Talk:Salvage item

Categorization

Would you say a salvage item is a proper item type, or a subcategory of a trophy? I changed its categorization to Category:Trophy types, but actually i think trophies should have collectors...and are most often stackable —ZerphaThe Improver 13:11, 27 April 2008 (UTC)

In the game manuals and the gw website, salvage items are listed in their own section separate from trophies. Also, the tooltip on salvage items displays the words "Salvage item" under the name. Trophies are items that are dropped by foes and can be sold to merchants or traded to collectors. So I would say salvage items are a separate item type. Tedium 23:05, 27 April 2008 (UTC)

Ok, thanks for this detailed answer, i had Charr Hides in mind when changing it, but other items are, as you said, actually a diffrent type of item. I accordingly reverted my last edit. —ZerphaThe Improver 20:58, 28 April 2008 (UTC)

Should we mention...

Should we mention that the professions of profession-specific runes and insignia could be anything, and are not tied to the profession of the dropping foe? Cynique 14:37, 27 April 2011 (UTC)

Common or Rare Materials

At what armor rating is it worth it to use an expert salvage kit to try for rare materials? I've noticed that I almost always seem to get common materials from anything under 25 armor. Is there a set point at which rare materials are a possibility? Singing Wolf 00:39, 24 July 2011 (UTC)

There's a correlation among stated armor rating, merchant value, and amount of mats...but it's not strict formula (i.e. the armor rating implies a range of possible merchant values and a range of amount of mats). I haven't expert sal'd enough salvage mats to be sure, but I suspect that the number also implies a range in the likelihood of dropping rare mats. At one time, I went looking for hard data on this topic...and couldn't find any.

I stopped experimenting in this area because the value of soft rare-material mats (e.g. silk, linen, ...) is low (or it's easy/cheap to craft them) and the hard rare-material mats are almost always steel, which is plentiful from other sources. In other words, I have never found it worth my time to use an expert salvage on an armor salvage item. — Tennessee Ernie Ford (TEF) 00:59, 24 July 2011 (UTC)

It's also complicated by two factors. (I'm talking about salvaging in general here, not just salvage-armour items.)

* The amount of materials (common or rare) is strongly influenced by the merchant value of the item, and the chance of getting rare materials seems to be likewise. That translates into a fuzzy relationship between armour value and materials, as there is often overlap between the merchant prices of different armour values.

* The chance of getting rare materials when salvaging is dependent also on the item in question. Spider webs always (or nearly so) give silk when expert-salvaged (i.e. never gives a common material), and one of the iron-giving bows seems to always give steel (never iron).

That last point means that the player-to-player price of silk (if such a market existed) should not be significantly more than 16 gold, as that's the price of an expert-salvage charge, and high level characters can easily solo-farm spider webs in the Plains of Jarin for essentially zero risk.

I had a "bah" moment the other day, though. After having shelled out vast quantities of gold directly or indirectly for rubies and sapphires to buy my necromancer her Vabbian armour, I then proceeded to expert-salvage a highly-salvageable Ruby Hammer, and got a ruby. All those Kournans, djinns, etc. killed in the hope of getting ruby-salvageable items, all that money spent with the traders, and all those trade contracts expended, and all I had to do was wander around the Crystal Desert. Bah. Cynique 07:01, 24 July 2011 (UTC)

Thank you both for answering my question, I appreciate the thought and detail you provided. It hadn't occurred to me that the materials I get from armor are not really worth what I pay for the kits.

Cynique - I cannot find a reference to a Ruby Hammer on the wiki, only a Ruby Maul, found only in Nightfall. Does something drop the Ruby Hammer in the Crystal Desert, or is it found in chests? I hope you at least able to sell the rubies from the hammer to get some of your money back.  :)

I have to say, I love this community. You guys are wonderful to help out those of us less versed in the game and game mechanics. :) Singing Wolf 22:09, 24 July 2011 (UTC)

You may well be right, a Ruby Maul. For complicated and not necessarily valid reasons, I have spent a great deal of time with the text interface set to French, and the same French word is used for both Hammers and Mauls. Cynique 03:22, 25 July 2011 (UTC)

The Bug

I just picked up an empty purple Corsair Raiment out in the Mehtani Keys (normal mode) with an un-ID'd merch value of 22g. This is in keeping with other variably-valued item drops in that area, which mean averages about 18g. I've removed the "this has only been observed" parenthetical as I think it's now been rendered invalid (the Keys isn't a high-level area, and the A24 rating on this salvage item is quite typical for the area). Kruhljak (talk) 09:15, 17 November 2011 (UTC)

That seems fair. Good catch. – Tennessee Ernie Ford (TEF) 03:11, 22 November 2011 (UTC)

I got yesterday the similar (or the same) armor piece dropped by corsair in Zehlon Reach, more exactly, from one of corsairs who spawn in the southern part of small narrow island, east from the Istani village. This is a tooltip after identification:

	Corsair Raiment Salvage item Armor: 24 Value: 32 gold Use Salvage Kits, to produce crafting materials and upgrade components.

I would prefer to think that it's a single item (or maybe one of very few items) which has a bug in properties, preventing the generation of random rune/insignia when dropped or when we try to identify it. I never noticed such buggy items before. Would the problem be caused by flaw in game mechanics, such bug should occur much often and of course be not linked to a single piece and geographical area. If someone will find the same or maybe the different example of this bug (it's important), please add a note here. --Slavic 15:42, 16 April 2012 (UTC)