TOPIC: Which tokens to mulch and which to save - looking for transmute advice

I am putting together my first transmute order. I have seen random forum references to multi-year transmute recipes. I seem to recall people saying they hold on to monster trophies for a few years, and in the 2022 transmuted token thread there is a suggestion to use the various greaves that have come out.. So now I am wondering if there are tokens I should be holding on to. I would be bummed if I missed a cool transmute because I turned in the components to get one extra Darkwood Plank.

I know about the future recipe that will use the 4 shirts, but those are URs and I couldn't accidently mulch those anyway. Any advice on what not to transmute, beyond the obvious of whatever I need for builds?

Thanks in advance for the advice.

As long as you are making trade goods, I would say mulch everything you don't need that is not a special token. You can tell the special ones by the two dots that surround the letters of what it can be made into at the top. That will protect your Treasure Box only tokens like the greaves and ghosts. It will also protect your completion tokens.

I think mulch what you definitely won't use or give away.
I try to keep several uncommons or rares that I think newer players might like, just to gift to them.

Other than tokens you just want to set aside to maybe use, here's a couple guidelines:

If you look at the Belt of the Brave image, you can see the two dots next the where it says "MS" in the top center. Those dots signify a completion token or treasure box only token that you might want to hang onto.




With the Dwarven drinking gloves, you can see right beneath the name where it says the "truedungeon.com/transmuted" to indicate that it is used in a transmute.

The only reason I make Planks or Silks is to reduce the number of tokens lying around. They have so little value.

So, there's planning what you are going to use and there's "cutting weight". Transmuting for trade goods just to do it doesn't strike me as better than keeping the components. Sometimes, weird tokens can get hot, especially with VTD, where weird runs are far easier.

But, as for very broad thoughts on what to hold on to even when in cut weight mode, participation tokens, treasure box only tokens (gee, suggestion to have these two types in different colors aligns to something), rez potions, Scrolls that do something "important" (Stone to Flesh, Mind Blank), interesting ammunition because EMs are used in such small quantities anyway, far better than their rarity tokens like Linked Shirt of Healing, named recipe components.

I used to like to hold on to lots of potions I would never use, but Ink is like the one thing I can run out of on my own, so lots of healing potions went away a while back, as did I'm sure Dex/Str potions. With Iktomi's, polymorph potions aren't as consumable so need way fewer, though, oddly, not everyone has Iktomi's (yet).

When it comes to monster trophies, the general guideline is that the ones you are currently getting in dungeons are going to be used in the next year's transmuted tokens (so the automaton gears/oil, darkrift ingots, etc from last year in VTD are the ones you now use for the transmuted tokens that just opened up this past week). The new recipes tend to then be available the year they come out and most of the next year- the recipes that just came out expire December 1 2022, for instance. Ultimately, that means that monster bits you would have gotten in 2020 are still potentially useful until December 2022, at which point they are often best used for trading in for Golden Fleece trade tokens.

A side note: there is always they chance they will decide to do some kind of multi-year ongoing thing, see Bead of the Luck Traveler , which used monster bits from 4 years. I feel like they normally telegraph those sorts of things well ahead of time, but it also probably doesn't hurt to try and put together a set of monster bits from each year when they start a new story arc- worst case scenario you could always still turn them into golden fleece later. If you see people talking about greaves or treasure box only amulets, it's probably tied to speculation that they might end up having a special transmute that combines a bunch into one bigger effect (though that is still pure speculation at this point).

For multi-year Monster Trophy transmutes there have been:

tokendb.com/token/medallion-of-greyhawk/ (2006-2008 bits)
tokendb.com/token/dragon-tooth-amulet/ (2009-2010)
tokendb.com/token/draco-lich-claw-charm/ (2011-2012)
tokendb.com/token/icecrag-heros-earcuff/ (2013-2015)
tokendb.com/token/bead-of-the-lucky-traveler/ (2016-2019)

It's up to you to decide what to do with this information...

I always assume that there will be a multi-year storyline monster token transmute, and save some for that purpose.

There are often tokens that have a higher value untransmuted than the trade item tokens will have, although it's not always easy to figure out which those are.

Thanks for the advice everyone! This is exactly what I was looking for. I actually printed out the list of vtd participation tokens so that I wouldn't accidently transmute one of them. Looking for the dots is going to be so much easier. And the monster trophy and consumable advice makes a lot of sense. I learned the value of a Stone to Flesh scroll the hard way.

Jeff Greene wrote: I learned the value of a Stone to Flesh scroll the hard way.

Pun intended?

If you can wait until Saturday, it sounds like Trent’s next show on YouTube is all about transmuting.

I bet he’d love to give his opinion and answer any questions you still have about transmuting/mulching tokens.

I just went through the same thought exercise about 2020 tokens last month. For the standard tokens, I would benchmark off Kirk and Trents sites. You can order by popularity (sales) and price. That might give some idea of ones you should probably hold on to (e.g. IS:TT, Earcuff of Vitality) for future gifts to new players or consignment through Trent/Kirk.

YMMV, but I think the 2020 tokens will be in such supply due to VTD that most of their values will be depressed for an extended period of time.