Refining for cheap

WarrenWolfy - Sanctuary

Olbaze - Sanctuary wrote: »

So basically, the cheap Dragon Orbs are just about making Tienkangs and Tishas obsolete for weapon refining.

The same is of course not true yet for armors, as the price per attempt is much lower.

Surprising but true.

Knowing PWI's love of all things on-sale, it's entirely likely that Dragon Orbs will end up being on-sale for even less than 50% at some point, which could make them the cheapest for everything.

Olbaze - Sanctuary

WarrenWolfy - Sanctuary wrote: »

Surprising but true.

Knowing PWI's love of all things on-sale, it's entirely likely that Dragon Orbs will end up being on-sale for even less than 50% at some point, which could make them the cheapest for everything.

Interestingly, that also makes the Dragon's Fire Pack that much more useful, since it might come ready with 2*, 3*, 4* or 5* orb, not to mention that the average price it gives to 1* isn't bad either.

Considering that it was recently marked down permanently, coupled with these recent extreme orb sales and the resulting high gold price, doesn't it all seem a bit much for a mere coincidence?

WarrenWolfy - Sanctuary

Olbaze - Sanctuary wrote: »

Interestingly, that also makes the Dragon's Fire Pack that much more useful, since it might come ready with 2*, 3*, 4* or 5* orb, not to mention that the average price it gives to 1* isn't bad either.

The interesting thing about Dragon's Fire Packs is that I'm starting to see more and more people treating them like Token Packs. i.e. People are gambling in hopes of getting the Dragon Orb Flame, then selling off their "losses" for below-cost in order to afford more Packs.

Right now, the lowest price for D.Orb 1s I'm seeing from people doing this is about 95k, which is almost exactly 50%-off regular price. (On a side-note: This means merchants who bought 50%-off D.Orb 1s last sale are now being under-cut, and since Gold prices have dropped they have effectively already taken a loss on their investment.)

Assuming a Dragon Orb Flame is worth ~240 million (I have no actual idea, but I saw one on-sale for 265 million recently), then that means Dragon's Fire Pack gamblers are averaging 8% profit, provided they eventually do hit a Flame Orb. What remains to be seen is whether or not these gamblers are conscious of this and are making sure to stay profitable about their pricing, or whether they will end up like Token Pack gamblers who are feeding an addiction and averaging about -20% loss.

If they do end up being gambling addicts, then D.Orb 1s could end up being like Tokens, in the sense that it would be better to source them from gamblers rather than from the cash-shop, which would mean I'd have to re-do the spreadsheet somewhat.

cupinabojan

+1 mirage

+2 mirage

+3 mirage+tienkang

+4 mirage+tienkang

+5 mirage+tienkang

+6 mirage+tienkang

+7 mirage+tisha

i did all my gear(armors,wep,ornaments) +7 this way at Archosaurs elder

valkyriamwf

me again b:surrender

http://img15.imageshack.us/i/20110305034729.jpg/ +4

http://img851.imageshack.us/i/20110305033900.jpg/ +5

http://img852.imageshack.us/i/20110306230024.jpg/ +6

http://img195.imageshack.us/i/20110306230442.jpg/ +7

http://img231.imageshack.us/i/20110306231656.jpg/ +8

http://img138.imageshack.us/i/20110306232843.jpg/ +9

http://img146.imageshack.us/i/20110308012514.jpg/ +10

=X

CuteLilDemon - Lost City

cupinabojan wrote: »

+1 mirage

+2 mirage

+3 mirage+tienkang

+4 mirage+tienkang

+5 mirage+tienkang

+6 mirage+tienkang

+7 mirage+tisha

i did all my gear(armors,wep,ornaments) +7 this way at Archosaurs elder

Did u do it at the same time or random time?

CuteLilDemon - Lost City

TheDan - Sanctuary wrote: »

I've +6/+5ed all my gear using mirages / tienkang / tishas lol. (only using the Ancient Wall Officer) So much cheaper than using dragon orbs if you know what you're doing :P

do u rmb the time that u refined ur gears?

Malicent - Lost City

Refined 5 pieces of my armor to +8 with tishas.

6 pieces gone up to +7 using 250 mirages, give or take, and 20 tishas. This was done when all my armor was +5 and +4.

I +8 5 of them and failed on one of them, took me 10 tishas and 400 mirages.

valkyriamwf

Finally b:dirty

+11

http://img62.imageshack.us/f/31489956.jpg/

+12

http://img851.imageshack.us/f/121oi.jpg/

valkyriamwf

Videos

+11

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mMKBU9cEia0

+12

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OZxJnhOndmk

WarrenWolfy - Sanctuary

valkyriamwf wrote: »

+12

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OZxJnhOndmk

WOW! You used a Tienkang!?!?!

That's some crazy-intense stuff! The odds of that working were 25%, with a 75% chance of losing everything!

Congrats!

Admante - Dreamweaver

I've been getting crazy low success rates recently. It took me over 2k mirages to get my lionheart vambraces to +7 and I'm at 1.5k mirages trying to get my nirv pants to +7 with no luck. I'm currently on a string of 10+ failed attempts to +5 with a tienkang in a row.

EDIT: Got +7 in the next hundred mirages But still, those rates **** me off.

Decrepify - Lost City

I've used about 250 mirages now for my rank 8 sphere..

highest it's ever gotten was +2


...and now it's +0 b:cry

valkyriamwf

Thanks.
I did it in one of Brazil's official servers
is bad because many players are noobs
very hacker, theft, expletive, bugs
a lot of trash talking in global chat.
the majority of Brazilian players cause of her being burned out
I used the same tiekang
I went a little crazy
lose refining always trying various things i do not care if they lose or not
often lost +8 +9
+7 and +8 are Extremely Easy
just take a little luck
but the question is neither quantity
always go with 40 50
+12 this was less than 50
you have to have courage and if you get lucky eventually.
I try to help if they need
good game everyone

valkyriamwf

Despite not having been said, I have a post refining on page 40 of last year but the links are broken
The videos are now private
+12 want to put something else before it leaves the public
+12 here for those who did not see

http://img98.imageshack.us/i/32877253.jpg/

here was that the oracle +9 sleeves and zeroed

http://img215.imageshack.us/i/63676653.jpg/

http://img31.imageshack.us/i/87815242.jpg/

I put him three slots now
Trying to make a video since it +1
Sorry for the bad english.
I'll be back soon with the results of refined oracle sleeves.
Thanks b:thanks b:bye

Valirah - Sanctuary

OK the chart in the opening post has the base chances for refining to +11 and +12 as 15% and 10% respectively. I'm seeing elsewhere these rates being listed as 12% and 5%. Which is correct?

Having generally poor luck with these things, I'm on the fence about Tishaing for a +11 and the difference between 18.5% and 15.5% is significant.

Ozuru - Lost City

WarrenWolfy - Sanctuary wrote: »

Thanks to the help and input from so many here on the forums, many of the questions about refining without Dragon Orbs have been answered. The tl;dr version is as follows:

The chance of success when refining without Dragon Orbs is:

From    To   Mirage  Tienkang   Tisha  Chienkun
 +0 --> +1:    50%      65%     53.5%    100%
 +1 --> +2:    30%      45%     33.5%     25%
 +2 --> +3:    30%      45%     33.5%     10%
 +3 --> +4:    30%      45%     33.5%     4%
 +4 --> +5:    30%      45%     33.5%    1.67%
 +5 --> +6:    30%      45%     33.5%    0.77%
 +6 --> +7:    30%      45%     33.5%    0.47%
 +7 --> +8:    30%      45%     33.5%    0.25%
 +8 --> +9:    25%      40%     28.5%    0.13%
 +9 -> +10:    20%      35%     23.5%    0.07%
+10 -> +11:    15%      30%     18.5%    0.04%
+11 -> +12:    10%      25%     13.5%    0.02%

- Generally speaking, refining armour up to +7 costs, on average, about half the price of a 30%-off sale on Dragon Orbs, and is still significantly cheaper than a 65%-off Dragon Orb sale, provided you do it correctly are willing and able to accept the risks involved!

- When refining weapons, the cheapest option is to wait for a 65%-off sale on Dragon Orbs.

- Choosing which stone is the most cost effective for each level of refine can be calculated by entering the current market price for Mirages, Gold, Stones, and Orbs into this spreadsheet: Zoho Sheet - Refining Guide

- An Excel-only version of the same spreadsheet, that is also capable of running simulations of thousands of refining attempts, can be downloaded here: Excel Version - Refining Guide

- Duke Blacke's rumours regarding certain times of day, certain NPCs, certain techniques, certain types of equipment, etc..., having better odds for refining success appear to all be false. For example, the rumour that the Harshlands Officer gives better +1 refining odds to players who belong to the faction that owns the land was tested with several hundred Mirages and no improvement was found.

Good luck, and happy refining! (for cheap!)

(The rest of this post is the original question and theory that I posed to the forum. Please note that my 40% theory was eventually proven false! The correct numbers are now listed above.)

- end of EDIT -

dam this is beast

WarrenWolfy - Sanctuary

Valirah - Sanctuary wrote: »

OK the chart in the opening post has the base chances for refining to +11 and +12 as 15% and 10% respectively. I'm seeing elsewhere these rates being listed as 12% and 5%. Which is correct?

Having generally poor luck with these things, I'm on the fence about Tishaing for a +11 and the difference between 18.5% and 15.5% is significant.

Oops, I must have been sleepy or something when I copied the chart. The correct values are the lower ones in the spreadsheet --> 12% and 5%.

I'll correct the opening post. Thanks for pointing this out!

Valirah - Sanctuary

Should have stayed on that fence, took me 14 tries ..... b:cry

WarrenWolfy - Sanctuary

The new 50%-off sale on Tishas/Tienkangs has really had a dramatic effect on refining costs. Up until now we only had 66%-off Dragon Orb sales.

However, with the new sale, armour refines up to +7 are now about 1/3 the price of a 65%-off Dragon Orb sale, and weapon refines up to +7 are now about 1/2 the price.

I've updated the first post to reflect this, and also released an updated version of the Excel spreadsheet that's a bit easier to use because it allows you to simply type in the current sale amount (0%, 50%, 66%, etc...) instead of messing around trying to figure out the current cost per Gold.

For example, at the moment I put 50%-off for Dragon Orbs, even though they're not actually on-sale, because there are still plenty of merchants selling them for roughly that price. Similarly, I have D.Orb Oceans listed as on-sale for 30 Gold, which seems to be about what merchants are selling them for.

I haven't updated the Zoho sheet version, though, because Zoho sheet likes to trash everything whenever I update it, and I really don't feel like fighting with it today. I'm hoping someday they fix their import system...

Magiere - Dreamweaver

WarrenWolfy - Sanctuary wrote: »

The new 50%-off sale on Tishas/Tienkangs has really had a dramatic effect on refining costs. Up until now we only had 66%-off Dragon Orb sales.

Are you kidding me?
Tisha/Tiankang are still 50% cheaper to get with Dragon Points than buying them off the boutique ...
The tisha/tiankang sale has no impact at all...

Slightly disappointed to see that you out of all people think this sale affected anything.

Olbaze - Sanctuary

Magiere - Dreamweaver wrote: »

Are you kidding me?
Tisha/Tiankang are still 50% cheaper to get with Dragon Points than buying them off the boutique ...
The tisha/tiankang sale has no impact at all...

Slightly disappointed to see that you out of all people think this sale affected anything.

It depends.

For example, on Sanctuary, you see people buying the Chests of Coin for 100,000 coins each. That puts Tishas and Tienkangs at 200,000 each. However, if you buy gold at 1,280,000, you'll end up paying 176,256 coins each.

And then there's the issue that a person can buy any amount of gold instantly, whereas you cannot just get any amount of Dragon Points instantly.

Magiere - Dreamweaver

Uhh your math is bad olba.

100k chest of coins means 5m coins aka 50 Tisha = 100k ea.

Also buying DQ is even better at 10k, cos that costs you around 3,9m coins including the returns from NPC..which then puts Tisha/Tiankang at around 78k coins.
Which is even less than HALF of what you pay at the boutique sale, and why I'm so severely disappointed that Warren did not see it o.O

And then there's the issue that a person can buy any amount of gold instantly, whereas you cannot just get any amount of Dragon Points instantly.

I dont count a Person that is doing Tisha instead of Orbs a person that is impatient..as they usually plan their lucky refining days far ahead and prepare hundreds/thousands of mirages.

Olbaze - Sanctuary

Magiere - Dreamweaver wrote: »

Uhh your math is bad olba.

100k chest of coins means 5m coins aka 50 Tisha = 100k ea.

Wrong. Each chest sells for 500 points, you need 50,000 for the ticket. That comes to 100 chests for 50 Tishas, or 10,000,000 coins for 50 Tishas. Last I checked, that means 200,000 each.

Then again, maybe I just failed third grade math.

Also buying DQ is even better at 10k, cos that costs you around 3,9m coins including the returns from NPC..which then puts Tisha/Tiankang at around 78k coins.
Which is even less than HALF of what you pay at the boutique sale, and why I'm so severely disappointed that Warren did not see it o.O

Let's say you buy a 35 point DQ at 10,000 coins each. Since you can NPC it at 3,720 coins, this means you're actually paying 6,280 coins per DQ. This gets us the following:
6,280/35 = 180 coins per point
50,000 * 180 = 9,000,000 coins for 50 Tishas
9,000,000/50 = 180,000 coins per Tisha

Oh and btw, if you can buy gold at 1,298,701 or lower, you'll be paying 179,000 coins per Tisha. And at least here on Sanctuary, gold seems to floating at around 1,270,000 or so.

Somehow I'm not seeing where Warren supposedly failed. Or where I failed.

Magiere - Dreamweaver

Olbaze - Sanctuary wrote: »

Wrong. Each chest sells for 500 points, you need 50,000 for the ticket. That comes to 100 chests for 50 Tishas, or 10,000,000 coins for 50 Tishas. Last I checked, that means 200,000 each.

Then again, maybe I just failed third grade math.



Let's say you buy a 35 point DQ at 10,000 coins each. Since you can NPC it at 3,720 coins, this means you're actually paying 6,280 coins per DQ. This gets us the following:
6,280/35 = 180 coins per point
50,000 * 180 = 9,000,000 coins for 50 Tishas
9,000,000/50 = 180,000 coins per Tisha

Oh and btw, if you can buy gold at 1,298,701 or lower, you'll be paying 179,000 coins per Tisha. And at least here on Sanctuary, gold seems to floating at around 1,270,000 or so.

Somehow I'm not seeing where Warren supposedly failed. Or where I failed.

Eh nvm, i still confuse Event Gold Ticket with old R9 medal price. being 20k
My bad.

However the DQ thing still stays, at its about the same price as current sale.
People on my server are even able to buy DQ for 7-8k which then makes it cheaper than the sale again.
Its 120k each Tisha/Tiankang then.(Around 11,3m for DQ and 5m+ for selling)

Olbaze - Sanctuary

Magiere - Dreamweaver wrote: »

Eh nvm, i still confuse Event Gold Ticket with old R9 medal price. being 20k
My bad.

However the DQ thing still stays, at its about the same price as current sale.
People on my server are even able to buy DQ for 7-8k which then makes it cheaper than the sale again.
Its 120k each Tisha/Tiankang then.(Around 11,3m for DQ and 5m+ for selling)

Well of course, but you have to consider that buying DQs isn't necessarily a fast business. And it doesn't really work too well if you need a few hundred Tienkangs soon.

When it's not 2x drops, people just don't really grind enough for you to be able to buy hundreds or thousands of DQs in a day.

WarrenWolfy - Sanctuary

Magiere - Dreamweaver wrote: »

...I'm so severely disappointed that Warren did not see it o.O

Heh... I'm kinda flattered that your expectations of me are high, but I'm personally not at all surprised that I was overlooking using DQ points. I think for every 1 thing I've figured out by myself about saving money in-game, there are at least 3 more I learned by reading the forums!

Probably the reason I personally never thought to calculate using DQ items is because I've still got a stockpile of ~230 Event Gold that I've gotten for free from doing the Tiger Event each week, so I've never needed to actually buy any.

I'll update the first post, though, to point out the possibility of using DQ items. Also, I should probably update the spreadsheet to allow people to just enter the DQ point price, but I'll have to do that later.

Thanks, though, for the heads up!

lolipop67

I can say only one:

645 Mirage, 10 Chienkun Stones = +0 on my r9 Weapon b:shocked

SiIverRain - Raging Tide

Yea Uhm refineing really doesnt matter about the time or level of the gear because i refined all of my TT 99 (4 of them) to +3 with about 50-65 mirages and i +3 my r8 armour to +3 with like 20 mirages so really it all depends on luck you'll never get the greatest refines at times and sometimes you just have bad luck and fail alot but its still all luck my friend got his r8 daggers to +5 with mirages and +7 with tienkeng with about 100 mirages so yea hes really lucky

Olbaze - Sanctuary

With the recent sales (Tisha/Tienkang, Dragon Orbs dropping from 0.27 to 0.045), at least the Zoho Sheet has lost lots of accuracy. Having that it rounds figures to an accuracy of 0.05 and runs with those, it's pretty bad, as it'll tell you things such as Ocean Orb being cheaper to +8 than a 8* orb, when the actual prices are 20 Gold and 18.225 Gold, respectively.

Is this an issue with the precision of Zoho Sheet itself, or is it something you put in?

Also, I noticed that the Zoho Sheet has something funky going on with the refreshing of the cells. A lot of times a change you make won't affect all the cells and you get funky results, where re-doing the change will often fix it.