30 Hero Merit Rolls

So my new project for November -- which I can hopefully accomplish even though I'm going to try and play less and work on writing for NaNoWriMo -- is to burn 50 merits and 20 million a night on a hero merit roll, and see how much money this nets me when I craft and sell. (It's not clear to me which is the best way to make money -- random rolls, buy and craft the best rare recipe, or save up for a PvP IO. I suspect the PvP IO is the best route, but if I can hit over 2 billion with 30 merit rolls, I might reconsider that. )

For the purposes of this Experiment, I'm using my level 50 MA/WP scrapper Nina Ballerina. I can hami raid easily with her, and she already has 600 merits to start with. She's also a hero, which is not true for the two scrappers I normally play more often -- Mouse Police and Tiffany Blackheart are both vigilantes. I'm doing 35-39 rolls to begin with, but I may experiment with other levels at some point in the process too.


I started this experiment Thursday. I made sure Nina had exactly 50 million influence to begin with, and had nothing for sale. I do have some outstanding bids on Oblits on her, but if they suddenly fill I'll just e-mail the recipes to someone else to craft. Likewise for any random recipes that drop while I'm playing Nina. I was going to try and keep track of money made while running TFs and selling salvage drops and the like so I could factor that out, too, but that's kind of a pain and I screwed that up on the first day. So any money made while playing just gets added to the pool. It shouldn't make a big difference, anyway. Results so far:

Nov 4

Starting Money: 50,000,000

Hero Merit Purchase: 20,000,000 (level 35-39 roll)

Impervium Armor: Resistance (listed for 31 mil)
Gift of the Ancients: Defense (listed for 17.1 mil)
Trap of the Hunter acc/immob/rech (listed for 5.1 mil)
Aegis end/rech/res (listed for 16.1 mil)
Time & Space Manipulation +stealth (listed for 2.1 mil)

Ran: 1 Freakshow Wars

Ending Money: 17,581,246

Nov 5

SOLD:
Aegis res/end/rech for 20 mil
Inpervium Armor resist for 35 mil
Trap of the Hunter acc/immob/rech for 6.1 mil

Money: 75,181,246

Hero Merit Purchase: 20,000,000 (level 35-39 roll)

Mako's Bite dam/rech (listed for 7.1 mil)
Numina's Convalescense +recovery +regen (listed for 57 mil)
Numina's Convalescense heal/rech (listed for 31.1 mil)
Obliteration chance for smashing damage (listed for 17.2 mil)
Analyze Weakness chance for +to hit (listed for 7.1 mil)

Money after crafting/listing: 38,116,369

Nov 6

SOLD:
Obliteration chance for smashing damage for 20 million
Numina's convalescense heal/rech for 36,666,666
Numina's Convalescense +recovery +regen for 60 mil
Analyze Weakness chance for +to hit for 9 mil
Mako's Bite dam/rech for 10 mil

Money: 166,191,376

Hero Merit Purchase: 20 million influence (level 35-39 roll)

Numina's Convalescense heal/rech (listed for 37.1 mil)
Aegis +Psionic and Mez Resist (listed for 7.1 mil)
Luck of the Gambler +7.5% recharge speed (listed for 141 mil)
Devestation chance to hold (listed for 7.6 mil)
Mako's Bite chance for lethal damage (listed for 8.1 mil)

Ran Freakshow Wars twice

Ending Money: 121,495,766

I'll be interested to see how this goes. So far the numbers are just about supporting random rolls over direct buys if you ignore the LotG 7.5% (including it blows direct buys completely out of the water but given the low roll count so far it's an anomaly).

This is a really cool idea! Thanks for sharing it!

Are you sure you want to display your list prices? Some sneaky marketer might try to undercut your proft by bidding just slightly higher than what you list at. Heck, if it's close enough to the price floor they might just end up flipping it, depriving you of profit you might have gained! At the very least it'd muck up your experiment a bit.

Still, having already more then doubled your starting money in just a few days, it's probably not a huge concern!

Nov 7

SOLD:
Luck of the Gambler +7.5% recharge for 150 million
Mako's Bite chance for letal damage for 10 million
Numina's Convalescense heal/rech for 45 million
Devestation chance to hold for 10 million
Aegis +Psionic and Mez Resist for 8 million

Ran: Freakshow Wars, 2 tip misisons, Freakshow Wars

Money: 333,541,024

Hero Merit Purchase: 20 million influence (level 35-39 roll)

Luck of the Gambler +7.5% recharge speed (listed for 143 million)
Mako's Bite acc/end/rech (listed for 9.1 million)
Dark Watcher's Despair recharge/end reduction (listed for 4.1 million)
Decimation acc/end/rech (listed for 8.1 millino)
Scirocco's Dervish chance for lethal damage (listed for 8.1 million)

Ending Money: 294,603,232

Interesting experiment Organica. Just a few notes:
Assuming Lotg7.5 sells for 140 mil:
minus fee: 140 - 7 = 133
minus crafting: 133 - 5 = 128
minus merit convert fees: 128 - 40 = 88

Lotg7.5 can be bought for 2 A-merits or 100 merits + 40 mil, so:
88 mil/2 A-merits or 44 mil/1 A-merit.

Random rolls win over direct buy of Lotg7.5 if your net profit is over 44 mil a day.
With random rolls, your craft overhead is higher because you use 4x more salvage, which is dominated by 4 rares. 4 rare salvage adds between 4 mil to 8 mil in crafting cost.

11/8 marks your 5th day, so assuming 44 mil/day, you should have 220 mil in profit.

So far, the 2 Lotg7.5s that you rolled are keeping you comfortably ahead.

This thread has my interest. I have always felt that random rolls were the way to go, and I am interested to see your numbers at the end.

You seem to have been much luckier than I have on the rolls, I've rolled 10 A-merits and given up as I was making only about 6-8 million average per IO, so 30-40 million per A-merit. I rolled no LotGs, miracles, numinas and one oblit quad was the best I got.

I cashed in 30 A-merits twice for level 10 Gladiator's armor 3% defs, and sold them for 4BN each. I also cashed in one A-merit for a kinetic combat D/E and sold it for 85M, so that also was more efficient for me.

This is actually pretty interesting to watch.

One thing I'm wondering, as others have noticed, is how this experiment might go in the absence of lucking out with those LotGs. They're almost single-handedly covering the profits I think.

I've rolled maybe around ten hero merits on a toon I have who is level 38. He has somewhere around 770M I think, crafting and selling most of what I roll (excepting things like Ghost Widow, etc). I'm finding that I'm getting a bit clogged inventory-wise. I made a point of rolling as much as I could at 32, 35, and then 37. Probably a little too much, as I wanted to keep recipe slots open so I would store recipes in the auction house, which cut down on slots to buy/sell. When crafted enhancements that I post don't sell, that clogs things up further.

Salvage is also a bit of an issue, but that's more my bullheadedness. I refuse to pay 100k regularly for Alchemical Silvers (and a lot of recipes seem to take Alchemical Silvers), hate to spend AE tickets on Uncommons (Alchemical Gold!), etc. I'd rather use drops I get playing, but in the high 30s you're starting to see less and less of the salvage you need for recipes in your level range.

Anyway, I love the idea of documenting the rolls and market results and will be following along. I think you'll make out quite well.

Nov 8:

SOLD:
Scirocco's Dervish chance for lethal damage for 9 million
Mako's Bite acc/end/rech for 10 million
Luck of the Gambler +7.5% recharge speed for 150 million
Decimation acc/end/rech for 10 million

Hero Merit Purchase: 20,000,000 (level 35-39 roll)

Money: 464,733,735

Miracle +recovery
Gift of the Ancients +7.5% run speed
Mako's Bite acc/end/rech
Devestation chance to hold
Devestation dam/rech

Ran: Freakshow War & Hami Raid

Ending Money: 422,717,916

Of note: I made my Saturday merit purchase/roll at about 2 PM. I did my Sunday merit/purchase roll at 10 AM. I managed to make a merit purchase/roll (and craft and list) at 6 AM Monday morning, before I went to work. (And I somehow wasn't late.)

I made today's merit purchase & roll at 2 AM. I set my alarm clock. woke up, did the roll, crafted and listed stuff, and went back to bed. So it's already all sold (not for much though). But I'll be able to make another purchase and roll at 10 PM tonight. ^_^

Nov 9

SOLD:

Devestation dam/rech for 11 mil
Devestation chance for hold for 10 mil
Mako's Bite acc/end/rech for 12 mil

Money: 454 634 187

Hero Merit Purchase: 20,000,000 (level 35-39 roll)

Positron's Blast acc/dam/end listed for 10.2
Positron's Blast chance for energy damage listed for 7.1
Luck of the Gambler end/rech listed for 2.6
Devestation acc/dam/rech listed for 5.1
Aegis res/end/rech listed for 9.1

Ending money: 421,907,037



I listed my Miracle for slightly too much -- it hasn't sold, despite sales above my list price. I do expect the Dark Watcher's Despair to sell -- eventually. My Gift of the Ancients Defense is way overpriced for what they're currently selling for, but I suppose it'll sell eventually too. So far the only recipe that I'm convinced I never should have crafted is the TimeSpace Manipulation stealth IO. I didn't even check what that sold for before crafting it.

Also: despite some very nice "big ticket" items dropping to me, I think overall I've probably been not far off average. A lot the other stuff I've been getting has been sellable but nothing to earn big bucks on.

I did a hero merit roll on my level 33 blaster last night -- I have 180 merits on her. I got another Miracle unique and a BotZ KB IO. (And 3 items of true vendor trash -- Ghost Widow's Embrace, Pacing of the Turtle, I forget what else. Though since there were few available at level 33 I crafted and listed them anyway). Anyway I've been pretty lucky lately on those big-ticket items at least.

Hehe, thanks! Wow, I really overestimated my ability to sell that IO. (I did log in this morning and saw that it had sold!) The lesson here is to check to see what something sells for before crafting it. I crafted my Dark Watcher's Despair because I noticed that they actually sold for a bit above cost (and it has sold). I just assumed a stealth IO, even a teleport one, would be valuable enough to craft. :/

I think I'm pretty good at pricing things to sell. It's always a trick to list it high enough that you get a good sell price but low enough that it actually sells. So far my Miracle has been listed just a little too high -- people are buying them for more than mine is listed, but the sales are always going to people who listed cheaper than me. But if I list much lower, say, 136 million, I run a slight risk of it selling for only 140 million.

When I listed my Gift of the Ancients defense, they were going for 20 million or slightly more. In general defense and resist IOs go for a lot, so even though GotA is not one of the best defense IOs, I figured a listing of 17.5 mil would be good. Lately they've been going for 10 million though. :/ On the other hand, I have faith that they'll eventually go back up as soon as supply dries up.

Whether that ever happens, we'll see. Right now it seems that a lot of rare recipes are being driven down in price, probably from a lot of people doing a-merit rolls like me. ^_^ I wonder if, once they fix the most recent AE problem, if prices will drop even lower. (Working on the theory that prices for top level IOs are good when people are getting to level 50 more easily.)

Nov 9 (10 PM)

SOLD:

Aegis res/end/rech for 15 mil
Positron's Blast acc/dam/end for 14 mil
Devestation acc/dam/rech for 7 mil
Luck of the Gambler end/rech for 4 mil
Positron's Blast chance for energy damage for 7.5 million
Dark Watcher's Despair for 5 million

Money: 471,067,0037

Hero Merit Purchase: 20,000,000 (level 35-39 roll)

Positron's Blast chance for energy damage listed for 9.1 mil
Obliteration chance for smashing damage listed for 21 mil
Lockdown acc/end reduction/rech/hold listed for 5 mil
Decimation acc/end/rech listed for 10,000,001
Aegis psionic/status resistance listed for 6.1 mil

Money: 436,382,637

Nov 10

SOLD:

TimeSpace Manipulation stealt for 2.3 million (thanks Madam Pistacio!)
Miracle +recovery for 150 million
Lockdown acc/end reduction/rech/hold for 6 million
Decimation acc/end/rech for 15 million
Aegis psionic/status resistance for 8 million

Ran: Hami Raid, Freakshow Wars

Money: 609.069,184

8th Hero Merit Purchase: 20,000,000 (level 35-39 roll)

Lockdown chance for +2 mag hold listed for 3.1 mil
Guassian's Synchronized Fire-Control rech/end reduction listed for 42 mil
Mako's Bite acc/end/rech listed for 8.1 mil
Lockdown acc/end/rech/hold listed for 4.6 mil
Stupefy chance for knockback listed for 3.1 mil

Money: 576 217 234

Gonna list tonight's roll because the good stuff has already sold.

Nov 11

SOLD:

Mako's Bite acc/end/rech for 10 million
Lockdown acc/end red/rech/hold for 6 million
Gif of the Ancients defense for 20 million
Gaussian's Synchronized Fire-Control recharge/end reduction for 44,444,444
Lockdown chance for +2 mag hold for 5 million
Stupefy chance for knockback for 5 million

Money: 661,517,234

9th Hero Merit Purchase: 20,000,000 (level 35-39 roll)

Scirocco's Dervish acc/dam/end listed for 10.5 mil
Numina's Convalescense heal/rech listed for 36 mil
Mako's Bite acc/end/rech listed for 7.6 mil
Force Feedback rech/end listed for 2.6 mil
Edict of the Master damage listed for 5,000,001

Money: 628,241,834

SOLD WITHIN TEN MINUTES:

Scirocco's Dervish acc/dam/end for 12 million
Numina's Convalescence heal/rech for 45 million
Mako's Bite acc/end/rech for 9 million

Money: 690,346,834