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Since the formula for skill up was disclosed in the Fan Faire along with specifics about tailoring, it is now possible to study the cost of raising tailoring using the Solstice Robes route.
Solstice Robes is different from other skill up routes in that the cost factor is proheminent, compared to, say, Studded Acrylia for which the rarity of components matters the most.
Equipped with the formula for success, the formula for skillup and a few assumptions about availability of components, it becomes possible to make an estimate of the cost of skilling up at each level.
First of all, this study is based on formulas below.
1. Skillup. The chance of skilling up is, according to what Tanker disclosed at the Fan Faire (see this thread) the combination of two checks. The first check is
P1 = (Stat - 15) / (Skill_difficulty * Success_factor), in percentage, capped at 100%.
Stat is the highest stat between your wis and int (there is no other relevant stat). Skill_diffuculty is a factor specific to the skill it applies to. For tailoring it used to be 4, and it's now 3. Success_factor is 1 if the combine is successful, 2 if it's a failure. Obviously, for Solstice Robes we rather have 2 failed attemps than a successful one, but failing is still a serious impediment to skilling up.
Assuming Stat = 355 (/wave casters), success means automatic success (P1 = 114%), failure gives a chance of passing the check equal to 56,7%.
The second check is
P2 = 100 - (Skill / 2), in percentage, below skill 190, and P2 = 5% above.
I'm only interested here in skilling up from 200, so the second check is always 5%.
2. Successful combine
To determine the rate of success at each skill level I use the following formula (from the F.A.Q.):
S = (Skill - (Trivial * 0.75)) + 51.5 rounded up.
According to the TS UI the trivial for the robe is 335, which leads to a success rate of 0% at 200 and 50% at 250. I have assumed a minimum chance of success of 3%. It doesn't impact much the total cost of skilling up anyway.
Knowning the average chance of succeeding a combine, and the skillup rate of both successes and failures, I estimated the average number of combines to skillup at each level by making a linear combination of the 2 percentages:
P = (100 * Success_ratio) + (56,7 * Failure_Ratio).
Success_ratio is 0.03 at skill 200, 0.5 at skill 250. Failure_ratio = 1 - Success_Ratio.
Then, I assumed an average number of combine per skill level of
C = (100 / P) * 20. The factor 20 comes from the second check of 5% chance of skilling up.
Application to a few levels:
200 to 201 C = (100 / (100 * 0.03 + 56,7 * 0.97)) * 20 = 34
249 to 250 C = (100 / (100 * 0.5 + 56,7 * 0.5)) * 20 = 26
Second of all, the cost of combines
I have simulated the best case, assuming the silk is farmed, and all vendor components are bought at the best price. I have assumed access to a cleric or druid of Tunare to imbue Emeralds for free, and to an enchanter with JCM3 and 240+ skill in JC with geerlock to enchant the silver and combine the chains with the best success rate (75%).
The assumption about best prices and silk farming is pretty safe, I find silk very easy to farm compared to most other tailoring components.
The availability of Imbued Emerald is more problematic, but it's only a 29 spell so leveling up an alt to make them is realistic.
The biggest assumption is certainly access to a JCM3 enchanter. It also has a huge impact on the total cost of skilling up to 250 if you make chains yourself or worse, buy them at a high price.
However, for enchanters, getting to 240 JC is easy (can be done in a few hours with 10 to 20k) and JCM3 is not that big of a deal for a high-level character. It certainly takes less time to xp for 18 AA than farming Rockhopper hides by the thousand, and can even be very profitable in the long run, if there is a market for chains.
I assumed a failure rate of 3% for all sub-combines (except Silk), so here are my figures:
Imbued Emerald..............13,649
Celestial Essence............1,701
Jar of Acid.....................0,105
Blessed Dust of Tunare...15,919
Silk swatch....................0,000
Sacred Tunare Silk.........16,396
Emerald........................13,649
Ruby...........................131,250
Sapphire......................105,000
Enchanted Silver Bar.........0,525
Small Piece of Ore............0,052
Metal Bits.......................0,114
Water Flask.....................0,010
Worked Silver Chain..........0,649
Gem Studded Chain.......334,064
Tunic Pattern..................0,052
Total cost of success.....383,305
Total cost of failure.........49,241
Resale value...................14,686
I assumed all robes are sold to vendors. On my server, the bazaar price is like 30pp (!!!).
Here is the progression chart for skilling up. I only show it by increment of 5, the full progression chart, along with all formulas is available in this xls file. You can download it and make your own simulation if you want.
Skill....Combines......Success.....Fail..........T otal....Cost per combine...Total
200........34.............1............33......... ...2028.............59..............2028
205........34.............2............32......... ...2216.............65.............12452
210........33.............3............29......... ...2660.............81.............24877
215........32.............5............27......... ...3075.............97.............39432
220........31.............6............24......... ...3461............113.............55976
225........30.............7............22......... ...3823............129.............74378
230........29.............9............20......... ...4163............145.............94522
235........28............10............18......... ...4482............161............116301
240........27............11............16......... ...4782............177............139618
245........26............12............14......... ...5066............193............164386
249........26............13............13......... ...5281............206............185190
So, according to this chart, in the best case the cost to skill up to 250 is of the order of 185Kpp. Skilling up to 211 and 212 can be done with Ethereal Silk Swatch, so 2660pp + 2745pp must be substracted from that, for a grand total of 180Kpp.
More interesting is the cost per combine. It helped me realize that, in the bazaar, any component sold for 200pp or more wasn't worth the money.
For instance, Flawless Rockhopper Hide sells for 300pp on my server. Add to that the cost of Acrylia Ore and I'm better off selling my own hides and making robes
(end product market is dead, of course 
).
Solstice Robes is different from other skill up routes in that the cost factor is proheminent, compared to, say, Studded Acrylia for which the rarity of components matters the most.
Equipped with the formula for success, the formula for skillup and a few assumptions about availability of components, it becomes possible to make an estimate of the cost of skilling up at each level.
First of all, this study is based on formulas below.
1. Skillup. The chance of skilling up is, according to what Tanker disclosed at the Fan Faire (see this thread) the combination of two checks. The first check is
P1 = (Stat - 15) / (Skill_difficulty * Success_factor), in percentage, capped at 100%.
Stat is the highest stat between your wis and int (there is no other relevant stat). Skill_diffuculty is a factor specific to the skill it applies to. For tailoring it used to be 4, and it's now 3. Success_factor is 1 if the combine is successful, 2 if it's a failure. Obviously, for Solstice Robes we rather have 2 failed attemps than a successful one, but failing is still a serious impediment to skilling up.
Assuming Stat = 355 (/wave casters), success means automatic success (P1 = 114%), failure gives a chance of passing the check equal to 56,7%.
The second check is
P2 = 100 - (Skill / 2), in percentage, below skill 190, and P2 = 5% above.
I'm only interested here in skilling up from 200, so the second check is always 5%.
2. Successful combine
To determine the rate of success at each skill level I use the following formula (from the F.A.Q.):
S = (Skill - (Trivial * 0.75)) + 51.5 rounded up.
According to the TS UI the trivial for the robe is 335, which leads to a success rate of 0% at 200 and 50% at 250. I have assumed a minimum chance of success of 3%. It doesn't impact much the total cost of skilling up anyway.
Knowning the average chance of succeeding a combine, and the skillup rate of both successes and failures, I estimated the average number of combines to skillup at each level by making a linear combination of the 2 percentages:
P = (100 * Success_ratio) + (56,7 * Failure_Ratio).
Success_ratio is 0.03 at skill 200, 0.5 at skill 250. Failure_ratio = 1 - Success_Ratio.
Then, I assumed an average number of combine per skill level of
C = (100 / P) * 20. The factor 20 comes from the second check of 5% chance of skilling up.
Application to a few levels:
200 to 201 C = (100 / (100 * 0.03 + 56,7 * 0.97)) * 20 = 34
249 to 250 C = (100 / (100 * 0.5 + 56,7 * 0.5)) * 20 = 26
Second of all, the cost of combines
I have simulated the best case, assuming the silk is farmed, and all vendor components are bought at the best price. I have assumed access to a cleric or druid of Tunare to imbue Emeralds for free, and to an enchanter with JCM3 and 240+ skill in JC with geerlock to enchant the silver and combine the chains with the best success rate (75%).
The assumption about best prices and silk farming is pretty safe, I find silk very easy to farm compared to most other tailoring components.
The availability of Imbued Emerald is more problematic, but it's only a 29 spell so leveling up an alt to make them is realistic.
The biggest assumption is certainly access to a JCM3 enchanter. It also has a huge impact on the total cost of skilling up to 250 if you make chains yourself or worse, buy them at a high price.
However, for enchanters, getting to 240 JC is easy (can be done in a few hours with 10 to 20k) and JCM3 is not that big of a deal for a high-level character. It certainly takes less time to xp for 18 AA than farming Rockhopper hides by the thousand, and can even be very profitable in the long run, if there is a market for chains.
I assumed a failure rate of 3% for all sub-combines (except Silk), so here are my figures:
Imbued Emerald..............13,649
Celestial Essence............1,701
Jar of Acid.....................0,105
Blessed Dust of Tunare...15,919
Silk swatch....................0,000
Sacred Tunare Silk.........16,396
Emerald........................13,649
Ruby...........................131,250
Sapphire......................105,000
Enchanted Silver Bar.........0,525
Small Piece of Ore............0,052
Metal Bits.......................0,114
Water Flask.....................0,010
Worked Silver Chain..........0,649
Gem Studded Chain.......334,064
Tunic Pattern..................0,052
Total cost of success.....383,305
Total cost of failure.........49,241
Resale value...................14,686
I assumed all robes are sold to vendors. On my server, the bazaar price is like 30pp (!!!).
Here is the progression chart for skilling up. I only show it by increment of 5, the full progression chart, along with all formulas is available in this xls file. You can download it and make your own simulation if you want.
Skill....Combines......Success.....Fail..........T otal....Cost per combine...Total
200........34.............1............33......... ...2028.............59..............2028
205........34.............2............32......... ...2216.............65.............12452
210........33.............3............29......... ...2660.............81.............24877
215........32.............5............27......... ...3075.............97.............39432
220........31.............6............24......... ...3461............113.............55976
225........30.............7............22......... ...3823............129.............74378
230........29.............9............20......... ...4163............145.............94522
235........28............10............18......... ...4482............161............116301
240........27............11............16......... ...4782............177............139618
245........26............12............14......... ...5066............193............164386
249........26............13............13......... ...5281............206............185190
So, according to this chart, in the best case the cost to skill up to 250 is of the order of 185Kpp. Skilling up to 211 and 212 can be done with Ethereal Silk Swatch, so 2660pp + 2745pp must be substracted from that, for a grand total of 180Kpp.
More interesting is the cost per combine. It helped me realize that, in the bazaar, any component sold for 200pp or more wasn't worth the money.
For instance, Flawless Rockhopper Hide sells for 300pp on my server. Add to that the cost of Acrylia Ore and I'm better off selling my own hides and making robes
(end product market is dead, of course ).
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