Could Master Writs actually drive legendary upgrade material prices down?

silvereyes · January 2017

I've seen a lot of doomsday discussions on the forums about how Master Writs are going to increase prices for gold legendary upgrade/crafting materials (i.e. Perfect Roe, Kuta, Tempering Alloy, Dreugh Wax and Rosin) even worse than they already are, since they are required for some of the new writs.

However, I would like to suggest that counteracting market forces may actually drive prices down for all of them except Perfect Roe. Here is my reasoning:

Most Master Writs that require gold upgrade materials but give < 100 vouchers as a reward will be trash. Nobody will want to invest the raw materials for so little reward. So the actual number of Master Writs being turned in that require these materials will be limited to only the rarer ones.
Sealed writs that give 100+ vouchers will be very valuable to crafters that have the skills to craft them.
Sealed writs can be traded for gold, and will therefore be lucrative sources of gold for *everybody* to grind for.
This will cause far more people to do normal writs than currently do.
Normal writs also drop legendary upgrade materials (except Perfect Roe, unfortunately) at a fairly decent rate.
There are far more people that will be willing to do normal writs than there will be who are willing or even able to do equipment Master Writs. Only a niche subset of the player base will be able to do the 8 and 9 trait Master Writs, and those are the only ones that seem to give a decent return on investment.
Therefore, the supply of gold upgrade materials will increase faster than demand will increase due to Master Writs.
Supply rising faster than demand will lead to lower prices.

I've done maybe 20 writs in my entire 2 years of playing before Update 13 hit PTS. Ever since Update 13 was announced, I've been doing writs on all my toons every day, and I have to say I'm getting a *ton* of those materials.

The exception of course is Perfect Roe, but XP pot prices aren't really prohibitive right now.

What do you all think of this reasoning?

Zinaroth · January 2017

This is plausible. It is but one scenario out of many. Impossible to guarantee.

Auricle · January 2017

Interesting scenario. But what happens when the demand for those lower level master writs dries up because no one (or not enough folk) wants to do them? The added incentive to do normal writs will be gone and things will fall back into the place they are now, wouldn't they?

I appreciate your optimism, though.

silvereyes · January 2017

Auricle wrote: »

Interesting scenario. But what happens when the demand for those lower level master writs dries up because no one (or not enough folk) wants to do them? The added incentive to do normal writs will be gone and things will fall back into the place they are now, wouldn't they?

I appreciate your optimism, though.

Heh. It's not so much optimism as just logic about people's motivations, which are what shape supply and demand. To answer your question, Master Writs are the only way to get vouchers, and vouchers are the only way to buy the target skeletons in-game. Vouchers are also the only grind that can almost guarantee you get a Mythic Aetherial Ambrosia recipe, the drop rate on Ciphers being so bad.

My point wasn't that demand for low-level Master Writs will drive people to do normal writs. It is that demand for high-level Master Writs will drive prices for those high-level sealed writs up, which makes them a tempting grind target for the average player to make gold.

One huge caveat though is that my perspective is shaped by where I play, on PC. PC has the addon that makes writ crafting very easy and fast. On console, writ crafting with the default UI may be too cumbersome to catch on as much. But that will also be offset by the fact that hardly any of the Master Writs will be worth doing due to the high cost, with material prices being so high on console.

If I had to make a bet, I'd say that prices will stay about the same on console, due to people mostly ignoring Master Writs.

Rosveen · January 2017

silvereyes wrote: »

Ever since Update 13 was announced, I've been doing writs on all my toons every day,

Why? You won't get Master Writs from pre-update containers, so wouldn't it be better to save your mats and energy until U13 is on live servers?

silvereyes · January 2017

Rosveen wrote: »

silvereyes wrote: »

Ever since Update 13 was announced, I've been doing writs on all my toons every day,

Why? You won't get Master Writs from pre-update containers, so wouldn't it be better to save your mats and energy until U13 is on live servers?

Mostly, I'm testing how many mats it takes, how much time it takes, drop rates from turn-ins, etc. So far, I agree, it doesn't seem like a great use of time. But at least I'm ready now for when Update 13 drops.

NovaShadow · January 2017

Rosveen wrote: »

silvereyes wrote: »

Ever since Update 13 was announced, I've been doing writs on all my toons every day,

Why? You won't get Master Writs from pre-update containers, so wouldn't it be better to save your mats and energy until U13 is on live servers?

I've spoken to a few people who are saving containers, even though it's been mentioned it won't work that way.

Survey's however are worth saving.

Anhedonie · January 2017

I've been doing writs for a month already, and I have yet to see any gold upgrade.

arvilla · January 2017

silvereyes wrote: »

Heh. It's not so much optimism as just logic about people's motivations, which are what shape supply and demand. To answer your question, Master Writs are the only way to get vouchers, and vouchers are the only way to buy the target skeletons in-game. Vouchers are also the only grind that can almost guarantee you get a Mythic Aetherial Ambrosia recipe, the drop rate on Ciphers being so bad.

The recipe you get from the vouchers is not the same that mythic aetherial ambrosia, it's a less powerful version that only gives you a 100% exp bonus.

C4Bliss · January 2017

I can see where you are going and i kinda hope you will be right... but im Doubtful.
Prices are already ridiculously high without the master writs. So with the really high demand that will happen from the master writs and the mats needed to make new gear gold I am afraid the prices will go through the roof.

Rex-Umbra · January 2017

I agree also a lot more people will be farming for furniture materials.

WhiteCoatSyndrome · January 2017

arvilla wrote: »

silvereyes wrote: »

Heh. It's not so much optimism as just logic about people's motivations, which are what shape supply and demand. To answer your question, Master Writs are the only way to get vouchers, and vouchers are the only way to buy the target skeletons in-game. Vouchers are also the only grind that can almost guarantee you get a Mythic Aetherial Ambrosia recipe, the drop rate on Ciphers being so bad.

The recipe you get from the vouchers is not the same that mythic aetherial ambrosia, it's a less powerful version that only gives you a 100% exp bonus.

@arvilla Is because of the recipe or the dust though? I noticed the Dust in the vendor has a different name.

Carbonised · January 2017

WhiteCoatSyndrome wrote: »

arvilla wrote: »

silvereyes wrote: »

Heh. It's not so much optimism as just logic about people's motivations, which are what shape supply and demand. To answer your question, Master Writs are the only way to get vouchers, and vouchers are the only way to buy the target skeletons in-game. Vouchers are also the only grind that can almost guarantee you get a Mythic Aetherial Ambrosia recipe, the drop rate on Ciphers being so bad.

The recipe you get from the vouchers is not the same that mythic aetherial ambrosia, it's a less powerful version that only gives you a 100% exp bonus.

@arvilla Is because of the recipe or the dust though? I noticed the Dust in the vendor has a different name.

I have to test it when my EU character gets ported over, but it does seem like the Mythical Aetherial recipe is the same, but then you can either buy diminished aetherial dust at the vendor for 100 % bonus, or use the 'real' dust found as it is now, for 150 % bonus.

Meaning we then have 2 recipes for Ambrosia, one 'normal' and one 'mythical' - while having 2 dusts, one 'lesser' for 100 % ambrosia, and one 'better' for 150 % ambrosia (or no dust and regular 50 % ambrosias).

Stamden · January 2017

NovaShadow wrote: »

Rosveen wrote: »

silvereyes wrote: »

Ever since Update 13 was announced, I've been doing writs on all my toons every day,

Why? You won't get Master Writs from pre-update containers, so wouldn't it be better to save your mats and energy until U13 is on live servers?

I've spoken to a few people who are saving containers, even though it's been mentioned it won't work that way.

Survey's however are worth saving.

Why are Surveys worth saving?

arvilla · January 2017

WhiteCoatSyndrome wrote: »

arvilla wrote: »

silvereyes wrote: »

Heh. It's not so much optimism as just logic about people's motivations, which are what shape supply and demand. To answer your question, Master Writs are the only way to get vouchers, and vouchers are the only way to buy the target skeletons in-game. Vouchers are also the only grind that can almost guarantee you get a Mythic Aetherial Ambrosia recipe, the drop rate on Ciphers being so bad.

The recipe you get from the vouchers is not the same that mythic aetherial ambrosia, it's a less powerful version that only gives you a 100% exp bonus.

@arvilla Is because of the recipe or the dust though? I noticed the Dust in the vendor has a different name.

It's a different recipe, one is mythic aetherial ambrosia and the other just aetherial ambrosia.

Ilsabet · January 2017

Neighbor wrote: »

NovaShadow wrote: »

Rosveen wrote: »

silvereyes wrote: »

Ever since Update 13 was announced, I've been doing writs on all my toons every day,

Why? You won't get Master Writs from pre-update containers, so wouldn't it be better to save your mats and energy until U13 is on live servers?

I've spoken to a few people who are saving containers, even though it's been mentioned it won't work that way.

Survey's however are worth saving.

Why are Surveys worth saving?

Survey drops will include the new furniture materials after the update.

silvereyes · January 2017

arvilla wrote: »

It's a different recipe, one is mythic aetherial ambrosia and the other just aetherial ambrosia.

Thanks for those images! I hadn't even realized that. I'm feeling much better about buying a Cipher now.

silvereyes · January 2017

Ilsabet wrote: »

Survey drops will include the new furniture materials after the update.

Excellent point. Now I'm even less motivated to go harvest all these surveys I've collected.

WhiteCoatSyndrome · January 2017

arvilla wrote: »

It's a different recipe, one is mythic aetherial ambrosia and the other just aetherial ambrosia.

Disappointing but good to know, thank you! I can bump that down to the bottom of my 'need to grind for' list.

silvereyes · March 2017

Gold improvement mat prices have steadily declined ever since Homestead was released, at least on PC NA. To me, that indicates zos did a good job balancing the drop rates of gold mats vs master writs.

I'm curious how long the trend will continue now that voucher prices are below 2k and master writs are less lucrative.

If I had to guess, once voucher prices are down to about 500g, things will reach a new equilibrium.

Banetek · March 2017

silvereyes wrote: »

I've seen a lot of doomsday discussions on the forums about how Master Writs are going to increase prices for gold legendary upgrade/crafting materials (i.e. Perfect Roe, Kuta, Tempering Alloy, Dreugh Wax and Rosin) even worse than they already are, since they are required for some of the new writs.

However, I would like to suggest that counteracting market forces may actually drive prices down for all of them except Perfect Roe. Here is my reasoning:
Most Master Writs that require gold upgrade materials but give < 100 vouchers as a reward will be trash. Nobody will want to invest the raw materials for so little reward. So the actual number of Master Writs being turned in that require these materials will be limited to only the rarer ones.

Sealed writs that give 100+ vouchers will be very valuable to crafters that have the skills to craft them.

Sealed writs can be traded for gold, and will therefore be lucrative sources of gold for *everybody* to grind for.

This will cause far more people to do normal writs than currently do.

Normal writs also drop legendary upgrade materials (except Perfect Roe, unfortunately) at a fairly decent rate.

There are far more people that will be willing to do normal writs than there will be who are willing or even able to do equipment Master Writs. Only a niche subset of the player base will be able to do the 8 and 9 trait Master Writs, and those are the only ones that seem to give a decent return on investment.

Therefore, the supply of gold upgrade materials will increase faster than demand will increase due to Master Writs.

Supply rising faster than demand will lead to lower prices.

I've done maybe 20 writs in my entire 2 years of playing before Update 13 hit PTS. Ever since Update 13 was announced, I've been doing writs on all my toons every day, and I have to say I'm getting a *ton* of those materials.

The exception of course is Perfect Roe, but XP pot prices aren't really prohibitive right now.

What do you all think of this reasoning?

You are forgetting the Chinese gold farmer quotient, factor or whatever you want to call it. I consistently see people with any where from 100 to 300 gold waxes, tempers for sale. {gold temper ) WTS 7k,. have 200 of them adverts are always around in zone chat. Its especially fun to see the people in Reapers march get riled up when they realize there's a dude selling for 3k+ LESS than they have posted in one of their bloated guild stores.

I do find though that master writs have become less of a " WAHOO" item and are now being priced more by how hard it is to do them. Clothier with a common set-trait & style tend to stay around 2 +k while the harder ones, mostly Smiting are going for as low as 1400-1800 per voucher.

You won't ever truly figure out the flow in and flow out until right after ZOS does their next Chinese gold farmer - botter pruning. Who knows, I don't get many Master writs and always end up buying anything worth a dam.

MLGProPlayer · March 2017

Prices on gold upgrade mats have been plummeting since the homestead patch (PC NA). They're nearly worthless right now (and still dropping).

I'm guessing it's a combination of people being out of money (spent it all on housing), no new sets to upgrade, and bots flooding the market.

I'm hoping Morrowind will drive prices up with new BiS sets that people need to upgrade. Right now I am making up the difference in revenue by selling furniture mats/actual furniture, but their prices are dropping fast too.

Could Master Writs actually drive legendary upgrade material prices *down*?

Could Master Writs actually drive legendary upgrade material prices down?