Why is Volatile Magic so hard to come by?

[Ashantara.8731]

We still have no infinite gathering tools for it, and the common ones cost karma, which is also sparse due to the fact that many items in LWS4 require karma as a currency.

 

When will we finally get better means to farm Volatile Magic?

[GrubySzymek.1362]

Infinite tools have already been datamined. About magic itself, I'm closing to 40k and have literally nothing to spend it on.

[Ashantara.8731]

> @"Kheldorn.5123" said:

> Infinite tools have already been datamined. About magic itself, I'm closing to 40k and have literally nothing to spend it on.

 

That's probably because you saved and didn't spend. Other people might have bought trinkets or map boni or other much needed stuff. ;)

[GrubySzymek.1362]

> @"Ashantara.8731" said:

> > @"Kheldorn.5123" said:

> > Infinite tools have already been datamined. About magic itself, I'm closing to 40k and have literally nothing to spend it on.

>

> That's probably because you saved and didn't spend. Other people might have bought trinkets or map boni or other much needed stuff. ;)

 

I don't know. Except from minis (which I don't collect) there are better ways to get trinkets than LW4, so what is there to spend magic on?

 

[Ayrilana.1396]

Don’t the enemies in Istan drop them fairly frequently?

[Ashantara.8731]

LOL! As if I could feel it coming ;) (and nope, don't read Reddit, so I didn't know about the datamining, obviously):

https://www.guildwars2.com/en/news/unlimited-gathering-with-volatile-magic-gathering-tools/

 

> @"Kheldorn.5123" said:

> I don't know. Except from minis (which I don't collect) there are better ways to get trinkets than LW4

 

_Ascended_ trinkets, by the way. What better ways are there in open world PvE for the new stats?

[Pifil.5193]

> @"Kheldorn.5123" said:

> > @"Ashantara.8731" said:

> > > @"Kheldorn.5123" said:

> > > Infinite tools have already been datamined. About magic itself, I'm closing to 40k and have literally nothing to spend it on.

> >

> > That's probably because you saved and didn't spend. Other people might have bought trinkets or map boni or other much needed stuff. ;)

>

> I don't know. Except from minis (which I don't collect) there are better ways to get trinkets than LW4, so what is there to spend magic on?

 

Yeah, it's a useless currency alright if you don't want minis. I certainly wouldn't buy an infinite tool that gave it.

 

You can't even use it to buy all that many trinkets right now, just 1 ring and 1 accessory. The only thing you _can_ spend it on is the various Crafting Material Shipments, which cost 1G and 250 Volatile Magic. They mostly drop T5 materials so it's a really terrible idea to buy those, in every case you can get a lot more materials just by spending your 1G on the TP.

[Tanner Blackfeather.6509]

> @"Pifil.5193" said:

> The only thing you _can_ spend it on is the various Crafting Material Shipments, which cost 1G and 250 Volatile Magic. They mostly drop T5 materials so it's a really terrible idea to buy those, in every case you can get a lot more materials just by spending your 1G on the TP.

 

Except there is currently a ~60s *profit* (after the gold cost and TP tax) from the Trophy shipment. If you have use for both t5 and t6 - like any gen 2 legendary - it's a gain.

[Pifil.5193]

> @"Tanner Blackfeather.6509" said:

> > @"Pifil.5193" said:

> > The only thing you _can_ spend it on is the various Crafting Material Shipments, which cost 1G and 250 Volatile Magic. They mostly drop T5 materials so it's a really terrible idea to buy those, in every case you can get a lot more materials just by spending your 1G on the TP.

>

> Except there is currently a ~60G *profit* (after the gold cost and TP tax) from the Trophy shipment. If you have use for both t5 and t6 - like any gen 2 legendary - it's a gain.

 

Ahh, I completely misread those tables, thanks for clearing that up!

[Tanner Blackfeather.6509]

> @"Pifil.5193" said:

> > @"Tanner Blackfeather.6509" said:

> > > @"Pifil.5193" said:

> > > The only thing you _can_ spend it on is the various Crafting Material Shipments, which cost 1G and 250 Volatile Magic. They mostly drop T5 materials so it's a really terrible idea to buy those, in every case you can get a lot more materials just by spending your 1G on the TP.

> >

> > Except there is currently a ~60G *profit* (after the gold cost and TP tax) from the Trophy shipment. If you have use for both t5 and t6 - like any gen 2 legendary - it's a gain.

>

> Ahh, I completely misread those tables, thanks for clearing that up!

 

Noticed a bir of an oops there, the profit is of course ~60 **silver** per shipment, not gold :D

 

 

[Ashantara.8731]

> @"Pifil.5193" said:

> just 1 ring and 1 accessory

 

If you have only one character...

 

Anyway, people here say it was just for minis, but that is not true. If you are running short on Karma, you need VM to boost it on the new maps. Karma items are gimmicks like the Prototype Position Rewinder (175,00 karma) or the Orr back pieces (315,000 karma).

 

It is all interconnected, so yeah, it can cause an issue for many players who are interested in those things, and up until now we _were_ running short on VM.

[Illconceived Was Na.9781]

So I think this is more a matter of perspective:

* It happens many people have plenty of UM to fulfill their needs, from whatever existing sources. It also continues to grow sufficiently quickly.

* It similarly happens that the things that some folks like to do most don't generate much VM, so it appears to accumulate slowly.

 

In actual fact, there are lots of sources of each and some people feel that they have more than they can spend, some too little.

 

(Also: not sure why karma-based tools are rejected, but gem-based tools are requested; surely karma is about as easy to farm as gold.)