Merch value of gold and purple weapons

So last night I was bored and looking around my Xunlai when I noticed that not a single one of my gold or purple rarity weapons had an ODD merch value. The only exceptions to this that I could find were items with an "improved sale value" inherent or a "show me the money" inscription. As far as I can tell, those things give a flat increase of 50-75g which would explain that. (If all golds/purples have an even value, then a 50-75 range gives a 50/50 chance of an odd value) White and blue rarity weapons appear to drop with even/odd values about 50/50 as well. Anyways, I was talking to Luny about this and it was posited that maybe when the game generates an item, it starts with a base value (white and blue rarity) and then multiplies it by x2 or x4 depending on if its purple or gold rarity. I'm wondering if anyone more knowledgable about these things knows if this is correct or not?

I hope that I've at least made myself clearer on this thread than the last one I posted. Also, if any super duper mods out there feel that this belongs more in the Q/A section, thats cool. I just thought I'd have a better chance of getting an answer here

When he asked me about this, I couldn't find any odd-number merch values on any of the gold and purple gear I checked except for those with improved sale value mods.

I'd actually never noticed the trend one way or another before Fred asked me.

And I'd say it makes more sense in Trader's Outpost, or at least with a moved-link left here. Those of us who look at a lot of item tags are more likely to frequent this section than Q/A, no?


Cheers for the interesting observation and the spectacular Yawg-bait post about it, too!

while I cant really answer it...I do have an example of the exact same shield in purple and gold (got the drops in the same place a few moments apart).....I cant explain any of it (not even going to try----)...

Wow cosy! I think you're fallenangel's long lost twin or something. He had the same thing happen with gold and purple r11 Tactics Kappa Shields with single-mod ar vs. demons happen just the other day. There's a pic (which I just shamelessly stole from his thread - I apologize for nothing! HA!) Both the gold and purple have even numbered merch values there, too.

Since Fred asked me about this, I have been trying to watch merch values more closely. I've not seen a single purple or gold with an odd numbered merch value, except for some with "Improved Sale Value" mod. Of the whites and blues, it seems more like 50/50 ratio of odd to even values, after identifying. I keep forgetting to check merch value of golds before I id them, sorry.

After reading this thread I kept an eye out on merch values of gold and purples (yet another thing to do while playing the game) and indeed I havent come across anything yet. If so I will certainly update the thread and post a picture of it

Fascinating. I can't believe I've opened ten thousands of chests, idded so many purps and golds and never noticed this. Definitely going to keep an eye out for this. Just checked all the golds I have, and without exception all their merch values can be divided by 4. So you guys are definitely on to something with your x2 and x4 multipliers theory.

Glad to see that Luny and I arent the only ones who think this is interesting As to the x2/x4 theory, that is all Luny. I just happened to notice the gold values because I pay attention to weird stuff like that.

umm - I think this is highly interesting as well!

been observing similar facts:

first I was wondering, because all purple or gold items values were even. Then I took a closer look and found that all gold item´s values could also be devided by 4 (been checking on this for few years yet). Also it seems that on gold items gold value is usually between 200g and 400g. saw items with value of 600g and higher tho... and most of them not "improved sale value" on them - oldschool ones. Then I found some exceptions: q8 gold items tend to have way lower gold value - the ones I had were 140-160g (inscr. ones) furthermore pre-nerf items frequently have very low gold value, if low req - thus I´ve seen q7 and q8 shields (prenerf) with gold value 120-160g (got one myself), another oddity is my icy dragon sword (148g) - dunno if this is a general oddity, which would be reasonable tho, because it drops more like a greenie - more info might be useful here tho. well that´s most I have so far...

ah no: all this only applies to max items (I mean the borders), the fact that gold item´s value can be devided by 4 applies here same, and so does purple=>even gold value. on blue items odd and even seems to be 50/50

another point might be identifying: checking item´s value at merch vefore and after identifying might give some new ideas about how the gold value is generated as well... didn´t do that myself so far tho
Hope I could help

possibly it might be worth setting up something like the low req thread in order to find borders of item´s value?! - I´d be interested in such

I remembered to check before IDing the unids I bought a few minutes ago!

click for fullsize - I promise it's not a rickroll unless a mod played a dirty trick with ninja edits!

So, there's two things ...

1) 13/9 Wooden Buckler. Unidentified, merchant offers 19 gold. Identified, merchant offers 120 gold.

2) 8/4 Idol. Unidentified, merchant offers 12 gold. Identified, merchant offers 92 gold.


At least now we know they're not all even before ID'ing, right?


PS - I see Yawg reading this thread! The bait worked! +1 internet point for Fred!


EDIT - fallen gave me eight golds (which he got in the past day or two) to ID just now. I took the following before and after id'ing shots.
click for fullsize
So those were all max golds and had even pre-ID merch values. I don't see an obvious relation between pre-ID and post-ID merch values, but I'm not good at spotting such things. Maybe someone else can.

Items' gold values have always been key for much of my research or just observations since the earliest days and was very valuable in finding out how other more complicated things work in the game.

I see you're mostly correct in this thread but as I've been bored today I wrote this:

• Yawg's guide to items' gold value •

Basically a gold value of a randomly generated drop is just another base stat of an item, just like the item's damage, armor or requirements.

• Base generation

Just like other base stats it's generated in the same way - with similar algorithms and based on one parameter - the item's level, but there's one difference - it's generated twice, for items in unidentified and identified state.

When an item that has randomly generated properties drops, it's always in the unidentified state (even if it's white). It always has a randomly generated gold value - there's a fixed minimum value that an item of a given level can have and it gets increased by a random amount based on a function with a distribution curve like this:

(based on actual data for id'ed items, but the curve is the same or very close for unids as well.)
It's clearly not linear - smaller increases occur more often than bigger - the average and the median gold value is on the lower end of the possible range.

When an item gets identified, it may seem that it gets a completely new value, independent of the one it had before identification.
But actually there's some dependence - it's always an increase, by a random amount generated again with the same function as before, just with bigger variance and it has to be at least +1g. There's however NO relation between those 2 increases - both are independent rolls.
And then finally the value gets multiplied by 2 if the item is Purple rarity or by 4 if the item is Gold rarity. There are no exceptions to this.

• Interesting facts, unusual observations, anomalies

Golds from Reward Chests (Zaishen / HoH / UW / FoW / Urgoz / Deep / Dungeon end chests) have a fixed 50g value while unidentified. After identification they receive increases exactly like other "max" level golds, but because their initial value was lower, you will get many more 204g ones but their top-end values will be lower than you'd get from other sources. And values over 400g will be really hard to find among them - see yourself how many skins that drop only from Reward Chests you can find with 400g or higher value.

Randomly generated drops from Nightfall Treasures especially ones later in the game do often have much much higher gold value than drops anywhere else in GW. This includes their value while still unidentified - you won't find 70g++ unids anywhere else!

An interesting fact is that the generation of other base stats (except requirements) also uses a distribution curve similar to one used by gold value generation algorithm, just they don't have fixed minimums.

• Material Value

An interesting thing to note is that the item's gold value has more meaning than just selling to merchant - it also determines the material value of the item!
Salvaging is a random function but it's strongly based on the item's material value - the average amount and quality of materials (chance for rares) the item will salvage to is directly proportional to the gold value.

Exception: that material value of rare (gold) items doesn't get multiplied by 4 - it seems to be x2 like purples or slightly more like x2.5, need more data.

• Non-random items

Gold value of most items that are not randomly generated is mainly based on the value of materials the item contains (can be salvaged to) if they're salvageable or if they were. Those items have a fixed material value and a constant gold value reflects that.

There may be some exceptions.

• Increased gold value mods.

Everything said before this point assumed the item has no gold value increasing mod on it. These mods should be considered separately as that's how they work in the game engine - their value just gets added to the item's base gold value at the end.

Both, the improved gold value inherent mod and "Show me the Money" inscription work exactly like other weapon mods - it's a mod that should read:
"Value +X gold"
where the X variable follows exactly the same rules as variable values for other mods, like for example the Health +X (while Enchanted) shield mod.

So as opposed to the base gold value, the distribution of the mod's values is linear. The value range for the mod is +50g...+75g and it's divided into 3 ranges depending on the rarity of the item it was found on -
-on commons (white/blue) it has 0...50% of the main range, for purples it's 50%...80% and for golds it's 80%-100%.

Despite the linear distribution function the rarity of the edge values can be higher than values in the middle due to the cuts. It's especially visible with the perfect +75g one - it's at least twice as rare as a +74g one.

___________________________
version 0.1

This guide is by no means complete - there's still a lot of research that could be done, but I don't have time for that anymore (it's all based on info gathered years ago anyway).

have I missed something important?
is anything hard to understand and should be clarified?

Wow this could lead to an average value of gold weapons. So one only has to go through their wisdom title (if under 10k) to find out how much we've made off them from mr merchant. Figuring we merch at 95% or so. Say it's 200g... 10k wisdom... Around 1.9k plat off of junk golds besides mods etc and broken items.

Could it also raise or lower the price of unidentified stuff?

Another one of those threads that makes me smile, but also signals that gw2 is overdue.

so yawgmoth taught us the basic formula for identified golds is:
(value before identification + randomly added gold value)*4

applied to luny's wooden buckler:
(19gold+ 11gold)*4 = 120
Now I've been testing on my golds since yesterday and so far the second added gold value before multiplication is always smaller than the original. So far ranging from 5-20.

It also seems to me that unlike the unid value, the randomly added gold value is rather independant of the items parameters (means of acquirement, req,stats,mats). For example if you take luny's jade sword from the second picture, the added value seems to be 5. Alot lower than the (I assume) non max wooden buckler.

If this is true that would mean that the unid gold value is the only one that isn't random. Adding Yawgmoths theory that the value is related to the materials, you should be able to make conclusions about the materials without having to identify the item. (If no other parameters such as finding location and stats have to be taken into account).

Also what red fireball said is something I have noticed myself too. Low req max weapons generally have a lower gold value than high req gold weapons. This makes me wonder if the unid gold value has anything to do with the damage range of weapons at all, maybe its only about the requirement.

Interesting post Yawg! If I'm reading it correctly then, Luny's theory that I posted in the OP was only missing one step in the process?

I posted: (Unid value)*4=Gold rarity items
It actually is: (Unid value + ID value)*4=gold rarity items

Am I correct in this statement?

Also, thats very interesting that there is a correlation between the merch value and the materials that can be salvaged from an item. I've never noticed that before, as I tend to not ever salvage my items for materials.

As for the Nightfall treasures; it seems to me that there might be another factor at work with them. As you said they can be 70g+ BEFORE being ID'ed. However I have seen some of them reach values of 600g+ at the merch after being ID'ed. IF the formula follows with the one that is stated above, and we assume that the Unid value is 75g then we get this...
(75+ID value)*4=600
that doesnt seem wholly unreasonable to use as an example with some random numbers I just made up. But if we do go with that, then the ID value there would need to be 75g. That seems like its much higher than any other items you might find elsewhere, as even with a 0g merch value +75g would ensure a 300g final value. I just wonder if these items have a slightly different formula for their gold value, or if there is something in the game that essentially forces them to the high end of the spectrum and therefore gets rid of most of the random chance? Sorry if this paragraph didnt make sense.

Lastly onto the value of golds of lower req items. I too have noticed that even gold rarity items with LOW requirements tend to have very low gold values. For example, I collect a lot of these lower requirement weapons, and a majority of them are worth 100g or less AFTER being ID'ed. This is in contrast to the few items that I have that are r9+ and are usually worth more along the lines of ~300g. My theory on this (mind you I have no proof or screenshots or anything, just a guess) is that this is influenced by the location of the drop. A LOT of the lower req items I have were dropped on the factions starter island. I would guess that if you found the same item later in the game, the gold value would probably have been higher. You can try for yourself if you farm...Minister Cho's Estate for example. Even if you get an r13 weapon, they tend to never be worth more than the low 200's after being ID'ed. 200-400 appears to be the standard range for normal req golds and therefore being in the low 200's would be the very low end of that range.

I had another thought on this subject but I forgot what it was as I wrote that other stuff. If I remember it I'll probably post it

Well once Yawgmoth has spoken in such a research topic, just few remains to be said - tym for taking the time and informing us! saved us a lot of guessing.
well just few things I´d want to add... the item´s level might be some good hint here as well... at least I think I might explain, why lowreq stuff has (by far) lower gold value.
Well the item´s level depends on the level of the foe, who dropped it. item´s level affects all the base stats of the item. thus there is one or more item´s level (I dunno which foes it drops from, but should be somewhere lvl 16-20) which on the one hand has max damage possible and on the other hand a req lower than 9. now if u get a drop which has this certain item´s level the chance for these two base stats just to hit the desired borders is very low - therefore, there are just few low reqs around. well then the item´s value is generated in dependance from item´s level as posted by yawgmoth. But the item´s level of low req item´s has to be lower than the one of frequently happening max DMG items, as pointed out in the beginning and such the gold value tends to be lower than on frequently droping q9/max DMG or similar - I wrote as such this was a fact - it´s just my own guess tho, still it sounds very reasonable to me^^ still I can´t explain that icy dragon sword of mine tho...

/agree

even tho it is still nice, I enjoy "scientific" research done on matter that can hold my attention.

similar topic I like is the "Polar bear drop rate talk" on GWWiki
Yes, I am one of many who spent entire Wintersdays farming these things,and never got one. Just to hear someone had one drop after a meager 30 runs (sorry I am going offtopic, ill stop here)

odd-value gold/purp items:

http://www.guildwarsguru.com/forum/m...tml?t=10499212

685g Shield of the Lion.

Have linked that thread here also.

Was there an age when all items had even gold values?
Many amongst my old axes/swords/etc with nerfed 2005 mods have an even gold value...
means, 200g... i have to many 200g that it could be randomly...

Tangential topic, apologies for ~derailment, but I think it's best asked here ...

Has anyone ever seen an inherent gold text item with improved sale value or highly salvageable?

I see plenty of golds that drop with those inscriptions, but I can't remember ever seeing those mods show up inherent on gold-text items.

i suppose its possible that on golds that drop with no inscription or no inherent mod that they have either highly salvageable or the show me the money factored in without any way of showing it

for example on a sword with inherent 15^50 it doesn't say anything other than the 15^50 mod and thats how we know its there, whereas either one of those inscriptions would have no way of showing since it is just based on "magical components"

of course i could be completely wrong but its just my possible explanation for "no mod" drops

Yep i'm pretty sure i've had a HS from a gold prophecies item within the last 2/3 weeks, can't remember on IS but i'd can't see why not, although i have no memory of eveer having a purp inherent with IS.

I've seen (and had) many Highly Salvagable inherent goldies, but I can't recall any Improved sale value inherents on golds, not even prophecies purples (except for certain canthan staves... i think).

I've identified more than 30,000 golds and have never seen a Prophecies/Factions gold item with Highly Salvageable or Improved Sale Value.

It's always a blue item if it has those inherents.

inherent golds - never seen highly salvageable or improved sale value, neither on purple inherent... identified quite a lot as well and checked quite a lot forum entries for os golds - never have come accross any so far...

well back closer on topic - I´ve been doing some research as well... well found "proved" what yawg posted (well not necessary to mention...)

I´ve done some chestruns in Maatu Keep and been observing following: gold value of unid there is 50-57g (just found one 57g... more might be possible - will have to check loot drops soon...) Furthermore the added gold value (before multiplication) never exceeded the item´s unid value, items with very low unid values also had smaller increases there. This might be a hint for item´s unid value getting multiplied by 1+random, whereas randow would be between 0 and 1 and then the new gold value would be raritymultiplier*max((1+random)*unidvalue, unidvalue+1), which also explains, why white lower items have increasement of +1 more frequently than max ones (which I observed checking white drops). Been doing research for treasure items from nf as well... item value seems to be generated according to the area´s "difficulty" (- I guess u know what I mean: earlier in nf mainstory means lower gold value). had unid values ranging between 32g (istan) to 78g (desolation). (this made me have a gold few off max 140g valued staff ).

All this is just theory, have done 162 chestruns (since I went across this thread) in Maatu and got exactly 1/3 purples and 2/3 golds - most of the unids had unidvalue 51, 54 was rarest except from the 57 one, 46 nf treasures opened and 50 whites recorded. Will be going on on research, due to the fact that I need treasurehunter either way and it kinda makes me happy doing research like this

A month or so ago, I was trying to be careful to take before and after id screenshots to offer some raw data here for anyone who cared to see what patterns they could discern. I took them, filed them away, and forgot to post them.

Better late than never?

(Click each for fullsize version)

(The second two pictures were fallen's drops, not mine. I took those screenshots while he had passed them to me to ID.)