Can we do something about Mudcrab Chitin?

Imperial_Archmage · August 29

As in either increase its abysmal drop rate or remove it from the daily professional writs circuit because it’s literally a massive gold loss to do those dailies.

DenverRalphy · August 29

I for one think that every DLC zone that for some reason has Coral Crab instead of Mudcrab (Summerset, High Isle, Solstice, etc..) should have the entire coral crab species eradicated and replaced with mudcrab. It's hard enough keeping Mudcrab Chitin in stock when they keep releasing zones with Coral instead.

AcadianPaladin · August 29

Perhaps even better, let coral crabs drop mudcrab chitin?

I only do writs on one character per day so the drain on mudcrab chitin is pretty low. Also, I spend lots of time in the basic alliance zones, and harvesting mudcrabs is just a habit like harvesting spiders for eggs.

LadyLethalla · August 29

I'd really like to see all the rare ingredients that you have to drop off with your potions removed. I've run out of nightshade, spider egg, nirnroot, mudcrab chitin, and imp stool over the years, so I refuse to do any of those ones. None of which come from surveys. Why can't it be something that doesn't require separate harvesting, such as Lady Smock, that doesn't get used as much?

Orbital78 · August 30

Betnik, Alik'r, and a few other spots are my favorite. Mud crabs die very easy, and the drop rate isn't that terrible compared to some resources like chaurus eggs. High Isle did help with mother of pearl and clam gall. Just kill more crabs, it is a decent source of leather somehow too. I wouldn't be opposed to coral crabs dropping it as well, but I doubt that will change.

DenverRalphy · August 30

Just to clarify.. I have no issues with the drop rate of mudcrab chiitin. I never step past a mudcrab without stopping to kill it for the chitin. But with more DLC zones not even having mudcrabs, the opportunities to loot the stuff has been severely diminished.

I miss the days when a stray AoE caught a singular mudcrab, and then a swarm of his angry cohorts would flock to his aid! The chitin was literally jumpin at you to pick up! =D

scrappy1342 · August 30

go to sentinel in alik'r. along the coast either way there are small groups of mudcrabs and they respawn almost instantly. my theory is that the dolmen farming messes with the respawn rate in the rest of the zone. this is on pc na. so console may not have the same results?

Orbital78 · August 30

West Weald had mud crabs I think, as well as Telvanni Peninsula. It just happens that it makes sense for Solstice with the High Isle/Summerset style island to have coral variety. I personally haven't run into major issues with shortages, but I tend to farm my own stuff and have had luck during these phat stacked event boxes filled with resources.

Maybe I will list some on my guild traders if there is really that much demand and shortage.

Orbital78 · August 30

scrappy1342 wrote: »

go to sentinel in alik'r. along the coast either way there are small groups of mudcrabs and they respawn almost instantly. my theory is that the dolmen farming messes with the respawn rate in the rest of the zone. this is on pc na. so console may not have the same results?

Yep, Alik'r has a stupid fast respawn rate. Part of the reason people like to aoe farm those zombie type enemies along the shore too. You get fetcher fly larva resource from those too.

scrappy1342 · August 30

Orbital78 wrote: »

scrappy1342 wrote: »

go to sentinel in alik'r. along the coast either way there are small groups of mudcrabs and they respawn almost instantly. my theory is that the dolmen farming messes with the respawn rate in the rest of the zone. this is on pc na. so console may not have the same results?

Yep, Alik'r has a stupid fast respawn rate. Part of the reason people like to aoe farm those zombie type enemies along the shore too. You get fetcher fly larva resource from those too.

and leather scraps from the mudcrabs ^.^ when i need flowers, the oases are always packed with them. for some reason there's a TON of logs outside of bergama. for metal nodes, the cliff wall outside of sentinel. and class/weapon skill kills for endeavors, the goats at the oasis are great. alik'r is one of the most convenient zones

katanagirl1 · August 30

I think it should be added to the reward boxes for doing daily writs. Everything else is, including violet coprinus though at a low rate.

You can get the ingredients that are required for daily writs in all zones except for mudcrab chitin, which is nonexistent in land-locked zones and can only be obtained in the coastal areas.

EDIT: the mudcrab chitin is not actually part of the potion, so it could be easily replaced by something more like the bugloss or alkhest for other writs. Also, I delete all of these writs on all toons because 700 gold for 3 mudcrab chitin is not even close to being fair

Islyn · August 30

Imperial_Archmage wrote: »

As in either increase its abysmal drop rate or remove it from the daily professional writs circuit because it’s literally a massive gold loss to do those dailies.

There's an addon Lazy Writ Crafter - you can in settings, drop alchemy writs with certain ingredients (you choose) automagically.

randconfig · August 30

katanagirl1 wrote: »

I think it should be added to the reward boxes for doing daily writs. Everything else is, including violet coprinus though at a low rate.

You can get the ingredients that are required for daily writs in all zones except for mudcrab chitin, which is nonexistent in land-locked zones and can only be obtained in the coastal areas.

EDIT: the mudcrab chitin is not actually part of the potion, so it could be easily replaced by something more like the bugloss or alkhest for other writs. Also, I delete all of these writs on all toons because 700 gold for 3 mudcrab chitin is not even close to being fair

I think I sell each mudcrab chitin for 700-800 gold, not 3 for 700 lol. I would hate for them to change this economy, as farming mudcrab chitin to sell is one of the ways I make gold.

LadyLethalla · August 30

Islyn wrote: »

Imperial_Archmage wrote: »

As in either increase its abysmal drop rate or remove it from the daily professional writs circuit because it’s literally a massive gold loss to do those dailies.

There's an addon Lazy Writ Crafter - you can in settings, drop alchemy writs with certain ingredients (you choose) automagically.

Not all can be selected. I still have to abandon the alchemy writs for nightshade.

redlink1979 · August 30

I just do quick grind in any starter zone when I need to. Easy peasy nice and breezy.

JustLovely · August 30

randconfig wrote: »

katanagirl1 wrote: »

I think it should be added to the reward boxes for doing daily writs. Everything else is, including violet coprinus though at a low rate.

You can get the ingredients that are required for daily writs in all zones except for mudcrab chitin, which is nonexistent in land-locked zones and can only be obtained in the coastal areas.

EDIT: the mudcrab chitin is not actually part of the potion, so it could be easily replaced by something more like the bugloss or alkhest for other writs. Also, I delete all of these writs on all toons because 700 gold for 3 mudcrab chitin is not even close to being fair

I think I sell each mudcrab chitin for 700-800 gold, not 3 for 700 lol. I would hate for them to change this economy, as farming mudcrab chitin to sell is one of the ways I make gold.

Farm more please. There isn't enough in game.

ZOS should add everything that is required to do writs with to their writ drop tables. Period.

tmbrinks · August 30

At least on PC/NA, the average value of doing an Alchemy daily writ is still greater than the cost of doing them, even those that use Chitin. Some days it will be below, but if you get a survey and get even a single node of Columbine, you will be quite profitable, even more so if you get a master writ as well.

Over time, it's still worthwhile to do. Sure you can "optimize" and not do those particular ones, for a higher profit margin. But in terms of sheer profit, it's worthwhile to do all still.

tincanman · August 30

DenverRalphy wrote: »

I for one think that every DLC zone that for some reason has Coral Crab instead of Mudcrab (Summerset, High Isle, Solstice, etc..) should have the entire coral crab species eradicated and replaced with mudcrab. It's hard enough keeping Mudcrab Chitin in stock when they keep releasing zones with Coral instead.

It is kind of annoying that they don't drop chitin.

Orbital78 wrote: »

scrappy1342 wrote: »

go to sentinel in alik'r. along the coast either way there are small groups of mudcrabs and they respawn almost instantly. my theory is that the dolmen farming messes with the respawn rate in the rest of the zone. this is on pc na. so console may not have the same results?

Yep, Alik'r has a stupid fast respawn rate. Part of the reason people like to aoe farm those zombie type enemies along the shore too. You get fetcher fly larva resource from those too.

I think (anecdotal!) the respawn rate has been normalised with last update but I have not exhaustively tested it.

Like many, I just kill/harvest any mudcrabs encountered. But, generally, I have become less fastidious with craft dailies anyway so less demand on mats.

tincanman · August 30

I am more concerned with the current bug that prevents, in particular, cloth surveys from dropping - it would be a disaster if zos took their usual 6 months - 2+ years to fix this. Except for farmers who sell mats, of course.

DenverRalphy · August 30

tincanman wrote: »

I am more concerned with the current bug that prevents, in particular, cloth surveys from dropping - it would be a disaster if zos took their usual 6 months - 2+ years to fix this. Except for farmers who sell mats, of course.

IIRC, that bug is tied to the bug that is also causing cloth/wood Master Writs to drop on crafting toons that haven't maxed out those respective skill lines. So I'd bet dollars to donuts they're not dragging their feet on this one.

Imperial_Archmage · August 30

A lot of you guys are missing the point. It’s not a question of farming the chitin, it’s the fact that due to its rarity you will make a lot more gold selling it than you ever will from turning it in for the writ so it defeats the purpose since the only reason to do writs in the first place is to make gold.

FadeShade · August 30

Imperial_Archmage wrote: »

A lot of you guys are missing the point. It’s not a question of farming the chitin, it’s the fact that due to its rarity you will make a lot more gold selling it than you ever will from turning it in for the writ so it defeats the purpose since the only reason to do writs in the first place is to make gold.

tmbrinks wrote: »

At least on PC/NA, the average value of doing an Alchemy daily writ is still greater than the cost of doing them, even those that use Chitin. Some days it will be below, but if you get a survey and get even a single node of Columbine, you will be quite profitable, even more so if you get a master writ as well.

Over time, it's still worthwhile to do. Sure you can "optimize" and not do those particular ones, for a higher profit margin. But in terms of sheer profit, it's worthwhile to do all still.

Sorry, but I am going to take the word of the guy who wrote the book on eso crafting.

Imperial_Archmage · August 30

FadeShade wrote: »

Imperial_Archmage wrote: »

A lot of you guys are missing the point. It’s not a question of farming the chitin, it’s the fact that due to its rarity you will make a lot more gold selling it than you ever will from turning it in for the writ so it defeats the purpose since the only reason to do writs in the first place is to make gold.

tmbrinks wrote: »

At least on PC/NA, the average value of doing an Alchemy daily writ is still greater than the cost of doing them, even those that use Chitin. Some days it will be below, but if you get a survey and get even a single node of Columbine, you will be quite profitable, even more so if you get a master writ as well.

Over time, it's still worthwhile to do. Sure you can "optimize" and not do those particular ones, for a higher profit margin. But in terms of sheer profit, it's worthwhile to do all still.

Sorry, but I am going to take the word of the guy who wrote the book on eso crafting.

Take what word? He acknowledged what I said. This is simply poor game design. It’s like having a quest that takes away experience from you instead of awarding it. The writ requirement have never been updated even though the reality on the ground has completely changed and inflation has skyrocketed (particularly since crown selling became a thing). The chitin is a particularly poignant example of this because they actually changed how the regular mudcrabs spawn in addition to introducing the coral ones which don’t even drop the chitin for some weird reason. All I am saying is that these sorts of things need to be looked at and updated periodically to keep up with the dynamic nature of the in-game economy.

freespirit · August 30

I rarely farm but I do on occasion visit the beach to the NE of Haven in Grahtwood to kill some crabs(unfortunately it is a popular spot), I kill crabs because for me the Chitin is secondary I want Decorative Wax!!

I usually end up selling the Chitin to buy more Wax, the droprate of wax is still absolutely awful across all its possible sources and it is in so many furnishings!!

I do a lot of dailies but on alts I keep alchemy at a lower level to avoid any Chitin shortages, I still get more than enough surveys and really don't mind missing a few Master Writs.

lillybit · August 30

Alchemy surveys really annoy me because they're so limited. All the others will give back a good percentage of the mats needed to do the writs but not alchemy. Especially as the mats needed to make the actual potions are much less than the additional ingredients. I would love to see alchemy surveys change to satchels that can contain any alchemy mat instead of just half a dozen different flowers. It's ridiculous that I have over 12k of each of those flowers and I still have to regularly spend hours farming mudcrabs on top of killing any I come across

DenverRalphy · August 30

lillybit wrote: »

Alchemy surveys really annoy me because they're so limited. All the others will give back a good percentage of the mats needed to do the writs but not alchemy. Especially as the mats needed to make the actual potions are much less than the additional ingredients. I would love to see alchemy surveys change to satchels that can contain any alchemy mat instead of just half a dozen different flowers. It's ridiculous that I have over 12k of each of those flowers and I still have to regularly spend hours farming mudcrabs on top of killing any I come across

I am kinda on board with this. Just one tweak I'd make to the idea.. leave 4 nodes as they are, flowers. Cuz those get used a lot. But then the other two being one mushroom node and one satchel. I'd be happy with a guaranteed mushroom and a random rare-ish mat.

DoofusMax · August 30

Imperial_Archmage wrote: »

As in either increase its abysmal drop rate or remove it from the daily professional writs circuit because it’s literally a massive gold loss to do those dailies.

I think my Bank balance would beg to differ with that assessment, but I do agree that it is probably the most annoying of the writs because chitin mostly restocks by intentionally hunting mudcrabs. Most other Alchemy writ stuff can be picked up through surveys, picked up through writ rewards, looted from various containers (licitly or il-), or whatever, but chitin has so few sources that hunting it down is often the only efficient method of keeping up stocks. The number of times I've tried to turn in daily writs and then had go hunt mudcrabs because I'd run out of chitin and could not turn in Alchemy are too many to count, but somewhat less than four-plus years of daily alchemy writs.

Al_Ex_Andre · August 30

I used to complain about chitin not being auto earned, but now I just abandon the quest whenever it pops. So either way, I adapt now.

Checking the quest and abandoning it is a waste of time and energy though when I have 20 characters to deal dailies with.

Ishtarknows · August 31

Al_Ex_Andre wrote: »

I used to complain about chitin not being auto earned, but now I just abandon the quest whenever it pops. So either way, I adapt now.

Checking the quest and abandoning it is a waste of time and energy though when I have 20 characters to deal dailies with.

You might be interested to know that Lazy Writ add-on has the option to auto abandon writs asking for chitin. There's an option for Violet Coprinus too

ghastley · August 31

The point about mushrooms - in this case, Violet Coprinus and Imp Stool - and Mudcrabs not being part of the survey drops is the key factor. But the cloth/leather imbalance was never properly fixed, so I won't hold my breath.

And that reminds me, wasn't there a time when Clothier surveys were only cloth plants?

LadyLethalla · August 31

ghastley wrote: »

And that reminds me, wasn't there a time when Clothier surveys were only cloth plants?

Yes, this is true.