Talk:Key farming

Is it worth it?

I just tried and it took me about one hour to finish the lvl 10 story. In the meantime, a friend did all three paths of CoF and earned more than enough gold to buy himself a key from the Trading Post... -- Crazy (talk) 07:51, 14 August 2015 (UTC)

probably it'd be even more efficient to work in real life for an hour (>$5) + get the equivalent of 400 gems per hour... or 3 keys. -Chieftain Alex 08:14, 14 August 2015 (UTC)

Not the same, it's not gaming (plus not applicable if you have fixed hours)^^ -- Crazy (talk) 11:16, 14 August 2015 (UTC)

I work for a little more than R$6.50/hour, but if I consider exchange rate to dollar ($5 = R$16.00)... (roughly 1:3.2). Economy is golden, you know. >.> – Valento ^msg 11:45, 14 August 2015 (UTC)

I sometimes get tired of dungeons and... active game stuff, so I'll sometimes just sit 'n do this mindless task while watching a movie or something. Also. It shouldn't take you an hour.. o.O Flakkenmarsh (talk) 15:00, 14 August 2015 (UTC)

Absolutely not. It takes me max. 40min (if I'm very bad), but most of the times it's 30-ish min. Some people say they do in 20min. – Valento ^msg 17:07, 14 August 2015 (UTC)

Maybe because it was my first run ? ^^ I used a spare scroll of 'direct to lvl 20' though. -- Crazy (talk) 07:36, 15 August 2015 (UTC)

Then it definitely shouldn't've taken you an hour.. The 20 mins mentioned by Valento is how long it takes to get to 10 AND do the story. O.o Flakkenmarsh (talk) 07:41, 15 August 2015 (UTC)

And that's quite difficult to make it in 20min., you must use all movement skills and have that Executioner Outfit scythe toy (I don't have it, and I'm lazy anyways). I'd say 35-ish is average. – Valento ^msg 12:18, 15 August 2015 (UTC)

Feedback 2015/08/15

I just ran a key run. didn't pay much attention at the time but after thinking back, when i used my instant lvl 20 scroll i don't believe there was a mini wxp given out anymore. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 67.8.157.45 (talk • contribs) at 08:28, 15 August 2015‎ (UTC).

They no longer give that item as a reward at level 18. Instead, it's given at level 31. We're in the process of gathering the new leveling info at [[Level rewards/research]]. If you happen to notice any other missing information, please let us know. Thanks! G R E E N E R 09:01, 15 August 2015 (UTC)

Level 40 key farm

Does anyone have an idea of what story arcs are the fastest for the level 40 key? I've decided that since we're getting level 30 scrolls I may as well level up 10 more times and get the second story key. If not, I'll just have a muck around with it and see what happens for each arc. ~Miss Lana 00:31, 31 August 2015 (UTC)

I've found that the fastest route is doing the "standard" human commoner level 10 farm, then going with a "Missed Opportunity" (chosen in character creation), as the instances involved are close and easy to get to, though they do have a lot of unskippable dialogue. "Infiltrate the Meeting" is a MUCH faster instance than confronting Uzolan in his workshop. For the level 30 stories I go Priory (can run directly to the children, no waiting for mob spawns) > Vigil (can run straight to the end with this one) > Priory (This one is faster to get to, I'm not entirely sure if it's faster than the Whispers instance though), then choose whichever for the last instance, as it has no real effect except what order gives you a choice of their weapons. Then I craft cooking til level 40 and grab the second key. All you have to do is get to LA and skip through dialogue and a cutscene. Ambling through this takes me maybe 2 hours, but I'm not intensely speed running it (no point anymore anyway). I'd say that's not bad for a fair bit of loot, some spirit shards, an order weapon of your choice and two keys.~Miss Lana 11:45, 1 December 2015 (UTC)

from a reddit thread, https://www.reddit.com/r/Guildwars2/comments/9rwy5x/most_useful_things_you_can_buy_with_gems/e8lkba1/

When also going for the level 40 and 60 keys and the level 64 sigil of nullification, I'd extend that with the choices: Lost sister. Confront captain. The Orders of Tyria Priory : Mortus Virge Vigil: Triskell Quay Priory: Speaker of the Dead Pick order: Whispers - The Trap Extract Demmi: Dampener spell - They Went Thataway (can be done just running around to the end without fighting at all) Helping Hands: Hylek Chosen of the Sun

also, i'd like to add that charr level 20 personal story rewards can include 6 of their tier 3 cultural weapon skins.

guardian, revenant, elementalist, mesmer, necromancer: Adamant Guard Staff (skin) from Avenger's Staff

warrior, guardian: Adamant Guard Greatsword (skin) from Avenger's Longsword

warrior, guardian, revenant: Adamant Guard Hammer (skin) from Avenger's Hammer

warrior, ranger: Adamant Guard Bow (skin) from Avenger's Longbow

ranger, thief: Adamant Guard Short Bow (skin) from Avenger's Short Bow

engineer: Adamant Guard Rifle (skin) from Avenger's Rifle

total value is 378k karma, so it's worthwhile to play through charr story for those. i'm not positive about the quickest story options, but it's probably blood legion/honorless gladium. --Vm0d (talk) 13:42, 28 October 2018 (UTC)

To expand on that theme, the level 30 personal story rewards include your choice of any faction weapon: Vigil's Honor weapons, Priory's Historical weapons, and Whisper's Secret weapons. There's 57 in total, but if you're in it for the long haul, you can save about 240 gold all told. The levelup rewards between 30 and 40 include some free boosters, which are no longer available from daily rewards. SarielV 04:23, 28 November 2018 (UTC)

Drop Rate Research

Should we start a drop rate research page for this now? Given that the drop rate was to be increased. While partied with a guild member they received a key as a drop so I know it was increased at least very slightly. I say slightly because they (guild member) only had 80% MF while I was at 243% MF and did not receive a key in over an hour of play. Even though I did receive 3 rare items.Seth Moonshadow (talk) 05:17, 16 September 2015 (UTC)

Unfortunately, in order to calculate the drop rate we would need to tabulate all drops across a large swath of characters (or from a single account for a very, very long time). We would then have to parse out the possible effects due to magic find, note the emphasis. How long you play should have no effect on the drop-rate. G R E E N E R 05:29, 16 September 2015 (UTC)

Scheduled or dynamic weekly reset?

If anyone has found any information about the reset time for the new 1 key per week nerf, or is also testing to find it, please comment here. The way I see it there are really only 2 possibilities, either it is a timer that counts down to a scheduled reset time just like a once per day crafted item, and it does not matter when you get the key inside that "week" it will always reset at the same time each week. (presumably started when this patch went live, or the first daily reset thereafter) Or a dynamic timer is started for 1 week when an account gets a key, this being the less likely to be the case as it is much less fair than the scheduled reset. I will be testing this on Wednesday, Sept. 30th, which will be the third week this nerf has been in effect. Key #1: 9/16 reset - 1.25hrs, Key #2: 9/26 reset - 3.95hrs. --Skekzyz (talk) 17:15, 27 September 2015 (UTC)

per the comment at the bottom of this talk page, the reset time is likely to be 00:00 between Saturday and Sunday. -Chieftain Alex 17:41, 27 September 2015 (UTC)

So far that fits for me, I'll try again Saturday the 3rd (U.S. timezones) after reset to confirm this. Key #3: 9/30 reset - 4.5hrs. --Skekzyz (talk) 19:36, 30 September 2015 (UTC)

US Central Time ('day' resets at 6pm); got key on Wednesday, deleted old and prepared a new character on Sat, finished the final "The Commander" on Sunday 1pm and got no key. If I recall this has worked in the past. 6:35pm (which is next day), no key. llandale (talk) 00:41, 11 January 2016 (UTC)

The reset time may have changed or any number of changes to this may be undocumented as of yet. I too have just gotten screwed out of a key when I thought I had one coming after the supposed Saturday (US time-zones) reset that originally appeared to be accurate, and had not failed me since that 9/16/15 key mentioned in the first post. The last ten (10) keys I've gotten were: (- is before daily reset, + is after)

11/5/15 -

11/13/15 -

11/20/15 -

11/24/15 +

12/5/15 -

12/11/15 -

12/19/15 -

12/25/15 -

12/31/15 -

1/7/16 +

The failed attempt was 1/10/16 +, I will try again 1/14/16 after reset. --Skekzyz (talk) 04:22, 13 January 2016 (UTC)

Perhaps there is a 7 day cool-down instead of a reset. llandale (talk) 02:41, 15 January 2016 (UTC)

Feedback 2016/05/29

If it would be possible to have a countdown to the next reset (Monday at 8:30), and a stopwatch counting up from the last reset (up to 7 days and then resetting). Just to help people know how much time they have to do them. Having to deal with changing times can be difficult. For example, does 8:30 on Monday mean Sunday after the 8:00 reset, or Monday after Monday's reset at 8:00. I would put the timers in, as well as a few other places, but I don't know how. If you could do 1 example, if it's possible, then I could add it elsewhere if I think it would be helpful.

--173.66.126.33 10:49, 30 May 2016 (UTC)

I see that the 08:30 UTC time wasn't using {{UTC time}}, which I have corrected. If your timezone is not +0 hours UTC, then it should now show a set of brackets () after the UTC time with 08:30 UTC converted into your local time according to your PC.

In terms of what it means, it means that if you were to complete a key rewarding mission at 08:28 AM Monday morning, and a further mission at 08:31 AM Monday morning (3 minutes later), then you would qualify for 2 keys. -Chieftain Alex 11:11, 30 May 2016 (UTC)

edit, if your timezone offset is > 8 hours, then the template should also display "the previous day" or something like that. -Chieftain Alex 11:11, 30 May 2016 (UTC)

Feedback 2016/07/30

maguuma burl now lvl 80 item. --88.192.246.4 08:47, 30 July 2016 (UTC)

Edited out, thanks for the feedback! —Ventriloquist 10:45, 30 July 2016 (UTC)

Bug in Human Story since Sept 2017 Release of Path of Fire expansion

If you do the Human Story for keys and choose the Hospital you won't be able to complete it currently without the help of a ranger pet. Since the release of the 2nd expansion and the introduction of mounts, Anet has had to put in some invisible walls as mounts could get to places that they should not. However this has caused some invisible walls to "shift" or be "pushed over" to places they were not supposed to go (Do not quote me on this but this is what I have read). Due to this there is an invisible wall just before the door of the hospital. I am told this can also be seen in human home instances. Not just limited to the story itself. You can see the progress of if it is fixed or not here: Known Issue Tracker. For the time being choose Orphanage. KatieBoom (talk) 22:02, 9 October 2017 (UTC)

=This is no longer the case. I have been doing key farms for at least 6 weeks in a row and have done the Hospital choice. There was one time when a patch reverted the wall but Anet fixed it. I just did the Hospital today. --Justaplayer (talk) 03:57, 5 March 2018 (UTC)

Order for speed?

It may be helpful to see a rough idea of the order of 'speediness' for races/classes for those of us that like to change it up, if anyone could put such a list up.. e.g. Human Warrior (/'heavy'), Norn Guardian, etc.. That kind of thing :) Honnaja (talk) 13:07, 22 January 2019 (UTC)

Fastest story

Might be good to do some checking on which is fastest after the release of mounts, as I feel this makes a bit of a difference. My personal preference is Norn Warrior with "Guard the Mists" which takes me about 17 minutes with beetle. -Chieftain Alex 11:57, 6 May 2019 (UTC)

Correction, 16 minutes. -Chieftain Alex 22:15, 2 June 2019 (UTC)

I know I'm late but ~18 minutes for Human Warrior with "Commoner". Almdudler (talk) 19:04, 3 December 2020 (UTC)

Guardian human commoner 15-18 min depending on how attentive I am.~Sime 19:50, 3 December 2020 (UTC)

Open chest with BL Key on level 10/40/60 character or a different character?

I have heard that it is best to open BL chests not with the character you got the key on but a different character that is a certain level. Is this true and if so, what level? --KatieBoom (talk) 18:29, 5 September 2021 (UTC)

I believe you've misheard: that's something people only do for opening bags of gear. If you do it on a lower level toon, you get lower level mats which are better for selling usually(what level that is, I don't know). It doesn't matter what character or level you open a black lion chest on. - Do_odleplex 19:21, 5 September 2021 (UTC)

Optimal Weapon

Isn't a dreambound weapon better than a lv10 mighty? Ventaurion (talk) 07:58, 21 June 2022 (UTC)

Looking at the stats of the level 10 mighty greatsword (+16 Power) and the Bloodbound weapons (I assume you meant those, since Dreambound weapons aren't obtainable/available anymore) (+18 Power, +13 Precision, +13 Ferocity, see also this image: File:User Almdudler BloodboundLevel10.jpg) the Bloodbound weapons are indeed better, but they do not offer upgrade slots, which means you can't use Minor Sigil of Justice (+3% dmg vs outlaws) and Minor Sigil of Bloodlust (+2 power per stack, +50 power max.), which means even with just 1 stack of bloodlust a level 10 mighty greatsword has the same amount of power as the bloodbound weapon. Yes, you loose the 13 Precision and Ferocity but that should be outweight by the percentage vs outlaws and the much higher power potential, but do not cite me on that, I did not make any calculations, just looking at the raw stats, Almdudler (talk) 17:59, 24 June 2022 (UTC)

I actually meant the dreambound weapons. At lv 10, the GS has 174-192 damage, +22 power, +15 precision, and +15 ferocity (but no sigil slot). Just because it's no longer obtainable doesn't mean we should ignore it, right? (The main page lists Polla as an option, but that's no longer obtainable either.) Ventaurion (talk) 05:12, 30 June 2022 (UTC)