Why I'm done with this game (at least for now)

My proposed solution to this crafting madness is ... more vendor recipes. A lot more. Hundreds of them.
(Check the old D2 mod ZyEl for what I mean).
There could be recipes to craft anything and everything, upgrade mods, add specific mods, remove specific mods, add links while preserving existing ones, etc. They would need to be quite costly in terms of material used, but would ultimately allow the min/max players (which is the core of playerbase of any ARPG) to tweak their gear exactly how they want it.

"

Chris wrote:

This is the way the game is designed. While the values may be changed to make it more rewarding, there will always be a non-deterministic element to the use of the currency items. Players who want a guaranteed return for them should trade them (once our awesome trade stuff is finished).

It really saddens me to read that.

Lottery grind ftl.

Certainty should be very costly and should only give median rewards.

In an economy where crafting mechanics are designed to be random, I believe introducing a mechanism that has certainty will invariably lead to inflation because it will bias sigma and shift it towards better items. Take a normal distribution:Assuming left is really bad items and right is really good items, the curve will shift to the right over time if results are guaranteed.

As well, it perpetuates a two tier economy: Those that spend the most time will have the greatest access to currency. If those players have a way of guaranteeing crafting results, regardless of how costly it may be, the investment will perpetuate their position on top of the economic ladder.

Secondly, certainty means that invariably over time, items available on the open market will skew towards the 'perfect' side of the chart. The problem with this is that the more perfect items there are in the world, the easier the game becomes. This will require the development team create harder and harder challenges in order to stay ahead of the item curve...

While the current system may appear flawed in some eyes, I believe the existing random generation is the only way to minimize the risks I identified in this post.

Those that understand this position should likely also see that introducing certainty will completely destroy the orb economy because the sinks will no longer be effective over time.

"

Chris wrote:

This is the way the game is designed. While the values may be changed to make it more rewarding, there will always be a non-deterministic element to the use of the currency items. Players who want a guaranteed return for them should trade them (once our awesome trade stuff is finished)

Thank you for clarifying this explicitly. It gives me great confidence in the leadership at GGG and I look forward to supporting PoE financially in the near future! =)

"

Garr0t wrote:

Certainty should be very costly and should only give median rewards.

In an economy where crafting mechanics are designed to be random, I believe introducing a mechanism that has certainty will invariably lead to inflation because it will bias sigma and shift it towards better items. Take a normal distribution:Assuming left is really bad items and right is really good items, the curve will shift to the right over time if results are guaranteed.

As well, it perpetuates a two tier economy: Those that spend the most time will have the greatest access to currency. If those players have a way of guaranteeing crafting results, regardless of how costly it may be, the investment will perpetuate their position on top of the economic ladder.

Secondly, certainty means that invariably over time, items available on the open market will skew towards the 'perfect' side of the chart. The problem with this is that the more perfect items there are in the world, the easier the game becomes. This will require the development team create harder and harder challenges in order to stay ahead of the item curve...

While the current system may appear flawed in some eyes, I believe the existing random generation is the only way to minimize the risks I identified in this post.

Those that understand this position should likely also see that introducing certainty will completely destroy the orb economy because the sinks will no longer be effective over time.

I understand that well, but my conclusion is that the system is broken or incomplete.

A solution to the problems you bring up is to add a way to trade in perfect items for some sort of permanent stat increase.
That way people would also be more invested in their characters, which is a good thing IMO.

OPs like these make me wonder when /ignore is going to be added to the forum.

If it's painful for anyone to grind out their perfect equipment, perhaps they should reconsider their time.

I haven't found equipment to be a hard requirement on any character and the crafting orbs right now are fine for generating a decent upgrade when a new base item shows up while questing.

"

pneuma wrote:

OPs like these make me wonder when /ignore is going to be added to the forum.

If it's painful for anyone to grind out their perfect equipment, perhaps they should reconsider their time.

I haven't found equipment to be a hard requirement on any character and the crafting orbs right now are fine for generating a decent upgrade when a new base item shows up while questing.

Wait until you reach levels 60+ and see how "easy" is to upgrade your equipment with crafting. I hope you have few thousands orbs saved.

"

lazyman75 wrote:

"

pneuma wrote:

OPs like these make me wonder when /ignore is going to be added to the forum.

If it's painful for anyone to grind out their perfect equipment, perhaps they should reconsider their time.

I haven't found equipment to be a hard requirement on any character and the crafting orbs right now are fine for generating a decent upgrade when a new base item shows up while questing.

Wait until you reach levels 60+ and see how "easy" is to upgrade your equipment with crafting. I hope you have few thousands orbs saved.

I have a level 73, have played hundreds of hours, and have burned through 50 fusings in a sitting. Go away.

"

Chris wrote:

With both sets of currency items available, would you still try to roll perfect items with the more risky set, or would you use the (higher expected value, lower variance) hypothetical ones presented here?

Obviously everyone would be using the hypothetical orbs until they needed near-perfect gear.

It really depends on difficulty balance though. If you assume the average player will be using equipment rolled with these hypothetical 75%-ish mods and adjust the difficulty so that content is able to be completed with such gear then what need is there for rolling "perfect" gear? Of course farming efficiency will rise, but its just extra. The long-term players grow bored and complain the game is too easy and move on to a game that will challenge them.

Yet, if you balance around the assumption that players will be obtaining near-perfect equipment then the hordes of lazy average players complain its too hard.

Currently, I feel like there's really only one or two mods required to move comfortably through the content. I'm happy with 125% IPD, throw in a 20% IAS and anything extra is just icing on the cake. I'm already satisfied using a 75% mod, but this hypothetical orb would give me 3-4 more?! its too much. You would have to rebalance everything assuming players had every item with 75% ideal mods. Then what's the point in even introducing the hypothetical orb? We are back to where we started.

Just balance the game assuming the player has 75% of their ideal physical, elemental, or spell damage maximum and we should be in good shape. Players using scrub gear will feel underpowered and seek better equipment. Players with excellent gear will feel powerful, as they should in an item-based game. The end-game grind requires challenge and cannot lack reward or you lose your long-term appeal.

I think you are failing to see that MMO games are not just games to be played online but games to be played with a COMMUNITY, I play mmos for the witty banter and the people who will play with me :)

Gear is currently VERY under valued compared to orbs. My advice has always been to craft with the low - mid tier orbs as you level your char. Spend alchs as soon as you find a nice base item for a slot you haven't upgraded in a while. Keep fusings, jewlers ( pointless to use on sub 60 gear without fusings ), exalted, GCP etc. Then when you hit 60 trade fusings, exalted & GCP for good gear. A very decent over 100% ED & 20% IAS will set you back perhaps 1 GCP in the current economy. To farm one will take a lot of hours, and to craft one will be almost impossible. Decent 5 links cost a few GCP, and one exalted can get you almost anything but the absolute best.

The high end orbs are for people who already have VERY good gear.