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

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ephetat wrote:

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ScrotieMcB wrote:

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Nightmare90 wrote:

In order to fight of some of the psychological impacts feared, one could just try this rework around Orbs (nothing else!) and implement your suggested values on items as "Orb/Shard Usage" instead of an alien sounding "Dust System".

"Dust" is just a design name. Leave it to someone else to figure out what the proper name of such a system should be. ;p

It's more relevant than simple naming -- centering the idea around shards eliminates the issue relating to "legacy orbs".

Indeed, you could use shards. That is, using an orb on low lvls would return a stack of shards. Stacks of shards would work interchangeably with orbs. I anticipate that being somewhat confusing however, especially when conveying costs and values to new players, which admittedly is already a problem with dust. Something else about that doesn't sit right with me either. When you're talking about variable costs it's best to use a single unit, that is '1.5 dollars' versus '150 cents'. Having both shards and orbs may be complication without benefit.

I understand its a smoother transition to go from orbs to already existing shards. I'm not sure that that would matter so much however. Legacy currency isn't a big deal.

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ephetat wrote:

why not give shards a use, instead of introducing something like dust? Granted, this would need the introduction of additional shard types, and the ability to shatter orbs into shards.

You're not getting it. If that's the case, that-which-is-called-shards are no longer mechanic-shards (because mechanic-shards aren't usable), and become mechanic-dust. There would also be a system to convert orbs (legacy currency) into mechanic-dust, aka that-which-is-called-shards. You're not arguing the mechanic, you're merely arguing the naming convention.

The main problem with this is the existing convention that 1 orb = 20 shards. It might be necessary to divide things up further than that (1 orb = 50 or 100 dust). Key word: might.

Curious. Would vendor recipes return less currency based on ilvl? They would have to I think.

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ScrotieMcB wrote:

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ephetat wrote:

why not give shards a use, instead of introducing something like dust? Granted, this would need the introduction of additional shard types, and the ability to shatter orbs into shards.

You're not getting it. If that's the case, that-which-is-called-shards are no longer mechanic-shards (because mechanic-shards aren't usable), and become mechanic-dust. There would also be a system to convert orbs (legacy currency) into mechanic-dust, aka that-which-is-called-shards.

The main problem with this is the existing convention that 1 orb = 20 shards. It might be necessary to divide things up further than that (1 orb = 50 or 100 dust). Key word: might.

You are not getting it either. There is no mechanic-dust currently in-game. Introducing mechanic-dust as suggested is unfeasible, because it infringes on established mechanic-orb territory. Reworking mechanic-shards is actually feasible, because it is already well-defined with respect to its relationship with mechanic-orb.

Also, saying "you don't get it" is meaningless. You seem rather self-absorbed with your own intelligence. Don't be -- it is not warranted.

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Veta321 wrote:

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ephetat wrote:

It's more relevant than simple naming -- centering the idea around shards eliminates the issue relating to "legacy orbs".

[...]

I understand its a smoother transition to go from orbs to already existing shards. I'm not sure that that would matter so much however. Legacy currency isn't a big deal.

Legacy currency would be a big deal to dedicated traders, that's a playstyle one should not discriminate. Hence my suggestion to make Legacy Orbs able to transit to suggested Dust and just remain with the drop rates.

As ScrotieMcB said justified it is then to decide how much one Orb transits to "Dust/Shards". Also there is still the option to balance around the value "Orb-Shard/Dust Usage" on items. This way GGG does not need to rework droprates or need to add completely new currency to the game and they have two new values at hand to balance Currency and Crafting around.

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ephetat wrote:

You are not getting it either. There is no mechanic-dust currently in-game. Introducing mechanic-dust as suggested is unfeasible, because it infringes on established mechanic-orb territory. Reworking mechanic-shards is actually feasible, because it is already well-defined with respect to its relationship with mechanic-orb.

Also, saying "you don't get it" is meaningless. You seem rather self-absorbed with your own intelligence. Don't be -- it is not warranted.

I think what Scrotie was saying was that in effect shards would work identically to dust. Which I gather is your point. Therefore your suggestion is with regards to presentation, a more traditional presentation via shards and orbs. I address that above.

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Veta321 wrote:

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ephetat wrote:

You are not getting it either. There is no mechanic-dust currently in-game. Introducing mechanic-dust as suggested is unfeasible, because it infringes on established mechanic-orb territory. Reworking mechanic-shards is actually feasible, because it is already well-defined with respect to its relationship with mechanic-orb.

Also, saying "you don't get it" is meaningless. You seem rather self-absorbed with your own intelligence. Don't be -- it is not warranted.

I think what Scrotie was saying was that in effect shards would work identically to dust. Which I gather is your point. Therefore your suggestion is with regards to presentation, a more traditional presentation via shards and orbs. I address that above.

That is correct, but I'm also opposed to having dust/shards/whatever droppable and supportive of maintaining the current orb-based loot drops (and orbs themselves, actually). ScrotieMcB's suggestion makes reference to dust drop rates, which appears to be suggesting the phasing-out of orb drops entirely. Perhaps I should have made that distinction earlier on, however.

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Nightmare90 wrote:

Legacy currency would be a big deal to dedicated traders, that's a playstyle one should not discriminate. Hence my suggestion to make Legacy Orbs able to transit to suggested Dust and just remain with the drop rates.

As ScrotieMcB said justified it is then to decide how much one Orb transits to "Dust/Shards". Also there is still the option to balance around the value "Orb-Shard/Dust Usage" on items. This way GGG does not need to rework droprates or need to add completely new currency to the game and they have two new values at hand to balance Currency and Crafting around.

Ok sure. There's no need to get hung up on that though. There's a variety of ways in which legacy currency could be addressed. It could be transformed via batch action by GGG. It could return dust/shards upon use as you suggest. It could be converted via vendor. Or it could be left entirely alone, as in that way its value would remain the same. That is equivalent to the highest level crafting cost.

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ephetat wrote:

Spoiler

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Veta321 wrote:

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ephetat wrote:

You are not getting it either. There is no mechanic-dust currently in-game. Introducing mechanic-dust as suggested is unfeasible, because it infringes on established mechanic-orb territory. Reworking mechanic-shards is actually feasible, because it is already well-defined with respect to its relationship with mechanic-orb.

Also, saying "you don't get it" is meaningless. You seem rather self-absorbed with your own intelligence. Don't be -- it is not warranted.

I think what Scrotie was saying was that in effect shards would work identically to dust. Which I gather is your point. Therefore your suggestion is with regards to presentation, a more traditional presentation via shards and orbs. I address that above.

That is correct, but

I'm also opposed to having dust/shards/whatever droppable and maintaining the current orb-based loot drops (and orbs themselves, actually). ScrotieMcB's suggestion makes reference to dust drop rates, which appears to be suggesting the phasing-out of orb drops entirely. Perhaps I should have made that distinction earlier on, however.

What would be the point? Anyone crafting would break them down into component parts anyway. Just make it so you could have huge stacks of dust — like 100 to 800 per stack. (I figure 3 digits is about the most you could fit in a 1x1 inventory square without it becoming unreadable.)

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ScrotieMcB wrote:

What would be the point? Anyone crafting would break them down into component parts anyway. Just make it so you could have huge stacks of dust — like 100 to 800 per stack. (I figure 3 digits is about the most you could fit in a 1x1 inventory square without it becoming unreadable.)

My thought was to provide an implicit bonus for using orbs directly (the "favorable result" referred to in other suggestions relating to orb usage, though Veta321 is right in that "favorable" would need defining) rather than shards, something which would lead to less RNG for the player. But I concur that you can argue for their entire removal.

Edit: Gotta go now! Will check this thread later.