Topic

Better to craft or to just sell rocks?!?!?

I'm trying to save up some currants. I have full tinkering and engineering... is it more profitable to craft (super scrapers, for example) or am I better off just selling the raw materials. I can't seem to wrap my head around the math myself.

Posted 14 months ago by Sly Hoax Subscriber! | Permalink

Replies

  • It's a complex calculation in part because it isn't just a matter of how much energy you expend for the return, plus a comparison of the currants you can obtain from the raw materials versus the finished goods.  There is also the experience earned if you decide to high-level craft.  The math is quite complex because of all the tradeoffs.
    Posted 14 months ago by Parrow Gnolle Subscriber! | Permalink
  • You know... it took something like a week to learn these skills... you'd think that with such a level of investment, it would be a no-brainer, right?
    Posted 14 months ago by Sly Hoax Subscriber! | Permalink
  • if you have any reasonable cooking skill to go with one of those, so that you can feed yourself to replace the energy used, I reckon the processed stuff wins hands down.  You get far more experience to go with the profit in currants.
    Posted 14 months ago by Tiresias Subscriber! | Permalink
  • I did a similar calculation a few days ago for raw rock vendor prices versus vendoring elements versus vendoring the crafted powders. There was an increase in profit for elements versus raw rock, but almost no extra profit between the elements and crafted powders.

    Personally I find this very odd, and a bit poorly balanced, as it takes more energy and time investment to craft the powder.
    Posted 14 months ago by Heatseeker Subscriber! | Permalink
  • The crushing of the rocks is what really makes it a negative return, I have found. Powders like EHSP do sell for a profit if you sell them on the auction and not to an NPC, compared to the raw ore. But the energy cost to crush them eliminates that profit. I haven't checked the tool prices yet, just finishing up Tinkering V today.

    If EXP isn't too much of a concern, do all your smelting/grinding/mixing on No-No Powder. I found I can do all that plus repair all my tools afterwards on just one No-No. And really, smelting and mixing aren't that high in energy costs; it's just the crushing that is way too expensive. Crushing on a No-No rush is the only way to profit over selling just pure ore.
    Posted 14 months ago by Shootsin Latters Subscriber! | Permalink
  • Had a post here. It was completely wrong, and now it's gone.
    Posted 14 months ago by Mr. Glenn Subscriber! | Permalink
  • I just like crafting things cos I'm so very crafty.

    *crafty eyes*
    Posted 14 months ago by shhexy corin Subscriber! | Permalink
  • How about when you take into account using no-no powder to do the crushing? would then make it worthwhile again, do you think?
    Posted 14 months ago by SacredBob Subscriber! | Permalink
  • How does energy eliminate profit if you group your own food???

    Seems to me isn't not about currants, its' about favor and levels...
    Posted 14 months ago by MeherMan Subscriber! | Permalink
  • >>>How does energy eliminate profit if you group your own food???

    Because profit = time even if you grow your own food, the time spent growing it could have been spent making profit.

    At least that's the theory. Obviously not many people (and particularly in this game) want to play just for profit, but the theory does still apply.
    Posted 14 months ago by SacredBob Subscriber! | Permalink
  • I just sell the chunks of ore straight. Mainly because it's a pain to calculate whether or not I'll make more profit if I break down the ores and crafting something else with them. And that's only for calculating a single craftable item.

    I think the elements you get from grinding sparkly ore chunks are worth about 25% more than the ore straight. However, you can't vendor Red, Blue, or Green elements. You can vendor Shiny, but you get 6 shiny per chunk, which sells for the same price as the chunk. So if you're vendoring, just vendor the chunk.

    Grinding 200 chunks of ore costs about 160 currants for the Flaming Humbaba, 21.6 currants in damage to your grinder (30 energy x lowest market price for energy (.72)), and about 20 seconds of your time, which is going to be worth nothing for the purpose of this calculation. It produces a total of 1556 currants worth of elements from what was originally 1200 currants worth of ore (which is close to my estimate of 25%, but hasn't taken into account the cost of grinding). Reduce 1556 by 182 (Humbaba + damage) and you get 1374. That's about a 15% increase in value as the end result, which will be modified by market prices on any given day.

    Now I guess I'll see if No-no powder is worth making. No-No flaps require Cosmox and Lemene, and the elements used seem to come out to 71.5 currants per packet or so. The energy cost per packet is 3.6 currants (5 x .72). So 75.1 currants per packet to make. The price for the packets on the auction is... exactly 75 currants. Take into account taxes, and putting them on the auction would lose you more money than vendoring them, which would still lose you .1 currant.

    So I guess no-no powder is a good way of converting that 15% extra from grinding into something that can be sold to vendors. But to be honest, I think the trouble of going through making/buying Humbabas (more crafting time or time waiting for the frog), grinding, then making compounds, and finally making the powders is a bit too troublesome for a 15% bonus. I'd rather walk to the vendor, drag an ore over, hit max, hit sell, and be done with it.

    Edit: Wait, what? Vendors apparently only pay 14 for No-no Powder. And you can only sell them one at a time. How wonderfully, pointlessly annoying.
    Posted 14 months ago by Mr. Glenn Subscriber! | Permalink
  • There are way too many mixed metaphors in so much of this discussion for me to understand it. 

    I guess I don't accept the premis that profit = currents, when the currents are a result of an unstable auction market. I've sold dullite (sp) rocks for as high as 360c - and now they seem to be hovering around $150 - 180c. 

    Seems to me Glitch is so much more then it's economy, which is cute, but hardly sophisticated, which I like! 

    Another thing I focus on is power foods rather than "buffs". Just raw grinding coupled with power foods - growing 'em, cooking 'em and hoarding 'em.

    Sometime too much overthinking/calculating just muddles things - so I prefer to follow my innerGlitch which usual light the way. 

    heheh
    Posted 14 months ago by MeherMan Subscriber! | Permalink
  • Mr Glenn, true that a 15% increase may not be worth the hassle if you go the humbaba / food route.

    However, if you do the mass grinding / repairing the grinder / crafting under the effects of no-no a few minutes before the end of day, the extra effort and cost is minimal in my oppinion.

    Guess it's the same as vendoring stuff to your nearest vendor versus heading to the tool vendor for a 10% gain. But combine the 2 gains and you get nearly 30% more currants for little extra effort / time on your part.

    It's worth it for me, considering I mine about 20k vendor worth of ore / day, and I'll get an extra 10k from this.

    Edit: MeherMan, we talk mostly about vendor prices. From my (limited) experience, the goods and basic resources I produce are worth more if vendored nowadays than if auctioned, when taking into account AH fees and going prices.
    Posted 14 months ago by Heatseeker Subscriber! | Permalink
  • What Heatseeker says.
    Posted 14 months ago by MeherMan Subscriber! | Permalink
  • Hmmm, I'll have to check on vendors - last time I studied it the auctions were much better...
    Posted 14 months ago by MeherMan Subscriber! | Permalink
  • I check vendor/auction prices on a somewhat regular basis... sometimes it's a toss-up. Some items won't even sell in the auctionhouse. sometimes it's so close that you're better off selling to the vendor, as it's faster, and a sure-fire sale. Some items are better at the auctionhouse. 

    MeherMan said:
    I guess I don't accept the premis that profit = currents, when the currents are a result of an unstable auction market. 


    Problem is, I'm saving for a house, so it is the currants that I'm concentrating on at the moment. I'm over level 20, so I don't get much out of leveling at this point... just a fun animation and a bigger energy reserve.

    Also wanted to note, when I said craft, I meant tinker...I somehow thought the two were interchangeable. 

    I guess it's along the same lines either way- takes loads of education to get there: tinkering, engineering, mining, refining... I still think it should result in more than a %10 return on investment at the end of the day after sending my glitch to virtual trade school. 

    Rant time!

    I get that they want the game to be..."balanced"...  but it seems to me, the devs idea of balancing involves applying hard daily limits to XP rewards at this point. That's just unfair to higher level players, as I'll explain:

    Traditional RPG games would have areas with stronger enemies that would yield more xp/gold. The strength of the monsters would keep low level players out of the area, keeping the newbies from leveling up too fast while still keeping higher level players interested, as their rewards are greater and they get to explore new parts of the world.

    Glitch doesn't have that, instead, the only thing that separates the low level guys from the high level guys are possessions and skills learned. Hence, a player with a higher education should see noticeably greater rewards as their character 'grows', even if they're now leveling up more slowly than they were before. 

    Putting hard limits in place ruins this dynamic for the higher level players; 200 xp may be a lot for a level 5, but it is trifling to a level 15.

    Edit: I had lost my train of thought, and forgot where I was going with this...

    I guess what I'm getting at is that once you've built your character up, (with education as is the case here), then your character should be able to earn rewards on a higher level- if I spent two weeks (real time) learning all the skills it takes to tinker a "really awesome thingamabob©" , then it should be worth much more than the sum of it's parts, not ... "just about the same, let me break out my calculator here and I'll tell you just how many tenths of a percent more valuable it is". for example... real life example.. Tiffany& co. Jewelry... finely crafted silver jewelry... the raw silver in a pair of Tiffany earrings is not all that valuable... maybe $10. But because they are created by master silversmiths, they are worth $100+. I'm not saying that a tenfold return on investment is necessary, but it shouldn't be so close that there's no noticeable difference.
    Posted 14 months ago by Sly Hoax Subscriber! | Permalink
  • Sly said:
    Problem is, I'm saving for a house, so it is the currants that I'm concentrating on at the moment. I'm over level 20, so I don't get much out of leveling at this point... just a fun animation and a bigger energy reserve."

    Which is true, and if you have solid skills, esp. minning, you can earn $50,000 in 7 - 9 hours...Also, once you have your house, don't give up on leveling, as there are some nice surprises ahead.

    I like what you've adided at your edit, and agree...
    Posted 14 months ago by MeherMan Subscriber! | Permalink
  • You shouldn't be looking to make any currants. Play Glitch and enjoy it and bond with the community and show love and support and things will come over time. What is so pretty unique about Glitch is the warmth and caring. If you can craft items, craft them and put them on auction for one-fifth the price of the other items to help give back and support the younger players.

    OKAY-- enough of that foolishness. :) There are people who will tell you that you're playing the game wrong if your goal is getting currants, but that's foolish. A glitch needs some scratch.

    Making the maximum currants in the minimum time means grinding it out mining. Get some bigger bags, a couple of picks, and the location to a few mines with a lot of sparkly (I'd avoid AB or NN, as they can be lag-inducing). Go there and grind out the sparkly mining. Only leave when the bags are completely full. Then go to the TOOL vendor and sell your sparkly. Do not sell to the other vendors.
    Posted 14 months ago by Billy McBinky Subscriber! | Permalink
  • @Billy McBinky, when you want to give back to the community, try to make it so your help reaches those in need. Give your items directly to low level players if you can - and here's an idea for the devs: show the player level next to his name so we don't have to go click, info, level - or direct it to a specific in-game foundation that makes sure it'll reach those in need (see the cubimal orphanage for an example of this). Listing an item in the auction house for 1/5 of it's price will ensure it's grabbed seconds later by automated scripts ran by high level players, and the item vendored or relisted for a higher price.

    @Sly Hoax: I believe the XP is capped to something like 1/4 of your needed XP to level (which obviously scales as level increases). Thus the daily cap may be 50 xp for a level 5 glitch, but it is 2000 xp for a level 23 glitch.
    Posted 14 months ago by Heatseeker Subscriber! | Permalink