why ETERNAL ORBS are really BAD for the game !

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This is sadly a group/societal thing that has plagued games more and more recently and it's a real shame. People get this notion that they need godly gear and therefore overlook pieces that may have one or two stats that aren't 'optimal' but would still be very good and quite useable. It's also a case of more and more of this really good gear being shown off and people getting that green-with-envy feeling along with the huge sense of entitlement that has grown by leaps and bounds in society in the past few years for a multitude of reasons. Instead of sitting down and thinking calmly and rationally and indeed lowering expectations to find the good deals they instead stamp their feet and throw temper tantrums saying, "THEY HAVE WHAT I DON'T AND I WANT IT NOW, NOW, NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOW! GIMME GIMME GIMMEEEEEEEEEEEEE!"

I mean, to be fair, what is the point of an ARPG if not item progression? The problem is item progression works on a normal distribution and eternals jumped everyone forward many deviations. Even so, item progression in POE is somewhat shallow. It's a lot of looking for items similar to your own but with larger numbers. To really keep the item hunt interesting we need more obfuscated itemization, like Diablo 2. There's a good thread on the subject here.

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Veta321 wrote:

I mean, to be fair, what is the point of an ARPG if not item progression? The problem is item progression works on a normal distribution and eternals jumped everyone forward many deviations. Even so, item progression in POE is somewhat shallow. It's a lot of looking for items similar to your own but with larger numbers. To really keep the item hunt interesting we need more obfuscated itemization, like Diablo 2. There's a good thread on the subject here.

Preaching to the choir here, and I actually did post something in that topic regarding that. :) I do agree that there needs to be more varied item diversification whether it comes from uniques, more item affixes, or other things of those natures. I played Diablo II for a while and the fun uniques, runewords, and actual gear/item/character progression kept me coming back to it and enjoying it for so long. :)

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Novalisk wrote:

The problem isn't that you can use an infinite amount of exalted on a single item and roll a BIS. That's what people wanted, a way out of frustrating exalted rolls.

The problem is that if you have eternal/exalted orbs, you are encouraged to either roll a BIS item or trade the orbs away for an upgrade. This is because buying the upgrade is a far superior option to 99.99% of the playerbase, due to oversaturation of the item pool.

If GGG wants to keep eternals, this less frustrating form of end-game crafting, they must balance it by doing at least one of the following:

1. Introduce a proper end-game item sink. (such as making eternal orb usage bind the item to account)

2. Make rare affixes far more personalized, so trade value of end-game gear goes down. Example: +300 armour = not personalized, +400 armour if standing still = personalized

Eternals are the reason you need to roll a BIS item for it to be worth it, if everyone could only roll 3-4 exalts then you wouldn't need to roll a tri res 100 life 2.5k+ armor piece for it to be worth it.

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Tanakeah wrote:

Preaching to the choir here, and I actually did post something in that topic regarding that. :) I do agree that there needs to be more varied item diversification whether it comes from uniques, more item affixes, or other things of those natures. I played Diablo II for a while and the fun uniques, runewords, and actual gear/item/character progression kept me coming back to it and enjoying it for so long. :)

:)

Hi

Never seen a eternal or a mirror and have only ever had a handful of exalts while playing this game since CB. This game needs to look at the other orb ideas presented and a more complex crafting system, the eternal orb is a cop out to a more complex crafting system on top of the one armed Wraeclastian crafting method.

I agree this game needs a better item sink besides trading. This game needs to use the common, end game useless orbs with rare items to create specialized orbs that would roll certain mods, these specialized orbs could later be further crafted with higher lvl orbs to roll even higher specialized mods, thus a player has choice all the way along to use their orbs to initially roll a item(randomly), they like the mods but want them stronger they could use a divine but that would roll all the mods, so player makes a specialized orb from the mods on the rares/orbs given to vendor to roll certain stats. Way more fun and involving then this present system that just scratches the surface with what it could do. With a system like that in place players could choose to: save orbs for trading or actually craft the item with what they want.

Summary of main ideas: More new world drop orbs(orb of the prism:x number of sockets become colourless, etc..), more complex recipe/orb crafting system.

cheers

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Peenk wrote:

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Novalisk wrote:

The problem isn't that you can use an infinite amount of exalted on a single item and roll a BIS. That's what people wanted, a way out of frustrating exalted rolls.

The problem is that if you have eternal/exalted orbs, you are encouraged to either roll a BIS item or trade the orbs away for an upgrade. This is because buying the upgrade is a far superior option to 99.99% of the playerbase, due to oversaturation of the item pool.

If GGG wants to keep eternals, this less frustrating form of end-game crafting, they must balance it by doing at least one of the following:

1. Introduce a proper end-game item sink. (such as making eternal orb usage bind the item to account)

2. Make rare affixes far more personalized, so trade value of end-game gear goes down. Example: +300 armour = not personalized, +400 armour if standing still = personalized

Eternals are the reason you need to roll a BIS item for it to be worth it, if everyone could only roll 3-4 exalts then you wouldn't need to roll a tri res 100 life 2.5k+ armor piece for it to be worth it.

"Worth it" is very dependent on market saturation.

Hi

Ntk

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I'm afraid the OP didn't see the whole picture, and haven't really figured out how the scam happens in he first place. It can be done with any item, rare or unique, and you dont need to have a duplicate with the same colours / links / sockets.

All it takes is one eternal orb investment and 1 fus of yours.

Roll the lottery, get the 6l, eternal it, use your fus, link it, and it's done.

From thread, general discussion:''Let me explain to people how easy it is to do a lottery scam''

Didn't think of that idea.

cheers

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Novalisk wrote:

The problem is that if you have eternal/exalted orbs, you are encouraged to either roll a BIS item or trade the orbs away for an upgrade. This is because buying the upgrade is a far superior option to 99.99% of the playerbase, due to oversaturation of the item pool.

If GGG wants to keep eternals, this less frustrating form of end-game crafting, they must balance it by doing at least one of the following:

1. Introduce a proper end-game item sink. (such as making eternal orb usage bind the item to account)

So let me see if I get this straight:

1. The stated problem is that players are stuck between the choice of roll a BiS item, or trade the orbs away for an upgrade. This implies that the third, hideously underpowered option, which we are trying to buff, is to use the orbs to roll a non-BiS item, which means: one which would be used for a while, upgraded past, then traded away (assuming the player doesn't quit prior).

2. Your proposed solution to this problem is to make it so that players who use (a subset of) orbs on their items cannot trade their items away.



PS The "armour while standing still" idea is actually kind of cool.

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Wooser69 wrote:

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ScrotieMcB wrote:

Spoiler

Personally, I'd like to see Eternals removed from the game. They still don't do anything that a sufficient quantity of other crafting materials cannot do (Scouring); it just does what it does at a discount (hard to believe given its high cost, yet true). Since crafting is still almost exclusively the province of ultra-endgame, itemlevel-78 type players, it utterly failed as "A Fundamental Change to Crafting," not just keeping power in the hands of the elite but actually intensifying that power and widening the gulf. (For a more thought-out idea on how to possibly have a fundamental change to crafting, check this out.) And we really, really don't need more godly rare power creep if we actually want the game to have a nice long ten-year lifespan; power creep kills games prematurely.

Bad idea then; bad idea now. And yet another reason not to listen to the SFL, and — to borrow a line from Jim Sterling — to thank God for me.

What I dislike most is their rarity. They do nothing for the game at that rarity. It's not experimental, the average player still crafts in the same shitty gambling method that the majority of players will never see any benefit to - it only affected the guys with 50 exalts in their stash.

To do what? Make them richer. Most pointlessly badly implemented addition.

Their rarity has almost nothing to do with it. Until there is 1 Eternal sitting next to each and every Exalted Orb plus each and every Mirror in existence, the min/max reason to use them wouldn't really change. And even if this did happen, the main thing it would do is just begin to cover a fraction of the Regal Orbs, which is the next-best application. The entire idea that you should use an orb to "allow crafting on your currently used items" is complete stupidity, because you can trade for a near-copy of your current gear, craft on that, and resell the original at no long-term loss, no orb surcharge involved, just common fucking sense. Thus the history of the Eternal Orb is a history of not being used as intended — because only idiots ever needed the intended use anyway — and instead min/max, exploitative use. Making them more common would solve nothing, and instead simply make the abuse more pervasive.

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ScrotieMcB wrote:

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Novalisk wrote:

The problem is that if you have eternal/exalted orbs, you are encouraged to either roll a BIS item or trade the orbs away for an upgrade. This is because buying the upgrade is a far superior option to 99.99% of the playerbase, due to oversaturation of the item pool.

If GGG wants to keep eternals, this less frustrating form of end-game crafting, they must balance it by doing at least one of the following:

1. Introduce a proper end-game item sink. (such as making eternal orb usage bind the item to account)

So let me see if I get this straight:

1. The stated problem is that players are stuck between the choice of roll a BiS item, or trade the orbs away for an upgrade. This implies that the third, hideously underpowered option, which we are trying to buff, is to use the orbs to roll a non-BiS item, which means: one which would be used for a while, upgraded past, then traded away (assuming the player doesn't quit prior).

2. Your proposed solution to this problem is to make it so that players who use (a subset of) orbs on their items cannot trade their items away.

What I'm saying is, usage of eternal orbs is done not to reach a perfect item, it's to reach an item so good, that you are unlikely to ever see an upgrade up for sale. To achieve that status where players don't regret eternaling their item, you must assure them the market won't fill up with perfect items that sell for less than what they spent crafting. Bind on use of eternal does that. Every other orb can still be used to retain trade value, except eternals due to their power.

As a side note, the frequently suggested "remove a random affix" orb would work great with this suggestion. If you have a near-perfect 6 affix item, you could eternal+remove and eternal+exalt should you wish to perfect it in the long run. You could also save your imprints and roll back your item if you want to perfect it later.

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Novalisk wrote:

What I'm saying is, usage of eternal orbs is done not to reach a perfect item, it's to reach an item so good, that you are unlikely to ever see an upgrade up for sale.

Nope. I mean, of course that's what players are hoping for. But that's not why.

Think about gold in Diablo 2. Did it have a sink? Sure; gambling. The correct procedure was to hoard gold until you reached a certain character level (taking into consideration the maximum chance of the desired affixes, with the highest chance of the desired item type, at the lowest gold price). Then you dump the currency, because gambling was the only serious gold sink in the game.

Path of Exile isn't that different. The correct procedure is to hold orbs until you acquire items of a certain itemlevel on which to use them; for example, the best ES%/stun% prefix requires itemlevel 78, so an itemlevel 78 Vaal Regalia is generally preferred for CI, available only by finding it in a map of at least level 75 (unique boss drop only), and best farmed for in the level 77 Shipyard map (and even then, whites cannot drop it). So you dump orbs once you hit this, because gambling on this type of item is the only serious orb sink in the game.

Do you want to find something better than you can trade for? Of course. But that's not really the point. If you trade your orbs away, that person is either going to sink them in this kind of intelligent manner, or trade them away himself... and eventually, the orbs will fall in the hands of someone who will use them in this manner. Orbs being used to gamble is inevitable; therefore, your decision to trade them away or use them yourself is irrelevant.

What is relevant is that the optimal use for Eternal Orbs — and really, all orbs period — is on either extremely high itemlevel whites, or in the case of socket-based orbs and Orbs of Chance, on very powerful uniques and/or item-types with the potential to become said uniques. This is what causes hoarding — the fact that players do not have such crafting bases at their disposal until very late in their progression. Thus their best options are to continue passive hoarding, or trade said orbs away to players who actually are in a position to use them effectively.

As I said earlier, all a bind-on-use would do here is further discourage the use of Eternals on less-than-perfect item bases, intensifying the problem.