Self-Found (League) [Thread outdated!]

Rational people call JG Wentworth when they dont have a choice. If you play HC, and you need an upgrade now. You might just use those orbs. If using a chaos or alch etc, helps save your life and increases progression rate.

Its worth it.

Edit. I realize you said this, but felt the need to highlight its importance. Its not bad to use them. Just be smart about it. Theres nothing wrong with that.

people want self found so it is known they have self found league and have their own global chat and such. i don't think it would be that hard to add another league...

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SL4Y3R wrote:

And those who want SFL + high drop rates. Which I personally do not want to see.

I agree about drops. The game is already in a state in which the path of least resistance doubles as the path of greatest reward. Such a thing would continue this trend.

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ScrotieMcB wrote:

It's not crafting vs trading, people. It's crafting vs (gear) farming.

Good posts from you SMB. As I see it there are 3 routes to upgrading items.

1) Farming Gear - Investment of Time
2) Crafting - Investment of Currency
3) Trading - Investment of (Less) Time or Currency (minus trade value of obsolete/used gear)

Eliminating trade alone doesn't force players to choose 2 but it does make the choice more direct. Do I spend time farming or do I invest currency which itself takes time to find. The opportunity cost is time. So if all that matters is time, the question then becomes what is the most efficient use of my time. Ideally it would come down to RNG. It does not. Things are further complicated by the diminishing returns on farming currency at higher levels which contribute to the 'Mapping and End Game Crafting' opportunity cost of currency.

Gear=Time*RNG, does not diminish
Currency = Time*RNG, diminishes at higher levels
Opportunity Cost of Currency = Mapping and End Game Crafting

Because the time cost of currency decreases relative to the time cost of gear the opportunity cost of currency becomes greater at higher levels. I would make a few suggestions on top of a self found or bind-on-equip ruleset. More consistent currency/gear drop rates from level 1 to level 100, pending the level of content and the availability of IIQ/IIR. I mention IIQ/IIR because the facility to stack them at a higher level, especially in a group, could discourage rerolling a new character. Gear drop rates should also be tempered at higher levels as far as I know they are not, and that contributes to the increasing opportunity cost of currency. In this way we will have a consistent time opportunity cost for crafting versus finding gear, no matter how far you are into the game.

That's not the whole story though. Because currency directly affects the quantity and rarity of loot from maps it must be as valuable as the total improvement in loot. That is difficult to qualify but given that you can choose what you craft and you cannot choose what items drop that opportunity cost is more balance under a SF/BOE ruleset.

For example, if I am looking for a bow upgrade and I Chaos a map then any rare thicket bows or currency I otherwise would not have found are the opportunity cost of that Chaos orb versus using it to craft. Furthermore, if that map drops any maps that otherwise would not have dropped then any thicket bows that subsequent map drops are a function of the original Chaos. If I use an additional Chaos, perhaps to roll Maze, then its opportunity cost would be the additional bows, currency and maps that would not have been found after using just one Chaos. The second Chaos has significantly smaller economic benefit, but properties like Maze are highly desirable and make up for the increased opportunity cost. The probability costs could be calculated but the maths are complicated. I would suggest making Maze or other such highly desirable map properties implicit or rebalanced with currency opportunity cost in mind.

Under the current system a single currency is always better spent on maps versus crafts. Which means the time cost of spending currency on a lvl 38 Grove Bow is as long as it takes to find as many Thicket Bows, currency and maps you would have otherwise not found if that currency was spent on a map instead. Ergo the opportunity cost of crafting lvl 38 Grove Bow = Time Cost of Finding Late Game Gear without spending said currency on map.

That's not necessarily a bad thing if we had more currency than we needed to spend on maps. Rebalancing highly desirable map mods will abate the problem but it would be good if currency was common enough that the opportunity cost of getting desirable map mods diminished greatly with each marginal currency spent. In that way players would be encouraged to use a minimal amount of currency on maps and the rest on crafting (or trading).

I also recognize the solution I described hinges greatly on balanced drop rates. Finding the right drop rates would be a trial and error process best suited for small custom leagues.

Lastly the difference between Self-Found and Bind-on-Equip is that the latter allows for upgrades via method (3) but removes the value of obsolete or used gear, thus not being overwhelmingly the right choice against methods (1) or (2). However, under a BOE ruleset there's still no reason to Chaos an ilvl38 Grove Bow if somebody found a good ilvl38 Grove Bow and saved it to trade. BOE does however mean that very powerful used gear can no longer be arbitraged and would mean methods (1) and (2) are highly viable for end game itemization.


Summary:
### - Self Found or Bind-on-Equip ruleset
### - Consistent gear and currency drop rates regardless of game progress, but accounting for the relative level of content and availability of IIQ/IIR at that level.
### - Rebalance highly desirable map mods like 'Maze' with crafting currency opportunity cost in mind, this should lead to a diminished economic benefit for spending additional currency on maps to get their mods just right
### - Balance crafting currency drop rates such that we have more currency than maps on which to spend, assuming the benefit of spending additional marginal currency on a map is greatly diminished
### - Custom Leagues with control over drops rates would be ideal to find a happy drop rate balance.

Custom drop rates in paid leagues will never happen. Unless of course its less drops. Custom leagues will make the game harder. Not easier.

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SL4Y3R wrote:

Custom drop rates in paid leagues will never happen. Unless of course its less drops. Custom leagues will make the game harder. Not easier.

It would be less about facility of play and more about balancing time opportunity costs. For example, you could have far more currency than maps on which to spend currency on by significantly lowering the map drop rate. I don't think maps are too common so that may not be optimal. That said, why do you think paid leagues wouldn't be given control of drop rates, assuming the league was a separate system and didn't feed back into any other league?

Trial and error would be necessary to balance opportunity costs and it seems like it'd be easier for GGG to give us the tools rather than do it themselves. Of course I realize exact drop rates shouldn't be revealed, so maybe that in itself poses an obstacle.

A lot of what would work for a SF/BOE league would also be well suited to standard leagues. Rebalancing highly desired map mods with opportunity cost in mind is definitely a good idea and something I'm sure GGG is already planning. The nerf to currency but not gear in the later stages of the game could need a revision as well. It would make sense to nerf both gear and currency equally and relative to the availability of IIQ/IIR.

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ScrotieMcB wrote:

Even for self-found, it never makes sense to craft vs hoard. You could use your Chaos Orb on that ilvl 38 Grove Bow you just found, or you could hoard it and many, many play-hours from now use it on an ilvl 78 chest. Which one is better?

Uh, that depends if advancement is stopped due to the lack of that grove bow. If so, then you craft it because failing that you will never see the iLvL 78 chest.

At the two choke points I experienced I'd have been happy to craft a solution. The fact that crafting was suboptimal to trading doesn't factor into it for me because by definition (for me), trading is "quit the game" stuff. What DOES matter is that crafting was just plain beyond my reach in ridiculous ways.

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snapple99 wrote:

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ScrotieMcB wrote:

Even for self-found, it never makes sense to craft vs hoard. You could use your Chaos Orb on that ilvl 38 Grove Bow you just found, or you could hoard it and many, many play-hours from now use it on an ilvl 78 chest. Which one is better?

Uh, that depends if advancement is stopped due to the lack of that grove bow. If so, then you craft it because failing that you will never see the iLvL 78 chest.

At the two choke points I experienced I'd have been happy to craft a solution. The fact that crafting was suboptimal to trading doesn't factor into it for me because by definition (for me), trading is "quit the game" stuff. What DOES matter is that crafting was just plain beyond my reach in ridiculous ways.

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ScrotieMcB wrote:

Which one is better?

Simply put, orbs are like annuities, and using your orbs is like calling JG Wentworth. It might indeed be a lot of fun, but from a min/max perspective it's a trap that loses you money, until/unless you've reached the very end of the endgame.

The only way that rational people call JG Wentworth is because they have no other choice. In the same way, the only way that players actually use orbs, prior to the endgame cash-in, is that they are desperate: the content is too hard, they don't have an upgrade

Next time read my entire post. Thank you.

Also would like to point out that "what depends" is whether your desperate or not. What doesn't depend is whether you're self-found or not. Orb hoarding and trading are not connected. At all. Trading an orb to someone doesn't consume the orb, it just changes who hoards it.

Hi

1+ SFL

veta1991

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Finding the right drop rates would be a trial and error process best suited for small custom leagues.

This is quite true and what I have been pointing out that SFL could have new orbs and recipes, work on the drop rate of orbs not items but this can only be done in a ''league-like'' closed environment.

This game feels like it has developed 3 kinds of playing styles: Traders, HC, SF

The traders and HC have their shit, HC players don't even need HC they can just play and destroy their character anytime so why do we have HC mode? SF players deserve this mode as equally as traders got their trade screens and HC players get their ''Hardcore'' league. Did GGG have to make trade screens? NO, they didn't but they did because enough people wanted it, just like SF.

cheers

those analogies were atrocious.

HC mode is needed to see who has actually died. Cant have that otherwise. Traders and trade screen is irrelevant. As you, a CB supporter should know.

If you want a SFL, that's fine. But that's not all you're asking for. What you want is to make the game easier.