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Why send multiple Companions Scavengin'?

AuthorMessage
Dread Pirate
May 27, 2009
2131
In the recent Newsletter, Madame Vadima noted that Scavengin' is lowest on the list of Companion Tasks selected by Pirates. The reason for this is pretty plain -- the heavy penalty imposed on each successive Companion sent on the task. For Pet Wranglin' the wait time is a matter of minutes to hours. For Scavengin' that penalty stretches out to days and even WEEKS! The only activity with a stiffer penalty is Keel Hauling, which I actually think is fine because any pirate will only have one or two companions at a higher level than they are anyway.

It's no wonder that most Pirates select the activity where their crew will return most frequently. I can send a dozen companions Pet Wrangling' and collect everything the next morning. I send 12 companions Scavenging and the last couple won't return until a week later.

Someone should look at the formula used for the Scavengin' activity timer. It's not like they bring back better gear the longer they are out. If my pirate is maxed, there is only so much gear to choose from, and most of that is just going to be sold because I've received it several times over already, and certainly don't need it cluttering my backpack. I think more Pirates would choose Scavengin' if the activity had a more reasonable time component.
Petty Officer
Aug 11, 2013
52
I agree, the time needed for scavengin' is a bit over the top. I'm hesitant to send multiple crew members off on that task at one time in fear that I won't see them for several days. I haven't been sending any of my companions to do that at all lately, because I've only ever gotten things my character couldn't equip.

~Gibbsie
Pirate Overlord
Mar 16, 2012
10631
I rarely have more than a third of my companions 'on task'. I usually have 3 to 4 scavengin'; 20 hours is long enough to wait. 4 companions pet wranglin' is fine, you get more than enough gear and snacks for your pets. Since all my companions are at max or above, there is no need for keel haulin' and as I'm at max for nautical, sailin' is not available. That leaves plunderin' for the last 4 to five companions.
Ensign
Jun 18, 2009
38
I suspect that we all have a companion or two that we don't really care that much for. By sending them out plundering I get them out of the way, and depending on your level the gear sells at a higher price than you would gain by plundering. I have gotten a few good articles from scavenging and the others sell nicely. And usually they can go to the shared bank to help a lower ranked pirate of yours to buy something great a lot faster.
Dread Pirate
Jun 17, 2013
2743
Willowydream on Aug 4, 2014 wrote:
In the recent Newsletter, Madame Vadima noted that Scavengin' is lowest on the list of Companion Tasks selected by Pirates. The reason for this is pretty plain -- the heavy penalty imposed on each successive Companion sent on the task. For Pet Wranglin' the wait time is a matter of minutes to hours. For Scavengin' that penalty stretches out to days and even WEEKS! The only activity with a stiffer penalty is Keel Hauling, which I actually think is fine because any pirate will only have one or two companions at a higher level than they are anyway.

It's no wonder that most Pirates select the activity where their crew will return most frequently. I can send a dozen companions Pet Wrangling' and collect everything the next morning. I send 12 companions Scavenging and the last couple won't return until a week later.

Someone should look at the formula used for the Scavengin' activity timer. It's not like they bring back better gear the longer they are out. If my pirate is maxed, there is only so much gear to choose from, and most of that is just going to be sold because I've received it several times over already, and certainly don't need it cluttering my backpack. I think more Pirates would choose Scavengin' if the activity had a more reasonable time component.
I think that Scavengin' is not something that is meant to have more than a few companions assigned to it. To me it appears that it is there to supplement our boss farming attempts for No Auction gear and/or our gold intake. With Scavengin', there's a chance to have a companion bring back a No Auction piece of gear to use or pass on to other pirates. The other non-No Auction items seem to be there for the purpose of selling to help bring in more gold.

Pet Wranglin' has a much faster turn around because what it produces is something that we can use a lot of each and every day. With multiple pets being trained (3 pages at times, in my case), we need all of the gear and snacks that we can get. So it seems fitting that the system would have a much faster turn around in regards to Wranglin'. With Scavengin', we don't necessarily require the gear that is being brought back because we are not "using" it up daily like we do with Pet Wranglin'. Though, what I would really, really like to see is a companion assigned Wranglin' having a very small chance at bringing back orange, energy potions that we could use when we needed it. What do you say Ratbeard/Decius/KI?.

To me Scavengin' is primarily just a way to provide us another, no effort way to get No Auction gear and to provide us with another source of gold. Also, I am not sure if many are aware, but if you reset and train your "spare" Witchdoctors with the Scavenger Rank 3 Talent, they will bring back the goods 25% faster. Right now I currently have 11 maxed companions assigned to Scavengin', with 6 of them being Witchdoctors fully trained in Scavenger Rank 3. The longest it takes any one of my companions to bring back a piece of gear is just barely over 3 days. So in order for it to take weeks for any given companion, one would have to either have well over a page of companions assigned to Scavengin' or not have the companions, that are assigned, trained efficiently to help reduce the amount of time it takes for them to return with the scavenged gear. Training those companions assigned to Tasks efficiently and in their specialized Talent, soooooooo helps with the expediency and if applicable the amounts of the returns.

Here's a list of what Talent each class can train to Rank 3 and specializes in.

Overall, I am actually quite impressed with the Companion Task System and Pet System because it gives us so many other ways to get extra gold and items. We can sell off extra Snacks/Gear, sell gear brought in from Scavengin', collect gold from Plunderin' and possibly hit gold mines and in regards to training pets- gear earned from training events can be sold as well. With these updates, KI really helped us find things to not only spend gold on, but also ways to bring in more gold.

I say it's a system well thought out, developed and implemented!
Dread Pirate
May 27, 2009
2131
Thanks, Valkoor - I was kind of replying to the implied question that Madame Vadima posed as to why people aren't sending very many companions Scavengin' -- but you bring up some good points about doing it efficiently. Since I haven't used any of my companion resets to retrain talents, I don't have any that have more than one level in that activity anyway so it's...

My bad.
Commodore
Jan 22, 2013
889
i send a full page of crew on scavenging but do i mind, no! i have gotten some pretty good stuff, like the arms of Ares which give me another heal which would help in say the rooke battle. i seem to get allot of card gear. something many people would have to farm along time for while i can make my companions get it and while doing that i farm for something else. also if you don't want the item or cant use it you can sell it. for me i usually get around a 1000 gold. so if i don't want something i get gold, if i do i usually get a card which can help me lvl up (i'm max but you get the point) i get gold will help me farm, also helps me not waste my time repeatedly trying to get something, the gold can help with all the other stuff by helping me have money for pet stuff and companion training points. they way it helps with nautical farming is again gold plus the gear, if i have to board i can easily win the fight and can go back to getting nautical exp. in my opinion scavenging is the best, it can get me all the other stuff plus more! its worth its wait because i can now do allot of shopping at the bazaar without worries.
Dread Pirate
Jun 17, 2013
2743
Willowydream on Aug 5, 2014 wrote:
Thanks, Valkoor - I was kind of replying to the implied question that Madame Vadima posed as to why people aren't sending very many companions Scavengin' -- but you bring up some good points about doing it efficiently. Since I haven't used any of my companion resets to retrain talents, I don't have any that have more than one level in that activity anyway so it's...

My bad.
No worries Willow.

I just know that I "stumbled upon" the so-called Talent Specialization by Class on my own and haven't seen many players mention it or imply that they are aware of it at all. So, I thought it may help to get the word out there that training efficiently helps just a wee bit in regards to time and numbers. Many know that you can train some to Rank 3 but not which Class takes full advantage of which Task. And yeah, I read Vadima's inquiry in the Newsletter in regards to Scavengin' and I too thought it was just a bit odd that the #s for Scavengin' were so low.

Since the updates went live I have only hit 4 or 5 gold mines from plunderin', with anywhere in the range of 8-12 companions (most Swashbucklers, trained in Plunderer Rank x 3, of course) assigned to the task. So that is a lot of times that my maxed crew members have only brought back 633 gold.

Meanwhile, most of the non-No Auction gear that my companions bring back from Scavengin' sells for 1000-1300 gold each. So even if they take 1.5 times longer then those companions bringing back gold from Plunderin' they will more than earn their keep. With 3 "task trips and collects" from normal Plunderin', I will get 1899 gold. Meanwhile, in the same amount of time, 2 sellable gear returns from Scavengin' will yield my pirate 2000-2600 on average (more gold from less companions in the same time frame).

So, it does seem peculiar that most would prefer to receive less gold in the same amount of time, but...that's were the lure of the gold mine comes into play. Hit one of those every so often and it seems as if you are making out better than by sending companions Scavengin'. When you very well could have nearly made up the difference of the gold mine by the extra 400-600 gold per sold piece of gear (in most cases when maxed). Plus you may get a No Auction piece for a pirate that you were looking and farming for. But with Scavengin' some players may view it as more "work" to get the gold. They have to teleport somewhere, interact with someone and then actually sell each, individual piece of equipment. Maybe some see that as a bit more of a hassle and just prefer the easy way of collecting gold from companion Plunderin' - no effort really required.

I prefer a good balance between the tasks with about 10-12 companions each on Scavengin' and Plunderin' and about 1 1/2 pages assigned to Wranglin'. With the Scavengin' and Plunderin' I chose to spread out the collect times to where I am collecting about every 4 hours. I log on up to 3 times a day (about 7-8 hours apart) and this guarantees that no matter when I log on, I am usually collecting from 4 companions from both Plunderin' and Scavengin'.

Man, why do I always end up typing so much? Well, now that I have used up nearly all of my character(s), I leave you with this.............Happy Tasking and Collecting!
Captain
Jan 17, 2012
672
I presently have two pirates who have reached level 65. They presently cannot get any more experience points, so continuing to do quests is to their disadvange, as they will advance into harder areas without getting any additional experience levels.

So, I have been spending my time working on a pet (since I don't like pokemon, I don't bother with more than one pet), and have gotten that pet up to full levels in everything.

I have also accululated all of the training tomes I can.

I have also maxed my gold.

I have also maxed my nautical level.

All I have left to do is scavenging. So, all of my companions are out doing that, since they can't do anything else useful.

The advantage is, I can then put all the scavenged items in the shared bank for my other pirates.

I can also accumulate these items for when the cap is raised to keep my gold level high. As I spend gold, I sell the scavenged item.
Admiral
May 30, 2010
1221
I just do it to keep the Cool Ranch companions out of my hair for as long as possible, since with the exception of El Toro I just don't like them that much. They're good enough, but cowboys just don't mix with pirates in my book. I'm not a fan of their look, either. So I encourage them to scour the world in search of that just right hat or boots or armor and keep my more favored companions doing the stuff that frees them up sooner to play with.