Orb of Fusing and general currency problems

Regarding your comparison, giving an ex to a low lvl'er isn't like giving them a Lambo, an ex only feels like a Lambo when you are using it on endgame gear that you already dumped ridiculous amounts of other orbs into, at low level it's like being given the same car you already had just with a new wing mirror but being told it's still worth a Lamborghini.

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lethal_papercut wrote:

Regarding your comparison, giving an ex to a low lvl'er isn't like giving them a Lambo, an ex only feels like a Lambo when you are using it on endgame gear that you already dumped ridiculous amounts of other orbs into, at low level it's like being given the same car you already had just with a new wing mirror but being told it's still worth a Lamborghini.

That's why I compared it to giving a Lamborghini to a starving african family, you know the sort who can't buy petrol or drive cars. I think if you re-read what I wrote you'll see it's not that different from your comparison.

That was a great post Caliban!!

Points out the way it is very concisely and great metaphor to boot :)

Thanks still.

I don't have an issue with it because currency value is meaningless to me, and I appreciate the currency system is heavily geared towards anti inflationary pressures and creating 'genuine' achievement amongst the community as reflected by top level gear.

If achieving top level gear wasn't an incentive, if only accessing all content at all difficulties was an incentive - I think I may feel a bit more like the O.P. that the currency system just slows you down in that regard

It's interesting - but also it's pretty clear that it's not an oversight on GGG behalf - they have clearly intended and calibrated the game to be this way. Heck, it's literally their company name.

If you ask me why I like this, it's because I appreciate what it adds to the complexity and make up of the community, even though I may never craft top level gear or participate in the community at that top level the fact that there is that depth to the game appeals to me.

If getting rich in currency was the status of wealth, every rich person would look the same. Because of the random nature of gear, no two top level players attributes will likely ever be the same, and no crafted item will ever be absolutely perfect for a character - but there will always be competition as to 'how close to perfect' a player can get their gear...

That's interesting if you look at the game community as a whole, but if you are really only talking about your OWN enjoyment, and you don't feel the need to attempt perfection, then the system is indeed going to be both confusing and a bit of a let down.

Path of Exile theoretically has a 'perfect build' in terms of gear, and it's probably mathematically all but impossible to achieve, and that's pretty cool in my opinion.

I gotta agree. That was a fantastic post.

It provides a point of view from both sides, and in all honesty, I value the Lambo (exalt) because I know what it can do for me.

I do not look at it as money/currency. I tend to save mine for use. If they cost 10 GCP, I would still buy them, but that's because, without them, my high end regaled items would be meh. Incredibly powerful to some, one stat to another.

Again, great post.

That was indeed a great post Caliban!

It clearly defined the 'problem'!

Perhaps you are 'the one' to dream up a 'solution'? An 'appeasement'?

I don't think there is a solution really, other than making currency trading easier between both players and vendors (universally agreed).

It'd be helpful offering tutorial videos etc on trading and communicating how important the real world economy is to the game (easier to to do once web based trading tools are implemented). Also good to try and ensure players understand that high level currency is exceedingly rare from the outset, and that even though it's use is more contingent on late game play in can indeed drop anywhere so keep an eye out for it. Maybe require talking to an NPC who does a run down before you can use your first exalted/regal/divine if that's possible within the game engine, so that there is an element of in game tutorial - although that may become annoying on subsequent run throughs with new characters (perhaps have that as a menu option that defaults to on but you can turn off?).

The fact that exalted's etc can drop in act 1 normal etc (I believe) and that the stash is shared creates a positive reason to run alts to try the different types of gameplay.

Unfortunately this won't help people much who are just in the game to discover the content.

Still, communicating to new players that the game is meant to be replayable in a way where your lower level characters can actually find drops that are really useful to your higher level characters, even if you decide not to be involved in the player based economy, may make them less stressed about the value of and Exalted or a Regal as a trade and more inclined to keep it for themselves, if not for this character but maybe for another character they grow attached to later on.

Finally, as a bit of an off the wall suggestion I'd ask that a very small number of the purchasable cosmetic differences actually had some sort of gear pre requisite to go along with them, so they cost money but ALSO required the player had crafted high level gear, so that players could visually appreciate that gear was the indicator of wealth in terms of time spent in the game.

These wouldn't be particularly expensive purchases or anything, similar to any other cosmetic difference, they'd just have that pre requisite.

Regarding fusings and chromatics I really don't think there is a solution, other than again some sort of tutorial/forcing you to talk to an NPC before you first use one - the fact that you need hundreds of them to craft high level gear and that it's RNG dominated seems implicit in the game design, the second you remove that aspect then 6L's and 5L's are significantly less rare, because it basically becomes a quest that's just part of the normal game content to get one - fetch 1500 fusings, get your 6L, that's a true grind (or will just create an out of game economy where 1500 fusings has a set monetary value and the game effectively becomes P2W, just to bots/farmers).

Gambling your fusings for a 6L is a true grind if you DON'T get one, but a massive success if you DO get one - but it's meant to be hard so that the achievement feels like something beyond regular game content (in a game whose innate mechanics can't really reward player skill, only persistence.)

It also lowers their real world monetary value because of that uncertainty factor, so discourages real world influence on the game economy to an extent.

This all makes way more sense when you treat POE as an innately social game, if you don't treat it as such then it's just kind of 'how it is' I think, and either the gameplay, setting and content grabs you enough to play through it a few times, or it doesn't.

Which is fine, because it's FREE. Ultimately you'll turn up for the game, but you'll stay (and pay) for the people. Including just proving that your better than everyone else.

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Qarl wrote:

Hi Never_Nou (and others),

Thanks for all your feedback. I have a quick couple of questions.

If we assumed trading for currency in bulk was easier, and there wasn't such an obstacle to chaining through the currency types in your trades, and we assumed you could trade up to Orb of Alchemy (Upgrade to Rare) and Orb of Chance (Upgrade randomly), would that be enough to feel you had enough access to the whole game?

This would mean that adding affixes to Rare items would be something you could only do rarely.

What would you consider the minimum kind of gear you should have after (say) 40 hours of play?

How different would you expect the gear of someone who has played 1000 hours to be?

artificial barriers to currency liquidity currently in game serves no functional purpose aside from aggravation for the players.

the game is supposed to be fun. you guys understand this or you would not have created PoE :)

the current barrier for exchange serves no purpose because if people wanted to trade up, they will. no matter how aggravating it may be, they will do it. the possibility of exchange exists so the market value is FIXED regardless of how much pain it may be to exchange it. nobody is going to offer 10% more for the higher currency because the market value is fixed. the labor of exchanging it has no market value in game so it's only it only adds to aggravation.

as for adding alchemy or chance into the currency exchange mix, it is up to you as the game designer to decide if it is appropriate based on the current game design and future direction of the game. keeping in mind that less accessible currency will naturally fetch a premium in the market. I can see keeping alchemy out of the exchange equation while allowing chance into the market place. chance orb has almost no chance of rolling a unique anyway so for all intensive purpose it's a chance to roll a yellow but cost more then a blue.

after 40 hours of /played, I would expect that my gear is entirely yellow or better. the only exceptions would be some double rolled IIR/IIQ jewellery which might be blue if they are almost perfect rolls. the mid to high end of the game is entirely socket based. 6linked gear trumps anything else in the game. so having yellows is pretty much a "expected" thing. because in reality just because it's yellow doesn't really mean it's good. there are plenty of blues that have better rolls then crappy yellows out there.

however, what it comes down to is what YOU as the game designer designed the content to be. was the content balanced against blues? yellows? or unique's? what was the content designed to require for the intended difficulty is a more accurate question to ask. a even more complicated question is what future direction is the game taking and should all these yellows be in the game already? what should the players be aspiring for 3 years from today? will there be unique sets? ancient tier that is higher then the unique tier? what color is the carrot at the end of the stick?

these are design issues that we as the player can not answer because we don't know what you are planning for us :D will there be larger content like raids? will there be 12 man maps in the future? what kind of gear do we need to overcome the hardest content you guys are planning? :P


one of the most difficult part of game design is to determine how hard the game should be and how to balance it so the players experience that level of difficulty in relatively the same way. so naturally it's hard for us to give feedback on what you guys are planning when we don't know what you are planning :D

For whatever it is worth

/sign to the OP's original observation / suggestions.

I agree with most of what was stated but would
emphasize the MOST annoying bit of how GG has
the system implemented forcing one to open and close
the vendor window for each and every purchase
of said currency items.


I would suggest they create a separate vendor for
such items that way they would not have to
mess with coding the original vendors to update
inventory until the purchase window is closed.


There is no good reason to go out of the way to
annoy players with the system as is. Go ahead and plan on fixing it PLEASE.

Idea is to keep people coming back right? Hmm?