Thinking Outside the Box: What if we had dust instead of orbs?

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leto2626 wrote:

I don't get what is wrong with this system? Why would you want to go something that has been done so many times before...
You complain about hoarding, that was the intention, a natural currency evolution. There will allways be hoarders, be it gold, orbs or dust.
I love the system as it is now, it creates economies that change over time, are different in every league, what do you want more? Some boring gold counter?

I don't know if "wrong" is the right word. I think we are looking for ways to make it better.

Right now crafting or using orbs on anything non-endgame is pretty much a noob move. I don't think looking for a better option is bad thing. Maybe nothing can be done, but it certainly doesn't hurt to present ideas.

now this ... i actually like , im usually against a lot of suggestions people make , and many things you say aswell scrotie , but this is actually a very well thought through idea and would be very good for the game .

khem approves +1

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leto2626 wrote:

I don't get what is wrong with this system? Why would you want to go something that has been done so many times before...
You complain about hoarding, that was the intention, a natural currency evolution. There will allways be hoarders, be it gold, orbs or dust.
I love the system as it is now, it creates economies that change over time, are different in every league, what do you want more? Some boring gold counter?

The games economy should be a byproduct, not the product itself. Which to most people who are going to buy hats and whatnot is much more important.

You think for a company to make money their new players should be told by older players that if they plan to enjoy the game and play past normal, they should not use the item altering system that is a selling point of the game itself?

GGG can make the decision to keep in noob traps, either way power to them, but I'd like to play a game with a better budget.

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ScrotieMcB wrote:

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Novalisk wrote:

A lot of people will still hold onto exalted dust, because trading it for end-game items will still be more efficient than using it for crafting.

If you're talking about my grand axiom of trading — that a hand-me-down will invariably sell for less than the original cost of making it, regardless of any other changes you make to the economic system — then yes, I still believe in that.

However, the dust system heralds in some big differences which mitigate this fact, without invalidating it.

Let's look at 4 possible options:
1. Create a slightly worse piece of gear yourself
2. Create an equivalent piece of gear yourself
3. Trade for the gear offered
4. Create a slightly better piece of gear yourself
5. Create awesome super-endgame ubergear

Under the current system, your reasonable options are #3 and #5. This is because of how high-level crafting is heavily incentivized over lower-level crafting.

False. You can still use alts+regals, alchs+scourings and orbs of chaos to craft upgrades.

What I think you're after, which is valid, is something between Chaos/Alts+Regal/Alchs+Scourings and Exalted orbs. It's valid because the more saturated the market becomes, the more the former lose their value and the latter gains value.

We don't need a dust system to fix that.

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ScrotieMcB wrote:

1. The Dust Usage stat on different items could be modified, to balance low-level crafting and high-level crafting.

2. Dust drop rates could be adjusted, to balance consistency against loot-finding excitement.

3. Increased haggling precision.

Dust would achieve these goals just fine. I have no issue with it. However I do find it strange that you would posit haggling precision as an advantage given some of your other stances on trade and skill commitment. Coarse-grained precision is a contributor to the uniqueness of the current system that distinguishes it from gold; it's not a disadvantage in need of a fix. If 1 Exalted dust is a fungible commodity, do you think that might further solidify Exalts as the go-to currency? You mentioned it as Disadvantage #1 but it's really a restatement of Advantage #3 from the opposing perspective.

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ScrotieMcB wrote:

1. Since the numbers are bigger and each unit is smaller, it feels more like gold. However, as many of you know, orbs feel a lot like gold anyway; just as orbs feel like competing types of gold, dust probably would too. Still, it's possible that dust's more particulate nature could have psychological effects on the playerbase which I cannot foresee. (I guess part of the reason I made this post was to get some reactions and get some first impressions.)

3. We already have an orb system, with a "no more wipes" promise. Would we suddenly have "legacy orbs?" What kinds of effects would that have?

4. Implementation would take significant developer effort. GGG does not have unlimited time and money. Would this be worth GGG taking the time?

The disadvantages are the issue for me. Compared to my concept of scaling orbs to ILVL, the list of disadvantages for that idea are below:

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PolarisOrbit wrote:

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With the exception of haggling precision, they both have the same advantages. One has several barriers to its implementation and the other does not. Picking between two solutions that have the same benefits, I would have to base the call on the disadvantages. I don't see a reason to pick your idea for low level crafting over my own.

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leto2626 wrote:

I don't get what is wrong with this system? Why would you want to go something that has been done so many times before...
You complain about hoarding, that was the intention, a natural currency evolution. There will allways be hoarders, be it gold, orbs or dust.
I love the system as it is now, it creates economies that change over time, are different in every league, what do you want more? Some boring gold counter?

The system is fine right now, I agree. It's geared towards long term use. However the crafting system is fun and it seems a waste that it shouldn't be applied to less than permanent gear. Common currencies it seems were designed with some sparing low level use but rare currencies were not. OP's suggestion is a small tweak that would give GGG the tools to encourage low level crafting.

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PolarisOrbit wrote:

With the exception of haggling precision, they both have the same advantages. One has several barriers to its implementation and the other does not. Picking between two solutions that have the same benefits, I would have to base the call on the disadvantages. I don't see a reason to pick your idea for low level crafting over my own.

I replied to your thread over in BF. But the main difference I see is with regards to rare currency. Reducing the negative of impact of RNG does indeed mitigate opportunity cost but I'm not sure it will go far enough. You could entirely remove RNG as a factor and turn rare orbs into 'choose perfect mods for my item' and it still may not be viable versus hoarding. As far as the occasional chaos or alchemy goes your idea is superior.

Like the idea in part.

Some things definitely work better as orbs -->
GCP, jewels, fuse, chromes, etc.

My clarification on what should be orbs and what could be dust

Orbs
Portal scroll
Glassblower's Bauble
Gemcutter's Prism
Jeweller's Orb
Chromatic Orb
Orb of Fusing
Blessed Orb
Mirror of Kalandra
Orb of Regret

Dust
Orb of Transmutation
Orb of Alchemy
Orb of Augmentation
Exalted Orb
Orb of Alteration
Chaos Orb
Orb of Scouring
Eternal Orb

Could go either way
Wisdom Scroll
Armourer's Scrap
Blacksmith's Whetstone
Cartographer's Chisel
Orb of Chance
Regal Orb
Divine Orb



Though I could see an argument for chromes where you use 'more' dust to get a higher off colour chance.

Few questions as didn't have time to read entire thread only main post and some other posts.

I assume dust usage would be based entirely on ilvl. Is there a way you can know in advance how much dust an item will take?

It would suck if you had say 30 exalt dust, an item taht you figured would take about 8 dust, and then it uses 26. This would put many people off using dust when its difficult to tell its amount usage.

Would the effects still be exactly the same, its just the usage that changes?

Would there be any options to change how much dust is used to perhaps have a positive outcome, such as increasing the dust used on a regal orb and it may roll more than one affix?

And finally, orb of chance. This thing has a chance of making an item a magic, rare or unique. Would this be based on ilvl, as that seems fairly restrictive (say you are chancing amulets because you might as well hope for that astra, etc), the unique aspect (beyond links) really doesn't care about ilvl that much, and it feels like you might be gimping yourself if trying to chance a unique item by using high ilvl.

Finally, selling items, I assume that would be given in dust rather than shards as is currently setup. Would that mean that trading in the vendor would also be based on dust (alts->jewel->fuse for example), what about vendor recipe's that use orbs at the moment (scouring to reduce gem level for example), how do you judge that now?

Interesting idea. Now I don't screw myself over for trying to exalt a level 30 item.

Also for GCP and the other recurrences you mention, I think they should be kept the way they are, considering they don't change item properties like other orbs.

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Real_Wolf wrote:

My clarification on what should be orbs and what could be dust

Orbs
Portal scroll
Gemcutter's Prism
Orb of Regret
Glassblower's Bauble
Jeweller's Orb
Chromatic Orb
Orb of Fusing
Blessed Orb
Mirror of Kalandra

Dust
Orb of Transmutation
Orb of Alchemy
Orb of Augmentation
Exalted Orb
Orb of Alteration
Chaos Orb
Orb of Scouring
Eternal Orb
Glassblower's Bauble
Jeweller's Orb
Chromatic Orb
Orb of Fusing
Blessed Orb
Mirror of Kalandra
Wisdom Scroll
Armourer's Scrap
Blacksmith's Whetstone
Cartographer's Chisel
Orb of Chance
Regal Orb
Divine Orb

Could go either way
Wisdom Scroll
Armourer's Scrap
Blacksmith's Whetstone
Cartographer's Chisel
Orb of Chance
Regal Orb
Divine Orb

Fixed that for you.

In particular, dusting Mirror of Kalandra would be a particularly important change, possibly eliminating the need for the Eternal Orb altogether. Also important is making 5L and 6L more achievable on lower-level gear and harder to achieve on ubergear.