Hello, I have recently started playing again after several years off. I am leveling up the crafting and I remember the exotic mats were only available from ops and flash points on hard mode. Just before I left though they added them to the random boxes in space missions that you can buy. Are these still available that way and what if any changes since 4.0? Any possibility that a small drop chance was added to high level investigation or similar missions?

 

On my server some of these are 400 to 1 mil each, hard to make stuff to sell at those prices!

Hello, I have recently started playing again after several years off. I am leveling up the crafting and I remember the exotic mats were only available from ops and flash points on hard mode. Just before I left though they added them to the random boxes in space missions that you can buy. Are these still available that way and what if any changes since 4.0? Any possibility that a small drop chance was added to high level investigation or similar missions?

 

On my server some of these are 400 to 1 mil each, hard to make stuff to sell at those prices!

 

First of all, all the different exotic materials were consolidated into three possibilities:

 

Exotic Isotope Stabilizer (EIS) is the new blue quality exotic material. You can get these from several sources:

On Odessen (KotFE "fleet") there is a vendor that sells them for 25 glowing data crystals each

1. Again from Odessen there is the Heroic 2+ Star Fortress missions that drop one at the end (the solo mode version of this also have a chance to drop one but it is very low)
   
2. All HMFP bonus bosses drop one, and the final bosses have a good chance to drop one
   
3. All SM Ops bosses drop one
   
4. All HM bosses drop two
   

Strategic Resource Matrix (SRM) is the new purple material acquired as a reward for completing personal conquest goal. Based on your post you probably do not know what the new conquest system is. the short of it is that each week different one shot and repeatable "tasks" are given to your legacy (open your quest log and go to the conquest tab; one shot tasks are across your legacy - once you do that task on one character you will not get points for doing it on another character). Each completed task rewards a certain amount of points when you reach 20,000 points and you get the personal goal reward (NOTE: it is not "every 20k points"; whether you hit 20k or 100k on a single character you only get the personal goal reward once). These are used in crafting grade 216 and 220 items that are derived from schematics acquired from REing trained 208; go to a trainer, get a rating 208 schematic, reverse engineer it, you get a 216 schematic that requires a single SRM, reverse engineer that 216 and you get a 220 schematic that requires 2 or 3 SRMs.

 

Dark Matter Catalyst (DMC) is the new purple material acquired from operations. SM Ops final bosses drop one. All HM Ops bosses drop one. These are used in crafting grade 216 and 220 operations and crystals items. Run a SM op, get a token for an ear piece, turn it in for a usable ear piece, RE it, get the schematic for that 216 and it costs 1 DMC. Run a HMOp, get a token for a relic, turn it in for a usable relic, get the schematic for that 220 and it costs you 2 (i think) DMCs.

 

I do not know about the space combat mission boxes dropping them. Something tells me that they do not for a couple of reasons:

 

#1: BW has all but abandoned space combat as an aspect of the game. It has not been touched since the grade 7 and heroic mission P2W debacle (you need grade 7 ship parts to have any chance at completing the missions and the only way to get them was through the Cartel Market (CM); they have since moved these ship parts to vendors but they cost an ungodly number of fleet commendations to acquire; 350 or 500 each).

#2: I have seen old exotic purple materials on the GTN after they were all supposed to be converted to the new ones. This tells me that a source of them still exists; i.e. space combat boxes.

 

Mission skills have ZERO chance to drop exotic materials.

ok thanks for the answers, it appears that making the purple items that require these is all but impossible. I was under the impression the conquests were more guild oriented and did not know about solo conquests. I will look into that. seems there is not much i can do about making high level mods and other accessories for a long time if ever.

 

thanks again

Solo conquest can be fairly painless if you frequently engage in PvP or GSF. Alternately stand on the fleet and say "Looking for an active Conquest guild." Most times you will quickly get an invite since many of the guilds that do well in conquest are actively looking for people to pad out their conquest points. Once you are in a guild each week certain objectives are going to be worth more points depending on which planet your guild invades, other than the initial invite no coordination with your guild is required. I actually started doing conquest for the mats once 4.0 hit and I have found it fun and rewarding, especially if your guild takes one of the top 10 slots, then each member of that guild (character not account) gets a reward that includes 10x purple jawa gear and some rare decorations that can frequently be sold for decent bank, so if you managed to hit 20K conquest on 3 toons in a guild that took top 10 you suddenly have 30 more of whatever crafting resource you want!

Solo conquest can be fairly painless if you frequently engage in PvP or GSF.

 

It is fairly painless period. This week, I already have three characters with personal goal achieved, having never set foot in a Warzone or GSF battle (a guildmate got personal goal on a character within hours of logging on Tuesday). That being said, doing it totally through solo content (dailies, heroics, and the like) can be tough (it can be done though). Basically so long as you are willing to engage in some group content (TFPs, HMFPs, Ops, PvP, GSF), you will hit the personal goal is short order.