Shipment Gear Math

Hmmmm ...
Something about your math seems off. Mind if I take a look? Let's look at it from a different perspective.

( 50 salvage/gear ) / 20% drop rate (salvage/node) = 250 node/gear. You must farm a node 250 times to get 50 salvage out of it at a 20% drop rate.

( 250 node/gear ) * ( 10 energy/node ) = 2500 energy/gear
( 2500 energy/gear ) / ( 120 energy/refresh ) = 20.833 refresh/gear. You will need 20.8 refreshes to farm enough salvage for one 50-piece gear.

Now, if each refresh costs you 50 crystals, then each gear costs ( 50 * 20.833 ) = 1041.67 crystals, if you farm it. If the drop rate is only 15%, then the cost rises to 1388.89 crystals. Either way, you come out ahead by farming instead of spending 1400 in shipments.

A 20-salvage gear takes only 8.333 refreshes. That equates to a cost of 416.67 crystals for each gear. More than 50% more expensive than buying it from shipments. Best to not farm these if you buy all your energy


But that's not the whole story. You get 120 free energy every day. That reduces the cost of farming both pieces. By quite a lot. If R is the number of refreshes you buy every day for 50 crystals, and S is the number of salvage you need, then the cost of node farming is:

C = S * 20.83333 * R/(R+1)

For 50-piece and 1 purchased refresh per day, it will cost you 520.8 crystals to farm one gear (in 10.4 days).
For 50-piece and 2 purchased refresh per day, it will cost you 694.4 crystals to farm one gear (in 6.9 days).

For 20-piece and 1 purchased refresh per day, it will cost you 208.3 crystals to farm one gear (in 4.2 days).
For 20-piece and 2 purchased refresh per day, it will cost you 277.8 crystals to farm one gear (in 2.8 days).


Shipments are more expensive in all cases when you consider free energy.