What to Vaal on pickup?

Hey.

Which items are worth vaaling on pickup? I am interested specifically in items to vaal pretty much every time they drop, at a low risk of losing much more than the vaal orb itself.

I know some of the basics, like always vaal Tabula or Drillneck unless it's very early in the season and you might still need one. Small risk of destroying, but for Tabula 75% of outcomes are still at least a divine.

But I've learned recently, that there are a couple of seemingly mediocre items, that become much more valuable instantly, if you happen to hit specific vaal mods. Like a +1 curse Sidhebreath, which is worth nothing uncorrupted, but a couple ex if it hits the curse. Or various gloves with curse on hit.

Is there a guide about items like these? Not sure, what exactly to search for, didn't find anything about this topic at first glance. And if no guides exist, what are some items you like to always vaal on pickup?

The Sidhebreath or gloves things aren't necessarily worth Vaaling in and of themselves. The +1 Curse corruption and a few of the glove CoH corruptions are, in and of themselves, worth a few exalts. People slam Sidhebreaths because Sidhebreaths drop like popcorn chicken, almost nobody wants them, and thus cost mostly nothing except the Vaal Orb itself to slam and hope. The same could be said of just about any unique amulet, or any half-decent rare amulet, that manages to roll +1 curse. Vaal a Karui Ward with +1 Curse, you've got a couple-odd exalts depending on the market at the time. Vaal a blue amulet with a high life roll and one half-decent resist? That might actually tack an extra ex on the price, since amulets with both +1 Curse and actually-desirable mods tend to be massively expensive.

Pro tip, though: don't try and sell white +1 Curse amulets for exalts. At that point the player doing the buying can just buy a Doedre's Damning for an alch or two, sacrifice a less powerful item slot for her extra curse, and go about her day without sinking an exalt into a wearable Whispers of Doom notable that otherwise does nothing for her. You can demand better prices for a white +1 Curse amulet than people can for DD since the +1 Curse is in an unusual slot and would let people stack many multiple curses better...but not THAT much better a price. If your amulet has nothing worth any money on it save +1 Curse, then it's not really worth that terribly much more than a Damning.

Gloves are trickier since a set of crappy gloves with no links is a hard sell even with a desirable curse-on-hit roll, and linking up gloves prior to Vaaling that will almost certainly not roll Vuln or Elemental Weakness (i.e. the two most people actually want) is a great way to lose a ton of money fast. Some folks Vaal gloves that already drop four-linked, hoping for some easy money, but generally corrupted curse-gloves are worth less than a +1 amulet and also harder to make. Ironically, this makes them more expensive since people who're slamming those gloves are often trying to craft for themselves rather than crafting for the market, so gloves with desirable corruptions and also usable links don't get put on the market nearly as often as random +1 Curse amulets. This can make them more valuable, but again, the cost of making worthwhile curse-on-hit gloves is many times higher than just slamming Vaals on random amulets.

Generally? There's nothing in the game that's explicitly worth Vaaling in and of itself, with the sort-of exception of Tabula Rasa. You always have the brick chance to contend with, and most stuff that can be Vaal'd for increased value is only really worth something if it's at least halfway usable before being Vaal'd.

amulet for +1 curse or +1% max res

gloves for ele weakness or vulnerability curse

boots for +1 frenzy charge

belts for +1 endurance charge or skill duration

You want to do this with cheap unique items which are the must have item for certain builds, like stone of lazhwar for max block necro, ngamahu tiki for RF, shaper's touch for HoWA, I think ngamahu tiki adds the most value at a managable investment, because RF can benefit so much more than normal builds do from a second or a third curse, push a 5c item to possibly 15+ex or even more.

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1453R wrote:

Gloves are trickier since a set of crappy gloves with no links is a hard sell even with a desirable curse-on-hit roll, and linking up gloves prior to Vaaling that will almost certainly not roll Vuln or Elemental Weakness (i.e. the two most people actually want) is a great way to lose a ton of money fast.

I was wondering about all those "stupid" people corrupting unlinked gloves as well. Then I read that you can still link them via Vorici.

@OP:
If you want to risk no more than the Vaal Orb itself, the natural answer is that you may only corrupt (nearly) worthless items. One thing that wasn't mentioned yet are jewels. Vaal any Viridian jewel and you may get one of those uniques that were in demand during Vaal Spark's prime.

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Solmyr77 wrote:

I was wondering about all those "stupid" people corrupting unlinked gloves as well. Then I read that you can still link them via Vorici.
...

Most people aren't Vaaling those gloves. They drop in a pre-corrupted state from Izaro chests or certain types of modded strongbox, and as such they're random items. That's where gloves nobody would otherwise look twice (or even once, sometimes) at with Curse on Hit corruptions come from. People get them as drops and try to make whatever buck they can off of them.

Vorici can fix them, yes, but that tends to be a hellaciously expensive process, especially if you don't have your own max-level Vorici and have to pay someone for crafting services. Few random drop gloves are worth the bother, outside of uniques particular to someone's build.

The unique ones are vaaled even if unlinked though, because it ends up being very expensive to link every Shaper's Touch before vendoring them because you got a bad corruption, which is the most likely outcome. So you insta-vaal, and if you hit the jackpot you can link them yourself (costs 10 jewellers, 5 fusings and 15 vaal orbs), or sell as is if you don't have Vorici 8 yet.