Alchemy Mastery 3 -- is this 9aa wasted?

[Posatrocible]

With tradeskills being what they are... skillup to 300 plus 15% mods, does Alchemy mastery 3 mean anything?

Using this calculator: http://www.eqtraders.com/calculators/main.php

I inputed my stats (300 skill, 15 % mod, 295 wis) and then various trivs. Even the highest trivial I could find for alchemy (363), the calculator said my success rate would be 95 with AM 2. AM 3 didn't seem to alter that percent at all.

SO, am I better sticking my aa into salvage at this point? Or is there some value in spending 9aa on Alch Mast 3?

[Teledriel]

With tradeskills being what they are... skillup to 300 plus 15% mods, does Alchemy mastery 3 mean anything?

Using this calculator: http://www.eqtraders.com/calculators/main.php

I inputed my stats (300 skill, 15 % mod, 295 wis) and then various trivs. Even the highest trivial I could find for alchemy (363), the calculator said my success rate would be 95 with AM 2. AM 3 didn't seem to alter that percent at all.

SO, am I better sticking my aa into salvage at this point? Or is there some value in spending 9aa on Alch Mast 3?

I would start Salvage (even being not an Alchemist)

My understanding of all the Mastery AA's is as you get closer to the trival level, the lower they are actualy "used". I could be wrong, but since everything has like a 5% chance to fail, your success rate will always be 95% after a certian point compared to an item "trival. Mainly they help more for the ones not maxed at 300 skill level. Hope this helps in making it a little more understandable.

[Gaell Stormracer]

My Shaman has AM3 because at skill 233+Trophy, the combines she's going to be doing most often (Clarity X and HoT X) have a significant failure chance. I actually want the products, rather than simply skill ups, so the 18 AA (3+6+9) I threw into it are well worth it to me -- especially as I got most of them during the last double XP weekend-and-a-bit.

[Tokkyl]

Put in salvage as mentioned since you are already at 300 in Alchemy (and salvage works for ALL tradeskills so better use of AA's IMO). So at 300 with a 15% trophy you are sitting at 345 and the mastery AA's won't really help you with current max trivials out there today.

I think the answer really depends on how high you want to get your skill, how easy that skill is to raise for your race, and what are highest level of combines you are going to attempt. Even though I plan on getting to 300 in tailoring someday if the RNG will be kind , I purchased TM 3 in order to have better success at DoN combines while I was still in low 260's as my tailoring was going up VERY slow (and still hasn't gotten to 300 /sigh). Now that I'm in 280's it doesn't help as much, but was well worth it at the time as I wanted to succeed on my expensive combines more than getting skillups.

I haven't crunched numbers since trophies were introduced but if remember correctly with Trivials of <=307 your at the max success rate of 95% (excluding DoN combines) if get any skill up to 256 when add in a +5% Geerlok/Trophy + Mastery 3. Almost all skills are easy to get to 250 these days, so then getting the mastery AA's makes more sense if only attempting 300 trivials than trying to raise your skill.

With PoR and some new bow trivials in the 400's maybe the mastery AAs would come into play again and could see getting those now even if at 300 with Trophy at 15%. Not sure about other trades since PoR as only looked into the bows personally.

[bazile leaf]

i have both salvage and alchemy mastery 3. personally, i think it's a great help to have both especially when making the newer pots that carry 350+ trivials. i think i have been more successful with combines having alchemy mastery.

[Gaell Stormracer]

Well, technically, it only helps when your modified skill is such that your success rate is 90% or less -- halving the fail rate then takes you to the max success rate of 95%. That would be at 278 skill + 8% mod (or 300 modified if you have a better mod - eg 273 if your trophy got to master well ahead of you, or if you have the old Grieg's End "Philosopher's Stone" item).

But, for anyone without that level of skill, it makes a fairly significant difference.

[Bobaten]

If the level cap is raised to 80, and if that is accompanied by new potions for XI and XII at higher trivials (two ifs there of course), then there will probably again be a use for Alchemy Mastery.

[deria]

I think that the answer to this question lies in your current skill level.

At 200 skill with a 5% modification, your chance of suceeding on an "X" potion is 5% without any alchemy mastery. With AM3, its 50%. Since those are useful potions, which can be used or sold, it makes alchemy mastery absolutely desirable. As you get higher in skill, it will be used less, but its still saving your bacon for quite a while.

At 300, its more of a future investment. 9AA is not alot to get, and its a reasonable assumption that new potions with higher trivials will come along eventually. It happens with every other tradeskill, and now that alchemy has been revamped its alot more of a "real" tradeskill. I'm not sure if I would expect potions, though. It might be in the form of new augments.

Myself, I got AM3 at 200 because I knew I would want to keep the potions I was making. I think I got my 9aa worth (since getting 9aa took about 3 hours).

I'm not sure how accurate the calculator is, as well. It could be straight from a developer for all I know, but having Alchemy Mastery 3 gives me a warm fuzzy feeling even if its not doing much of anything. At 90k per failure, its nice even if it really is just the placebo effect.

[Vashan]

So at 90% or 95% if you have the Alchemy Mastery AAs you think it won't help? Makes me wonder a bit to be sure. I have all the AAs and I noticed that (shortly after I hit 200) I had far fewer fails on "trivial" gate potions (10 dose with 3 helitrope). Add in the Salvage AA and I was in heaven with far fewer fails and much more plat in my pocket. For those foraged and farmed items it mean that many fewer fails so I could at least pay for the time I spent farming.

[Posatrocible]

First off, thanks for all the responses!!!

I found your answers really useful, and accordingly have started on my salvage aa.

I "under-get" what everyone is saying about the am3 being useful someday, but I appreciate your confirmation that *for now* I should go after salvage.

Once again, thanks all!