Concept for an entirely new Crafting System.

In this post, I am devising an entirely new Crafting System for Path of Exile. This system intends to 1. make items easier to craft, while still being sufficiently "random", and 2. brings many pieces of content from Path of Exile together in a way that will make players engage with many different pieces of content to fully engage with it.

Here's the basic concept.

The Crafting Bench has been entirely reworked. Where before, the Crafting Bench was only used to add a single modifier to an item with an open modifier, now it's a full workshop that lets you craft items from start to finish, by allowing you to add different currency items together to craft items in specific ways. For instance: Let's say I want to craft a Physical weapon, and I have a weapon that already has the Suffixes I want. I place the weapon in the crafting bench, and add the following items:

Chaos Orb
Purified Eldritch Ember (this is an item you can add to your crafts to force the craft to only impact Prefixes)
Jagged Fossil

There are 7 currency slots in this new Crafting Bench: A "base" slot, for Chaos Orbs, Exalted Orbs, or Orbs of Annulment, a slot for Purified Eldritch Ember or Ichor, a slot for Essences, and 4 slots for Fossils (see "a few notes" for some explanation). When these items are placed in the currency slots, the Crafting Bench will indicate to the player exactly what will happen to their item. In this case, the item's Prefixes will be reforged, and have more Physical modifiers and less Chaos modifiers. Note: the more complex a craft is, the more expensive it will be (more Chaos Orbs, or Jagged Fossils, etc).

Now, let's say I got a Flaring and a Merciless modifier on the weapon by some miracle after doing that craft, with an open Prefix. I really want that Dictator's now. So now I add the following currency to the crafting bench:

Exalted Orb
Jagged Fossil

This craft would be *extremely* expensive, requiring many, many Jagged Fossils and possibly many Exalted Orbs, for a *chance* to add a third Physical mod. Adding anything else, like extra Fossil types to improve the chances of getting a good modifier, would be prohibitively expensive. Note that because the item has 3 Suffixes, Purified Eldritch Ember did not need to be added which would have further multiplied the cost of the craft.

And, of course, I get Physical Damage Leeched as Mana. Predictable, but it's okay. Now, we want to add the following items to the crafting slots to try to fix this problem:

Orb of Annulment (many?)
Purified Eldritch Ember (many)
Lucent Fossil (many)

This craft would also be extremely expensive, likely moreso since the force prefix currency was added. Adding the Lucent Fossil pushes the Annul *toward* the Mana Leech modifier, but it *does not guarantee it*.

And we probably lost Merciless or something. As it goes. Back to step 1. But we still have an item with the Suffixes we want, so we still have a *path to victory*, which is a big part of the philosophy of this crafting system.

A few notes: Chaos Orbs, Exalted Orbs, and Orbs of Annulment are all mutually exclusive in the Crafting Bench, and cannot be used at the same time.

Essences and Fossils are also mutually exclusive, with Essences granting a single modifier every time but not impacting the rest of the craft. Essences can only be used with Chaos Orbs.

Fossils now do not say "No x Modifiers", and instead say "Fewer x Modifiers". Up to 4 different types of Fossils can be used for each craft, although using more than one multiplies the cost of the craft exponentially very quickly.

Resonators are removed with the change to crafting, and both Fossils and Essences are only used to alter crafts in the Crafting Bench.

Finally, the single "crafted" modifiers that are added via the bench would be mutually exclusive with the big crafting system; in other words, you must remove crafted modifiers before using the Crafting Bench. This prevents some previous shenanigans where you would block a modifier to increase the chances of getting a good one.

It is my opinion that this system is a far better, far safer form of determinism than 3.11's Harvest was (mostly because Fossils only push specific crafts in the *direction* of the modifiers you want to change or add, rather than being able to just say "add a physical modifier") . Additionally, I believe Harvest could be changed specifically to only have more niche crafts, such as the resistance swap craft, etc. Also, add a Shaper and Elder Exalted Orb to the game.

Here from the subreddit to give this a bump. Its a really well thought out and designed systemic change, which I think at the very least warrants consideration.

Another great set of carefully considered ideas!

I hope the development team listens to the suggestions in this forum section and plans out a compelling set of changes to crafting.

Going to think on your ideas and reply again later.

This looks like a very well thought out idea, that I would not be opposed to some version of this type of thing coming in.

I came over from the reddit mirror post, just want to comment for visibility. I like the agency it gives to the players, the simplicity of focusing everything in one location, and how it combines in game currency in a reasonable manner. I do think that the cost really should increase as you try to force the craft more and more, but I like that you can have an item and continuously make progress on it over the course of a few play sessions. Personally, I think that I would spend more time playing PoE if this change/similar was implemented. +1 OP

I am from the PoE forums, not the subreddit.

But, also strong agree.

So THIS is what the feedback section is for. Imagine that.

I love this already, It would fix a lot of things.

Not to ruin your concept or anything, but for someone who actually takes a long time to use all the options to craft items avaiable in the game, your addition to it functionally adds a lot of expensive "bloat" AND baits people into using their currency in a wasteful manner, for the advantage of visibility, AND also only really be useful when attempting to make mirror-tier items, which is completly pointless to the majority of people.

Let me explain before someone starts flaming me for saying something like "Why are you saying it's shit!?". I am not fully, but I'll be using your example (Crafting a pDPS weapon with finished suffixes), and point out the flaws your system has, versus already avaiable methods at the current moment.

First up, the purified eldritch orbs. I am all cool for gating the "Keep Suffix / Prefix" currency behind late game influence grinds, because realisticly that's where you are approaching to perfect your items, or make them strong. However, such an "Orb" would be heavily limited in their droprate, due to its power, and only REALLY be useful, if you, by some unlucky stroke of luck, also have full prefixes. Otherwise, functionally, it works the same way as using two divine orbs to craft "Cannot roll suffixes"

Next step the Fossil addition. And this is where I tell you that this is where a clueless Exile, who is aiming to make a strong pDPS weapon instead of a mirror-tier one (This is important), would be needlessly throwing away their currency. I presume that the more additional currency you add after the basic one (Chaos/Exalt/Anullment), is followed up with a multiplier of the next, you'd be putting several jagged fossils down, which doesn't block in your system, for only a higher chance to add any physical modifier alone. But, someone who knows all aspects of crafting, would go to harvest, "Reforge with a Phys modifier" and guarantee themselves 1 physical mod, which is significantly cheaper, and more determenistic, than your option.

Following this, let's DO say I hit very lucky with my Reforge, and have T1 flat phys and T1 % phys as your next step would describe. This is where every player not aiming to make a mirror tier item would stop, go the normal crafting bench, and craft a prefix [Depending on your build there are a lof of options. Gain X of phys as extra Element / Chaos damage, Hits cannot be evaded, Elemental / Chaos Pen].

A smarter crafter, who is aiming to hit an actual strong 3rd Prefix, would go and use a warlord's Exalted orb for a roughly 1 in 6 chance to hit hybrid phys and attack speed. Someone not well-versed, using your crafting bench, is very likely to just waste away their currency for much, much worse odds, since you said using exalted orbs in the basic currency slot would become "very, very expensive".

The ONLY advantage that your crafting bench now possesses, is the ability to have a "Keep Prefix reroll Suffix" or "Keep Suffix reroll Prefix" option on an item, that already has FULL affixes on either side of the spectrum, which is something we lost with 3.19 Harvest. But I feel like this is a problem fixed easier by giving us that option back, rather than spending ludicrous ammounts of currency for a multiplicatively bad crafting bench.
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Onwards to your additional notes:

- Not sure if it's an oversight, but I find it odd that you make the essence craft in the bench cost an extra chaos orb for no additional benefit (Since you can use essences as they are...)
- Fossils become worse, no matter how you look at it, compared to current system, except now resonators don't exist, so I suppose there is that
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Now I am sure someone will say "Well, how would YOU craft a strong pDPS sword!? It's impossible! I will, for the curious, demonstrate our current existing crafting methods and execute upon it.

If you want you can follow me step by step by using craftofexile.com

For my base I am choosing a 20% Eternal Sword of itemlevel 84, that I found of the ground.

Step 1 for me would be to spam Deafening Essences of Contempt Until I hit minimum T2 %phys damage, ideally, an open prefix and an open suffix. Running this trough a simulator, gives me the odds of 1 in 450ish [100000 simulations], which, to me at least, isn't awful (It's not cheap either, but we are trying to make an endgame sword here so it shouldnt be)

Step 2 is to block the suffixes with a craft and slap a Warlords's exalted orb to hit %phys and attack speed on the prefix. This is a 1 in 6 chance to hit the worst tier (5) on it, which again, aren't awful odds to me. If we don't hit, bummer, happens, crafting in PoE ideally has elements of RNG. We could either get a new weapon base, or continue from that step onwards. I'll decided to continue onwards, since I DO still have very strong prefixes. (T1 flat phys and T2 %phys)

Step 3 is work on suffixes now. Here we could now scour the suffixes after crafting "Cannot roll prefixes" and have a clean item with 3 Prefixes and 0 suffixes. We then craft ANOTHER "Prefixes cannot be changed" and go for T4 Aisling. This guarantees to hit the craft and turn it into an unveil. Before unveil we block "Trigger socketed spell" since it's useless to our build and has the highest weighting, and hope for the following unveils = Dex+Int and Attackspeed, or Trigger lvl 1 bloodrage and attack speed. If we fail the unveil, we restart step 3, if we hit, we go to the craft bench and craft whatever you find desireable and pray exalt for the 6th.

Voila, you have a sword that, even IF it fails the conqueror's slam, has a pDPS of 450+ without applying a crafted mod (Like crit chance, crit multiplier, or even AS when nearby rare or unique monster). Not too shabby!
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Some closing words. I like your idea a LOT about having the crafting bench act out as a form of toolshop, especially since this could aid newer players into trying to craft their items more, as your idea suggest being able to see what is being worked on in a similiar fashion how "Rog" crafting works. But the execution on it, as you stand at the moment, actually adds too much bloat, that are MORE expensive, than the current systems we have avaiable.

Cheers though for your time, and sorry for the long post.

Great idea and a fun way to: 1) implement a usable crafting system and 2) remove unnecessary content/bloat (harvest, bestiary, betrayal, etc.).

To Rakushi's point: I think you got hung up on the example, and not the actual crafting idea. The OP was using a particularly high end craft as an example, but that isn't necessarily what all the crafting would look like. If you do a lower end craft, it would presumably cost the same or a similar amount of currency that it already does with the benefit of having all the crafts located in one place. It wouldn't be adding any bloat, nor any additional currency sink at the lower end. Your example of the harvest craft ALREADY has a "cost" of currency in the form of lifeforce. This simply substitutes a currency such as chaos instead of the life force cost. But it would act exactly the same way.

And entirely separate, is an adjustment to cost really a bad thing if we incorporate a new system? The players and the game will adjust to the higher or lower costs, the developers would just need to be careful of not having redundant crafting procedures with one clearly better than the other. Easiest way to avoid this: remove ALL crafting league mechanics in favor of a new, central system like this one. Have all future leagues provide unique crafting or other item modification opportunities that don't carry into any other league. Stops powercreep, increases temporary league enjoyment, and sets expectations that such items will NOT go core.