How to fix Jewelry Crafting

BretonMage

Crafts_Many_Boxes wrote: »

One of the key points of this discussion is that they can't make upgrading to gold cheaper than the gold vendor. If anything, for the system to make any sense at all, it needs to stay more expensive than the gold vendor.

Right now it's 400-450K to take a ring to gold from base, about 330-350K for just purple to gold. It is 250k for the expensive tier of rings from the gold vendor. So right now, upgrading yourself costs almost twice as much as buying from the golden.

If you reduce the number of grains required per plating, wouldn't the cost to upgrade also drop as materials become less rare?

GoldenLight

I have been working on Jewelry crafting with my character for a while. I first focused on being able to craft all types and then while doing that (and gathering resources) slowly built up enough to make my necklace and one ring gold. I agree it is slow as I am a casual player but really found it better to not have this come too easy.

I can see it working more like blacksmithing for tempers to be better though.

I can agree that processing materials gives the same level tier stuff at the same % as with blacksmithing but leave the grains to half the amount we need now. That way everything is 5 grains per plating. Don't want it too fast but don't want it to drag on and frustrate most players trying to level items. Also, it would let the crafting writs be a little less painful to do for Jewelry.

I agree that it should be a little easier to get the materials but not too easy to make gold less valuable as everyone has gold.

Crafts_Many_Boxes

BretonMage wrote: »

Crafts_Many_Boxes wrote: »

One of the key points of this discussion is that they can't make upgrading to gold cheaper than the gold vendor. If anything, for the system to make any sense at all, it needs to stay more expensive than the gold vendor.

Right now it's 400-450K to take a ring to gold from base, about 330-350K for just purple to gold. It is 250k for the expensive tier of rings from the gold vendor. So right now, upgrading yourself costs almost twice as much as buying from the golden.

If you reduce the number of grains required per plating, wouldn't the cost to upgrade also drop as materials become less rare?

Correct. However it's important to consider to what degree it is reduced. A 50% reduction in grains is essentially a 50% cost reduction. This puts it pretty much even with the golden vendor, which as I've been saying would defeat the purpose of the golden vendor.

IMO like 2 would be an appropriate grain cost reduction. Still more expensive than the golden, but not double the cost.

karthrag_inak

I think jewelry won't ever be worth a crap until the devs truly understand what's going on. The biggest evidence of how they don't understand it is how only about 1 in 20 sealed jewelry writs are even worth doing. Would be good if the guys making the game actually played it. Until then nothing's going to change.

Alinhbo_Tyaka

Crafts_Many_Boxes wrote: »

Alinhbo_Tyaka wrote: »

Crafts_Many_Boxes wrote: »

BretonMage wrote: »

If they reduced the grain to plating requirement to 5 grains per plating, I think that should balance it out appropriately. It will still be much more of a grind compared to the other crafting skills, but it will at least be bearable. As I see it, this is probably the most straightforward fix that won't require too many other variables to be tweaked.

One of the key points of this discussion is that they can't make upgrading to gold cheaper than the gold vendor. If anything, for the system to make any sense at all, it needs to stay more expensive than the gold vendor.

Right now it's 400-450K to take a ring to gold from base, about 330-350K for just purple to gold. It is 250k for the expensive tier of rings from the gold vendor. So right now, upgrading yourself costs almost twice as much as buying from the golden.

That being said, having the freedom to upgrade whatever you want is far more useful than the RNG of the gold vendor, so it SHOULD be more expensive.

The real questions are

A) Should gold jewelry be ~twice as expensive to craft vs the gold vendor? What increase is considered "fair"?

Are the base prices of the gold vendor OK? That dictates to what degree JC needs to change, if at all.

The problem, at least from what I can see for some sets, is there is no predictability for the Gold Vendor availability. Some sets like Necropotence haven't had an item available across all platforms since June, 2017. You also have crafted sets that will never be available at the Gold Vendor so why should those require a premium? After all they don't really compete with it.

You're failing to understand my argument. I'm saying that you have to pay a premium for that convenience. Gold vendor is cheaper, but inconsistent. Crafting yourself should be more expensive from a game balance standpoint, because you can craft / upgrade whatever you want, whenever you want. You pay extra for that freedom. There isn't a single trial or dungeon that you can't easily get carried through to get at least blue jewelry, so you technically have all jewelry at your disposal.

Gold vendor should have a chance at crafted drops to make things consistent, yes.

The only questions are whether or not the prices of the gold vendor are reasonable, and what magnitude should that premium be? Methinks the current 80-100% extra is too high.

I understood what you are saying. I think a premium is ok if the item is something the gold vendor would carry. I also agree with you that an 80% - 100% premium is too high. However I don't think there should be any premium for exclusively crafted pieces as they do not compete with the gold vendor. I also think if an item is going to be in the gold vendor then it needs to be predictable in order to deserve a premium. Charging a premium to upgrade a non-craftable piece that might or might not show up at the gold vendor depending upon RNG is not providing extra freedom just frustration.

Feric51

Crafts_Many_Boxes wrote: »

BretonMage wrote: »

Crafts_Many_Boxes wrote: »

One of the key points of this discussion is that they can't make upgrading to gold cheaper than the gold vendor. If anything, for the system to make any sense at all, it needs to stay more expensive than the gold vendor.

Right now it's 400-450K to take a ring to gold from base, about 330-350K for just purple to gold. It is 250k for the expensive tier of rings from the gold vendor. So right now, upgrading yourself costs almost twice as much as buying from the golden.

If you reduce the number of grains required per plating, wouldn't the cost to upgrade also drop as materials become less rare?

Correct. However it's important to consider to what degree it is reduced. A 50% reduction in grains is essentially a 50% cost reduction. This puts it pretty much even with the golden vendor, which as I've been saying would defeat the purpose of the golden vendor.

IMO like 2 would be an appropriate grain cost reduction. Still more expensive than the golden, but not double the cost.

The golden vendor would still be worthwhile as an AP sink. Right now the golden is one of the few things worthwhile for people to spend AP on, especially those who trade AP for gold by buying the BoE jewelry (with AP) then selling to other players (for gold).

I haven't paid full price for a BoE jewelry piece out of the golden since... ever. I just message one of my PvP buddies and buy it off them for a 5:1 ratio (i.e. 60k gold for 300k AP).

rustle911

Feric51 wrote: »

The golden vendor would still be worthwhile as an AP sink. Right now the golden is one of the few things worthwhile for people to spend AP on, especially those who trade AP for gold by buying the BoE jewelry (with AP) then selling to other players (for gold).

I haven't paid full price for a BoE jewelry piece out of the golden since... ever. I just message one of my PvP buddies and buy it off them for a 5:1 ratio (i.e. 60k gold for 300k AP).

Which is exactly what The Golden should be, an AP sink. Cyrodiil vendors are Cyrodiil currency sinks. AP and Tel Var stones are currencies acquired in and used in Cyrodiil. The vendors there are sinks for them. Gold is acquired outside Cyrodiil and its vendors are sinks for it. The Golden sells for gold so that people who don’t want to pvp can get its items without having to PvP. Crafting is another option for getting around that need. That’s why on the whole I believe that the costs should be about equal.

To be fair, those costs should be on the higher end, meaning that within the economy, it should cost about 250k to upgrade a piece of jewelry to gold. Anyone who thinks that adjusting drop/reward/decon rates to bring this about would “tank” the economy needs to return to school and retake economics. At the most, what would happen is that we would see a market over-correction, but I doubt it would take long for prices to level off correctly.

Edit: correct errors

tmbrinks

rustle911 wrote: »

Feric51 wrote: »

The golden vendor would still be worthwhile as an AP sink. Right now the golden is one of the few things worthwhile for people to spend AP on, especially those who trade AP for gold by buying the BoE jewelry (with AP) then selling to other players (for gold).

I haven't paid full price for a BoE jewelry piece out of the golden since... ever. I just message one of my PvP buddies and buy it off them for a 5:1 ratio (i.e. 60k gold for 300k AP).

Which is exactly what The Golden should be, an AP sink. Cyrodiil vendors are Cyrodiil currency sinks. AP and Tel Var stones are currencies acquired in and used in Cyrodiil. The vendors there are sinks for them. Gold is acquired outside Cyrodiil and its vendors are sinks for it. The Golden sells for gold so that people who don’t want to pvp can get its items without having to PvP. Crafting is another option for getting around that need. That’s why on the whole I believe that the costs should be about equal.

To be fair, those costs should be on the higher end, meaning that within the economy, it should cost about 250k to upgrade a piece of jewelry to gold. Anyone who thinks that adjusting drop/reward/decon rates to bring this about would “tank” the economy needs to return to school and retake economics. At the most, what would happen is that we would see a market over-correction, but I doubt it would take long for prices to level off correctly.

Edit: correct errors

It currently costs 400k to make a gold ring from scratch on PC/NA. It "only" costs 320k to upgrade from purple to gold. That seems pretty in-line with your 250k suggestion. The "primary" suggestion to "fix" jewelry crafting has been to remove the grains. 400k/10 = 40k. That is "tanking" the economy. This is why I've been saying that it only needs a minor tweak.

Hence, again
* adding in a jewelry hireling (to be honest, this might be enough to lower the prices the 20-25% they need to come down, IF they drop zircon grains)
* drop rate for chromium seems to be lower than the other gold improvement mats (20% vs. 30% at max level writs). Make these equal.
These two would most likely accomplish what you just admitted was "fair" for the cost, and would probably even bring them below them (which would be okay, since rings are 150k and necks 250k, being in the middle would be okay)

rustle911

@tmbrinks if jewelry was the standard upon which the ESO economy was based, then yes that would be a tank job. But it isn’t. It will be like when Google decides to make more shares available in the market by splitting their stock. It will have short term impact on a few related market pieces, then everything will settle at or near what it was when those things were introduced to the economy when Summerset launched.

I have a little faith in the ESO economy being able to handle even a drastic change like that. I’m not proposing it, but I believe that if it can handle the introduction of JC, then it can handle any major changes to JC. Besides, if you want to see what a market crash would look like, get rid of grains, and make all upgrades like JC as a 1-4 mat progression.

Now, I don’t think any of that is necessary. Like you, a hireling that drops zircon would be great. Balance the drop rates so that the upgrade cost adjustment makes more sense. 1-2-3-4 vs 2-3-4-8 without an adjustment to the drop rates of the middle upgrade mats creates a clear bottleneck. Lastly, guarantee grains on decon. Let RNG determine how many. 1-3 or 1-4, instead of 0-1, would further help relieve the bottleneck in the middle and help level out material costs while improving the vale of jewelry in general.

tmbrinks

@rustle911 There are a lot of different ways to accomplish a similar effect. Personally, I'd be happy to see them go back to the 2-3-4-8, but counteract that with 5:1 grains:plating ratio. It'd help clear out the middle "bottleneck". And it would keep the green/gold ratios the exact same they currently are. Plus, then it'd be the same as the other crafts. That along with with the zircon drops from a hireling, and increasing the chromium drop rate from writs to the be same as the other crafts would go a long way to smoothing things out.

I'm obviously not an economist (I do have a degree in mathematics), so I can't say for sure what it would do to costs, but as a back of the envelope, you'd see about a 33% reduction in Chromium prices, and a similar 33% reduction in Zircon (even without the hireling). Those two are the bulk of the cost of crafting jewelry.

(Also, I only have a beginners idea of the stock market, but when a stock splits, that doesn't create any more shareholders, since your 1 share of stock becomes 2 or 3 or whatever the split ratio is.. right? Unless some shareholders decide to sell some of their shares)

rustle911

@tmbrinks To me that would be about the ideal result. I personally think that their “halving the upgrade cost” should have come in that form to begin with. If all drop rates and avenues to acquire platings were the same except for grains, then it’s a simple matter of adjusting the number of grains required per plating until the desired cost differentials are achieved. Making those changes becomes more difficult the more time goes on and their effects are much less predictable. On the one hand, costs could in fact come down, or the added resources could create a boom in usage that keeps them ultra rare for an extended period of time that could actually cause costs to rise for a period of time before that adjustment happens.

Most companies will split their stock to increase the number of shares that could be available in the market. It allows investors to sell off shares. The thought process is that even if the shares are initially less valuable because my 1000 shares at $200 are now 2000 at $100, I can sell them off and increase the value of what remains as they sell. The company gains more stakeholders and protects itself from being bought out by a competitor while providing a return on investment opportunity for its current stakeholders.

Taleof2Cities

Did you two just agree on something?

FlopsyPrince

Taleof2Cities wrote: »

Did you two just agree on something?

tmbrinks has some good ideas as long as he/she doesn't fall into the insults.

rustle911

It isn’t the first time we’ve agreed. It’s just that there’s been a lot of back and forth on both sides of this. The main thing to get over is that regardless of ZoS’ stance on the current state of JC, there are clearly issues that should be addressed. The question is how to best address them. Even when I first started posting about it, I wasn’t asking for a full shift to be the same as other gear crafting, but a simple increase in drop rates from raw mats. Anecdotally, I see fewer grains from refining plat than I see tempers, resins, and stitches from their respective top raw mats. Since I’m not the only one who sees this, and my primary source of these items is refining, I wanted to see an increase.

How I play has undergone some changes recently and other activities, as well as points made by others, have revealed that other options are available, but also fall short in balancing. The degree to which the balance is off is not what it was when I started posting either. Getting grains from daily writs has made this less cumbersome, but has also caused a greater imbalance in the middle(zircon). If we can get this addressed, then it should be left to minor tweaks to make JC fully viable across all functions. For those looking to upgrade their own gear, or for those looking to do master writs, or both, JC should be able to be fully realized as something worth having rather than a chore that is akin to cleaning toilets with a toothbrush.

@tmbrinks has put forth some good suggestions as to how to accomplish this, as have others and myself. @Taleof2Cities put forth an alternative farming option that while it doesn’t work well for me, is still a good option. It’s now just a question of whether or not ZoS is paying attention and is willing to implement any of them. They have 2 months until Elsweyr to try one or more of them. The alternative is that some players may go elsewhere for their MMO fix.