What Is The Deal With Elonian Treasure? - Page 2 - Guild Wars Forums

Parson Brown · May 13, 2008, 12:58 PM // 12:58

Just did my May run through the chests. Now, I have 4 characters through NF and 5 who I just got to the Sanctuary so they could run the first 2 treasures on the mainland.

I noticed that the characters who finished NF (and have access to all the chests) got 400-700g and a purple while the others got 1k+ and usually a gold. One got a sapphire drop.

I run all the chests available to each character every month, skipping a couple that take too long to get to.

One exception: My mesmer who finished NF got a diamond from the Mirror of Lyss.

Maybe it's the total number of treasures collected and not the number of times you've hit a particular one.

fusa · May 13, 2008, 01:38 PM // 13:38

I've been opening them for over a year, and still think its worth it. I'm getting all purples but with 10 characters at the end or finished with NF that means 120 treasures opened. Usually get a few diamonds/sapphires/rubies and around 100k gold, not bad for a weekend of running.

Hanok Odbrook · May 15, 2008, 05:14 PM // 17:14

There are still many theories in regards to the treasures as we can see here and on both GW wikis on the subject. What I have concluded is based upon my observations of taking 20 different characters from two different accounts on treasure runs since they were added to the game.

1) There is a 30 day timer on the chests. When this timer resets is currently unproven. Based on what I have observed since the treasures were instituted, the timer resets 30 days from when any one character on an account completes a campaign. Therefore, if one character opens a chest on May 15th, and a completely different character completes any campaign on the 16th, the treasures can be farmed again on June 16th. If all characters on an account have completed every campaign, the treasures simple reset 30 days after being opened.
a) The timer is cumulative, therefore checking a treasure before it resets adds another 30 days to the time left. For example, if the last treasure you checked will not reset for 15 more days, and you check that treasure anyway, you then have to wait 45 days before is resets.

2) At some point, the treasures where changed to degrade in value over time. Each of my characters made many runs to the Istan treasures, and only with the last three recorded runs have I noticed a significant drop in the amount of gold and type of item with each run. This happens regardless of how much time has passed between runs. This degradation is character based.

3) Even treasures a character has not yet opened is affected by the degradation. However, I have noticed these treasures seem to be less affected than ones that have been opened many times. This leads me to believe that the formula used bases the degradation on two factors – total number of treasures opened by a character, and total number of times each treasure has been opened. Therefore, each time you open a treasure, it immediately downgrades every treasure in the game, and that particular treasure is downgraded even more.
a) Strictly as an example: let's say a new character opens the Issnur Isles treasure for the first time. For every treasure thereafter, even though they have never been opened by this character, the value of the gold and drops is reduced by 1%, however the II treasure is reduced even further, by another 1%. So, after opening your first treasure, all others are reduced by 1% and the first one by 2%. Opening the next treasure reduces all others by another 1%, and that particular one by an additional 1% for opening it. Now, with both the II and MK treasures open, the downgrade would look like this:
1)All Kournan and later treasures are downgraded by 2%. The Istan treasures are
downgraded by 3%. Waiting until they reset and checking again reduces the value of
the Kournan and later treasures to 4% total, and the Istan treasures to 6% total, etc.

Based on what I have observed with my most recent treasure run, it is best to leave all treasures untouched until a character can access all of them. Once that happens, it is best to run all treasures within a short span of time (even a single sitting if possible) starting with the ones accessible at the end of Nightfall and finishing with those on Istan for each run made. This way, you can take full advantage of the higher returns of the latter treasures as much as possible.

Hanok Odbrook

Angelica · May 16, 2008, 12:54 AM // 00:54

Now I understand why some of my characters got a purple item when getting to a treasure for the first time ever! :O

Parson Brown · May 16, 2008, 12:40 PM // 12:40

Quote:

Originally Posted by Hanok Odbrook

math stuff

Only problem with this is that by these numbers, chests should be completely empty in about 9 months, unless there's some minimum treasure value above zero.

Elusive of SoLD · May 16, 2008, 04:59 PM // 16:59

I did 2-3 clean sweeps of these hidden treasures, made some very good money and gold drops. Then, all of a sudden, no more, poor money and purple at best.. I stopped after that. Probably everyone was doing the same thing so GW said no more.

isamu kurosawa · May 16, 2008, 05:46 PM // 17:46

Its because lyssa hates you.

Brian Fellow · May 16, 2008, 08:44 PM // 20:44

I wonder if anyone got a bolt of silk as a drop from it since it drops rare materials.

Hanok Odbrook · May 17, 2008, 12:08 PM // 12:08

Quote:

Originally Posted by Parson Brown

Only problem with this is that by these numbers, chests should be completely empty in about 9 months, unless there's some minimum treasure value above zero.

The numbers I used were strictly as an example. I am sure the actual degradation percentage is much less. However, I have experienced a 68% drop in treasure value for treasures farmed the most compared to a 32% drop for the ones first opened on the last run.

I should also add that the amount of gold seems more affected than the item drop. Though I have has several characters receive nothing but purples, they seemed to be valued at 100 gp or better at the merchant, and on a couple of occassions, still received a gem or a gold drop on a character who farmed almost as much as the all purple characters. So the item drops might downgrade slightly less than the gp amount.

Hanok Odbrook

ElinoraNeSangre · May 17, 2008, 03:49 PM // 15:49

Quote:

Originally Posted by Hanok Odbrook

This happens regardless of how much time has passed between runs. This degradation is character based.

We actually don't know that for sure, about the time passed between runs. It's very possible that if you leave a year (or more) between runs, the degradation might not happen. I don't really know either way, but I'm just hesitant to make too many assumptions.

strcpy · May 18, 2008, 06:03 AM // 06:03

Quote:

Originally Posted by ElinoraNeSangre

We actually don't know that for sure, about the time passed between runs. It's very possible that if you leave a year (or more) between runs, the degradation might not happen. I don't really know either way, but I'm just hesitant to make too many assumptions.

I now only do chest runs if I happen to need some stuff. All my characters have access to the chests they will ever have access too so no real reason to wait.

I have not seen any "improvement" for time between the chests. I recently opened them whilst doing the final part of my skill hunter title - I figured if I am going by them might as well open them. It has been many months since I did so - all purples and little gold.

While it may be the case that in another 3 days they would all have been gold I have found that only the amount of chests opened (after the first time I opened said chest) effects drops. Time in between only affects if they reset. But then I don't really know for sure - though I can tell you for my dervish roughly 6-8 months between opening them didn't do anything, nor did any of my other characters open any in that time (I do them all in one go).

Shyft the Pyro · May 18, 2008, 06:59 AM // 06:59

Quote:

Originally Posted by Brian Fellow

I wonder if anyone got a bolt of silk as a drop from it since it drops rare materials.

It's gems, not rare materials. The treasures may give you a Diamond, Ruby, or Sapphire instead of an item drop, which is probably the best thing you can get if you've popped all the treasures 10 times or so.

I have a long-standing (and never substantiated) theory that the player who comes back to doing anything in the game after a long absence will get better drops. I believe the gradual reduction in Hard Mode golds people reported after HM was introduced and the similar degradation of treasure drops both point in this direction, but all I can offer is this guess: the random generation code in Guild Wars is a bit too sophisticated for its own good. I believe the mechanism attempts to balance/average out reward, so it checks the logs of what the player was previously assigned, similarly to the way the anti-farming code "knows" when you zone into the same area a large number of times in a short period. My guess is that the logs are deleted after a while, and when the loot-assigning mechanism attempts to check non-existing logs, it defaults to the values of 0 instead. Problem is, the code tries to balance things out in the long run, which means the player suddenly receives an influx of drops to make up for the 0s.

Again, the above is just a theory, but I believe my explanation (trying to keep things balanced) is more plausible than one by Hanok Odbrook (nerfing the drops on purpose). There's no such thing as random generation for a computer program; the values have to be entered in at one point or another, and a code to retrieve these values written so that the program's output is perceived to be random and fair by the human user. A streak of "average" rewards with a tangible chance of an "awesome" reward is how gambling sucks people in, and a similar mechanic - as applied to loot distribution - is how people get sucked into games like Guild Wars.

I don't know enough coding or game theory to definitively say this is precisely what's going on here, but that's my best guess.

May 13, 2008, 12:58 PM // 12:58	#21
Parson Brown Wilds Pathfinder Join Date: Apr 2006 Location: In ur base... Guild: The one true [Hope] Profession: E/	Just did my May run through the chests. Now, I have 4 characters through NF and 5 who I just got to the Sanctuary so they could run the first 2 treasures on the mainland. I noticed that the characters who finished NF (and have access to all the chests) got 400-700g and a purple while the others got 1k+ and usually a gold. One got a sapphire drop. I run all the chests available to each character every month, skipping a couple that take too long to get to. One exception: My mesmer who finished NF got a diamond from the Mirror of Lyss. Maybe it's the total number of treasures collected and not the number of times you've hit a particular one.

May 13, 2008, 01:38 PM // 13:38	#22
fusa Krytan Explorer Join Date: Mar 2007	I've been opening them for over a year, and still think its worth it. I'm getting all purples but with 10 characters at the end or finished with NF that means 120 treasures opened. Usually get a few diamonds/sapphires/rubies and around 100k gold, not bad for a weekend of running.

May 15, 2008, 05:14 PM // 17:14	#23
Hanok Odbrook Wilds Pathfinder Join Date: May 2005 Location: Tyria Guild: Real Millennium Group Profession: Mo/N	There are still many theories in regards to the treasures as we can see here and on both GW wikis on the subject. What I have concluded is based upon my observations of taking 20 different characters from two different accounts on treasure runs since they were added to the game. 1) There is a 30 day timer on the chests. When this timer resets is currently unproven. Based on what I have observed since the treasures were instituted, the timer resets 30 days from when any one character on an account completes a campaign. Therefore, if one character opens a chest on May 15th, and a completely different character completes any campaign on the 16th, the treasures can be farmed again on June 16th. If all characters on an account have completed every campaign, the treasures simple reset 30 days after being opened. a) The timer is cumulative, therefore checking a treasure before it resets adds another 30 days to the time left. For example, if the last treasure you checked will not reset for 15 more days, and you check that treasure anyway, you then have to wait 45 days before is resets. 2) At some point, the treasures where changed to degrade in value over time. Each of my characters made many runs to the Istan treasures, and only with the last three recorded runs have I noticed a significant drop in the amount of gold and type of item with each run. This happens regardless of how much time has passed between runs. This degradation is character based. 3) Even treasures a character has not yet opened is affected by the degradation. However, I have noticed these treasures seem to be less affected than ones that have been opened many times. This leads me to believe that the formula used bases the degradation on two factors – total number of treasures opened by a character, and total number of times each treasure has been opened. Therefore, each time you open a treasure, it immediately downgrades every treasure in the game, and that particular treasure is downgraded even more. a) Strictly as an example: let's say a new character opens the Issnur Isles treasure for the first time. For every treasure thereafter, even though they have never been opened by this character, the value of the gold and drops is reduced by 1%, however the II treasure is reduced even further, by another 1%. So, after opening your first treasure, all others are reduced by 1% and the first one by 2%. Opening the next treasure reduces all others by another 1%, and that particular one by an additional 1% for opening it. Now, with both the II and MK treasures open, the downgrade would look like this: 1)All Kournan and later treasures are downgraded by 2%. The Istan treasures are downgraded by 3%. Waiting until they reset and checking again reduces the value of the Kournan and later treasures to 4% total, and the Istan treasures to 6% total, etc. Based on what I have observed with my most recent treasure run, it is best to leave all treasures untouched until a character can access all of them. Once that happens, it is best to run all treasures within a short span of time (even a single sitting if possible) starting with the ones accessible at the end of Nightfall and finishing with those on Istan for each run made. This way, you can take full advantage of the higher returns of the latter treasures as much as possible. Hanok Odbrook

May 16, 2008, 12:54 AM // 00:54	#24
Angelica Krytan Explorer Join Date: Jan 2006 Location: Aussie land Profession: Me/E	Now I understand why some of my characters got a purple item when getting to a treasure for the first time ever! :O

May 16, 2008, 04:59 PM // 16:59	#26
Elusive of SoLD Frost Gate Guardian Join Date: Nov 2007 Location: England Guild: SoLD Profession: Mo/Me	I did 2-3 clean sweeps of these hidden treasures, made some very good money and gold drops. Then, all of a sudden, no more, poor money and purple at best.. I stopped after that. Probably everyone was doing the same thing so GW said no more.

May 16, 2008, 05:46 PM // 17:46	#27
isamu kurosawa Desert Nomad Join Date: Nov 2005 Location: United Kingdom Profession: Me/	Its because lyssa hates you.

May 16, 2008, 08:44 PM // 20:44	#28
Brian Fellow Lion's Arch Merchant Join Date: Feb 2006 Guild: [STAR] Profession: Rt/	I wonder if anyone got a bolt of silk as a drop from it since it drops rare materials.