TWEN Tokens, Thoughts and Considerations

The markup on TWEN tokens started out around 3 PEDs per, and now is basically down to 1 to 1.5 PEDs per... I do not know whether to expect the price to rise or sink further. But, one thing is for certain, if the markup crashes too far, then everyone will have a chance at the TWEN gear in the TWEN trader, which I don't think we will get that lucky. If the tokens become too cheap, all the big players will scoop them all up along with all the TWEN gear to flip later on. But with weapons averaging 50K to 100K tokens... Even if I could loot that many, I'd probably sell them and buy the older gear that is better than what I have now, and play on what is left. That is just me personally. 

I don't know that loot will be substantially different enough that the difference in cost between the TEN, FEN, TWEN gear vs the non anniversary UL's, that there will ever be any kind of a ROI on that difference in markup value. I know the specs and things like decay eco and efficiency should be different even if only slightly between all of those... But for me, DPS is efficiency and eco; more DPS means less hits to armor, less healing, more mobs cycled, more chances for good loot. In my own tracked runs, the indication is strong that this makes up for any gains you might otherwise have from penny pinching your damage per pec ratios. So, for me, anything that fires faster, may well be worth extra markup, i.e. Adjusted or Modified or Perfected over non modified gear. And indeed I've seen data that suggests modified gear is better to run than non-modified gear, hence, the extra markups seem to be justified. But. IMO... Whomevers paying five digits for any kind of Opalo, will probably never live long enough to see a return on that investment, you are saving a small fraction of a pec per shot over the standard Opalo, and to have to recoup five digits of peds at a fraction of a pec per shot, well... Just saying. If you are able to prove me wrong, then I congratulate you for doing that much low-stakes grinding. I just personally would never be able to. My time is valuable to me. So, I will only spend it at levels commensurate with how much I hope to loot for my time invested.

Ultimately, consider whether the TWEN items you like justify the price difference between the non TWEN versions that may be on the market and what the tokens will cost you for the TWEN edition. 

As for solo-grinding for 50K or 100K tokens... I have been running LootNanny to track my hunts. I have found a mob, which, I am not going to give exact details unless someone is willing to make a small donation to this blog, I mean lets face it, Adsense permabanned me for something I didn't do and I can't monetize my blog, everyone else is getting donations for all their other projects... But the results of my tracked runs on this particular mob have consistently been thus: Using my Tier 8 damage enhanced R-150 with Dante amp, (around 45 pecs a shot in ammo and decay if memory serves), 1K peds cycled reliably provides me with 40 TWEN tokens. And the occasional unreal token still drops too, which yes it surprised me too, they have been such a rare drop these days. Some of you may have better ratios or worse ratios, I've seen people kill thousands of small mobs for only a handful of tokens. So, I really don't know what is "average". I just know what I can personally observe and measure. Nevertheless, lets use this number. 40 tokens per 1000 ped cycled. That is win, lose, or draw, everything you cycle and recycle cumulatively. 

Upon doing the math here, it basically came out to 2.5 million peds needing cycled and recycled to have any expectation of me looting 100K tokens. Thats about 1550 hours doing one shot per second at approximately 45 pecs a shot to cycle 2.5 million peds, for me. With a ring and pills, I get about 60 shots per second, maybe a bit more maybe a bit less.

In 1550 hours of that kind of grinding, I would hope like hell a TWEN would drop in normal loot, though I've been skunked for TEN, FEN, and so far TWEN. And way to go, MA, for trolling us, by giving us all TWEN face masks ffs for easter was it? I forget, time is going by so fast everythings a blur for me right now. 

So is it a pipedream to try to grind for 50K or 100K tokens? I don't know. Of course if you are enterprising, you can probably trade certain loots with people who need them in exchange for TWEN tokens to speed the process up. But... For me, it is enough to hoard the ones I do get until the pile of them is large enough that if I sell them, I will have enough PED all in one pile that I can do something I need to do with them. Selling them as I go, what's a few PED... A few here few there doesn't really do anything. But a few thousand here and a few thousand there will.

As for the M tokens, I feel bad using the ones I used, but the piece of armor I got with them sold for enough I was able to correct a past mistake as a critical piece of gear I'd regrettably sold long time ago came back on the market for less than I sold it for. The difference here though is... The M token stuff is a straight up grind, there is nothing tradeable about them except for cashing them in for something that is tradeable, and I don't know if, when, or what MA will decide to restock the M trader with... All I know is the gun I really wanted is sold out, so it made the decision easier to use my rare M token to at least get my old gun back. The M-Tokens not being tradeable, means that I set myself back at least a year in the occasion something else epic I do want IS put back into the trader. But the benefit of having my reliable looter with satisfactory DPS for what I want to do with it, without having to pay markup on any decay, allows me to grind better and hopefully recover the lost ground quickly.

Any token you loot in Entropia has some kind of use or value that is different to all of us. It may have more leverage trading for other forms of loot than just selling outright. It may function better as a reserve currency, where, you save it until you can't afford to save it any longer and using it serves a greater purpose than anything else you would have needed it for. 

But I do caution, with TWEN tokens, there is no clear view of a timeline as to when these tokens will cease being valuable. Hoarding them will only be a benefit for so long, after that, they may become a liability. I don't know what MA will do for those of us who inevitably have leftover tokens, if anything. They just might turn into being another collectible in our storage terminals like so many other things have over the years. Many of us older players could probably open museums with the things we've got laying around, and who knows... That might even be a trend that catches on some day.

So, I do wish all of you good luck for whatever you are trying to accomplish. Its not so much there isn't opportunity in Entropia, there's just a lot of overlooked opportunity. Thinking about things differently may be just enough to make a difference. 

Merchant - Trader as a profession.

 The world is hurting. The paradigms are shifting. The world pre-2019 is not coming back. I am sorry but it isn't. It cannot. It is outmoded. Why do I say this?

1. Can you do everything your job required, on your own, without your employer? Yep, thats right. people are going into business for themselves saying to hell with their bosses, in droves!

2. During covid, people were working from home and enjoying it! After covid, they weren't willing to go back to their dreary cubicles. You get a taste of working for yourself at home you don't go back.

How is this all related?

I actually want to help and encourage people... So consider this my contribution to society. Everything you do in Entropia, as far as trading is concerned, you can do in the real world, and to greater effect. 

Lots of people have things they do not want and will sell cheaply. Lots of people need things they do not have and will pay greatly. The difference, if you can bridge the gap and make it happen, is your profit margin, which is not theft, or screwing anyone over, it is simply a reward for helping the supply reach the demand.

I AM writing a book on my real life experience as a real life merchant trader, and I won't ask much for it, but you see, there are so many people who are so happy working, that they don't want to trade, or work for themselves, I don't understand it either. Why work a 9 to 5 and make someone else rich, but ok. Someone has to flip the burgers, and haul the garbage. But even if you are a garbage worker, you could buy your own garbage truck and offer your own rates to your own route of your choosing? There is opportunity everywhere!!!!

Anyways... My blog isn't monetized, Adsense permabanned me because someone clicked my ads too much, allegedly, and no ones donated to my blog... I've given a lot of valuable info and no appreciation... But I am still willing to sell my expertise cheaply when I publish my book. 

I've spent the last three decades of my life taking care of the WWII and Vietnam veterans in my family. The government wouldn't, so I did and am. I don't care that it isn't a paying job. What am I going to do turn my back on family AND veterans? Nope. But I've HAD to make my living in a non-conventional way.  A 9 to 5 is NOT something that works for me. And I am willing to give everyone the opportunity to access my sum total of my experience, so that anyone can replicate what I've been able to do. I've had successes that people in general would never understand. 

The reason I can share my secrets, is because I can't be everywhere at the same time. A million of you could all do your own thing and never put a ding in my bottom line. It does me no harm for you to do what I do in your part of the world. 

You are all experts in something and you might not know it.. You are all good at something. You all know something the other doesnt. There is a lot of money in say, 3D modelling, but not everyone is going to go into 3D modelling. There is a lot of money in coins, but not everyone is going to be an expert in every coin. Not everyone is going to be an expert in every stamp. Not everyone is going to be an expert in every antique. There are literally so many niches we can all carve in any sector of the economy, that we can be our own experts, and really make things happen. But there are a lot of people with money, and you aren't going to get it from them unless you decide to find something they want, that you can provide them with. 

And when I say this... Legal money is easy enough to make. I've taken $1K up to $180K in one month of manual day trading of cryptocurrencies. No looking over my shoulder, no feeling guilty about it... But, I was exhausted, took a weekend off, and came back to see the bottom fell out of the markets, so, my 180K turned into $10K which I cashed out, few days later cryptopia got "robbed" probably an inside job, you know how that goes, a big enough piece of cheese and the cat thinks he's a mouse... SO.. had I not rage quit, I'd have lost it all anyways... SO I used that money to go into making my handmade coin rings and etc. 

I seriously am writing a book telling all. I will announce it here when I publish. You guys are doing well trading in Entropia, or in games that don't even run on money. But those same skills work in real life too... I am going to show you how and why. And you won't have to feel guilty about your success.

Yes, ive spilled a few beans in this post. But stay tuned. We can shift the paradigm, and we can, as Johnny Paycheck sung, tell our bosses to "take this job and shove it." There is nothing no one does for someone else they can't do for themselves AND keep 100% of the profit doing it. We don't need employers. We don't need to be wage slaves. I haven't been in so many years, out of necessity, but the average person can't wrap their head around it.

People have made tens of thousands of dollars trading in Entropia. Actually, credible reports of some old players actually paid for their college by trading in Entropia. Anyhow. Regardless... Imagine doing it in the real world. THAT, is the way to freedom.

My luck is so bad that a full time job would only put me in debt. I at least break even working for myself. But seriously, I cannot afford to work a job. J O B... Just Over Broke. And for me, not even. 

Unreal Tokens, Now Tradeable, & My Forecast

The Unreal Tokens are now tradeable. This means they have become lootable in space and PVP4. So. Here's my forecast.

I forecast that there will be an increase in piracy and pvp runs in the contaminated zones. Why? Many of us have a dozen containers or more on our avatar. We stash all kinds of things in them, especially things that weren't lootable. Well, some of you may not get the memo in time to relocate your now lootable tokens. So, I suspect there is a sizeable amount of tokens people simply forget they have, that are on them, in a container, free for the looting. In the long run, it isn't the loot we know we have that is at risk. It is the things we forgot we carry that probably are the mainstay of the pirates.

I forecast the trading range for these tokens will be anywhere from 5 to 30 peds for the forseable future, but probably will not drop below 10 nor rise above 40. Eventually its possible, but probably not very soon.

The biggest inhibitor to any shares in anything in Entropia being a realistic investment, is the ROI... Right now if you aren't getting 5 to 10% per year, you are losing money to inflation. But, as a "savings" method, if you are saving up for a real goal, you want a set of this armor or you want that UL gun, or whatever;, or if you are swing trading the shares and stuff, this is the real value of these shares. And, there are people with more peds than money and they don't want to cash out so they are happy to put the peds they aren't using into shares so that something is being earned until they need them. 

I must hereby disclaim that none of this is investment advice nor should be taken as such. It is merely me presenting things as I see them for you to consider when making decisions or deciding what your priorities are. But it is common sense if your ROI is far less than inflation, you will lose money unless you are taking profits on the swings in value, or otherwise trying to avoid losing your money through genuinely blowing it before you can achieve a very important goal.

A Message to the Miners of Entropia Universe

 I've been here in Entropia for just shy of 15 years now. I've seen a lot of the good and the bad that has happened inside of the game. A lot of what goes on, if its out of sight its out of mind. Some things you just maybe don't notice anymore because everyone you associated with has either passed on or quit the game... So you keep your nose to the grindstone and keep grinding.

In a strange twist of luck, I ran into an old school trader. From way back. He got me thinking in the few minutes we chatted. I thought I'd make a little bit of an address here to the miners of the game. Why the miners? Well I will tell you. You have the power. The power to do what? I will tell you.

The vast share of markup has always been involved with ores and enmatters. Not counting the oddball high markup item that only a select few seem to loot while hunting. Even the greediest trader can only steal so much on an animal oil trade where its just a couple percent over TT value. But when you are talking ores and enmatters, its a whole nother ballpark.

There are some not so scrupulous traders taking advantage of the sheer need for selling ores and enmatters. It doesn't matter who, it doesn't matter why, where or how. What matters is this.

It is the miners who control enough of the good markup materials, to make an honest trader, or break a dishonest one. It is up to you to keep the traders you deal with in check. If you don't like the deal they offer, press them for a better one or find someone who can do better. This will cause them to tighten up their ship, or else see it sink into the abyss. Trading only works if you have the volume, and can move it. It is you, miners, who control who gets your supply.

The harder something is to sell, then yes, by all means its ok to allow for enough of a difference that the trader isn't sitting on that stuff for months only to make nothing. And you will probably get a better deal from traders who already know a customer who is waiting for what you are selling. But not checking the numbers, and not understanding what an acceptable offer for what you are selling is, allows for traders to be sloppy and loose on the numbers they give.

How many trades have you done in a year? Have they been reasonable? Or have you been forced to take a bit too heavy of discounts in order to close the deal? If you do 500 trades in a year, and if only you get one more ped per trade, thats $50. Thats $50 more that you won't have to deposit, or sweat for, that contributes to everything you have to do to try to survive.

Everyone complains about markups. Well, we can start doing something about that by keeping the traders honest. It doesn't mean cutting them out of their profit margin, but you don't have to let them destroy yours either. And always double check the pile of peds dropped in the window against what you are selling. Does it look right? If something seems wrong, it very well could be. I know of a couple massive trades that went horribly wrong for one particular person. But once you push the button twice, it's done. MA doesn't fix that for you if you didn't notice something and approved the trade anyways. And the more a trader gets away with this sort of thing, the more they will continue to do it. 

I am primarily a miner, and I used to do quite a bit of trading. I don't anymore, because, well, real life trading opportunities far exceed what I am able to make in Entropia by trading. I much rather enjoy the game mining. But if, as a miner, you are taking abuse from the people you rely on for your returns when selling loot, you can either do something about it, or not. If you do nothing, things could worsen overall. A lot more rides on keeping traders honest than we even can think about. We all know MindArk is against us, and the only chance we have against them is to strike the best possible deal for both sides of a transaction. And not all trades have a 1 to 1 ratio, either.

Sure. I sold a Mayhem harness for less than I would like to have got. But I needed the peds. And I didn't have to wait. The loss of some fairly substantial markup on the deal, is the price I paid for the convenience of having the peds sooner than later. BUT. This worked to my advantage. Something I've been waiting for to hit the market for a long time, at a bargain price too, finally went on the AH. I was able to buy it and had some peds left over. In all honesty, in a face to face trade, I'd probably have traded straight across for the item. So, you see, taking a loss is advantageous if the timing is right. It is all about leverage, and timing, and I think I just got lucky on that working out the way it did. 

I think this is probably all I have to say. Just, the traders will be as honest as we can keep them. If something is wrong and they can't explain why the discrepancy, that would be a problem maybe.

So good luck, happy mining, and I hope theres something in all of this for you all to think about. 

Tips for New Shop Owners

 I notice a lot of shops and properties have changed hands over the recent years for whatever reasons. Some of you, I am impressed with how far you have expanded, for I have watched you start with next to nothing and end up living the dream, land areas, a shop in every TP (almost), yep. 

Many of you know what you are doing and need no advice from me. 

But. A lot of new players will come into the game as they always do, and need some advice. There really are a lot of people in the real world too, who want to start a business and have no clue why their efficiency is down or why customers are frustrated. Inexperience is no ones fault, we have to overcome inexperience by doing. And we can compensate for it by seeing what others have to say about what it is we are trying to accomplish.

There are a few things that would be so amazing yet I haven't hardly seen anyone attempt to do:

90% of my runs through shops, are looking for things that are not available on the Auction. This can be a UL Weapon, or a full set of UL armor, or a Fi/Ra/Co amp of any configuration. Some are rarer than hen's teeth. Some aren't. Sometimes I want to see if theres any good deals on estates. I know there usually aren't any super bargains falling through the cracks, everyone runs a pretty tight ship on markup, but... There are many other games where you can see what is for sale in what shop. Entropia doesn't do that, I wish they could do that, but who knows maybe MA will implement something like that in UR5, who knows. It would be smart if they did. Idle gear is not making MA money, and no ones going to buy it if they can't find it. 

I once seen a UL gun, priced insanely cheap, I thought about buying it. After an hour or so I decided you know what, I wanna go buy it. I had forgotten what shop it was, and by the time I got to the shop I know it must have been in, it was already gone, someone beat me to it. But I didn't even know it was there if I wouldn't have been bored enough to stroll through the mall one day.

The point I want to make here is... If you are going to offer rare items, UL items, anything that has any significance, make it as conspicuous as possible. This may mean putting a giant sign over a shopkeeper that says "RARE ITEMS SOLD HERE" or something. Some people I see, have put UL's amidst shelves of L items... When I see a bunch of L items and no clear indication of UL's, I book it out of there, and maybe other players do too, I don't know. 

I am not telling anyone how to run their shop, but just highlighting the importance of making your important items stand out so they are easy to spot. People can't buy what they can't see or find.

Hunting Skills and What I'd have Done Differently

 It is easy to think unlocking a new skill is no big deal. I thought that. Until I spent months trying to finish the next few levels to reach level 70 BLP so I could unlock commando skills. Whats the big deal about Commando skill? Well. Every 200 points is 1 health point! That is huge! But also, it makes levelling go much faster, too, and really, once you reach level 100, all those level 100 weapons that are TT food or low priced because by the time people can use them they already have more expensive UL's that they use, you can use anything you want to use.

I spent the first portion of the game skilling laser. At some point I switched to BLP, I just found laser annoying. BLP, for me, at least, tended to be quicker and sound better. But, had I decided to go BLP from the beginning and only skill that, I might be much closer to level 100, and that is probably one of the biggest things I'd do differently.

If you want to build your strength so you can carry a lot of stuff, melee probably is the way to go. It is unclear to me the full extent of which the strength attribute impacts gameplay. Intelligence tends to help crafting and mining, stamina seems to improve overall survivability against tough mobs. The attributes tend to operate in ways that are different from the other skills. I always figure the hardest to get attribute, or the hardest to get skills, might be the most important. If something is really helpful, I figure MA won't let us have much of it at one time or at all. I've done some limited testing along these lines and my results are encouraging.

I suppose the other thing I regret is not maintaining a record of every run, the cost, the loot, everything. I know it doesn't sound like much fun, but if I had that data for the 15 years I've been playing, I might be closer to figuring certain things out. And, the most successful players tend to track everything. I suppose there's a reason MA doesn't give us an ingame pedflow statement. It would be nice, but something tells me they would never do it. Sort of why they never put a clock in a casino, they don't want people aware of the passage of the time... Similarly I feel MA doesn't want us aware of the passage of our peds.

Having a clear goal, and focusing on the goal. It can be many goals. You can have a goal for every profession. But focusing on them is probably better than jumping around randomly hoping something works out. 

Lootable Zones in Space Changed?

 Some of you may be aware already, its probably a year or two old news by now, but I haven't really been in the posting mode for some time. The last few years as you well know have put everyone into different funks and what not.

But it does appear now that we have safe passage from Ark Moon to Arkadia, and from FOMA to Calypso, etc. Which, really, they needed to have done from the begining... Let's face it, who WOULDN'T pay the 7 peds to beam down to the planet from the moon or asteroid if you had loot to safeguard? So its not like the pirates lost out on anything, save for a few stones or fruits or things we forget we have in our inventory, or may purposely keep in it just to insult and infuriate the wouldbe looter if he got us.

And, as for pirates and people who otherwise waste my time forcing me to revive and cross large distances once again when I was almost to my destination... I probably won't buy anything from you ever, that you ever list on the auction, no matter how cheap it is or how badly I need it. If piracy is only business, well, not financing the war against me is only business, too. 

Does MA Take our Suggestions Seriously?

 The short answer is yes. Please use extreme care when sending MindArk suggestions about changes you want to see in the game. Everything I've ever suggested they've implemented. But they've always implemented my suggestions in the poorest way possible making me regret ever having suggested the things I've suggested. Those of you who know me know to what I am referring. Those of you who don't know me, nope, I am not going to admit to anything lol. Just take a look around you at the costliest activities currently surrounding this game, then you will know the devastating effect that a good idea can have when someone like MindArk attempts to implement it. 

It would seem we do have some ability to urge MA to make necessary changes to benefit our experience in the game, but we must be careful with how we word our suggestions, and anticipate every way in which our ideas will be used against us. 

Consider the damage done to us by Loot 2.0. A lot of people complained of the runs of no loot mobs on a given hunt. I used to get dozens of no loots in a row back in the old days. As many as a hundred no loots in a row, which shouldn't be possible really but it did happen. A lot of us complained to MindArk, I wasn't the only one, and Loot 2.0 was their solution. Personally, I believe all they needed to do was mitigate some of the no loots, not all of them. So, we get loot every time now, but the result is multipliers are far and few between and there is almost nothing in the way of items dropping either. And no multipliers has taken a lot of the fun out of hunting. Oh sure, there are a few lucky enough to hit something. But gone are the days when there was a four or five digit Atrox on the hof board at least a couple times a day. Or ambu for that matter. Now there are times when the SandKing doesn't even hof for five digits. If a mob like that can't hit five digits, it doesn't make me feel like its worth the bother to hunt. Yet, we still hunt.

Ultimately, I would like there to be an option for loot. We should have the choice of low volatility, medium volatility, or high volatility. Low volatility lets say we keep loot 2.0. Even though it is not so stable, it is considered less volatile since there is loot every time. Medium volatility lets say there are some no loots, high volatility would be the old loot 1.0. You can still give everyone the same percent returns, but allowing us to choose how these returns are distributed would let us see the results we wish to play for according to our risk-reward mentality.

There are ways to improve the game to everyones satisfaction, including MindArks. How many of you quit playing because loot has been too bad? Does that benefit MA at all for you not to be playing? If you felt loot was in proportion to your effort, would you feel better about continuing? Yep, I know I would. And this would benefit them as well as us. But how do we talk to them about it in a way they will comprehend, so that something meaningful can be done about it. I am sure they all must be sitting back thinking "All these players want is more loot, bigger loot..." No, we want fair loot. We don't want to grind an entire mayhem to have nothing bigger than three digits when we are whipping out $100 bills every few hours to keep grinding. There has to be something more equitable for all to be done with loot.

Some players are happy to grind for small ups and downs. Some of us aren't. Usually it is small ups and large downs that we actually end up with. 

Easy Way of Making a Few Extra Dollars to Deposit

Disclaimer: Nothing in this post is to be construed as financial advice.

Yes, the economy sucks for the entire world basically. Inflation is off its rocker, and it is supposed to get worse. Many of you are losing your Entropia budgets to inflation. Your electric bill, your fuel bill, your food... So here I am to present one option to add some extra funds to your budget that has always worked for me, its simple enough, really. Nope, you don't have to buy anything or sign up for anything. Just take a close look at what you already have. It hasn't been my intention to deviate from all things Entropia, but since Entropia for most of us requires money to be playable, lets face it, non-depositing is only going to work if you went that route from day 1... Someone who's deposited thousands of dollars into Entropia is simply not going to be satisfied to sweat for a few cents an hour. And its bad enough that many of those people have been forced to do so.

The in-game means of earning free peds either require investing a LOT of deposited money, i.e. shares and deeds... Or investing a LOT of time for very little monetary gain, i.e. sweating or fruit and stone walking. Virtually any real-world activity pays more than sweating, and with a lot less effort. There is one commodity we all have to some degree or another at any given time. And volumes of it generally pass through our hands at some point. This commodity is loaded with desirable anomalies that collectors are paying ridiculous premiums for. What am I talking about, you ask?

This isn't a get rich quick, or slow, scheme. This isn't a scheme of any kind. And the sought after items of interest are perfectly legal and sell themselves without any effort at all to speak of.

Coins. Specifically, coins with errors. Mint Errors. Also paper money have errors too. 

Of course error collecting isn't limited to coins and paper money. There are errors to be found in baseball cards, or any other printed or manufactured collectible that isn't normally supposed to have errors. The no-name Frank Thomas card sells for five digits, and yes, I've had a real one offered to me and I passed on it not knowing there actually were late 80's and early 90's baseball cards worth something :( But its ok. I try not to think about the things I've missed out on. 

But the beauty of coins is that almost everyone collects coins. Collectors are found in every level of society, in every part of the world. And usually only the smallest of towns are without coin dealers; pawn shops usually will buy and sell coins, but not always. And even if you run an advertisement in your local classifieds to sell the mint errors you've found, you probably won't have to wait for long for someone to be interested; but naturally you want to be smart about meeting a buyer. Public place, maybe not go alone, etc. Just be smart, things can and do go wrong, though fortunately not as often as it could. 

"How much could an error possibly be worth?"

As of this post, a 1982 Roosevelt dime with no mintmark is actually selling for around $150, easily selling for that is, and they aren't that uncommon.

Then there is the matter of paper money. Mismatched serial numbers on the same bill are worth thousands of dollars. Serial numbers with all digits the same are also readily selling for $1000 to $5000. 

If you have jugs of coins sitting around, hell, you can even look at them while you sweat in Entropia for that matter... You could have a fortune easily enough found.

Most desirable errors are double-dies, which will appear as slightly, or very pronounced doubling of letters and numbers or otherwise some portion of the design of the coin. Or you can have a mintmark that is doubled. If that is the only thing doubled, you have a repunched mintmark. But, if you have two different mint marks on top of each other, S over D or etc, these can be extremely valuable.

Mule errors exist where the wrong two coins are stamped on the same coin... You may have a quarter that somehow managed to end up with a dollar being struck on the other side.These can be insanely valuable.

You can have blank planchets which are worth anywhere from $5 to $100 each depending on what denomination the planchet is. It will literally look like a blank disc of metal, but it will be of the same size of the coin that was supposed to be struck on it.

You can have coins with chunks of metal missing from the surface like it was popped out, which are lamination errors, and indeed thats what happens due to imperfections in the sheet metal from when it was made.

The errors you can find are absolutely endless, all you got to do is figure out what coins you have, look up the errors for those particular coins and those years of coins, and you should have no problem finding values or at least images of what you are looking for. A simple search for mint errors will give you some ideas too.

I really won't go into a lot more depth here, since if the topic were a horse, it would have been beaten to the point its a mere grease spot on the ground. Probably a million books and millions of webpages exist on the topic of mint errors and coin collecting. I am just here to point out every day someone is finding thousands of dollars worth of highly sought after errors or varieties. If its not you, it will be them, and I'd rather it be you than them.

What happens to Entropia if everyone suddenly has more money to deposit? Everyone plays more. More trades are done, more items and gear change hands. Everyone does better. The game does better. The whole point of this blog is to help everyone in the game do better. I don't necessarily care if Mindark does better, they are literally bending us all over on loot right now. Nevermind the strongboxes... Those are so bad lately I don't even get the obligatory garland or candy cane anymore. I probably will never open another Xmas box again to be honest.

Good luck to you all! And I hope this has helped you find a new path to refilling the old war chest.

Not the Usual Post, but a Helpful One (Fixing your Laser Printer Blank Page Print Problem, Time Saver!)

With tax season coming up, and all of the other deadlines we have in life on a nearly daily basis anyways, I know some of you work for yourselves, some of you don't work, some of you are students, some of you are retired, yet the printer you have is your lifeline to the world, in order to meet your deadlines for paperwork. And I know some of you know very little about Information Technology, yet others who will read this undoubtedly are engineers who build the very things we curse at on a daily basis, such as these laser printers. So, as a public service, and to make the world a better place, especially when you might have been or might yet end up at, the end of your tether in dealing with the problem I am about to mention, I offer this solution.

In my case, I run a Dell e525w, the print quality is great, and if it was any cheaper to use, Dell would have to pay me for printing with it. (No, I don't buy the factory toner... 2K peds for a set of new brand name toner? Nope not happening. $19 on eBay. And I have yet to see proof that the quality varies between the two... I can't guarantee there aren't unscrupulous oddball sellers cutting their toner with talcum powder or something, of course. For my IT background, I pride myself in figuring out the unsolvable hardware problems. I could fix things my bosses weren't able to. When I had bosses. I always rather work for myself. 

What I am getting at is, the world runs on paperwork, but today my laser printer went from working perfectly to not wanting to print at all. It took half a day away from my Entropia game time because I had shipping labels that HAD to be printed today, these shipments were already a bit late because of holidays etc, and with new toner and a decently high-quality laser printer, it should be fixable right? 

I did everything the manual said, cleaning the sensors for the toner density, making sure the firmware was updated, etc. Nothing worked. I scoured the forums and Google, nothing remotely close to fixing this. I could only eventually find responses to an OP who's post I couldn't seem to get to, but I could read the replies... Something about a "Russian fix". So, I figured how would a Russian approach such a problem, other than blowing it up or shooting it, what have I got to lose. I unplugged the printer, carried it over to the middle of the room, and dropped it from about four or five inches on the floor. A few times. The result was a pile of miscellaneous toner on the floor. I plugged the printer in, let it do its cycling, particularly if you have an error code that won't clear, you will have to shut the printer off, pop one cartridge, turn it back on, put cartridge back in, if the code comes back, then you have to repeat with a different cartridge until you no longer get the error again. After doing this...

My printer works like new! Prints better than ever! And I was > < that close to throwing it out and getting a new printer. This of course will save you money which means you can deposit more, and waste less! Although, Im not entirely sure the way loot is these days if that's not the same thing. 

And for the non-Entropians who find this blog post, you really probably should at least explore Entropia and give it a chance if you like gaming, ignore the bad remarks sore losers make when ranking the game on various websites, just take a look around. Yes there is a lot to criticize, but there really is some opportunity here, and they have no real competition in the Real Cash Economy niche. To quote an anonymous gambler from the old west... "The wheel might be crooked, but it's the only game in town." 

I am of course not responsible for you being too rough with your printer and breaking it... It is just that if you are about to throw it out of the window or something, you've nothing to lose by doing what I did. And no I couldn't find any reference at all to needing to pull a cartridge to clear the error code; since I had no access to anything else integral to the printer, the menus all locked out buttons not functioning with the error code, I figured it had to be the cartridges. I suspect the manufacturer would leverage you into paying a ransom to their tech support for this information, hence why the error says to "call them" I am sure.

I do have some new Entropia related posts to make soon. I haven't forgotten about this blog, it's just, MA changes and implements things slower than a turtle can make a 'Round the World trip. Many of my posts are obsolete from long ago, many aren't, but anything obsolete is kept around strictly as a time capsule and record of the way things once were, or at least probably were and possibly still are. 

Also, Google has permabanned me from making any revenue with Adsense, so you have a relatively ad-free experience here. Please take a look at the few banners or links I have up, and if anything is useful or interesting to you, your taking a look is greatly appreciated. Everything advertised here is either something I've made or done myself, or is something of exceptional utility and quality that I felt was worthy to bring to your attention. Afterall, it does me no good to advertise things that are not of use or interest to my audience.

Just a small... Update; comments on loot, etc; general rant.

Firstly... Yes, I added a new banner to the top of the blog. It is for an instant deposit / instant cashout cryptocurrency casino; and their games have treated me the most fairly of all of the online casinos I've ever done business at. Well, there's no question of getting paid when you win, and the selection of games is insane enough. If you have some crypto laying around and want to give Entropia a break, I highly, highly recommend giving it a try, and my affiliate commission isn't a lot but, the events of the last year or two have put my life in a sling pretty much, working ten times harder for a tenth of the gain. That is the story of my life and I am used to it; but instead of asking for donations, I simply ask you to consider any advertisements I do offer, as they are directly benefiting this blog and myself; and if you can't use any of the things I advertise, maybe you know someone who does. This blog pretty much has been something I've worked on over the years without any reward at all, yet I do appreciate the so many of you who took the time to contact me in the game and let me know how much you have appreciated a lot of my past posts.

Also; if any of you need a free VPN to make use of any online platforms, I suggest Windscribe, its free, you get up to 10 gigs of data for free per month, which has been plenty using it only when I need to use it. I did not provide a link I will just let you search for it, its easy enough to find on your favorite search engine.

Now, I only have some observations, which disgust me really. 1. I do not know a single person who has looted a ring from the mayhem boxes. 2. I do not know a single person who has looted a Mayhem amplifier from the mayhem boxes. (Or event boxes, either way. Potato Potahto.) This is problematic for obvious reasons, MA for whatever reason thought it was a good idea to nerf one of their biggest rackets. Supposedly now we have to really work to earn the Mayhem amplifiers, I know they are OP, but they were costly enough just grinding boxes to get them nevermind having to do what, a mission chain now to get one?

As for loot... Think back a year, or two or three. Remember how there were always hofs popping? EP, Shrapnel, etc.... Constantly. I know a lot of people who been trying to do shrapnel and EP crafting even with the loot so bad as it is; and let me tell you, there is no way you would ever know anyone still does them a lot judging by the loot ticker. They weren't making anything then, imagine how little they make now that there isn't much activity on the ticker when they are clicking like mad. 100 clicks without a success or partial is now a routine occurrence... And yes, the slider does not appear to even change this. Oh, you get a few more partials but theres still nearly no successes. Nothing commensurate to what is being spent on the attempts.

"Focus on markup" lol, it doesn't matter when there is nothing to mark up. You get 25% hunting runs like I do, 105% on oils, 110% on robot stuff, that isn't going to make up for the other 75%. In my 14 years, MA has never dropped a good UL item on me at all, and the ESI's have been so rare I don't even imagine I can loot one, yet I know people who grind about as much as I have and filled their storage with them.

It is pretty sad when you can hardly find a mining tower on the HOF board... Or an Atrox uber... Remember when there was always a four digit Trox on the board every day at the minimum and often enough a five digit? Whatever MA broke, they might want to consider fixing and letting people have a chance at some loot. The lack of multipliers has driven a lot of big spenders to quit. It isn't fun knowing every run is going to be less than even with no chance of anything good. When you lose more in a day than the typical daily hofs run, and you haven't hoffed in years, why would you even keep going? And that is whats happening. Its ok to take some, but all at once and break your golden goose before it can even lay an egg? Bad business model. If loot were fairer, there would be more profit in it for everyone. Why? Because the pie is never a fixed size. It is always changing in the real world, and it should be allowed to in a digital world. Currently I see no evidence of what we put in say, today, changes what comes out of it at the end of today.

What I would hope to see for the future of the game, if anyone at Mindark manages to see this, I agree, you guys are not operating as a Casino. You can't operate as a casino. Your implementation of the game does not fit any of the classifications of casino. You are running some black-box hybrid system that for all I know theres some Merlin the magician in your basement waving a wand to see what pops up in our loot. Or theres a blind monkey pushing buttons attached to the loot server and if he gives too much loot he gets shocked. Seriously though. You need to consider that 1. the internet has changed a LOT in the last decade and nearly two since your game was released. 2. Your game has not changed in any major way, just cosmetically, and a few tweaks to loot. 3. You may not be a casino, but you are competing for the same disposable income that online casinos are after. 

Many of my decisions not to deposit, were based on the fact that I might get two or three days out of a deposit if I am luck; if I am lucky and I win, its up to three or for months to get any money back out, and by the time I decide I can't wait that long, I've failed to cash out and lost it all back in anyways. So, I typically just go for the online casino. I can play video poker for a 99.54% return on full pay jacks or better, or, Aces & Eights and All American have over 100% long term return if you master the strategy and if the paytables aren't nerfed which, is easy enough to check by looking at the paytables.

Then consider, Entropia is the only game I know of in the modern era, to still not have adopted the use of cryptocurrency for deposits and withdrawals. It doesn't matter if you were to go to a stablecoin or your own free-market coin, or a combination of both. Being able to instantly put in and take out would do a LOT to convince people to stick around. Unless of course you aren't running honest books and are paying withdrawals from half a year ago out of todays deposits? And I am sorry but I just have to... Is it not possible the loot is so bad today because we are still paying for that expensive castle you guys bought so long ago??? Oh what a fun forum thread that is to read if you can find it.

But at the end of the day, we don't know what MA is capable of. Just, it usually isn't good for us. They screwed the planet partners at every turn, they screwed the hangar owners when they upgraded to Cryengine 2 and destroyed the old Calypso. Statistically a person would expect MA might even by accident do something that helps us all instead of taking something away from the game.

MA's version of RCE Simplified for New Players

 If you are like me, then you know anything worth doing is worth doing for money. But, with my 14 years in the game at the time of this writing, it is my hope I can clear up some issues for those not certain if this is the right game.

When I started, the withdrawals were processed within a month for the most part. Now, its three to four months for a withdrawal to hit your bank account. I don't think it has anything to do with them not having the cash to pay everyone off, on the contrary, I think they are so reluctant to give us any money back that they make it take so long in order for us to reconsider cashing out; it is entirely possible we will end up depositing more than we've withdrawn in the time it takes to get that money. Which, of course, makes withdrawing a moot point.

If you are going to operate the game like a business, craft and sell for profit, trade for profit, own and operate land areas and shops for profit, then its probably worthwhile to get a cycle of cashouts going, but it will take you time to do. 

Money put into Entropia is not considered "assets" or "investments"... i.e. MA doesn't guarantee anything you own in the game. The terms and conditions are fairly disheartening for anyone who might take the game seriously.

But, it isn't all bad. It is just different. It takes getting used to. If you are going to commit vast sums of money to the game, please make sure you read the terms and conditions and understand what it is implying.

Yes, there are quicker ways to cash out; but they are against the terms and conditions. I do NOT advocate doing this, I am only reporting it as a fact that people DO do it. There are people who will sell their peds for cash or cryptocurrency, the buyer of the peds saves the deposit fees, and the person selling the peds doesn't have to wait a financial quarter to be paid. Ultimately, MA needs to increase the frequency of their payouts, or they may not thrive to their full potential.

IF you plan to exchange currencies outside of the sanctioned Entropia way; PLEASE be careful about how much and what you say in the chat in game; it IS monitored and I know people who have lost their accounts for even SUGGESTING they were going to give Bitcoin in exchange for peds. It doesn't seem to worry Mindark that they are throwing customers out on their asses who lose thousands of dollars a year; I reckon they figure they can just tighten down the loot some more and make up for it that way.

The moral of the story is, if you don't play by the rules, don't let MA know about it, ok? And if you plan to play by the rules like I do; then be aware there is very little liquidity.

If you are going to be a trader, be aware there is a lot of competition. If you are going to be a crafter, you are going to need to figure out what niche appeals to you and focus on that niche. If you are going to buy land, you will need to take a look at what is available for sale, generally you will find posts on the forums about such things being for sale. No two land areas are the same, they will have their own unique mix of ores and enmatters. If you are lucky and get good minerals, you will be able to attract a lot of miners if your taxes are set fairly... I strongly recommend not setting taxes over 4%. People mine with 5 and 6%, but only on the asteroid (FOMA), and only because the blast radius is smaller and the claim sizes are boosted meaning they will gladly pay 5% in tax for a shot to hit a $42,000 claim (417,000 peds give or take a few is the current #1 mining All Time High). So, whoever owned that dome got at least $2100, not bad. And just off that one claim, so, you can see, land is a great idea in entropia, but it is going to cost you a bit, too.

It is cliche at this point to say if you are going to hunt or mine, aim for markup. The problem is, the higher the markup something has, the less of it is dropping, so, you never quite make ends meet on markup. Mining is probably your best chance because you can almost always get markup on anything that is mined. Even if you have to sell large quantities in small amounts. At the end of the day it is only markup that will overcome the expenses of running around and doing stuff in the game.

I know a lot of people are bored out of their minds from long winters, lockdowns, life having pretty much been cancelled. I know a lot more people are making their fortunes on cryptocurrency, and gamestop, oh man that is so epic to watch. I do believe Silver will be the next big short squeeze. I am told something like 180 ounces are short-sold for every 1 ounce that exists... Thats the same as borrowing one ounce of silver, selling it, borrowing it back from the person you sold it to, and selling it to someone else, 180 times... But some day you have to give those 180 people back their 1 ounce of silver, each. It is going to get interesting once it takes off. But I guess my point is, if you've made a bunch of money off something, and you are bored, Entropia probably has something to offer to you. Hell, if you are excellent at playing Elite Dangerous, you might just have the ability to make a go of being a pirate in space; but they've implemented space so poorly its almost cringe to try to do anything in space. I really really hope they unlock their full potential of space some day.

So, I've given you enough knowledge to be dangerous I suppose, please note nothing I've said here is to ever be construed as financial advice in any way shape or form. I just wanted to highlight some things that will either make Entropia appeal to you or not. It is better to find out it is a waste of time or not before you spend a lot of time on it.

The game has cost me a lot over the years. But it has given me a number of incredible friends that I'd never have had without this game, so, yes, for me it was worth it. 

Update RE Ark Moon Deeds & The Rest

 Yes, they are tradeable finally for some time now. Yes, they crashed to about 30 PEDs right away, but as of this post, are back to around 50. They have a lot of potential and the fact I traded my pile of them away should be enough to tell you they are going to the moon, everything I sell always goes to the moon. If I buy more of something it always crashes. Seriously.

Why do I think AMDs are a bargain right now?

Sure, it will take a year or two probably before they start paying up like we want them to. But imagine when the codex finally comes to Arkadia. So many people are refusing to go to the moon or to Ark because there is no codex. I understand it, especially with the meta rewards for attributes now. I am probably crazy for being on Ark most of the time, but I am working towards more important goals that require me to be there.

So, imagine, you have Smuggler invasions on the moon and in the underground. You have story arc's and more missions that we are told are coming to the moon. And then, the codex. Especially if the smuggler mobs are in the codex, I think you will see ridiculous dividends on the AMD's. An awful lot of people ubered up fast and went for the big smuggler mechs. If you want to chase an ATH, that is probably the best opportunity I can think of. Apparently everyone else thinking that too for how many of them you see being hunted in recent times.

Mining on the moon is a bit dicey; it is new enough that you won't have the intuition where to go with what finder to hit what like you have if you spent a lot of time mining on one of the planets or on FOMA or in HELL. But I do see it as an untapped potential to further add to the AMD's.

You really should never underestimate how much "free" peds are worth in Entropia... I thought $100 was too much for CLD's, but look at it, every day I check the markups they are closer to $300 now. "Free" money costs a lot. You can expect AMD's will be trading for 100 peds in no time. AUDs have traded over 100 in recent times, again probably due to the heavy grinding that was going on outside of the various mayhems, on the smuggler mobs.

If I had to rank the worth in terms of ROI, of the available deeds and shares...

1. CLD

2. AUD

3. AMD

4. Crystal Palace

50. Greece. Yes, it is so bad because of how many were created and the structure of revenue sharing, that I just couldnt resist jumping it to #50 instead of 5. I just don't see it ever having an ROI. And only COMPET is worse, hopefully none of you have too many of those left on hand... Oh, I am not knocking Greece, it is a tremendous opportunity to skill Melee I am told. But whoever decided on how many shares to issue must have been thinking "lets make printer go brrrr".

If I have to rank them in terms of potential opportunity in the future, if you aren't worried about now and immediate rewards and gains...

1. AUD

2. AMD

3. CLD

4. Crystal Palace

5. Greece

CLD has already gone up so much, and it seems to be fairly cyclical in terms of dividends, and events on caly and etc. It will be easier for the other shares and deeds to double in value than for CLD to double in value. And then, factor in all the new updates I imagine are on the horizon, there is a lot of long term potential in the AUDs and AMD's. 

I don't expect everyone to agree, and these are my opinions. I would assume you are here reading this because you are looking for some advice to consider. Reconcile these points against what you are already thinking or what other people are saying, and you will be that much closer to being able to make an informed decision. That is all I am here to do is provide some advice you may not be thinking about already.

In the interest of full disclosure, I hold NO shares or deeds as of this posting. (Trading my AMD's for a full set of Imp Spec was the best thing I could have done at the time.)

Good luck! And you may want to see the post that came just before this; as it does show you where you can go to make over $100 in free cryptocurrency with no strings.

Entropia Isn't a Casino; but if you are looking for one...

 I know a lot of people consider Entropia gambling or a casino, even though it is expressly forbidden in the terms to call it that. Well, they aren't lying. Yes, you can take infinite risk for microscopic rewards if you want to; I am not going to dox anyone or their losses; but right now I know of several people who have treated Entropia as if it were a casino, and they've racked up losses in the hundreds of thousands of dollars. It doesn't mean Entropia is a lost cause; it just means you have to use skill and knowledge to overcome the fact that loot is not commensurate with the cost of doing certain activities. Knowing where to go for what items that are currently ordered for insane markups; knowing what to craft that you won't be sitting on forever; knowing where to go to find things like Zanderium and Tridenite; or industrial quantities of Alicenies... These are things that will help you overcome the inadequate loot.

So, if you are tired of grinding and not hitting big, if you want to take a break from bad loot, and have some cryptocurrency laying around to gamble with; I want to recommend Stake.Com. The hyperlink is my affiliate URL, it doesn't give me huge rewards on people I refer, but, considering Google killed my ability to monetize this blog many years ago, all I can do is find the limited sponsorships I can find, and I appreciate anyone taking the time to explore something new and support this blog if you find the information I provide useful. (clicking the link will take you off this page, right click and open in a new window if you want to remain on this page. Same is true for the rest of the links in this post.)

Stake operates on several cryptocurrencies, most of which are nearly instantly credited, and instantly payed out when you withdraw, and there is no complicated paperwork or verifications to worry about. Generous comps and thousands of games, and the support is friendly and respond quickly.

If you do not have cryptocurrency, but would like some, whether or not you wish to gamble with it, even if you just want to invest in it; signing up to Coinbase through this hyperlink which is also an affiliate link, we both receive $10 free in cryptocurrency once you make your first purchase I believe of over $100 worth of cryptocurrency. There are also many "rewards", that is, several of the coins on the site pay you up to $10 each just to watch a few short videos and answer a few quick multiple choice questions... I think its something like $140 in free cryptocurrency that is available this way, and it is credited immediately after you've earned it, and you can cash it out to PayPal or trade it or use it or whatever you want to do with it. So, there you go, if you want a way to make over a thousand peds without having to sweat for a million units in Entropia, there you go. 

So, as you can see, while I did promote some things that benefit me, I still offered something that will benefit you, too, if you avail yourself to it.

Smuggler Warehouse 1 - Detailed Overview

 A lot of you will inevitably want to know what to expect from the smuggler warehouses on Planet Arkadia. This post covers Warehouse 1 in detail. I will cover Warehouse 2 in a few days. Hopefully.

REQUIREMENTS for Warehouse 1:

1. Complete IFN Killpoint Challenge for WOMBANA through Stage 6. You can do this before you buy the smuggler clothing or visit the smugglers for that matter.

2. After you've completed the 6 stages of Wombana, you will have to visit the smuggler's den. They will need 500 peds TT of arkoins for the first half of your smuggler clothing set. Then you will have to buy the second half of the set of clothing for another 500 peds TT of arkoins. This is one time fee. You will then be able to get the "proving your worth" mission or similarly called. Immediately you can turn in your stage 6 wombana progress and the smuggler will inform you that you can access the warehouse, located at Celeste Military HQ, to the right of the trade terminals through those doors that were normally sealed, and to the left, down the ramp, and then to the right by the IFN soldier guarding the door, he says he will look the other way. You then go in those doors immediately left is Warehouse 1. Also you will want to pick up the Smuggler Training mission from the terminal there as well at the smuggler den, er, maybe its an NPC, I forget its been a year since I was there, but this will give you mission skill rewards for all the mobs you grind inside the warehouses.

RECOMMENDED GEAR:

Adjusted Vigi and 6A works great; the adjusted vigi gives 20% dodge boost, and yes, all the mobs in the warehouse 1 shoot at you so you need dodge for defense skill. It is doable in Imp Spec and Pulsar 5 plates, but I will tell you, not having the dodge boost from the adjusted vigi is very noticeable with multiple mobs shooting at you at the same time, which, I only ran this combo to see the difference between having the boost and not having the boost. Are there better combinations of armor for warehouses? Most likely. But Adjusted Vigi won't break the bank with a full set coming in around usually 1200 to 1500 peds total, sometimes cheaper if you watch for bargains. Or you can go for improved vigi for better bonuses and ratings, too. But no use breaking your bank if you don't have to.

Adjusted Maddox 4 with beast amp works great, i.e. base DPS in the 50s plus the amp, though the less dodge and defense skills you have, the more dps you might want just so you aren't suffering so hard to get through. Its not that the mobs are tough, but when you dont quite have enough skill, the fact there can be 5 or 10 NPCs shooting at you at the same time, even damaging you for 5 or 10 at a time, it hurts and adds up fast. But it is loot as you go, so, if you've unlocked it, and you cant quite make it through, you aren't going to be out a whole lot.

I have never used more than 200 peds TT of ammo on Warehouse 1, and always have some left over; if you are using L weapons, make sure you've got enough condition worth of weaponry to dispense at least that much ammo.

Using the Maddox 4 Adjusted with Beast, my total cost, with decay, on gun amp and armor, healing, everything, I was averaging 166 peds spent each warehouse 1 I ran. (I am reasonably certain, unless this was the number from my PBR-25 and Evil amp, I can't remember now, but regardless, I doubt you will approach 200 peds regardless of your setup as long as its reasonably suited for this level of instance.)

I usually get back anywhere from 120 peds to 400 peds TT worth of loot; most of the time theres good markup.

THE GENERAL LAYOUT

You get a 50 minute timer, which is more than plenty.

Warehouses are made for teams, but you can solo them. Oh, and you can run them as often as you want! Your smuggler clothes and your grind to unlock the warehouse in the first place, are the only costs you will ever have to pay to access these! 

There are four levels. Most commonly there are 69 mobs total for warehouse 1. The second level has the half-boss, and the last level has the boss, which, has a lot of health compared to all the other mobs in the warehouse. Be aware if you are soloing and you are dying, the revive timer increments each time you die.

There are no trade terminals in the warehouses like you would find in Aakas. So, it doesnt hurt to have portable repair and trade terminals on you just in case.

The first two hallways between levels, have soldiers that will spawn behind you. If you don't shoot them, the doors will not open. The door for the last level, is opened by two terminals. You have to rapidly use each terminal in quick succession. If you are too slow operating them both, the door will remain closed, an alarm sounds, and soldiers spawn behind you. Once you shoot them, you can attempt the terminals again. It is easy to get the hang of, but if you are banging on a terminal and wonder why the door dont open, well, you gotta work both of the terminals.

Also, the soldiers that spawn on top of the cargo containers, are auto-loot regardless of whether you have autoloot or not. They are the only ones with this trait.

HOW TO ACCESS WAREHOUSE SOLO:

Form a team, you don't have to actually add anyone but yourself. Enter the warehouse. Once you are inside, disband your team. Now, you can hunt all you want, regardless, and you can loot everything you shoot. But, make sure you disband if you didn't add someone to your team. It is loot as you go, there are NO boxes for you to open.

IMPORTANT ADVICE AND KNOWLEDGE ABOUT WAREHOUSE 1:

RARE LOOT: You want to be on the look out for Full TT Moonshine L plates. Less than full TT are only worth whatever similar rated plates are worth for people who use L plates. But FULL 30 ped TT plates, can be converted via NPC in the arrivals hangar, along with 1 graphene COMPOSITE, and 10 graphene polymers, into a Unlimited Smuggler Plate 1. It has the same protection ratings, but is repairable and adds 1% chance to block damage. The graphene composite is EXTREMELY rare. I have never looted a composite. But, I've looted a few full TT plates. So. just be on the lookout.

A lot of good markup L guns and attachments drop in warehouse 1, though you can easily flood the market with the attachments. The guns are always reliable sellers.

I was told, even in Warehouse 1, you still have a (very slim) chance of looting your UL Smuggler armor. But, most likely you will loot limited Moonshine armor pieces, but, my advice is hang onto them, and use them for the bigger warehouses. I suspect the moonshine will work great on the bigger warehouses.

CONCLUSION

Warehouse 1 is too easy for me, warehouse 3 is too difficult for me, so I am about to try warehouse 2 for the first time. I have 1/4 million skill points, but, I reckon chipping out my dodge and evade a few years ago was the worst mistake I ever made in the game. I have no one to blame but myself lol.

I have given away a LOT of valuable hard to just go out and find info in this post, so, please, if you find any use in any of my sponsored banner ads either near the top or near the bottom of this page, please consider taking a look. I have no popups, no paywalls, just a few honest banner ads that maybe will be of some interest to you, and if they are, great, if not, well, that is ok too.

Some Words of Caution; Don't be a Lemming

 There are so many new players in Entropia, presumably from people being stuck home looking for new fun things to do. A couple years ago it was only ever the same names running around. Now, its almost all players I've never even heard of before. In fact, for a few months, I've seen nothing but new names everywhere I go, which is good, it means the game isn't dying, but rather growing quite well it would appear. 

So, this is intended for those newer players. Just a few pieces of advice and common sense to consider.

Beware that misinformation does exist in a few places once in a while. There are people that have it in their minds that if they can't loot something it doesn't exist, or if x equipment works great for y mob, then that is the best gear for it and no one should use anything but that. The fact is, you can sometimes make slight changes to what is considered "the best there is". Everyone loves Ghost and 5B plates for Atrox. Nothing wrong with that. But you also have to consider do you want one suit of armor for each couple mobs you hunt? Or do you want to find a suit of armor that averages out nicely for those mobs you typically hunt so that you don't need to tie up money in several sets of armor? In my case, robots are my best looting mob, and the differences between Vigilante armor and Ghost aren't so far apart that I can't use it for Atrox, too. And yes, it drives people crazy that I run around in Vigi with 5B plates for Trox; but I just can't see having several different sets of armor when I can have one that is acceptable for everything I do. 

There are some very high end rewards sometimes for a few very, very, long grinds. If you find something epic, that you absolutely want to work for, yes, you will have earned it by the time you get it. For example, there are people doubting the smuggler armor even exists. Oh, it absolutely exists; there was a full set on display in a booth in Ark Underground for a short while. I regret not taking a screenshot of it. But it is character bound, and there is a very, very small chance of looting a piece when running a warehouse. MA has a mob maturity connection to the type of loot and chance of that loot dropping so I am assuming the greatest chance of obtaining the smuggler armor would be from Warehouse 4. But do not for a moment think it doesn't exist and cannot be obtained. It is, in my opinion, the most epic of the gear one can possibly try to obtain, though it isn't mission related per se. You do have to unlock warehouses by doing all 6 stages of Wombana for Warehouse 1, Navi for 2, Badger for 3, and Togolossi for 4. You can expect to spend a couple years to complete all four of those through stage 6. But then you also have have to have two piles of 500 peds TT worth of Arkoin to buy the smuggler clothes to be accepted as a smuggler, but there is no sense in doing that until youve done at least one of the stage 6s. I will do a post soon going into depth on Warehouse 1 so you can know better what to expect and what you are getting yourself into.

On another note, sometimes there are missions to obtain gear from NPCs; which is to say if you have the required loot items, you can turn them in and get your stuff without having to have it drop from a mob or after so much grinding on mob. MA can, and does, break NPC's once in a while when they do updates or patches. Most notably is, the armor NPC on Planet Cyrene is non-responsive. So, people hoarded up all the animal parts and loot to "craft" their uber armor, and the patch came, now they are stuck with the parts, and there is a rather limited amount of the uber armor sets. For how good the various armors are, they are a tremendous bargain. But no one knows if or when the NPC will be fixed, and people aren't so eager to sell or trade the armor they do have now. So, the lesson here is, as soon as something rolls out that you are very interested in, go for it right away because eventually it will get nerfed.

And I suppose the last main thing here to cover is... Eco vs non-eco. Well. I've never had a good return playing eco. I know everyone worries about being as eco as possible. There comes a certain point at which being eco will cost you more for the gear than you will ever save in costs. Do a few runs eco, do a few runs uneco, track everything, and decide for yourself. Ultimately you need to do your own trial and error, and testing. What works for one player will not work for everyone else. No two players with the same gear and the same skills will loot the same way or have the same chance at the same loot. Just the way the game is, and this is my 14 years of playing the game and observing and looking for similarities and differences between what's happening to me vs what is happening to others. Don't be afraid to try a different combination of gear, and seek to find that which works best in your situation.

And sweating... Well... If you are insistent upon non-depositing, by all means I won't stop you. But it is a long slow grind to get much accomplished that way. You likely will spend more on electricity to run your computer than you will make off the sweat. So, my first day playing the game I put $10 in and played on that for right around a full year. Well, as a totally new player, you can only spend so much and do so much.

I will sign off now, and I will get into some more specific, detailed and informative posts shortly.

Quick Update

 Life has been crazy, and Entropia changes fast enough that there are a lot of new things for me to write about here. Please keep in mind the older posts may be outdated info, but as stated before, I leave all the old posts up because I think it is important to preserve some sort of memory of how things used to be. As the game changes, we tend to forget what used to be, and what used to be may have some importance to whatever research we are doing in trying to figure out patterns and strategies for having an honestly decent shot at getting somewhere in Entropia. So, at some point, about everything I've had to say was true, and it may not hold true currently. As soon as we figure something out, MA changes it anyways.

There are some important things I would like to post about. Some of you likely have questions about various things that you would like answers to. Whether it is the Aakas instances on Ark, or the smuggler warehouses; or maybe its some gear that you are grinding towards earning but can't quite seem to get and are wondering if it really exists or not. So, standby, lots of fresh posts will hit this blog very soon. I just wanted to drop this quick note to let everyone know I didnt give up, and this blog isn't dead.

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I have to sign off for now, but within a day or two expect some posts concerning hunting, mining, crafting, quests, and instances. And maybe even an update regarding the PVP situation and piracy. I know everyones an expert these days, but, trust me, no one thinks about things the way I do. If what everyone else had to tell you worked, then you wouldn't be looking for more help, right?

Crystal Palace shares, New Mission System, and more...

I should be bringing you updates more regularly here... I very much am grateful for all of you who take the time to visit my blog. Much of what has long since been posted is now obsolete just due to the fact there were so many massive overhauls to so much of the game; but I leave it all posted in the hopes that it will bear witness to what was a glorious golden age of Entropia years gone by.

That said, we seen a lot of BAD changes the last several years. I am pleased to report I am now seeing POSITIVE changes. What am I talking about? Well ok, then... I know you are thinking "positive changes? in Entropia??! What's this guy on!?" But seriously, yes there are some positive changes.

NEW MISSION SYSTEM: From what I see, EVERY mob now offers missions and rewards; you will have to likely track down the button from the action library and add it to your keyboard or GUI yourself. A lot of good mobs suffered from lack of hunting missions. Now, even the miner bots have missions! I just wish they had some loot again like the old days. You can let the rewards pile up, just have to hit claim as many times as your rank increased for that mob, and pick from a wide variety of rewards. Might be a good opportunity to push for that new level that you always wanted, or fill up your lower skills so you can catch up on what you are lacking in.

What is so good about this system? For those of you who were around a while before the new system came online; you probably have a ton of unfinished iron and bronze challenges. Well, this is one thing they did right: while you are trying to climb the ranks of the new mission system, your progress still counts for the old missions too. But I am told once you complete the old mission and finish it, that's it, its done. But you effectively will end up with double the rewards for the same amount of grinding. I know, some people don't like change, but, I am sure you were complaining about something before it got changed, so, at least now you will either be happy or more upset! But at least it isn't the same old thing.

CRYSTAL PALACE SHARES: I absolutely do NOT like Mindark deciding to roll out the new shares system to sell the shares in Crystal Palace, which I am told all 500K shares sold out within days of the update; when the old system still had tens of thousands of Ark Moon Deeds going unsold. I did send suggestions to MA, and I don't know if they helped, but I see that the robot pets are awarded for buying deed packs. I don't know how many AMD's we have left to sell before we can trade, and I wouldn't put it past MA to hold just ONE deed out just to keep us from being able to trade them on the AH... Well after having so many for so long now, you kind of worry about that kind of thing happening. Waiting, and waiting, and waiting. The moon has a lot of potential; but I think loot needs better balancing, no ones going to bother making the trip if they already know its going to be a money sink. There needs to be better rewards for risk. Low or no multipliers doesn't cut it.

We can now buy and sell these shares in Crystal Palace by right clicking on the PED card and clicking on the shares system, and then highlight the necessary tab and the entry for Crystal Palace and click buy, and you are free to buy however many you can afford of what is available. Last time I looked, they were purchasable for around 19.7 peds each. For those who like a little trivia, with 500K shares, valued at almost $2 each, that makes the fair market value of Crystal Palace around $1 million dollars. As long as something doesn't go wrong at CERN and wipe Sweden off the planet, we are ok, right?

I do not know what they pay out but they gotta be better than AMD's... Not that I want to knock the AMD's... Please folks, hurry up and buy them so we can trade them already. You can dollar-cost-average them after the prices crash on the free market. Seriously though... I think the Moon will have a bright future, just, that's the problem. We need it to happen sooner than later.

MARKUPS AND TRADING: There are some interesting things going on with the markups on certain items. I won't specifically mention anything, but there is indeed hope that things are improving based on what I am seeing.

SURVIVABILITY: My biggest problem the last couple years has been no matter what I looted or how much markup I got out of it, it was impossible to survive no matter what I did or didn't do. I have this week, survived hunting and amped mining on 500 peds. Yes, for almost a whole week I've played on 500 peds. Before, I'd be lucky if that lasted a couple hours. So I get the feeling some rebalancing is being done, and I feel like things are going back to being a little more equitable. Afterall, if we can't survive to enjoy playing, why bother even to deposit? Just maybe they have figured this out. But, yes, Crafting does seem rather busted still.

MISCELLANEOUS: There may be a lot of things I am not aware of that I should be aware of, but I do not frequent the forums. The forums are full of smug elitists who think the world revolves around them and I just don't have time for that. At least here I am reporting what I directly observe and experience.

Good luck, and I will probably have more to post soon!

Open Letter to Mindark

Once in a while I feel the need to express some things publicly. And maybe I will open a support case later and express them directly.

1. We who HEAVILY invested in the Arkadia Moon.... Would have appreciated it if A. You would have waited for the new shares system until AFTER AMD's were tradeable... OR port the AMD's TO the new Shares system so that they might actually sell out and be tradeable finally.

2. The game has a LOT of potential, but only a minimum of it's potential is being reached. I see a lot of improvement as of late, and as long as you keep working towards reaching the full potential of what the game could become, I'd say Entropia's better days are ahead of it still, and not behind it as the case has been for so long.

3. I am still not seeing loot as commensurate to what we are spending / grinding. I have 210K skill points (after some chipping out in the past, I still have 210K now), and I can't get a hunting hof on big OR small mobs. I've had one hunting uber in 12 years. This is not how you retain customers. This is not how you get people to want to grind months long mission chains. Yes people scream about "Pay to Win"; but for crying outloud, when the game costs money to play, what is fair about paying to lose?

4. You need to look at other games that have a space component to it; find the good ideas they utilize in making space so it isn't just a big expanse with nothing to do once you leave orbit. Maybe fill the voids with small asteroids so that you can equip space craft with mining equipment so that these space rocks could be bombed and drilled for ore and enmatter. It would be riskier but you could offset that risk with better odds, you will make it all back anyways when miners have to defend themselves against pirates or other miners.

I am sure there are a lot more ideas to get people thinking... There are so many things that could make the game better for everyone. It is not necessary to make 99% of the player base suffer in order to make the 1% happy. Everyone could be treated fairly and commensurately then there would be much less complaining from everyone on the average.

OH YES, my biggest complaint... I had acceptable loot... Literally until the moment Mayhem went online. Nothing but lose since, and I don't even participate in Mayhem, and when I did I lost even more. I wish Mayhem did not every year punish those players who do not participate. I can't imagine anyone doing extremely well who isn't doing Mayhem and who is actually tracking their loot during Mayhem. Am I in the majority? Am I in the minority? I don't know. But every year it is the same thing. I will not have a good return until after Mayhem goes offline.

After 12 years, while much of the game is still a mystery, and "dynamic" loot can mean anything; somethings are all too predictable. I know if I go spend a year on Atrox or Ambu, I will not uber. I've done it before. I know if I play during Mayhem, I will be broke as fast as I can deposit.

The game is always trying to balance and counterbalance with every update; but there is always an imbalance. Instead of having some developers in a room discussing how to tweak loot, I would say what is wrong with setting up an AI algorithm to balance loot automatically and just let it ride out, certainly it can't do any worse than how loot is distributed all these years already.

I dunno. I've said what I need to say, some of you will agree some of you wont. The point is to get people to think about things in terms they haven't maybe thought of things in, and start discussing them. It is through discussion that things finally will be worked out.

If MA finally gets the game to where much of its potential is finally realized, I will be happy no matter what. It is just the fact so little of its potential is unlocked and untapped, that it hurts to see. It is almost like they are happy with how things are, they make their money, people keep playing thinking there is actually loot somewhere for them, the world keeps turning. But they would make so much more if they would make the game be what it could be, and THAT is what I am pushing for here.

They are the only game in the business, they have no direct competitors. Second Life is almost a joke as for the real cash economy portion of it; yet it has the level of complexity I like to see games have. But as for MMO's running on real cash, MA is the only game in town. I don't know if it is a lack of competition that keeps them unmotivated, but surely the time to strike is when you have the only iron to work, never mind if it is hot or cold.

Smuggler Warehouses

There is very little information available as to the actual mobs, loot, cost to run each warehouse, etc. I think the assumption is that if you can afford to grind say, Wombana through stage VI (which counts whether or not you've bought the smuggler clothing yet or even found the smuggler den; you simply visit them, buy your clothes and tell them you've already completed the task and then you will be granted access to the appropriate warehouse for that mob. Wombana = 1, Navi = 2, Badger = 3, Togolossi = 4).

They likely also assumed if you can handle those mobs with no problem, the instances should be not that bad for you. Well, that is a fairly accurate statement, with exceptions and caveats. 

If you have chipped out any of your dodge and evade at any point in your Entropia career and never replaced it, the bigger boss mobs in the instances will be a pain, and whatever armor was good for the mobs you completed, you will be wanting to have some plates and good healing. You are going to want DPS as well since it is a timed run, plus the faster you drop the bosses the less you will die, and the smaller the revive counter will be. Yes, the incrementing revive timer is the worst invention ever conceived by the swedes.

I have unlocked Warehouse 1 and 3. I unlocked 3 first, because my avatar likes robot hunting, and does the best on bots, always has, probably always will. But even though I was able to drop the level 10 badgers, there was just no way I was going to progress very far on the warehouse 3. So, that's when I decided I need to complete Wombana and open up warehouse 1.

Before I go into details here, I better tell you what I was equipped with. And mind you, I was one of those people who thought "I will just chip out all my hunting and never do it again, stick to things that actually loot for me like mining"... I only got as far as chipping out dodge, evade, and firstaid. I never really replaced those skills, so they are quite low as of this attempt on Warehouse 1 I am going to tell you about. What gear did I have? This is important. If you are this well equipped or better, warehouse 1 will be no problem.

Piron PBR-20 with Fi/Ra/Co Evil; no damage enhancers used. Adjusted Vigilante (full set) without plates. With plates, the boss (Col John) would have been a LOT easier. Or of course more DPS would have been good too. I have 169 Health, and 210K total skill, but only like 2K each of Dodge and Evade though I have 7500 points of BLP Weapons Tech and 7200 of Rifle. (No matter how tempted you are to chip out, don't do it, DONT do it, unless you are truly done.)

What is the difference between the warehouses and ark keys?

Well, Ark Keys you have to craft or buy a key each time you run the instance which it isn't such a big deal as it was in the beginning of Arkadia. Also, just anyone can run them, solo or in a team. I would tend to think the more people able to run an instance the more competition you have for the good loot that remains to be got.

The warehouse, once you've completed the stage VI to unlock it, and have your smuggler clothing and have talked to the smuggler boss; that's it, you've got free access for life for the instance. You can run it as many times as you want any time. The only exception is, there is as of yet no solo option. You have to have a team, and someone has to be on the team, even if they aren't hunting with you, you can't loot mobs or enter the instance without a team and someone on it.

I don't want to go into all of the specifics, certain things I need to keep close to my vest because these certain things have made it worth the couple years it took to grind my missions and get into these warehouses. But I can tell you most of what I have discovered.

There are a lot more multipliers on the loot than on normal mobs in normal instances. It is easier to global, presumably hofs will be easier to get too. Of course the real draw to the warehouses is not the better loot, but rather every kill has a small, a very small, chance of dropping a smuggler armor part. I am hoping I can loot a set, yes it is bound to account, but is that so bad? How many of you have had a full set of uber armor, pawn it or sell it because you are poor and then wish you never did it? What if you could have a set of uber armor that will always be yours and the only cost to you is the TT value it was worth when it dropped which you cannot TT it for?  That's the only way to really look at it... Though I hope these things which are not tradeable in 10 or 20 years might end up tradeable finally. The game has changed so much since I started in 2007, that I would say anything and everything is possible.

I will only say that Wombana are the biggest losing things I ever had to grind. It was COSTLY to unlock the warehouse 1. My only advice if you are going to do the Wombana's first, do not continue if you burn say 100 Peds of your run and have not had a mini at least. My last 10K points of Wombana were a 400 Ped loss to me. But I persisted because the finish line was in sight and I was sick of hunting Wombana. I probably will never hunt another one ever again now.

The first run on Warehouse 1 was a profitable run. I didn't track it closely enough to know how profitable, but it was noticeable. Of the 300 Peds in loot some 40 Ped of it was in the form of Arkoins, and another 40 Ped or so were in the form of weapon attachments (L). The rest was not mostly shrapnel, but had the feel like the old days of hunting loot were back. So, are the warehouses running with the old style loot algorithm? I don't know. But it sure feels like the good old days to me. 

Yes, it is costly to get access to the warehouses. Yes it is a pain to find someone to team with you every time you want to do one. But, in my honest opinion, it is all worth it. I am sure some people will read this and say "Oh my god, the instances are so horrible how could anyone like them." I surely would hope those people are in the minority. I quite probably have had the best hunting of my entire Entropia life in these warehouses. I can't guarantee you will too though. 

Warehouse 1 mobs start out with Level 10, and go up to what Level 30 or 33 with Col. John. I would say if you can take on two or three generation 10 badgers at the same time, Col. John will be no problem. The mobs leading up to him, I dunno, comparable to say young to old Atrox really. No big deal. 

No I do not have any AUD's, so I do not gain by talking you into doing these missions. I do however have AMD's and I will shamelessly ask anyone who has never been to the moon but thought about going, to please go already  (LOL). Seriously though, I need to get serious about this blog again, I still have not found an adequate means to monetize the blog yet, so that leaves me with plugging my own stuff, which is fine.

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This is the Goldbaron signing off. Stay tuned for more posts in the near future.