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The query does not have to check for an item that is IN a list of like a zillion Post items, as the method would only check if the item is NOT IN a list of a handful of (allowed) Pre items?
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If you're going to do that, you might as well just build a single query for each item in the inventory of the player and check it when they zone into a town or outpost. Then you could take advantage of indexable data, although you'd then have to run one query for every item in inventory, which could be problematic.
Also, I think you underestimate just how expensive those nested logical comparisons can get as they increase in number.
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All it would take is a lot of CPU-time processing, right?
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I don't know how their database, operating system, and hardware work, but given ANET's focus on small, fast transactions to reduce costs, I'd be more concerned about disk latency and memory issues than CPU cycles. CPU and memory gains are cheap and linear, but disk limitations, save for storage capacity, hit a lower boundary at which moving to something faster becomes substantially more expensive. SATA and IDE drives can only work so fast, and
the next fastest alternative is much more expensive.
You COULD do it, but it's not WORTHWHILE to do so. As others have pointed out, pre-searing is a training area, and the presence of post items is not actually that significant.
