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Adventures with Stat Tomes

Although I am generally opposed to spending real money to improve my characters, I decided I might spend a few of my accumulated Turbine Points for some stat tomes. My storage alt was holding a few dozen tomes I had accumulated, but of course there were missing ones, and you can’t use a stat tome until you have all the lower tiers of that stat. I had some duplicates I could sell to raise gold, but I expected it was going to cost me a lot of gold unless I wanted to spend a lot of TP.

Stat Tome Basics

Using a stat tome permanently adds some amount of a stat to your character. The stats available are Agility, Might, Will, Vitality and Fate. Tiers I through VI add 15, tier VII adds 30, and tiers VIII and higher add 40. If you have forgotten what tomes you have used, look at your skill window (“k”), Passive tab, Attribute Enhancements. If you mouse over a tome, it will be red if you haven’t yet used the next lower tier tome.

Stat tomes come from a variety of places. They may be in lootboxes or my drop in instances and battles, in which case they can be sold or traded. They may be in Hobbit Presents (I have seen tiers I to VIII), in which case they are bound to account The Sack of Presents you get for the Yule Festival daily quest may contain tier I tomes that are bound to account.

Tiers X to XII are more common, perhaps because they drop from battles. Lower tier numbers are rarer. I was quite surprised to have an Agility VII and a Vitality VIII drop on the same day (after this was all over), running the Sammath Gûl featured instance on two different characters.

My observation is that Vitality is most in demand (fewer on AH at higher prices) and Fate is least, with the others in between. The rarer tomes fetch 150-400g, the most common ones 20-100g. The market is thin, so you can pick up a bargain if a seller is impatient, or you can make a lot if the buyer has a lot of gold and is impatient. Players will also try to buy or sell using world chat.

Tier 1 tomes can be purchased from the Mithril Traders in the starting areas for 30 Mithril Coins. Depending on the quantity and discount when you bought the MC for TP, this can be much cheaper than buying the tomes for TP in the in-game store. The regular price is 295 TP. If you buy I-V as a bundle, you save 12%. They are periodically featured in the weekly sale at 20% off (236 TP).

Deciding to Buy

During the recent sale, I decided to see what I could get for my 3 characters. Earlier, I had parlayed my accumulated tomes into Agility I-XII for Michaleo. I figured I could use Fate for Michaleo, Vitality and Might for Nodread, and Will for Wrytune. Although Vitality is in theory useful for anyone, because it gives only 3 Morale per point of Vitality for non-tanks, it is harder to justify. Although Fate is also potentially useful for any class, it is more important for hunters, who need Critical Rating for more damage and In Combat Power Regeneration especially in blue line.

I had 23 tomes I had accumulated through drops, but I needed about that many more to fill in gaps.  I had about 5 duplicates of the expensive ones, so I figured I would “trade” those by using the gold I got by selling them to buy ones I needed.

I rationalized spending a large amount of gold on stat tomes because I had worked to accumulate Anfalas Star-lit Crystals and Essence Reclamation Scrolls during the Farmer’s Faire. I estimated the 22 crystals and 28 scrolls would save me about 3500g, so I decided that was my budget. To keep me honest, I did the buying and selling in a storage alt so I could see how I was doing. On the last day of the sale, assuming there were only a few still missing, I would spend TP to fill in the gaps.

Buying and Selling

The first ones I bought were the more common ones. There was usually more than one for sale, so I could get an idea of a fair price, and because they were more common, they were cheaper. I waited a couple days, watching the prices, before posting the ones I wanted to sell.  If I hadn’t seen any of a particular tome for sale, I posted at a higher price. If there were other sellers, I posted at a competitive price.

Once I had an idea of the prices, I would buy if they looked reasonable. Over time, it became clear that Vitality was going to be harder and more expensive to get. There were fewer for sale, and sellers were often asking 300-400g, whereas other tomes were in the 150-250g range. It was necessary to check the auction house frequently, as some tomes sold quickly. Once I saw a tome that I wanted, but it was bought before I could switch to a character with enough gold to buy it.

A few sellers would not have a buyout price. This causes a problem, since if I bid on it, then see one with a lower buyout, I could end up with an extra one to sell. Worse, if I pass up one with a higher buyout, I could get outbid and end up with nothing. My worst case was Will VI. I hadn’t seen one for sale until one was posted with no buyout. I had to log on early so I could place a bid in the final hour, and then had to sit on the auction house to be sure I didn’t get outbid. It was a lot of effort, but at that point it was the only one I needed to get to Will XIII.

On the last day, I bought a Fate V for 225g, which was high for Fate, but it was the last one I needed to get to Fate XII. The most I paid for a planned purchase was 250g for a Vitality VII. I paid 265g for a Vitality XIV, which seemed like a bargain, since I had a Vitality XIII.

The Day of Reckoning

On the last day of the sale, I took stock. I had filled in the gaps for Nodread’s Might XII and Wrytune’s Will XIII. For Michaleo, I hadn’t seen a Fate VI all week, and that was all I needed to get to XII. For Nodread, I was still missing Vitality III, VI and VIII. There was an VIII available for 400g, but I was close to my budget limit.

So I bought the 4 remaining tomes in the store for 236 TP each.

I ended up spending 4358g for tomes I bought, and made 854g for the ones I sold, yielding a net cost of 3504g, which was close to my budget (despite buying the extra Vitality XIV). The 944 TP for the ones I bought in the store was OK, especially considering that 3 of them were Vitality. If I had been willing to wait longer and not buy any in the store, I estimate I could have eventually found those 4 for around 1000g more.

How much are these stat tomes really worth? Getting to Agility, Might or Will XII gave me 320 of the stat, about a 5% boost, which is about two essences of the stat. (It doesn’t include the extra mastery or morale in the tier 8 supreme essences.) Getting to Vitality XIV gave me 2000 morale (for guardians, wardens and beornings), also about a 5% boost, which is about 2 essences of morale.

If I hadn’t earned the scrolls and crystals during the festival, I would have needed to spend gold to get them, since they are required to upgrade essence gear and max my LIs, and those are more important than a little better stats. Fortunately, I had accumulated enough gold through my various enterprises to have it to spend on stat tomes. I spent about two months’ worth of VIP TP. It would have taken a year’s worth, if I had bought all the ones I needed in the store instead of spending gold.

You’ll have to reach your own conclusion about whether it is worth your gold, TP, time and effort to get stat tomes.

by Michaleo on 2016-09-26 05:53:11