GavinRuneblade

My vote is for a combination of lack of patience and entitlement.

I'll strongly debate that this ever changes (meaning the "at least" bit). The performance difference between level 35 IOs and level 50, comes out to be quite negligible. Slot 'em when you can. And if that extra 4 to 9 points of damage turns out to really matter, replace one later.

But by and large if you slot 35s, you're nearly the same actual enhancement as someone who slotted 50s. The only difference is you get to enjoy them for half of your characters growth, and they were complaining about expiring SOs all that time and spent tons more than you for that last couple percent of bonus.

This counts double if you do TFs and flashbacks at lower level.

As I understand it, with exemplaring there are three factors:
1. Set bonuses
2. Special IO bonuses
3. % enhancement

1 and 2 depend on the level of the IO compared to the level you exemplar to, and sometimes to the level of the power you put it in (gets confusing, the Wiki has a whole page dedicated to it somewhere that I always lose the link to and really need to bookmark). Purples and PvP sets are immune to this.

#3 only cares about your original level and exemped level and from that uses the table Positron provided (at my link above) to determine the final value. The level of the IO never plays into it. So a level 50 IO on a character exemped to 33 still gives a 42.5% bonus. But at level 30, it is lower. At level 15 it is far lower. But since it is a straight % reduction from the original value, your best bet is to get the highest starting point as possible. Or to combine a ton of really small bonuses. Purples and PvP sets ARE NOT immune to this:

That gets to "step 1" where really small bonuses don't get reduced. Hence the example in the link of using frankenslotting with level 40-ish triples and quads to have a bunch of bonuses too low to get reduced that work all the way down to level 20 at no penalty. You lose the set bonus for two Devs and three thunderstrikes up in the high 30s, but the % enhancement is not reduced.

To keep your total % intact as low as level 15 you need to have each individual bonus be less than 10%. So an Acc/Dam that gives 9.8%/9.8% would not be reduced, but one that gives 12%/12% would. For that you need this page Enhancement Relative Values.

A level 12 Acc/Dam gives 9.4%/9.4% so would give full power from level 50 to level 10. But at 18.8% is only as good as a +2 DO. A level 15 Triple gives 9.6%/9.6%/9.6% and is thus as good as a -1 SO all the way from level 10 to level 50. In theory the Salvo Quad would be a good one too, but since the fourth is Range it's only so-so. Works up to level 17 though and you can pretend it is a Triple giving you a few more options.

But in reality, it's rough to try and get full value all the way down. There just aren't enough triples to drop to level 15 without getting the hit. And they're not from great sets either. But it's probably a safer bet than using high-level sets. Problem is that there is only Salvo with ranged triples low enough. Compare:

Salvo (Dam/End/Rchg) Level 15 = 9.4%
Salvo (Acc/Dam/End/Rang) Level 17 = 9.6% (5.6% range)
Salvo (Acc/Dam) Level 12 =9.4%
Far Strike (Acc/End) Level 12 =9.4%
Far Strike (Dam/Rchg) Level 12 = 9.4%

Total: 28.4% Acc, 37.6% Dam, 28.4% End, 18.8% Rchg, 5.6% Range. Would be the same total bonus at level 10 and at level 50. And you get the almost worthless set bonuses all the way down to level 14 for both, and level 9 for Far Strike. As if anyone would really care at that point.

If you use the examples from the linked page:
At level 15 those totals are reduced TO not "by" 39% (technically .391) yielding:
36.4% Acc, 36.6% Dam, 30.0% End, 36.4% Rchg at level 15

Not a lot better, but better. You'd have no set bonuses unless you used some Purples or PvP sets in place of the ones given in the example. I only used 5 IOs in the level 15 build so in theory you could stick in the level 50 Dev Quad to squeeze a little more oomph (I think 4%-ish) out of each category.

I'm currently driving myself bonkers trying to figure this out for my BS/Regen scrapper I like to do Oroboros missions with. I think I'm coming to the conclusion that if it is below level 20, I really don't care about the % or the set bonuses.

Now the real kink in the process is this line here:

Which strongly implies that for a build aiming to exemplar extremely low, overslotting might help. Specifically, it suggests tht 250% damage at level 50 (which ED will limit to something like 106%), would turn out to be 97.75% at level 15. I'm going to test this over the weekend to see if that is actually how it works. I have a level 44 with 4 resepecs saved and an empty second build. =) No worries slotting a power with 6 level 50 damage IOs and oroborosing down to see what the final number comes out to be.

So, Paragon Wiki has it wrong? Because it looks to me like having generic level 50 IOs gives a fixed bonus all the way down to level 32.

A quote:

and examples:
Due to ED it's not a big difference in most cases, but in a lot of places you only have one or two generics and it might matter. I know I get into fights where I win or lose by a hair and those small percentages might make the difference.

All of these are issues the search engines on the web have solved and the same solutions should work. Most of the code required is available online too. Now, it would need tob e converted and tweaked to unrecognizable form for sure, but at least the method of getting past the problem already has been worked on.

"Trust" as defined by search engines (age, who is linking, etc) alone solves many of the issues.

That's true too. Bumps the price a bit. Though the low end only cost 5 to 9k to craft it jumps to 18k at level 18 and again a huge jump from 36k to 74k at 25. I still stand by my statement that they are very affordable even to a new player.

As an example, I consider myself a bit of an idiot and I was able to afford them on my very first character before level 20. I didn't even know how to tell what sets were in which category, and I didn't know there was such a thing as the market but I had about 10 IOs slotted just based on what dropped and I was able to craft from random luck plus the one level 10 I crafted doing the tutorial. I would hold an enhancement and look at what areas lit up telling me I could slot it. then I would put it into an empty spot. If I couldn't use it anywhere I deleted it because I thought you couldn't sell them.

And if I can do it, then seriously anyone can.

Looking at the Redside Market while typing this:

Level 30 Entropic Chaos Just sold two for 1,000 each. Salvage: 2 commons, 1 uncommon, 1 rare (Alien blood). Most expensive salvage: Clockwork Winder, average price 3k. Alien blood sells as low as 500 sometimes.

Maelstrom's Fury Acc/Dam from levels 20-25, sell 1 or 2 a month of each level. Price ranges from 1k to 20k. Salvage costs: about another 10k or less.

Far Strike level 19 Dam/Recharge (1 on the market right now) last 5 sales average 3k. Salvage: Clockwork Winder (3k) Simple Chemical (300), Polycarbon (700). If you drop down to the level 16 there are 4 on the market and they go for only 1k each.

Salvo Dam/End/Recharge, none under level 20 for sale right now, but they show up. Salvage is again dirt cheap, no rares, Ancient Artifact is the "expensive" one. This recipe moves between 500 and 50,000 so could be expensive if you're not patient.

Salvo Acc/Dam is available right now at every level from 10 to 20 at least one of each level. Price going from 500 to 10k, salvage is even cheaper than the triple.

There's a lot of Volley Fire on the market under level 25, nothing costs more than 25k, most of them down around 5k.

From the Market Forum's last level 10 challenge (level a new toon to 10, put all drops on the market for 1 inf, so you might lose money) the lowest income anyone had was over 100k by level 10. Should be more than enough by level 15 to buy a few IOs? And that's not counting the "free" ones that you get as loot, complete with often finding the needed salvage to craft them. Happens at least once on each character I've made. Get a couple luck charms or similar high value drops and you can easily be rolling in inf early on.

I'm not saying, build out your whole character using level 20-ish IOs. But use 'em where they fall and where you can buy 'em cheap. Why not? In the long run, even a level 20 IO is as good or better than an SO, so it will last you to 50 without being "gimpy". And they are far from expensive.

Oh sure, if you want the Salvo Quad or some of the Melee procs, they're multiple millions. But there are cheap sets that no one uses, that have recipes on the market right now in the price range of a character at level 15 to 20.

The whole point is I don't have the time. If I could solo it over the course of a month, great but I can't get the time. Pretty much ever.

But for the record, I'm on Virtue only, and I play from about 9:00pm to midnight Pacific time.

This page from the Wiki compares the levels of an IO against an SO.

An important thing to note: If you slot two level 21 Acc/Dam IOs into a power when your character is at level 18 you get a higher bonus than if you slotted one Acc SO and one Dam SO, but you can't slot SOs until level 22.

Unlike the SO, those IOs will last all the way to 50. So they not only give a higher bonus, they never expire. But way, there's more! If you bought cheap sets, they might even be less expensive! If you get them as loot they might even be "free".

Waiting until 50 or 35 while using SOs seems a little arbitrary to me. But it works for many people.

In my case, if I find it and it is worth more than an SO, I'll slot it regardless of level. After all, if it's worth more than an SO, all it does is make me stronger.