Chests & keys: rant or praise

The base items depends on the area yes - so the more expensive keys gives better chance to get a max dmg item. I also belive they give higher rank on the bonuses but the chance to get gold or purple seems pretty constant.

key should not be available at merchants. only mobs should drop them

I'm kinda mixed about it. I like the fact that I can get Purple/Gold items of all quality levels from these chests, but I don't like that there don't seem to be any other chests anymore. So now, I *must* have a key to open a chest. Granted, if I'm going into a Mission area, I will buy a key if I have to, but it's kinda pointless otherwise. Well, not entirely pointless: You can use the only so-so items in the chests to help build up a new guy in your guild. They like that kind of stuff.

i like to farm. not because its actually fun. but i get gold form it. and it makes me happy in the long run. i don't have to sell out my useless items (useless to most but valuable to me) every time i want something. having finished a single character (unlocked 2 proffession lines) and being 1/3 of the way done with my other 2 i use a lot of money. its boring to farm. yea. but it makes me happy in the long run cause i don't have to sell my cool stuff every time i need something.

i have a raven staff for each of my characters. it looks cool. it sucks. but it looks cool. i don't care what other people thing about it. I don't use it while fighting but if i need to hit somthing on a cliff or behind some kind of barrier. i'll use it. even i'f i'm doing 2-3 dmg

and now to the point. its the same thing with chests. i get a gold drop. i know theres a 90% chance i'll get some whitty mod on it. and its worth more unid'd but do i save it and sell it to other players? no. because if it WAS something nice. i would just have thrown it away. and i wouldn't be able to look at myself in the mirror. so even if i know its bad for my gold and i won't get anything of value (most of the time atleast) i am having twice the fun spending money than i normally would

edit: and i like making other people happy. i found a dragon sword once(back when they were still rare). perfect dmg. +15% while above 50% hp. i didn't wanna use it myself because i'd have to switch out my beloved axe with my hard-earned mods and i'd need a bunch of sword skills.

so i went on my lvl 5 and went to ascalon. found a party. and this one guy. everyone was yelling at him because he didn't know EXACTLY what to do. so i gave him the sword. he was happy. everyone else was mad at me. but i made the guy they picked on happy. makes me even happier. that guy still has me on his friends list. i made a friend that way.

ninja-Edit2: and i still believe he has the sword

There's at least one normal chest in kryta that I know of.

I think the keys are a terrific idea.

It's a natural money-sink for people with a lot of money. It worked on me for about a day until I realized that my gambling wasn't paying off. Since I was getting mostly the lousiest purple items in the game, my natural paranoia convinced me that the chest yield distribution was a curve weighted by some indicator of wealth to give the poorer players a better chance of getting something good....

Then again I should take my medication (just kidding). I'll use keys on occasion if I feel lucky but I don't bank on them. It's nice to have that option.

I suppose I really shouldn't be appalled that I get the gold/rare items .... only rarely....

I like the keys.

I found a Steel Key today, where abouts are they used?

I like keys, they're really good and have helped me get good items and unlock a lot of stuff and the purple and gold I get I sell for 1-2k each which is more than the keys. The only keys I buy are shiverpeak, miners, and darkstone, I think it's a waste to get the ascalon keys and stuff though. I never used them but I am thinking they are.

I'm enjoying the Key system, though I have to keep myself from overdoing it.

The key is that if you're doing nothing BUT farming Key chests, you're likely to go broke. That's how I started out (buying up Shiverpeak Keys, running to easily-accessible chests, warping back and trying again), and it burned a lot of gold. I did find a Superior Absorption rune eventually that gave me a nice bankroll, but I had 4 gold left when it dropped.

Now, when I'm farming Grenth's/Sorrows, I buy one or two Shiverpeak and Miner's Keys and bring them along. They're not the primary focus of my trips, but they're nice to have around; they're guaranteed loot, and it's a crapshoot whether they'll provide something useless, something marginally useful, or a goldmine. I generally earn enough along the way from monster drops to pay for the keys even if they all give generic purple Chakrams, and if I get something nifty I come out ahead on the experience.

I hate getting gold items that require a three different class types in order to get full benefit! What where they thinking?! For example I got a gold Wand:

11-22 max damage (requires 9 fire)
Smiting skills +1 (chance 20%)
health +20
Blood magic skills recharge faster

Ok, that requires an Ele, Monk, and Necro class!

Northern Shiverpeaks (Anvil Rock, Deldrimor Bowl, Iron Horse Mine, etc..)

of the 800 shiverpeak & miners keys I purchased I've had about 4 drops that were worth it. I've used 270 of them.

Well, the designers know you can't have 3 classes, so the intent is apparently that this wand does different things depending upon your class combination. (I'm not defending it, just explaining it.)

I really think that the chest system is a good idea, not from personal experience, but with a view of the game overall.

* They're a gold sink. Nobody is pretending that they're not. However, in the long run, a player is more likely to get a "Rare gold godly somethingsomething with sick mods" for just the price of a handful of keys, instead of paying the ridiculous prices of many LA player merchants. There's no guarantee, but I like those odds.

* They are a stumbling block for botters. OK, so bot farmers will just hunt for keys, but with keys dropping very rarely, (About as frequently as rare items before the SF update), the other option is to buy keys from merchants, and of course, in the long run, that is not a viable venture.

* The aforementioned LA merchants now have to take a good long look at the sort of prices that they are charging. The chest system means that their customers are leaving (Mind you, only stupidly rich players, richly stupid players, players who cashed in on the economy reset, and Ebay gold buyers would consider buying any weapon over 50k unless it was a gold crystalline with perfect mods, 15%>50 etc.). Most of the weapons selling at LA before the update were substandard and bland, but were intantly marketed on a 50k baseline price just because it was gold and had max damage. - There is no pretence Anet did not intend for this to happen ingame, and while there are still merchants out there charging 100k+ectos for sub-par "godly" items, the majority are selling good rares for more sensible prices.

* This in turn has also meant that people are less prone to turning to Ebay for gold (Unless they're gambling junkies and intend to spend everything on keys). You don't NEED copious amounts of cash and hours of farming in the hope of raising the dosh for your desired item. You don't need to try to find "hotspots" in the game in the hope that you might get a lucky drop.

* The quality of drops from personal experience seems pretty decent. I was lucky enough to get a sup vigor. (I stupidly IDd it, but no big loss. I got the unlock and a few plat too ) - A fellow guildie also got very lucky with a sup absorption, and was cautious enough not to ID it. An offer of 85k from the NPC merchant was all he needed to know.

* And another point. With the increased ease of unlocking skills, mods etc, (coupled with increased faction), it now becomes easier for those who enjoy both PvE and PvP to UAS without so much farming involved.

* The only people who think that the chest system sucks seem to be the LA traders, the people who were stupid enough to buy items for absurd amounts of gold, and those who view the ultimate goal on GW as needing to have the most money, the most u83r items, FoW armour and storage spaces full of ectos.

The best items I've found have been from the southern shiverpeak chests in a rather short timespan.

I found a golden max damage sword with +14% damage while health over 50% and 30 life, and a golden max damage axe with +15% damage while health over 50%.

I sold the sword cheaply to my guildmate and kept the axe. I'd never ever have found these items on my own before the update, much less trade for them.

I do think the chests spit out near-perfect items too often. I quite like it though :P.

I would like to see chests give out Gold as well.

Items that are now up for auction are not even getting bids that cover the cost of the key. Before update it would have raised 40k will now if lucky get you 1k.

I have stopped purchasing Keys because I seem to be spending more than im earning. If the chests were to give out Sums of cash with the max being say 50k It would be worth the gamble than getting a gold Rare worth 300g

You're missing the point. The keys are a gamble. In general they are gold sinks for people with a lot of money, who have nothing better to spend it on or those desperate for one great weapon for themselves or a jackpot...ie.) Superior absorption worth over the 50k you mentioned...even if you sell it to the merchant, so basically they have already done what you asked!

They also keep farming down because now gold items are not as rare. Even if you don't buy any keys you benefit, because now you can buy a gold item from someone for much less than what they used to go for.

Here is the deal,
Ever look at the merchant on a green(boss drop) item? They sell for like 25gp. These items are not meant to be sold back to the merchants guys. They are meant to be sold to other players. Ergo, new problem; the market on guild wars is crap. No one wants to or needs to buy these gold items b/c you can get one almost just as good from any collector and add upgrades on it or someone already has one. What im tryin to say is there are too many nice weapons out there rendering the ones we do get next to impossible to sell. It is my belief we need to have the market fixed so these items we do get green,gold,purle are actually worth something. The only way i see that happening is making the rare drops more rare and collector weaps not as good or the rare drops better. Less item circulation= more value for the items.

As far as the keys go im a greneth and sf addict, ive had about 4-5 keys drop for me this week. 2 superior runes, 1 rare shield of wing rcv dmg -2(sold for 6.5k) It can work. The harder the place you use your key in i believe the better chance for a better drop.

on a side note: we could all use a little more space.... storage space that is :}

Hopefully this will teach players how to be better merchants! ^^ I am often asked by people "how do you do it?" when it comes to making lots of gold from the GW item market. The trick is in keeping an eye on prices, knowing what you can and cannot sell, and being good about convincing your potential buyer that they NEED the item you're peddling.

Having lots of "garbage" gold items to get rid of is good for people, I think.

Meh, I'm just BS-ing.

In truth, gold items being more plentiful just means that supply goes up while demand remains the same, so you have to pay less for the item you're looking for. What, is it harder to make money nowadays? Not really, feel free to "play the green item market" ^^ or concoct some other get-rich-quick scheme that exploits the GW economy. There's always plenty waiting to be tapped. All that's really changed is rather than having to pay 350k for a perfect hammer you can buy it for maybe 30k from someone who opened the 90th gold-item-they-don't-want in a chest. So get your item, and go play PVP or the story mode.

If you don't get good luck from keys, then don't bother with them, but I have picked up a gold req 9 Flamberge from one (which covered my key buying for a while ^^). Just know that other people are still using them, throwing more gold items into the economy, and dropping prices even further (for the time being) so that YOU can afford the item YOU want! It's all good, people.

Try in tascas demise outside of granite citadel. I get tons of golds andchest is right outside of place. Sup vigor 15%, always axes, 20% enchant upgrades +29 fortitude bow grip and much more!

Yeh, GW is now a casino game... Great.... And of course it is only really useful for those with loads of cash, as opposed to those saving up for a Guild hall (me)

Good thread so far. No one getting way of topic and harsh flame/rants really.

As for I, I've gotten three supeior runes. Axe, a mesmer one and a healing one. And I must say if I sold them I would get the money back or more from buying a few keys here and there. Also I've unlocked stuff so I wouldn't have to bother PvPing in the random arena which isn't really fun to me personally (I'm on hours when my whole guild isn't and we don't have a lot to do PvP anyway we like going through SF a lot and I must say we do get some nice finds.

Sure, the whites, blues, and purples that are more or less not "worth" much to players is sometimes a bummer. But seriously don't expect to get something awesome beyond all belief when it's a completely random drop.

The old chests...I didn't like them..
First off drops are not 'distributed' some have said. It's a random roll on who gets the item that drops from a mob (NPC enimies) and the chests drops whites and blues more often than the new chests.

Gold sink of course. For those who have the money to do so. If you don't then get what you need and want. Gambling isn't the only way to make money.

i dont think the chest/key is that unfair( if thats the correct word to use) becuz 95% in my opinion the mods are piece of shit. the best gold drop ive gotten from a chest was a 12%^50% flameberge lol.. and ive gotten like 30 rares now

Take a look at this thread to find out how to get more then just 25g:

http://www.guildwarsguru.com/forum/s...410#post515410

tis true! but only for higher lvl armors. i got stalker armor of major vigor once... merchant offered me 12g. ummm no?

tis a great way of making money. you make more money on the same object and don't spend money on the salvage.

also i have found that keys are not meant to make you richer. their purpose appears to be to keep your money at exactly the same level. go into SF with 2 shiverpeak keys and 2 miners keys. you will usually just make that money back. sometimes you may find a ub3r 1337 sword of pwning but not all that often in my experience

don't buy keys and your money will grow.

You should also sell stuff not to the merchants, but to the traders (Rune, material, dye, etc). That major vigor could go for a lot more then 12g if you salvage and sell it to them. You're best beat would still be selling it to a player though.

I'd just like to see a few more things actually worth using come out of the chests I shell out so much money for. That, and getting a Wand I can use would be nice. ^_^

I DESPISE KEYS FROM THE PIT OF MY SOUL

i want to MAKE money from open in chests not lose money, since i only get crapy purple focus items or some crap like that

Then don't buy the keys simply put and find a different way of making money =P The chests were there not to help your money grow it's for 'fun'. Did you make a lot of money from getting the old chests? I never did..

At any rate they're here and now. Just don't buy keys it's not like you HAVE to.

I've gotten 2 miners keys and 2 shiverpeak keys in only 3 hours of farming grenths footprint with 4 people.

I got a sup vigor the first time. Superior marks the second. The other 2 drops were gold weapon drops that I sold for over 10k each......

maybe I just have good luck

nice!

I've bought about 30 plat worth of keys. I'd say i've gotten slim to nill back... especially considering how FOUR OUT OF SEVEN OF MY GOLD ARMORS WERE RANGER RUINS. (Two beast Mastery, One Expertise, One Marksmanship). Other than a few unID sup runes (Warrior rune turned out to be swords >_>) I could give to teamates in exchange for gratitude, i must say I was jipped. All the bows I got came with no passive mods and were usually longbow branchs (No short-bow speeds). If I kept everything and sold it for maximum market value somehow, i probably would've gotten 10 plat back. (But I didn't... so i got 1 plat back from merchant).

I think the idea is to make the item usable for 1/2 the classes in GW!

Do any of you know that some of the items that you think have no mods on them really have hidden mods. It's true, you may get an item from a chest that appears to have no mods even after ID'ing it, this isn't the case, quite a few of the items have mods that are hidden.

And by the way, the chests were intended to be a gold sink, maybe not a big one, but a gold sink none the less.

When U say they Have hidden Mods what do u mean, I know certian Bows have Armor Penitration. Is this what u mean, please explain more. And if u Know what kind of hidden mods r available.

Personnaly the only thing I got that was remotely good *in the whole game* was a Ettin pauldron drop that was a Superior healing rune.

Big woop.
I don't have money for keys either and since the items that I have gotten from chests where pure crap. I don't bother with them anymore unless I get keys from drops (which is never).

I don't like the chest system. It's hardly profitable. Oh and I bought a Miner's key, did the whole SF and no chest appeared for it!

That's just.... <(GRRR)

In 500+hours of play I have seen:
1 green item drop for me (yakslapper)
1 Sup Rune of healing worth more about 3k
a non-max divine holy rod with a +20% enchantments that I don't DARE salvage because of my luck....
....and that's pretty much it.
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My game is depressing i don't know how people can even *make* 5k!

No offense but...You dumb A$$....chests are not for making money, that is what farming is for. If this were the case, everyone would be out with a runner build just openning chests! They are there for those WITH money to waste or those willing to gamble what little extra they have.

Keys, how to make them work for you.

FoW obisidian keys. 1.5K a shot, that's quite a bit. Chests tend to drop the same color in FoW. My advice is to not be the first person to open it. Take a watch, and see what falls before investing a key. Now, almost always you can sell keys at a chest when golds are falling out of it. Usually for a modest markup. (I sell keys in FoW for 1.7K a shot).

Another thing that I do, and this is because I've found the obsidian chests to have great value, is I bring friends I know with me, and if I discover them to be out of keys, I will offer them 300 gold and a key if they return the drop (don't try this with people you don't know, if a nice item falls, they simply abandon the game, but friends usually have honor).

I spent about 30K in keys (20 of them), from that I have 10 left, and found 3 gold chaos axes (reqs 8,11,12). Those are listed here at this link, not for promotion purposes, but to show you that you really can MAKE money off these infernal keys

http://www.guildwarsguru.com/forum/s...d.php?p=507995

As you can see, 2 already reached their buyouts, and the other will go up more I promise you that. The last 2 req 8 chaos axes I saw fall went for around 100K each. So out of those 20 keys, I am looking to make roughly 150K.

Thats right. Keys are a nice way to gamble for players who earn lots of gold daily. Too bad that there are so little chests around.

Here's you guys' problem. You want all sorts of uber weapons to drop. BUT if that happened, they wouldn't be worth anything because then they would drop for everyone else too. Good stuff has to be rare or else the 1 or 2 rare things will be worth way too much. Quit complaining that the economy works. Sure it might be too expensive in your opinion but at least its not inflating or deflating at a ridiculous level.