Topic

Price of the Crystalmalizing Chamber seems too high

Not really a bug, nor an idea, so wasn't sure where to put this...

But frankly, it seems the price of the Crystalmalizing Chamber is a bit excessive compared to other tools.  It just seems a bit high at 2500 currants. Seems like it would be more reasonable to be the price of a fancy pick at 1000 currants or the combo of a fancy pick and smelter at 1700 currants.  Especially since you have to buy a grinder and jars for fireflies at 200 each...just to make crystals, it can easily cost over 3500 just for the tools...there are no other skills that are this expensive except for blockmaking which seems to be a more advanced skill anyway.  Seems to me that Crystal making should be at most a medium level skill like smelting...and the tool price for the chamber should be more in line with that.   Just seems to penalize those that want to start out and work in the swamps...

Posted 15 months ago by b3achy Subscriber! | Permalink

Replies

  • Shhh.... it's a great way to make money--mine metal rock and sparkly, then combine to make a crystalmalyzer and sell to a tool vendor for 2000 currants. I made some detailed calculations, and the price of the crystalmalizer is good considering the worth of the base components (it takes 1000 shiny and 100 metal rock, plus some blue element, to make a single crystalmalizer). Note I said good, not great--more minor objects like cutting boards will make you a higher profit compared to the worth of the individual components, but it takes alot more time and energy to fashion enough of them to equal what you would get from a single crystalmalyzer.

    Crystals are one of the most expensive items in the game for many reasons, and the price of the crystalmalyzer is just one of them. It takes a long time to harvest barnacles one at a time, and search around for a firefly swarm that has at least 7 fireflies left in it. Crystals are rather precious, and maybe they should be--well, something should be. It can't be easy to get everything.
    Posted 15 months ago by Shepherdmoon Subscriber! | Permalink
  • Actually crystals are only worth 300 currants.  So what 210 at a 70% vendor?  That's not all that valuable, IMO.  Now, they are valuable when there are street projects and you sell them in the auctions...  Now, if they wanted to raise the retail value of the crystals to what they typically sell for at auction (between 1000-2000 currants), then I'd say the chamber is a bargain.  However, they aren't worth that much, and you only get that higher price at auction when there is a huge demand and little supply.  

    You can only make a chamber once you get higher level skills...so that isn't an income producer early on, yet you can make crystals early on if you have the chamber.

    It just seems unbalanced when you consider you can buy a fancy pick for 1000 and potentially get a diamond worth 2000, not to mention the value of the rock you get along the way (which one sparkly rock earns you enough ore to sell to a vendor for 300+).  Whereas the chamber costs 2500 and makes something worth only 300...not to mention the energy costs spent gathering barnacles and grinding them and gathering fireflies which is way more than hammering at a single sparkly rock.  

    I only bring this up because I was looking at doing a skill set based only on swamp harvesting, but it's not worth it with the chamber costing so much...and people are wondering why everyone flocks to mining or cooking...the cost of the tools vs the ROI is much more reasonable than for harvesting in the swamps given the cost of the chamber alone.  Sure you can sell just the barnies or the talc or the jellies...but again, since you don't get good drops from harvesting those items, it is foolish to go down that path when mining is clearly so much better/easier.
    Posted 15 months ago by b3achy Subscriber! | Permalink
  • By "expensive", I meant expensive to make. Of course, never sell a crystal to a vendor. That's just silly. You can get way more at auctions, because they are needed in large quantities at some projects, and are very hard to make. That is what makes them precious. Plus, the devs have hinted that there is more to come with crystals... we'll be able to do something really cool with them at some point... Maybe these future plans that we aren't privy to are the reason the devs made them so expensive and hard to make.
    Posted 15 months ago by Shepherdmoon Subscriber! | Permalink
  • By the way, the drops have changed when harvesting barnacles now: it used to be you only ever got apples. Now you can get music blocks and other things, which is worth it. Not sure about jellisacs.
    Posted 15 months ago by Shepherdmoon Subscriber! | Permalink
  • Ooops, sorry Shepherdmoon, I read your comment wrong (I do that sometimes)...so we are in vehement agreement then...good point on the possibility for future uses which may make them more valuable...sort of like crystals are like the metal ingot for other possibilities yet to come...

    Funny, I have almost always gotten music blocks from barnies...and it seems once they stated they added the drops, I was just getting apples - go figure...lol. They said they added drops for jellies, but after that announcement I went and scraped over 25 jellies with zero drops...so while they might have added the potential, I wasn't seeing it.
    Posted 15 months ago by b3achy Subscriber! | Permalink
  • I think the price is high now, but that there will be more uses for the crystals down the road. Same thing with the smelter. ;)
    Posted 15 months ago by caley dunn Subscriber! | Permalink
  • "Not really a bug, nor an idea, so wasn't sure where to put this..."


    I think this one is best in the General section
    Posted 15 months ago by kevbob Subscriber! | Permalink
  • A small number of crystals will net you a big percentage of a street project, which has a big payout in xp and currants.  Depending on how you use crystals, this can be a big payout.
    Posted 15 months ago by jasbo Subscriber! | Permalink
  • b3achy: "vehement agreement": what a wonderfully discordant phrase :).
    Posted 15 months ago by Shepherdmoon Subscriber! | Permalink
  • Ah, thanks kevbob...didn't think it was of enough significance for general...should be interesting to see what others have to say...

    And yes, Shepherdmoon...one of my fav phrases...especially if I've been arguing with someone and we eventually realize we were saying the same thing just in slightly different ways...

    Unfortunately, it really never dawned on me how expensive the chambers were since I think I got my first one from the Rube for a cherry or something...now that I'm building strategies for after reset...it's like...wow...that tool is quite expensive compared to others of similar ilk...
    Posted 15 months ago by b3achy Subscriber! | Permalink
  • They came in quite handy for leveling up to prime...
    Posted 15 months ago by g33kgurrl Subscriber! | Permalink