Lazurite:

[Ore Mine camps.]

Seen in:

• Virago (L6), inconsistently, Rare (level).
  - Rare (level); upon defeat
  - Inconsistent / not always!
  

Not seen in:

• Executioner (L6) - did get Tar along the way, and on the last hit. A Lumber camp resulted - perhaps indicative.
  
• Heretic (L6)
• Nord (L6) - Epic Dye on 7th hit led me to expect a Food camp. No further non-assailant material until last hit - Dye and Wood. Silver camp resulted. YMMV.
  
• Renegade (L6)
• Smuggler (L6)
  
  
• Bloody Duke (Alpha)
  (Current consensus: Alphas don't drop non-assailant camp materials. Or, at least, not enough to make hitting them cost effective, given the stamina cost of killing an alpha. Greater results will be obtained killing L6 instead, non-assailant camp material wise.)

Yielding:

Yielding L6 Ore Mine camps tended to gain Unusual Lazurite, at best. L7 gave Rare in one instance. Given the low level, it does not seem that yielding camps is an efficient means of acquiring Legendary material. (64 unusual -> 1 Legendary. 16 rare -> 1 Legendary, but L7 camps are too sparse to easily access sufficient.)

Gold (Item Store / Treasure / Chest of Materials 4 @ 8,000 gp ea.):

• 12 item types , 3 levels , possible.
• (Hunter's Settlement: Dye, Hemp, Wool; Logger's Camp: Silk, Tar, Wood; Stone Pit: Bronze, Flint, Leather; Ore Mine: Lazurite (Gem), Granite, Steel. Rare, Epic, Legendary.)
  
• Experience shows distribution is not equal. You might get what you are looking for soon, or not. (Some message thread noted never getting what they were looking for - which could only be bad luck.)
• The prevalence for repeated items is unclear - given equal distribution is could take 36 further purchases to receive a duplicate item, yet experience demonstrates that not to be the case. Sometimes it duplicates not infrequently, sometimes not. Stopping upon getting the first, and coming back later, may be prudent. (Statistically shouldn't matter, but ...)

vs Hitting L6 assailants - *IF* that assailant type always drops what you are looking for (thus the first section lists):

• ~27 hits per assailant @ 662 stamina per hit, 17,874 stamina. Less 3-5k on the first one, depending upon how much stamina has been restored since your last attack.
• Only 4 item types (vs 12 above), also 3 levels. (By the final attack, assailants drop materials at least 2 levels below their own level. e.g. Alpha -> Rare.) [They can drop lower, and higher, along the way. Higher is frequent.]
  
• - so, 4 times more likely to get what you are looking for, with event and other bonuses and points along the way.
• - but very time consuming.
• 9 +2,000 stamina potions needed (after 1st kill) @ 5,600 gp per potion -> 50,400 gp.
• = 6+ Chest of Materials 4 above.

Do you feel lucky? Rich? Time constrained? At loose ends? ...

- if any of the former, perhaps try Chest of Materials 4. If the latter, may as well hit Assailants and gain additional (order) bonuses for the  time spent.

* On a test of 25 Chest of Material 4's, costing 200k gp, no Lazurite of any level resulted. Any sort of even and reasonable distribution should have resulted in at least 2. YMMV.

[Or stamina on hand you have no other use for. (Does happen. Once you have all the gear and jewels you want ... except for the x number of these items you are looking for. And ready to move on to seriously tackling apostates.)]

These were my experiences. YMMV. Possibly first material hit not being Lazurite, Granite, or Steel (as this thread is about Lazurite, which comes from Ore Mine camps) means resulting camp will not be Ore Mine and there will be no Rare or better Lazurite upon final hit - so one could stop attacking the assailant upon receiving first material, saving the stamina? Cleary, further testing for larger sample size and additional observations are required. Comments and contributions welcome.

• further tests reveal above is not consistently true. e.g. 19th hit wood (rare), nothing further until last hit - rare silk and leather, 210k stone, and stone camp resulted. (If consistent, wood drop would have indicated Lumber Camp.) Including no Lazurite.
  

From past experience, during a run of killing assailants, camps of a couple type are the usual result, with Silver camps occurring not infrequently. i.e. The other two camp types occur more rarely. Perhaps assailant types incline towards particular camp types - pointing us towards particular assailants when looking for particular materials?

You won't get Lazurite killing alphas.  They don't drop common materials.  You would have to kill lvl.6 assailants.  I find I am always short of Hemp.  The best ways I have found to get legendary common build elements quickly is to either buy level 4 chests (if you have gold to spare), or to do lots of instant completes of errands if you are capable.  Otherwise, killing T6 or lower assailants or single-march farming of 7 tiles are your next best options.

Leerooooy Jenkins said:

You won't get Lazurite killing alphas.  They don't drop common materials.  You would have to kill lvl.6 assailants.  I find I am always short of Hemp.  The best ways I have found to get legendary common build elements quickly is to either buy level 4 chests (if you have gold to spare), or to do lots of instant completes of errands if you are capable.  Otherwise, killing T6 or lower assailants or single-march farming of 7 tiles are your next best options.

Well summarized, thank you.

> They don't drop common materials.

I believe they do. I will try and reconfirm. I expect you are correct for the final hit where drops of everything available are given - such common material only happen during some hits on the way to that final hit.  I agree one probably can't consistently count on particular items of particular levels. 

> best ways I have found to get legendary common build elements quickly is to either buy level 4 chests (if you have gold to spare)

The problem being no guarantee of a particular type of material, nor its level. There have been times where I have had to buy dozens of these before I received what I was looking for. So, this can be endless, -very- expensive (as you note), and fruitless.

> do lots of instant completes of errands if you are capable

Same comment as above, but this is a very good point and reminder. Along the way you are gaining points for KvKr, Order Points, and Hero and Inquisitor points. Sadly, though, you can still come away without what you were looking for.

> Otherwise, killing T6 or lower assailants or single-march farming of 7 tiles are your next best options.

* Thus this thread. The question (of this thread) is: which assailants don't drop Lazurite, which do, and which might.

My experience has been the drops on such are so low, e.g. not legendary, and only one per camp, that I've given up spending the time and energy on yielding these. Let alone the usual result of simply being tile hit. [And the rancour and scarcity of of L7, if they're even available.]

Thus my OP - clearly some varmints more readily drop particular types of materials, but it is not at all clear which does what, when.

Thank you for the astute comments.

All of you keep them coming, please. Clearly I am not alone on these quests.

I will try to keep the OP updated with comments you all make here in this thread.

Re-searching the forums, was reminded of a couple of fiddly bits:

- Final drop is always 2 levels below that indicated in the 'i' about the assailant. i.e. If shows Legendary, you get, Rare. [Test's post.]

= So, you may get better along the way, just not at the end.

- You get category of the camp type resulting. So if not an iron ore camp, you didn't get Lazurite.

= So, if that assailant type doesn't tend to result in iron ore camps, killing them will not get you the Lazurite you're seeking.

Test killing a Bloody Duke (Alpha) ...

WWO said:

Leerooooy Jenkins said:

You won't get Lazurite killing alphas.  They don't drop common materials.

> They don't drop common materials.

I believe they do. I will try and reconfirm. I expect you are correct for the final hit where drops of everything available are given - such common material only happen during some hits on the way to that final hit.  I agree one probably can't consistently count on particular items of particular levels.

Hit #: Result -

(Of the interesting / pertinent non-assailant camp material result, per this thread.)

Last (56): 70k food.

- no material rewards on any hit prior to that.

Astonishing.