Cost to transmute a trait too high with Transmute Station

Veinblood1965 · November 26

Costs 50 crystals to change the trait of an item using a transmute station OR you can reconstruct it. If you only know one item than it costs 75 crystals. I rarely find myself just knowing one or two pieces of a set. Crystals aren't hard to get but they are not easy either, it just feels like a waste the way it is set up now to change a trait.

If you change the trait of an item you cannot get any crystals back when deconstructing.

If you reconstruct one you get 25 crystals back when deconstructing.

Maybe it's just me but I've never changed the trait due to this. Does anyone else feel this way? There needs to be more of an incentive to change the trait or just remove it all together. It's not hurting anything as it is but it's basically useless.

AlnilamE · November 26

Nobody will reconstruct a set item if they don't have enough pieces for at least the set bonus they want.

But for a normal set (all body, jewelry and weapon pieces), knowing only 5 pieces makes reconstruction cost 65 transmutes. You need to know 12 pieces, so more than half the set, for reconstruction to be better than transmuting.

If you are doing the content the set comes from exclusively to get the set for a build and won't go back there afterwards, you might never get to that point.

So just because you don't transmute often, doesn't mean other people don't.

Jabbs_Giggity · November 26

Trait changes, at the very least, should cost no more than your current cost to reconstruct. Even Mythics, by default, only cost 25 to reconstruct.

IMO, reconstruction should definitely cost more than a mere trait change...the logic is backwards.

Rishikesa108 · November 26

IMHO the trait change cost is adeguate.
We have so many opportunities to earn transmute crystals that 50 is really low. I change traits or craft from scratch using the required transmute crystals and always have plenty.

sarahthes · November 26

They have literally doubled or even tripled the sources of transmute crystals since clockwork city was released and the cost has stayed the same - this is actually a net decrease in cost since now you are capped at 500/1000 instead of 250/500 and now you can get 10 per random normal instead of I think it used to be 5?

Jabbs_Giggity · November 26

sarahthes wrote: »

They have literally doubled or even tripled the sources of transmute crystals since clockwork city was released and the cost has stayed the same - this is actually a net decrease in cost since now you are capped at 500/1000 instead of 250/500 and now you can get 10 per random normal instead of I think it used to be 5?

Interesting, I get 1 crystal from Normal dungeon dailies....

virtus753 · November 26

Jabbs_Giggity wrote: »

sarahthes wrote: »

They have literally doubled or even tripled the sources of transmute crystals since clockwork city was released and the cost has stayed the same - this is actually a net decrease in cost since now you are capped at 500/1000 instead of 250/500 and now you can get 10 per random normal instead of I think it used to be 5?

Interesting, I get 1 crystal from Normal dungeon dailies....

You get a guaranteed 10-crystal geode in the mail as part of the rewards for completing your first *random* dungeon. You must use the queue and select random, so it is not guaranteed to match the pledges for the day.

This is in addition to whatever geodes you get for completing a daily (i.e. pledge).

sarahthes · November 26

Jabbs_Giggity wrote: »

sarahthes wrote: »

They have literally doubled or even tripled the sources of transmute crystals since clockwork city was released and the cost has stayed the same - this is actually a net decrease in cost since now you are capped at 500/1000 instead of 250/500 and now you can get 10 per random normal instead of I think it used to be 5?

Interesting, I get 1 crystal from Normal dungeon dailies....

You get a 10 transmute crystal for your first random normal per character per day, so if you have 20 characters you could get 200 transmutes per day just from that.

Blood_again · November 26

Basically, the whole transmute idea (retraiting and then reconstruction) was added as an auxiliary mechanism for traditional gear drop mechanic.
If you don't have spare crystals, use it as the last tool only.
First things first. You should farm the content for the gear you need.

Somehow it became a common idea that reconstruction/retraiting is the main tool to make your build. It is wrong.
Well, some percent of players can reconstruct the whole build. Just because they've already fulfilled their collection and gained a lot of spare crystals in process. So they can afford spending 300+ transmutes at a time.

Most of the players don't have both, so they need to farm the gear to certain point, then fix the gaps in their build with retraiting/reconstruction.
How it works:
For example, I farmed relequen and got only 4 different pieces divines for 6 runs. I got 8 relequen pieces to my collection in total.
I can reconstruct the 5th piece in divines, but it will take over 50 crystals. So I'd better retrait the piece I got with a wrong trait. It will be cheaper.
As a result, I spent 6 trial runs, 50 crystals and some improvement materials to get 5 of 13 items for my awesome build. Then I hunt for another set.

manukartofanu · November 26

Jabbs_Giggity wrote: »

Trait changes, at the very least, should cost no more than your current cost to reconstruct. Even Mythics, by default, only cost 25 to reconstruct.

IMO, reconstruction should definitely cost more than a mere trait change...the logic is backwards.

No, it shouldn't be that way. Collecting the entire set is much more difficult than getting one specific piece and changing its trait. This way, there is currently a reason to collect the whole set, which means revisiting the same content even when there are no other reasons to replay it. If the cost of reconstruction is increased, it simply removes one incentive to engage with that content and essentially help those who haven’t completed it yet.

manukartofanu · November 26

virtus753 wrote: »

Jabbs_Giggity wrote: »

sarahthes wrote: »

They have literally doubled or even tripled the sources of transmute crystals since clockwork city was released and the cost has stayed the same - this is actually a net decrease in cost since now you are capped at 500/1000 instead of 250/500 and now you can get 10 per random normal instead of I think it used to be 5?

Interesting, I get 1 crystal from Normal dungeon dailies....

You get a guaranteed 10-crystal geode in the mail as part of the rewards for completing your first *random* dungeon. You must use the queue and select random, so it is not guaranteed to match the pledges for the day.

This is in addition to whatever geodes you get for completing a daily (i.e. pledge).

And in addition to that, if you do vanilla dungeon dailies, you now get guaranteed 5 crystals. You get 1 only for DLC normal daily. Therefore, the reward system is quite clear: ZOS aims to encourage veteran players to participate in content that helps new players progress. That’s where the highest rewards are. Next in line are the unpopular Veteran DLC dungeons, which are needed by players who are no longer beginners but not yet in the late game stage.

Then come the normal DLC dungeons, where most players farm sets. For these, the rewards are minimal because it’s the most popular content.

Essentially, those who only focus on their own interests when running dungeons end up with just enough rewards to barely make full use of transmutation.

P.S. Winning a Battleground now gives 10 or 15 transmutation crystals, and that’s in addition to the reward for the first Battleground of the day!

Zodiarkslayer · November 26

So, fill your sticker book, maybe?

I know, I know. But its the system. And it serves to create an incentive to farm your stickerbook.
I dont see the issue, honestly. 🤷‍♂️

Gabriel_H · November 26

Jabbs_Giggity wrote: »

Trait changes, at the very least, should cost no more than your current cost to reconstruct. Even Mythics, by default, only cost 25 to reconstruct.

IMO, reconstruction should definitely cost more than a mere trait change...the logic is backwards.

Reconstructing requires applying a trait to a blank item. (1 action)
Changing trait requires removing the existing trait then applying a trait to blank item. (2 actions)

Jabbs_Giggity · November 26

Blood_again wrote: »

Basically, the whole transmute idea (retraiting and then reconstruction) was added as an auxiliary mechanism for traditional gear drop mechanic.
If you don't have spare crystals, use it as the last tool only.
First things first. You should farm the content for the gear you need.

Somehow it became a common idea that reconstruction/retraiting is the main tool to make your build. It is wrong.
Well, some percent of players can reconstruct the whole build. Just because they've already fulfilled their collection and gained a lot of spare crystals in process. So they can afford spending 300+ transmutes at a time.

Most of the players don't have both, so they need to farm the gear to certain point, then fix the gaps in their build with retraiting/reconstruction.
How it works:
For example, I farmed relequen and got only 4 different pieces divines for 6 runs. I got 8 relequen pieces to my collection in total.
I can reconstruct the 5th piece in divines, but it will take over 50 crystals. So I'd better retrait the piece I got with a wrong trait. It will be cheaper.
As a result, I spent 6 trial runs, 50 crystals and some improvement materials to get 5 of 13 items for my awesome build. Then I hunt for another set.

I don't think I agree with this. Yes, we have all done the hours upon hours grinds for gear. This generally lead to 80% of time played as farming time and 20% play time, where the latter gave you just enough time to barely enjoy it before the next nerf sweep or new replacement set from new content drop.

Then, transmuting was introduced to allow players to bring the grind time down to a minimal with a new grind - being that transmutes were harder to come by.

Now we are at the current, where reconstructing any collected item had reduced cost based on the number of pieces collected. Thus, reducing said grinds (above) even further.

That being said, reconstruction requires maximum collection for minimal cost. Yet, you are still creating an entire item from having nothing.
Whereas transmuting you are simply changing a trait on an item you already found and own, bound to you. The cost on this should be maximum 25 crystals (the current minimum cost to reconstruct any set item)

sarahthes · November 26

Jabbs_Giggity wrote: »

Blood_again wrote: »

Basically, the whole transmute idea (retraiting and then reconstruction) was added as an auxiliary mechanism for traditional gear drop mechanic.
If you don't have spare crystals, use it as the last tool only.
First things first. You should farm the content for the gear you need.

Somehow it became a common idea that reconstruction/retraiting is the main tool to make your build. It is wrong.
Well, some percent of players can reconstruct the whole build. Just because they've already fulfilled their collection and gained a lot of spare crystals in process. So they can afford spending 300+ transmutes at a time.

Most of the players don't have both, so they need to farm the gear to certain point, then fix the gaps in their build with retraiting/reconstruction.
How it works:
For example, I farmed relequen and got only 4 different pieces divines for 6 runs. I got 8 relequen pieces to my collection in total.
I can reconstruct the 5th piece in divines, but it will take over 50 crystals. So I'd better retrait the piece I got with a wrong trait. It will be cheaper.
As a result, I spent 6 trial runs, 50 crystals and some improvement materials to get 5 of 13 items for my awesome build. Then I hunt for another set.

I don't think I agree with this. Yes, we have all done the hours upon hours grinds for gear. This generally lead to 80% of time played as farming time and 20% play time, where the latter gave you just enough time to barely enjoy it before the next nerf sweep or new replacement set from new content drop.

Then, transmuting was introduced to allow players to bring the grind time down to a minimal with a new grind - being that transmutes were harder to come by.

Now we are at the current, where reconstructing any collected item had reduced cost based on the number of pieces collected. Thus, reducing said grinds (above) even further.

That being said, reconstruction requires maximum collection for minimal cost. Yet, you are still creating an entire item from having nothing.
Whereas transmuting you are simply changing a trait on an item you already found and own, bound to you. The cost on this should be maximum 25 crystals (the current minimum cost to reconstruct any set item)

Why would anyone ever reconstruct anything in that case?

Aldoss · November 26

BGs have been giving 35 transmutes/day consistently this patch and have been a welcome quality of life boost. I've never willfully transmuted anything since reconstruction became a thing and I now find myself transmuting stuff all the time just to tinker with traits because BGs give so many.

I even deleted a lot of my duplicate items like Balorgh's helms and duplicate rings because if I ever need to switch them to a diff toon with diff traits, I'll just transmute them and gobble up all the geodes that are littering my inventory.

Cooperharley · November 26

I agree.

I feel like the people that generally have too many play one character largely, PvP a ton, or don’t change builds often. If you enjoy many characters or experimenting with builds, it heavily dampens your ability to do so. The transmute system as a whole could use a facelift. My proposed changes would be:

1. Remove the cap altogether. There’s no logical reason to me why there’s even a cap on this. Data? Come on. This would solve the problem for people that complain about having too many. ZOS could even be cheeky and lift the cap for ESO+ members only 🤷🏻‍♂️

2. Either lessen transmutes needed to change traits or reconstruct OR enable you to earn more in content SO LONG AS #1 holds true to not overwhelm those who don’t want them. Maybe your daily random gives 25 and your preceding ones, to incentivize you to continue interacting with the random dungeon finder could give you 5 or something rather than 1, which frankly is just silly. Could do the same for the daily BG - 25 for the daily, 5 for preceding random BGs.

I think the game should incentivize you to create more characters and more builds and to interact with a variety of systems rather than constantly time gating you. The way I look at it is, if I have 4 characters for example and I need like 300 transmute for a build, I just think about how many days of random dungeons I have to run on all 4 to accumulate all of those, which is a little over a week. But, this just makes me not want to play after the random dungeons tbh whereas if I had plenty to have fun and mess with new build ideas, it’d make me want to play longer each day.

To those people that have too many, I’d recommend just reconstructing gear with the nirnhoned trait, breaking it down, and selling that trait material for gold FYI.

Just my $0.02

Not everything needs FOMO and time gating

DenverRalphy · November 26

Transmuting has already all but destroyed Crafting. I'd rather not see it become even easier.

Aggrovious · November 26

DenverRalphy wrote: »

Transmuting has already all but destroyed Crafting. I'd rather not see it become even easier.

How? Dungeon and trial sets would have to be farmed for the perfect trait.

DenverRalphy · November 26

Aggrovious wrote: »

DenverRalphy wrote: »

Transmuting has already all but destroyed Crafting. I'd rather not see it become even easier.

How? Dungeon and trial sets would have to be farmed for the perfect trait.

If your character hasn't researched that trait, then an alt need only research 1 trait which takes no time at all, then reconstruct it. You don't have to farm the perfect trait.

Jabbs_Giggity · November 27

sarahthes wrote: »

Jabbs_Giggity wrote: »

Blood_again wrote: »

Basically, the whole transmute idea (retraiting and then reconstruction) was added as an auxiliary mechanism for traditional gear drop mechanic.
If you don't have spare crystals, use it as the last tool only.
First things first. You should farm the content for the gear you need.

Somehow it became a common idea that reconstruction/retraiting is the main tool to make your build. It is wrong.
Well, some percent of players can reconstruct the whole build. Just because they've already fulfilled their collection and gained a lot of spare crystals in process. So they can afford spending 300+ transmutes at a time.

Most of the players don't have both, so they need to farm the gear to certain point, then fix the gaps in their build with retraiting/reconstruction.
How it works:
For example, I farmed relequen and got only 4 different pieces divines for 6 runs. I got 8 relequen pieces to my collection in total.
I can reconstruct the 5th piece in divines, but it will take over 50 crystals. So I'd better retrait the piece I got with a wrong trait. It will be cheaper.
As a result, I spent 6 trial runs, 50 crystals and some improvement materials to get 5 of 13 items for my awesome build. Then I hunt for another set.

I don't think I agree with this. Yes, we have all done the hours upon hours grinds for gear. This generally lead to 80% of time played as farming time and 20% play time, where the latter gave you just enough time to barely enjoy it before the next nerf sweep or new replacement set from new content drop.

Then, transmuting was introduced to allow players to bring the grind time down to a minimal with a new grind - being that transmutes were harder to come by.

Now we are at the current, where reconstructing any collected item had reduced cost based on the number of pieces collected. Thus, reducing said grinds (above) even further.

That being said, reconstruction requires maximum collection for minimal cost. Yet, you are still creating an entire item from having nothing.
Whereas transmuting you are simply changing a trait on an item you already found and own, bound to you. The cost on this should be maximum 25 crystals (the current minimum cost to reconstruct any set item)

Why would anyone ever reconstruct anything in that case?

Well, having multiple pieces of one set for different functions, coming back to a set you collected but no longer have. These are two of the major reasons.

katanagirl1 · November 27

Jabbs_Giggity wrote: »

Trait changes, at the very least, should cost no more than your current cost to reconstruct. Even Mythics, by default, only cost 25 to reconstruct.

IMO, reconstruction should definitely cost more than a mere trait change...the logic is backwards.

View it from the other perspective, the reconstruction cost being lower for having more items in the sticker book is a reward for completing the set. Mythics only have one item per set so you get the low cost when you pick it up.

Jabbs_Giggity · November 27

Cooperharley wrote: »

I agree.

I feel like the people that generally have too many play one character largely, PvP a ton, or don’t change builds often. If you enjoy many characters or experimenting with builds, it heavily dampens your ability to do so. The transmute system as a whole could use a facelift. My proposed changes would be:

1. Remove the cap altogether. There’s no logical reason to me why there’s even a cap on this. Data? Come on. This would solve the problem for people that complain about having too many. ZOS could even be cheeky and lift the cap for ESO+ members only 🤷🏻‍♂️

2. Either lessen transmutes needed to change traits or reconstruct OR enable you to earn more in content SO LONG AS #1 holds true to not overwhelm those who don’t want them. Maybe your daily random gives 25 and your preceding ones, to incentivize you to continue interacting with the random dungeon finder could give you 5 or something rather than 1, which frankly is just silly. Could do the same for the daily BG - 25 for the daily, 5 for preceding random BGs.

I think the game should incentivize you to create more characters and more builds and to interact with a variety of systems rather than constantly time gating you. The way I look at it is, if I have 4 characters for example and I need like 300 transmute for a build, I just think about how many days of random dungeons I have to run on all 4 to accumulate all of those, which is a little over a week. But, this just makes me not want to play after the random dungeons tbh whereas if I had plenty to have fun and mess with new build ideas, it’d make me want to play longer each day.

To those people that have too many, I’d recommend just reconstructing gear with the nirnhoned trait, breaking it down, and selling that trait material for gold FYI.

Just my $0.02

Not everything needs FOMO and time gating

This is a perfect response. Not sure why anyone is bashing the idea that cost being lower is a problem, or having more access to crystals is a problem. Unless they are selling in-game runs for farming gear to profit, I don't see a reasonable argument for making it an easier QoL change to be able to test different builds more frequently.

You can even make the argument of making the crystal currency tradeable for in-game profit, just like Luminous Ink.

manukartofanu · November 27

Cooperharley wrote: »

I agree.

I feel like the people that generally have too many play one character largely, PvP a ton, or don’t change builds often. If you enjoy many characters or experimenting with builds, it heavily dampens your ability to do so. The transmute system as a whole could use a facelift. My proposed changes would be:

1. Remove the cap altogether. There’s no logical reason to me why there’s even a cap on this. Data? Come on. This would solve the problem for people that complain about having too many. ZOS could even be cheeky and lift the cap for ESO+ members only 🤷🏻‍♂️

2. Either lessen transmutes needed to change traits or reconstruct OR enable you to earn more in content SO LONG AS #1 holds true to not overwhelm those who don’t want them. Maybe your daily random gives 25 and your preceding ones, to incentivize you to continue interacting with the random dungeon finder could give you 5 or something rather than 1, which frankly is just silly. Could do the same for the daily BG - 25 for the daily, 5 for preceding random BGs.

I think the game should incentivize you to create more characters and more builds and to interact with a variety of systems rather than constantly time gating you. The way I look at it is, if I have 4 characters for example and I need like 300 transmute for a build, I just think about how many days of random dungeons I have to run on all 4 to accumulate all of those, which is a little over a week. But, this just makes me not want to play after the random dungeons tbh whereas if I had plenty to have fun and mess with new build ideas, it’d make me want to play longer each day.

To those people that have too many, I’d recommend just reconstructing gear with the nirnhoned trait, breaking it down, and selling that trait material for gold FYI.

Just my $0.02

Not everything needs FOMO and time gating

I think the best solution would be to provide a 3600 CP account right away, with all traits and recipes unlocked, and an infinite amount of materials and currency for ESO+ players. I mean, they've come up with all these systems just to make me waste time farming. Instead, they should just let us restore unlimited sets an unlimited number of times—that would be a game worth playing!

Blood_again · November 27

Jabbs_Giggity wrote: »

That being said, reconstruction requires maximum collection for minimal cost. Yet, you are still creating an entire item from having nothing.
Whereas transmuting you are simply changing a trait on an item you already found and own, bound to you. The cost on this should be maximum 25 crystals (the current minimum cost to reconstruct any set item)

You try to appeal to some kind of logic of the craft, as you understand it.
Meanwhile you totally miss the matter of choice: when players would choose to retrate and when they would choose to reconstruct.
This is in fact a model of service request, which builds the service prices. Not the imaginative logic of the magical world.

Just a reminder, that the reconstuction prices were set based on the existed retraiting price.
Try to build a logic, why the max reconstuction price was set higher than the retrait? And why the min one was set lower then the retrait?
What might you miss while choosing to reconstruct a new cuirass instead of retraiting your favorite one, that you worn?

Then you catch, why you pay more for the retrait.

o_Primate_o · November 27

Cost of transmutes is cheap. I know ppl who reconstruct pieces just so they can store transmutes in their storage chests because they taking up so many inventory slots.

If you need transmutes, take all your toons into 30-day cryodiil and get to 25,000 AP on each. At end of campaign you get 50 per toon.

Or do daily undaunted random on every toon for 10 per.

Too easy.

It's sad ppl complain about transmutes after having suffered the grinding for sets in trait. You have any idea how many runs (100+) ppl would do a trial, then 100+ in an arena to get an in trait drops?

wolfie1.0. · November 27

Cooperharley wrote: »

I agree.

I feel like the people that generally have too many play one character largely, PvP a ton, or don’t change builds often. If you enjoy many characters or experimenting with builds, it heavily dampens your ability to do so. The transmute system as a whole could use a facelift. My proposed changes would be:

1. Remove the cap altogether. There’s no logical reason to me why there’s even a cap on this. Data? Come on. This would solve the problem for people that complain about having too many. ZOS could even be cheeky and lift the cap for ESO+ members only 🤷🏻‍♂️

2. Either lessen transmutes needed to change traits or reconstruct OR enable you to earn more in content SO LONG AS #1 holds true to not overwhelm those who don’t want them. Maybe your daily random gives 25 and your preceding ones, to incentivize you to continue interacting with the random dungeon finder could give you 5 or something rather than 1, which frankly is just silly. Could do the same for the daily BG - 25 for the daily, 5 for preceding random BGs.

I think the game should incentivize you to create more characters and more builds and to interact with a variety of systems rather than constantly time gating you. The way I look at it is, if I have 4 characters for example and I need like 300 transmute for a build, I just think about how many days of random dungeons I have to run on all 4 to accumulate all of those, which is a little over a week. But, this just makes me not want to play after the random dungeons tbh whereas if I had plenty to have fun and mess with new build ideas, it’d make me want to play longer each day.

To those people that have too many, I’d recommend just reconstructing gear with the nirnhoned trait, breaking it down, and selling that trait material for gold FYI.

Just my $0.02

Not everything needs FOMO and time gating

The nirnhoned trick is one reason I believe it wasn't changed.

Northwold · November 27

The only time transmutation (rather than reconstruction) has felt normally priced has been in the events when it's been lowered to 25 crystals. It's plain weird that it costs less to construct a tailor-made new weapon from thin air than it does simply to change an existing weapon's trait, and I can't see any obvious reason why that is justifiable, whether in the lore or as a matter of gameplay.

At a bare minimum, transmutation should cost the same as reconstruction for gear in the same set.

Veinblood1965 · November 27

Lots of things I had not considered, thanks for the responses everyone. I did like the idea that the cost to transmute should not be more than the cost to reconstruct the item.

Aggrovious · November 27

DenverRalphy wrote: »

Aggrovious wrote: »

DenverRalphy wrote: »

Transmuting has already all but destroyed Crafting. I'd rather not see it become even easier.

How? Dungeon and trial sets would have to be farmed for the perfect trait.

If your character hasn't researched that trait, then an alt need only research 1 trait which takes no time at all, then reconstruct it. You don't have to farm the perfect trait.

You said the introduction of the transmutes have ruined crafting. It is necessary to craft gear that otherwise has to be farmed. Why want acquiring traits to take longer? That is boring and frustrating. I have a master crafter that makes everything and sends it to the corresponding character. I do not want an alt to craft because they wont have all the necessary reduction cost passives.

the1andonlyskwex · November 27

One reason that trait changing costs more is because it lets you avoid all of the gold/mat costs associated with upgrading and enchanting a newly reconstructed item.