User talk:Dr ishmael/Collectable trading

What a useful page. I hope you won't mind if I print this out and keep a copy near my computer to use while playing. This should be a mainspace article, much more convenient than looking up each and every collectable drop separately and comparing numbers. Good job! Entropy 01:39, 24 January 2007 (CST)


 * Really? Well, guess I'll go ahead and compile the data for Prophecies and Factions items, then - wasn't sure if I should bother since none of my characters are actively playing through those campaigns anymore.
 * What do you think of the layout? Should the Mainland section be broken up more?  I wasn't sure how to do it since a lot of the items can be found in multiple areas (Kournans can be found in Kourna and Vabbi; Djinn in Vabbi and the Desolation; Margonites in Vabbi, the Desolation, and Realm of Torment).  Or should it be split based on where the collector is?  &mdash;Dr Ishmael [[Image:Diablo_the_chicken.gif]] (talk|contribs) 09:57, 24 January 2007 (CST)
 * I really like this page too. Thanks, very useful. I have lots of collectibles scattered all over my characters inventory and this is a wonderful way to start getting rid of them. For the mainland, I think it's fine the way it is. Easier to search by name; otherwise might have to try remember which collectible came from which region. -- Ab.Er.Rant (msg Aberrant80) 06:39, 25 January 2007 (CST)

Alright, I went all-out tonight and added every single collectible item in the game to this page. Unfortunately, there is very little info on the value of the collector rewards for either Pre-Searing or for Cantha.

Pre-Searing: I can check out the Pre-Searing info myself sometime in the near future. This probably isn't critical info for most people anymore, anyway.

Tyria: The majority of items here are worth more direct to the merchant than through the collector. And holy shit, I never realized there were so many of them!! Should they all be left in for completeness, or would it be better to only show items that are worth trading? (This decision would have to apply to the whole page, of course.)

Shing Jea: Most items here didn't have values, but it wasn't hard to infer the value of the different armor pieces from the ones that did have values.

Cantha: Like I said, not much with any values here. It seems like almost all the rewards from the mainland collectors are worth 125, but I don't feel safe assuming that yet. If that is the case, however, then there are again very few cases where it would be worth it to make the trade - most items are worth 25 each and require 5 for the trade, thus it would be equivalent.

Elona: Very few items here are not worth making the trade, now that collectors have items valued up to 300. You can even make a profit off of Juvenile Termite Legs - a single gold for every 3 legs, but that's still a profit!

Anyway... my fingers hurt now. &mdash;Dr Ishmael (talk|contribs)


 * This page is total pwnage now and is article-worthy to boot. Awesome job :). I like the layout as is, though I might change the red color - bit glary. Entropy 02:03, 26 January 2007 (CST)


 * What color would you suggest then?
 * Also, as I was checking up on some info today, I noticed that all collector items show their values (except for Bags and Belt Pouches) in the collector dialogue. So... why don't more of the collector pages have the values filled in? o_O  Guess that'll be my next mission!  &mdash;Dr Ishmael [[Image:Diablo_the_chicken.gif]] (talk|contribs) 15:11, 26 January 2007 (CST)


 * I would suggest Green, as it's the color of money. Or Gold. :)
 * Also, hmm, I dunno. I know that sometimes some users were filling in the Value columns but I guess noone felt like making a project of it and doing all of them. Meh. :) Entropy 12:38, 27 January 2007 (CST)

New idea: row template

 * 1) Collect stuff
 * 2) Profit!
 * 1) Profit!

(lol, I'm funny) Anyway, I created a template for each item to be used in these tables - User:Dr ishmael/Profit. It can take info for up to 3 collectors (at this time; it can easily be expanded for more) and, based on the collectible's value, the collector's trade quantity, and the trade-item's value, will calculate whether you can profit from trading with this collector and by how much. I re-wrote the table for Istan using this template. &mdash;Dr Ishmael (talk|contribs) 16:22, 30 January 2007 (CST)


 * This is good. It's very clear to me now how much potential cash I've wasted by selling certian collectible drops. >< I should add a link to this page on my uesrpage... Entropy 01:22, 31 January 2007 (CST)


 * Yeah, I know - now when I think about all the Stone Summit Badges and White Mantle Emblems and Intricate Grawl Necklaces that I salvaged for common crafting materials... I cry inside. ;_;
 * I went back and added Location fields to the template - my fiancee convinced me it was more convenient to keep that info here than force people to go to the collector pages every time. I also configured it so that if no collector info is passed, then it prints the "no known collectors" message.  And I added the code for a 4th collector, and made it print [[Image:Maybe.png|16px]] if the values are equal, as well as how much you lose by making bad trades.
 * I just finished rewriting ALL of Prophecies into the template, turning it into "information overload" by including every single collector for each item. I should be able to rewrite Factions and the rest of Nightfall tomorrow, then this should be complete.
 * The only problem then would be what to call this article (besides moving the templates to the Template: namespace and updating all the references... hurray for Find+Replace!). "Best Value for Collectibles" doesn't sound all that snappy.  "Twinking your Collectibles"?  I dunno. XD  &mdash;Dr Ishmael [[Image:Diablo_the_chicken.gif]] (talk|contribs) 01:58, 31 January 2007 (CST)
 * Hehe, I'm not the only one then, except I sold Azure Remains. >< I'm liking the Locations field, great usage for when you "happen to be in the area" - oh, there's a Collector here, keep an eye out! (or search the minimap for bags) Hmm. Y'know I named the link to this "Collector Items and You." But that's not much help is it :) Perhaps "The Wall Street Guide to Effective Collectible Management"? Entropy 02:03, 31 January 2007 (CST)
 * Call it "Collector item best value"? -- Ab.Er.Rant (msg Aberrant80) 02:26, 31 January 2007 (CST)

Profit-per-Collectable Item Suggestion
Got one small suggestion for this, it should show profit per collectable item, Mandragor Swamproot for instance, if you collect 2 for the leg armor then you get 20g profit (10g per collectable item), but if you collect 1 for the head armor you get 15g profit per item. So it would be better value to get two head peices instead of 1 leg peice. Hope I made myself clear there. 81.19.57.138 04:26, 31 January 2007 (CST)
 * Added a new section for the anon suggestion. -- Ab.Er.Rant (msg Aberrant80) 04:31, 31 January 2007 (CST)
 * Thanks, didn't realise I wasn't still logged in when I posted, and wasn't sure it warrented a new section. Matt heys 05:55, 31 January 2007 (CST)


 * Hmm, I hadn't even considered that, but yeah, it could be done. Should it still show the total profit, or only the profit/item?  For example:

!Collectible!!Qty!!Profit
 * rowspan=2 | Mandragor Swamproot || 2 || [[Image:Yes.png|16px]] +20 (+10)
 * 1 || [[Image:Yes.png|16px]] +15 (+15)
 * }
 * or only profit per:
 * }
 * or only profit per:

!Collectible!!Qty!!Profit
 * rowspan=2 | Mandragor Swamproot || 2 || [[Image:Yes.png|16px]] +10
 * 1 || [[Image:Yes.png|16px]] +15
 * }
 * It's too early in the morning yet for me to make a logical decision on that. Coffee! &mdash;Dr Ishmael [[Image:Diablo_the_chicken.gif]] (talk|contribs) 09:34, 31 January 2007 (CST)
 * I like the top one, of the two. It would not be immediately clear to people that just "profit" was profit per collectable item, rather and total per collected item.Cyrogenic 15:37, 3 February 2007 (CST)
 * Ah, right - I still need to work on this. Guess I'll just make it look like the first one then, and mention it in the page header. &mdash;Dr Ishmael [[Image:Diablo_the_chicken.gif]] (talk|contribs) 14:11, 4 February 2007 (CST)
 * I like the top one, of the two. It would not be immediately clear to people that just "profit" was profit per collectable item, rather and total per collected item.Cyrogenic 15:37, 3 February 2007 (CST)
 * Ah, right - I still need to work on this. Guess I'll just make it look like the first one then, and mention it in the page header. &mdash;Dr Ishmael [[Image:Diablo_the_chicken.gif]] (talk|contribs) 14:11, 4 February 2007 (CST)

Rename/split
Well, I discovered that the MediaWiki engine has a limit on how many templates it will evaluate per page before it gives up. Not sure what that number is, but it was halfway through the Factions mainland table. So I split it into separate articles for each campaign, which I probably should've done to start with.

I also renamed it to "Collectable trading", which sounds a little better and is simpler. &mdash;Dr Ishmael (talk|contribs)
 * Hmm.. didn't notice that template limit. Did you try including those subpages back to the main page as inclusions? -- Ab.Er.Rant (msg Aberrant80) 19:48, 1 February 2007 (CST)
 * Interesting, that does appear to circumvent it. I suppose it can work like this, although I am still worried at how much stress it may be putting on the server.  &mdash;Dr Ishmael [[Image:Diablo_the_chicken.gif]] (talk|contribs) 22:03, 1 February 2007 (CST)

Best page on the wiki
For profit, of course. Many thanks for all the effort, and we really should mainspace this. Kessel 10:29, 4 February 2007 (CST)
 * XD Thanks. The only thing holding me back from mainspacing it right now is that, in order to make the User:Dr ishmael/Profit template work, I had to use a second template, User:Dr ishmael/!, in order to interpolate the " " character into the ParserFunctions used in that template.  The ! template needs to be protected from edits as a "high risk template", a la the one at MetaWiki.  I suppose I could just ask an admin about getting that done.  &mdash;Dr Ishmael [[Image:Diablo_the_chicken.gif]] (talk|contribs) 14:09, 4 February 2007 (CST)
 * Never mind, they've already got one: | . I must've spaced out as I was searching through the Templates before.  Guess I'll be mainspacing it soon.   Just gotta figure out where to link to it from... &mdash;Dr Ishmael [[Image:Diablo_the_chicken.gif]] (talk|contribs) 19:05, 9 February 2007 (CST)

Nice Work
This is definitely very useful. In the past I decided which collectable drops to keep based on whether it could get me any useful items, and overall it seems I've luckily kept most of the valuable ones aside from Stone Summit Badges and White Mantle Emblems. This chart also clearly illustrates the increased value of Nightfall collectable drops, and therefore the increased importance of not merching them. My only suggestion for improvement is to change the header of the Profit? column to something like "Profit (profit per item)", as it wasn't immediately intuitive what the information in the brackets was. Also, I think it would be more intuitive to get rid of the "even" symbol, and just have "profitable" and "not profitable". Since if it is an even trade, that means it is not profitable, and it is easier to just merch it. You would still show that it is an even trade by placing a 0 in the profit column. This would make it easier to quickly scan the list for what to keep when selling to a merchant (which is the most useful benefit of this chart). If you don't want to get rid of the "even" classification, at least consider changing it to something less checkmark-like or make it red for an easier visual aid to indicate the things that are not worth keeping. -- BrianG 11:28, 9 February 2007 (CST)


 * Thanks again - I had no clue when I created this page that so many other people would find it useful.
 * On the "Profit" column, I was wanting to keep the header short so that it wouldn't make a reeeeeally wide column with a teeny-tiny bit of data in it. I think I came up with something that'll work, though (see page).
 * Yeah, you're probably right on the "even" trade stuff. I went ahead and removed it - it makes the template a bit simpler, which is always good for future maintenance.
 * Thanks for the suggestions! &mdash;Dr Ishmael [[Image:Diablo_the_chicken.gif]] (talk|contribs) 18:53, 9 February 2007 (CST)
 * Wow awesome, that was quick. I figured the length of the column header might be tricky.  Honestly, you could maybe consider eliminating the bracketed info since its really just simple division in your head for the profit per item, but the layout you have now looks alright as well.  You could also consider adding the gold symbol after the profit amount to make it more obvious.  Thanks a lot for implementing my suggestion regarding the "even" items, it looks really great this way.  The usefulness and clearness has been maximized, I love it. :) I support a move to the mainspace for sure. -- BrianG 19:24, 9 February 2007 (CST)


 * What about de-bolding the explanatory Profit text and removing the brackets?

!Collectible||Sell Value||Collector||Location||Qty||Item||Trade Value||Profit? total (per item)
 * }
 * I suck at design, so I'll listen to anyone's ideas on this. &mdash;Dr Ishmael [[Image:Diablo_the_chicken.gif]] (talk|contribs) 01:31, 10 February 2007 (CST)
 * That looks great! I wasn't crazy about the square brackets, this looks more elegant and clear.  Maybe you don't suck at design. :P -- BrianG 14:24, 10 February 2007 (CST)
 * Agree, this is great work and it deserves to be an article. I linked this page to the article Earning gold, so please maintain the link when you publish. &mdash;  Ali ( talk )  12:52, 17 February 2007 (CST)

It is, quite literally, excellent work. Unfortunately, Anet must have heard about this page. They have now changed nearly all elonian collectors so that their items are only worth 100 each (all items). This means that it's net 0 (or worse) profit on almost all items. Not sure about other campaigns, but so much for elonian collecting. (it may not affect all, but I clicked on a few and the pages have been updated to reflect the value change)Cyrogenic 20:02, 19 February 2007 (CST)

Vermins
Yu Lae has a profitable deal on Vermin Hides - Jill Bioskop X 21:13, 21 February 2007 (CST)
 * I must have gotten distracted at that point or something - I had her data in the template for Vermin Hides except for the trade quantity and the trade value, and the template won't print out the row if the quantity is empty. Added back in.  &mdash;Dr Ishmael [[Image:Diablo_the_chicken.gif]] (talk|contribs) 21:59, 21 February 2007 (CST)

Dude, wth...
Dude, i'm soooo impresed with this.. i just have 1 question; why did you do it? it's great but fells like a waste of time for you... anyways its nice.. Falafel 18:27, 27 April 2007 (CDT)

Outdated
This page is no longer accurate, I just took a trip through Lahtena Bog and found all the collector's trades to be worth 30g - meaning none of them give a profit and some even lose money. Either ANet nerfed collectors in a recent stealth update or it's a bug. Anyways the tables need a massive overhaul, at least for non-Prophecies collectors (which are still accurate to my knowledge)...sigh. (T/C) 23:20, 3 June 2007 (CDT)


 * * insert cries of anguish* &mdash;Dr Ishmael [[Image:Diablo_the_chicken.gif]] 10:07, 4 June 2007 (CDT)

Hey, perhaps all is not lost. I found this: Category:Profit if collected that some anon made. I went through just now and weeded out the ones that weren't profitable anymore...all the remaining entries, though, appear to still be valid. With this info, it shouldn't be hard to reconstruct your tables, just need to do some simple maths. Although I am still concerned about some of the Elonian collectables, since some of the Wiki pages still show variable values from 100-300g based on which trade-in you choose...and, iirc, none of those exist anymore. All collectors should give items of equal value now. Unfortunately, I can't check the ones in Elona past Venta Cemetery atm. (T/C) 14:20, 10 July 2007 (CDT)
 * Cool, thanks! I guess I should try to salvage what I can from this - since there are so few profitable items now, I should probably just strip it down and only show the profitable ones.  I'll go and double-check the Elona collectors through this evening and update their articles if they need it.  &mdash;Dr Ishmael [[Image:Diablo_the_chicken.gif]] 16:06, 10 July 2007 (CDT)
 * Okay, I'd like to keep this page here for posterity, so I made a new page at User:Dr ishmael/Collecting for fun and profit. &mdash;Dr Ishmael [[Image:Diablo_the_chicken.gif]] 20:27, 10 July 2007 (CDT)
 * Ah well, it was great before ANet nerfed the collectors, and still nice to keep around. I guess the good part about stripping it down to just the profitable ones, is that it becomes much easier to manage and monitor for changes. Thanks for all your hard work, even in the face of disaster :) [[Image:Entropy Sig.jpg]] (T/C) 23:31, 10 July 2007 (CDT)
 * I still feel satisfied, at least, for having done it. I've gotten used to Anet nerfing everything right after I figure it out - the AoE change came a month after I started farming Minotaurs, the Lost Strongbox was removed a couple weeks after I learned about it, the Elona collectors got nerfed a month after I finished this article...  I just /sigh and move on.   &mdash;Dr Ishmael [[Image:Diablo_the_chicken.gif]] 00:02, 11 July 2007 (CDT)
 * Why'd you put a delete notice up on the new page? Is it really obsolete already? If so that means there is no resource to use anymore :( [[Image:Entropy Sig.jpg]] (T/C) 15:58, 12 July 2007 (CDT)
 * Ah nevermind, I didn't know that you moved it to mainspace. All is well. :p [[Image:Entropy Sig.jpg]] (T/C) 16:09, 12 July 2007 (CDT)
 * Yeah, I figure I've done all I can think of with it, so I might as well release it to the masses to let them find other ways to improve it. &mdash;Dr Ishmael [[Image:Diablo_the_chicken.gif]] 16:32, 12 July 2007 (CDT)