Gear Collection Tab/Scrying.

TwiceBornStar · February 2021

Gear Collection Tab: It's really great I don't have to store set pieces in the bank anymore, but still! I do have a few opinions I don't really want to keep to myself about it.

Currently, it costs 50 transmute crystals to alter a trait on any given item, right? It costs less than 50 transmute crystals to reconstruct an item. Neat! But here's the kicker: Since you can choose any trait with reconstruction, why is that other option still there, especially when it's actually more expensive? It just doesn't make any sense to me to use transmutation anymore?

Okay, so it costs 30 transmute crystals to reconstruct any given item, provided you have gathered the whole set. So in the most optimistic scenario, I can do 12 random dungeons with 12 different characters, which means I can get 120 transmute crystals a day, which means I can reconstruct 3 items and choose a trait. I think I'll take my chances by choosing a specific dungeon and do it 6 times, because with a bit of luck I'll probably get the items I'm looking for?

I don't think it would hurt anyone if the reconstruction and the transmutation cost were brought down a little, because how it currently works looks like a bit of an unnecessary time-sink to me.

Scrying/Leads: It's always fun to look for treasure and stuff you want. But! Would you please consider casual players who don't have heaps of time and take the timer off leads so they don't expire any longer? Because it's not really fun if you have to get the same lead again, because you ran out of time to go and get it. I don't see why it's necessary either. We all pay for this game, and I know I'm a subscriber, so to me it doesn't matter how long it's going to take to search, scry and eventually find the item described in the lead, because I like to think I'll get to it when I'm in the mood or have time to do so. I don't like being forced to search for leads or scry for items in the next x-amount of days because the timer says I should. For me personally, it's not going to make a difference as I'm not going to spend more or less time playing, but to me, the fact that leads expire is a bit lame. Especially when you have to reach a certain rank in Scrying first to be able to go and look for those leads in the first place! Again, this looks like a time-sink to me.

Hey, I know I can't speak for everyone, but to a person like myself less time-sinks equals more fun! Just my two cents! I do hope you people can see it's constructive criticism.

Coffee?

TwiceBornStar · February 2021

TwiceBornStar wrote: »

So in the most optimistic scenario, I can do 12 random dungeons with 12 different characters, which means I can get 120 transmute crystals a day, which means I can reconstruct 3 items and choose a trait.

4! Duh.

TwiceBornStar wrote: »

Coffee?

Yes please!

AlnilamE · February 2021

A couple of thoughts:

1. The transmutation system is not so much for the items you want to use right now, as it is for the items you may want to try later (and may never get around to). Of course, being able to copy an Arena weapon as many times as you like for all your alts is nice, but it's more about "this set used to be semi-useless and now it's BiS and I deconned hundreds of them and I'm never getting them back".
2. If you transmute a trait, you can deconstruct it to recover the trait stone. If you reconstruct something, you can only decon it for the transmutes. So many people will transmute weapons to Nirnhoned, for example, and make money that way. Also, the lowest cost for reconstructing is 25 stones if you have the entire set.

3. 30 days is not bad for leads, and you only need to level one character, as the leads are account-wide. What this does is, it prevents you from letting leads pile up and become overwhelming. I don't think that's a bad thing. Even casual players will log on once a month, so if you wanted a particular lead, you are going to find the time to dig it up. If not, it wasn't that important in the first place. BDO had a 7-day timer on their boss scrolls, which they removed. Now I have literally 100s of scrolls on a character and it's going to take me days to go through them all.

zaria · February 2021

Transmute let you change trait on golden out items including crated gear who the recreate system don't work on.

Even for purple rings 50 instead of 30 transmute crystals is cheaper than the 100K gold for the purple tempers if you don't need another ring.

tmbrinks · February 2021

Say you have a Perfected Siroria Necklace you want to change to Bloodthirsty.

You can get it to drop in Gold Quality from clearing vCR +3, and spend 50 transmutes to get it.

Or, you can reconstruct, spend 25 transmutes (assuming you have everything else) and then another ~800k gold to upgrade it to gold

I like that we have both options

(Now, for Perfected False God's, which ONLY drops in gold quality... I agree that nobody would transmute)

TwiceBornStar · February 2021

AlnilamE wrote: »

1. The transmutation system is not so much for the items you want to use right now, as it is for the items you may want to try later (and may never get around to). Of course, being able to copy an Arena weapon as many times as you like for all your alts is nice, but it's more about "this set used to be semi-useless and now it's BiS and I deconned hundreds of them and I'm never getting them back".

..and now you have to do 12 different dungeons on 12 different characters for three days, in case you want to reconstruct 2 armor sets and a weapon set, so you might as well go back to the arena or the dungeon where you got it in the first place, because I'm pretty sure that if you do that dungeon 12 times you'll have what you're looking for.

AlnilamE wrote: »

3. If you transmute a trait, you can deconstruct it to recover the trait stone. If you reconstruct something, you can only decon it for the transmutes. So many people will transmute weapons to Nirnhoned, for example, and make money that way. Also, the lowest cost for reconstructing is 25 stones if you have the entire set.

25 stones! Okay, so you can reconstruct 5 pieces if you do 12 different dungeons with 12 different characters. Awesome. Yeah, I haven't gotten that far yet. I've collected a few sets where it now states the cost is 34 so I made a guess based on the remaining slots.

AlnilamE wrote: »

4. 30 days is not bad for leads, and you only need to level one character, as the leads are account-wide. What this does is, it prevents you from letting leads pile up and become overwhelming. I don't think that's a bad thing. Even casual players will log on once a month, so if you wanted a particular lead, you are going to find the time to dig it up. If not, it wasn't that important in the first place. BDO had a 7-day timer on their boss scrolls, which they removed. Now I have literally 100s of scrolls on a character and it's going to take me days to go through them all.

And what if you log in and spend your time scrying for the green leads so you can hopelly scry for the blue leads but you have no purple leads so you can watch your yellow lead expire? Right. I don't see why it's going to be problematic for leads to be permanent. Once you've found a lead, you keep it. Once you've scryed and found the item it disappears. Have a double lead? Destroy it. Just like treasure maps!

How it is now: I don't even want to try because of that timer. I mean, I have friends who want to play with me, I have loads of storylines I still have to do, and want to do, but on that odd day where I feel like doing a lead: What leads? Oh, I thought I had one..

I don't know where this is leading to..

Septimus_Magna · February 2021

I agree that transmuting is bit expensive compared to reconstructing an item. It would seem logical that its easier to change a trait than recreate an entire item with a specific set bonus and trait.

Currently its pretty easy to gain transmute stones just by doing random normal dungeons on a couple chars for example so I dont have trouble with the cost of either system.

TwiceBornStar · February 2021

tmbrinks wrote: »

Say you have a Perfected Siroria Necklace you want to change to Bloodthirsty.

Or, you can reconstruct, spend 25 transmutes (assuming you have everything else) and then another ~800k gold to upgrade it to gold

Fair enough! But you do know you can get Jewelry Crafting to level 50 and actually not spend any gold. Just materials?

tmbrinks wrote: »

(Now, for Perfected False God's, which ONLY drops in gold quality... I agree that nobody would transmute)

Yeah, that would be silly. With a capital S.

I think the point I'm trying to make is that when you look at the time that goes into getting the transmute crystals in order to transmute or reconstruct an item you already have, it's quite possibly easier and quicker to do a particular dungeon or arena again. I thought this system was brought into existence so we'd have to do a little less farming, but it seems the opposite is true?

Thanks for your input!

Starlock · February 2021

TwiceBornStar wrote: »

And what if you log in and spend your time scrying for the green leads so you can hopelly scry for the blue leads but you have no purple leads so you can watch your yellow lead expire? Right. I don't see why it's going to be problematic for leads to be permanent. Once you've found a lead, you keep it. Once you've scryed and found the item it disappears. Have a double lead? Destroy it. Just like treasure maps!

I'd one up that - allow players to trade leads. Logically, if an antiquarian is finding leads they could sell that to a colleague. And with how obscure some of these leads are? When you have to look up where to find a lead on the internet to complete some of this stuff, making things a bit more accessible to anyone who isn't hardcore addicted to this game would be nice.

Speaking of, that's probably part of why the timers are there - it's another hook to bait someone into playing more. Many modern video games are addictive by design, unfortunately, and timers are one of the major ways this is done. It's also possible the antiquities system was originally designed to be a heavily-monetized mini game. It has that look and feel. There's no reason to have the timers there except to push addiction or to promote purchase of "timer expansions."

TwiceBornStar · February 2021

Starlock wrote: »

Speaking of, that's probably part of why the timers are there - it's another hook to bait someone into playing more. Many modern video games are addictive by design, unfortunately, and timers are one of the major ways this is done. It's also possible the antiquities system was originally designed to be a heavily-monetized mini game. It has that look and feel. There's no reason to have the timers there except to push addiction or to promote purchase of "timer expansions."

Hey, you see it and I see it, and I'm pretty sure we're not the only ones!

Starlock wrote: »

I'd one up that - allow players to trade leads. Logically, if an antiquarian is finding leads they could sell that to a colleague. And with how obscure some of these leads are? When you have to look up where to find a lead on the internet to complete some of this stuff, making things a bit more accessible to anyone who isn't hardcore addicted to this game would be nice.

*high five*

tmbrinks · February 2021

TwiceBornStar wrote: »

tmbrinks wrote: »

Say you have a Perfected Siroria Necklace you want to change to Bloodthirsty.

Or, you can reconstruct, spend 25 transmutes (assuming you have everything else) and then another ~800k gold to upgrade it to gold

Fair enough! But you do know you can get Jewelry Crafting to level 50 and actually not spend any gold. Just materials?

tmbrinks wrote: »

(Now, for Perfected False God's, which ONLY drops in gold quality... I agree that nobody would transmute)

Yeah, that would be silly. With a capital S.

I think the point I'm trying to make is that when you look at the time that goes into getting the transmute crystals in order to transmute or reconstruct an item you already have, it's quite possibly easier and quicker to do a particular dungeon or arena again. I thought this system was brought into existence so we'd have to do a little less farming, but it seems the opposite is true?

Thanks for your input!

Oh, I know (only have 36 characters that do max level writs

)... I'm talking about the 4 chromium platings you have to source/buy to upgrade it... since reconstruction does it at the lowest level it drops, and you can get purple perfected cloudrest jewelry

TwiceBornStar · February 2021

tmbrinks wrote: »

Oh, I know (only have 36 characters that do max level writs )... I'm talking about the 4 chromium platings you have to source/buy to upgrade it... since reconstruction does it at the lowest level it drops, and you can get purple perfected cloudrest jewelry

36? Wow. Respect! I have 13 characters and that's way more than I can chew. I have characters I don't play for months. Not because I don't like them, but I simply don't always have the time.

I've got one crafter who's at level 50 with all professions, and three crafters who make pewter/copper rings everyday. Just to get the surveys and materials for my main. So far I've managed to turn five sets into gold, and I currently have 7 Chromium Platings. I believe this is my second year of playing ESO, and I sure as hell don't have any problems with how long certain things can take, but when I see timers and game designs like that where I can't help myself thinking they want me to spend more time on purpose then that takes the fun out of things for me. I just want the developers and managers to be aware of that, because I saw the same thing happen to SWTOR when they introduced all these time-sinks. I don't think I have to explain where that game is compared to where it could've been. I'm a subcriber. I pay wether or not I'm online. I'll keep coming back if I'm having fun. It really is that simple.

I'm going to make some food, so that'll be it for today. Thanks for this discussion people!

AlnilamE · February 2021

TwiceBornStar wrote: »

AlnilamE wrote: »

1. The transmutation system is not so much for the items you want to use right now, as it is for the items you may want to try later (and may never get around to). Of course, being able to copy an Arena weapon as many times as you like for all your alts is nice, but it's more about "this set used to be semi-useless and now it's BiS and I deconned hundreds of them and I'm never getting them back".

..and now you have to do 12 different dungeons on 12 different characters for three days, in case you want to reconstruct 2 armor sets and a weapon set, so you might as well go back to the arena or the dungeon where you got it in the first place, because I'm pretty sure that if you do that dungeon 12 times you'll have what you're looking for.

You must have been really lucky on your arena runs if you think getting the weapon you want is that easy. I was very lucky. I got a bow in my first run and an inferno staff on my 4th or 5th. But I still don't have a Master's Resto staff.

But there are plenty of people that have run Maelstrom dozens of times without getting the piece they want.

AlnilamE wrote: »

3. If you transmute a trait, you can deconstruct it to recover the trait stone. If you reconstruct something, you can only decon it for the transmutes. So many people will transmute weapons to Nirnhoned, for example, and make money that way. Also, the lowest cost for reconstructing is 25 stones if you have the entire set.

25 stones! Okay, so you can reconstruct 5 pieces if you do 12 different dungeons with 12 different characters. Awesome. Yeah, I haven't gotten that far yet. I've collected a few sets where it now states the cost is 34 so I made a guess based on the remaining slots.

I personally am avoiding random dungeons right now because I have so many transmute stones. When they changed Rapids two updates ago, I started a PvP event on Fridays for my guild so that my guildies who had lost rapids on their alts could get it back. Just going in on a character every Friday is more than enough to keep me near max for stones. I don't even know what to use them for at this point.

AlnilamE wrote: »

4. 30 days is not bad for leads, and you only need to level one character, as the leads are account-wide. What this does is, it prevents you from letting leads pile up and become overwhelming. I don't think that's a bad thing. Even casual players will log on once a month, so if you wanted a particular lead, you are going to find the time to dig it up. If not, it wasn't that important in the first place. BDO had a 7-day timer on their boss scrolls, which they removed. Now I have literally 100s of scrolls on a character and it's going to take me days to go through them all.

And what if you log in and spend your time scrying for the green leads so you can hopelly scry for the blue leads but you have no purple leads so you can watch your yellow lead expire? Right. I don't see why it's going to be problematic for leads to be permanent. Once you've found a lead, you keep it. Once you've scryed and found the item it disappears. Have a double lead? Destroy it. Just like treasure maps! [/quote]

I don't understand this. There are enough green-blue-purple treasures in the game that you can get your first character to max level in scrying without issues. And you only need to do it on one character.

Also, you can't get duplicate leads if you don't scry them.

How it is now: I don't even want to try because of that timer. I mean, I have friends who want to play with me, I have loads of storylines I still have to do, and want to do, but on that odd day where I feel like doing a lead: What leads? Oh, I thought I had one..

I don't know where this is leading to..

I don't know what to say. Nothing stops you from scrying one thing every time you log on to the character you chose to be your antiquarian.

I'm working on getting all my alts to 7 so they can see glowy chests and it's been a fairly straightforward process.

TwiceBornStar · February 2021

AlnilamE wrote: »

I don't understand this. There are enough green-blue-purple treasures in the game that you can get your first character to max level in scrying without issues.

I know, but you'll have to get them first. I've gotten way more yellow leads than green, blue or purple leads for some reason. I don't know why. Anyway, I've been scrying for all the leads I've gathered so far but I quickly ran out of green leads to scry, so I couldn't scry for the blue ones etc. So yeah, I'm just going to watch my yellow leads expire and not bother with it any longer, because no, I don't want to hunt for green leads at the moment. I want to finish the zone's storyline first.

I don't understand why anyone would want to put a timer on leads in a game that has paying customers and paying subscribers, because the alternative wouldn't hurt the game. Just like treasure maps or surveys. You find them, you keep them and you'll use them when you want or when it's convenient.

Just imagine reading this: ''Your Lava Foot Soup & Saltrice expires in 1d, 2h, 1m and 2s''. ''Your XP scroll expires in 30m and 11s. (Bookworms!) Even better! If you keep your mushrooms and other funky reagents in your crafting bag for longer than a month, the content of your whole crafting bag will expire because the rotten mushrooms have spoiled all the wood and alchemical reagents you've been carrying around and now you have to go and find new materials.

I mean, who would like to see this? I sure as hell wouldn't! So why put an expiry date on leads? What's fun about watching things expire? Enlighten me.

You're right. I don't get it!

AlnilamE · February 2021

TwiceBornStar wrote: »

AlnilamE wrote: »

I don't understand this. There are enough green-blue-purple treasures in the game that you can get your first character to max level in scrying without issues.

I know, but you'll have to get them first. I've gotten way more yellow leads than green, blue or purple leads for some reason. I don't know why. Anyway, I've been scrying for all the leads I've gathered so far but I quickly ran out of green leads to scry, so I couldn't scry for the blue ones etc. So yeah, I'm just going to watch my yellow leads expire and not bother with it any longer, because no, I don't want to hunt for green leads at the moment. I want to finish the zone's storyline first.

OK, so you know how the "Treasure" leads in each zone work? There's a green lead available in every zone. When you didg that up, you get the lead for the blue "Treasure" in that zone. The first time you dig up the blue lead, you also get the lead for a PURPLE Treasure lead in that zone, which you can only dig up once per account. You an repeat the green/blue in each zone as many times as you like, and each of them has 3 codex entries, in case you are a completionist like me.

So when you are starting out, it's very easy to go down the zones and dig up the greens (and unlock the blues in the proces) and then once you can scry blues, you come back and dig them up and unlock the purples, and once you are level 5 and can do purples, you can get those. At level 7 you can start scrying yellows, which give a good chunk of XP, and then, if you are in the mood for grinding, you can go to Coldharbour and gather resources and you'll get the Void Crystal Anomaly so many times, you can fill a house with it.

Also, note that you can slot the Antiquarian's Eye in your quick slots and use that as a beacon to find the dig site inside the blue area when you are looking for it.

TwiceBornStar · February 2021

That's not how it happened for me, but I appreciate the fact you're trying to explain it to me. I think too many leads expired and that this is why I couldn't progress. I may give it a shot some day, when I have the time, but I still think putting timers on leads is unnecessary.

Have a good one!