Talk:Trophy Shipment/Drop rate

I don't understand how to read the profit/loss. Is profit anything greater than the 1g you spent, so that there is a loss on most purchases? If we could routinely show loss in red font, that would line up with the colour most often used in industry to indicate losses. It is not clear to me:

why there are two sets of tables for each type of purchase that have different figures

taking the right-hand table, why the subtotal on a row (e.g. Large Bone) is not the drop rate (5.03) multiplied by the TP price (.8) with the TP cut deduced (*.85).

in the bottom row, for the results for each 100 VM:

what the 1 c means

why there are two rows with the same value, except one is pink (40 s)

--Hesione (talk) 22:25, 1 May 2020 (UTC)

How to interpret the 'Profit/Loss' tables

I found the so called "profit/loss" tables confusing as well. But after some study, here's my explanation of what they're telling you:

• There are 3 tables corresponding to the 3 different non-gold 'currencies' that you can buy trophy shipments with - one Kralkatite Ore, one Powdered Rose Quartz, or 100 Volatile Magic.
  • For some reason the author chose to do the tables in terms of one unit of Kralkatite Ore, or Powdered Rose Quartz, but 100 units of Volatile Magic
• Each table's goal is to compare the value and cost of trophy shipments per one of the three currencies.
  • So instead of profit/loss, the tables really ought to be labeled value/cost.
  • The tables as they stand will make more sense if you substite as follows: For Profit read Value. For Loss read Cost.
  • Then actual profit would then be the difference between the value and cost. i.e. profit = value - cost (a negative profit is a loss)
• In the 'Profit' section of each table there are two sub-tables. The one on the left quotes 'buy' prices from the Trading Post; the one on the right quotes 'sell' prices.
  • The first column is the quantity of the particular item expected to drop from one trophy shipment. (q)
  • The third column is the trading post price for that item. (p)
  • The forth column is the gold you'd get if you sold that many items at the trading post per currency needed to buy one trophy shipment (ie. Kralkatite Ore).
    • cost in 'currency' of 1 Trophy Shipment (n) -- Kralkatite Ore: n=60; Powdered Rose Quarts: n=100; 100 Volatile Magic: n=2.5
    • value = q * p * 0.85 / n
  • At the bottom of the Profit table is a Grand Total. This is the money you'd receive by selling 1/n of a trophy shipment on the trading post.
• In the 'Loss' section of each table there are also two tables corresponding to 'buy' and 'sell' prices.
  • As Kralkatite Ore and Volatile Magic aren't sold on the trading post, the 'Loss' (cost) tables for these only list the cost in gold per the specific commodity. So the money cost per one currency is 1G / n.
  • Powdered Rose Quartz can be purchased on the trading post, so in that table, the 'Loss' (cost) also includes the price to purchase one Powdered Rose Quartz (using the buy or sell price as appropriate). Since you're buying in this case, there is no 15% trading fee involved.
  • The Grand Total at the bottom of the 'Loss' table is the cost of buying 1/n of a Trophy Shipment.
• There really ought to be a final row in each table that is the difference between the value and the cost - i.e. the actual profit or loss per currency unit. Why isn't it there? Beats me.
  • If this were added, then one could also calculate the profit/loss in terms of Trophy Shipments, instead of the other currencies, by multiplying by n.
• Finally, it looks like the values in the subtotal column are rounded down to the next copper, so potentially there could be some noticable rounding errors when you scale the profit/loss figures back up to a whole Trophy Shipment by multiplying by n.

My comments -

• The Profit/Loss tables are of most use to someone who wants to convert their Kralkatite, Rose Quartz or VM to Gold (or see if a profit can be made by buying Rose Quartz and converting it to Trophy Shipments).
• Personally, I'm trying to craft Legendaries, and I need to decide if I should get the needed T5/T6 mats by buying Trophy Shipments, or just buying the T5/T6 mats from the trading post. These tables are not as useful for that since, among other things, they build in the 15% TP fee.
• Since the price of Powdered Rose Quartz is included in the 'Loss' table, but not in those for Kralkatite or VM, it looks like Rose Quartz is a very bad deal (and it looks like it currently is if you actually buy it). But if you already have it, then you might want to subtract that value from the Loss table to compare on an even footing with the other two currencies.
  • If you want to decide whether to sell your Rose Quartz or use it to buy Trophy Shipments, I think there's info there to help you decide, but my brains too adled at the moment to sort that out :)

SomeGuy (talk) 23:59, 6 August 2020 (UTC)

You should never subtract value of Rose Quartz from this table, even if you "already have it". While Kralkatite or VM is account bound (if you have it, you need to use it), Rose Quartz is available to sell. Even if you have it and not buying it, you "lose" by not selling it on TP. It's like crafting cheap components instead of buying on TP, "because you already have materials, so it's free". But component was available to buy for 10 copper because people were doing it to level up crafting or it's common drop, while materials for it is worth 10 silver, because is needed in some other important craft. So instead of "crafting it for free" from expensive material you already had, you could sell material and buy 100 components for this price.

Hiperon (talk) 09:36, 26 October 2022 (UTC)