Waystone Sustain has killed this game for me.

Level 82 Invoker, currently doing Doryani's quest to do T11 maps. I successfully completed the two T11 maps I had. Didn't get any more T11 maps, so I had to do some T10 maps in the hopes of getting more T11s. I didn't. In fact I didn't even sustain any T10 maps, and had to start doing T9s and T8s. I'm in a death spiral of b.s.

I'm already extremely frustrated at this situation, and do you know what makes it worse? How insulting it is to see T1-T4 maps dropping in these higher level maps when I'm trying to progress forward, or at least tread water. Why waste our precious drop budget with this garbage? (On a related note, why do you let a level 75 item roll a T1 garbage affix?)

I've also noticed (but have not fact checked) that since getting to T10 maps that all of a sudden I get more interesting currencies, like Breach Splinters and Delirium Simulacrums. So now I have left the Garden of Eden. I have the knowledge that doing maps below T10 is a complete waste of time. I don't even get xp for doing them, but I'm still at risk of a random one-shot and losing 10% of my bar.

Now to address comments I imagine I'll get:

* I have taken the lower left and bottom of the Atlas tree for nodes to do with waystone quality and quantity.

* Yes I know about and use the Reforging bench. But you do realize that it scales as 3^n, where n is the difference between what level maps you have and what you want to do? For example, I would need to turn 27 T8 maps into a single T11 map. Why am I using T8 maps in this example? Because they are all I have left, and you would know that if you had read my first paragraph.

I watched a recent developer interview they did with Darth Microtransaction and Ghazzy. Jonathan Rogers seemed incredulous that the community was complaining about waystone sustain "as such." Because he personally hasn't had much problems with it. Well Jonathan, whatever probability distribution function you are using to generate the random numbers for the tier of map drop (and affix tiers for "crafting") sucks, and leads to a large number of players experiencing bad luck and waystone sustain problems. I know that you have an entropy system in place for Evasion, and you desperately need something like that for waystone sustain. Or just find a better and tighter probability distribution function that isn't as left-skewed as what you are using now. Honestly I'm starting to wonder if the probability distribution function you are using is just the Uniform distribution whose range is 1 to (your level +1). Because that is what it seems like to me. If I ever pick this game up again to grind T8 maps perhaps I will collect data and test that hypothesis.

TLDR, but I see the problem. It just doesn't exist in reality.
Sure it's a lot of RNG and at start I ran out of waystones of the higher tiers once, however, just do a few more maps with bosses. They do drop better waystones. You'll be fine.
I run only t15+ maps and I rly don't know where to dump all the new t15 waystones I'm getting, I have no "sustain" nodes on the tree at all right now. Well, maybe like two points here and there where they were hard to avoid.
This game is VERY rng based. I see low tier waystones in t15+ maps all the time.. well I mean I don't due to the loot filter, but if I press ALT - there they are, it's normal.
As for the "death spiral" been there too. Try respeccing, try different builds. Something will work, it always does.
If they game would just hand out you everything you need - that'd be no fun.

Kill bosses. That's all there is to it.

Focus on using overseer tablets with +quantity and kill bosses. If you don't have those tablets - kill bosses.

Every single player struggling with waystone sustain is not running boss maps.

Bosses were infrequent prior to the patch, but now, especially with the overseer tablets, getting a stash full of T15s is trivial.

absolutely agree. i hate life when i run out of waystones.

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galloper#2354 wrote:

TLDR, but I see the problem. It just doesn't exist in reality.

It does exist in reality. It exists for me and it exists for everyone who has ever complained about waystone sustain. If you condense all of the luck rolls of a single map into one event, then it only takes like 2 or 3 bad luck events to find yourself in a death spiral. There are hundreds of thousands of people playing this game. Tens of thousands of those people will have a string of 2-3 bad luck events in a row.

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just do a few more maps with bosses.

I'm kicking myself for not including this in the list of imagined feedback I'd get. Of course I do bosses. I beeline straight to bosses.

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As for the "death spiral" been there too. Try respeccing, try different builds. Something will work, it always does.

I don't think you understood my post. I don't need to respec. I'm not having a problem with dying. My Invoker blows up screens and doesn't have a problem with bosses. The death spiral I am talking about is waystone sustain. Read my first paragraph again. I was doing T11s but didn't get anymore T11s. Then I didn't get any T10s. Then I didn't get any T9s. It has nothing to do with me needing to respec.

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voodoochile78#9787 wrote:

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just do a few more maps with bosses.

I'm kicking myself for not including this in the list of imagined feedback I'd get. Of course I do bosses. I beeline straight to bosses.

I'm confused then because every boss will drop several waystones and frequently of a higher tier.

I'll happily give you a bunch of 14s right now if you like.

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Mordgier#6997 wrote:

I'm confused then because every boss will drop several waystones and frequently of a higher tier.

Sure, so let's say that you ran out of the T11 maps you need to do. You head to a boss node using some lower level maps, and now that lower level boss drops you a T9 or T10 map. Still not the T11 that you need.

As part of my death spiral last night, I did three bosses with the lower level waystones I had and still could not get back to the T11 waystones that I need.

As for your offer, I am currently doing SSF, though thank you all ht esame.

Hey I know this might be a bit frustrating at first but waystone sustain does eventually become ridiculously easy. I am drowning in T15 maps. It's impossible to run out.

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voodoochile78#9787 wrote:

Sure, so let's say that you ran out of the T11 maps you need to do. You head to a boss node using some lower level maps, and now that lower level boss drops you a T9 or T10 map. Still not the T11 that you need.

Irradiated adds +1 level to the map, so does corruption. Doing a t9 waystone on a corrupted and irradiated map makes it a tier 11 waystone.

Craft the maps, regal + 3x exalt, Craft and use tablets in towers.
If you are running out of waystones you are not crafting them enough or dying all the time.

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Hey I know this might be a bit frustrating at first but waystone sustain does eventually become ridiculously easy. I am drowning in T15 maps. It's impossible to run out.

it should not be a thing that it only becomes sustainable at T15 maps..

it should be sustainable across all tiers.. it should be a range based on the waystone used and not a "1-lvl" range.