Enchanting Essence Questions.... from an outsider. on 07/19/2020 07:34 PM CDT
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So, I get the alignment of enchanting to be more like ensorcellment, but 0-4x enchants are now unobtainium, since noone's willing to pay that much for a baby enchant, when big boys are willing to pay more, and limited essence won't be wasted on the younger folks. Is there something that can be fiddled with or something? Ben, Player of Brutish
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Re: Enchanting Essence Questions.... from an outsider. on 07/20/2020 09:38 AM CDT
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>> So, I get the alignment of enchanting to be more like ensorcellment, but 0-4x enchants are now unobtainium, since noone's willing to pay that much for a baby enchant, when big boys are willing to pay more, and limited essence won't be wasted on the younger folks. Is there something that can be fiddled with or something? Ben, Player of Brutish

I realize that players set the prices and they will fluctuate over time but it seems very unlikely that we will ever see a time where a 0x-4x enchant will be more valuable than a 4x-5x enchant. Yet that is what the current Enchanting system assumes.

0x-4x 19000 Essence
4x-5x 11000 Essence
5x-6x 48000 Essence
6x-7x 108000 Essence

The thought process may be that lower level wizards will fill the gap here but the reality is that my low level warmage (so not focused on enchanting training), upon learning 925, can already do a 5x projects out the gate so guess what projects he is going to focus on (hint: it won't be 0x-4x projects).

What about a change in the system for 0x-4x projects along the following lines? For anything below +20, instead of taking the item up +1, it will take the item to the next increment of +5 (e.g. a +0 or a +2 item would both be brought up to +5 in one cast)?

Additionally, dramatically reduce the essence cost for doing this somewhere along the following lines:

0x-Plus 5(1x) - 250 Essence
1x-Plus 10(2x) - 500 Essence
2x-Plus 15(3x) - 750 Essence
3x-Plus 20(4x) - 1000 Essence
Total 0x-4x: 2500 Essence

At today's rates (lowest I have seen advertised 150 silver per essence) it would still cost a player ~375,000 silver to enchant their project item from 0x to 4x and imagining a time where this rate might go down to 100 silver per essence it would be on par with buying many 4x projects off the shelf at 250,000 silver (for comparison, under the current system it would cost a player nearly 3 million silver to bring an item to 4x today, even at a very competitive Silver to Essense exchange rate).

Part of the enjoyment of this game is in acquiring interesting / fun items that express your individual character. It seems like the current enchanting system discourages, or at least penalizes players from acquiring common off the shelf / treasure system found items that they can use in this way (unless they are already 4x out the gate).

-- Robert

>> A halfling magistrate picks up a small rock and throws it at a half-elven bandit in a valiant effort to subdue him.
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Re: Enchanting Essence Questions.... from an outsider. on 07/20/2020 09:55 AM CDT
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Great points, Robert. Never ceases to amaze me personally how much some like to gouge others. I still disagree fundamentally with the system that causes this. But I'm just gonna lean over here against my railing.

;)

Doug
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Re: Enchanting Essence Questions.... from an outsider. on 07/20/2020 11:04 AM CDT
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>Part of the enjoyment of this game is in acquiring interesting / fun items that express your individual character. It seems like the current enchanting system discourages, or at least penalizes players from acquiring common off the shelf / treasure system found items that they can use in this way (unless they are already 4x out the gate).

I agree with the principle. However, one of the issues I've seen pretty consistently over the years is that uncommon or rare event drops are worth less (sometimes pawnshop fodder) because even though they look nice, they are functionally the same as what players can create on their own or are widely available. The cheap 1x to 4x gear that enchanters churned out before dis-incentivizes the same. Allowing players to create an artificial glut and sell it for cheap lowers the value of everything comparable that can be found in the game. This is one of the reasons why enchanting shouldn't be performed by both players and as a premium/paid service. To wit, players have such control over the economy that staff can only release novel items or unique item scripts. And this is precisely what they've been doing.

One place I can see it might need attention is for people who want to enchant forged weapons. Maybe the days of the forger-seller enchanting them before sale are gone. Let the buyer deal with the cost of enchanting them. It does seem prohibitive, but maybe having a perfect weapon is worth the additional cost.

Making 0-4x enchant less economically feasible still allows players to do it, if they want, but it discourages it. To me, that's not a bad thing. It creates more demand for uncommon drops at the events, and could potentially drive more event participation. It also might create more demand for alterations. While it seems inconvenient for us, who are accustomed to the old ways, it is probably a healthier path forward for the game in general. Something so integral as enchant to the event offerings, and game revenue, shouldn't have been given to players in the first place.
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Re: Enchanting Essence Questions.... from an outsider. on 07/21/2020 06:15 PM CDT
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Additionally, dramatically reduce the essence cost for doing this somewhere along the following lines:
0x-Plus 5(1x) - 250 Essence
1x-Plus 10(2x) - 500 Essence
2x-Plus 15(3x) - 750 Essence
3x-Plus 20(4x) - 1000 Essence
Total 0x-4x: 2500 Essence


I made a similar suggestion a while back about reducing the cost of 0x to 4x work and it was actually twice the final amount that you suggested and folks still told me TS. Deal with it.

For some reason any minor changes to help fix some glaring issues that I've suggested people don't like it. My suggestion was to allow a handful of 4x enchants a week instead of 3, 4x enchants a month. Apparently the idea of allowing a couple extra 4x enchants from wizards a week was going to break the system or was overkill. Old system you could do unlimited 4x and under projects. New system you can do 43, 0-4x projects over the course of the entire year. That's less than 1, 4x project a week. I was hoping for some give here to make it more reasonable for doing 0-4x casts, but apparently it wasn't well received.

Let's face it, no one is clambering for enchants under 4x that I've seen, but that's probably because of the horrific cost. Even a newly level 25 wizard that does at least 1x in the 900s (925), AS (25 ranks), MIU (25 ranks) and EMC (25 ranks). Standing in a guild workshop with a familiar. Stats are still growing, but they might have INT bonus of 15 and LOG bonus of 15.....which means a level 25 wizard could reasonable have an enchanting bonus power of around 190.

Based on testing that I've read, an item that is 5x (+25) has a negative bonus of 63. A 6x (+30) item has a negative bonus of 93.

A brand new wizard with basic training should have zero issues taking a plain jane 5x weapon up to 6x (depending on how much essence they have stored up).
If they charged 100-150 silver per essence....
48K essence to take an item from +25 to +30 would cost: 4.8mil to 7.2mil
16k earned in a week for weekly essence cap means 3 weeeks of essence building to do a full 5x-6x project.
People will pay for this work, getting an item from 5x to 6x. 5-8mil.

So, why would even a lowly new enchanting wizard want to settle for basic enchanting of low items when they can do mid ranged enchants and make more or raise up their own equipment? I'd much rather use some critter found weapon/armor/shield that's 4x or less or buy some cheap-ish 4x or under weapon/armor/shield from the pawnshop over paying someone 1-2mil to enchant a weapon to 4x. Heck, you can even get the Landing's weapon smith or armor smith to fasten weapons/armor/shields out of vultite cheaper than getting someone to enchant an item from 0x to 4x for a fraction of the cost.

I used to see 4x armors in the player shops for 25-50k. I still find a few types of 4x armors priced there, but they're usually ones that aren't highly sought after (double chain, augmented breastplate). Costs for more widely used 4x armors (full, double, brig, chainmail and so on) are now easily 100k+.
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Re: Enchanting Essence Questions.... from an outsider. on 07/21/2020 07:51 PM CDT
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>>For some reason any minor changes to help fix some glaring issues that I've suggested people don't like it.

Did Robert get a different response? I ask because I'm not seeing it, which makes me wonder what you're seeing that would cause you to suggest people didn't like your 'fixes'.

Bottom line - that rail I'm leaning against says "JUST RIP IT OUT AND MAKE IT NPC-ONLY"

Has for a while. Don't need to fix anything. Doesn't mean your's aren't good. Means they're totally unnecessary.

In my view.

Doug
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