if new future content mainly exists in new skins... Than why not go play neopets??

Well you raise a really interesting issue. If what does it for you is the mods, which are really the only thing that affect the actual play of the game, then the skins don't really matter as much.

I would guess that most of us are not that way though, and are more interested in the skin, with some standard base reqs and the ability to mod as we see fit.

However, those additional mods have been the same since Prophecies was released, minus the sundering upgrade. What additional mods would you like to see available and how would it influence game play?

Personally, my evaluations of items are pretty founded in practicality.

Skin: long as it's non-crafter or non-collector, good 'nuff
Mod: 15>50, +5 energy, 15/-5 energy are the only ones not merchant-fodder. Beyond that, I'll shell out a little more if it's vamp/zeal/ele, since I would prolly be putting one of those on there anyway. Only suffixes worth anything are fort and defense, and if it's a character intended for PvP, fort all the way. Enough armor-ignoring dmg and degen out there to make the health more valuable. Enchanting has limited useage too, but that's often a really low priority.
Req: don't matter. If it's a melee weapon, you're a fool to have lower than 14 in your wep stat, IMO, and that's only if you're running a minor instead of a superior. Same for bows, unless you're trapping. Outside of that, a req 8 performs the same as a req 13 in combat, since I never have lower than 14 in the wep that I'm using.
Caster items: generally don't buy 'em. Why? Because most any staff/rod/offhand that's worth anything (20/20, 15/-1 +30, etc) is available from a collector or crafter, and the other stuff is gonna be ridiculously expensive since it's so hard to find items that have req and mods in the same att line

These guidelines have saved me a lot of money.

Also, the +5 energy wep is useful for warriors as a swap when energy's tight. For instance, to get in a shock at a critical moment, or crushing blow, or empathic removal, or <insert energy skill here>. Though, a Nolani Fire Wand is often used for this purpose, too, though I'd imagine less so since its nerf.

Skins is what most peoples buy now a day. Also it has to be low requirement. I have several items on me that has nice damage value but with high requirement. Also damage mod like 15%^50, 15%-10(ar), 15%-5(energy) is what most people perfer. 15% stance or enchanted are for those who want to try certain build but rarely do these type of mods sold for alot.

I don't look for weapons based on appearance. Functionality is what I'm after. Most of my weapons are collector's weapons because they have the stats I want. I don't care about what's in, what's cool, rare skins, or ultra low req.
Function over form for the most part. That's also why I went throught the entire Prophecies campaign with no 15k armor. lol

As for caster weapons, since everyone is so different, it's hard to figure out what makes a good weapon. Personally, I don't go for weapons with the longer enchant time for most of my characters. When I'm running fire on my ele, I don't need that, but when I'm running earth, I do want it. Same with air and water. Enchants on my necro? I don't think so. Those are just for example.

Ultimately, I'd far rather get a clean weapon with good, built in mods, and add others myself.

Yep...

I'm aware of the delicate balance and I don't want to destroy it. Yet I think Anet could be more creative on mods. To start with reversing existing mods. Take for example vampiric: -1 life regeneration and +(1-5) life steal... Reverse it and you get +1 life regeneration and -(1-5) life per hit. I'm sure there are still lots of new combnations possible. But I guess its easier to make new skins than to make new mods and keep the balance ok...