Armorsmith Archive
Thread: FYI ...Armor Pricing Guide (Armor Type Comparison) ...Step 1
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RonneLykell
Thu Aug 12, 2004 5:01 am
#1
I've been trying to put most of the main armor types into perspective, with respect to organic/inorganic
ratios. These are by no meanssuggested prices for your armor. Rather...they're a basic comparison
of how much certain types of armor should cost in relation to the other types.
Conditions:
1) I gave every Inorganic (IE...mineable) Resource a value of 5 credits per unit.
*I understand this is probably low...particularly for older, cherished resources
2) I gave every Organic (IE...pay scouts to gather it for you) Resource a value of 30 credits per unit.
*30:1 ...yeah right!!! Seems like to have to offer at least 50:1 to generate any interest these days
3) I gave components the following values:
A) Fiberplast Panels - 30 credits each
B) Synthetic Cloth - 60 credits each
C) Reinforced Fiber Panels - 90 credits each
D) Armor Padding - 625 credits each (5 inorganic (5x5 = 25)and 20 organic (20x30 = 600))
Limitations:
1) These are base sets with no layers or extra components added to the segments
2) I did not crunch the numbers for Bone, Tantel, Mabari, or RIS Armor
3) This does not take into account:
A) Resources and components wasted during schematic experimentation
B) Power and Maintenance of Factories
C) Maintenance of storage facilities
D) Maintenance of vendors
E) The most valuable resource of them all - your time
4) The resource prices in the conditions are probably a bit low, depending on what you've been paying,
but they serve in this case as a conservative constant for a very basic comparisonacross the set
types. I personally value some of myresources from 3:1 on up to 200:1
Plugging the conditions into the following armortype resource requirements:
1) Composite - 19,805 Credits per suit
2) Ubese (1 Jacket) - 19,690 Credits per suit
3) Ubese (2 Jackets) - 24,010 Credits per suit
4) Chitin - 39,960 Credits per suit
5) Padded - 52,305 Credits per suit
6) Wookie Ceremonial - 15,205 Credits per suit
7) Wookie Black Mountain - 26,885 Credits per suit
8) Wookie Hunter - 43,660 Credits per suit
According to these numbers, unlayered composite should be the second-cheapest set I sell (I always put 2
jackets in my ubese sets). Padded is by far the most expensive!!! Sorry to all you fashion wanna-bes...
Padded just aint worth wasting all those organics!
...Hope this helps
Keuller
Thu Aug 12, 2004 5:13 am
#2
The resources for just the layers for a stun suit would run me over 88,000 credits. Ouch?
RonneLykell
Thu Aug 12, 2004 5:21 am
#3
Actually...
A Stun Suit of Composite (again...assuming 5:1 on Inorganics...Vertex Crystalline and Crism Ore
on Naritus are way over that!) would figure in at:
63 stun layers per suit (47 resources x 5 per resource x 63 = 14,805 credits + 19,805 Credits)
Total - 34,610 Credits per suit
Keuller
Thu Aug 12, 2004 5:31 am
#4
I was working on a rough number of 30:1, which is more realistic on bloodfin if you're going to be using server-best resources.
RonneLykell
Thu Aug 12, 2004 5:52 am
#5
It depends,
I've paid 120:1 and up for some of my stun layer ingredients...so I charge quite a lot for Stun Comp. But if we ever had an incredible spawn of one of them...I'd be sure to mine up 1 million of it or more, and then base the resource cost at 3:1
Don't feel guilty if you're charging a lot for stun armor. We're all charging a lot. The 5:1 deal is purely hypothetical at this point...maybe one day it'll be a reality, but not today
Garnax
Thu Aug 12, 2004 6:22 am
#6
*ponders if he'd make more selling his Isale, Eotasu and Ipootiate to Ronne rather than making stun comp and selling* 
Probably not.. but then it'd be a lot less work.
Probably not.. but then it'd be a lot less work.(Those are good stun layer components for those of you not on Naritus)
DoWei
Thu Aug 12, 2004 7:45 am
#7
First off, I have only been an Armorsmith for about 2 months, but I just wanted to add some information that may or may not be relevant.
Good information, but rarely does the cost of an item directly relate to its value on the open market. I love to think about armor pricing from an Armorsmithing point of view, but the fact of the matter is 95% of the players that buy armor couldn't care less about what goes into armor or what we have to pay for the resources. I also believe that the durability of a suit is a major factor in the price. A composite suit with 36k condition to all pieces with few vulnerabilities will last much longer than a Ubese set with 20k condition per peice and many vulnerabilities. When I have tried to come up with a relative price per suit, I have never been satisfied with the results because there are so many factors. I also feel the need to factor in not only the cost of my current resources, but also the cost of replacement of those resources. Maybe I found some Wooly for 30:1 to make a good run of suits, but I also need to have money to buy the next spawn for as much as 75:1 and I don't have millions to ensure that at this time.
Too much business school for SWG?
Good information, but rarely does the cost of an item directly relate to its value on the open market. I love to think about armor pricing from an Armorsmithing point of view, but the fact of the matter is 95% of the players that buy armor couldn't care less about what goes into armor or what we have to pay for the resources. I also believe that the durability of a suit is a major factor in the price. A composite suit with 36k condition to all pieces with few vulnerabilities will last much longer than a Ubese set with 20k condition per peice and many vulnerabilities. When I have tried to come up with a relative price per suit, I have never been satisfied with the results because there are so many factors. I also feel the need to factor in not only the cost of my current resources, but also the cost of replacement of those resources. Maybe I found some Wooly for 30:1 to make a good run of suits, but I also need to have money to buy the next spawn for as much as 75:1 and I don't have millions to ensure that at this time.
Too much business school for SWG?
DoWei
Thu Aug 12, 2004 11:05 am
#8
I think it would be incredibly interesting to come up with a modifier that your comfortable with to use across the board and base pricing solely on cost of imputs, say 5 to one just for fun. You would end up with prices that are roughly...
1) Composite - 99,025 Credits per suit
2) Ubese (1 Jacket) - 98,450 Credits per suit
3) Ubese (2 Jackets) - 120,050 Credits per suit
4) Chitin - 199,800 Credits per suit
5) Padded - 261,525 Credits per suit
6) Wookie Ceremonial - 76,025 Credits per suit
7) Wookie Black Mountain - 134,425 Credits per suit
8) Wookie Hunter - 218,300 Credits per suit
This would place Composite and Ubese very close to each other and make Chitin and Padded pretty senseless to make unless you have some nice enhancements to make Uber suits with a substantial markup. I'm still thinking on this one!
1) Composite - 99,025 Credits per suit
2) Ubese (1 Jacket) - 98,450 Credits per suit
3) Ubese (2 Jackets) - 120,050 Credits per suit
4) Chitin - 199,800 Credits per suit
5) Padded - 261,525 Credits per suit
6) Wookie Ceremonial - 76,025 Credits per suit
7) Wookie Black Mountain - 134,425 Credits per suit
8) Wookie Hunter - 218,300 Credits per suit
This would place Composite and Ubese very close to each other and make Chitin and Padded pretty senseless to make unless you have some nice enhancements to make Uber suits with a substantial markup. I'm still thinking on this one!
RonneLykell
Thu Aug 12, 2004 11:55 am
#9
yeah...that's actually not too far off on what I've been charging lately. I'm selling basic composite sets for 75K each...ubese for a little more, believe it or not...however it's kinetic layered
In response to your first reply...I really think you have to base the prices mainly on what you're paying out to get resources. A small balance of some sort may be ok, but I'm not going to skew prices down in a major way just because a type of armor isn't as effective...I'm just not going to make it at all. Yeah...some "worthless" types of armor may have a "non-worthless" price-tag that no-one wants to pay...guess that's the price of fashion. No way am I going to use up my organics on padded just to suit someone's fashion sense. I could make 7 runs of composite for the number of organics used in just one run of padded.
...not to mention...for some reason, people just assume that when they're getting padded, they're automatically supposed to get their choice of color-setup. Sorry folks...when I make a run of armor...it's tons more resource-effective to make them all the same color...that doesn't change just because padded has a huge color pallete. Simply put...custom orders/custom colors get charged more, and will probably come up with worse HAM than mass-produced sets...and considering padded should be 3x the price of composite to begin with...
I agree with you that durability is much more important than most people give credit. I'm starting to put a little more emphasis on kinetic-layered sets than ubese lately. Ubese still has some advantages, but with recent Naritus resources, I've been getting my kinetic comp sets pretty light. I've been making 1/1/1 layers, and ending up with unsliced sets at (526 / 458 / 534). I had one sliced for my alt at (333 / 296 / 335) with most of the Encumb slices around 35%. Now I'd say that's pretty light for a mass-produced layered set. 
...dev's really need to implement an armor-painting tool...please!
DoWei
Thu Aug 12, 2004 1:32 pm
#10
I totally agree with an armor customization tool 
) That would be AWESOME!! I wish there was a way that all armor was equally useful, but as we all know that isn't the truth!
) That would be AWESOME!! I wish there was a way that all armor was equally useful, but as we all know that isn't the truth!
RonneLykell
Thu Aug 12, 2004 10:21 pm
#11
Emily...
I disagree with composite being boring. The wide variety of layer combinations really do a lot to keep it interesting. I have 7 or 8 layer variants that I cycle through, and each time it's a challenge to see if I can shave off a few HAM points compared to the last run. There are boring parts, as with all armor construction...but it can be more exciting than some people are letting it be.
I don't find padded any more exciting than composite...less so...fewer layer slots...very impractical armor. Not to mention...it's quite painful to watch good resources get wasted on armor someone wont use for its' intended purpose...to fight in.
AegolinAdaron
Fri Aug 13, 2004 12:52 am
#12
RonneLykell wrote:
No way am I going to use up my organics on padded just to suit someone's fashion sense. I could make 7 runs of composite for the number of organics used in just one run of padded.
I don't quite get it. Aren't we armorsmiths because it is fun? So why is making 7 suits of boring composite better than making one set of great looking padded to suit a customer's wishes? If it is a matter of money than just reflect it in the price. Personally, I rather handcraft one cool looking set of padded then do the factory runs for several composite suits.
Emily
Garnax
Fri Aug 13, 2004 4:48 am
#13
I find it painful to watch hides get used no matter what.. which is why I charge an arm and a leg for padded and hunting armor. (My Padded costs as much as my Composite, but I suppose it should really cost more.. so only people who really want to fight in Padded will buy it, those who want for fashion will buy cheap stuff made with crap from someone else.)
RonneLykell wrote:
Not to mention...it's quite painful to watch good resources get wasted on armor someone wont use for its' intended purpose...to fight in.
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